THIRTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
St. Cyril of Alexandria (444), Bishop, Doctor of the Church
Our Lady of Perpetual Help (13th C) (Trad)

Dear Beloved:

If I could live life over again, I would do everything the exact same way -- all the trials, all the tribulations, all the heartaches, and wounds, and stabs in the back, and joys, and wonders, and happy moments.... all the good and the bad I would live over again. Why?

I would live it over again because as I sit here an contemplate my mortality (which could be right around the corner) I find that I am who I am. I have worked hard to be who I am. God has worked hard to bring me to Him. Although I may be a big 400 pound lemon I try to let God squeeze a lot of lemonade out of me.

All of us are who we are. We are God's children and our lives give us a tapestry that represents all that we have experienced. If even one small thing was changed about our past we would not be who we are today.

Those who have life's tapestry colored with pastels have had a good life. Praise God. But the more beautiful hues of a tapestry come in the deeper colors and hues of life's bumps and valleys and mountaintops. Those who have had many trials and may hardships develop this deeper and more beautifully colored tapestry.

I am reminded of the story of the man carrying his cross who came to Jesus asking to trade his cross for another. The man was tired and bored with his cross. Jesus said, "sure, come on in and look around and pick the cross you want to carry."

The man looked around and tried out this cross and that cross and the other cross, but none seemed to satisfy him. Finally he came to the last cross on display. He tried it on and it fit just right. He was satisfied. He told Jesus, "I'll take this one."

Jesus replied, "My son, that is the same Cross you came here with!"

So it is with us, we cannot change the past anyway, so we must accept it. When I say we must accept it I do not mean intellectually or even emotionally, I mean ontologically. We all need to come to a place in our soul that we can truly say, "If I could do it all over again, I would have it the same way it was; I wouldn't change a thing."

This is a hard thing to say, especially if we have had great tragedy or trauma in our lives. Nevertheless, we need to come to this total acceptance; an acceptance of even the terrible traumas. Why? Because all of our experiences, good, bad and the ugly, have made us who we are. And since we are what we are, since God has worked to bring lemonade to all our lemons, we need to love who we are. How can we not love who we are when God loves who we are?

I would not change a thing, for even if one little thing was changed in my life, my life would not be what it is today.

There is a movie called, Mr. Destiny. It is about a 35 year old man who pines over the fact that he missed the ball when he was up to bat in Little League as a kid. If he had swung the bat just one second sooner, he told himself over and over, he would have hit the ball and his life would be a lot different that it was.

He meets a man, an angel, who knows, who gives this man the change to see what his life would have been like if he had hit that ball all those years ago. That ONE event truly changed EVERYTHING about this man's life.

By the end of the movie, he realizes that what he had was beautiful and he came to accept what his life was, and is. He was then allowed to come back to his original life that he so desperately wanted to trade in before this experience.

One small event in our lives, if altered, can change the entire universe and certainly change who we are.

We are to love ourselves. God says so. We are to love our neighbor AS WE love ourselves. How can we love others without a healthy love of ourselves and who we are?

To love ourselves means to love who we are, and who we are is a product of all the events and experiences of our past, thus we must accept the past, even love our past to such a degree that if it were possible to do it all over again, we would do it the same way.

This does not mean that we have to like everything that happened to us, but we must accept it if we are to love.

Love is a burning and consuming fire. There is no such thing as 99% love. Love either is or is not. Thus we must Love all that we are and all that we have been. Then we can truly love ourselves and present our love to God.

St. Cyril of Alexandris, pray for me.

Our Lady of Perpetual Help, pray for me and help me to love all that I am so I may love others for all that they are.

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