Deaths in 2020

Every so often I take a look at the Worldometer.com website, just to see how the world is progressing, statistically speaking. It's really a remarkable website in that it keeps running totals of all sorts of data throughout the world, including population, government, economics, media, environment, food, water, energy, health, and, of course, coronavirus. Because of the way data is presented, spending more than a minute or so on the site would likely induce insanity, but just taking a quick look seems to have few lasting negative effects. 

How accurate is the information presented by Worldometer? I haven't a clue, but it seems to be held in some esteem by a wide range of folks who worry about such things. I suspect many of the numbers are driven by algorithms based on data pulled from other sources, but this is only a guess since I'm completely ignorant concerning the site's methodology.

Anyway, as I said, the data is presented as a series of continually running totals for the year; so, having no New Year's Eve party to attend, I checked it out late on December 31 to get the final totals for 2020. I was particularly interested in the death totals, not out of morbid curiosity, but simply to compare various causes of death. I especially wanted to know how many worldwide deaths resulted from the pesky virus given to us by our communist friends in China, compared to other causes. Here are the results:

2020 Worldwide Causes of Death
Deaths/Illnesses	No. Deaths
Deaths: Mothers during birth	309,631
Deaths: Malaria	395,032
Deaths: Seasonal Influenza	490,923
Deaths: Suicides	1,074,231
Deaths: Road Accidents	1,352,267
Deaths: HIV/AIDS	1,684,015
Deaths: Coronavirus (COVID-19)	1,808,041
Deaths: Caused by Alcohol	2,505,485
Deaths: Caused by Smoking	5,007,810
Deaths: Children under 5	7,614,399
Deaths: Cancer	8,227,342
Deaths: Communicable Diseases	13,004,509
Abortions	42,655,372

Yes, indeed, abortion remains the #1 killer of human beings and far exceeds other causes of death. The data on Worldometer does not include deaths by such non-communicable causes as heart disease, diabetes, and, presumably, old age, but that really makes little difference. The most alarming figure is the number of abortions worldwide. Hiding from each other in fear, the people of the world wring their collective hands over the 1.8 million coronavirus deaths, and yet ignore the intentional killing of innocents on a scale 20 times greater. 

I actually suspect the abortion data is probably under-reported, but that's a topic for another time. I've since noticed that several pro-life websites also took note of the Worldometer data for 2020. This is good. Get the word out, and let the world know what we are doing to our unborn children.

Death comes to every one of us...eventually. But how disheartening that so many beautiful lives, created by a loving God, should be snuffed out in the womb before they take even their first breath. Today, as we continue to celebrate the Holy Family during this Christmas Season, let us ask our Blessed Mother and St. Joseph to join with these heavenly children of the Father and intercede for our world that has seemingly embraced a culture of death.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, pray for us.

Homily: Feast of the Holy Family (12/29/2019)

I have embedded a video of this homily below. The text of the homily follows the video:

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Readings: Sir 3:2-6,12-14; Ps 128; Col 3:12-21; Mt 2:13-15,19-23
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Holy Family Icon

How wonderful it is to be surrounded by family. But for many of us, retired here in sunny Florida, our children and grandchildren live elsewhere. Family gatherings become increasingly rare events, special moments to anticipate and cherish.

Just as individuals grow and change, so too do families. Indeed, for some of us it’s hard to remember that our children are no longer children. And yet families, even in the midst of change, still come together when crises arise. Problems are solved, and crises overcome. So often the slammed doors, quarrels and tears, end in apologies and forgiveness and hugs, with the tears wiped away. Despite 52 years of crises, large and small, Diane and I realize we’ve been blessed when it comes to our children and grandchildren. Even though the struggles continue, we realize it’s God who works His Will through us and through our weaknesses.

Now I realize that within many families the problems can be very serious. Indeed, by most statistical measures, the family’s an institution in sharp decline. Not only are divorce rates high, but many couples are choosing not to marry at all. Far too many fathers abdicate their parental responsibility and abandon both mother and child. Almost half of today’s children are born outside of marriage. And the plague of abortion has devalued not only the child, but human life itself.

