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Gung Hay Fat Choy! ... Now you can do better than that. Gung hay fat choy! (laughter!) Oh, you’re all Chinese now, huh? It’s the year of the dog. And so, if you are born in the year of the dog, you’ll be a great leader and very prosperous. So let’s hope everybody who is born this year is at least very prosperous, if not great leaders.

These readings this week are really great for what we are about to celebrate in the beginning of Catholic Schools Week. Yes, you are being spared having a Power Point Presentation. Later, at the next Mass, the children from the school will deliver a reflection instead of the Homily. Several days ago we practiced the joint reflection... I put all the pictures from the school digital camera onto this (projector) so that when they are talking, there are all these pictures of kids doing all sorts of things that they do in school. It’s kind of nice. One of the first graders got up to do his practice part and started to cry immediately. (Oh, my God! Who laughed at that?!!) But, it’s really wonderful because there really is an authority in there in the sense that they are very sincere. They’re very real about their experiences. So, the themes in this week are compassion and caring and the love and spirituality that can be found in Catholic Schools, as I’m sure in all schools, but particularly in our Catholic Schools Week.

These readings are really good for talking about teaching, talking about authority, talking about, not so much the law, but certainly the authority that Jesus brings to this moment. Going back to Moses in that first reading, Jesus is owning who he is. The Greek word for authority is “ex usia.” (Turning to the celebrant, “Did you know that, Father? I bet you did. So, that’s why I’d better get this rig ht.”) “Ex” is “out of.” And “usia” means “out of being.” So, out of Christ’s being, he communicated who he was/is and Mark is asking, all the way through these first eight chapters. The basic question is “Who is this Jesus... Who is he?” And immediately, he steps up and he communicates who he is. And he communicates it through action and word. We all learn through our different pedagogical styles. We all have different styles of learning. For some it’s auditory. Some, it’s seeing. Some, it’s doing. Some through pictures. We all have different ways of learning. I learn through, actually, doing. I hate reading. I love listening to the tapes in the car and the CD’s. Our pastor won’t change his car. Guess why? Because there are no tape machines in the new cars. Isn’t that crazy? I’m not saying he’s tight or anything. (I know some of you are going to tell him I said that.)

But Jesus is communicating about his authority, who he is, from his own reality. The Scribes and the Pharisees spoke in terms of the law and of the Hebrew Scriptures. Their reality was outside of themselves and in a different place. But Christ is communicating through this unclean spirit, and through the situation he’s teaching. Moses, on the other hand, the great Prophet par excellence, he’s the one of all the prophets that communicates between God and us, between the people of Israel and us. But Jesus is communicating directly. And as I said to Father Brian last night, I am not even going to touch the second reading (for all of you who are married.) Thank you? OK! We won’t touch that. You know, the reality of the authority of Christ and the experience of healing is a very important one. Now, if you were back in that day, everything that wasn’t understood was basically seen as a demon. Sickness was seen negative and evil it was thought that you had done something wrong. While we have a twenty-first century mindset, based on scientific understanding, we still have demons in our lives. They are varied and have different names.

I want to talk to you in terms of the experience of the healing, the experience of Christ in this time and at this place. We’ve heard his words. We have heard it and we can experience it in the authentic living out of Christ’s experience, of his compassion and of his love. Now, how many of you have read “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”? Hands up. Oh, God.... There better be more readers. One, two, three, four, five, six.... Six! There are fifteen million people in the United States who have read this book! The homily is going to be null and void now, because.... Well, I have three stories based on it.

For us Christians, none of the seven habits are novel or startling. In a nutshell, they are as follows: You have to own your own life. You have to be proactive. You have to take initiative, and you have to have responsibility for my being, for your being, for our place on the Planet. So, that means we’re not our history. We’re not our genetic history. We are not the experience of our families. We can rise above, take the good stuff and rise above some of that stuff in our families. We can all do that, can’t we?

The second one is begin with the end in mind, that is, envision the outcome while wanting to maintain your own values, to put first things first and allow your values to discipline your feelings and impulses. Well we know how many would say that we’re not animals. We can own our own feelings. Sometimes, there are things we want to do but we know we shouldn’t do them because it’s the right thing to do. It’s the moral thing to do. Think WIN! WIN! and keep a “no losers” attitude. Seek more to understand than to be understood. (The Prayer of St. Francis) Focus on listening, and not replying. Synergise. Enable more energy to be released than put in. And sharpen the saw, that is, cultivate yourself physically, mentally, socially, emotionally and spiritually. Last year, I was helping a lady up at Diamond Terrace in Clayton work on her e-mail because she is one hundred two years old and she couldn’t understand where her cursor went when it went off the screen. And I was helping with that, and I was so amazed that somebody at one hundred two years old.... Her name was Martha. She has since gone home to God. But she was sharpening the sword. She was constantly wanting to learn new things.

