Yes, my spell check is working. This is a made-up word, obviously based on the word “family.” The suffix -ing shows action, effort, intent, planning. “Familing” is keeping one’s parents and siblings and in-laws connected. Sometimes it means getting everyone in the same place. Or maybe it’s a text or phone call to individual members. Prayer is a greater connector, as we pray for the health and well-being of our loved ones. Our hearts and minds keep our loved ones emotionally close, and our unity in God keeps us spiritually close.

May is usually a month of many opportunities to bring family together with weddings, First Communions, reunions, graduations. Attend each with intent and effort; that is, plan to make conversation meaningful, be attentive to anyone on the periphery, and make “We’ll see you soon” a real promise.

In the ancient Church among the earliest community of Christians there was a man named Joseph, also named by the Apostles, Barnabas meaning “son of encouragement.” The reason for the change in name is not given, but I wonder whether Barnabas’ willingness to sell a “piece of property” and put the money “at the feet of the apostles” encouraged other believers to do the same. The word “encouragement” implies giving others courage, which may be necessary when parting with finances—or parting with other things like our time, our desires, our convenience.

Look for opportunities to be a son or daughter of encouragement. Take courage yourself to give up something important to you. Encourage others to step out in social action. Help with fund-raisers. Say an encouraging word to those who need a little push. With such deeds we become not only sons and daughters of encouragement but also fathers and mothers who pass on an inheritance of encouragement.

According to Chiara Lubich, Jesus had one ideal: “May they all be one.” This was God’s ideal at creation. This was the purpose of the Incarnation. This was the message of Jesus’ life, his last words at the Last Supper. As followers of Jesus, this must be our one and only ideal: unity. How will I increase unity in my family and workplace? When I watch the news, will I recognize the spiritual features of Christ in everyone regardless of race or beliefs and be able to call them brother and sister? When I walk outdoors, will I feel my oneness with all created things? Our world is so divided. Every tiny act of unity (thought, prayer, deed) is badly needed.

Risen Lord, your resurrected life is the power giving unity to everything. Give us the will to solidify the God-given bonds among all people and created things.

The Sacred Triduum is the most sacred time of the year. We do much more than remember past events: Last Supper, crucifixion, resurrection. We celebrate the Paschal Mystery. Jesus Christ died and rose, and so do we. We remember the past events so that we can better be the Christ today. We receive the Eucharist and become what we eat.

When a close friend or relative invites you to a meal, will you attend?  Where else would you be? If your close friend or relative celebrates a victory, would you celebrate with them? Where else would you want to be? If your closest friend or relative is dying, would you be with them? Our God invites us to the Sacred Triduum. Where else would you be?

More than at any other time of the year, the liturgies of the Sacred Triduum stimulate our senses with the potential for fully engaging us. On Holy Thursday our eyes and noses are attuned to the glistening oils carried in procession, our ears hear the ring of bells at the Glory to God, we hear the splash of water during the Washing of Feet, and incense and candles invite us to the Altar of Repose. In contrast are the darkness and emptiness of Good Friday. Even more intense darkness begins the Easter Vigil until the Easter fire is lit. Thrill to the leaping flame. Enjoy the veritable feast for the senses! The lights are bright, the smell of lilies overpowering, the music boisterous, the excitement contagious. Watching the reactions of the newly baptized, we imagine the feel of water dripping into our own eyes. Come to the feast!  Don’t miss it!

Do you ever find yourself remembering, humming, or singing a refrain non-stop? The past few days I keep hearing “He has covered himself in glory.” It’s from Exodus 15, the responsorial psalm after the required Exodus reading from the Easter Vigil. Referring to the Israelites’ triumph over the Egyptians who drowned in the Red Sea, it seems an incongruous phrase in the midst of Holy Week. Yet Holy Week is a mix of glory and shame, life and death, victory and defeat. Rituals and readings take us up and down, down and up.

