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Father Jim Callan

December 20, 2020

You might remember the story of a big oil refinery that caught on fire.  There was a huge conflagration, it was a 20-alarm fire. They called in fire fighters from all the metropolitan area. About thirty minutes in to the fire an old beat-up fire truck arrives from a small town and cruses past the other fire trucks and glides to a stop just yards from the fire.  The fire fighters get out and hose each other down and then train their hoses on the fire and they put it out!  Surprisingly enough.  The oil company is delighted and they throw a banquet for the fire department and they give the fire chief $10,00 at the banquet. A reporter, after the banquet was over, asked the chief what was he going to do with the $10,000.  The chief said that the first thing they were going to do was “…to bring that fire truck in to the garage and we are going to get those dam breaks fixed!”

So the moral of the story.  Some people are born holy.  Some people achieve holiness during their lifetime and other people have holiness thrust upon them.  Think of the doctors, the nurses, the EMTs, the ambulance drivers during this Covid time.  Caring for patients.  They put their lives in danger every single day and many of them are dying.  I don’t know if they were born holy but certainly holiness has been thrust upon them.

Today’s gospel is the story of Mary of Nazareth.  Now the church said that Mary was born holy.  The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception.  That Mary was born without sin.  But isn’t it truer to say that Mary had holiness thrust upon her?  

Now people have called Mary the maternal face of God, but Got has her own maternal face.  Mary is one of us.  She had to make decisions the way we do.  She is one of us.  So when the Angle Gabrielle visited Mary it caused some major change of plans.  Before this Mary had a nice life planned for herself.  She was engaged to a wonderful man, Joseph, they were planning on a nice honeymoon; she thought she would have a nice quiet Palestinian family in Nazareth.  She would bring her kids to the Synagogue and everything would be cool.  But all of a sudden her plans are changed.  Interrupted by an Angle. She is summoned by a power that she didn’t understand. She is recruited for a role that she didn’t audition for.

Now artist all over the centuries have tried to capture this woman, the enunciation we call it.  Some paintings show Mary very pious.  Folded hands in prayer or with open arms.  But one artist, Lorenzo Veneziano in the fourteenth century showed Mary in a state of panic and she has to hold on to things just to keep herself from falling.  That’s probably true because Luke says that Mary was deeply troubled.  Deeply shaken.

Now first Mary goes through some objecting. Some questioning:  How can this be since I don’t have a sexual relationship with a man?  But notice she doesn’t consult any man?  She doesn’t ask Joseph, she doesn’t ask her father, and she doesn’t ask any priest.  She doesn’t seek anybody’s permission. She knows she can figure it out herself.  She discerns the voice of God within her and commits herself.  She has no idea how this will change her life but in the end she says “yes.”

You know, maybe we are like Mary.  I think we are.  Most of the time when we do God’s will it is pretty routine.  We go to work.  We raise a family.  Do some volunteer work.  But every once in a while isn’t it true that it seems like God throws a curve ball.  Has that ever happened to you?   Everything is cool and then all of a sudden there is a curve ball. 

God asks us something:  A) that we have never considered before; B) that we thought we were incapable of doing; and, C) that we consider a burden.  But in th

Bearing Witness (Advent 3 – 2020)

A man goes into a pet shop to buy a parrot. He asks the owner how much they are.  The shop owner points to three very similar parrots on a perch and says, “The parrot on the left costs $500 dollars.”  

“Why does the parrot cost so much?” asks the man. The owner says, “Well the parrot knows how to use a computer.”

“What about that one – pointing to the middle parrot?” “That one’s $1000…”  “A thousand dollars?”  “I know it’s a lot but that one can do everything the first parrot can do plus it knows how to do accounting.”

“Well what about the last one?”  “That one is $1500…”

“You gotta be kidding me?  What can it do?”

And the owner pauses and says, “Well, you know, we’re not really sure what it can do but we just know that the other two call him the boss!”

As is common every Advent, our gospel focuses on the figure of John the Baptist – one of the great personalities of the Christian scriptures.  We hear about his amazing and challenging ministry as he tries to make straight the paths and prepare for God’s coming into the world.  

And today we get to witness a little bit about how he interacts with Jesus.  And not unlike the last parrot in the story, we don’t know yet what Jesus can or will do. He’s just appearing on the scene.   All we know is that John calls him the boss!

Now John’s wilderness ministry had created quite a stir and generated a lot of questions.  In the reading, we hear John getting interrogated. They can’t quite figure him out.  Who are you?  What are you?  What answer can you give for yourself?

