Prophets In Our Midst!

Sloughing Towards Galilee: Prophets in Our Midst!

St. John Bosco

Mark 6:1-6

Mark 6:1-6

“1. Leaving that district, he went to his home town, and his disciples accompanied him.

2. With the coming of the Sabbath he began teaching in the synagogue, and most of them were astonished when they heard him. They said, ‘Where did the man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been granted him, and these miracles that are worked through him?

3. This is the carpenter, surely, the son of Mary, the brother of James and Joset and Jude and Simon? His sisters, too, are they not here with us?’ And they would not accept him.

4. And Jesus said to them, ‘A prophet is despised only in his own country, among his own relations and in his own house’;

5. and he could work no miracle there, except that he cured a few sick people by laying his hands on them.

6. He was amazed at their lack of faith. He made a tour round the villages, teaching.”

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    Even in the little village of Nazareth, long before digital over load, folks had to decide how to engage the wisdom and miraculous acts of One among them. Awe and wonder battled with envy and offense–and in today’s Gospel at least for some God -among-them was dismissed as unworthy and irrelevant.

    In today’s world of information overload, where everyone says whatever they want to say on social media how can we know what messages sorting system. But I point to a few people who have been prophets for me.

    I grew up listening to “Mister Rogers“, never missed a show, and his words and actions have radiated through me:

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people to who are helping” “Mister Rogers”.

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“Love isn’t a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like “struggle”. To  love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he is”)Mister Rogers”.)

—–

These were words I heard, read, and my parents had me chew on, until they became reality in my life. This was the heart of the Gospel message over and beyond all else in the “Word of God!”

    During my sophomore year in college, at the end of a retreat, Fr. Dan Berrigan, asked all of us: “If you are afraid when you have nothing to lose, when will you stand up to your fears?

    Thirty one years ago I heard Des Moines. Iowa Catholic Worker, Frank Cardaro,  give a presentation on being a Catholic Worker, pushing me to embrace my inward call, and so the next year I came to San Francisco. His life is a demonstration of the living Christ.

    And in the last six or so years as I have struggled with the over-whelming sense of the anger, and hatred on the internet, the desire to simply turn tail and run away, the young fifteen year old saint, Carlo Acutis reminds me:

“Life is a gift, because as long as we are on the planet, we can grow in our ability to love. The more we learn to love, the more we will enjoy eternal blessedness with God” (Carlo Acutis).

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    With their lives and ministries these four have shown me the answer.

These ordinary prophets are pillars of my spiritual, moral, and professional life. Their lives–and their few words–point me to God, to my friends on the street, whom we separate ourselves from, so often, rather than seeing them simply as human beings. I help them, and I find they help me more than anyone else! These four saints, along with my friends on the street point me to the Divine within myself. I have found in the words of Terry Pratachett: “The meaning of life is to find your gift. To find your gift is happiness.”

     Whenever I stray from my role as prophet they call me back! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

http://www.temenos.org

415-305-2124

snap/chat: riodamien2

Mission in Life! (Revised January 1, 2024):

The best summary for my mission in life is found in the statement that:

“Obedience to Christ does not consist in

engaging in propaganda, nor in engaging in propaganda, nor even in stirring people up, but in being a living mystery. It means to live in such away that’s one’s life would not make sense if God did not exist.”

Being a ‘living mystery’ means to love ‘to the point of folly, and in the words of Kawaga:

“I am a free lance tramp, a vagabond for Christ. I must go until Christ’s work is done. I go like the wind.”

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Keeping Perspective!

“Sloughing Towards Galilee!”

KEEPING Perspective!

Third Sunday in Ordinary Time!

January 28, 2024

Deuteronomy 18:15-20;Psalm 111;

I Corinthians 8:1-13; Mark 1:21-25

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    I woke up early this Tuesday morning listening to the rain. In years past I have been out passing out socks, blankets, clothes, and food, but this year I stay in. I have always taken ill, the day after, and remain sick for several weeks, and therefore am not present to others. So I take care of my self. I am keeping things in perspective!

    I love laying in bed and going to sleep listening to the rain drops, best sleeping pill one can have, yet I am always edgy knowing how many suffer without housing, blankets, on the street. I am keeping things in perspective!

    Keeping perspective is one thing I have had difficulty with all of my life, for I want everything to turn out perfectly, and (LOL) that never happens! We are all broken vessels, and thus is our society and the Church!

    We worship at the foot of the  false gods of politicians–office holders and candidates, who promise us the false salvation of economic security, the false god of being right about everything, false god of expecting our government  fixing homelessness, of expecting others to meet our expectations.  I prefer keeping the perspective of our broken humanity, and need to do our best!

