 As the saying goes, some of you look suspiciously familiar, and the rest of you just look suspicious. So we'll have to work on that. It is a joy to be with you. Thank you for coming. When you all gather here, it is for us a huge consolation and a grace and a blessing to be surrounded by so many wonderful people. Just thank you. Thank you for being here. I look forward to spending some time with... Well, frankly, amongst you, whoever will spend time with me, we like to hang out after hours, before hours, and just be friends. I've been looking forward to giving this talk no exaggeration for about 15 months, with some excitement and a little bit of nervousness because we want to do a good job for you and for the mission of the church. And that's not an exaggeration. We actually plan the conferences, like 15, 16 months in advance. So that I think it was April or maybe even March of 2015 that we were looking at the 2016 Summer Bosco Conference and who would be giving the general session from amongst our Catechetics staff or faculty. And I had a feeling that maybe it was gonna fall to me to do it, which is a great honor and a great blessing. And it's also the kind of thing that there's a certain fear of the Lord, like, oh, gosh, to represent the university and to be able to speak to all these people at one time. And because I had a feeling it was gonna fall to me to do it, I took the time, although I'm not a technological wizard, I took the time to actually clandestinely record that fateful meeting in April of 2015. And I don't think that any of my colleagues are actually aware that I actually did that, as far as I know. And so I thought maybe I'd play now for you what it looks like behind the scenes when the staff and faculty talk about the BOSCO conference behind closed doors so you can see, so to speak, how the sausage is made. And before I do that, let me just say, because this is being recorded, and some of you might be from highly regulated states like California, and you're wondering, who does he think he is to record his friends? And they didn't have any permission. Ohio is still the wild, wild west, okay? And here we have what's called a one-party consent law. Which means, and I'm going to read it myself, it, Ohio law makes it a crime to intercept or record any wire, oral, or electronic communication unless one party to the conversation consents. And that's from the Ohio Revised Code 2933.52. As Ron said, I'm an assistant professor, not yet a full professor. I hope to have a long future in front of me. Although I think we can do this one because it is somewhat perhaps obvious, and I can spot you, the English gentleman, the unassuming deferential leader of the whole group, who's of course Christopher Robin, and Petrock, who's just our beloved Petrock. I don't know if Petrock was expecting or needing applause for that, but the other ones, anyways, are a little bit more dangerous, a little bit more difficult, and so I'm not really interested in going there because they involve a lot more, so to speak, gray area that require a little bit of a subtlety to get the hang of, and so I won't talk about those, but I will point out the one that I think probably all of you know at home, which is, if you weren't already aware of that correspondence, you just haven't been paying attention, okay? My understanding is later, he'll be giving his talks in the Tigger outfit so we can look forward. You wanna know something just fantastic? I texted Bobby like last week and said, maybe two weeks ago or so, and said, I've got a Tigger outfit at home, I'm doing this poo thing, would you mind, and he's a pretty adventurous guy, pretty fun guy, would you mind taking a picture of yourself like in the poo outfit costume thing and sending it, and he texted back right away, all caps, I'd love to. That's a great, that's just so amazing and fantastic, and frankly, sister is aware of the, we talk about this, the picture actually has a little figurine in her office of Eeyore, and when I told her that Bobby took the picture in the Tigger outfit, she said, oh, I would've done that too, I would've put a tail coming out of my gray habit. Which is, so besides being just amazing people, amazing staff, amazing faculty, talented working for the church and service, they're just really wonderful friends, and part of what I wanna say to you tonight, and by the way, I mean here, the faculty, the staff, I also mean all the presenters here, some are a little bit newer, some have been with us just for many, many years, and over time, there's been developing just a wonderful, fruitful, rich, and real friendship, and I want to invite you into that friendship. I wanna encourage you during this time to cultivate some other friends in the field, make new friends, maybe keep the old, and to take this as a time really of renewal. To take this as a time of renewal, I'm sorry, I understand how you've been looking at Bob Rice in the Tigger outfit for a little bit too long, so I'm gonna go ahead and flip that along, but in all seriousness, if there's one thing over really, roughly the last year that I've been thinking, what is it, Lord, that I'm supposed to say to these people, this is it? The Lord wants to say, behold, I'm doing something new. Behold, I am doing something new, and what I wanna talk to you about tonight is the way in which God is calling us on to make room for newness, to be renewed in Him by recognizing that mercy is forgetting and forgiving in Him, and so that's where we're gonna spend our time. How do we make room for new and recognize that mercy is both forgetting and forgiving in God? And to launch us into this, I'd like to use, this is from Isaiah 43, as our launching pad and our guiding light for the talk. Fear not, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by name and you are mine. Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old, for behold, I am doing something new, and I will not remember your sins. That's from Isaiah 43, and I took several verses out between verses one through 25. It's a little bit of a hodgepodge, but they're not taken out of context. And what I'd like to do is just draw your attention, especially here up front, to the action words of God. I have redeemed you, I have called you. I am doing something new, I will not remember your sins. And I'd like to draw your attention to these action words because I'd like to speak to you up front about receptivity. The theme for the whole conference season is receive the Father's mercy. And I'd like to speak to you a little bit from catechist to catechist about receiving the Father's mercy. And I'm gonna be, if you don't mind, it's very frank with you. I know I don't know you, some of you, I know pretty well, some of you I already saw in the back and it's such a joy. Some of you I look forward to getting to know you better. But I'm gonna be fairly straightforward because I know that insofar as you're a catechist, my strong suspicion is that most of us as catechists suffer from many of the same self-imposed spiritual difficulties. And one of them is the inability really to receive the way that God wants to give to us. Because let's face it, as catechists, you're doers, you get things done, you're passionate, you're always improving, you're planning, you're executing, you're good at doing things. Catechists tend to be good at doing things, we don't tend to be as good at receiving. Sometimes our greatest strength is our greatest weakness to draw on yesterday's gospel reading. For most