Down, down, down. That is the direction of Jesus Christ. It becomes the direction of his followers, too. The Second Person of the Trinity gave up all recognition to his divinity to become incarnate—a mere human. And all through his life, his direction was down. Born in a stable, living as a carpenter, suffering all manner of mental and physical abuse, equated with Satan, sweating blood in agony, betrayed, killed as a criminal. “Because of this, God greatly exalted him, and bestowed on him the name which is above every name.” The Letter to the Philippians states that “every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” For over thirty years Jesus covered up his glory. In his resurrection, the down became up. In his resurrection “He has covered himself in glory.”

Followers, be courageous in the multiple downward moments of life. Down is always the way up.

The Easter Triduum, AKA the Sacred Three Days of Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday, is full of symbols and rituals that engage the senses. Every sense is involved. We can see, taste, smell, feel, and hear the liturgy.

Our sense of sight awakens as the glistening oils are brought in procession during the first minutes of the Holy Thursday liturgy celebrating the Lord’s Supper. We hear the joyous ringing of bells during the Glory to God and the splashing of water at the washing of the feet. We taste the consecrated bread and become what we eat—the Body of Christ. We smell the incense as the Blessed Sacrament is brought to the Altar of Repose. We feel the mood of solemnity as we leave in silence, preparing our senses for the contrasting sensory experience of emptiness and subdued starkness on Good Friday.

The same darkness begins the Easter Vigil, but soon we thrill to the leaping Easter fire. This “liturgy of liturgies” is a veritable feast for the senses. The lights are bright, the candle flames warm, the music boisterous, the excitement of the newly baptized contagious, the lilies pungent.

Spend time now planning for Holy Week so that you will be able to attend all three services. Everything else should cease. Cook, clean, and decorate as much as possible before Holy Thursday.

When your closest friends and relatives invite you to a feast, will you attend?  Where else would you want to be? If your closest friend or family member is dying, will you stay with them?  Where else would you be? If your closest friends and family members celebrate a victory, wouldn’t you celebrate with them?  Where else would you be? Our God invites us to the Sacred Triduum.  Where else would you be?

A driver used her GPS to find her destination. Unfortunately, the GPS remained silent. Left to her own sense of direction, the driver found her destination. Slowing the car to park at her desired spot, she heard the GPS exclaim gleefully, “You are here!”

April has arrived. No fooling! Suddenly we find ourselves “here.”  March alternated between lamb and lion. Lent is half over with its recent “Laetare!” We stare at the calendar and wonder, “How did we get here?”  Yes, we are here! If our Lenten resolve has wavered, we have two weeks to renew our efforts. Take stock of where you are. No matter how you might feel about yourself, know that you are “here” standing in God’s unconditional love.

The prophet Isaiah puts these words in the mouth of God: “For I create Jerusalem to be a joy, and its people to be a delight.” God would have felt the same when we were created—and everyone else was created. Yes, God made the person who annoys us a joy. God made the ones who make life difficult a delight. Everyone came into this world fully loved and delighted in by the Creator, a bundle full of newly created joy and delight.

If your Lenten resolution is becoming routine, if you want to make today a bit more challenging, try to see every person as a joy and delight.

On any day of the year I can find dust or spots to clean, so why do I wait for spring cleaning? It must be the sunshine that gets me in the mood, yet it’s the sunshine that reveals the most dust motes. I’d save time cleaning if I waited for a dark day. Yet spring cleaning must be something genetic or at least so much of the English-speaking world that Webster’s dictionary includes the hyphenated word “spring-cleaning.” Webster claims spring-cleaning must be “thorough.” This brings up another interesting use of the word “thorough.” Have you ever used “thorough” as a verb? I have, as in “I need to thorough the dining room.” (I think this is a Sister of Notre Dame idiom. You’ll never find it in Webster as a verb.)  When you read this, we may have had our official first day of spring. I believe the equinox lands on a Sunday. Yeah! It’s a day of rest! Spring cleaning can wait.