Some years ago, our elder daughter was teaching 2nd grade in an inner-city school in California. The fathers of half of the children in her class were in prison. But even among the affluent, too many parents devote themselves solely to their children’s material well-being and success at the expense of their spiritual well-being and moral character.

Single parenthood is a fact of life today, and it carries with it a whole set of financial, emotional, and psychological burdens. If raising a child today is a challenge for a two-parent family, just imagine what’s it’s like to do it alone. Most single parents love and care for their children admirably, but it’s hard to be both mother and father.

Now I’m no sociologist, so I won’t even attempt to explain these problems and their causes. But one thing I know: We need the example of the Holy Family in today's world, a world openly hostile to marriage and the family. Today, celebrating the Holy Family, we’d do well to consider an often-overlooked figure in the Gospels.

In Matthew’s Gospel there emerges a quiet, modest figure, a perfect model for all fathers, St. Joseph. Just consider the sort of man he must have been. He was chosen by God the Father as the guardian, teacher, and guide of His only Son. God chose Joseph to love and protect Mary, the virgin Mother of the Son of God. Yes, Joseph was a very special man indeed.

…a courageous man of honor determined to protect Mary’s reputation. Why? Because he’s a righteous man and this is what God would want.

…a man who then takes Mary as his wife even though the child she carries is not his. Why? Because God told him to take the Child and His Mother to himself. And so, Joseph obeys.

…a man who, to protect his family, leads them on a dangerous journey into exile, into an unknown future. Why? Because God commanded it.

Flight to Egypt

Joseph doesn’t stop to think it over; he doesn’t even spend a day planning the trip. No, he leaves immediately in obedience to God’s command. He “rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt.” Matthew glosses over the flight to Egypt in a few words, but the reality was surely nightmare. Leaving in the middle of the night, the Holy Family would have traveled many days across the 300 miles of harsh terrain that led to Egypt. Then, as homeless refugees, they relied solely on Joseph to earn a living during their exile. And just when Joseph had probably established himself in this foreign land, God tells him to return to Israel. Once again, he obeys.

The murderous Herod is dead, but in Judea and Samaria, Herod's son, Archelaus now rules, and Joseph fears him. And rightly so, since Archelaus began his rule by slaughtering 3,000 of Judea’s most influential citizens.

Once again in obedience to God’s command, Joseph takes Mary and Jesus to the safety of a small town nestled in the hills of Galilee, to Nazareth. It’s through the obedience of Joseph that the prophecies are fulfilled. “Out of Egypt I called my Son.” And “He shall be called a Nazorean.”

What a mystery! That God, to protect His Son, the uncreated Word of God, should choose to do so through the mediation of a humble carpenter. It’s a piece of the greater mystery of the Incarnation, in which Father and Spirit now relate to the Son not only as Divine Word but also as incarnate Man.

Notice how, throughout Matthew’s brief narrative, God doesn’t reveal everything to Joseph at once. Instead, Joseph remains continually dependent on God’s next word. For Joseph, the just man, is nevertheless fully human, and like all of us must learn to grow in God’s love and grace. He must experience, as we all must, the trial of faithfulness, the trial of perseverance in seeking out the will of God in our lives. Joseph waits patiently for God to speak, just as God waits patiently for Joseph to grow in fidelity.

It’s in Nazareth, in the home of this family, that Jesus grows to maturity.

It’s here that Joseph teaches Jesus to recite his prayers, to sing the age-old Psalms of David, and to read from the Law and the Prophets.

It’s here that Joseph teaches Jesus to appreciate, firsthand, the importance of following the laws and customs of His people.

In Nazareth, working alongside Joseph in his carpenter's shop, Jesus comes to recognize the value and dignity of work.

Learning His Trade

Here, in Joseph’s home, Jesus encounters a man happy to be poor in spirit, to be meek, just, and merciful, happy to be pure of heart.

Later, during His public ministry, Jesus often spoke of God the Father as “Abba” or Daddy. It was from the loving and caring Joseph that in his humanity Jesus first learned what a daddy was.