catechists, our inner Martha is doing pretty well. But our inner Mary could use a lot of work. And that's what I wanna talk to you about tonight is receiving in the way that our blessed mother receives. And by the way, to be sure, this conference is supposed to be practically helpful. It's supposed to really help to guide us, perhaps you're looking at a new strategy for program development, perhaps a new emphasis in the way you're gonna teach a given lesson plan to a given audience. And this work, this practical work, it's necessary, it's beautiful, it's hard, it's the diligent labor that we owe to the vocation that God has given us. So it's wonderful, but it's secondary. Your work and my work is secondary. God's work is primary, it's God's work. God's work comes first. And in fact, this is actually, this is very much given in the actual structure of the catechism. I'm assuming many of you know that the catechism is in four pillars, right? Four pillars to the catechism. So we have the creed, the sacraments, life in Christ, and prayer. The catechism is also in two halves. It tells a two-part story. Sometimes there's two-paneled artworks that tell a two-paneled story. So for example, in the one half you might have like the angel Gabriel appearing to Mary. And on the other half, you have a painting of the baby Jesus and the manger. And so you have a two-paneled icon of the annunciation and birth of Christ. The catechism is like a two-paneled icon. The first half is God's work. And the second half is our work. The first two pillars are God's work. The second two pillars form our work by and large. What I want to point out to you is the weight, W-E-I-G-H-T, the weight of the catechism, which is this. The first two pillars of the catechism take up two thirds of the actual content. Two thirds of the emphasis is God's work. One third is our work. And I can't help but wonder, in my own life, does my life reflect the structure of the catechism? Am I allowing two thirds of God's work and understanding that my work, which is necessary, but it's a third and it comes after God's work? Do I actually live in that way? And frankly, to tell you the truth, I don't. I don't think I do. I'm not a two-thirds, one-third guy. I'm probably the exact other way around. So it's difficult, really, right? God's work and then our work, to be receptive, to be a passive channel of God's work. That's an act of enormous subtlety to allow God to work through us. So even though it's partly our work, it's really God working through us, being ever attentive to the promptings of the Holy Spirit. Yeah, our tendency as catechists, I don't think we're necessarily naturally geared for this. Our tendency is to always think, what do I have to do? When the Holy Father, Pope Francis, when I found out that he was going to proclaim a year of mercy, do you know what my first reaction was? It's a little embarrassing. But my reaction was this, oh, okay. Sounds like we're gonna have to get, you know, kind of tooled up on some mercy. I'll probably have to read these documents. That'll be a hot topic, mercy. I'll have to read some older documents. Maybe some divas at Missouri Quarty, some all kinds of, because it's gonna be about mercy and so I need to, it didn't occur to me for like six months, hey Scott, maybe the Holy Father has prayerfully discerned that you need some mercy. That was, that took me a long time to figure out, because I'm always in the mode of thinking, I need to do something. So the first piece, the first important step is understanding that it's God's work. And to finish off just this little piece and then we'll move on, I'd like to recite for you a poem from a Scottish poet, his name is Sir Edwin Muir. It's M-U-I-R and it's called The Question. And the poem, The Question is a question that I'd like to pose to you this evening. It's somewhat of a long question, so I'll try to make it followable, but it's just from Sir Edwin Muir, The Question. Would you sometime, who have sought so long and seek still in the ever-darkening hunting ground, would you catch sight some ordinary day or week of that strange quarry you scarcely thought you saw? You, the gatherer gathered, you the finder found, you the buyer who would buy all in bounty bought. And would you perch in pride on the princely hand at home and there the long hunt over, would you rest in Rome? And what I'm inviting you to do tonight this week is to rest a little bit, to roam a little bit. And by the way, you can't. You won't be able to. You're gonna have to ask the Holy Spirit to please God help me to settle down and rest in you because God has work to do, so let him do some work. Now, what is the work that God wants to do? Well, the Lord wants to do something new. The Lord says, behold, I am doing something new. And to dig a little further into this, I'd like to speak to you about the new evangelization. Just a quick show of hands. How many of you have heard something, know something about the new evangelization? I'm guessing it's quite a few of you. Okay, fantastic, thank you. Of course, the audience for the new evangelization is Catholics who have so to speak fallen off the wagon. Catholics who have lost their zeal. Catholics who are no longer practicing the faith. Perhaps individual Catholics or whole cultures that large that need to be renewed, right? This renewed word is kind of a weird word. It kind of reminds me of eggplant. It's like eggplant. What is that? I don't know. You know? Is it an egg? Is it a plant? I'm not really sure. Let's have it go on home, make up its mind. And when it's ready, come on back and then maybe we'll eat it, you know? Renew is kind of like that. What is this renew? Is it new? Or is it re? I'm not really sure if it's re or if it's new. So it can be confusing. So let's drop the re. Let's just talk about the new evangelization. And to talk about the new evangelization, of course, we're talking about new and ardor, new and method, and new in expression. I always think of the acronym AIM, A-M-E, ardor, method, expression. And so we talk about the methods, these new methods, we talk about the expressions. Sometimes not as often we talk about the ardor, but we pretty much forget to talk about the new. That it's supposed to be new. And in fact, some people think, you know the new evangelization? That's an odd thing. That's like the new and improved toothpaste. What are they thinking? In 10 years, what are you going to say then? Newer, improved, or better than it was before? It seems like we've kind of put a certain time stamp or an expiration date on the new evangelization. It's like a little trend. It's probably going to come and go, and then we'll have to think of something altogether different, which is a serious problem, because actually there's a whole pontifical council for the new evangelization. And I hope they don't lose their job in five years when it's no longer new. I'm telling you this in part, by the way, because of course, catechetics lives under the new evangelization. It's so to speak under the guidance, under the authority of the Pontifical Council for the new evangelization. It had been under clergy, et cetera. And so I even have some friends who have suggested to me, new evangelization, bad idea, trendy. We don't want to have trends, et cetera. It'll probably expire pretty soon. So to help get away from this idea, I want to just do a little reconnaissance, a little history of the new evangelization, which of course, as I said, is a pontifical council. There's Redemptoris