Thread: In Poland, where homophobia is rampant, LGBT people are on trial for "desecrating" a copy of the Black Madonna. But Mary is for everyone, including LGBT people, and there is a long history of portraying her as part of different faith communities... americamagazine.org/faith/2021/01/…
She is especially important to communities that have been persecuted or marginalized. For example, Father John Giuliani, who died recently, often portrayed her as a Native American woman, with Native American references and symbols prominent in his paintings....
Mary is often portrayed as a woman of color (which she assuredly was) by the contemporary artist Janet McKenzie.
Indeed, for centuries the Blessed Mother has been depicted as a member of communities in which she is venerated. Her image has been "inculturated" over and over, around the world, as here in Japan...
When I was a Jesuit scholastic, I worked with East African refugees who started small businesses in Nairobi, Kenya. Many of them were artists. My friend Mark Lutaaya, a Ugandan refugee, painted this traditional image of "Our Lady of Africa...."
The LGBT community has few images like this. So it is not surprising that they would add their own symbol, the rainbow, in a respectful way, to a beloved image of their mother.
How appropriate that she is weeping, for it her son who suffers whenever an LGBT person is persecuted
Corr: For it is her son who suffers whenever an LGBT person is persecuted.
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"And I say to you, I have also decided to stick with love, for I know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind's problems. And I'm going to talk about it everywhere I go. I know it isn't popular to talk about it in some circles today..."
"And I'm not talking about emotional bosh when I talk about love; I'm talking about a strong, demanding love. For I have seen too much hate. I've seen too much hate on the faces of sheriffs in the South. I've seen hate on the faces of too many Klansmen...
"....and too many White Citizens Councilors in the South to want to hate, myself, because every time I see it, I know that it does something to their faces and their personalities...
Gospel: Today Jesus meets Peter for the first time, after being introduced to him by Andrew, Peter's brother (Jn 2). All of them are in the company of John the Baptist, by the Jordan. But in the other Gospels, their first meeting is quite different. In the Synoptic Gospels...
Jesus comes from Nazareth to the Sea of Galilee where he says, "Come after me, and I will make you fishers of people" (Mt and Mk). And in Luke he performs a miracle before Peter (5:1-11). So which is it? Well, NT scholars generally avoid trying to "harmonize" the Gospels...
But what seems likely to me is this: Jesus, as well as Peter and Andrew, were most likely part of John the Baptist's circle. So it makes sense they would have met in John's company. Perhaps Jesus met Peter and Andrew at the Jordan, took their measure, returned home to reflect...
Gospel: Today Jesus calls Levi (Matthew) from his tax collecting booth in Capernaum (Mk 2). Remember that Jesus has just called four fishermen. How do you think they would have reacted to a tax collector joining their group? We tend to forget the differences within Jesus's...
...group of disciples. Even at this early stage we have two brothers: Peter and Andrew. Do brothers always get along? Then Jesus calls James and John, whose fishing business with their father Zebedee was probably more successful than Peter's and Andrew's. How do we know this?...
We can't be sure but Peter and Andrew are "casting" their nets, from the shore, while James and John are working on their father's boat with "hired hands. So Z's business was probably more successful. So there may have been some rivalry between the two pairs of brothers...
Dear friends: Let's be honest: This is a strange #Christmas, maybe the strangest any of us have ever experienced. Most of us are far from our homes, far from our friends and families, and those who are able to be with their friends and families are afraid, worried or nervous...
In the past few months, all of have faced the prospect of suffering, illness and death, and many of us have experienced great economic hardships.
So what does it mean to say "Merry Christmas"?...
This is the entrance to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. It's a tiny opening, no more than five feet high. Originally it was much larger, but it was made smaller and smaller to ensure that succeeding waves of invaders would not be able to enter the church easily....
"We spoke earlier of narcissism, of armor-plated selves, of people who live off grievance, thinking only of themselves. It is the inability to see that we don't all have the same possibilities available to us....
...It is all too easy for some to take an idea--in this example, personal freedom--and turn it into an ideology, creating a prism through which they judge everything.
You'll never find such people protesting the death of George Floyd...
...or joining a demonstration because there are shantytowns where children lack water or education, or because there are whole families who have lost their income....On such matters they would never protest; they are incapable of moving...
Gospel: Today on the Solemnity of #ChristTheKing Jesus tell us the litmus test for entrance into heaven: how we treat the "least among us." Who are they? The hungry, the thirsty, the sick, the stranger, the imprisoned. God will judge us on how we cared, or didn't care, for them..
There are so many arguments today about what it means to live a Christian life and to be a disciple, but Jesus is clear in today's Gospel passage:
"'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’"