YOU GUYS, I AM SO EXCITED!
Okay, Before we get into today’s piece, I finally get to tell you about something I’ve been building.
On November 29, the First Sunday of Advent, we’re beginning A Walk With Jesus of Nazareth.
The idea is wonderfully simple:
What would happen if, for thirty days, we simply paid closer attention to Jesus?
His life. His words. His world. The people He notices. The questions He answers. The questions He doesn’t. The familiar Gospel stories we may know so well that we’ve stopped noticing how strange, beautiful, demanding, and sometimes inconvenient they actually are.
But here’s the fun part.
I don’t want to disappear into my study, build the whole thing by myself, and then emerge holding stone tablets.
So before the Walk begins, I’m inviting a Founding Community behind the scenes while I build it.
I’ll show you pieces as they take shape. I’ll ask what you’ve always wanted to understand about Jesus. I’ll ask which stories deserve another look and where you want to see the Gospel brought into serious conversation with the life you’re actually living.
And some of what you send me may change what I build.
I want the people who eventually take the First Walk to have fingerprints on it before we ever begin.
If you’d like to be one of them:
The First Walk begins November 29.
Come and see.
Your Brother in Christ,
What is mine to do? Thoughts and Prayers Part Two
Learning to share the work of caring for one another.
I bet you’ve been here before, a friend asks whether you can take her to an appointment on Tuesday. You can, so you say yes.
She needs a ride the following week, too. Then there is a prescription to collect, and someone ought to make sure she has food in the house. You know she is having a difficult time. Her kids live in another state. Before long, you are rearranging your own appointments around hers, and the thought of another Tuesday begins to make you tired.
Nothing about her need has become less real. And you genuinely care about her. But somewhere along the way, an offer to help once has become an arrangement nobody quite remembers making.
How do you talk about that without feeling that you are withdrawing your love?
In the first reflection, we considered what it means to promise someone our prayers. We can mean those words sincerely, and prayer can help us notice something we are able to offer. Now I want to stay with what happens when the need continues. We have to learn how to care for one another over time, when affection alone will not tell us who is driving on Tuesday.
What did you actually have to give?
St. Paul encounters a practical question about generosity in his second letter to the Corinthians. He is encouraging a collection for other Christians in need. In chapter eight, he says willingness is assessed according to what someone has. He also makes clear that relieving others should not mean burdening the people giving. The purpose is a fair sharing of resources. 2 Corinthians 8:12–15
He is discussing money. But his attention to actual means gives us a useful place to begin when we consider what else we offer.
What did you have when you agreed to the ride? A car, a free morning, and the ability to drive. You may still have the car, clearly. The free morning may be a different matter. Perhaps your work has changed. Perhaps you are recovering from an illness of your own. An honest account of what you can offer now has to include that.
It also has to include the friend. You cannot assume that she knows what this arrangement is costing you, especially if you keep assuring her that everything is fine.
I think many of us would rather become privately resentful than admit that we need to change something. Resentment at least lets us avoid an awkward conversation for another week. Unfortunately, the conversation tends to be considerably worse by the time we finally have it, because by then she’s come to rely on you.
We can start sooner, with what is true. We can do next Tuesday, but we cannot continue every week. We want to help find another arrangement. There may be disappointment in that conversation. There may also be relief in finally knowing what can be counted on.
St. Benedict has a word for the person making the schedule
Saint Benedict’s Rule concerns people who have committed themselves to a shared monastic life. It includes prayer, work, and the considerable business of getting along with the people who happen to live with you.
In chapter 48, he directs that sick or fragile brothers be given suitable work, taking care that they are “neither idle nor oppressed and driven away by the pressure of the work.” The abbot must consider their weakness. Benedict is making provision for participation suited to the person’s condition. Rule, chapter 48
Then, in chapter 64, he tells the abbot to exercise moderation and discretion in assigning work. The leader must consider what people can bear, arranging things so that the strong have something to aspire to and the weak are not driven away. Rule, chapter 64
I am interested in who receives that instruction. The person in charge has something to examine.
That reaches me as a priest. In my last parish, the same few people said yes to every single request. I had a responsibility to look at what we were asking of them. Praising their generosity didn’t tell me whether they were becoming overburdened. I needed to ask, and I needed to make it possible for them to answer honestly.
