Try to remember the kind of SeptemberSeptember is a “falling” month, a time when everything begins to turn, but I always think of it as a “starting” month, when school started and starts. As a child I always loved the beginning of school, getting my new stuff, wearing my new clothes, meeting new people. Perhaps that is why I am in the work I am in. I love September and then to add to its wonder we get chilling days and evenings, turning leaves. It is beautiful in the way only time and seasons can be beautiful; achingly lover time. It is like experiencing first love over and over again, as if God prepared that sentiment for us every year.
when life was slow and oh, so mellow.
Try to remember the kind of September
when grass was green and grain was yellow.
Try to remember the kind of September
when you were a tender and callow fellow,
Try to remember and if you remember then follow.
I wonder if the theme of transition and change are part of my attraction. Perhaps it is a good meditation for this month. We might call it conversion. I was thinking about the Holy Father’s prayer intentions for September: First the Holy Father asks us to pray for the mentally disabled, so that they may receive the love and the help they need to live a dignified life. I was in a restaurant not too long ago and there was a small family having dinner. The daughter of the family was mentally challenged in some way and kept crying out during the course of the meal. When she did so, the family would pay attention for a minute and then, move on. The girl ultimately did not “bother” the other patrons, hopefully, because the patrons were so edified by the way in which the family dealt with their charge. I am always in awe of heroic families that deal with the question of offering a dignified life to children and siblings they didn’t pray for, but whom they love so deeply. And that is really the secret for living a dignified life for all of us isn’t it? How people today long for dignity, long for respect and we seem to have lost the ability to ask the question. Perhaps our mentally disabled brothers and sisters are prophets of God’s care, seen in the care offered by their brothers and sisters. September is a waning month, a challenged month but it is so beautiful. Try to remember. I wonder if God looks at each of us with the love those parents and siblings offered the restaurant patient. I wonder if the universal intention is God’s intention for all of us?
The intention for evangelization this month is that Christians may serve the poor and suffering. We do not have to look far to find them. They are here among us in Southern Indiana and here among us in the seminary. I do not mean to take away from the true plight of the poor and suffering by making it a universal plight, but in some sense it is. What I find interesting is that it is the call for evangelization, not of service. Evangelization as a charge refuses to see the poor as merely a group to be served. They are persons of equal dignity who share our lives of discipleship with us. If we do not attend to the poor and suffering among us, in fact, often very close to us, our efforts at evangelization are useless. The human person cannot survive spiritually on platitudes and cynical attitudes alone. Cynicism is a drink that can satisfy for a long time but one day it constricts the throat and kills its imbibers.
This month also brings some feasts of transition. On Sunday the 14th we celebrate the triumph of the Holy Cross, the beginning of the Eastern liturgical year. When I think of this feast I think of my friend and mentor, Fr. Bob Ewing, a priest of the Diocese of Memphis who died on this day in 1996. This was a day of great beginning for him. Other beginnings in the waning month are the Birth of Mary (September 8), the Feast of St. Matthew (the first evangelist in the canon of the New Testament). We have the Archangels on the 29th, the dedication of our chapel, the dedication of the abbey church, the feast of Gregory the Great (September 3) and, ironically, St. Januarius on the 19th. Liturgically, September cranks up as much as it winds down. And of course, we are a cranking up. We are getting to know one another, or know one another again, or anew. Try to remember the kind of September when grass was green and grain was yellow. Try to remember the kind of September when you were a tender and callow fellow.
Of course, September also brings its secular feast day, Labor Day, which we observe each year with a Day of Prayer, this year with Cardinal Collins, the Archbishop of Toronto. It is a great honor to welcome him and in welcoming him to welcome the international Church. All of us need to be reminded occasionally of the necessity as Catholics to write large. September is upon us, try to remember, but in remembering, look around and look ahead.