Mesio, Mission of the Redeemer, St. John Paul II, 1990, where he really calls for a new evangelization. It's in paragraphs 30 through 33. He lists these audiences. Now there's a new audience, those Catholics who need to be renewed. And then there's actually people who are historiographers. This is really fascinating to me, but they've kind of looked and wanted to see where did this all start? And they've located it. Some, they go back to Central America here. St. John Paul II said somewhere in the early 80s, new evangelization. Then someone else said, wait, we have another citation. It was in Poland, and it was before Central America. It goes all the way back to Poland, et cetera. And really, as you probably, many of you are aware, it actually goes back even further than that. It goes back to the opening address at the Second Vatican Council. The substance of the ancient doctrine of the deposit of faith is one thing. And the way in which it is presented is another. I'm gonna read to you the line right before that, where the church is looking to a step forward. This is, of course, from John the 23rd. A step forward toward a doctrinal penetration and formation of consciousness in faithful and perfect conformity to the authentic doctrine, which, however, should be studied and expounded through the methods of research and through the literary forms of modern thought. In those words, you can see initial vestiges of the new evangelization, new and ardor, new and method, new and expression. I'm gonna take this back before that. In fact, there's much more we could say. I'm gonna just go ahead and jump back about 2,000 years to Acts 4. Remember what happened in Acts 2? 1-4, we're all aware of that. Pentecost, this fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit. I mean, talk about a new evangelization, right? And do you know what happens two chapters later in Acts 4? Peter and John, they're taken before the council because they're speaking boldly about God and the council doesn't like that. But at the same time, they managed to perform this thing that seemed miraculous. And so they weren't sure what to do with these guys. And so they decided, let's just give them a harsh warning and tell them, don't knock it off. Stop it. And so they let them leave. And Peter and John go and join the rest. And this is Acts 4, verse 29. They're praying. And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to speak your word with all boldness while you stretch out your hand to heal and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus. And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness. What happened in Acts 2? 1-4, Holy Spirit descends or filled with the Holy Spirit. They speak the word in boldness. What happens two chapters later? They're all filled with the Holy Spirit and they speak the word in boldness. That was a new evangelization, right on top of the new evangelization. In fact, let's just go ahead and jump back another 800 years. So now we're looking back to Isaiah 43. Behold, I'm doing something new. So the new evangelization is at least 2,800 years old and it doesn't really seem to be going anywhere. And the reason for that is because although it's new to us, although it's new to me and it's new to you, God isn't new. God's eternal. And anytime me and my little finite human self come in contact with God, real contact, where I open myself up to him, my creator, my redeemer, God. When I open myself up to him and he touches me when he speaks his eternal word into me, that's new. And there will be a new evangelization as long as there are Catholics on God's green earth because God is ever ancient, ever new, and you can always be deepened right in your conversion. The problem with Catechists, frankly, and putting myself first and foremost amongst us, is that it seems like there's nothing new under the sun. There's a way in which maybe I'm just speaking for myself here, but there's a way in which we might have an over-familiarity with divine revelation. We might have an over-familiarity with God so that we can talk about the trinity with the same passion and depth that we talk about in equilateral triangle and then move on to other things. Forgetting this is the mystery of God, for some reason we just become in such a way so blessed and graced to have these words of God through the Holy Scripture and the sure norm of the faith in the Catechism, that it becomes, yeah, that's the faith and here it is and A and B and therefore C and 1 plus 2 and 1 plus, and there it goes. But what God is calling us to is something new, something new starting tonight, starting in your next breath and your next heartbeat. Let me say something else about the New Evangelization and I'm going to jump back here to the General Directory for Catechesis from the Congregation for Clergy and I just want to point out in the GDC, the General Directory for Catechesis, there is listed there, so to speak, three audiences for evangelization. This is GDC 46. GDC 46.3. I lied, it's 49. The process of evangelization consequently is structured in stages or essential moments and here they are, there's three stages, three movements to evangelization. Missionary activity, directed towards non-believers and those who live in religious indifference. Initial catechetical activity for those who need to complete or modify their initiation and pastoral activity directed toward the faithful, the Christian faithful of mature faith in the bosom of the Christian community and so we have these moments. You could call these our audiences and it notes there in the GDC 49 that these moments can be repeated. By the way, can I just see a show of hands? How many of you are maybe involved in RCIA or in the RCIA track? Okay, so these three phases, so to speak, are somewhat, I think, already familiar to you because they're embedded in the RCIA, right? In a sense that first phase, that first essential moment, that missionary proclamation, the charisma, the good news, matches up very well with the pre-catechuminate, right? And then once they've heard, and only when they really heard that and they've got it and they want to move on and they're ready to go deeper, then they move on to the period of the catechuminate, right? And that period of the catechuminate is very much matching up with the catechetical activity that is due for this second essential moment, for this second audience. And so is, by the way, purification and enlightenment, the third period of RCIA. So catechuminate, purification and enlightenment, those are the periods leading up to the reception of the sacraments. And then after the reception of the sacraments, as you're well aware, we're meant to help them to cultivate that grace to deepen in this life that they receive, this mystagogy, to deepen in the mysteries which corresponds very much with number three, right, this pastoral activity. By the way, I just have to ask, so those of you who are in RCIA, isn't it the case that oftentimes right about the end of the period of the catechuminate or maybe the beginning of purification and enlightenment that it just seems hard? Do you ever think to yourself, I think this might be my last year? I think I'm not sure I can do this again. This is so exhausting. I see only the RCIA people are laughing, but it really is one of those phenomena. It's a real work. It's very demanding. And every year it just seems like, I don't know if I can do this again. And then here you are next summer training, preparing yourself, getting