Higgins Beach (my vacation, part 2)

It has been a while since my last blog post, but I wanted to continue the story of my vacation. It sets the context for what comes next. I'm back-dating this post to the time when it takes place. 

Part II: Higgins Beach

When I got the beach house I was greeted at the door by my good friend Mike and his 3-year old daughter Hannah. Mike and I could tell she wasn't too sure about this stranger who was showing up close to her bedtime. Mike explained that I was "daddy's friend" named Bishop Thomas. She, of course, needed to test this relationship, so she held out her toy bunny rabbit to me. Naturally, I gave the bunny a hug, but as I went to give it back to her she corrected me: "He needs a kiss, too!" So I gave the toy a peck on the nose, and she was happy. Little did I know that this would be the start of a lovely friendship. Hannah, in short, just *loved* Bishop Thomas. She wanted to sit next to me at meals, and regularly wanted me to read her stories. Her two older sisters were also present in the house, as well as kids from other visiting families. It was really nice to be part of the family, and happily the kids were able to keep themselves pretty well entertained. I should add that Mike's parents were also there, and were absolutely great hosts (with amazing food!)

Mike and Ellie were kind to offer me the use of the attic bedroom, which was just lovely. I felt like I had a personal retreat centre in the middle of a family home, with a view overlooking the beach and, further on, the ocean. Sunday morning we had mass at a nearby parish, and then I got busy doing... nothing. Well, not quite. Personal prayer was a big part of this time off. In addition to the Liturgy of the Hours I went on prayer walks along the beach and through the neighbourhood, rosary beads in hand. I also made it for mass at the local parish each day, where the pastor and his assistant (and indeed, all the people I met) were warm in their welcome. 

A lovely family I got to know, with a connection to Montreal!

Spiritual reading was also a big part of my time. Some months before I had read the Dialogue of Saint Catherine of Siena, but it was a library copy so I wasn't to mark it up with pencil and write notes in the margin like I usually do to really appropriate a book and its contents. Since then, however, I had bought my own copy, and my goal was simply to re-read it and see what I might get out of it a second time. I have to say, I was not disappointed. Wow, this woman was true genius of the spiritual life, tackling deep issues like heaven, hell, joy, and pain. It is not an easy read, not because the language is tough, but because it is so deep. 

I was looking forward to a week of this, reading, praying, and relaxing in the company of good friends. Unfortunately, it was not to be. Tuesday night (Aug 22), three days after arriving, I got a message from my brother Chris, so I gave him a call. It was among the worst news possible: he had just been diagnosed that day with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), otherwise known as Lou Gehrig's disease. We spoke a bit, and then I hung up the phone, wondering what I should do next.

My vacation, part I -- Getting Away

I wrote my last blog post just before leaving on vacation. Now that I am back at work, I thought I should write about it. A lot happened, things that I can say without exaggeration changed my life.

Part I: Getting away

My vacation time started with a long, leisurely drive to the lovely state of Maine. Actually, to be honest my vacation started with an attempt to drive to Maine the day before, but a flat tire and a driving rainstorm put the kibosh on that plan. A friend and I took in a film that night instead -- Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. Wow, was it dull. I know that vacations are meant to be for rest, and I was pretty tired, but I rarely start to fall asleep in a movie theatre. The film really earned its bad reviews.

The drive to Scarborough (just south of Portland) was lovely. I stopped at Saint Benoit du Lac abbey on the way for a brief time of prayer. I should have known that would never work: I was spotted by a monk who spotted me for a bishop, and he offered to give me a tour. How could I refuse?

After the monastery, I also dropped in at a small village sitting off highway 55 on the way to the border. My parents had a cottage there back when the family lived in Montreal. In those days, the village was called Katevale, but today is called Sainte-Catherine-de-Hatley. Since "Kate" is an English diminutive for Catherine, either way the name makes reference to the lovely country church we worshipped at during the summers (and some winters) we spent there as a family.

I have such fond memories of that place. The pastor at the time was so very kind to us, especially the kids. I still remember the priest coming for a meal at our cottage, and the impact that made on us. My brother and loved going to mass there, even though it was all in French and we didn't understand much.

There was a wedding rehearsal going on, so I had a chance to go inside and look around. It seemed smaller than I remember, but the sanctuary was still set up the same way. I served mass there for the first time, and I still remember sitting in the big chairs next to the credence table, waiting for the priest to tell me what to bring over next.

I headed a bit further down the road and found the path that led to where our cottage once stood. I have to say, it was hard to find. The new owners did extensive renovations, so I had to use and old landmark to identify it: a large rock that you can see in this picture that would have too big to move unless it was really necessary.

After this trip down memory lane was done, I started for the border. The crossing to the USA via Stanstead put me first on an interstate, but there is no major highway that connects Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. Pretty soon, I was crossing the Appalachians on country roads. I passed Mount Washington, which I would have loved to climb had I the time (I love mountains). I also drove past Bretton Woods, a place of legend for those of us who studied economics or finance.

It was getting dark by the time I was getting close to the Maine coast. A fog had rolled in off the ocean, so thick I had to use the fog lights on my car for the first time. Now I know where Stephen King (a Maine resident) had gotten his idea for his novella The Mist. While I would probably have gotten lost if I was replying on street signs, GPS came to the rescue. Night had fallen, but I finally reached my destination: a house on Higgins Beach.

Blown tire, but thankfully not a blown vacation

Ah, vacation. A time to get away from it all. And today was the day when that was to start. Except this happened on my way to Sherbrooke...

The good news is that it was the rear tire. I was driving on highway 10 in heavy rain with moderate traffic, so if a front tire had blown there would have been greater danger of losing control. As it is all I felt was a lot of vibration, like I was driving on rough asphalt. I managed to get to the side of the road, and call CAA (AAA for my USA friends). 