    All of my early life I was taught that the United States is “the land of the free!” But in “coming out“myself, caring for the um-housed,  people of color and migrants learned the phrase means different things to different people. 

    We enter this election season hearing so many different perspectives on  immigration, gun ownership, abortion, and the rights of the homeless. We are so divided, that many of us will not speak, let along listen to other perspectives. Let us keep the perspective! Let us be open to the perspective of each others broken humanity!

    Paul, in I Corinthians 8, reminds us that we all have our rights to discern our own actions, and to be mindful and lead by example(verse 9: “Only be careful that this freedom of yours  does not in any way turn into an obstacle to trip those who are vulnerable. (Revised New Jerusalem Bible).

    The message of Paul is to eat whatever you choose, in order not to offend other persons.

    I am learning to take that to heart as well, rather than having people fix a vegetarian meal when I come to visit, which is offensive to some, I eat what is put before me. I am keeping things in perspective!

    This message of Paul reflects the summary of the Great Commandment of Jesus, “You shall love the Lord your God, with all of your mind, your heart, your mind, your soul, and strength,  and love your neighbor as yourself.” This is the creed of all major religions–to love another as we wished to be love.

    In Psalm 111, the poet high lights the Lord’s faithfulness to the community rather than to any one individual. As Nancy L. deCaisse-Walford has written in The Shape of the Book of Psalms, although the Psalms highlights and individuals words of thanks to God, they reflect God’s faithfulness to a whole community. The rights and concerns of the individual are important, but the welfare of those at the margins is paramount.

    For myself as a Christian, Bishop Oscar Romero summed this up in his book: The Violence of Love, “Authority to Teach:

To Know Christ is to know God.

Christ is the homily

that keeps explaining to us continually

THAT GOD IS LOVE…

Let us during the next months heed the words of Jack Kornfield, and be at peace and  with one another:

“Be open to whatever you experience without fighting;

Let it be present just as it is.

Let go of the battle.”

(Jack Kornfield).

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Fr, C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

415-305-2124

http://www.temenos.org

punkpriest1@gmail.com

Snap chat: riodaimien2

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“Be open to whatever you experience without fighting;

Let it be present just as it is.

Let go of the battle (Jack Kornfield).

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This Old Room!

“Sloughing Towards Galilee!”

This Old Room!

St. Francis de Sales

January 24, 2024

Third Week in Ordinary Time

Second Samuel 7:4-17;

Mark 4:1-20:

Mark 4:1-20:

“1. Again he began to teach them by the lakeside, but such a huge crowd gathered round him that he got into a boat on the water and sat there. The whole crowd were at the lakeside on land.

2. He taught them many things in parables, and in the course of his teaching he said to them,

3. ‘Listen! Imagine a sower going out to sow.

4. Now it happened that, as he sowed, some of the seed fell on the edge of the path, and the birds came and ate it up.

5. Some seed fell on rocky ground where it found little soil and at once sprang up, because there was no depth of earth;

6. and when the sun came up it was scorched and, not having any roots, it withered away.

7. Some seed fell into thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it produced no crop.

8. And some seeds fell into rich soil, grew tall and strong, and produced a good crop; the yield was thirty, sixty, even a hundredfold.’

9. And he said, ‘Anyone who has ears for listening should listen!’

10. When he was alone, the Twelve, together with the others who formed his company, asked what the parables meant.

11. He told them, ‘To you is granted the secret of the kingdom of God, but to those who are outside everything comes in parables,

12. so that they may look and look, but never perceive; listen and listen, but never understand; to avoid changing their ways and being healed.’

13. He said to them, ‘Do you not understand this parable? Then how will you understand any of the parables?

14. What the sower is sowing is the word.

15. Those on the edge of the path where the word is sown are people who have no sooner heard it than Satan at once comes and carries away the word that was sown in them.

16. Similarly, those who are sown on patches of rock are people who, when first they hear the word, welcome it at once with joy.

17. But they have no root deep down and do not last; should some trial come, or some persecution on account of the word, at once they fall away.

18. Then there are others who are sown in thorns. These have heard the word,

19. but the worries of the world, the lure of riches and all the other passions come in to choke the word, and so it produces nothing.

20. And there are those who have been sown in rich soil; they hear the word and accept it and yield a harvest, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.”

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    For the last twenty-nine years and three and a half months, I have lived in this room, my home,  in San Francisco. I chose it because I wanted to live as close to the hustlers and homeless people I ministered to.

    This building was built in 1910, for railroad workers, and moved through the various echoes of San Francisco culture, for when I moved in it was all gays who lived here, and now all tech and mostly straight.

