Category Archives: hope

The first speaker is Fr. Michael Lightner. Former college lineman, he’s a seriously big guy (6’4″ 330), with a great conversion story.

Raised in a Catholic family, his dad was one of General McArther’s bodyguards. His mom was a daily communicant, very devout.

Fr. Lightner went off the rails in college, doing all the things wrong that some of us do at that time. Was hurt by a woman early, became bitter and started using women etc. Became a band security guy, did a lot of Lollapaloozas and so forth.

Became an intermedia between the athletes who wanted drugs and the art people who had drugs. Picked up the nickname as “The Kingpin”, because he hooked up people with jobs, drugs, and more.

Then one night he brought some pot home, stashed it under the couch and his three year old niece found it … “Grandma, what’s this?”.

Awkward.

His mom confronted him with his sister, who was a drug abuse counselor at the local VA hospital.

His mom then forced him to attend a pilgrimage to Medjugorge with her that Christmas. On that trip he was so angry that he wanted to beat people up (which he did for a living), so freaked out by the trip that he actually started praying a bit. Kept having panic attacks, a big one as he got to the location itself.

His mom told him … “if you do only one thing here, go to confession”. Outside of a resignation he accepted.

His first real prayer was “God if you exist … and I don’t think that you do … you have 7 days to show me. Otherwise I’m living my life my way”.

After a 40 minute confession the priest gave him 5 Our Fathers, which made him mad. But then with the absolution he felt a presence, which pushed him to his back, against the back wall of the confessional. He was pinned against the wall, couldn’t move.

Then he felt release, had no idea what to do. Everything changed. The five Our Fathers took him 45 minutes, and he wept the whole time. Kept flashing through all the women that he’d hurt, women who sought comfort and protection in him.

He then offered his second prayer, which led to a mystical experience, an infilling of the Holy Spirit.

Four months later he went on a second trip, and they went to a monastery where there were miraculous headings, truly astonishing. He waited for 20 minutes behind a woman in a wheel chair, and while they were praying over her he heard a voice … “if I get this woman out of the wheelchair, will you enter the seminary?”.  His obvious answer … “no”.

He was thinking of upcoming tryouts for the NFL, so he put conditions “if she walks around the church …”, when she did he said “if she steps on that block” and she did, … well, he entered the seminary and is obviously now a priest.

A bit later he had a dream that he was in the NFL, in which he had a deep sense of deja vu, which allowed him to see ahead as to what was going to happen. They win the game, has a party, and he’s weeping. At three that morning he woke up to a dream in which he was shown that he’d fulfilled his childhood dream, now it was time to fulfill God’s dream for him”.

So he was convicted, but it was hard because he was dating (closely) a woman he’d met on pilgrimage. But, he followed the call, accepted the conversion.

What is conversion? The Holy Spirt is asking us to change, asking us to receive His mercy. That is the tug, that is the sense conviction that we’re sensing during those times.

We want to change, but the world and sin keeps the anxiety on us, does not bring us peace. If we ask for God’s mercy, if we use the tools in our tool belt that the Catholic Church has given us – Holy Scripture, the Euchartist, Confession, fasting, prayer – we’ll be fine, we’ll slay the dragon.

This is the path to conversion, this is conversion.

Step into this, try increasing each one a little bit at a time. The Holy Spirit will make it work, will lead us through conversion.

Perhaps start by going to the Eucharist one more time a week (+1).

All of this can only happen with God’s mercy … if we set our pride aside even a little bit, He will make it real, He will make it happen.

If you ask God to reveal Himself to you, He will do so, make you a son with all of the inheritance that He already has ready for you.

God elevated our state of humanity – fallen humanity – above the angels, they are hear to serve us. That is nearly incomprehensible, if you think of what that actually means, given that they are created above us.

We need these chops now. The government is attacking us, a battle looming. If we do not teach our wives, our daughters and sons, our grandchildren, then they will not even be able to fight the battles that loom

Those battles will come our way, whether we ask for them or not.

—–

The problem with our families, our Church, our society, our government, and more is that we have forgotten how to serve – we are self-centered.

If we change our hearts, all the rest will inevitably change.

Finished by telling a great story about a friend of his who followed God’s call to play the piano, if he would serve him…

anything is possible. Anything is possible.

If we hear God call us, we need only answer, and he will call us forth so that we can be His son’s in glory. We don’t see that glory right now, but one day we will. If we hang on his mercy and persevere, we will change this country, we will change the world.

