Due to bad driving conditions, I have received word that a meeting I was to attend at St. John Fisher College has been cancelled today. It presents me with an opportunity to return to “blogging” and an article long overdue.

I have been invited this evening to nearby Christ the King parish, to meet with a seventh grade faith formation class to discuss issues of social justice, related to a book I wrote in 2005, entitled You Did It For Me: Care of Your Neighbor as a Spiritual Practice.

Some background to the book: One of the great secrets of the Catholic Church has been social teachings. This tradition is found essentially in the collection of encyclicals on social justice issued by several popes beginning with Pope Leo XIII in 1891, with the historic “Rerum Novarum.” Although most of us are familiar with the doctrinal teachings of the Church which we know from our catechetics formation, few of us are familiar with the Church’s teaching about social justice.

The teachings of the Church in this matter are taken from the Scripture. Many prophets from the Hebrew Scriptures (“Old Testament”) proclaimed God’s special love for the poor and the oppressed and invited the people of Israel to a special covenant of justice and love with Yahweh, their God. The social justice teaching is also well established in the Christian Scriptures, rooted in the life and teachings of Jesus who proclaimed a gospel of love, justice and a special concern for the poor, the hungry stranger and the outcast.

The Good News of Jesus presents a path of life often different from the way of the world. The way of the gospel points to a narrow path that leads to a life lived in its fullness, a lifetime of conversion, living in the world, but not being mastered by it. I have had the privilege of meeting many such pilgrims of faith and have noticed a clear pattern in their lives which I detail also in this book. They spend a great deal of time in prayer, but then spring into action, to help concretely their neighbors in need.

I hope to share these stories of real live people with the class this evening. I am sure they also know people who try to be Jesus in the world today. One of their teachers also sent me some questions I am to answer, not all necessarily related to the topic, but still helpful:

• What else do you do for your community, besides preaching?

• What can I do for my community?

• Should we give money to people on the street?

• Do you wear a cross?

• Have you ever sinned?

• What should I do if I see homeless people?

• How did you get into the topic of the book?

• Why did you want to be a priest?

• Why does the Church think the death penalty is wrong?

• How long have you been a priest?

• If someone had a drug problem and other problems, how do you help them?

• If someone has problems in life how can they get happy or better?

• Will it be good to give poor people on the streets money or food?

• What would you do if you didn’t like your life?

• Why did you decide to write a book?

Some daunting questions. Some, if I could answer, would make a good book! Pray that I may be inspired to help these great kids in their search to know Jesus Christ and his teachings about loving ourselves and our neighbor, as we love God.

(January 29, 2007)