    In this room thousands of young men and women have come through the years, where they were fed, given a place to rest, and if sick, a place to sleep; this room has heard thousands of stories and confessions filled with so much pain of rejection, and loneliness; twice a month we celebrate the Eucharist for a number of nurses and hospital workers who work the night shift.     Each has left a mark on this room and on me. Martin Scorsese says: The Church is found on the streets! We sew the seeds in this room and on the streets of the Churches presence!  Much seed has been sewn in this room!

    Through this room we have had the experience of the Apostle Paul in a more modern context and in the City of San Francisco: (2 Corinthians 11:4-31):

“4 Five times my own people gave me 39 lashes with a whip. 25 Three times the Romans beat me with a big stick, and once my enemies stoned me. I have been shipwrecked three times, and I even had to spend a night and a day in the sea. 26 During my many travels, I have been in danger from rivers, robbers, my own people, and foreigners. My life has been in danger in cities, in deserts, at sea, and with people who only pretended to be the Lord’s followers.

27I have worked and struggled and spent many sleepless nights. I have gone hungry and thirsty and often had nothing to eat. I have been cold from not having enough clothes to keep me warm. 28Besides everything else, each day I am burdened down, worrying about all the churches. 29When others are weak, I am weak too. When others are tricked into sin, I get angry.+

30If I have to brag, I will brag about how weak I am. 31God, the Father of our Lord Jesus, knows I am not lying. And God is to be praised forever!”

I have sewn the seed of vulnerability through this room.

    We do not live at the beginning: we come onto the scene in the middle of the play of redemption. We gather around the table with our hopes and our baggage–the rugs are slick and stained from wear, some funny stains along the bottom of the wall, original sins that predate our arrival. They are ours now.

    These texts and all of the Gospels are carried forward by the community of believers; they come to us already smudged, the corner of a favored passage folded over, and some times torn a part.

    We live here together in the Old House of the reign of God on earth, from which we are called to make repair until it includes all people and all creation not in some “heavenly place”, but here on earth! In the now!

    I have grown up here, and even as my body ages, weakens,  is broken and hurts from arthritis, old injuries and hearing the words of many critics  calling me  “a kid”, I laugh, I own them, I claim them in the words of  George Santayana: “Nothing is inherently and invincibly young except spirit,” and my spirit is young  continuing to hear the  words of Albert Schweitzer:

He comes to us as One unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lakeside. He came to those men who knew Him not. He speaks to us the same word:

‘Follow thou me!’ and sets us the tasks which he has to fulfill for our time. He commands. And those who obey Him, whether they be wise or simple, He will reveal Himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they will pass through in His fellowship, and as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience Who He Is.”

Deo Gratis! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

Snap Chat: “riodamien2”

pay pal can be found on http://www.temenos.org

415-305-2124

http://www.temenos.org

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“Our life of grace and our life of the body goes on beautifully intermingled and harmonious. “All is grace,” as the dying priest whispered to his friend in ‘The Diary of a Country Priest.” The Little Flower also said, “All is grace” (Dorothy Day).

Let Love Ache

Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.

when others keep on hurting.

help me to live an achy love, a gritty,

persistent and emptying love;

a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other

who has little left to offer in return.

And may I tread faithfully with heaven

through the unfinished work that surrounds me.

Catching the Big Fish!

Sloughing Towards Bethlehem Catching the Big Fish!

Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

January 21, 2024

Mark 1:14-20:

14. After John had been arrested, Jesus went into Galilee. There he proclaimed the gospel from God saying,

15. ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is close at hand. Repent, and believe the gospel.’

16. As he was walking along by the Lake of Galilee he saw Simon and Simon’s brother Andrew casting a net in the lake — for they were fishermen.

17. And Jesus said to them, ‘Come after me and I will make you into fishers of people.’

18. And at once they left their nets and followed him.

19. Going on a little further, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John; they too were in their boat, mending the nets.

20. At once he called them and, leaving their father Zebedee in the boat with the men he employed, they went after him.

“River”,

This week I spend time with your dissertation, which I’ve had for too long, I’m sorry.  I want to finish it and return it to your custody. 

I’ve been thinking about why there are few who do what you do.  Your dissertation supplies a large factor at play.  Fear.  I have thought for a long time that although money is said to be the root of all evil, fear must be right at its heels as a close second.  I’m OK with the fact that I will never live a ministry such as yours. But if I asked the question “Why not?” my answer would most certainly be fear.  Fear of the unknown. Fear of not having enough.  Fear of injury or death. 

Which is one of the reasons you are the most courageous person I have known.  Barbara Lovejoy thinks so, too. 

See you Tuesday,

David”

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Davids letter is very complimentary, so why would I take the chances that I do?

