Luckily I remembered to get my mom a Mother's Day card this year. But for those of you who forgot or just realized this Sunday is Mother's Day, the guys at Regis College have created something great for this season:

Joseph Schuner, SJ, president of Regis College and the genius behind the prayer site http://www.forthiswepray.com/ have Mother's Day eCards available.

4 different styles of cards are available for use, all of which have scripture quotes and are ready to send out. And when you're there, why not add a prayer for your Mom to their list of intentions. The community at ForThisWePray.com takes the prayers of visitors and adds them to their own prayer intentions at the community. It's an innovative way of taking the power of prayer and moving it onto the Web.

Thanks to Joseph and his community at Regis College for making these gifts available.

And Mom, if you're reading this, your card is in the mail...I promise. =)

This simple prayer was written by the Pastoral Director of my ministry. It is reprinted here for all to use (with permission, of course!) Please keep those affected by earthquake in your prayers.

Prayer for the Victims of the Earthquake in Haiti

Dear God,
We ask you to give comfort and strength to the people of Haiti. May they know of your love and care thorugh the actions and prayers of the world community. We pray that they may receive spiritual and material help through the generosity of the world community.

We pray also for those who ahve died, may they rest in the peace of your Heavenly Kingdom. May their families and friends find solace through their prayers and the prayers of others.

Amen.

While there is no historical basis that this prayer came from Francis, it's easy to see that it exists in the Franciscan tradition and is based on the teachings and life of Francis of Assisi. I've seen this prayer in different forms - I've posted it for reflection and for inspiration as we look at our own baptismal calls and how we will live them out after experiencing the celebration of God's incarnation and self-emptying love to live as one of us.

May God bless you with discomfort
At easy answers, half truths, and superficial relationships,
So that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger
At injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people,
So that you may work for justice, freedom, and peace.

May God bless you with tears
To shed for those who suffer pain, rejection, hunger, and war,
So that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and to turn their pain to joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness
To believe that you can make a difference in the world,

So that you can do what others claim cannot be done,
To bring justice and kindness to all our children and the poor.

Fr. Bill Hugo OFM Cap. continues his series on Franciscan Prayer.

When you discover God, you discover others and yourself.

Like all communication, prayer is not a one-way street. In prayer, we are not the only ones talking; God also talks. Both God and we both speak and listen. In Franciscan prayer, there is also a third group sitting on the stage of prayer: the rest of creation. Creation also listens and talks. This is because we are sisters and brothers with all creation; all have our origin in the same Father-Creator.

Since prayer is such a family affair, when we learn about God in prayerful conversation,we also learn about our sister and brother creatures. And when we learn about God, our brothers, and our sisters, we can’t help but learn about ourselves. Consider these examples:

• When we learn that God created us out of His intense desire, we learn that we did not earn our existence.
• If God creates all creatures out of equal desire, than no creature is more important than the other.
• Since God created all creatures, we are in relationship with all creatures through a common source.
• The respect God shows me is the respect he shows all creatures. So, I have cause to respect other creatures as I myself hope to be respected.
• If the God who creates me is humble, how can I possibly think of myself as haughty.

Since conversation with God will ultimately lead us to examine ourselves, prayer requires honesty and humility. The story of Francis unexpectedly meeting a leper forcefully illustrates this. Francis was understandably petrified of lepers. But their existence bothered him. Most of us ask “Why me?” when confronted by difficulty. When Francis saw a leper, he asked “Why them?”

As Francis’ deepening prayer was leading him to realize that the leper and he came from the same creator, Francis could no longer tolerate their separation. When Francis learned about God in prayer, he learned about the leper. When he learned about the leper, he learned about himself. So, in this story, Francis would finally embrace the leper. They were brothers and sisters. They were the same. His prayer had changed is life!

read Part 1

(William Hugo is the Provincial Director of Formation as well as director of Postulancy at St. Conrad Friary in Milwaukee, WI. He lectures on Franciscan spirituality and history and has an M.A. in Franciscan Studies from St. Bonaventure University in Western New York. He authored Studying the Life of Francis of Assisi: A Beginner’s Workbook, Franciscan Press, 1996.)

