About a month ago, I found out that one of the two priests from our parish was in the hospital. This particular priest is not just any priest to me.  This priest is Fr. Ouellette.

Fr. Ouellette was one of the many priests at my parish when I was a young boy.  Way back then, daily mass was said several times per day at our church and altar boys were assigned to serve at each mass.  I served with Fr. Ouellette many times at these daily masses, for funerals during the school week and at weddings over the weekend. He always treated me – any everyone else -  like gold. He was one of the most appreciative people that I’ve ever known. He taught me how to show sincere appreciation for the smallest acts of kindness shown by others.

Somewhere around 1973, the Christmas masses were so crowded that we had two midnight masses – one in the beautiful, ornate upper church and a second in the darker, dingier but, just-as-large lower church. On this particular evening, this 12-year old was sick, but still wanted the honor of serving at midnight mass (even though I was relegated to the downstairs dungeon!).  I must’ve been sicker than I thought because I fainted right in the middle of the mass.  This was not just any lazy, quiet, not-get-noticed, graceful faint either.  My entire pudgy body smashed against the kneeler and caused it to crash against the solid marble altar floor with a resounding boom!  My older brother, Bill, and  my Dad rushed up to the altar to carry me into the sacristy as Fr. Ouellette looked-on to make sure that I was okay. Fr. Ouellette followed my Dad and brother into the sacristy to make sure that I was okay before proceeding with mass.  He taught me kindness and compassion.

One of the reasons that he’s been assigned to our parish almost continuously since 1973 is that his dear Mother lived in our city.  The great part of that is that he frequently incorporated stories about his family into his homilies. He wasn’t  a boring priest who spoke in monotone about God,God,God.  He was a human who had a real family. He frequently spoke about real family responsibilities and challenges from first-hand experience. He spoke of each challenge in his life with faith in God and hope and confidence that things would always turn out well. He taught me how to honor and appreciate family-especially when things are not perfect.

The St. Vincent de Paul Society is a group within the Catholic Church that cares for the poor within the parish. Its members collect food and money from the parishioners so that they’ll be able to provide for the poor on a weekly basis throughout the entire year. Fr. Ouellette has always been our biggest ambassador and salesperson. When he speaks about a topic, he never uses notes and always speaks from his heart with tremendous passion.  He doesn’t act like he cares…he cares.  He taught me sincerity and authenticity.

When I went to visit my 83-year old friend a few weeks ago, there were signs all over the door to his hospital room. Disinfect hands before entering. Caution: Infectious matter. Put-on gloves prior to entering. Dispose of gloves before leaving room. Nurses must put on gowns prior to entering. I was afraid to go in.

Once in the room, I saw my friend in bed with visible tubes everywhere  – his nose, mouth and arms.  He was having difficulty breathing. The nurse told me that he’d been unable to eat solid food for three weeks. He looked awful. His mouth was open. His lips were chapped. His arms were badly bruised from all of the the IV’s there were inserted into his veins.  I pulled up a chair and sat next to his bed and began to pray. My mind immediately came to a standstill.  Because of his age, poor health, and the obvious pain that he was in, I wasn’t sure if I was praying for him to recover or for him to die quickly and peacefully.  After a little consideration, I proceeded to pray for about 30 uninterrupted minutes for God’s will and not mine. He was so bad that I expected any one of his gasping breaths to be his last.  I was giving up hope.

All of a sudden, the silence in the room was broken. A chipper nurse entered the room to check on his vital signs. I took that opportunity to step out of the room to give my friend some privacy. From just outside the door, I could hear the nurse wake up Fr. Ouellette and tell him that he had a guest.  When I re-entered the room, he rolled over to face me.  The man who looked like he was ready to breathe his last breath, opened his eyes and said with a top-of-the-mornin’-tone, Hello Bob. I thought that he was about to die and within a matter of a few seconds, he began engaging me in conversation just as he had since 1973. How are you? It’s so good to see you.