I remember standing around a camp fire, singing the closing hymn, Amazing Grace when I was twelve, and felt my heart “strangely warmed“, as John Wesley shared. I knew in those moments God in Christ was calling me to preach.

From that time forward there was a “raging fire” with in my heart to be a priest. And that fire has lead me from my father’s profitable business to seminary, serving in Missouri and Iowa, and finally, thirty years ago to San Francisco.

It is odd to have a stranger show up during a closing camp fire and at twelve hear his life changing  promise of a bigger “gig”: “Follow me and I will make you fishers of people.”

One would think of Jesus coming across as the “teller of tales” like the father character in Tim Burton’s movie, “Big Fish.” Who would trade ownership in a profitable business to leave everything and follow Jesus?

I was laughed at, joked about and belittled during my teen years, my parents resisted for a time, and  the “raging fire” continued to burn through college, seminary, and the two doctorate that followed. I fell away for a while, but that call was like a “raging fire”and I returned coming to San Francisco and Temenos Catholic Worker was borne.

Ched Myers noted in  Binding the Strong Man that the phrase “fishers of people,” goes back to Amos 4:2 and Ezekiel 29:4, where catching fish with hooks rather than nets is an euphemism for judgment upon those who engage in oppressive practices. In essence, Jesus is inviting the disciples to hold accountable the “big fish” in the oppressive system, the disciples signed up quickly, and I as well.

Christian discipleship is rooted in a commitment to justice, and not about pleasing the powers that be.

The radical change to which Christ calls us may cause profound discomfort for those whose welfare is closely tied to keep structures that oppress intact. Fortunately, the disciples who were powerless accepted the invitation of Jesus despite the risks.

The disciples accepted the invitation because they had so much to more to lose by not accepting the invitation to follow him.

When people try to figure me out, to understand my ministry, and logically try to make an explanation, they always fail, because their is “a raging fire” within my life that has called and continues to call me on this journey, and will call until I enter the kingdom and hear Jesus say, “Well done good and faithful servant!”

And rather than continue to try to explain, the “why’s”, and “my feelings” etc I am taking the words of Jack Kornfield to heart as a new mantra in my life which is to be:

“Open whatever you experience without fighting; Let it be present just as it is. Let go of the battle!

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

==============================================================================

Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

Snap Chat: “riodamien2”

pay pal can be found on http://www.temenos.org

415-305-2124

http://www.temenos.org

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“Our life of grace and our life of the body goes on beautifully intermingled and harmonious. “All is grace,” as the dying priest whispered to his friend in ‘The Diary of a Country Priest.” The Little Flower also said, “All is grace” (Dorothy Day).

Let Love Ache

Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.

when others keep on hurting.

help me to live an achy love, a gritty,

persistent and emptying love;

a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other

who has little left to offer in return.

And may I tread faithfully with heaven

through the unfinished work that surrounds me.

Don’t Be Afraid My Friend!

Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday

Monday of the Second Week In Ordinary Time!

January 15, 2024

“Don’t Be Afraid, my Friend!”

Mark 2:18-22 (Revised New Jerusalem Bible)

2:18 One day when John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting, some people came and said to him, ‘Why is it that John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not?’

2:19 Jesus replied, ‘Surely the bridegroom’s attendants would never think of fasting while the bridegroom is still with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they could not think of fasting.

2:20 But the time will come for the bridegroom to be taken away from them, and then, on that day, they will fast.

2:21 No one sews a piece of unshrunken cloth on an old cloak; if he does, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and the tear gets worse.

2:22 And nobody puts new wine into old wineskins; if he does, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost and the skins too. No! New wine, fresh skins!’

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    Tomorrow (January 15) we will celebrate the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., with parades and services, and we will serve cheese pizza on the street in his honor, as a day which calls us to see that  his work is very far from being completed.

    A friend of mine wrote a piece to me which describes where our culture lives:

And yes, myself and all of us have been whores in our lifetime. Middle class whoredom is worse than street whoredom because we hide it, disguise it, analyze it, legitimize it, pretend it is for the downfallen and certain not for us, the respectable burghers.”

    This is a modern day description of the first part of our text this morning:

One day when John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting, some people came and said to him, ‘Why is it that John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not?’

    Our preference is for us to fast in our “middle class” ways, and ignore the racism, classism and

poverty in our midst. We become “whores” to  money, and our lifestyles.

    Just go  out on the streets of San Francisco, we can blame each person who is homeless for being there, or we can look inward and take our responsibility of wanting more and more for where they are.