Because I had CAA-Plus I could have gotten towed all the way to the Eastern Townships and have the tire replaced there. Unfortunately none of the garages contacted had the tire in stock. So I had to double back to Montreal to see my tire-specialist garage here. I am sitting in their waiting area as I write this.

So much for the start to my holiday -- I was going to spend the afternoon with brother bishops at our gathering in Sherbrooke, and the evening with Archbishop Luc Cyr, but alas. Still, it could have been worse -- my plan was to drive tomorrow from Sherbrooke through the White Mountains to Maine, and I'm certainly glad the tire didn't blow while I was in the middle of nowhere. And nothing says I can't take a break and have fun in my hometown -- once I get out of here, of course!

Celebrating mass on TV

I had an unique opportunity this morning: I celebrated mass at Saint Joseph's Oratory at 8:30 am -- a mass that was televised by Salt and Light TV.

While I've celebrated mass many times (obviously), I've never done so for TV before. You have to be very present to the celebration, particularly given that there are important time constraints involved (i.e. you need to keep to the time slot given to you). In our case we have 30 minutes, and I managed to keep it to 32 up to the final blessings. It is a good discipline, especially for the homily. Next time I'll keep it to the actual 30.

I'll be honest, I was dreading to do this at first. I'm not much of a performer. Still, it was good to this, and in my homily I even addressed the television audience directly, giving people some spiritual "homework". Heck, it was fun, and I'm looking forward to doing it again.

Thesis writing update

It's been a while since I wrote in the blog, mainly because I've engaged in another writing project... my canon law thesis! It is the final step in my licentiate through the Université de Strasbourg. The final text has to be between 60 and 80 pages long -- not too bad, but still a fairly big project. My goal is to do 2 pages per day in the month of July of the first draft, and then polish it up. The final draft has to be in France by mid-August, so that I can defend it in September. Otherwise, I have to enroll in an additional year. Not a big deal, but honestly I just want to get this done.

So far (July 9) I am up to 24 pages. That is a bit ahead of schedule, but honestly the process is extremely time consuming. I wish I could just sit down and blurt it all out, but the writing process is slow. Please keep me in your prayers!

Time to buckle down for my thesis

I got my most recent report cards from the Institut de droit canonique in Strasbourg, where I have been a distance student for the past 7 years. They confirmed the good news that I passed my final paper, which means the only thing left to do is the thesis. Good thing I have a clear topic, and the general outline is already done. Really, all I have to do is 60 pages of fill in the blanks, i.e. yikes!

I started this journey a year before I was made a bishop, and when that new reality came along I figured it was a sign from God to drop out and focus on other things. When I would pray about it, though, I kept getting a very clear signal that the Lord wanted me to keep going, even if it would take longer. The Institut de droit canonique was really good with me too, offering me lots of extensions along the way. It has been a fantastic learning experience, and one which has already been of service to the Church in ways I did not expect.

Of course, it has also been a lot of work too. I'm sure every student has, at some point, felt the temptation to procrastinate, or needed a push to break through writers block. I'm all set up to use July as a month of writing -- in addition to the new laptop and reference materials, I've got my brain food (i.e. snacks) and study music (you wouldn't believe it if I told you) ready to go. But your prayers would be appreciated as well!

The Gospel and animals

So I was walking down the street today (June 27) to get to a lunch appointment when a guy came up to me while I was waiting at a red light. He handed me the above two cards, and then began to berate the Catholic Church for (in his view) not doing enough to protect the animals, despite Jesus having eliminated animal sacrifice.

Such is life when you walk around downtown Montreal in a Roman collar -- similar to a box of chocolates, you just never know what you're gonna get.

Coming back to my mystery interlocutor, after offering me his cards (as well as a piece of his mind) he took off in another direction. The whole exchange was less than 10 seconds, and as the light changed green I thought to myself, "Now I know what to blog about for today!"

So for what its worth, here is a brief summary of what the Catholic Church teaches about animals, vegan diets, etc.:

The message on the cards includes an exhortation to love animals, because (as the card says) God does. I have no problem agreeing with the general thrust of this message, and in fact it is part of official Catholic teaching. However, it must be lived in a balanced way. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which acts as a summary of Catholic doctrine, has this to say on the subject:

2416 Animals are God's creatures. He surrounds them with his providential care. By their mere existence they bless him and give him glory. Thus men owe them kindness. We should recall the gentleness with which saints like St. Francis of Assisi or St. Philip Neri treated animals.

2417 God entrusted animals to the stewardship of those whom he created in his own image. Hence it is legitimate to use animals for food and clothing. They may be domesticated to help man in his work and leisure. Medical and scientific experimentation on animals is a morally acceptable practice if it remains within reasonable limits and contributes to caring for or saving human lives.

2418 It is contrary to human dignity to cause animals to suffer or die needlessly. It is likewise unworthy to spend money on them that should as a priority go to the relief of human misery. One can love animals; one should not direct to them the affection due only to persons.

I recognize that there are some who will object to some of these points because they affirm a special place for human beings within the animal kingdom (and indeed, within creation). However, that special status within the overall ecology of our world is definitely part of the Biblical perspective too (a subject for another blog post sometime).

Within the religious practice of the Catholic Church, there is nothing that mandates harm to animals. For example, as the guy who handed me those cards pointed out, the tradition of animal sacrifices found throughout Hebrew history was not carried over to Christianity. On the flip side, our official book of blessings does have prayers for the blessing of animals. I even got asked to bless a dog in a veterinary hospital once (a neat story for another day).

