Freundian Clips
John Freund, Just because...Freundian Clips
Recent Posts
- Easter People in a Good Friday/Holy Saturday World?
- Holy Week: What Would You Do?
- Transfigured
- Lent: a Campaign of Christian Service?
- He Gets Us
- Connecting Dots: Lent, Valentine’s Day, and Systemic Change
- Why Am I a Vincentian Priest?
- Did Jesus Contradict Himself?
- Why Did I Create Mindwalk?
- How What I Dreaded Became a Source of Life
- Lessons Learned From a “Street Priest!”
- Is Advent “Missing In Action?”
- Christ the King and the “Duck Test”
- Thanksgiving
- Will You Be Traveling For the Holidays?
- Are You “Woke?” – Should You Be?
- The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same
- Raised in the world of “Pay-Pray-Obey”
- The Early Church Had No “Office of Evangelization”
- Street-level Encounters – a Parable
- Have Catholics Seen Such Polarization Before?
- Changing Our Clocks, Fast-forwards and Do-overs
- What’s Your Way of Handling Conflict?
- Unfinished Family Business?
- How Are You At Predictions?
- Real or Fake – Spotting the Difference
- Hearts on Fire – Feet on the Move!
- Star Wars, the Nones, and the Good News
- Serving Others In a Digital World
- Shocking document bishops signed in the Catacombs 60 years ago
- NATO As No Action – Talk Only
- What was your mother’s special recipe?
- If Jesus’ Mother Had a Scrapbook
- Does Everybody Want to Change Your Thinking?
- Is it Time for the “Brocolli” Approach?
- Putting Newest Cardinals in Their Place
- Missing the Point!
- Can You Imagine That!
- Know Any Relationships Not Going Anywhere?
- Who, or What Has Transformed Your life?
- Have You Tried Praying the News?
- Revisiting – Are You an Original or a Photocopy?
- Nobody Wants To Do the Dishes!
- What Did Jesus Did Not Have?
- Remember Where You Were on 9/11?
- Some See More Than Others … Do You?
- Are Interruptions the story of your life?
- What Does Labor Day Mean For You?
- How Did America Get So Mean?
- What Catechism Did Jesus Use?
- Is There an “Immaculate COMPLEXION?”
- “The more things change…”
- Why is Mary Fittingly Called Queen of Heaven?
- Practical Prophets
- Name Two Women Who Changed Jesus’ Mind?
- Know Anybody Who Walks On Water
- What Are You Afraid Of?
- