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525 thousand, 600 minutes …. (pause) …. 525 thousand, 600 minutes … (pause) ….
How do you measure a year?
In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee, in inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife?
In this song from the musical Rent … the question is asked and it is suggested that those 525, 600 minutes each year be measured in love. I recently had a conversation with one of my daughters who had seen the play several times. She posed the question:
What if the life of a woman or man was measured in love?
Would there be more peace in our world?
Our world be a place where life itself was valued. Each woman and each man would be extending themselves to others. People would be other-minded, people would be transcending themselves, getting out of themselves and thinking of the other. All in all, people would die to themselves for the sake of the other.
This is why we were created. From the beginning we were created for the other, we were created to be in relationship with others. "It is not good for the man to be alone," God said in the Garden of Eden. Simply put, when we do for others, we act in accord with the way we were created. When we do for others, we act in harmony with the image of God in which we were created.
If we measured time in love, we can be certain that we would spend our time the way God directed on our original packaging directions: take one human … add life … send out to serve in love.
I think of the four years of high school and realize that it is 2,102,400 minutes that we are talking about ...or I think of the minutes since I graduated and I am talking about 18,921,600 minutes. If we think of this evening's honorees we are collectively talking about 78,314,400 minutes since they graduated from St. Mary's Academy. And from looking at their accomplishments and who they have become since graduation from St. Mary's, I think I am safe in saying that these minutes can be measured in love.
I firmly believe that each of us is called to measure our year in love. Last year I was honored to receive the Sr. Shawn Marie Barry Award for Outstanding Community Service and I commented that I believe we are all called to serve and to make service a way of life … not just something that we do, but who we are. One of my favorite scripture quote is from Micah … "This is what Yahweh asks, only this … act justly, love tenderly and walk humbly with our God." We have each been gifted with only so much time on this earth and we do not know how much. If we measure our years in love … if we equate TIME with LOVE … we would each make a difference in the world.
Shortly after I was asked to give this address, I was part of our Mass of Anointing at Holy Family. I stood with each of the participants as Father anointed first their forehead and then their hands. Each pair of hands was so beautiful in its own way. I noticed the beauty of these hands and reflected on what those hands had done. How they have touched others, many of them having touched and shaped me.
I invite you now to take the luxury to stop, take some time and consider a little thing. I invite you to look at your hands. I ask you, when was the last time that you looked carefully at your hands? Or the hands of another? Whose hands have touched you? shaped you? Whom have you touched, shaped with your hands?
Slowly open your hands and look at them. Turn them over, palms up and palms down. Stop and think for a moment about the hands that you have … have they served you well over your years? These hands may be wrinkled or smooth, they may be weak or may be strong. They may be small or large, soft or rough and calloused; they may have short fingers or long fingers. These hands have been tools that you have used all of your life. For each of you they have been something different: Most likely
- They braced and caught your fall as a toddler.
- They put food in your mouth and tied your shoes.
- They have covered your face, combed your hair, washed and cleansed your body.
- They have been dirty, clean, maybe swollen and bent.
- You learned how to fold them in prayer..
- They have wiped away tears, may your own or maybe someone else's.
- They have held another's hand or a newborn child.
- They have held children, consoled neighbors.
For some of you
- They may be decorated with a wedding band showing the world that you are married and love someone special.
- They have skillfully maneuvered the internet to solve someone's dilemma.
- They have magicked a tune on the ivory keys of a piano.
These hands are the mark of where you have been and the nature of your life. More importantly, it will be these hands that God will reach out and take as he leads you home.
Find your lifeline … there is a reason that it is called a lifeline. Through these hands you can give life, but with them you have also accepted the life that others have offered to you. I think of those hands who have shaped me … my mother's hands, my father's hands … the hands of a friend … the hands of my teachers … the hands of my husband and children. As I watched the hands of those being anointed, many of the hands belonged to people who have been part of my life journey … have also helped shape me … These hands were hands that create … that provide … that teach … that applaud … that pray … that comfort … that protect … that discipline … that play … that serve …
Today I am not asking you to focus on the hands of time but on your hands and time.
Have you used your hands to reach out and to grab and embrace life? Have you used them to care for the life that you have been gifted with and in your gratitude you reach out to others? Whom have you touched with your love and whom have your hands helped to shape?
Or have you exhausted your minutes … spent your time … in ways that are not for others?
You do the math …
do you watch 3 hours of TV a day … 65,700 minutes a year
do you spend an average of 3 hours a week shopping … 9,360 minutes a year
how about time spent on computer activities, not work related, 5 hours a week … 15,600 minutes a year
do you spend time worrying … 1 hour a week … 3,120 minutes a year
or talking on the phone and much of the conversation is gossip … 1 hour a day … 21,900 minutes a year
Instead of spending time … would you like to know how you can multiply your time? Extending your hand to another person will multiply your time. Use your lifeline to grasp time and reach out to another and you will find that you seem to have more than 525,600 minutes. These minutes measured in love will not be limited but rather they will allow you to be a person who embraces those you meet and is other-minded.
I doubt if the people honored this evening have done what they did, accomplished the things they have accomplished, or lived the way they have lived, just to "store up" some bonus points so they could make other choices at some time. I do believe that they live the way they do because their years are measured in love. Hopefully, all graduates of St. Mary's and each of us can measure each year of our lives in love and say that each year … all 525,600 minutes have been life for others, whether it be in our homes, in our workplace, in our neighborhood or church community or in the greater world.
- Maybe it is caring for an aging parent or a special needs child,
- Telling a child how special they are.
- Comforting a teenager with a broken heart.
- Maybe it is mentoring a new employee
- Listening to a co-worker who is overwhelmed with all that is happening around her.
- Understanding that everyone does not learn in the same way and so your extra teaching minutes may make a math problem clearer to a befuddled student.
- Maybe it was serving on the Board of a non-profit organization
- Being a volunteer for NW Medical teams
- Donating blood to Red Cross
- Teaching Vacation Bible School
- Listening to a teenager who feels that she hasn't a friend in the world
- Raising money for the tsunami victims
- Offering your time and skills to provide disaster relief in another part of the world or participating in a mission trip in a third world country.
OR then again those minutes measured in love just might be
- Sharing your excitement for life with another
- Performing a random act of kindness for someone you don't even know
- Giving a sincere compliment or a smile to someone who seems down
- Making each day one filled with gratitude for the miracles of creation and the many blessings you have received.
Being other-minded … Extending a hand …
What a difference the minutes of our lives can make in the world!
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