    Martin Luther King, Jr., was a prophet who called the people of his and our day into facing their responsibility towards racism. He suffered, and he died, to bring hope to our Black brothers and sisters , and challenged the war in Vietnam, calling all of us to non-violence.

    He calls all us  to work for equality and non-violence!

    And so on his birthday, lets pray, in the words of my friend, we can return to the “wilderness”, where we find ourselves, and our ability to see all as “one”:

“Yes, I believe that there is wilderness in all of us, and that our spiritual task is to know and accept that isolation. The only way we can do that is to find our God, a God within and not out there, somewhere. We may wander into the wilderness from time to time, but, if we ask Him, our God can help us out.

“We must sew new wineskins!”

“Don’t be afraid, my friend,

Of anything for too long a time.

God is in the middle of darkness,

Just as darkness is in the middle of the Divine.

Don’t be afraid, my friend,

Be just who you are.

Then the lamp that makes both night an day

Is yours through an infinite time.

(The Instructions of Receiving God)

“Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

Snap Chat: “riodamien2”

pay pal can be found on http://www.temenos.org

415-305-2124

http://www.temenos.org

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“Our life of grace and our life of the body goes on beautifully intermingled and harmonious. “All is grace,” as the dying priest whispered to his friend in ‘The Diary of a Country Priest.” The Little Flower also said, “All is grace” (Dorothy Day).

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“Don’t be afraid, my friend,

Of anything for too long a time.

God is in the middle of darkness,

Just as darkness is in the middle of the Divine.

Don’t be afraid, my friend,

Be just who you are.

Then the lamp that makes both night an day

Is yours through an infinite time.

(The Instructions of Receiving God)

The Voice of Mercy and Light!

Sunday, January 14, 2024

Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

The Voice of Mercy and Light

I Samuel 3:1-16 (New Revised Jerusalem Bible)

1. Now, the boy Samuel was serving Yahweh in the presence of Eli; in those days it was rare for Yahweh to speak; visions were uncommon.

2. One day, it happened that Eli was lying down in his room. His eyes were beginning to grow dim; he could no longer see.

3. The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying in Yahweh’s sanctuary, where the ark of God was,

4. when Yahweh called, ‘Samuel! Samuel!’ He answered, ‘Here I am,’

5. and, running to Eli, he said, ‘Here I am, as you called me.’ Eli said, ‘I did not call. Go back and lie down.’ So he went and lay down.

6. And again Yahweh called, ‘Samuel! Samuel!’ He got up and went to Eli and said, ‘Here I am, as you called me.’ He replied, ‘I did not call, my son; go back and lie down.’

7. As yet, Samuel had no knowledge of Yahweh and the word of Yahweh had not yet been revealed to him.

8. Again Yahweh called, the third time. He got up and went to Eli and said, ‘Here I am, as you called me.’ Eli then understood that Yahweh was calling the child,

9. and he said to Samuel, ‘Go and lie down, and if someone calls say, “Speak, Yahweh; for your servant is listening.” ‘ So Samuel went and lay down in his place.

10. Yahweh then came and stood by, calling as he had done before, ‘Samuel! Samuel!’ Samuel answered, ‘Speak, Yahweh; for your servant is listening.’

11. Yahweh then said to Samuel, ‘I am going to do something in Israel which will make the ears of all who hear of it ring.

12. I shall carry out that day against Eli everything that I have said about his family, from beginning to end.

13. You are to tell him that I condemn his family for ever, since he is aware that his sons have been cursing God and yet has not corrected them.

14. Therefore — I swear it to the family of Eli — no sacrifice or offering shall ever expiate the guilt of Eli’s family.’

15. Samuel lay where he was until morning and then opened the doors of Yahweh’s temple. Samuel was afraid to tell Eli about the vision,

16. but Eli called Samuel and said, ‘Samuel, my son.’ ‘Here I am,’ he replied.

17. Eli asked, ‘What message did he give you? Please do not hide it from me. May God bring unnameable ills on you and worse ones, too, if you hide from me anything of what he said to you.’

18. Samuel then told him everything, hiding nothing from him. Eli said, ‘He is Yahweh; let him do what he thinks good.’

19. Samuel grew up. Yahweh was with him and did not let a single word fall to the ground of all that he had told him.

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When I was a young boy, one of my favorite church hymns was “Here I am Lord!” I especially loved the refrain: “Here I am Lord. Is it I, Lord. If  you lead me/ I will hold your people in my heart(Don Schutte). These lyrics are based in part on today’s passage from the first book of Samuel.

I resonated back with Samuel’s reservation’s about hearing God’s voice. There is no thunderbolt, God reveals himself in little  ways.

Discernment is like that. Some of us have had that experience where we can spot God’s finger prints, similar to my call at camp when I felt my heart “strangely warmed”, and knew I was called.

