Last weekend, it was Chicago with our son Patrick and his fiancé Lauren. Near the University of Chicago, we passed a neighborhood called Kenwood, and I remembered from my law school days the 1924 “Crime of the Century.” Told the Middllers about Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, two U of C graduate students, who lived with their very wealthy families in Kenwood; both geniuses, they thought themselves Nietzschian supermen. Told the Middlers how petty crimes one day turned to the murder of their teenage neighbor Bobby Franks and how the two had convinced themselves that they were too clever to be caught. But they were—by a couple of smart enough Chicago cops. Clarence Darrow, the best lawyer in the land, couldn’t get them off. All he could do was save them from the hangman’s noose. Loeb died in prison, and Leopold was paroled from his life plus 99 year sentence in 1958. Finally, I told the Middlers about another law school memory—Ephraim London, a professor of mine, who came to know Nathan Leopold in the last years of his life. He lived in Puerto Rico and worked as a nurse’s assistant and x-ray technician in a poor, rural hospital. Leopold said, “The worst punishment comes from inside me. It is the torment of my conscience . . . The only thing I have found in all these years that helped at all is to try to be useful to others.” Superman had changed his attitude.
This Sunday’s gospel appears to be about the cure of the paralytic. And it is. But it’s about something else—attitude. Jesus blessed the attitude of the paralytic’s friends—faith and confidence. He cursed the attitude of the Scribes—cynicism, condescension and disbelief. And what was even more troubling to Jesus was that the attitude of the Scribes was set in concrete, which would continue to harden into murder.
The Middlers sat quietly as we exposed the Blessed Sacrament and thought about our own “Superman” attitudes and how hard and unchanging they can be. And we prayed that Lent might be a time for changing those attitudes.
The Elementaries also spent quiet time before the Blessed Sacrament. We remembered how the paralytic and his friends couldn’t get close to Jesus and had to tear off the roof to get near him. And how blessed are we to be able to get off a school bus, walk into church and be right there next to Jesus. We prayed for family and friends who needed healing. And the kids gave us some amazing definitions of healing—“making people better,” “comforting people,” “caring for people and letting them know people care.” Not curing, but healing. Amazing!!!
Girl Scout Troop 1023
Don’t forget the Girl Scout Troop’s collection for the Food Bank for Westchester. Their box is still in the front hall of the Upper Church for needed items: pretzels, canned vegetables, lentils (bag), and canned tuna.
Enjoy the Winter Recess. When we return, there will be First Penance on February 28, 29 and March 1.
Love,
Deacon Charlie
No comments:
Post a Comment