The beauty of John is that he knows who he is and who he is not.  He knows his role and supports others in theirs.  He has done his inner work and doesn’t get all flustered and so he tells them straight out, “Look, I’m just here to be a witness…”  

The dictionary says that a witness is one who can attest to something or give evidence.  And it also says that it is someone who has personal knowledge of something or can say that something has taken place.

And that’s what I’d like us to think about together today.  The value of bearing witness.

You may be aware that we live in a culture that values the hero, the person who comes in first or starts something.  We don’t focus very often on all those who are behind the scenes, playing supporting roles, amplifying others or just outside of the limelight.

Derek Sivers – an entrepreneur and business consultant – has a great TED talk on leadership called “How to Start a Movement.”  Contrary to other “leadership” talks, however, Sivers doesn’t focus on the first person to do something.  Instead he focuses on the “first follower” who he says is the one responsible for helping to start the movement.  The first follower – by supporting the other person – tells the rest of the world that something is happening here that is valuable and worthwhile.

I think John is a lot like that.  He uses his life to point to something else and towards someone else.  John invites us today to think about what it might take to be a good witness.

The famous Quaker educator Parker Palmer is known for his brilliant writing and insights into human relationships.  He’s also public about his difficult bouts with depression.  He says that very few people were helpful to him during those challenging times.  One friend named Bill, however, would come by Palmer’s house every afternoon (with permission) and would massage his feet.  Bill would hardly say a word and wasn’t trying to make Parker “feel” better.  He’d just do a simple foot massage and leave.  Parker Palmer said that Bill’s silent witness to the pain literally helped to save his life and goes on to say, “Here’s the deal. The human soul doesn’t want to be advised or fixed or saved. It simply wants to be

If I close my eyes right not I can navigate, probably to the square inch, of some of the spaces I used to spend a lot of time in when I was a child.  

One of those places was my grandparents’ home.  I can imagine myself walking up to their game closet, to get the dominos or card games we would play together.  I can virtually walk to the kitchen, and reach over the avocado color sink to get a glass for water.  And without fail – every time I was there I would certainly find the latest issue of National Geographic on their coffee table.  

I would flip through the pages every time I was there, thinking about where I might explore some day.    

For many years it was the most sold magazine in the country.  

But something happened.  In the 1990’s, after just over 100 years of publication, the magazine lost its punch.  

It was coined “your grandparent’s magazine” and sales were dismal.  

In an ever-changing world, with an ever-changing people, businesses must keep up with the fast pace.  A good business model and a good product are not enough… You also need a ton of luck, and the intuition to know when something is right and when it’s not working anymore.  

National Geographic decided it needed a change.  Not just any change though… CEO John Fahy called for a RADICAL RE-DIRECTION of the company. 

A RADICAL redirection of what content they put out and HOW they put it out.  

Some of the radical change and re-branding called for a new TV station, children’s hands-on toys and science kits, and the choice to have the magazines written in more languages than anyone had even heard of before that time.   

The cry of radical re-direction was heard.  National Geographic was put back on the map in a huge way and the simple magazine company that started in 1888 still thrives today.  

Today we hear another cry of RADICAL RE-DIRECTION – but it is not to save a company… it is a cry to take the church in a radical re-direction.  

John the Baptist must have looked like he had gone mad – when at the time the church was teaching about paying for sin by fear and fire – he was wandering around the wilderness forgiving people of their sins and baptizing them with water.  

This new radical direction of the church was so different, that the prophets called for people like John the Baptist to prepare the way for the Lord!  

The job was so big, that a path had to be laid down so that others might follow.  

Well – John did that work.  He traveled, preached and he started a movement – a ground-swelling, in order to let people know that something was coming.  Something was happening.  

In fact, John did so well at his job, that the people all around him were convinced HE was the one… 

The one to come and change life forever.  

The one that would right every wrong.  People were convinced HE was the messiah.  

Can you imagine the power you wield in your hands when people of that magnitude back you up and lift you up?

Some of you may have heard of the name JOYCE BANDA.  Banda was once a little girl born in Nairobi, Kenya to simple means and later would became the president of Malawi.  

Not only was she Southern Africa’s first female president, but she also had to break even more barriers as president.  

But coming from simple means in Nairobi, she was met with wealth and prestige her first day as president.  

Waiting for her in the president’s mansion was also a presidential jet and a fleet of 60 Mercedes limos to parade her and her group anywhere the she wished.  

What did Joyce Banda do the SECOND day of being president of Malawi?  