ready, making a sacrifice of your own time and energy to do it again. Youth ministers, any youth ministers who we have here? I know there's probably, hopefully, quite a few of you here. Youth ministry, of course, oftentimes is, you're looking at, you want to meet your people where they are, and so you're figuring, how can I actually offer something to these young people who really just, they just want to kind of, just an easy entrance, kind of crossing the threshold into the church. Maybe this isn't even evangelization. Maybe it's pre-evangelization, like dropping after school or something. They play foosball, they play ping pong, they eat some candy, they act a little bit silly, and then they go home, and then maybe you invite them to something where they can just come on Sunday evenings, and it's just pretty chill, and it's an initial proclamation. You're getting to know them, you're giving some witness, right? And you kind of have that in your Sunday evenings, and that's going on. And maybe then you also schedule a little something, another step, another way to meet people where they are, and to encourage some of these young people, hey, you know what? I can see that you're excited about this. I think you should come to our Thursday night thing. Maybe it's only like once a month, but we're going to go deeper, right? We're going to go a little bit deeper. We're going to go deeper into our catechesis, deeper into our study, deeper into our prayer. And so long story short, there's a way in which our programs should manifest a certain progression from initial missionary activity to catechesis to pastoral care. I was going to also address the DREs. DREs, where are you? DREs in my mind are the most amazing people on the planet because you're able to do both the hard administrative facilitating the actual organization and then actually do teaching and theology and catechesis, which to be able to do both of those things at the same time is a blessing that I wish I had. I can't do that. I can't administrate anything. But I'm sure in your own DRE programs, as you're thinking about reaching out to adults or reaching out to young people, how are we offering something that's initial? How are we really intentionally getting to know them and calling them on when they're ready to the next phase to help them to deepen, right? And as you probably are aware, in the same general directory for catechesis, besides talking about evangelization, there's also mentioned the new evangelization. And this is going to be paragraph 276, which I'm just going to flip to here briefly. This is paragraph 276, which says this. I'm on 276, first paragraph, about halfway through. There are, in fact, elements which prepare for catechesis as well as those deriving from it. And you can see that here, even according to our three essential moments. Elements which prepare for catechesis as well as those deriving from it. In this respect, the link between missionary proclamation, which seeks to stir up the faith and initiatory catechesis, which seeks to deepen its roots, is decisive for evangelization. I'm going to jump down a sentence. In situations requiring the new evangelization, coordination becomes more complex because, and this is really important, in situations requiring the new evangelization, coordination becomes more complex because catechesis is, at times, offered to young people and adults who need a period of prior proclamation and awakening in their adherence to Christ. Let me give you maybe two examples. Confirmation prep. I used to do confirmation prep in ninth grade, and we had a whole plethora of different types of groups in eighth grade. We had kids who had gone to the Catholic school. Most of their lives, there might have been 25 of them. We had kids who had been to home school. There were several of them. We had kids who had been coming to Faith Formation every Wednesday dutifully for a long, long time. There were like 70 of them. And then we also had a group that we had never seen before. And God bless them, right? These were the people who, grandma basically probably looked at the bulletin and said, looks like it's confirmation. You got to be, you better get Johnny over to the confirmation prep, and there Johnny shows up. And the confirmation program is something like this. And I'm being facetious here. Look, I don't care where you're from, or what your experiences have been, or what you know, this is my one-stop shop, lock, stock, and barrel confirmation program. Just get in there, Johnny. And we're going to talk about the Holy Spirit and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. And in a couple of months, we're just going to grind out a little confermond. And Johnny has no idea either who the Holy Spirit is or why he should care about these gifts that the Holy Spirit allegedly wants to give him. Johnny needs a period of prior proclamation and an awakening in his adherence to the faith. Johnny needs to hear the gospel proclaimed. He needs to see some Christian people running around being Christian. He needs a witness. He needs to catch fire. He needs to say, ah, man, I get it. I see it. I want more of it. And then he's ready to move from missionary proclamation to catechetical activity towards the sacraments of initiation. Something similar actually happens with marriage prep. My wife and I had the great blessing of being working for the Archdiocese of St. Paul Minneapolis for many years. By the way, there seemed to be a lot of Minnesota people who cheered when he said Minnesota. Where are you people? You're just loud. You're small, but loud. Okay, I got it. Okay. So we were in Minnesota. And so we were like, what would you call it? We were like the MCs, you know? And we also gave some of the talks. Basically, you want to get married. You're in the Archdiocese of St. Paul Minneapolis. You have to go to a marriage retreat. And you have to be there Friday evening and all day Saturday. There's lots of different things that are talked about. It's intense. You're there all day. And we would do evaluations. And the talk that always tanked was the NFP talk. Which by the way, my wife and I, thank you Jesus, never gave. Because that's a... And I say that just a little tongue in cheek, but that's a tough talk to give. And do you want to know why? Because you've got a lot of couples showing up there. We're talking 70, 80, 90, 100 couples. At least, big place. Every two months or so, we put these retreats on. And things seem to be going pretty well up until you get to the NFP talk. Now, you've got a guy who wants to marry this Catholic girl and he's maybe baptized Catholic, but whatever. And he has to go to this retreat. So he goes to the retreat and they're talking about what your families are like, what your budget concerns are, how you're going to live the faith. Everything's going fine until the Catholic Church starts talking about sex. And then this guy's like, NFP? What the heck? You're telling me that there's a whole bunch of time that we can't have sex? That's how the guys hear it. I hope I'm not being too crude. That's how a lot of those guys are hearing it. Because listen, unless you first have some sense that God is a communion of persons who give themselves perfectly and fully in life-giving love and God made you in his image and your marriage is going to image God. And this is going to be a perfect, full gift of yourself and a reception of the other in life-giving love. Unless you see that, want that, you're not quite ready to hear about