Great first talk.

Btw he started a motorcycle club, the “Sons of Mercy”. He’ll help others start the same, provided that a priest is involved.

Raul Jorge Lozano was born 72 years ago today to Raul and Francesca Lozano in Laredo, TX. The oldest of four children, he worked hard through high school, married my Mom, Mary Lozano during undergrad school, and with everybody straining together somehow both he and Mom figured out how to get through their bachelor’s degrees at the University of Texas, Austin.

Hardships were a way of life, but somehow they survived the death of their second child, David, while nearly alone a million miles from home.

Well not quite a million miles physically, but at least that far culturally. Used to family and the small town of Laredo, they were tossed into the cold isolation of the roiling masses in LA … East LA (Huntington Park, a tough part of the metro area even then) to be exact.

Isolated from all, and still only in their early to mid 20s they had a baby die … imagine what that was like, if you can. I cannot.

By the grace of God they took a temporary job (only to be six months) at McDonnell Aircraft in St. Louis, and well you know how that goes … six months turned into the rest of his life.

St. Louis turned out to be a perfect match for the young couple with a growing family. Two more children were added to the two that survived LA, followed by one lost in miscarriage.

We all made friends, Dad’s work was great and running in front of the industry, and the years went by very, very fast.

Next thing you know I (the oldest) was leaving for college, with all sorts of unresolved conflicts and anxieties. I respected my Dad, but if you pressed me I probably couldn’t really tell you why.

He died only four years later, at the relatively young age of 43. One kid married and in graduate school, one grandchild and one on the way, one kid each in undergrad, high school, and junior high.

I’m sure that as he heard God’s call Dad would rather have stayed and finished raising us, yet the One who created time itself knew what was best for everyone.

Definitely not easiest, but best.

Some Reasons Why
More than 28 years have passed since Dad went home, and I think I can begin to name out some of the reasons why I intuitively knew that I respected him on that day, just about 33 years ago now, that day when I left to “find my life”.

I have since struggled to live out my own vocation as husband and father, falling often, yet being overwhelmed by the mercy and grace of God in measures inexpressible.

Carol and I now have 8 biological kids of our own, 4 more by marriage (well one is almost, but that’s close enough!), 3 grandkids that we’ve lost through miscarriage, 3 more that we can hold today, and two more on the way later this year.

So it is from that perspective, that humbling place of gratitude for grace and joy undeserved, that I offer these reflections on why I respected my Dad, and why I still respect my Dad today:

Faith. My Dad lived his faith. While he wasn’t necessarily the most vocal, we all knew that we were Catholic, and that Dad really believed what the Church taught. Yes, we got to Mass every Sunday, until I was old enough to lie about going myself and dug my own hole. And when I had a big conversion experience my first year of college, I knew that he was very, very relieved. That Mom & Dad held on to their faith through the turmoil of those early post-Vatican II days is remarkable, something for which all of us are very grateful.

Family. Family really mattered to Dad. Sometimes it mattered enough to him that in a very Hispanic way he would want to shred us (particularly the teenage boys in the midst of doing something that sure seemed to make sense at the time), but as I got older I understood better that this went far deeper in him. Dad was willing to risk being ostracized for not being “hip”, for not going along with the decaying social / sexual norms of his peers, the so-called “sexual revolution” of the 1960s and 70s. While the toll in broken lives, devastated families, and increasing despair for those who dive down that path is increasingly obvious to us today, at the time people just thought it was something new and cool. Thanks for going against the grain big time on this one, Dad.

Driven. Dad was driven to do the best with what he was given – talents, circumstances, everything – and wasn’t too patient with reasons why he should wish for something more, with people who suggested that he had been shortchanged in any way.

Priorities. As his career prospered and money got a bit easier, many of my parent’s friends moved out to more upscale parts of St. Louis. Mom & Dad stayed in a solidly middle-class, mixed blue-collar / white-collar part of town for the explicit reason that being in this neighborhood would make it a little easier for us to stay balanced, to avoid the trap of endlessly chasing this world’s worthless “treasures”.

Open. As hard-headed as he could be, the last conversation I had with Dad was just two weeks before he unexpectedly died. As he prepared to take my pregnant wife and baby with me to the airport for our return to grad school (after an awesome two week Christmas break, which they had paid for), he told me about some of the regrets that he had from his life, from decisions that he made and the consequences derived. Dad also told me that he was proud of what we’d done in the few years since our head-butting conflicts that are so common in teenage years, and I KNEW that he loved us.

