Please VOTE today, PACT Viewing Party, and Next Mass is Nov 20th

Compañeras and Compañeros-

Election Day is here!  Be sure to VOTE!  and if you cannot vote, call someone to VOTE.  There is a PACT Viewing Party at St Paul’s United Methodist Church on the corner of 10th and San Salvador. PACT has been planning that event for a while and rather than us creating our own event, I think it would be a good sign of unity to attend the PACT viewing party.

Our next Misa de Solidaridad will be November 20th at 9 am at the Newman Center, the corner of 10th and San Carlos. (I’ll be on a retreat next weekend and so we will NOT have mass on November 13). Please pass the word!

Thank you to Yadira Guerrero for facilitating our time at the Liturgy of the Word and Teresa Castellanos for the amazing Community Forum last Sunday.

As I stated at the introduction to the Liturgy of the Word, we are in a powerful time where we must find a way to be united and stay united.  Our faith heritage teaches us that we are the Body of Christ and we have an obligation to help maintain that Body.  Eucharistic theologians suggest that the “Body of Christ” is more than a “membership” in an institution as one would have membership at Costco or the Elks Club and it is certainly more than a denominational declaration. Contemporary theologians suggest that the "Body of Christ” is so powerful, so “mystical” that the concept of “belonging” to the Body of Christ is a concept that is continually pushing the limits of inclusion. Some even suggest that the  "Body of Christ” is the entire cosmos. What a powerful image that is!  Ponder this concept: the whole universe: humanity, our planet, solar system, galaxy and time itself is woven together.  We are all connected.  We are a part of the fabric of creation…and because we are woven together, the task of the Church is to promote connections...and to heal divisions.

By the time we gather together on November 20th, we will have elected a new president and city and county measured and state propositions will have passed or failed. Some will be happy, others not.  I believe our task to continue the powerful work of making connections with others who are not like ourselves. As our movement grows, we will find more and more connections with people from other areas of the city, whose life experience is different than our own, whose language is not the same as our language.

Our Misa de Solidaridad is but one humble attempt to bring all of us together at one table. To “encounter” or “encontrar” the sacred Other in our Sister and Brother. When we share our hearts with each other at our Scripture sharing and then break the bread at Eucharist, the wall that divides us dissolves and we finally “see” each other.  It is my hope that we can offer other faith communities that are struggling to heal from the divisiveness and rancor of electoral politics, will find in our community a model of listening, sharing and healing.

So when you go to the polls today, remember that when you VOTE, you are not simply voting for a candidate nor are you voting for an issue.  When you vote, take the stories of your sister who is homeless and suffering with untreated mental illness.  Take the story of your undocumented immigrant brother who works the swing shift and then goes off to a day job with only 4 hours of sleep and never sees his children until Sunday.  Take the story of the young couple with their 3 small children living in a van along San Antonio Street. VOTE.

¡Hasta pronto!

Fr Jon