With regards to special diets, we know that many religions require their followers to follow such diets: kosher for Jews, halal for Muslims, various diets within Hinduism, etc. But for Catholics, there is no moral imperative in natural or divine law to eat certain foods or to avoid certain foods. The Torah does state that certain foods should not be eaten as they are ritually unclean, but the common Christian tradition says that Jesus declared all foods clean (Mark 7:19). The vision of Saint Peter as described in Acts 10:15-16 uses the fact of all foods being clean as analogy to enourage the inclusion of new peoples and cultures in the Church.

While there is no moral imperative in natural or divine law to follow a specific diet, the Church does teach certain diets as part of the spiritual practice of penance. We are asked to avoid eating meat on certain days (Ash Wednesday and the Friday's of Lent, in particular), and to avoid eating more than one full meal on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. Of course, this is just a minimum -- we can choose a more restricted diet if we wish. For the last couple of years, for example, I've followed a vegan diet during Lent, and I've gotten a lot out of the practice (a story for another time).

On the flip side, the Bible warns us that the following of a certain diet can also lead to a kind of pridefulness. The film Scott Pilgrim vs. the World has a hilarious take on the subject (sorry for the mild swear at the beginning as the title character defends the honour of Toronto):

I must confess, I did not get any vegan powers myself when I followed that diet during Lent, but that's probably because I took Sundays off :-) And before I hear protests, no that was not cheating. To avoid falling into the pridefulness a religious diet can encourage, the Church actually suggests certain days where we are called to feast, not fast! We even call them "feast days", as opposed to the aforementioned "fast days", and Sunday is the essential feast day, even during Lent.

Coming back to the fellow who printed these cards, he is correct that the original plan of God described in the story of creation in the book of Genesis was, in fact, vegan. More than that, it was fruitarian, an even more strict form of veganism. However, we must remember that the story is highly symbolic in nature, and cannot be taken to be a simple outline of a plan of daily living. After all, Adam and Eve walked around naked too, and yet I don't think God is asking all of us to practice continuous nudism as a form of discipleship -- apart from the purely moral and aesthetic arguments against such a practice, it could get a bit chilly during a Canadian winter! Brrr!

That's enough for now. I've already got enough material for three more blog posts on these and related subjects -- so stay tuned!

Connecting with a university buddy

Yesterday, my high school reunion...

Today, a meeting with Andy, a friend from university days!

I attended Concordia University's budiness school from 1989 to 1992. I was super involved in student life, and my final year I was President of the Commerce and Administration Students Association (aka CASA). It was definitely one of the best (and most important) years in my life, and Andy was part of it through his involvement in student life as well.

We reconnected recently at a gala fundraiser event for a local school. I must admit, it had been so long I didn't recognize Andy at first, but thankfully his memory is better than mine. We promised to reconnect, and although it took a while I messaged him when my schedule had an opening. What a great lunch we had! Part "good old days", part "what have you been up to", and part dreaming up new projects to change the world for the better.

Thank you Andy. Looking forward to reconnecting!

30th high school reunion

Yes, it's true: it has been 30 years since I graduated high school. I can hardly believe it!

Our last reunion was 10 years ago (20th anniversary), so we were due for another. It was great seeing people I had not seen in so long, even if I couldn't stay long. And even if I went in my collar, it was nice to just be "Tom" for a little bit.

My first three years of high school were somewhat meh, but my final two years were among the best of my life, especially the last year. Because we were all getting ready for college (called CEGEP here in Quebec) getting good grades (or heck, just graduating) meant that the academic pressure was on. Because my grades were pretty good I tutored lots of classmates my final year. I got a lot of personal benefits from that experience: I discovered a passion for explaining things, I made lots of friends, and in some cases I even earned a few dollars. But I also got a lot of satisfaction from seeing others succeed, and some of those stories came back to me. Who knows, maybe that was part of the genesis of my vocation to the priesthood -- seeing others flourish!

Learning about conscience, part 1: Saint Thomas More

I was a kid in a time before video on demand services like Netflix. Heck, it was before PVRs and even VCRs. We had one TV in the house, and if you wanted to know what was going on you consulted the newspaper or a print publication like TV Guide. Or, sometimes you'd be channel surfing and if you came across something you wanted to watch, you either just watched it or you let it go.

I don't remember exactly how old I was when A Man for All Seasons came on TV. It was probably between the ages of 7 and 10. It was an afternoon, and I'm pretty sure it was a Saturday. In those days, Saturday morning was a time for kids to watch cartoons, but at a certain point the kids shows stopped and the "grown up" shows took over. My recollection is that I had finished watching "my" shows, and my dad had come downstairs to watch "his show". But as I was getting up to go, my dad invited me to stay and watch the movie with him. I wasn't too sure -- I generally found "grown up" shows boring. But my dad said, "This movie is about someone you are named after." Really? Wow! So I couldn't refuse.

For those who do not know A Man for All Seasons, it is the story of Sir Thomas More (later known as Saint Thomas More). He was the good friend of King Henry VIII, and at one point was Chancellor of England. This was in the 16th century, when the Protestant Reformation was in full swing on the Continent. At one point Henry had himself declared the head of the Church in England, and communion disintegrated between himself and the Pope. Sir Thomas More could not accept to go down that path, and he eventually lost everything, including his life.

At my age, I did not understand all that was going on in the story. It was set in another century, the dialogue was a fairly advanced form of English, and I knew very little about the Protestant Reformation except that some kids in our neighbourhood were "protestants" which meant they went to a different church than us. But my dad explained things as needed, and my focus anyway was mainly on the main character who had the same name as me.

The story of Saint Thomas More left a deep impression on me, leaving me perplexed and even disturbed. My father asked me what I thought about the story, and I remember asking him the same question.