At the very heart of Joseph’s sanctity is an unquestioning obedience to accept the will of God in his life…and to act on it. And because he obeys, God comes to him again and again. God walks in Joseph’s soul just as He walked with Adam in the Garden. Is it any wonder He entrusts to Joseph what is most precious to Him?

Joseph Hears and Obeys

Mary and the child Jesus remain almost hidden in this Gospel narrative, wrapped in the decisions and actions of Joseph. Joseph leads but doesn’t dominate. He leads by serving – by serving His God and His family. And then his work is finished. Jesus, whom he has loved, taught, and protected, must now step forward into the light of history. Joseph, like John the Baptist, like you and me, can also proclaim: "He must increase. I must decrease."

We Catholics have always had a deep devotion to Mary, the Mother of God. How it would please her if we would deepen our devotion to her husband. With Jesus we owe honor to Joseph; and honored indeed would Joseph be if fathers today would accept him as their model. And pray, too, that single mothers turn to him, asking for his fatherly intercession in the lives of their children.

Today, on this beautiful feast of the Holy Family, let us pray for our families, for fathers, for mothers, for children, for grandchildren and grandparents.

Back in the 8th grade, Sister Francis Jane began each day by saying: “Jesus, Mary and Joseph, pray for us.”

Should we not do the same?

Homily: Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph - Year B

Readings: Sir 3:2-6, 12-14; Ps 128; Col 3:12-21; Lk 2:22-40

From the very beginning the Church has consistently taught that Jesus Christ is true God and true man, that the Incarnation is God coming into the world as one of us. In His humanity, the Church teaches, Jesus is like us in all things except sin.

And yet, over the centuries, many have tried to make Jesus into someone or something He isn’t. Indeed, most of the heresies that plagued the early Church focused on the identity of Jesus, as the world tried to answer the question Jesus asked His disciples: “Who do people say that I am?” [Mk 8:27] And now, 2,000 years later, people are still giving the wrong answers.

I once heard a television preacher say that Jesus possessed complete knowledge of all the sciences. “Jesus, the man,” he said, “was Einstein, Newton, Pasteur, Curie, Hawking…all the great scientists of the world rolled into one, and then multiplied by a thousand.” He went on to state that “Jesus was the most knowledgeable of doctors, for how else could He have cured all those people? How else could He raise the dead to life?”

I couldn’t help but think: well, if that’s the case, he could hardly be human, like us in all things.

And then, moving toward the other extreme, one of my theology professors once stated that the humanity of Jesus prevented Him from grasping that He was divine. Indeed this theologian taught that Jesus didn’t realize He was the Son of God until the Resurrection. What a surprise that must have been! And, the professor taught, because Jesus, in His humanity, was unaware of His divinity, none of those Gospel miracles really happened.

The real problem for the preacher and professor is that the Incarnation is a mystery, something beyond human understanding, and that just bothers the heck out of them. They can’t accept that Jesus is both fully human and fully divine. They can’t understand how Jesus can be truly the Son of God and yet became a man and our brother.

That they’re unable to grasp the mind of God is unacceptable to them, so they manufacture a Jesus they can accept…one, of course, that conflicts with everything the Church teaches.

As the Second Vatican Council stated: “The Son of God…worked with human hands; He thought with a human mind. He acted with a human will, and with a human heart He loved” [Gaudium et Spes, 22.2]. And yet that human will, “does not resist or oppose but rather submits to His divine and almighty will” [Council of Constantinople III: DS 556].

The Church gives us today’s feast of the Holy Family to remind us of Jesus’ humanity, to remind us that the family is the first church, the domestic church. Yes, Jesus chose to enter into the world as an infant, just as helpless as you and I once were. He didn’t place Himself above us. He didn’t reject the human story but entered directly into it, sharing our humanity, our flesh and blood, our physical mortality.

Although a divine person, He accepted everything that came with His humanity, all the messiness, all the ordinariness, all its limitations. In His humanity He accepted these limitations, and as Luke tells us, would “advance in wisdom and age and favor before God and man” [Lk 2:52]. And He did all this within a human family, a Holy Family under the care and love of Mary and Joseph.