She sold the presidential jet and sold all 60 of the Mercedes l

Spiritus Christi

Father Jim Callan

November 29, 2020

As you know there are two Christmas:  One begins on Black Friday, it’s a mad frenzy of commercialization and shopping and shopping until the holiday of Christmas.  The other began about ten minutes ago when Natalie lit the Advent candle. Actually, Natalie, your name means Christmas.  You are the perfect person to do this, thank you so much.  So Natalie got us going with the first Advent day and this is a spiritual time of peace, prayer and patience and kindness until not the holiday of Christmas comes but the person, Jesus comes.  And Jesus, himself, gives us the theme of these next four weeks of Advent.   Here is the theme:  Be watchful, be alert, stay awake, be ready.  Be ready for unexpected divine encounters.  Be ready for surprising intrusions of beauty in your life.  In other words it is going to be a good time the next four weeks. So stay awake and don’t miss it.

Now Joe read the Isaiah reading and one line says, “Lord, open up the heavens and come down.”  Do you notice anything off about that?  “Lord, open up the heavens and come down.”  See, that’s old thinking about God.  That God is way up there and we have got to plead with God to cut through all those barriers and come down to reach us. 

A missionary in India says it is easy to tell the Christian kids from the Hindu kids.  All I do is say:  Where is God?  And all the Christian kids point up and all the Hindu kids go in.

Richard Rohr was walking through the fields of a monastery one time and there is an old monk out in the field who goes: Richard!  Make sure you tell the people that God isn’t out there.  God isn’t out there.

I had to change the rubrics of the mass right before the consecration the priest extends his or her hands over the elements and says:  Let your spirit come down and bless these gifts to make them holy.  Well, God’s spirit doesn’t have to come down from anyplace.  God’s spirit is right here flowing through us.  We just need to be aware of it. So I changed it to:  Let us feel your spirit consecrating us along with these gifts. Let us be aware of your spirit because your spirit is here all of the time, we don’t have to call you out from outer space.  God is not an elsewhere God.  God is not a distant God.  God is flowing through our veins.

So Advent is a time to be aware.  To feel God’s presence, right here.  

Another name for God is – God has a lot of names – my favorite is beauty.  Beauty is another name for God.  So be ready for unexpected intrusions of beauty in your life.

Actually this happened to me a few days ago on Friday.  Jeff Reimer came over to tune my piano and I love how the piano sounds after it is tuned.  So I went right in there and played by favorite Rachmaninoff’s second piano concerto and as I was playing a few lines of it, I had to stop because I started to cry.  It is so beautiful!  It is so dreamy and romantic and emotional and spiritual.  Before he composed this concerto, Rachmaninoff fell in to the three-year clinical depression.  It was a terrible time.  Awful.  He had writer’s block.  Did a lot of heavy drinking.  He received psychotherapy and support from friends and family.  And he dedicated this concerto to his physician who restored his self-confidence.  So the concerto is a confirmation of his triumph over a very dark night of the soul.  His struggle gives this masterpiece extra spiritual character.  It is born from a heavy heart and that is why it brought me to tears.  It was an experience of God.  It was so beautiful and God is beauty.

So be ready for unexpected intrusions of beauty like this.  

Roxanne Zeigler often plays the harp for people who are dying in hospice care.&nbs

Spiritus Christi

Father Jim Callan

November 15, 2020

You might remember the big Enron scandal in 2001.  At the time Enron was one of the largest corporations in the United States.  It was a giant in the field of energy and utilities.  Fortune had named it America’s most innovative company six years in a row.  It had revenues of 100 billion dollars a year and employed 29,000 people. But it was not an ethical company.  It did fraudulent accounting.  Sherron Watkins, the Vice President, uncovered a $700 million dollar unethical mess.  Assets were missing, numbers didn’t add up.  So she blew the whistle.  She was the famous whistle blower.   Others knew about the problem but she was the only one to blow the whistle and of course Enron retaliated and she lost her job. But you might remember that Time magazine put Sherron Watkins on its cover for the person of the year.  When Time asked her if being a woman might be the reason why she was the only one to confront the institution, she said:  “Women aren’t part of the old boy’s club. And so a woman is not concerned about being kicked out of the club because you don’t belong in the club to begin with.”

Surveys show that women take more risks in the social and moral areas whereas men take more risks in the physical and financial areas.  

Being a whistle blower can be toxic.  When you try to stop something that is wrong you are dammed if you do and dammed if you don’t.  When you are in the news for doing something courageous some will say, “Hey!  You’re just a media hog!  You just want some attention.”  Some accuse you of not caring about your own people.  Watkins became a whistle blower because she was a person of faith.  She was raised to follow her conscientious.  She believed that actions do matter.  In her job at Enron she came across a memo with a quote from Martin Luther King.  “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”  When she took action on something that mattered she was fired.