*Artwork on page 1 by Michael Gaffney, O.F.M. Capuchin.

This week, we had friar Paul Dressler visit us and talk to us regarding Franciscan Spirituality. It was a wonderful seminar, as Paul is always full of energy and good for a laugh. But more importantly, he is someone who has great insights while willing to tell his story as an example of understanding a spirituality of Francis of Assisi.

While visiting us, he shared a prayer he'd written using primary images of love from the New Testament and from the saints.  We as Franciscans are often accused of living our faith through our hearts (as opposed to Dominicans who might live their faith through their heads/knowledge). Paul solidifies this belief by sharing this prayer entitled: A Saint's Litany to Love

The prayer is set up to be read as a choir, except for the last verse. Please give him credit if you choose to use it in a group setting. Thanks! -V

Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, it is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury

Love does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopees all things, endures all things. Love never fails.

All of you, be of one mind, sympathetic, loving towards one another, compassionate, humble. Do not return evil for evil, or insult for insult; but, on the contrary, a blessing, because to this you were called, that you might inherit a blessing.

Above all, let your love for one another be intense, because love covers a multitude of sins. Be hospitable to one another without complaining.

There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear. We love because God first loved us. If anyone says, "I love God," but hates his brother or sister, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother or sister whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.

We approach God not by walking but by loving. Love, and God will draw near; love, and God will dwell within you. The Lord is at hand; have no anxiety. Are you puzzled to know how it is that God will be with you if you love. God is love.

Love, indeed, is the source of all good things; they who walk in love can neither go astray nor be afraid. Love guides them, protects them, and leads them to their journey's end. Love is the stairway to heaven. 

Love is the reason why anything should be done or left undone, changed or left unchanged. The heart is happiest when it beats for others.

Love appeared to me to be the hinge for my vocation. I saw and realized that love sets off the bounds of all vocations. I proclaimed O Jesus my love, at last I have found my calling: my call is to love. Love alone counts.

Love is certainly greater than any rule. Moreover, all rules must lead to love. Love is a movement and advance of the heart toward the good. We cannot love our neighbor too much.

One who begins to love should be ready to suffer. Life without love has no flavor. Try always to advance in love; enlarge your heart with confidence for the Divine Gifts the Holy Spirit is anxious to pour into it.

Christ has no body now on earth but yours, no hands but yours, no feet but yours; your are the eyes through which Christ's compassion looks out at the world.

Yours are the feet which He is to go about doing good, and yours are the hands with which is to bless this broken yet beautiful world.

As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Reamin in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete. This is my commandment: love one another as I love you.

Fr. Paul Dressler is currently the assistant for Post-Novitiate Formation and the Academic Advisor for the Capuchin Franciscans of the St. Augustine Province in Washington D.C. His passion is for youth ministry. His facebook profile can be found here.

In my journey to become a friar, I've been given plenty of tools to build my prayer life. One of those has been the Examen, a form of prayer from the Jesuit tradition. The main goal of the Examen of Conscience, at the risk of limiting the scope in a short synopsis, is to reflect on one's day and the moments at which God was present...allowing for a dialouge between one and God about the day.

In their own words, the Jesuits explain the process:

Designed to foster an awareness of God, neighbor, and self, the Examination of Conscience holds a special place in the daily prayers of Jesuit priests, brothers, and seminarians from every part of the world. Since Jesuit beginnings, founder St. Ignatius Loyola consistently spoke of the value of this spiritual exercise for all believers everywhere. -Handbook On The Examen from the New Orleans Province of Jesuits

While the Examen presents itself as a rather simple form of prayer, the rammifications of speaking to God about one's experience can be very powerful, even self-revelatory. By opening the deepest and most honest parts of ourselves to God, we run the risk of doing something that is inherently unnerving: discovering our true self.