But most of the time it can feel like guess work. We assemble a few pieces , starting with the edges only to wait to try to make sense out of the middle section. This is the way it is often for me. My discernment is not black and white, but often like putting puzzle pieces together, but the one thing I am sure about is God’s call to ministry.

I have learned the truth of Robert Burch’s words:

“The meaning I picked, the one that changed my life. Overcome fear; behold wonder.”

I answered the call to ministry and over the years my life has been changed for the better.

Last summer my plane to Palm Springs had been delayed. A young man was crying across from me, and I simply walked over and sat down. Sitting, he looked up, after a few minutes and I smiled, and asked, “What’s going on?” He spilled it all out in the next forty-five minutes.

 I am subtle in the way I communicate God’s mercy and the light of Jesus.

Both must shine through us, absent the kind of audible messages that Samuel and the disciples of Jesus received. But each one of us is called to communicate our love for the other! Each one of us is called to see each other as children of the same God. Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

Snap Chat: “riodamien2”

pay pal can be found on http://www.temenos.org

415-305-2124

http://www.temenos.org

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“Our life of grace and our life of the body goes on beautifully intermingled and harmonious. “All is grace,” as the dying priest whispered to his friend in ‘The Diary of a Country Priest.” The Little Flower also said, “All is grace” (Dorothy Day).

Let Love Ache

Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.

when others keep on hurting.

help me to live an achy love, a gritty,

persistent and emptying love;

a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other

who has little left to offer in return.

And may I tread faithfully with heaven

through the unfinished work that surrounds me.

Called to Be Saints!

Called to Be Saints!

“To all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints Romans 1:7)”

My life is very ordinary filled with anxiety over my health, if I am going to have enough money to survive with, and if I have friends,  but these four individuals lead me in “calling me to be  a saint:”

St. Francis of Assisi, Dorothy Day, Damien of Molokai, and Carlo Auctis, are  saints I find inspiration through  to take on the ordinary things that God calls me to do each day.

In my few quiet moments of saying the Divine Office: morning noon, evening and night prayer, I might not see a vision of St. Francis of Assisi, Dorothy, Damien nor Carlos,  I might never found a religious order or write beautiful editorials, and inspire the creation of houses of hospitality,  serve on a an isolated island, or simply be one who inspires others through his works of supporting the Eucharist, and using the internet for Jesus,  but I can seek to know and do God’s will every moment of every day. I can allow God to work in my life.

That is how ordinary people living ordinary lives can become great saints.

Sainthood is not an exclusive club for the lucky few; it is a calling for each one of us and, as St. Teresa of Avila said, requires nothing but a deep friendship with God and a burning desire to do His will.

 As the French novelist Léon Bloy wrote:

“The only tragedy is not to become a saint.” 

Francis, Dorothy, Damien, and Carlos,  were real people living in the real world who endeavored every day to embrace the will of God.

As I have been “sloughing towards Galilee these past three decades I have heard people through the years standing around, telling me what I should be doing. But what I know is that:

“I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be.”– Douglas Adams, and like Dorothy all I can say in the end of each day is: “I tried!” Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

Snap Chat: “riodamien2”

pay pal can be found on http://www.temenos.org

415-305-2124

http://www.temenos.org

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“Our life of grace and our life of the body goes on beautifully intermingled and harmonious. “All is grace,” as the dying priest whispered to his friend in ‘The Diary of a Country Priest.” The Little Flower also said, “All is grace” (Dorothy Day).

Let Love Ache

Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.

when others keep on hurting.

help me to live an achy love, a gritty,

persistent and emptying love;

a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other

who has little left to offer in return.

And may I tread faithfully with heaven

through the unfinished work that surrounds me.

Sloughing Towards Galilee#

“Sloughing Towards Galilee!”

Mark 16:7

But you must go and tell his disciples and Peter, “He is going ahead of you to Galilee; that is where you will see him, just as he told you.” ‘

Recently I was looking for a piece on Epiphany and ran a cross-a post by the poet  David Whyte. The title  — “A Star for Navigation.” . The post was about finding one’s true work and vocation:

“Every work begins as an intimation and discovery. Like the first time as a child we walk to the edge of a Yorkshire field, glimpse a new horizon, and immediately want to go there. We do not know where the horizon will take us. We have a glimmering, an inclination, a notion that somehow we will find something beyond our present knowledge. . . Each of us, somewhere in the biography of our childhood, remembers a moment where we felt a portion of the world calling and beckoning to us.”

