Father Chris Looby

Albert Einstein is often credited for defining insanity as doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results. We all know people who seem to do the same thing over and over again. Someone says something hurtful. We forgive them. Then they say something hurtful again.  We forgive them. Someone disappoints us. We give them another chance. And after a while we might think: “Are they insane? Why do they keep doing the same thing over and over again?” But the flip-side to that question is: If I keep forgiving them over and over again, am I insane too? In a way, Peter asks Jesus that very question in today’s Gospel. “Lord, if my brother sins against me, how often must I forgive? As many as seven times?” You can almost hear what Peter is really asking: “Jesus, when have I done enough?” I forgave him once. I forgave him twice. I forgave him seven times. At some point you want to say, “That’s it! I can’t do this anymore! I’d have to be insane to forgive this guy ag...

  Last week I heard a fascinating interview on NPR about something that seems to be getting a lot more attention these days: family estrangement — parents and children, brothers and sisters, family members who simply no longer speak to one another. What struck me was that many of these people didn't want to lose their families. In fact, many desperately wanted those relationships to work. And that's when I heard a term I had never heard before: “the missing missing reasons.” It describes situations where someone says, “I have absolutely no idea why my son won't talk to me anymore,” or, “I don't know why my daughter cut me out of her life.” But sometimes there were reasons. There had been conversations. There had been phone calls. There had been emails or letters explaining the hurt. The reasons weren't really missing. They just weren't heard. And that's what makes today's Gospel so interesting. Jesus is talking about exactly this kind of situation: a ...

Have you ever downloaded a new app and immediately clicked “I have read and agree to the Terms and Conditions” without reading a single word? We all do it. For all we know, buried in the fine print is a pledge saying, “By clicking Agree, you grant us permission to name your firstborn child 'Algorithm' and use your living room as our corporate warehouse.” Yet we click it anyway. Then, down the road, when the hidden obligations suddenly surface, we find ourselves thinking, “Wait a minute—I didn't sign up for this!” Life has a funny way of catching us with that same unread fine print. And then something happens that makes us stop and ask: “Did I sign up for this?” A teacher goes into education because she loves teaching children. Then she finds herself dealing with behavioral problems, difficult parents, paperwork, technology, and situations they never mentioned in college. “Did I sign up for this?” Parents bring home that beautiful little baby. They expect diapers and sleepl...