We were given the task of writing down an experience of prayer based on this model and the model presented by Joseph Schmidt in his book Praying Our Experiences: An Invitation to Open Our Lives to God. Schmidt's book is an easy read for anyone looking to learn new forms of prayer. His thesis is clear: "Praying our experiences is the practice of reflecting on and entering honestly into our everyday experiences in order to become aware of God's Word in them and offer ourselves through them to God." (p. 35)

After reading the book and spending time with prayer, I wrote down my thoughts about an experience. I had no idea what would come out of the prayer experience, however I found that in the end I knew more about myself and who I was in front of God. The Examen and prayer of experiences is a form I'd (as well as others would) recommend for people seeking to find God in their lives. Perhaps my example will give you ideas on how to incorporate this type of prayer into your life:

Several times during my formation (be it here, Milwaukee, or Kansas) I've met people from my childhood. Having moved far away from Iowa at age 15, I never kept in contact with people from my youth. It was the magic of Facebook that allowed me to reconnect with people that I knew from as long ago as Kindergarten.

There was a lot of anxiety surrounding email discussions and sharing my life with people from long ago. Growing up I was a quiet and awkward kid - I was the poor Mexican boy in a wealthy area of town. Much like my high school years, I spent a lot of time trying to keep up with the other kids: the clothes they wore, the things they had, the trips they took and places they went.

While there is a reality to those experiences, these were excuses I used to explain my anxieties of these reconnections. The manifested quite easily: the benefit of the internet is that one can always "upload" their best face. At these times I repeatly changed and updated my resume and personal info, found the best (slimmest/coolest/most active/etc) pictures, and the most interesting things about me I could think of. I wanted everything to look "perfect."

Noticing the repetition of my actions and the self-consciousness that they stirred inside of me, I decided to take the entire situation to prayer.

Initially I found the situation to be one of misguided feelings, causing me to feel even more guilty. Bringing it to prayer brought out that same feeling: "Why am I so worried about what other people think of me?" Rather than explore the depth of this thought I simply chastized myself for my pride and resolved to be less inwardly-focused. Unfortunately the "online reunions" continued to occur, and I realized that I was repeating the same actions over and over...with an even greater sense of guilt.

Most recently, I decided to take it to prayer and stay with the feelings of anxiety and self-consciousness to see where they would lead me. I closed my eyes, sat silently in my chair, and allowed the thoughts to occur. I thought about how I was talking to people who (I simply assumed) thought less of me. I thought of my desire to be viewed as successful, popular, important, or just as someone who was "making a difference." As that anxiety built, my mind wanted to switch to other thoughts. But I stuck with the pain fears to explore them.

I realized the situation made me feel powerless - even voiceless. I felt like I did as a kid: out of place, judged, and self-conscious. The antagonist and subversive nature of my current attitude was dwarfed by feelings of being meek, small, and scared. Those feelings sat in the pit of my stomach; I thought I was going to be sick.

Perhaps as a defense mechanism, I became angry. I became angry at people, at myself, and at the kid who I once was. Not having any outlet for my rage, yet not wanting to walk away from the mental experience I was having, I imagined myself yelling at a brick wall....allowing whatever thoughts and words to manifest in a sort of daydream.

 I was struck at what I felt myself saying:

"I'm better than any of you ever thought I could be!"
"Who's making fun of who now?"
"Looks like I won!"

The reality of those words, as awful and horrific as they seem out of the mind of a friar, allowed me to get to a place where I could be honest about myself before God. By stripping the different layers of self-defense, deflection, and self-deprecation away, I was able to catch a glimpse of how God saw me...beyond all the chaff of my personality.

I had a chance to look at my true self, the self that God sees in me, and the part of God that resides in me and each of us. In spite of my prideful and childish reactions to what was going on (both online and in my mind), that ability to look inside and offer my true self to God is what reminds me of who I truly am. It is that self, not the one I try to make look good on Facebook, that is the one that God sees in me.

Second was the real look to see God in others. While my thoughts were full of contempt and anger (through honest reflection) the contact I was receiving was positive, affirming, and even encouraging. "You've accomplished a lot in your life!" one person told me. Seeing the reality of what was happening was humbling.

There was no great catharsis - I don't think there was supposed to be one. The Examen isn't a substitute for self-help, it is a look at one's experiences to find God and communicate with the Divine. I don't know that this experience will change who I am right away (in fact I'm positive it won't!) but it is a reminder of who God sees me as, and an opportunity to enter into that experience whenever I feel anxious or self-conscious.