Although his body was failing him, his teacher’s mind was as sharp as ever.  He asked me how Virginia (my Mom) was doing.  He told me what a great man Oscar (my Dad) was.  He and my Dad both went to the same high school. He went on to compliment my wife Carolyn and say what a valuable member of the parish she’s always been (not bad for a convert!).  He praised both of my kids (again by name). He then asked me about both of my brothers and sister by name. Because each of my siblings lives out of state, he hasn’t seen any of them in years. His name recollection was better than mine and I was not currently on drugs!

A few minutes ago I was considering praying for this man to die and he’s now speaking to me with his usual compassion and the memory of a teen-ager.  What was I thinking?  God does know better than I do.

Fr. Ouellette never complained (he did mention that he missed having turkey on Thanksgiving) during either of my hospital visits. For his entire life he was grateful and appreciative. He’d been lying in bed for weeks without solid food, without the ability to say mass and his thoughts were on God’s will – not his. His thoughts were on me and my family – not himself.  He always looks out for the well-being of those around him.

That is the exact attitude that he’s been preaching from the pulpit and living in his everyday life since I’ve known him. He has an unwavering faith in God. He has trust in God. He knows that God’s will is better than his. He always talks about the importance of family. He talks about how faithful and generous his parishioners are. He makes the people around him feel good about themselves.  He knows that we all make mistakes but, we can always recover.  He always has us leaning in the right direction – towards the positive, towards the good, towards God. I learned each of these things from him.

That is the type of attitude that has made Fr. Ouellette one of my family’s favorite priests -ever!  When our parish had the luxury of having 5+ priests on staff, we’d never know which priest would be celebrating at any given liturgy.  I can remember family members returning home from church saying with pleasure and thankfulness, it was Fr. Ouellette!  It was like someone had won the lottery.  He was always the gift that was given freely.

At mass last Sunday, another dear friend, Fr. Sannella walked down the center aisle of the church, leaned over, put his hand on my shoulder and whispered, Fr. Ouellette died last night.

Although I was a little sad, a smile came to my face after a few seconds of thought.  His entire life was dedicated and focused on helping people get to where he has now taken up residence. As I said prayers that night, I knew that I was not praying for Fr. Ouellette to get into heaven. He created heaven on earth for himself by living a Christ-like life each and every day.  He brought God’s presence with him wherever he went.  He now has a permanent residence in His Father’s mansion.

A friend’s daughter just walked into the coffee shop where I’m writing today. I told the beautiful 19-year old about Fr. Ouellette. She said with a proud smile, Oh, I love him, he baptized me!

Fr. Ouellette made the world a better place because of his presence: may you and I do the same each and every day.

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Over this last weekend, I played the organ and sang at three masses at our church.  Our regular music minister had to go and assist a daughter at the last minute and asked me if I’d fill-in for her at each of her masses.  I immediately said “yes” so that she could return her attention to her daughter.  Although I have a piano at home and have been playing the piano since I was 5, I don’t play much any more and I was not 100% comfortable with the organ, the sound system or the songs for this weekend.

The 4PM mass on Saturday went pretty well.  On Sunday at 9AM, my wife, my 15-year old daughter and several neighbors and friends were present and all sitting right up front.  As I was finishing the end of a song, I must’ve taken my eye off the music for just long enough to get out of alignment between what I was singing and what I was playing. I ended the song on the wrong chord with several wrong notes.  It was like a car crash!!!

My eyes went immediately to my wife (who is not close to being a musician) and I saw the look on her face that said, “How could you have made such a horrendous mistake!”?  If she knew that it was a mistake then no one could’ve missed that one!

I knew that I had made a huge blunder.  The choices at that point were to either let my head go negative and begin beating myself up or to laugh at myself, smile, thank God for such a small problem, and focus on the next song.  I chose the latter with the intent of playing and singing the rest of the hymns so gloriously that no one would ever remember the shriek.

It was an intentional choice to stay positive, stay present (forget about the past) and move on.

That was a very recent example of where I would have desperately appreciated a  “do over” in my life.

I knew at that moment that I was probably being tougher on myself than anyone else in the congregation.  I’m certain that our Pastor was very thankful to have me playing and singing.  I know that the music minister who I was filling in for would forgive me.  I knew that because my intentions were great – filling in for a friend and to worship God – that God would forgive me.  God always forgives me.

