My Jesuit Cousin and his Website

[catholicxjw]

After becoming Catholic some of my Lutheran relatives put me in touch
with my cousin Father Rodney, a convert to the faith from the Lutheran
Church Missouri Synod (with an undergrad degree in Chemistry by the
way). He is a Jesuit priest and has written some really good stuff.
He is a retreat master. Here is his new website:

www.frksj.org/

Jeff S.

[carloshelms]

Thank you, Jeff. I perceive that Fr Rodney is not far from the Kingdom! I liked his latest on God's sense of humor. Here's an excerpt:

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"But God‘s sense of humor reaches its climax in the New Testament. What is more unexpected, incongruous and preposterous than the Gospels? The King of Kings is born in a stable and dies as a criminal on a cross. The first are last and the last are first. Those who lose their lives find it. You add by subtracting and multiply by dividing. The foolish confound the wise and the weak conquer the strong. The stone rejected by the builders becomes the cornerstone supporting all the rest.

The Bible seems to be telling us that the only reasonable response to God is faith and laughter. Believe and laugh. Yet I have seen many people read the Bible, very devoutly and prayerfully, but I have yet to see someone read the Bible and laugh. Or even smile.

God’s sense of humor is most obvious in theology. Theology speaks glibly and eloquently about God and then says that God is incomprehensible. I remember the theology class about the Trinity. We spent one hour a day, five days a week for one semester studying the Trinity only to learn at the end that if we understand it, we don’t understand it, because it is unintelligible.

There is tragedy, of course, in the Bible as well as in human life. Sometimes there is very great tragedy, as in the world today. But there is also God. God who loves us, as only He can, not for our possessions, not for our achievements, but for ourselves. For ourselves, not as we could be or should be, but as we really are with all the physical warts, psychological quirks and spiritual infidelities. And He loves us with a love we cannot merit or ever be worthy of. And in the unconditional love of a Father He can laugh at the human foibles of His children. And He can change human tragedy into divine comedy. All we can do is to believe and laugh. Laugh with God, our loving Father."

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Brilliant!

Salve,
Carlos the Procrastinator