Once a month we have "days of reflection" here at Novitiate. While the entire experience is actually a year-long span of reflection and discernment, these particular days are like mini-retreats when we're given specific topics to think about and incorporate into our faith journies as we become Capuchins. We have guest speakers come in; it's importance to the program is such that all other activities are put aside during these days.

I've experienced reflection days when I was a Postulant. During Advent and Lent, our friary in Milwaukee got together with the other formation house from Chicago. It was a great time, however the opportunity for the houses to get together sometimes  became excuses for us to catch up and have fun rather than just focusing on the reflection time.

This past Monday was our first Day of Reflection here. We had Fr. John Pavlik come and talk to us. John is the provincial minister for the St. Augustine (sometimes called the Pittsburgh) province. And while the spirit of the event was light, there was definitely plenty to think about.

One if his points was the ability to look back on our reasons for choosing to become Capuchins. Each of the us have our reasons for being here in Allison Park. And while the year of seclusion continues, and nerves start to grate on each one another and people learn the true meaning of "living in community," there is an importance to be true to our vocations.

The challenge he gave us was this: there are three main reasons why we chose to join the Capuchins versus another Order or the diocese. Our task was to find those reasons and to keep them in our prayers. He told us how his three reasons got him through tough times as a friar, and kept his focus on why he was a friar instead of letting other things tear him apart.

It was a great insight for me to reflect on. Usually I choose to stay busy, fill my day with lots of tasks, and set goals that I try to achieve (the remnants of my life as a salesman). But at times my work and my life have felt empty...leaving me to wonder why I'm even pursuing this vocation. Remembering that I am not doing this for me, but because I felt the task of doing something for others puts things in perspective.

So while the use of three things seems as simple-minded as Curly's one thing, there is wisdom in the simplicity of this reflection. Whether it be a vocation like mine, or a long-term relationship, a marriage, or a career, there are times when we get into "the rut." We get overwhelmed with the daily tasks of living our lives; sometimes we forget those monumental and earth-shattering moments that brought us to where we are. While I've never been married or had my own children, I know how easy it is to forget about the love that existed at the beginning of a relationship. I know what it feels like to wake up and wonder: "What am I doing here?" Like any other committment, a vocation must be renewed continuously; each day I must choose to be here-living my life as a friar.

Someone great (although she'd humbly tell you otherwise) once told me that these memories are like pebbles: pebbles that can be easily lost or forgotten. The key is to keep those pebbles in our pocket; to shine them and touch them and know every ridge and smooth surface. If we can keep those pebbles of our memories close to us, and readily available whenever we need them, not only can they remind us why we are on our journey, but we might even leave a trail as a guide for others.

Flickr photos from Ben and rph10uk

Last week, I submitted an article to jesusmanifesto.com, a favorite site of mine as someone who's interests lie with the social teachings of the Catholic Church. While I thought the article was simply a personal reflection on my own prayer life and it's growth as a Capuchin friar, it's starting to turn into more.

Through discussion, insight (from prayer, formators, and fellow friars with plenty of knowledge and wisdom), and after spending 4 hours a day in prayer here at the friary, I found a way to meditate on aspects of Jesus' life as the Poor and Humble Christ that Francis speaks of. While Francis would consider Jesus' entire life, from the birth in a barn to death on a cross, to be an example of His humility, I wanted to focus on aspects of his life that exemplified this subversive lifestyle He lived. (subversive meaning: one who changes from below)

That specific article can be found here.

Later I chose to share more about my personal reflections and how I'd come to these specific events...even how they affected me in prayer.

That follow-up article can be found here.

While this, again, has all been out of a personal devotion and means to feed my spirituality, some have taken offense to my use of this traditional prayer form and the introduction of additional mysteries. I choose not to engage in theological debates via the internet, but I just wish people would stop referring to me as a monk. (I belong to the Order of Friars Minor!)

Enjoy them or denounce them. As always I encourage people do whatever leads them closer to God.

Peace and all good,
Br. Vito Martinez, OFM Cap.

(Please forgive my passive-aggressive outburst. -V)