I didn’t always live up to that.
Families can have their own version of this. One sibling lives nearby to their parents, so caring for them gradually becomes that sibling’s responsibility. Distance limits what the others can do, but there may be bills, phone calls, or arrangements they could handle. The person living closest should not have to invent and supervise every contribution while also doing the daily care.
Benedict was not writing a manual for modern families. But his instruction makes me wonder how often we admire someone’s endurance when we ought to be helping change the conditions that require so much of it.
The person we are helping is part of the conversation
Let’s return to our friend who needs the ride. Before everyone else decides how to organize her life, we ought to ask her.
She may know someone we have not thought of. She may be able to arrange part of the transport herself, once she knows we cannot continue all the time. She may also tell us why a solution that looks perfectly sensible from outside will not work.
There is a responsibility here for the person receiving help. When we have the capacity to take a reasonable step toward addressing our situation, we should take it. If I can make a call, provide information, or keep an agreement, I ought to consider what happens to the people helping me when I leave all of that to them.
Paul holds mutual care and personal accountability together in Galatians. He asks the community to bear one another’s burdens and also tells each person to examine their own work and bear their own load. The surrounding passage concerns restoration and conduct within the community. We should resist using it as a quick test of who deserves assistance. It asks something of each of us. Galatians 6:1–5
The difficult word in our own situation is can. We may think a phone call is a small thing because it is a small thing for us. The friend may be unable to hear well, may not understand what is being requested, or may be frightened of an expense she cannot meet. Until we ask, we are guessing.
Sometimes the next step is to make the call together. Sometimes it is to leave the call with her and agree when you will speak again. Either way, she has a voice in what is happening. We can expect reasonable participation without requiring someone to perform competence they do not possess.
And what if the person really could do something and repeatedly chooses not to? We are allowed to discuss that. We can explain what we are able to continue offering and what needs to change. A limit can be necessary, especially when an arrangement is causing challenges. Where someone depends on essential care, any change needs thought and, where possible, a safe handoff. An exhausted helper needs support in making that decision.
I also have to leave room for the possibility that someone will make a choice I would not make. Helping them does not give me ownership of the outcome. There are ways of being needed that can become very satisfying, and we may not immediately notice when our advice has begun to sound like instructions.
An important word from Father Rich…
What would happen if, for thirty days, we simply paid closer attention to Jesus?
On November 29, the First Sunday of Advent, we begin A Walk With Jesus of Nazareth.
But I’m already building it.
And before everything is finished, I’m inviting a Founding Community behind the scenes with me.
I’ll share pieces while they’re still being worked out. I’ll ask what you’ve always wanted to understand about Jesus, which Gospel stories deserve another look, and where you would like to see the Gospel brought into conversation with the life you’re actually living.
Some of what you send me may even change what I build.
I want the people who eventually take this Walk to have fingerprints on it before we ever begin.
Come and See.
The First Walk begins November 29.
We Continue…
What Leo keeps together
In Dilexi te, his exhortation on love for the poor, Pope Leo XIV writes about helping people find good work so they can develop their abilities and contribute. He then adds that when this is impossible, we cannot abandon them without the necessities of a dignified life. In the following paragraph, he says that almsgiving leaves intact the responsibilities of public authorities and the pursuit of justice. Dilexi te, §§115–116
That is useful information for this conversation. We want people to have a part in improving their circumstances. We also have to face the circumstances in which individual effort meets something it cannot overcome alone.
Our friend can ask about transportation. If no accessible service exists, someone may need to help her navigate what is available. A wider community may need to ask why the service is missing in the first place.
This is where responsibility becomes larger than the relationship between two friends. Churches, public agencies, and those entrusted with professional care have duties and resources of their own. A pastor should help organize the church’s response. A public official has decisions to make about the services people depend on. Those responsibilities cannot all be passed along to whoever is willing to answer the phone.
We may not be able to resolve the larger problem this week. We can still call it out accurately while making arrangements for Tuesday. Otherwise, a failure of provision becomes a private burden, and the person carrying it begins to think that needing relief is a failure of faith.