"I've always admired Thomas More," my father explained. "For me, he is a model of what it means to follow your conscience."

"Conscience? What's that?" I asked.

My dad did not answer the question directly. Instead of saying what it was, he said what it meant. "To live by your conscience means to always act according to the truth. That's what Thomas More did."

I changed the focus of my questioning. "But why did Sir Thomas go all the way to being killed?"

"He didn't want to die," my father explained. "If you noticed, Thomas was trying to avoid falling into the danger set before him. He didn't go looking for trouble, in fact he did his best to get out of it, but when in the end they backed him into a corner and said he had to deny his commitment or else, he refused to do so."

"That's what conscience means," he continued. "To live by your conscience means you have to have courage. Anybody can find excuses to avoid challenges and suffering, but sometimes there are things we have to be willing to sacrifice for. For example, if someone ever made me have to choose between my life and yours, or my life and the life of your mother, or brother, or sister, I'd choose to die rather than let you die. At least I hope I would, I hope I'd have the courage to do that."

Now that got my attention. My dad didn't know it, but he was teaching me about the difference between courage and daring. People will sometimes do something dangerous on a dare, but real courage is not just about daring. It is about daring to do the right thing, even if it costs you.

This, of course, raised other questions in my mind. After all, if following your conscience could have such high stakes, you had better be pretty sure of what the right thing is. After all, there is no point suffering for the wrong thing!

My father confirmed as much. "To follow your conscience takes courage, but you also have to use your brain," he said. "You have to always be willing to seek the truth and stick with it. But it also takes humility, because no one can ever know the whole truth all at once. You have to be willing to admit you don't know everything, and to be willing to ask questions. It helps to be part of a community that is committed to finding the truth and living it. That's what the Church is for."

Getting back to my story, I remember asking my dad if all this conscience stuff was really worth it. Remember, I was a kid and peer pressure was a fact of life. If joining with my friends was the path of least resistance, why not just do that, at least in the normal course of life? My father reminded me that, in the film, Sir Thomas had a conversation with his good friend the Duke of Norfolk, who had tried to persuade Thomas to take a false oath "for fellowship". Thomas replied, "And when we die, and you are sent to heaven for doing your conscience, and I am sent to hell for not doing mine, will you come with me, for fellowship?"

I looked at my father and said that this argument did not sound fair. God was going to punish us for not following our conscience? Is that the ultimate reason why we should seek the truth and be willing to suffer for it -- because we are afraid of God?

With great patience, and with (I believe) some delight in the fact that I was pushing the issue so far, he replied that, in fact, having a strong conscience, one that was anchored in truth and had the courage to live it, was actually the source of one of the greatest assets a personality can have: inner freedom. Saint Thomas, in his struggle, showed himself to be more free than the King himself, even when he was locked up in the Tower of London.

We need that inner freedom, my father explained, to be able to live according to the ultimate law: the law of love. I had heard of this law before, during the Bible readings and sermons and church, such as in the expression "love your neighbour". That law doesn't say we have to like our neighbour, but that we do have to love him. We have to even love our enemies. But, as my father explained, how can we do that unless we have the inner freedom to do so? Real love cannot be forced, it must be free. Having a strong conscience makes us free inside, the kind of freedom that Saint Thomas had to declare that he was "the King's faithful servant, but God's first".

"That's why we wind up in Hell if we disobey our conscience," my father explained. "We can't live real love with out. And God is love, Heaven is love. It's not that God will punish us if we don't follow our conscience, it's that conscience is our guide to Heaven, to being with God. And while God sometimes grants people visions or speaks words to them, it's in our conscience that God ordinarily impresses himself up on. If our conscience isn't clear, we can't have a real relationship with Him."

This conversation had a lasting effect upon me, even until today. For example, as I've gotten older I've come to realise this conversation was the start of my passion for ecumenical and inter-faith dialogue (heck, even dialogue with sincere atheists). I like speaking with people who have convictions and try and live by them. Our convictions may differ, but if those convictions are sincere it means the other person is willing to have them tested in the name of a higher principle, i.e. the principle that The Truth is more important than "this or that" truth. As I would learn later, this perspective would eventually come in handy when I started to have my own "crisis of faith" -- that that is a story for another time.

RIP to my aunt Louise Turner (nee Dowd)

I got a message from my cousin Paul that his mother Louise (my aunt) passed away. Condolences to her two sons, their spouses, her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She was predeceased by her husband Bruce a little under a year ago.

My siblings and I remember her kindness during many a visit to her home when I was young. She was suffering from dementia in recent years, so we kept those memories for her. Now she is with the Lord. May she rest in peace.

UPDATE: Here is her obituary.

Experiencing communion for the first time

Some time after my first confession our religion teachers began to shift gears, starting to prepare us for our first communion. For those unfamiliar with the Catholic tradition, the "communion rite" is the time during a prayer service (usually a mass, although not exclusively) where the people approach a minister to receive and eat what appears to the eye as either a piece of bread (most common), some bread with some wine (less common), or just a bit of wine (least common, for exceptional circumstances). As they are distributed during the communion rite, the term "communion" also commonly applies to the substances being consumed. A person's "first communion", therefore, refers to the first time a person participates in the communion rite by going up and receiving communion.

In some spiritual traditions, such as for many Eastern Catholics, a person receives their first communion at the same time they are baptized, i.e. it can be given even to an infant. However, in the Latin tradition (to which most Roman Catholics belong), communion is not given to infants, but is delayed until the person has attained a level of maturity called the "age of reason" (generally considered to be around 7 years old).