all the imperatives about Christian marriage. You have to have an initial proclamation. You have to be awakened in your adherence to Christ. So this is... I hope this wasn't a long walk for a short drink, but I'm here to tell you this. It's a little bit funny to put Johnny in a sausage grinder and it's a little bit funny that a bunch of guys hear about NFP and they freak out because Johnny needs a new evangelization and a lot of guys who are getting married need a new evangelization. What I'm here to tell you is catechists need a new evangelization. I'm here to tell you that catechists need to be reawakened in their love for and adherence to the good news that Christ has died for us and rose for us and is giving us his eternal life so we can go to heaven. We need to be reawakened. And that's hard, and it's especially hard for catechists because it always seems like the new evangelization is for somebody else. As Rama is saying, I'm working on my STL. I'm almost done. Thank you again, Jesus. And I spent three semesters driving to Detroit. Dr. Janet Smith is from Sacred Heart Major Seminary in the new evangelization. A lot of time, a lot of sweat, a lot of work, a lot of papers. I can summarize all of my sweat and work and reading and papers in one sentence. Most Catholics who know about the new evangelization think they're in phase number three, but they actually need to go back to phase number one. That's it. The new evangelization, get new. I didn't mean that to be obnoxious or rough, but that's the hard truth of the matter. Let me summarize this little piece with Pope Francis. This is from his joy of the gospel, Evangelii Gaudium. It's from paragraph 83. I remember reading Evangelii Gaudium and thinking, wow, this is so bizarre. It's nothing like I thought what it was going to say. And then you get roughly to about maybe the 80s and 90s in the paragraphs and realize it reads like an examination of conscience for people in parish mission, for people who are doing work in the field. And what he says in paragraph 83 is this. A tomb, T-O-M-B, a tomb psychology thus develops and slowly transforms Christians into mummies in a museum. Disillusioned with reality, with the church, with themselves. They experience a constant temptation to cling to a faint melancholy lacking hope which seizes their heart, called to radiate light and communicate life. In the end, they are caught up in things that generate only darkness and inner weariness and slowly consume all zeal for their apostolate. If the new evangelization is for Catholics who have lost their zeal, Pope Francis is gently telling us you may have lost your zeal. So we're making room for new mercy. We're finished with the first part. I want to look now at understanding that mercy is forgetting and forgiving and we're going to start with forgetting. I'm going to go back to Isaiah 43 where God says, I will not remember your sins. And throughout the rest of this talk, I want to talk about the purification of the memory in at least three different ways. And I'll try to flag or say something as those come up. But I'd like to start first by telling you a quick story. It's a true story. One of the most wonderful things about being here is teaching these young people in our undergrad classes. I teach a class and many people here teach this class, Cat 120, Catechetics 120, which you have these young people. Many of them are, they're on fire for the Lord. They've had great experiences and they're intelligent and they're here to be equipped to go and work in the field. And I had this class in the spring and it was really phenomenal, really exciting, right? This is their first venture into Catechetics. And so part of this Cat 120 is we want to also give them some sense of what it's like to be in a parish, some of the challenges, some of the successes, some of the failures, because God bless them, it's not their fault. But many times they don't have any experience of what it's like to be an adult in a parish, let alone to work in a parish. And so our job is to do not only some theological and then catechetical training, but also some professional training for the field. This is a story, this semester, regarding administration and being dutiful and being diligent. I was telling this story about how I was working in Stillwater, Minnesota, just a regular old day and this young, roughly young man came in maybe in his early 30s, mid 30s, a little bit disheveled and he had brought with him maybe a six or seven year old, his daughter and he was there to ask about getting his daughter baptized. Which is a real joy and this is, I think, in the summertime. Oh, wow, this guy is here. So I went out and I met him and I talked with him in the foyer for a little bit and I thought it'd be good to take him into the church proper and look at the baptismal font because the baptismal font is really beautiful and it's a really old church and it's beautiful architecture and I could tell the girl was really taken with this church and I was talking to her and her father that what we'll do is we'll put together and I went home for lunch which I was regularly doing at the time maybe 10, 15 minute drive home a lot of little babies in the house that kind of thing, I come back and the parish secretary says to me, oh, a guy was here, he was looking for you he had his daughter with him and right then my heart just sunk because I had forgotten that I had scheduled a meeting with him and his daughter to look further at how we could go about the baptism prep and I said, oh my gosh what did you tell him? I told him just to hang around for a little bit but he said he had to go and he seemed kind of upset and this is the secretary my good friend Deb, I told him is there any other way I can help you and he said no thanks, I've been helped enough and he left and I never saw him and I never saw his daughter again and I was telling this story to this class I hadn't told that story I don't think to really anybody and as I told it I was just kind of a frog in my throat and I just, oh man and there was a sort of pregnant silence in the class there's lots more to say about that story but the reason I bring it up now because I realized that that had been sitting in my heart and in my memory for, that was like almost 20 years ago but in my memory it was really fresh and although it had already I confessed it and been forgiven of it in my heart it was brand spanking new and it was very painful in short, I think this is what we do sometimes as catechists is we're really good at remembering our sins we're good at accumulating our faults, we're good at remembering where we dropped the ball, where we were incompetent where we could have done better and we not only fill ourselves up with this baggage like a little donkey all loaded down with all of our failings and difficulties and at least speaking for myself I also start to identify myself with my past sins, with my failings with my incompetencies and although I'm trying to make myself into a little donkey by carrying all this baggage God's reaching down in St. Solom stop making an ass out of yourself that's gone, that's done I will not remember your sins but I have a hard time believing God when he says my sins and part of that is because Satan doesn't forget your sins I'm thinking of Revelation 12 verse 11 the accuser of our brethren who stands before the throne of God night and day accusing us, not worthy not worthy and if you're not careful, Satan will regularly remind you that you're not