It brought me back to the moment, at twelve years old, sitting around a campfire at “Arcadia” our United Methodist Church Camp on a warm summer’s night, I felt my heart “strangely warmed” and I was grasped with the loving presence of Christ, a love that can not be explained, saying: “Preach the Gospel!” From that moment on I was compelled to pour all of my energy into that summons.

Christ was so real in those moments, and throughout my life in the good times and the bad, I never feel alone! 

Two of the greatest influences in my life  were a book by Taylor Caldwell, No One Hears But Him!,  in which she portrays God as One who simply “listens”, and the sermon at my ordination by Bishop Robert Goodrich in which he told us, “You shall ‘wait on tables’ the rest of your lives.”

In paraphrasing a title by Joan Didion, in the weeks ahead, looking towards our 30th anniversary celebration, October 4, 2024, I am going to write a couple a times a week on my attempt to be a “listener” on the street, “waiting on tables!” In attempting to follow Jesus I am “Sloughing towards Galilee,” little by little.

I am giving out Christmas gifts through Epiphany, and several days ago one gentleman I encountered was “Jim,”, around 40. He sat on the sidewalk, looking sad, and lonely, and as I knelt down and gave him his gift, his face simply lit up like the sun.

In listening he shared of being on the street for ten years, no family, feeling dejected, and never fitting in. Jim shared of not feeling safe in the shelters, and of being beaten, and hurt. I gave him some food, and with a smile on his face I moved on.

I am always asked “Why can’t you do more?” And to myself I laugh, for through the years, and especially in these days of social media, my biggest support, help, and care came from simply being listened to, and sitting down having a meal with someone. “Listening” and sharing “Food” are great healers!

I invite you to join me in “Sloughing Towards Galilee,” and to “listen” to my story, and those I “listen” to, simply listen without judgement, and see where you can “listen” to those around you. Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

Snap Chat: “riodamien2”

pay pal can be found on http://www.temenos.org

415-305-2124

http://www.temenos.org

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“Our life of grace and our life of the body goes on beautifully intermingled and harmonious. “All is grace,” as the dying priest whispered to his friend in ‘The Diary of a Country Priest.” The Little Flower also said, “All is grace” (Dorothy Day).

Let Love Ache

Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.

when others keep on hurting.

help me to live an achy love, a gritty,

persistent and emptying love;

a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other

who has little left to offer in return.

And may I tread faithfully with heaven

through the unfinished work that surrounds me.

Epiphany, 2024

Epiphany, 2024

January 7, 2024

Matthew, 2:1-12 New Jerusalem Bible

1. After Jesus had been born at Bethlehem in Judaea during the reign of King Herod, suddenly some wise men came to Jerusalem from the east

2. asking, ‘Where is the infant king of the Jews? We saw his star as it rose and have come to do him homage.’

3. When King Herod heard this he was perturbed, and so was the whole of Jerusalem.

4. He called together all the chief priests and the scribes of the people, and inquired of them where the Christ was to be born.

5. They told him, ‘At Bethlehem in Judea, for this is what the prophet wrote:

6. And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, you are by no means the least among the leaders of Judah, for from you will come a leader who will shepherd my people Israel.’

7. Then Herod summoned the wise men to see him privately. He asked them the exact date on which the star had appeared

8. and sent them on to Bethlehem with the words, ‘Go and find out all about the child, and when you have found him, let me know, so that I too may go and do him homage.’

9. Having listened to what the king had to say, they set out. And suddenly the star they had seen rising went forward and halted over the place where the child was.

10. The sight of the star filled them with delight,

11. and going into the house they saw the child with his mother Mary, and falling to their knees they did him homage. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh.

12. But they were given a warning in a dream not to go back to Herod, and returned to their own country by a different way.

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Epiphany is a season in which we celebrate the revelation of Christ to the world, it is a joyous time!

The photo that leads off our article expresses the feeling of many about the institutional Church, and Jesus of Nazareth, bent, broken, and used as a tool of oppression. In many ways I often feel personally the same way!

I remember many years ago Hilary Clinton spoke:, “It takes a village to raise a child,” And in reality it takes a village for each one of us to survive.

Today we are not surviving very well: drug use is rampant, divisions over race, politics, and economics, tear us a part. We see homeless and the deeply poor as the enemy.

Yet even through our societies connected by technology, the rule of law, and a global economy, our relationships are very much rooted in social media, and the internet, leaving us personally alone.

On Facebook  we are always have individuals look back at the fifties, sixties, seventies, eighties and nineties as times of connectedness. None of those eras were very romantic, but we did not have people centering their friendships, and for many all relationships on social media. One young woman recently posted: “All my friends and relationships are online, I do not feel like I belong in the outside world.”

Often I feel very much alone, I try to relate to every person as unique, not belonging to any villages, but being open to every individual.