The guy that wrote this book, Steven Covey, was writing it for corporate America, to have a principled centered life. But these are not principles that are foreign to us as Catholic Christians. Now, I believe that if you follow all of these, if you are Christ-centered, then the healing experience of f ollowing a Christ-centered life is what we are all called to do, to be saints, to be holy, but in very real terms. It is a healing experience and helps us to deal with the demons that happen in our lives. And you just name them for yourself, what your own particular demon is.

I’m not going to go through all seven. I am just going to name a few of these, give you a few stories of some of the effectiveness of some of these particular principles. Begin with the end in mind. That is, what’s your goal? What do you want to achieve? Let me translate this into very personal, practical terms. In the book “The Aladdin Factor” there is a story by Jane Nelson that could help a good deal of mothers and fathers. Nelson once received a call from a frantic single mother who was caught up in a real struggle with her fourteen year-old daughter. The mother had found a six-pack of beer in the girl’s closet. And so, when the daughter came home from school, the mother said, “OK, Maria. What’s this?” “...It looks like a six-pack of beer to me, Mom.” her daughter answered cheekily. “Don’t get smart with me, young lady. You tell me what this is. I’m your mother.” Well, “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” the girl replied. “I found this six-pack in your closet, young lady, and you’d better explain it.” Maria thought real fast. “Oh, yeah. I was hiding it for a friend.” “You expect me to believe that?” asks her mother. And Maria gets mad and stomps off to her bedroom, and slams the door. Does any of this sound familiar, with teenagers? Well, the mother called the advice center and Nelson answered the phone. So she asks, “Why were you so concerned with finding the six-pack of beer in her closet?” The mother replied, “ Because I don’t want her to get into trouble.” “I understand,” said Nelson, “But why don’t you want her to get into trouble?” And th e mother answered, “Well, because I don’t want her to ruin her life.” “I understand that.” replied Nelson “But why is it that you don’t want her to ruin her life?” Finally, the mother got it, “Well, because I love her.” Do you think that the daughter got the message? And the reply was, “Of course not.” What would you think would happen if you tried a totally different response, if you started with the message instead? If you started off with, “Honey, I love you so much and I really got scared when I found this six-pack of beer in your closet. Could we talk about that? Because I’m really afraid you can get into trouble, can we talk about it?” With this approach, Jane Nelson says “You can start by being vulnerable instead of conducting an Inquisition that ultimately ends in denial. Starting from the focus of love, which is your goal, provides a focus so that the child can open up and work together with you on some kind of solution.” Principled, centered living.

Years ago, there was a country and western song entitled “Roses for Mama.” In this song, it’s Mothers’ Day and a man goes to a florist shop to buy a bouquet. Now, he is real busy and he is going off to do the things that are really exciting that day and he doesn’t have time to go visit his mom. He goes into the florist shop and there is a little kid standing and he has not enough money to buy flowers for his mom. And so he gives him the extra money the kid needs and off he drives. He does some errands and, as he is driving down this small street, he sees the cemetery and, at the cemetery, there is the little boy kneeling at a grave with the flowers in his hand. And so, he stops the car, reverses it and goes over to the kid and says, “What are you doing?” The kid says, “Well, my mom died a year ago and I always talk to her every day and today, on Mothers’ Day, I wan ted to bring her flowers.” The guy gets into his car, goes back to the florist. The flowers are not delivered, and he brings the flowers to his mom. First things first, dealing with things that are real, things that are important.

The third thing is dealing with communication. You and I can have a really big fight over things, like Father Brian and I do all the time, (Gesturing toward the celebrant, “Not this Brian. We’re Irish.”) He’s only pretend Irish, the other fellow. But, if we are having a disagreement about something and we’re communicating or trying to communicate well, the best thing is to do exactly that, to communicate well with the people around you and to be the best possible communicators we can be, to listen to the other person and not presume.... A lot of married couples do this. I’m not married. I’ve listened to the second reading. But, what do they do in communications styles? What happens? They don’t listen. And there’s another thing they do, magical thinking. You ever come across that as a married couple, or involved in any type of relationship? “Oh, Honey, I thought you would know it’s our anniversary and I thought you would know that I want flowers and I presumed that you thought, that you thought, that you thought....” instead of just asking and communicating.

A lot of these principles that Steven Covey talks about are for corporate America. But we can translate them into the world of our Catholic faith and our Christian tradition, and we can heal, in our real living of our authentic lives and our lives that are centered on Christ, in a very powerful way. And, in living out this Christ-centered life, then we get to be more loving, more caring and more compassionate. Yes, stuff comes up. But the demons we can deal with much better if we are living Christ-centered, principled lives.

Now I want you to take one minu te to turn to the persons next to you and tell them the one person that taught you one of the best lessons in your life. Who was that person, and were words necessary? Just for one minute, since it’s Schools Week. Turn. Talk, talk, talk....