Of course, that doesn't stop little kids from wanting to receive earlier. Any minister of communion can tell stories of what often happens when parents bring their children up with them in the communion rite. "Let me see!" they sometimes say when we place the wafer (called a "host") in the adult's hand. "Can I have some? Why can't I have some?" they sometimes exclaim. I've even had a few come up and perfectly imitate the gesture of receiving communion, not noticing Mom or Dad behind indicating, with a shake of the head, that the little one has not yet made his or her First Communion. On some level they know that something special is happening with communion, and they want to take part.

I was no different. I knew I had to wait until I had made my First Communion, and I don't recall making a lot of fuss otherwise. Still, I was curious. During our annual summer holiday at a cottage in the country, I asked the kindly parish priest if I could try a host. My father accompanied us to the sacristy, where the priest took a host out of a tin and gave it to me. It tasted like... not much.

Sometime later I found myself reflecting on this experience. The host was way too small to be worthwhile as food, and as a culinary experience it left something to be desired. So I asked my father about it: what was the big deal?

His answer floored me. "After the host is consecrated, it isn't bread anymore. When we receive the host in communion, what we are actually receiving is the Body of Jesus."

Wait, what?

How was THAT possible?

"It's called 'transsubstantiation'," he explained (and yes, he used that word). "It means that the host keeps all of the outward appearances of being bread, including the look and the taste, but it isn't bread anymore. It is Jesus' body."

This all seemed very strange to me. I didn't have a lot of trouble thinking that transsubstantiation was possible — after all, God could do anything, so if that's what he wanted to do that was his business. But to be honest, it didn't sound terribly plausible. In fact, it sounded a little gross. So I asked where we Catholics got this strange notion that we were eating Jesus' body in communion.

My father's answer? "From Jesus himself." And then he went to a Bible, and showed me chapter 6 of the gospel of John, where Jesus said that the bread he would give the world was his flesh (verse 51). He also showed me how people disputed this saying (verse 52), how some found this teaching intolerable (verse 60), and how some even stopped following him because of it (verse 66). "People had taken him literally," my father explained, "and Jesus did not correct them. When it was the Last Supper, Jesus took bread and said 'this is my body", and then he took wine and said 'this is my blood'. He meant what he said."

I had heard those words before, of course, during Sunday mass. I knew the priest spoke them over the bread and wine, and I knew they had been the words of Jesus. My father explained that this was why we would kneel at that point, why the priest would elevate the elements after each set of words, and why we would ring the bells and bow our heads. Jesus was now present, ready to be received by us as food.

This also explained what happened after receiving communion. I remember being impressed at seeing my parents pray in silence after receiving communion. As I got closer to my first communion, I found myself wondering what I should be "doing" during that time of silence. My father's suggestion was an Our Father, a Hail Mary, and a Glory Be. I knew those prayers, so that seemed simple enough.

Once our special catechism classes for first communion were over, I knew the big day was coming. However, our parish at the time had a curious practice, in that there was no big group first communion ceremony as was found in many other parishes. Instead, the parents were encouraged to decide, as a family, on a particular Sunday when the young boy or girl would receive their first communion along with the regular parish community. As I recall, there was not a lot of extra ceremony.

It was at this time that my mother had an idea. Her suggestion was that I receive my first communion on the Thursday of Holy Week. For those who don't know, the mass of Holy Thursday evening is the special moment of the year when we commemorate the institution of the Eucharist by Jesus. Every mass is a memorial of that moment, of course, but Holy Thursday has that character in a special way. As she pointed out it would make every Holy Thursday from then on an extra special event in my life. Given everything I had learned, it made sense to me.

I don't recall feeling anything particular in the moment when I finally did receive my first communion. I went up, I received and ate the host, I went back to my seat, and I said my prayers. It was all very matter of fact, and I felt as much.

That is, until the end of mass.

My experience of the end of your usual Sunday mass had been: a closing prayer, a set of announcements, and a final blessing and dismissal. Grand total, about 5 minutes. Mentally, I started to already shift gears into going home.

Except this was Holy Thursday.

After the closing prayer, suddenly everyone was back on their knees. The priest put on what looked like an extra white robe (which I would much later learn was called a "humeral veil"), and picked up the vessels that contained the leftover hosts. Instead of putting them back in the tabernacle, he then began to walk around the inside of the parish church with them. It was a procession, complete with candles and an altar server waving incense.

As the priest walked around, the choir began to sing. It was all a capella, i.e. no instruments. I had never heard that gorgeous melody before, and it was all in a language I didn't understand (I later found out it was the Pange Lingua, being sung in Latin).

Through it all, something spoke to me in my heart, impressing on me not words but concepts:

"This is holy."

"What the priest is carrying, is holy."

"What you received, is holy."

It was a genuine religious experience. Despite whatever hesitations I might have had before, I never again had trouble believing in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist — or at least, not for many years, and even that time of challenge was never about the Real Presence as such. But that is a tale for a later installment of this story.

Prayers on a plane

When you are a priest, you never know when you'll be called upon. There are things you can plan, such as a meeting I had in Toronto on June 13-14. But then there are things that are just surprises from God. On my way back from Toronto I wound up sitting next to a lovely couple from Arizona who were on their way to Wabush in Labrador (quite a trip!). After some typical chit chat they asked me to pray with them for a member of their family who is sick. So the three of us, sharing row 16, leaned in and prayed. It was a lovely (and surprising) moment of ministry. God bless to them in their journeys.

