Memorial of Saint John Chrysostom, Bishop and Doctor of the Church

Collect of Saint John Chrysostom

 Lectionary: 443

First of all, I ask that supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings be offered for everyone, for kings and for all in authority, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity. 

After all we've been through, it is hard to say what the normal life should look like, that form of life which sets the norm for most of our days. Many days which come at us as challenges, with unexpected and unanticipated difficulties. They come so often we might suppose that crisis is the normal. I've met people who grew up in dysfunctional families where emotional upheavals were so common, they were their normal. They didn't know how to live without drama. 

Saint Paul urged his disciples to support the legitimate authority of emperors, governors, and kings so "that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity." Revolution may be necessary sometimes, but it should not be normal, despite Marxist ideology. 

When the Covid pandemic arrived in the United States in March of last year, everyone hoped we might get back to normal within a month. And then, within another month. By the third month some people suspected the old normal could not be reconstructed. The flu like illness had already killed so many, and the future looked bleak. Eighteen months later, we realize our unsettled politics has created a more severe variant of the disease. There is no end in sight even As the World Turns with its wars, hurricanes, forest fires, and migrations of entire populations.  

If this scourge will be remembered as a blessing in disguise, it might be because we decided finally to pray in the Spirit of Saint Paul, to lay off the drama, and to find common ground. Nothing is gained by hysterics and endless wars. 

That is no dropping out, as many did in the 1960's. There is no escape to Canada, the river bottoms, or Wyoming mountains; the Internet will find you! And psychonautics is a highway to Hell. Instead, we turn to attentive prayer with the news in one hand and the Bible, rosary, or missalette in the other. We offer supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings... for everyone, for presidents, judges, legislator and for all in authority, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity. 

That is our normal way of life.