We have to let other people belong to the work
In First Corinthians, Paul describes the Church as a body whose members have different gifts. The eye cannot dismiss the hand as unnecessary. Nor does a part cease to belong because it cannot do what another part does. He goes further: the members who seem weaker are indispensable. 1 Corinthians 12:14–26
There is something for the capable helper to hear in that. We need other people. We may even have to let them do things differently from the way we would have done them.
Suppose someone else offers to coordinate the rides. You know the routine, and it would be quicker to handle this week yourself. But if you always do, the other person never gets to learn it. Sharing the work may initially take more patience than continuing to carry it.
The friend receiving help belongs to this community as fully as anyone arranging it. Her knowledge of her own life should shape the plan. And if her condition leaves her unable to contribute anything practical, she still belongs. Paul’s body is a poor model for a club that keeps renewing membership according to usefulness.
OKAY, YOU! Yes, you. I am talking to you.
Believe it or not, I am getting to know a great many of you personally. We live hundreds, sometimes thousands of miles apart. Most of us have never met. But you write to me about your families, your worries, the things you are praying about. Over time, I begin to remember who is waiting for test results, whose daughter is struggling, who has been having a hard time since their husband died.
I believe the Holy Spirit works through these connections, even if I could walk right past you on the street without recognizing you. If you recognize me, please stop and introduce yourself. Give me a moment to put the face with the name. You have a considerable advantage in this arrangement.
Anywho, I know that a great many of you are living precisely what I have been describing.
You volunteer before anyone has finished explaining what needs to be done. You keep track of the children and grandchildren, remember the appointment, make the phone call. You slip your grown child a little money because you know things are tight, then quietly put off something you needed yourself. When someone asks how you are doing, you say, “Oh, I’m fine,” because you can see they already have enough on their plate.
I want you to hear something clearly.
It is okay to let other people take care of you sometimes.
Yes, you. I am talking to you.
And I know that may be uncomfortable. You are accustomed to being the person others can count on. Having someone bring you dinner, give you a ride, or listen while you admit how tired you are may leave you wondering whether you have become a burden.
Remember what Paul has been telling us about belonging to one body. You belong to it when you need help, too. The care you have so freely offered other people is meant for you as well.
Someone who loves you may have been looking for a way to help for quite a while. The next time they offer, try telling them what you actually need. Let them have the chance to love you that concretely.
Prayer can help us see what we bring to these arrangements. Perhaps we have been afraid of disappointing someone. Perhaps being indispensable has become more important to us than we wanted to admit. Or perhaps we have been waiting for somebody else to notice a burden we have never explained.
We can bring those discoveries to God and talk to the people involved. There may be something to apologize for, something to ask, or a responsibility we need to accept. We do not have to solve the whole arrangement privately before letting anyone know we are struggling.
Think again of Tuesday. Your friend still needs to get to the appointment. You can tell her what you can manage, hear what she can arrange, and ask who else might help. If the answer is that nobody else is available, that is something you can bring to the wider community together.
You may still be the driver next week. But there could now be a conversation about the week after, and someone willing to have it with you. I think there is reason to be grateful for that. You can pray for your friend without pretending that you have stopped needing help yourself.
A prayer for the work we share
Lord Jesus,
You know the people we are worried about and the promises we have made. Help us see what we can faithfully offer. Give us courage to speak when we need help, and patience to listen when someone tells us they cannot continue.
Bless those who are exhausted by caring for others. Bring people alongside them who will share the work. Guide those entrusted with leadership to notice burdens they have left for someone else to carry.
When we receive help, show us the part we can take. Help us explain what is difficult and accept the assistance we need. Keep us from measuring anyone’s worth by what they can accomplish.
Forgive our impatience and our desire to control. Teach us to trust one another with the work of love, and to trust You where our strength ends.
Amen.
And Now It’s Your Turn
Have you ever had to change an arrangement because you could no longer carry it alone? What helped you have that conversation? Share only what you are comfortable making public, and leave out details that would identify someone else’s private circumstances.
Share this reflection
If someone you love is carrying care that needs to be shared, send this to them with a personal word. It may give you a place to begin a conversation together.
P.S. I’m building something new.
A Walk With Jesus of Nazareth begins November 29.
Before then, I’m bringing a Founding Community inside the workshop to see what I’m building, ask questions, suggest ideas, and help shape the First Walk before it begins.
If that sounds like something you’d enjoy…
Come and see.