My personal story of faith

I've recently had a number of conversations in which people have asked me to share my story of faith. It's not the first time I've received those kinds of questions. When I was being made a bishop and was being interviewed by journalists, more than one reporter asked me if I had ever had any doubts or questions about my Catholic faith. In all honesty, while I am a firmly committed believer in Jesus Christ and in his Church, I (like lots of people) have indeed had my struggles. That being said, while those times were certainly difficult, I have to admit that the process of working through those challenges has helped me become the man of faith that I am today. As I sometimes tell people, "I used to believe what I did because I was a Catholic; but now, I am a Catholic because of what I believe." This holds true today. Indeed, it has become even more important to me now that I am a bishop, because as a bishop I supposed to be doing more than just be teaching "the party line". I don't see how I could ever have considered being a priest, much less a bishop, without a profound and examined conviction that what I would be teaching was actually the Truth: the truth about God, the truth about the cosmos and the human condition, and the truth about our deepest longings and our common destiny.

I don't want to claim that my journey of faith is somehow universal, and that everyone is obliged to accept it as universally valid. After all, my life experience is unique to me. That being said, I have often appreciated hearing about the faith journey of others, even though that journey was unique to them. Very often, I found myself challenged by the issues others would wrestle with, and nourished by the answers they found. Most importantly, I would find myself in admiration at their desire to follow where their emerging convictions would lead them. Faith, after all, isn't just an external content, a list of truths: it is also a personal response consistent with those truths.

I am not a perfect Catholic, and I don't want to pretend that my life today is some sort of ideal response to the truths of the Catholic faith. While I'd like to be a living saint (and I really mean that), I know I'm still a sinner, and that I have a long way to go. Still, even that is a grace. After all, one can only know their weakness if they also know their potential strength. The Catholic faith is part of that strength: it has given me a reliable map to guide my life, and firm foundation upon which to build as I have made (and continue to make) my life choices. To be honest, it has also led me to have a life that is, quite frankly, extremely rich and interesting, and full of opportunities for joy. I feel called to share my personal story of faith, in the hopes it will help others find their foundation and source of joy in Christ as well.

Wonder Woman is all kinds of awesome

I saw the new Wonder Woman movie. I was thoroughly entertained. It is definitely in my top three favourite super-hero themed films of all time. I don't know it if will achieve the number 1 spot (I'd rather wait and see how I feel about it some time down the road, after the initial exhilaration has worn off), but it has definitely de-throned my previous #1 favourite, The Dark Knight.

You might be wondering, "If it de-throned your previous #1 favourite, how come you aren't willing to say this is your new #1 super-hero film?" The answer is because watching Wonder Woman made me realise that The Dark Knight was not really my favourite super-hero film, it was my favourite super-villain film. Batman was ok in that film, but the Joker was awesome, the greatest depiction of Nietzche's ubermann I have ever seen in any medium.

What I loved about Wonder Woman, on the other hand, is that finally we have a DC film with an actual unambiguous hero (or, in this case, heroine). To date we've had an angsty Superman, a vengeful Batman, and a very silly Suicide Squad. Blech. But in the case of Wonder Woman, she just shone.

As a matter of full disclosure, I should add that I am a geek. I have been for a long time. For example, I collected comic books as a teenager. Among those comic books was the reboot of Wonder Woman led by artist George Perez. The Wonder Woman character had gone through a few incarnations, including the campy 1970's show starring Linda Carter, but Perez brought the character back to her Greek roots. She was not defined by the name Wonder Woman -- that was what others called her. She was Diana, warrior Amazon princess, come to man's world to chew bubble gum and kick a** (and she was all out of bubble gum -- bonus points if you get the reference). As the character's story arc evolved, the god Ares emerged as her key adversary. This was one scary dude, the personification of war itself -- not a god of strategy and victory, but a god who revelled in conflict, bloodshed, and even bloodlust itself. Yikes.

Seeing this film brought me back to being a kid again. The Perez Wonder Woman was definitely front and centre, as Wonder Woman's origin story and key villain matched that arc, but I have to hand it to the creators of the movie: they somehow managed to get in references to other versions of Wonder Woman as well. By setting the film in WWI (actually, an original setting for the character) they were able to bring in the whole feminist angle (via the suffragettes) without beating us over the head with it. There is also at least one hommage to the Linda Carter Wonder Woman, although it is very subtle. The Linda Carter Wonder Woman used to spin in order to change her costume, which was just about as silly as it sounds. In the film, she doesn't spin, but there is a scene where the camera sort of spins around her, and suddenly she's ready to go in her battle dress. It even start with her letting down her hair à la Linda Carter. A small touch, but classic. (There are references to a later version of Wonder Woman as well, but I don't want to add too many spoilers.)

I've heard some complaints that the movie is too long, or that the final act is too convoluted. Nonsense. The plot and writing are generally pretty tight, with one exception (how can Zeus have created Diana if he was previously killed by Ares?), but more important is how Diana has to confront not only the specific evil she has come to fight, but also the evils created by the simple misuse of free will (which, the movie reveals, are considerable). She even needs to confront herself, in a way. In other words, the character grows. Wonder Woman is not just an origin story, it is a "hero's journey" story, only she is going from someone already heroic to a more mature hero. Not easy to pull off in a compelling way, but it happens. Kudos to the writers.

Ares does make his eventual appearance, showing himself to be a master of deceit and temptation more than just a bad guy who makes things go boom. Yes, there is a final battle, but this is literally a battle between figures from mythological Greece -- people should read some Homer and then see if they want to come back and complain about the final act. And we should also realise that the villain, while named Ares, is really a depiction of Satan -- there is even a scene where Ares and Wonder Woman are speaking in a garden paradise, with Ares trying to tempt her, meaning that Wonder Woman is actually an Eve-like figure. If you don't know the stories you might not pick up on details like that, because the film is subtle about it. I like that.