DAD WAS NOT A SAINT
Lest you think I’m doing an ad-hoc canonization, I’m not … we all know that Raul Jorge Lozano was not without faults, that like all of us he could (and did) mess some things up. Sometimes big time.

I also do not know whether he was active in the Sacrament of Reconciliation before his death, though it is my deepest desire that he finds mercy in the arms of Our Lord.

Grief and the Flow of Time
When Dad died we all experienced that well known ache of grief, perhaps compounded by the unexpected, to us untimely nature of his passing. That unanswerable pain seemed to come from everywhere we looked, from reservoirs hidden yet painfully real.

Yet as these things go, with time the immediacy of the pain subsided, gradually leaving a holy residue, an echo of times past and a hint of times to come, a lingering call of heaven on the wind, a reminder that we are moving on our own path towards the One who loved us into existence. We still miss you, Dad, and we wait hopefully for the day when through His grace we may meet again.

Our Birthday Present for You, Dad
So on this, what would have marked the 72 year of my Dad’s sojourn in this ephemeral life, please join me in giving my Dad the best birthday present that we can give him: pray that he find the mercy that we all so earnestly hope for, the mercy that answers all of our doubts, the mercy that comforts all of our sorrows, the mercy that forgives all of our sins, the mercy that is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ himself.

Pray as best you know how. If you are actively Catholic, please pray a Chaplet of Divine Mercy. Heck, even if you aren’t go ahead and offer that beautiful prayer!

Happy Birthday, Dad!

Love,

For the last couple of years Carol and I have been ushering in the new year at our local parish, with an event that, while it sounded crazy at first is starting to make a lot of sense. Adoration at 11 pm, followed by Mass at midnight … essentially a vigil celebration of the solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God.

Something about the timing itself is so attractive … thanking God as the previous year draws to a close, and participating in the most singular event this side of the veil – the Mass, a truly transcendent reality – to begin the new year.

As before the Mass was celebrated by Fr. Eugene Morris, a great priest in our home archdiocese of St. Louis. Fr. Morris holds down a number of posts, including lecturing on sacramental theology at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary, running a house for those discerning vocation to the priesthood, guiding the permanent deacon formation program, and probably a bunch more … yet with that schedule, he spends a bit of time each year with us.

Awesome.

He Said Many Things

Fr. Morris has a real charism for preaching – he rolls one big idea after another right at you, bringing them together into nice, neat objects of beauty. Last night he was really on a roll, developing thoughts on …

… the Theotokos, in which we celebrate Mary as God-bearer …

… the mystery of the Incarnation, in which He who is, who was, and who is to come became our very own flesh and blood …

… leading us into the Paschal mystery, in which He transforms us and makes a new creation …

Are You Kidding Me?

I feel like a bug dancing between bowling balls … dozens of them, rolling right around me … by all rights I should be road kill …

but then Fr. Morris made a small point which just flattenned me.

While most of society was out celebrating the simple passage of time, we were completely blessed to be celebrating nothing less than the total transformation of time.

Time Keeps On Slippin … Into the Future

That really made sense to me. For years I’ve gotten all nostalgic about each New Year, as if the very passage of time itself was remarkable. What the heck – isn’t it just going to do that pretty much the same, whether we notice or not?

But then comes the very God who created time itself, for whom all moments of time and space are pretty much the same as we experience our own present moment (the eternal now, an idea well worth some contemplation), and he pokes a hole into the very nature of space and time.

The Best Part

Yes, Jesus entered our world as one of us, and chose a particular time and place to make that entrance. Yet instead of being confined by that entrance, in reality he brought eternity to each one of us, no matter where or when we are.

For the thief on the cross facing eternity, the early Christians martyred by an empire in it’s last throes, a lonely soldier pounding sand in the third millennium, and even for an easily-distracted geek who all too easily forgets what lasts, he reached out his hand and draws all towards him.

Sure, the implications for the space-time continuum are staggering … but even more important are the implications for our very lives.

Time to Act

So that transformation of time that began with a young girl who said yes to God, became visible to us in the Incarnation, became fully active in the events of Easter and Pentecost … that transformation is the best evidence of the central reality which knits the very flow of time into a cohesive whole.

How can you participate in this transformation, make it your own?

In the answer to this question lies the real meaning of Christmas!