Have you ever experienced moments of despair or embarrassment and wondered how you’re going to be able to move forward?  Me too. Without giving it too much thought, here are a few of my moments of despair or embarrassment:

• When I was in grammar school and taking piano lessons, my mind went completely blank during a recital. I was in front of a large audience and just sitting there with nothing coming out of my brain or my fingers related to the song(s) that I had memorized (apparently I hadn’t memorized them!).  My face was red and I was sweating with embarrassment as the silence in the recital hall seemed to go on for ever.
• In college, I dropped out of the management program half-way though a semester because I was so unprepared for the upcoming tests and overwhelmed with the curriculum – statistics, accounting, economics and finance all in the same semester!  “How’s school going?”  “I dropped out.”
• When I was out of college and working, I became a political casualty (I was fired) at work when my new manager brought in his own team of friends from his old company. When this happened, my stay-at-home wife was  pregnant with our second child (our daughter Emily) and I didn’t have a lot of liquid cash.  No job, no income, very little cash and no health benefits.  Now what?
• When Carolyn and I were trying to have children we went through numerous fertility tests to try and determine why we were unable to conceive. “Wow!  We might never be able to have the family that we’ve dreamed about.”  “What’s wrong with me?”  “What’s wrong with you?”
• When I finally got a new job, my income was not where it was supposed to be because I had been mislead during the interview process as to the amount of ongoing revenue from existing customers. I had to return the brand new Ford Taurus SHO muscle car that I had purchased and replace it with a used, old man’s Buick Century. I couldn’t afford the payments on the car and the mortgage with my drastically reduced income.  I felt humiliated as I drove into work the next day with the clunker.

We are usually tougher on ourselves than anyone else around us would ever be on us. People are forgiving, Life is forgiving.  God is forgiving.

It doesn’t matter what mistakes we’ve made because, there is not one that is so serious that we could not recover. It doesn’t matter how bad the cards are that we were dealt -a bad business partner, the loss of a job, a bad marriage, bad debt, a sour economy, a failed business, the demise of an industry.  It’s all history.  Life is not about history.  It’s about living in the present moment. We can always wipe the slate clean or reformat the hard disk of our lives.

You are larger than any problem that comes your way.

I had to get a new computer in June because the laptop which I use to run my businesses and personal life failed. How do we feel about the new computer?  It’s nice and shiny and new. The operating system is current.  The drives are virus free and full of lots of empty space.  There are no old files on the drive.

How do we treat the new computer?  We only put into the new computer the information that we choose to and that will serve us in the future.  All of the old files and viruses and worms and spyware are left on the old computer.

That how I see my life every day.  Our brains are so miraculous that it’s like buying a new computer on a daily basis.  We get to fill our brains with the files and programs that serve us today and that will serve us in the future.  We get to deliberately leave the worms and viruses and spyware that we somehow picked up along the roads of life in the past. There is plenty of space in the brain for all of the new, exciting thoughts that you want to think, now that you’ve created the space by leaving the viruses and negativity behind.

Give all of your problems to God.  Ask God for guidance.  Take time to become silent enough with yourself to listen to yourself and to listen to God.

Here’s a simple process to follow:

• Take several deep breaths.  Repeat to yourself: “With God’s assistance, I’m capable of solving every problem that comes my way with confidence.”
• Take time each day to be silent.  God is present in the silence of our mind and heart.
• Say some prayers.
• Talk to God. God is always listening.
• Listen to God. Trust your highest self.
• Have faith in yourself and your ability and in God.
• Trust that this problem can be solved.  Nothing is too big for God
• Reach out to supportive family members and friends.
• There is a new day ahead tomorrow and you get to control your thoughts and  decide how you will proceed going forward.
• Thought is the act of creation. Deliberately choose to create positive, constructive thoughts.
• Focus on the positive and remain grateful for all that you have.
• Keep in mind that “This too shall pass.”

Remember that staying positive is a choice made by staying present. There are answers to every problem that exists in your life and you are smart enough – with some assistance from the divine – to resolve each and every situation that you’re dealing with today.