I am getting pretty tired of seeing films where the supposed catharsis comes through vengeance. In this film, while the main character initially believes, in her naiveté, that her problem can be solved by wrath, in the end it is love that gives her the strength she needs. That's powerful. I think the film could have been improved by a greater exploration of what love actually means (in our day, romantic love is often assumed to be the highest form, a falsehood which does nonetheless find an echo in the film). Still, I do recognize that in the end it's a super-hero movie that has an audience to please. For what it is, the film is well written, well acted, entertaining, and even meaningful. Definitely worth my time, and I'm sure I'll be seeing it again.

My rating: 9.5 / 10

The story of Temperance: she's home!

My niece Temperance was born on September 5, 2016 (Labour Day), but at only 24 weeks (and weighing only 680 grams). Given her extreme prematurity she has been in the hospital for weeks, including in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). That all changed on December 3, when she finally made it home. Woo hoo!

My sister writes:

So far things are going well! It's sooo nice to have her home and not having to run off to the hospital everyday. We're so in love. Her older siblings love her too. Paxton will come to you asking "Hold it? Hold it?" Lol. Brigid been drawing pictures of our family and writing the number 5 on them. Temperance is such a blessing to us all.

I want to thank all those who have been such a blessing to our family. You've prayed, you've babysat, you've cooked meals, you've helped financially...In short, you've been the Body of Christ in action. It has been a wonder to be part of it.

I've not yet had a chance to see her since she's been home, but I will be in Ottawa between Christmas and New Years. I'm looking forward to holding her in my arms.

Visit to the Laurentians

I had a chance to head up north today. Stop #1 was Camp Kinkora, where my awesome niece Alex is participating in Visions camp for the week. Stop #2 was supper with my dad's cousin John and his wife Gail, who have a home in Sainte-Agathe. His daughter Katie (my second cousin) was about to head back to her home in Toronto, so I had the chance to join a small group for her goodbye supper. Turns out she is quite the artist, feel free to check out her website: katiefgorman.com

The Swedish connection

By the time I got to college and university, the Commodore line of computers was hitting its limits. A new form of computing was emerging, using something called a GUI (Graphic User Interface). For Commodore machines, it was called GEOS. It was so different from the simple text based interfaces I knew, it was slooooowwwww, and I had no clue how to program in that environment. I felt like a fish out of water.

When I got to university I discovered a brand of computer -- the Apple Macintosh SE. It had a similar sort of GUI, and was great for writing papers and doing graphic design. Programming, however, was completely out of the question...it just wasn't designed for that. My parents eventually bought a 286 PC clone, but the only programming options were GW-BASIC (yech) and MS-DOS batch files (double-yech). Compilers could be had, but for a price, and I was faced with a steep learning curve. My studies and extra-curricular activities in college and university didn't really allow for me to start all over again from scratch, so programming took a back seat for several years.

I graduated from Concordia University in 1992 with a bachelor's degree in commerce (major: international business), and got a job at a company I had never heard of: Ericsson Research Canada, a local branch of what I would learn was a huge Swedish multinational. There was an awful recession happening at that time, so I took the first job I could to pay the rent. It was a very low-paying administrative job, but it turned out to be a time of providence in my life. In all honesty, I owe Ericsson a lot for who I am today, and I'm proud to say I'm still connected with friends I made way back when.

Now as it happened, the local branch of Ericsson I was working for was developing software for help run the cellular phone networks that were just starting to be constructed. At that time they were hiring engineers hand over fist, but not business types -- despite a degree in commerce, I was just a clerk. Still, this was one sector of the economy that was actually doing well, offering some job security, and Ericsson was big into training their people, offering some opportunity. I took one computer-based training course after another in my off-hours, learning about the principles behind cellular technology. As it turned out, cell phones were just fancy radios, and all that time I had spent with my dad learning about amateur radio made the learning curve that much easier. That's how providence works sometimes: I was a programming geek with a degree in international business and a background in radio, working for a global company writing software to run cellphone networks. It was perfect.

I can't say that everyone noticed this synchronicity at first, not even me. The real breakthrough came when I discovered something new, at least for me: the UNIX operating system. We were shifting to the use of SPARC workstations, and so the company sent me on a brief training course to become familiar with Unix. I wanted to learn more, so I downloaded an early version of a Unix "clone" called Linux and installed it on a computer at home (one of the first Slackware distributions). No one could imagine at the time that Linux would change the world, including mine.

At the time our branch of the company was preparing for our first ISO 9000 certification audit. By now I was working as a technical writer in one of our departments, and I was given the task of getting all the documentation for our department ready for the audit. Document control was a big part of the ISO 9000 standard, but we didn't have any reliable way to track our documents, their revisions, and whether or not they had been approved. To solve the problem, I wrote a database program called "TROLL" (from "document conTROL tool"). It was basically just a giant shell script that could be run from the command line of a Unix workstation, but the darned thing worked and got the job done. Everyone was surprised -- no one had thought that the administrative clerk / technical writer was also secretly a programmer. The software engineers were actually quite delighted, and my "geek cred" rose.

When the certification auditors eventually came around, our department (which was *way* behind just six months before) passed with flying colours. The effect on my career was dramatic: I became the Quality Coordinator for the department, and eventually I was promoted to manager of a unit called the Global Integration and Verification Organization. Our goal was to coordinate the process of software testing between several units throughout the world. I knew about software, I knew our processes, and I had training in cross-cultural management. At 24, it was a dream opportunity.