In today’s gospel passage Luke relates the events surrounding the presentation of Jesus in the Temple. According to Jewish law, a firstborn son belonged to God. And so, 40 days after his birth, parents would present their son in the Temple, in effect, buying him back with a sacrifice. And for poor Jews, like Joseph and Mary, it would be a sacrifice of turtledoves or pigeons. On that same day the new mother would also be ritually purified. Indeed, the feast was originally known as the feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin.

Here we see the Holy Family, a Jewish family, living under God’s Law, doing as the Law prescribed. Yes, Jesus, the Son of God, accepts that His mission is rooted in God’s revelation, expressed in the Law and the Prophets. It’s there, in the Old Testament, that God’s plan of salvation is first revealed; a plan fulfilled and brought to completion by the Incarnation.

And so Mary and Joseph enter the Temple to fulfil the law. There they are greeted by old Simeon who amazes them with what he reveals. Simeon welcomes the infant Jesus with open arms and in Him sees redemption of the entire world: “…my eyes have seen your salvation, which you prepared in sight of all the peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and glory for your people Israel” [Lk 2:30-32]. He then gives Mary a taste of the sorrows she will experience, for a sword will pierce her heart.

Mary and Joseph then encounter Anna, a prophetess who lived in the Temple, who goes on to reveal more about their child. And just as Jesus advances in wisdom and age and favor, so too does the Holy Family advance in holiness.

But we should also realize that the message of Simeon and Anna is a message for every family. Holiness is nurtured first in the family. In the midst of all the chaos that surrounds any family there are glimpses of God’s presence, moments of grace when God reaches deep into the clutter of our lives and hands us a present that we never expected.

When my mother died, our elder daughter, 6-years-old at the time, told her mother, “Don’t cry, Mommy. Grandma is with Jesus now, happy in heaven.”

In moments like this God ignores all the barriers and debris that we place between ourselves and our redemption and reminds us that we are called to holiness. In those moments, sticky hands are transformed into instruments of grace and stories of the playground and classroom, or the words of a child to her mother become words of wisdom. In those moments, ordinary events take on new meaning and the dinner table can become like an altar.

In my family, those moments didn’t come when the six of us were kneeling piously in church. They were never captured on film or video. No, they were elusive -- sudden and unexpected. And sometimes, as with Mary and Joseph, they came in the form of words that amaze.

Yes, Mary knew her Son was special. What had the angel said? “He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High… the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God” [Lk 1:32, 35]. But to hear this and more in the Temple from these two holy ones…this too was something she would long ponder and cherish.

This visit to the Temple is a story that strikes a chord in every new parent who has wondered and worried about the future of their child.

It’s a story for every mother who has looked into the face of her newborn, the face of innocence, and prayed that God would help her raise that child to holiness.

It’s a story to remind us that as parents we will experience disappointment, sorrow, and sometimes great tragedy…but in the midst of it all we will encounter Emmanuel, God with us.

It’s a story to remind each of us of the depth of God’s love for us, that He calls us to His open arms with forgiveness and mercy.

It’s a reminder to parents that holy moments of discovery and growth are often sudden and unpredictable.

It’s a reminder that God calls us into families — not just to protect us physically, but to nurture us in faith and love, to prepare us for a journey that leads only to Him.

It’s no accident that Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and favor, and did so in the midst of a family.

It’s no accident that God used that Holy Family — as he uses our families — to reach deep into other people’s lives, to bring them the light of Christ.

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us; and He came as a child born into a family. By doing so, He sanctified the family, making it an instrument of holiness, and reminding us of the awesome obligation we have to protect it.

For the family today is under attack from virtually every quarter. We seem to have stopped investing in children, and now just invest in things. This is the great temptation for us who live in our affluent Western societies with their contraceptive mentality, societies that see children not as our future, but as competitors who threaten future affluence, as things that take something from us.

This is the same mentality that, 45 years ago, Pope Paul VI predicted would lead to increased marital infidelity, a general decrease in morality, especially among our youth, a lack of respect for women, and the continued erosion of respect for human life at all stages. How right he was!