worthy of course he's right but the point is we've been made worthy through the blood of Christ, right? there's a saying and if there's one of the key things I'd like you to take from this talk, it's this Satan knows your name but he calls you by your sin God knows your sin but he calls you by your name and that's really important and by the way that's also what it says in Isaiah 43 Isaiah 43 says I have called you by name because you are precious in my eyes and honored and I love you I'm gonna draw our attention here, I should have said this up front this is Rembrandt's, the prodigal son and this is of course the prodigal son who has returned and you can see him there, he's wearing he doesn't have any outer garment he's just wearing this kind of undergarment thing, he's basically in the form or wearing the clothing with his head shaved and no sandals etc in the form of a slave or of a servant interestingly and wonderfully when Rembrandt draws God the Father just check out God the Father's eyes if you can see them Rembrandt draws God the Father as this mostly blind older man by the way Rembrandt, so he's not really true I suppose you could say to the literal text from the Gospel of Luke the Gospel of Luke where the Father spots the son from a long way off and he runs and greets him and kisses him puts a ring on his finger which is wonderful because if God's gonna see you from a long way off that means he's been waiting for you sometimes when I'm standing in line to go to the confession and I'm getting a little nervous and a little anxious and thinking about all the things I have to say I think about God just watching and waiting for me from a long way off and running and meeting and greeting and kissing and putting a ring on my finger and that's wonderful because it shows God's action it shows God's work and it shows that he's getting the prodigal son returning and with all these different action verbs intact but here as Rembrandt gets older he depicts God as this very blind old man and the reason he does so is because he wants us to know that God the Father doesn't actually see the son with human eyes he doesn't see the son in his current state Rembrandt wants us to see that God's seeing is an eternal seeing God the Father is seeing with his heart and God the Father says in Isaiah I've called you by name because you're precious in my eyes and that's something I think the Lord really wants us to meditate on at least this evening if not this conference that you're precious in his eyes and that he's called you by name and that he's forgotten your sins which again is hard to do we think of ourselves as the sum of our weaknesses and failures but as John Paul II said at World Youth Day 2002 you're not the sum of your weaknesses and failures I think I put this right in the description for this talk he says we are not the sum of our weaknesses and failures we are the sum of the Father's love for us and our real capacity to become the image of his son and so you want to forget forgetting his key by the way I think at this point you might say forgetting his key we don't want to hang out of these sinful memories but just to be clear we're supposed to forget about the sinful memories but we're supposed to hold on to the good memories we're supposed to hold on to the consolations I mean you've heard the phrase don't throw the baby out with the bath water I'm telling you throw the baby out I'm telling you here's the secret the baby is not in the bath water you might think he is but he's not and I know let me just back up and say this might not be for everybody but I do feel like it's something I was meant to say tonight which is there's a way in which we have these great fond memories of our lives with Jesus it's like a scrapbook oh here is Jesus and me here's where we were it wasn't that wonderful I mean the world right now is going to hell in a hand basket but I have that retreat from 2007 and by golly I'm hanging on to that and so we're trying to live today's work based on yesterday's grace and there's a way in which by all means memory can be wonderful it can be consoling and you're going to have to discern for yourselves which memories you're meant to hang on to but I'm telling you if you really want to do something new don't look to the past the Lord is not the almighty God of reruns he's not interested in repeating his performances he wants to do something new the extent that we hang on to something old and a memory that becomes we shrivel up God and turn him into something he used to do and that becomes a little idol that sits in our hearts and it takes the shape and form of an idol so that we're not open to doing something new with God I'm going to put in here just a quick caveat that obviously there's a lot of ways that we remember right in the liturgy we remember things in the blessing of the holy water at baptism we do this whole remembrance of all the wonderful ways in which God has used water in the Old Testament or the memorial acclamations right for celebrating the holy Eucharist we remember Christ's paschal mystery but the reason we remember these things the reason we look back at our heritage is so that we can look forward to our inheritance and those sacraments aren't just the remembrance of something that happened we're entering into that mystery right then and right there right the paschal mystery is a historical moment but it's unique because it doesn't get swallowed up in the past it's God's work and the paschal mystery is made present to each and every moment so in the liturgy it's very important that we remember but we remember in a particular way in which God is making himself present now but all that being said I'm going to jump ahead here because apparently I talk too much and I want to make sure I keep us on time but I'm suggesting to you that our memories can become a very poor substitute for what God wants to do new with you in your heart today and at this conference okay so we're trying to forget as best as we can so so far just to sum up where we are we've talked about making room for something new we've talked about mercy is forgetting I want to talk about mercy is forgiving and to do that I'm going to look way back in the back back back cheap seats of the catechism 2840 this is going to take us this is going to take us to the Lord's Prayer 2840 this is wild stuff as far as I'm concerned 2840 now dash and this is daunting I could be mistaken but I don't think there's anywhere else in the catechism where it's written like this now and this is daunting this outpouring of mercy cannot penetrate our hearts as long as we have not forgiven those who have trespassed against us in the next sentence love like the body of Christ is indivisible we cannot love the God we cannot see if we do not love the brothers or sisters we do see that's an interesting reason here's why it doesn't work because God and love is indivisible so you can't participate in receiving mercy if you're not also participating in giving mercy I'm going to back up here for just a quick second because this is really important we're talking about a moral imperative here in the Lord's Prayer and I'm going to say something really quick something kind of fast here regarding the catechism as I said the catechism is based on four pillars it's based on Acts 242 right how many of you are aware that the catechism is based on Acts 242 so the early church they devoted themselves to the teaching of the apostles the breaking of the bread the communal life and the