I did not remain in that job, of course. To many people's surprise (including my own in some ways) I handed in my resignation in June 1995 in order to enter the seminary and start my studies to become a priest. Being manager of the GIVO did allow me to leave with one other technological legacy, however. The task of coordinating between the business units involved in the GIVO required me to learn about something called the "Internet" (you may have heard of it), and particularly a new technology called the "World Wide Web" (you may have heard of that, too). Our web browser was called Mosaic, and there were very few web pages out there. Still, a whole new field was emerging. I learned how to code web pages in HTML, and in the few months prior to leaving Ericsson I actually became the first webmaster for the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, which itself became the first episcopal conference in the world to have a presence on the web. The CCCB gave me an ongoing contract, so I was able to buy a decent computer for use during my studies -- and of course, to keep learning to program. Only now, my focus was the World Wide Web.

My emergence as a computer geek

My father's interest in amateur radio opened me up to a fascination with electronics, as well as to the marvel of using that technology to be able to communicate with the wider world over great distances. My father also was the instigator of my interest in computers.

My dad started working for the Department of the environment of the federal government in 1965, doing computer programming. You read that right, 1965. Computers in those days were BIG. The idea of a "portable computer" was ludicrous, and something with far less computing power than a typical calculator today would fill up a large room. I know, because when I would visit my dad at the office I'd see them for myself. It was all so...esoteric. The computer rooms were temperature controlled, filled with spinning tape drives and computer cabinets with flashing lights, and hum and whoosh of spinning fans...a kid could even (playfully) try and hide in there. I had the feeling I was entering into a different world, one that I knew not a lot of people ever saw. It was my entering the wardrobe moment.

Programming computers in those days was a bit of a pain. Programmers would have to load their programs using punched cards. During one of my visits (I must have been less than 10 years old) I distinctly remember having a chance to sit at the machine that produced those cards. It was a bit like a manual typewriter, except that instead of feeding in a sheet of paper a punch card was used. The keys would click and you could hear the hole being punched in the card. Of course, what was written on the card made no sense to me, and it was explained that this was a special language that the computer could read to make it run. From my point of view it was like magic, only intead of saying "Abracadabra" you'd say it in assembly language.

To my wonder, I discovered that it was also possible to have a computer at home, or at least to have access to one. The computers would sometimes have to be monitored throughout the night, and one evening my father brought home a strange-looking suitcase. Upon opening it, we saw a keyboard similar to those on the card-punching machines, as well as a couple of rubber cups into which he could fit our telephone headset. (I don't remember what model it was, but it looked almost identitical to this old beauty, a TI Silent 700 terminal.) He explained that this terminal would let him "talk" to the (huge) machines back in his office using the computer language -- over the telephone! Good grief, that meant computers could even use the phone to talk to each other! Would wonders never cease...

A few years later, another visit to the office introduced me to new ways to interact with the computer. Assembly language was out, and dad was now programming in Fortran (as he explained, just like people had different languages different computers might use different languages). As well, no more punched cards -- terminals with green monochrome monitors were the latest thing. In the old days he would have sat me in front of a card-punch machine to keep me entertained, but now he had something even better: my very first experience with a computer game. After a bit of research I now know that the game in question was called Colossal Cave Adventure. It didn't have any of the bells and whistles of today's games (it was purely text based, with no graphics at all) but nonetheless it was quite extraordinary. Colossal Cave Adventure allowed a player to enter commands using regular (albeit simplified) English, i.e. the user didn't also have to be a programmer. Prior to discovering that game, I saw computers as giant calculators: you entered the data, and got a result. Suddenly, it was all about interaction, and even with the machine itself.

We eventually got a video game console called the Atari 2600. The games were generally fun, but you were limited to just plugging in cartridges someone else had made -- there was no possibility for creative input by the user. Then, in my first weeks of high school, I attended a book fair in the school library where I discovered a book for programming computer games. Let me be clear, this book did not teach programming: it gave actual listings of computer program code that a user could enter manually to then run the game. (This would be completely unthinkable today, but back there there were whole magazines like Compute! that would publish monthly program listings.) Even though I didn't own a computer myself I bought the book immediately and tried to figure out how this particular computer language (called BASIC) worked. Eventually I decided to try and write a program of my own, and the result was a simple text-based golf game. Without a computer to actually test it on, though, I did the next best thing to check if it would actually work: I showed it to my dad. I remember how surprised he was when he started reviewing the code, and how delighted he was when he was able to tell me that he couldn't find a single programming error.

I don't know if that simple program is what prompted it or not, but shortly after that we got the computer that would prove to be the instrument of my full immersion into geekdom: the Commodore 64. Yes, you could play games, but you could also program in BASIC (the language I had learned for my golf game). I hacked the heck out of that thing. I entered code, I wrote my own programs, and while I couldn't make that thing dance I could literally make it sing (or at least make pretty sounds -- it had a really good sound chip). It didn't have a lot of resources (only 64K of memory, of which only about 38K was really accessible), but thanks to all kinds of code optimization tricks people were able to make it do amazing things. For myself, when I found that the BASIC language interpreter was too slow for some applications I learned hexadecimal and started to code in machine language (the C-64 Programmers Reference Guide was my geek bible). Honestly, it was a major creative outlet for me, and years later, when I saw the slogan "Code is Art" written on a T-shirt, I felt a moment not just of agreement but of recognition.

Those old Commodore programs live on thanks to C-64 emulation software that can be downloaded for free, and my old Commodore 64 is still sitting in my parent's basement. Just the sight of it still brings up fond memories, like a painter looking at one of his old palettes that just felt right in his hand.

POSTSCRIPT: A traffic camera caught a picture of a snowy owl in flight, and the image went viral in January 2016. While I think snowy owls are lovely birds, I have to say that the photo made me smile for a different reason. If you look at the picture, you'll see a building in the top middle with satellite dishes on the roof. That was my dad's old office!

RIP Uncle Bruce

I got word that my uncle Bruce Turner has died (b. 1927, d. August 1, 2016). Prayers for his wife, 2 sons, and grandchildren + great-grandchildren, please.