Our lifelong efforts to map our uniqueness do not defeat our collective connections. I am connected to different villages and they all reflect our social, cultural, national, spiritual, and generational identifications. I am out spoken about people being hurt, and I respect all of our political persuasions.

I believe with all of my heart that our call from Jesus is to love our neighbors, to house, feed, and care for each other, with out any thought of political persuasion, race, sexual orientation, or ethical stance–for each one of us is a child of God.

True love is counter-cultural because it is the conscious choice to love and to will the good of those who are deemed unlovable.

True love is cross-cultural because no one of any race, creed, color, sexual orientation, ability or disability can be excluded from it. True love is having the wide, embracing, redeeming, merciful love of Jesus!

Let us raise the Cross of the Cosmic Christ, the Universal One who is inclusive of all spiritual expressions of love!

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

Snap Chat: “riodamien2”

pay pal can be found on http://www.temenos.org

If you are writing checks predate them for today!

415-305-2124

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“Our life of grace and our life of the body goes on beautifully intermingled and harmonious. “All is grace,” as the dying priest whispered to his friend in ‘The Diary of a Country Priest.” The Little Flower also said, “All is grace” (Dorothy Day).

Let Love Ache

Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.

when others keep on hurting.

help me to live an achy love, a gritty,

persistent and emptying love;

a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other

who has little left to offer in return.

And may I tread faithfully with heaven

through the unfinished work that surrounds me.

#Embracing Death!

New Years Day!, 2024

Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live,^k

26 and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die..

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In the past, my New Year’s resolutions have looked a lot like most agencies and people: ranging from how to give our ministry a “cool look;” attracting more volunteers, more money, and personally de cluttering my mind and closet.

But for 2024, I am changing things up. For sure. I could still benefit from maintaining my vegan diet, cutting down on watching T.V. and screen time. But after the last few years marked by my health risks, so many untimely deaths of my friends on the street, apathy of local churches and funding for people on the street, it’s a time for a rethinking.

My resolution for the coming year is to center more on reflection of death.

In a time for the relentless pursuit of goals–“how many people do you feed? how many do you see daily? etc. and the perpetual busyness of life, a conscious and regular meditation on death, both our own and that of others, can be a guide toward using our limitless time more wisely, and meaningful.

Research has shown that reflecting on death in a regular and thoughtful manner enhances gratitude for the present and strengthens our relationships. Such reflection acts as a reality check, resulting in accessing our life goals and shifting our focus to more intrinsically and meaningful goals. By acknowledging the impermanence of life we appreciate people, and look at life more compassionately.

The actor John Stamos, mourning the death of his friend Rob Sager, whom he had recently had a final meal with, commented, “If you’re with someone you love, stay a little longer, have the cake, have some coffee.”

Last year I attended the memorial service on Zoom of a long time supporter and friend. The last time we had had a meal he was angry at me over something someone had told him, and he let me have it. He later sent me an “email” apologizing, the day before he died. I never was able to lay my eyes upon him and say, “No worries it is forgotten! Lets have dinner!

We should always have time simply to sit, be with people, without questions, and judgement. And I never discuss anything over a meal that is hateful or critical.

We use our contemplation of death to raise our awareness of our mortality as a guide post to intentional living.

And so in the next year when people talk bad about me; do not have time to sit down, visit and have a meal; have no respect and judge my beliefs and positions; my style of life; and betrays me; I will simply smile, dust off my feet, and move on.

In a world that glorifies youth, wealth, color of one’s skin, political beliefs one way or the other, and the endless tomorrows, perhaps the key to a fruitful life lies in acknowledging that each day and moment is a precious gift, it is  all that we have.

This life has taught me to take nothing for granted.  In her poem, “When Death Comes,” Mary Oliver writes:

When it’s over. I don’t want to wonder if I have made of my life something particular, and real.”

I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened, or full of argument.

I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world!

I do not either! I want to live a life of love and service to others! I want to live a life of faith!

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

Snap Chat: “riodamien2”

pay pal can be found on http://www.temenos.org

If you are writing checks predate them for today!

415-305-2124

—————————————————-

“Our life of grace and our life of the body goes on beautifully intermingled and harmonious. “All is grace,” as the dying priest whispered to his friend in ‘The Diary of a Country Priest.” The Little Flower also said, “All is grace” (Dorothy Day).

Let Love Ache

Father, give me the courage to keep on loving.

when others keep on hurting.

help me to live an achy love, a gritty,

persistent and emptying love;

a love that’s not afraid to flow toward the other

who has little left to offer in return.

And may I tread faithfully with heaven

through the unfinished work that surrounds me.