Now you get blackballed for telling the truth.  A whistle blower is labeled as somebody who’s loyal to the truth but not necessarily to their company.  It makes all the people feel uncomfortable because they are willing to take the same risks for the sake of truth.  So they end up sometimes criticizing the whistle blower too.

Sherron Watkins was shocked at how hard it is for people to take responsibility for their mistakes.  She said, “It is almost impossible for people to admit that they have done wrong.”

The night before the election, maybe you saw Frontline.  It detailed the earlier lives of Donald Trump and Joe Bidden.  It said that one of President Trump’s mentors taught him three things:  1) Never admit you are wrong; 2) Never apologize; 3) Always blame others.  Never admit you are wrong; never apologize; always blame others.  His mentor taught him this.  I don’t know about you but when I start blaming people I have to stop myself and I say what truth am I avoiding about myself?  If I’m just blaming other people.  

In Matthews gospel today there is a story about an unethical master.  He gives $10,000 to one servant, $5,000 to another and $1,000 to a third.  The first two servants double their money.  They play the system and the master is happy.  The third is a whistle blower.  The third man who gets the one gold piece.  He is a whistle blower.  He calls out the master:  Hey! You harvest what you don’t plant.  In other words you take what is not yours.  You cheat people.  You are a corrupt manager.

The whistle blower refuses to play the game.  Refuses to be part of the corruption so he gives his $1,000 back.  He says, “Here you can take this.”  The master is outraged that the ser

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November 1 All Saints homily 

As you may know, today the church celebrates the feast of All Saints.

Now I grew up Catholic, and I think it’s safe to say that when it comes to saints, we Catholics are a strange lot.

We have some interesting traditions associated with the saints:

For example, when something is lost, we pray to St. Anthony and say some version of: Tony Tony look around.  Something’s lost and can’t be found.

Or when you want to sell your house you bury a small statue of St. Joseph in your back yard upside down. (Bury him 12 inches deep, facing the road)

The church also went wild with assigning “patron” saints to things, and I mean everything.

Saint Barbara: Patron Saint of Fireworks.

Saint Charles Borromeo: Patron Saint of Dieting

Saint Drogo: Patron Saint of Unattractive People.

Saint Polycarp of Smyrna: Patron Saint Against Dysentery and Earaches (other parts are covered by other saints like St. Blaise covers your throat, St. Servatius of Tongeren covers your feet, St. John of God covers the heart…).

And then Catholics developed the practice of collecting bits of saints’ bones and teeth after they died and putting these in cases assuming that they had special power.

At one level, these cultural practices brought some comfort and folksiness to the faith, but at another level, I think they helped to distort a vision of “the saints” that we desperately need to recover.

Many of you know that my wife Lynne and I have two adult kids, Jonah and Kateri.  They’re twins.  And they recently launched their own podcast called Twinvestigation on Soundcloud.  In each episode, they pick a topic and explore it more deeply.  In a recent episode they picked a Halloween/All Saints theme and talked about the Celtic festival of Samhain (pronounced Sow-wen).  It means “summer’s end.”

At its core, the celebration of Samhain ritualized the end of the harvest season and shortened days.  But it also acknowledged what ancient peoples called “thin days” when the visible and invisible worlds met.  Days when the world of the living and the world of the dead seem to be very close to one another.

In many ways, the commercialization of Halloween has eclipsed the underlying richness of this time, yet our church tradition tries to help us stay mindful of thin days and ancestors.

Some of you may be familiar with the amazing pastor and theologian – Nadia Bolz-Weber who I will refer to a few times today – who says that “Apart from those who have fallen in combat, Americans tend to forget our ancestors…But in the church, we do the very odd thing of proclaiming that the dead are still a part of us…and are even an animating presence.”

At the health center where I work, there’s an amazing young woman named Serena who is interning with me as a social worker.  Besides just being an open soul and wonderful human, Serena brings a different consciousness to the work she does.  Serena grew up in Zambia in Africa, where they have strong traditions of speaking with and listening to ancestors.  She rarely makes major decisions without consulting them somehow and they are a vital part of her daily life and work. In fact they are the reason that she became a social worker. 

St. Paul in his letter to the Hebrews tells us that we are surrounded by “a great cloud of witnesses” and if you talk to someone like Serena you’ll be convinced that he wasn’t just speaking in metaphor.  He meant that we have access to all those who have gone before us and that we can draw upon their lives and experiences to assist us.  And they actually want to assist us!

It’s probably not a coincidence that our modern era uses the term “the cloud” to describe the place where all the data is stored.  “It’s stored in the cloud…”  I don’t even know what that means, but I do know that I can access all kinds of information from anywhere in the world as

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