prayers what it meant to be church was four fold what that means for us is the catechism is based on four pillars right they devoted themselves to the teaching of the apostles that's the creed the breaking of the bread that's the sacramental life the communal life that's life in Christ and the prayers that of course corresponds to prayer what that means for us as catechists is whatever it is we're teaching whatever bit of divine revelation we're handing on for conversion in Christ we want to show how it impacts all four of the dimensions of the church's life I'm going to give you a quick example let's say you're teaching on mercy and you look up your own reconciliation so let's say you're in paragraph 1441 and if you're on paragraph 1441 it's a nice little bit it's a reminder that only God forgives sins that's interesting and important note the priest himself as human person doesn't forgive sin it's the God forgiving sins in and through the priest on the outer margin of 1441 there's a little note a little italicized, non-emboldened paragraph number 270 that's a way the catechism is saying dear gentle reader you might want to go back to the creed to understand more about what's being said here, 270 and lo and behold, 270 says this it's about God the Father almighty have you ever thought of this? paragraph 270, if God was a loving father but not powerful that wouldn't be very helpful if God was all powerful but not a loving father that would be scary and so God's fatherhood and power shed light on one another and then it goes on to say this God reveals his fatherly omnipotence by the way he takes care of our needs by the filial adoption that he gives us and finally by his infinite mercy for he displays his power at its height the catechism, the church is about to say that God the Father displays his power at its height you could sound the trumpets here by freely forgiving sins in other words if you want to teach on the sacrament of reconciliation you need to root that in the creed what we believe then we celebrate then you want to say and how does that manifest in our prayer life and so on the outer margin it gives us a little indication to look at paragraph 2777 that's going way back to the prayer section I'm not actually going to read that section right now but in that prayer section it basically says we dare to say I think a lot of catechists have a bad prayer life because we're very aware of our sins and we don't want to come before the Lord because we don't feel worthy and we say that actually at mass we dare in all confidence or whatever and what it actually says in 277 is that Christ himself has made purification for our sins and crossed that divine threshold and welcomed you in so it's not enough just to know that God is merciful you got to know that that's going to impact your prayer so again mercy rooted in the creed celebrated the sacraments manifest in our prayer life now I'm going to go back to 2840 because in 2840 we also have the moral imperative what does this mean for your actual moral life which as I've said as long as we have not forgiven those who have trespassed against us mercy cannot penetrate our hearts I'm going to jump down to 2842 and I'm going to draw your attention here to the the prodigal son could have just a woman called the prodigal sons right the brother himself the key for Rembrandt is the brother is at quite a distance yeah he's at quite a distance he looks like the father he's wearing the same royal garment as the father he's got kind of the same class and prestige and status as the father but he's way out there he's looking on from the outside with that in mind I'm looking at 2842 as we forgive those who trespass against us this as is not unique in Jesus teaching you therefore must be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect be merciful as your father is merciful skip a sentence it is impossible to keep the Lord's commandment by imitating the divine model from the outside this is the second brother he's on the outside there's a way in which he I don't know some people say look his eyes are resentful and joyless he's wondering why he's not being honored he's wondering why he's not getting attention and I think maybe I see that but at least in me and maybe I'm projecting here but I feel like I see a guy who wants to participate who wishes he could throw himself on his knees and cry out for mercy but there's something he just can't do it whereas the younger son that's a guy who's got the new evangelization down pat he's thrown himself at the mercy of the father in fact Rembrandt actually paints you can see where the sons who's on his knees, his head especially his forehead blends right into the heart of the father he's there, he's participating in the mercy of the heart of the father and the older brother isn't and therefore he's not able to enter in it's impossible to keep the Lord's command by imitating the divine model from the outside there has to be a vital participation coming from the depths of our heart when I was in fifth or sixth grade I had a teacher named Mrs. Wolpat she was great, fantastic teacher we were doing something life changing in that English class in fifth or sixth grade which is we like diagramming sentences and at some point we had to, I don't know if it's called specifically but you know what I'm talking about and we had like underline linking verbs and what's that say yeah dissecting so at one point we got the prepositional phrases and we were supposed to for the upcoming quiz we were supposed to circle the preposition and underline the prepositional phrase and I wasn't a good student I had a pretty good memory I think Mrs. Wolpat she came to me individually and actually took a knee by my desk and gave me a list of the prepositions she didn't do this for the other students but she knew I had a pretty good memory and I think she desperately wanted me to pass the quiz get the heck out of fifth grade and move on you know I wouldn't bother her again so she gave me a list of the prepositions and she basically said look Scott when you see these in the sentence circle one and then underline the words after it so I memorized the prepositions and for whatever reason I still have them memorized today and now for our viewing pleasure I'm going to go ahead and recite the prepositions for you I'll miss a couple I know there's always some out there who have the prepositions memorized too you want to raise your hand in a rough order a board above across after against a long among around at before behind below beneath beside between beyond by down during except for from in into like of off on over past in through to toward with within with I miss them a lot of prepositions this is just me speaking but I think it's very important the most important the most important preposition in the Catholic faith is in part three of the catechism is called life in Christ you better not do unless you want to go to hell it's not called here's a system of ethics that we've worked out so you could be nice to your neighbor it's not even called here's a moral behavioral system all those things are important the ten commandments social ethics morality but at the heart of part three the catechism the most deep understanding is life in Christ God's life in you a divine DNA transplant what did the priest say with by the mingling of this water and wine we come to share in his divinity who humbled himself to share in our humanity this marvelous exchange that's at the heart of the matter and that's