“Critically, morality is only one generation deep, so unless we want our children to live in a bleak world, we must replenish the stock of spiritual capital we inherited from our parents and grandparents. In theory, at least, churches are allies in this effort.”  That’s one of Gary Hamel’s quotes in his WSJ Blog.

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Yesterday I wrote about things that the church can do to become more relevant. Fifty percent of the responsibility for a thriving, loving and happy faith community goes on the church and the other 50% (or more) should be on our shoulders. We are the church.

My spiritual capital came from several sources: from my parents serving as great examples of what it meant to live happy, loving Christian lives, by attending my Catholic church EVERY WEEK (without exception) and on holy days of obligation, by attending Catholic School from first through 8th grade and from attending religious education classes until I was confirmed.

Where did your spiritual capital come from?  Are you still living out the behaviors and rituals that built your strong foundation?  Are you passing on your spiritual capital to your children?

These days, we seem to have many solid reasons not to attend our mosque, temple, synagogue or church on a regular, consistent basis.

One reason is that parents are trying to juggle many activities for their children: sporting practices, sporting games, music lessons, recitals, school, school events, etc..

When I was a kid, organized sports began when I was about 12 years old.  Today, parents are bringing their children to sporting events starting at about age 4.  Many of the games and practices are conducted over the weekend.  Should I attend worship or should I bring my child to practice or the game? I know that it’s a weekly dilemma.

As I’m writing this, I’m thinking that when you commit to a team sport or to music lessons for your child, the coach or teacher usually hands out a list of dates and “expectations” of each child.  Things like practice dates, game dates, picture dates, codes of conduct and recital dates are all on the list. We as parents tend to immediately go to the calendar, Blackberry or iPhone and enter those “important” dates on the calendar.

What would happen if there were something very important already in that time slot?

In addition to trying to juggle all of the above activities, many families are doing the juggling as single parents.  I can’t imagine trying to do everything that my wife and I try to do as a family and for our kids alone.

I grew up in a family that had one breadwinner (my Dad) and a stay at home Mom.  I didn’t realize how fortunate I was then to have a Mom at home when I got home from school to prepare afternoon snacks for me and my friends and to keep my siblings and me on “on track” with school, work, doctor’s visits, homework, religious education or confirmation classes.

Today, it is the norm to have both parents working.  Frequently it is required just to make financial ends meet.

To make things even more interesting, most of us have given-in to the reality of working longer hours at our jobs because the economic climate has been so difficult, many of us are working and living in fear of losing our jobs.  It’s exhausting trying to keep up with everything!

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
2 Corinthians 12:9

Whenever we allocate more time to one activity, it always causes us to spend less time on something else.  We should get in the habit of making major changes to our values and routines by “intent” instead of unintentionally.

I truly understand that time is our most precious asset.  Because that’s the case, it’s critical that we design our calendars around the activities that we deem to be most critical. By doing this we and our family members will be spending our time focusing on the right activities.

These decisions on which activities are most important strongly relate to our values.

“You, Lord, give perfect peace to those who keep their purpose firm and put their trust in you.”
Isaiah 26:3

Would you like to play a game?  Put the following list in order (most important to least important):

Dining out, watching television, working, playing on the internet, Children’s Education, watching or attending sporting events, your exercise (physical health) , attending weekly worship (Church, Temple Synagogue, Mosque), your children’s exercise (physical health), socializing with friends, prayer, music lessons for your children, spiritual life (God), playing golf.

Was the exercise easy for you?  It’s called creating a priority of values.  I’ll encourage you to go through the exercise again but the next time,  create a list which includes all of the activities where you are currently spending your time and see if it would be in your best interest to make some adjustments.

I believe that the most important gift that I can give to my children is a very solid spiritual foundation. Spiritual capital is the gift that will be with them every day of their lives.  Their faith in God and their faith families will assist them through school, sports, dating, work, layoffs, marriage, deaths, children, grandchildren, sickness and with every challenge that comes their way.