Today, on this beautiful feast of the Holy Family, let us pray for our families, that we may grow together in holiness, love and mutual respect.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph – pray for us.

Homily: Feast of the Holy Family

Readings: Sir 3:2-6,12-14; Ps 128; Col 3:12-21; Mt 2:13-15,19-23
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As a deacon, husband, father and grandfather, there are two days in the liturgical year that have special meaning for me.

One is St. Stephen's Day, when we honor St. Stephen, the first deacon and the first martyr. The other is the feast of the Holy Family. And this year they both fall on the same day…today.

Like most of you whose children are grown, coming together as a family is increasingly rare. What Diane and I once took for granted are now special times, moments to anticipate and cherish.

Family relationships are certainly different, aren’t they? We’re drawn to each when crises arise. And for most of us, it’s wonderful to be surrounded by one's family. I’d like to be able to say our family is the ideal, populated by perfect people, but you’d know I was lying. We’ve had our share of problems and crises and arguments and slammed doors and tears. But, you know, the problems are eventually solved, just as each crisis is invariably overcome. And the arguments and slammed doors? Well, they always seemed to end in apologies and forgiveness and hugs, with the tears wiped away.

I’d like to take the credit, for even a small piece of it, for all the good things, but again I’d be lying. Despite 42 years of crises, large and small, Diane and I realize we’ve been blessed when it comes to our children and the love we have for each other and for our family. We’ve come to realize that it’s God who works His Will through us and through our weaknesses. And so we continue to struggle to discern His Will in the life of our family.

Now I know that many of today’s families have very serious problems, indeed. And many households are really not families at all, but simply groups of individuals who happen to share the same accommodations.

The Holy Family (Raphael)

Oh, how we need the example of the Holy Family in today's world, a world openly hostile to marriage and the family. By most statistical measures, the family is an institution in sharp decline. The symptoms are all around us in a profound shift in cultural values away from family commitment and toward self-fulfillment, away from self-sacrifice and toward self-gratification. The divorce rate is well over 50%. 40% of today’s children are born outside of marriage. The plague of abortion has devalued not only the child, but human life itself. Large numbers of fathers abdicate their parental responsibility and abandon both mother and child.

Some few years ago our elder daughter was teaching 2nd grade in an inner city school in California. The fathers of 40% of the children in her class were in prison. But even in affluent families, mothers and fathers spend increasingly less time with their children, or devote themselves to their children’s material well-being and success at the expense of their spiritual well-being and moral character.

Single parenthood is a fact of life today, and it carries with it a whole set of financial, emotional, and psychological burdens. If raising a child today is a challenge for a two-parent family, just imagine what’s it’s like to do it alone. Most single parents love and care for their children admirably, but can we really expect them to be both mother and father? What have we lost when the beneficial effects of a loving, caring father are lacking? When masculine role models are found only outside the family, too often in objectionable ways?

Now I’m no sociologist, so I won’t even attempt to explain these problems and their causes. But today, on the Feast of the Holy Family, we might do well to consider an often overlooked figure in the Gospels. As Matthew relates the story of the conception, birth and childhood of Jesus, there emerges a quiet, modest figure, the perfect model for fathers today, St. Joseph.

Just consider the sort of man he must have been. Out of all the men who ever lived, God the Father chose Joseph as the guardian, teacher, and guide of His only Son. And He chose Joseph to love and protect Mary, the virgin Mother of the Son of God. Yes, Joseph must have been a very special man indeed.

* a courageous man of honor determined to protect Mary’s reputation. Why? Because he’s a righteous man and this is what God would want.

* a man who then takes Mary as his wife even though the child she carries is not his. Why? Because God told him to take the Child and His Mother to himself. And so Joseph obeys.

* a man who, to protect his young family, leads them into exile, into an unknown future. Why? Because God told him to do so.

Joseph doesn’t stop to think it over; he doesn’t even spend a day planning the trip. No, he leaves immediately in obedience to God’s command. He “rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt.”