when the catechism says this is not possible unless you have a vital participation I used to look at that paragraph 1441 where we started our little catechism tour only God can forgive sins and I thought that it was only talking about the role of the priest in the sacrament of reconciliation it's not I don't think it is it's talking about forgiveness in total it's saying that you my friends and me myself we cannot forgive sins until or unless we're participating in God's very life unless we have God's divine nature transforming us and then God in us and through us we can forgive sins every sin is an offense against God and therefore only God can forgive it to the extent that we ourselves are called to also to say I forgive you only God can do that we can't do that ourselves it's going to be too hard and we'll fall short and we'll fail and we won't be able to forgive and therefore we won't be able to get and that's that moral imperative from 2840 there's one more piece I think I wanted to say there 2843 it's the last well you know what I'm going to do 2842 and then 2843 2842 about halfway down it is impossible to keep the Lord's command by imitating the divine model from the outside there has to be a vital participation coming from the depths of the heart in the holiness and the mercy and the love of our God only the spirit by whom we live can make ours the same mind that was in Christ Jesus and I'm going to jump down to the last sentence of 2843 it is not in our power not to feel or to forget an offense but the heart that offers itself to the Holy Spirit turns injury into compassion and purifies the memory in transforming the hurt into intercession and so there's a way in which we want to be merciful as the Heavenly Father is merciful it's only going to happen by the Holy Spirit poured into our hearts so we can be transformed in Christ and thereby forgive others in Christ mercy right is Trinitarian is the main point there so we've talked about purification of the memory forgetting our own sins even letting go of some of those fond memories that we have of God's consolation so we can grow so we have room for something new and we've also talked about purifying our memory of the injuries that we have also ourselves suffered that have been inflicted upon us and in each and every case it's not actually our work it's God's work I'm going to say one quick last story because the next piece is forgiving even our enemies so one last quick story and then we're going to sum up and move into a little bit of prayer this is actually a story it's Kierkegaard's famous story about the clown and the traveling circus basically this in Denmark this traveling circus is cruising around they go to set up shop near a village and there's a fire that catches while they're putting up the various circus tents and things like that and so the manager sends the clown who still he's already dressed up as a clown and he says you've got to run to that village and you've got to tell them that there's a fire because we're in danger and they are in danger and so the clown dutifully runs across the field and of course he gets to the village and he says something like hey look you've got to come to the circus there's a fire and we need your help and of course everyone's like aha I get it he's a clown this is some great bit of acting he wants to get us to actually come to the circus and the clown is like no I get it I'm in a clown suit haha but there's a fire and you're in danger and the more he shouts and shouts and says you've got to come splendidly I mean this guy is really putting on a fantastic act and the harder he tries the more they just applaud and laugh having a wonderful time and in the meantime the fire comes across the field and burns the entire circus and the village to the ground I know Kierkegaard's not very funny I should have had a better ending than that can you help no I'm telling this for a specific reason and it's this that comes up a young priest in Germany wrote a wonderful book called Introduction to Christianity and it was so well done that some people took note of him he became a theology professor professor Rott Singer who became course cardinal Rott Singer who became Pope Benedict and he starts the entire book which is a masterpiece with Kierkegaard's story of the clown and he makes an analogy to the catechist to those who are trying to hand on the faith and you go out and try to proclaim the gospel you are a clown as far as everyone else is concerned you're already ticketed and classified I know your deal, you're a stinking clown and you say clown things the more you try to tell them this is real God is real, love is real no no no you're a clown and I don't believe you because you're in the full regalia of a clown in today's world not only are we in a a fading Christian culture but it's deeply and quickly into an anti-Christian culture and I want to pose the same question to you that Ron had posed earlier which is when you go out and you're ridiculed and you will suffer and people will inflict real damage to you for trying to hand on the faith are you ready to forgive them because only if we're ready the compassion of the father that's why I titled the whole talk in the tender compassion of our God because it's only by resting in him by being transformed in him by making room for something new that you're going to be equipped not only to go out and work in your particular catechetical field but to be able to resist and forgive the buffets and the blows that are heading your way if they're not already very soon you'll be left out of town like a clown that's what we have to prepare for to be compassionate and to greet those blows with the same mercy the same love, the same forgiveness that Christ gave and asked for for those who persecuted him that they know not what they're doing so let's wrap up and then pray we're making room for something new and it's God's work and I think the work that God is particularly interested in is something new is that God is very interested in helping you to forget your sins, to remember not the things of old because he's already forgotten and you're just catching up and God is also asking you only by his grace to forgive others to participate in giving mercy so that you can also receive that same beautiful trinitarian flow of mercy let's pray for you and we are weak and we are in need of your grace we thank you Lord for calling us to this wonderful, this joyous this beautiful task of handing on the faith but Lord we can't do it our hearts are weak our hearts are old and we're asking you please Lord to give us, to put in us a new heart we're asking you Lord to please fill us with a new faith to transform our minds, to trust you to the Almighty God that you forgive sins there's no God before you and you've forgiven us and we ask you Lord to fill us with a new hope to purify our memories that we can look forward to our inheritance and to truly in you to forget our sins and we ask you Lord to please give us a new charity that we can love you that we can love our neighbors that we can love our enemies with your undying, your compassionate love and Lord we recognize we have a lot of work to do but the first work is yours we can do nothing without you we need your love and we need your grace and we come before you now Lord to please ask for a fresh outpouring of your Holy Spirit to transform us into the life of your son so we can make of ourselves a living offering to you Holy Father who are worthy of our praise