“For this very reason make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.”
2 Peter 1:5-8

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“Organizations lose their relevance when the rate of internal change lags the pace of external change.” That’s a quote from Gary Hamel’s management blog in the 8/21/09 Wall Street Journal blog.

Gary also poses the following two questions to further get our juices flowing:

• Is it the gospel that has become irrelevant or your churches?  (He was speaking to church preachers and laymen)
  • Anyone who’s read the Gospel lately knows that it could not be any more relevant.
• Is the problem God’s message or your methods? God’s message is still on target. Our methods of communicating the message in the 21st century must change.

I’ll give you a few of the stats that Gary mentions in the article:

• Since 1990, the number of Americans who claim no religious affiliation has nearly doubled.
• The number of people who describe themselves as atheist or agnostic has quadrupled.
• 2/3 of Americans believe religion’s influence is waning in our society and just 19% say that it’s growing.
• In 2005, just 17.5% of the population attended a Christian church service, down from 20.4% in 1990.

If these were the metrics being measured by a business, the business would be considered to be failing.  We can do better.

Is the rate of external change exceeding the rate of internal change within the church?  Yes.  Within the Catholic Church and many of the other Christian churches, there are several things that need to be changed in order to remain relevant with this generation and in order to sustain themselves for the future.

Within the Catholic Church, priests should be allowed to marry. There are many great, young charismatic men of faith who are not in the priesthood because of the church’s stance on married priests.

Women should be allowed to become priests. When the government or a company’s board or management team is not reflective of its’ constituents it’s thought to be a bad thing. How about when the church does it?  Because there are so few men entering the priesthood within the United States, our churches are filled with older priests or priests who are coming to us from India or other countries. Women need to be on an equal playing field with men.

There are more women than men in other positions of leadership- lectors, Eucharistic Ministers, CCD teachers,  yet we won’t allow them to serve as priests?  It’s time to change.

Because many of our priests are on the older side, they are not resonating as much with our children and younger adults.  Even when the messenger is good, the message doesn’t always get through to a teenager.  What might help the message get through to teenagers and young adults?

• Younger leaders in the pulpit
• Women in the pulpit and in leadership positions within the church
• More casual attire versus current garments
• Updated, more current music
• Blogs and other social media to interact with between services, while away at school or when traveling

Because all Catholic priests are currently male, that means that the entire hierarchy is 100% male-all the Bishops, Archbishops, Cardinals and Pope.  The problem get even worse.  In order to progress from a priest on through the organization, you must rise through the structure, position-by-position.  By the time a priest gets to the top, he’s in his 70’s or 80’s.  Is that person (at that age and time of his career) the best person on the planet to be leading an organization that is being required to change and remain relevant?  Could you envision a young, 45-year old Pope?

Contrast that structure with how businesses operate. Organizations that are looking to change and prosper  promote the best person for the role – young or old, male or female from within the company.   If the organization needs new talent or ideas that should come from outside the company, they’ll do an exhaustive search to find the person with the right skill set to lead the organization into the next phase of its’ evolution.

I remember when Louis Gerstner was brought in from RJR Nabisco to run IBM and was credited with turning around the company’s fortunes.  A cookie and cracker guy running IBM?  Someone had guts to make that move.

Iron Mountain- a multi-billion dollar off-site paper storage company- brought-in Bob Brennan to become  president and COO and help evolve the company from a very successful paper storage company into a paper and information storage company.  A young man from a small high-tech software company as the President of a multi-billion dollar company? Someone had foresight.

Theo Epstein became the General Manager of the Boston Red Sox at 28 years old and helped lead the Red Sox to their first World Series in 86 years! In 2002, Epstein was younger than 22 of the 25 players on Boston’s 2002 opening day roster.

The foundation of the church is very solid.  In order for any organization to evolve and remain relevant, it needs to constantly evaluate itself and its’ vision.  Even when the product is great, we must constantly look at ways to improve and to communicate with our target audience.

My vision for the church is one that is loving and inclusive and has married clergy – both male and female- in the priesthood.  The churches are full and alive with young and old, married and single, males and females.  People come to church early because it’s almost impossible to get a seat. Thousands of young men and women are seeking the priesthood as their vocation of choice.