What a mystery! That God, to protect His Son, the uncreated Word of God, should choose to do so through the mediation of a humble carpenter. It’s all part of the greater mystery of the Incarnation, in which the Father and the Holy Spirit now relate to the Son not only as Divine Word but also as incarnate Man.

Flight into Egypt

Matthew glosses over the flight to Egypt in a few words, but the reality was surely a nightmare. Traveling by night and hiding by day, the Holy Family would have required several weeks to travel the 300 miles through an inhospitable desert from Jerusalem to Egypt. Then, as homeless refugees, the family would rely solely on Joseph to earn a living during their exile. And just when Joseph had probably established himself in this foreign land, God tells him to return to Israel. Once again he obeys.

The murderous Herod is dead, but in Judea and Samaria, Herod's son, Archelaus now rules, and Joseph fears him. And rightly so, since Archelaus began his rule by slaughtering 3,000 of Judea’s most influential citizens. And so Joseph, again in obedience to God’s command, guides Mary and Jesus far to the north, to the safety of a small town nestled in the hills of Galilee, to Nazareth. It’s through the obedience of Joseph that the prophecies are fulfilled. “Out of Egypt I called my Son.” And “He shall be called a Nazorean.”

Notice how, throughout Matthew’s brief narrative, God doesn’t reveal everything to Joseph at once. No, Joseph remains continually dependent on God’s next word. For Joseph, the just man, is nevertheless fully human, and like all of us must learn to grow in God’s love and grace. He must experience, as we all must, the trial of faithfulness, the trial of perseverance in seeking out the will of God in our lives. And so Joseph waits patiently for God to speak, just as God waits patiently for Joseph to grow in fidelity to His will.

It’s in Nazareth, in the home of this family, that Jesus grows to maturity. It’s here that Joseph, according to Jewish custom, teaches Jesus to recite his prayers, to sing the age old Psalms of David, and to read from the Torah, the Law of Moses. It’s from Joseph that Jesus learns to appreciate, first hand, the importance of following the laws and customs of His people. In Nazareth, working alongside Joseph in his carpenter's shop, Jesus comes to recognize the value and dignity of work. Here, in the home of Joseph, Jesus encounters daily a man happy to be poor in spirit, happy to be meek, happy to be just and merciful, happy to be pure of heart, to be singlehearted.

Later, when Jesus begins His public ministry, he often speaks of God the Father as “Abba” or Daddy. And it was from the loving and caring Joseph that in his humanity Jesus first learned what a daddy was. At the very heart of Joseph’s sanctity is obedience, an unquestioning obedience to accept the will of God in his life…and to act on it. And because he obeys, God comes to him again and again. God walks in Joseph’s soul just as He walked with Adam in the Garden. Is it any wonder He entrusts to Joseph what is most precious to Him?

Mary and the child Jesus remain almost hidden in this Gospel narrative, contained in the decisions and actions of Joseph. Joseph leads, but doesn’t dominate. He leads by serving – by serving His God and by serving His family. Then, his task complete, Joseph seemingly disappears from view. His work is finished. Jesus, whom he has loved, taught, and protected, must now step forward into the light of history. Joseph, like John the Baptist, like you and me: "He must increase. I must decrease."

On March 19th, in the Preface of the Mass of the Solemnity of St. Joseph, the celebrant honors Joseph with these words:

He is that just man, that wise and loyal servant, whom you placed at the head of your family. With a husband’s love he cherished Mary, the virgin Mother of God. With fatherly care he watched over Jesus Christ your Son, conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit.

We Catholics have always prided ourselves on our devotion to Mary, the Mother of God. How it would please her to see us, and especially those of us who are fathers, deepen our devotion to her husband. With Jesus we owe honor to Joseph, and honored indeed would Joseph be if fathers today would accept him as their model. And if single mothers would turn to him, asking for his fatherly intercession in the lives of their children.

Today, on this beautiful feast of the Holy Family, let us pray for our families, and especially for fathers. Would that all fathers were just men like Joseph -- wise and loyal servants of the Lord who cherish their wives and watch over their children with fatherly care.

St. Joseph, pray for us.