Over the past two weeks I have been faced with a difficult situation with a volunteer organization. I had my reservations given some of the changes in the organization but believe this is still the best character and skill development program for youth, as it was for my brothers and me growing up. We advertised that two of the Immaculate Conception School (ICS) fathers (myself and another awesome dad) would lead the Lion Den (what the program is called for grade K) and nine of the boys in his class families were interested in joining. Wow! We showed up at the first Pack night to meet a mom of a boy who was not in his class announce she was the leader, had already set a schedule, and that we would be meeting with the 1st grade group called the Tiger Den for the year. This was a surprise but we were open to working with her. We scheduled a call to meet and long story short it did not go well. This person had issues with "duty to God" in the scout oath, a scout being "reverent" in the scout law, and even pointed out that it was excluding of atheists and people of other belief systems to say God in the pledge of allegiance and that in no way would there be prayer at the den meetings as that excludes people and makes them uncomfortable. Praying on this, I was willing to meet with Pack leadership as our request to them was allow us to run our schools group separately from the other person and still be part of the Pack. Sacrificing an evening with my kids, I agreed to meet the Cubmaster at a local coffee shop, let me say this, it was an ambush, not a meeting. 4 people showed up, not one like I was told, I was lectured about Martin Luther, how right he was, and the bad things priests & Catholics did, that we could not hold a Scout Sunday at our Parish and had to attend the Lutheran Scout Sunday since they were the host of this cub scout pack, I could go on but wont (this is already probably too long of a story). Keeping my mouth shut was one of the most challenging things I have had to do in recent memory. My only response to any of their lecturing was how is it that we could not say a prayer, even a non denominational one to start and end a den meeting if we would be asked to sit through a Lutheran service? I couldn't hold back a little laugh as I asked that. I thanked them all for their volunteering and commitment to the program, smiled, shook hands, and kindly let them know I had to get home to make lunches for tomorrow.

Woe to the Complacent.” After this admonition it goes to describe what complacency looks like. They drink lavishly, they stretch comfortably on their couches, they eat lambs, and improvise music…they are enjoying the good life, and in the good life, they have found their comfort. They grow complacent in their comfort. To them, God offers this warning, “Woe.” What is the object of a good life? That’s the question at the heart of today’s readings… What is the aim of a good life? For the complacent — it is time. The wealthy want more of it, they want to savor it, they want to prolong it as much as they can. They want the pleasures of life to last. They want to throw luxurious parties, and spend their waking days basking in their own comfort and glory. But, when the day comes to an end, when their time has come, they will have already received their reward. The Gospel offers a similar warning: Jesus offers the parable of the rich man who enjoys the fruits of a good life while the beggar, Lazarus, suffers outside. The rich man was dressed in fine linen, dined sumptuously, enjoyed the comfortable life, while poor Lazarus starved with dogs licking his sores. At the end, they end up in opposite circumstances and we can hear underneath a similar warning: “Woe to the complacent in Zion.” One of the lessons offered today is to remember that life has an aim: an aim to live well in love. Victor Frankl said it best when he wrote, “The salvation of man is through love and in love.” In other words, we were not made by God to simply enjoy our own independence free from worries. We were made for communion, we were made for love. Frankl’s point was simple: contemplation of our beloved can be the sweet refuge we find even in the worst misery, and if love is our refuge in misery, then salvation comes from love, in love. Love moves the heart beyond its own circumstances into a shared life. We were made in God’s image, to love, and it is through love that we, men and women broken by sin, are saved. As we come closer to our Savior in love, we also see that God inspires us to love: “Love one another, as I have loved you”, Jesus commands.

Hey Everybody! Today is the feast of St. Michael the Archangel, the one charged by God to help defend us in the battle against temptation, sin, and death. Our mortal enemy wants to destroy us, so we must be on guard, and ask for heavenly aid to fight the good fight and be fit for the kingdom! So… what better way to get fit for the Kingdom, then to start our first challenge! Challenge will run from 9/29/25 — 10/13/25 To gain points in the challenge you must post to the community and select the category, “challenge” 1 point — picture of you doing any exercise (gym, walk, something that shows you moving) 1 point — reflection offered from your prayer 1 point — post showing yourself praying the rosary. 1 point — post a picture of the time you wake up (before 6am gets you a bonus point). Limit is 5 points per day. Most points at the end of the challenge wins the prize. Prize is announced in the attached video!

Is anger the same as wrath? Is there a difference? In short, one is the cause, the other is its expression. The distinction between wrath and anger is important because too often they are conflated to mean the same thing, when in fact, one is a passion with the other a vice. To be clear, passion is not a sin in itself. Vices, however, are all sins, and wrath is one of them; one of the seven “deadly” sins. In contrast, anger is the passion that can lead down one of two possible roads, one is vice, the other is virtue. Anger is one of the passions. Passions unbridled go in any direction. They can lead to destruction as readily as victory. Like the other passions — love and hatred, desire and aversion, hope and despair, fear and daring, anger and joy — passions are movements in the soul, forward or back, towards or away from certain circumstances and situations. The intellect and the will serve to rein in one’s passions and provide direction for them. Without direction, they remain unruly, driving in whichever direction that seems most expedient. In the same way that the horse takes direction from its rider, the passions take their cue from the intellect and the will. The will and the intellect are the bridle and bit that move the passions towards their proper aim; for the virtuous, that aim is the Good. The question then, is where are those passions directed? The difference between anger and wrath is the final orientation of that passion. It would be better and more clear to say that anger is the passion that leads either to virtue or vice; the virtue would be charity, the vice, wrath. This clarification makes apparent the truth that anger in itself is no sin, but rather what one does with that passion. For instance if someone is angry at being wrongly treated, that anger is quite reasonable. Any injustice requires some reparation. Wrath, in contrast, seeks revenge. Wrath is an anger let loose; anger is unreasonable and their solution is the elimination of that which makes them angry. Children who have yet to learn how to master their passions, cannot express why they are angry; instead they throw tantrums, damage property (like breaking toys) and scream and yell.