Thomas, Mary, & James Guengoro August 18

Thommy and John

Good morning
I love you

John, it was good seeing you yesterday [8-17]. There are certain traits of your father that you’d be better served learning to use much more wisely: like ignoring. If you’ve not had the right psychology course yet, I suggest you look up on line how the extinction paradigm works. That will also help you understand the billboard about the blog. I may try the index card and push pin method too but it looks like the billboard is the only viable alternative – unless y’all have an different proposal….

Thommy, I looked for you over the weekend at SOAR – Spartans means Michigan State to me. I guess I have to learn a new referent. UNCG campus, the quiet before the students arrive – even the library was closed, one last time before Christmas I guess….

From Friday night until this morning [8-18-08], it’s been a settling in weekend. Friday was the feast of the assumption. Maybe you know that on your own by now. I remember one early in greensboro August 15th, 2003 actually, when I came to pick y’all up and not only had your mother “forgotten” that you were suppose to be with me that weekend, she had also neglected to arrange for y’all to attend Mass. And her live in knew nothing about either of those things – ignorance is bliss; except when you are responsible for doing things right and doing the right things…. So, ignorance about holy days of obligation isn’t a line you can use any more….

I celebrated the Feast at the Immaculate Conception – the evening Mass was less that 1/3 of the church full; I heard the place was overflowing for lunch Mass. This priest is not one I’d recommend for liturgy or for preaching. The liturgy has music and the deacon has a beautiful voice – except the pace of the singing is more like a funeral dirge and way far from uplifting. Father’s sermons are cerebral – and this is not a cerebral audience: if we were we’d be throwing tomatoes from the cheap seats. If we were a seminar maybe it’d be worth sitting there with him for twenty minutes. … oh well, enough of that rant.

Saturday was a good day! Glorious weather. Early up and OUT! A light and casual breakfast. At the ‘town square’ – the local hang out…. And then a round of golf. Yep, real life golf. My putting was ok – about one in two or one in three from close in got sunk; any other club I actually hit the ball about half the time. But the walk, the camaraderie, that made the morning. And the Knights do a hole at the Wyndam, like we’ve done since about when the Chrysler open started. This is a fun way to serve and get to see another game that’s played by the pros – what I do is not the same game as what they do…. And Saturday night we had a beauty contest to raise money for Relay for Life - She-men doing beauty pageant stuff! A bit too much for my taste but good family entertainment and about $15,000 raised in one evening. Talk about being part of the community!

Sunday there was SOAR [Saturday too], campus visits to let you know about the blog, and an afternoon at the golf thing, walking watching enjoying an overcast day and real live golf. I even hit a few balls…..
The rest of Sunday evening and night and into the wee hours was spent either writing – I’ve got two long stories/qua novellas or even novel length writings going on – or picking out birthday presents. 8-28, 9-9, 9-14,, 9-15 a very busy birthday few weeks…. It’s the fun part of birthdays, getting stuff to give for fun….

And back to work today – spent most of it reading one record. But, I may not have had the brain power to do much else because of the no sleep thing…. I gotta fix that.

Census is full – that’s a very good thing. Too bad I can’t take credit…. We gotta get a steady referral flow. And stay full…. Oremus….

And you? What’s up? What ya doing? What do you hear about the blog?
And all the Dad questions – remember the secret of a father’s love, my love, The Father’s Love.

I love you
dad



August 18
Thomas, Mary, and James Guengoro. d. 1620 bl. 1867

Each one of these Catholics were arrested and crucified, including 2 year old James. You’d think the English had the corner market on the horrific. Not so.

Imagine the family, the husband and wife, the wife and husband, two made one at marriage, with faith, and in their home, their community, their extended family. That oneness requires all of that. A personal relationship with God that understands, that experiences! love, the essential oneness of love, the I exist for you no matter what love. With any luck you get/got introduced to that in childhood, in the womb of your family; and find the experience synergized with your personal love affair with God. Then when you discover your vocation to be spouse, one with another, you expand your relationship with God to that woman and become one in three, now and forever, bringing all that has come before and the anticipation of what will come from ahead, love, Oneness, no matter what [like the secret of a father’s love]. In addition to being wrapped into one by the love of God, marriage is reinforced and guarded by the love and respect from your extended family, from your community. To the degree that is absent or, worse, oppositional, to that degree, marriage becomes more difficult. Anyone who in any way makes it easier or even reinforced for one of the spouses [spice?] to act against the marriage, such a person is undermining, violating, sinning against the crux of the married people’s being and well being.

Thomas and Mary Guengoro [I wonder what their birth names were; certainly not these anglicized baptismal names] had such a marriage to which they brought their faith, their family, and their community.

And they brought all of this to the living of our Catholicism in a time and place that was opposed to, actively suppressed the expression of the one true faith.

Bl Simon Kiyota Bokusai was a Japanese nobleman. After serving in the military, he founded a catechetical school. The pagan Japanese emperor ordered Bl Simon Kiyota Bokusai to close the school. Well, this noble warrior knew that this day would come when he decided to open his life and his home to the teaching of Jesus, to our Catholic faith. And disobeyed the emperor. Ignoring any order, especially a legal one, from a person of authority, does have its consequences. The emperor condemned Bl Simon Kiyota Bokussai, his family, and anyone living in his household. Thomas, Mary, and James Guengoro were not only Bl Simon Kiyota Bokussai’s servants but also students and teachers with him.

Thomas Guengoro could have taken his family out of harm’s way. Left the home. Left the church. Rejected his faith. But chose instead, husband and wife and, therefore their son, chose to stand and witness. Yes, God gave you parents to decide for you. To teach you to decide for yourself. To forever shape and guide you.

The emperor ordered that they all be crucified. At Kokura, Japan.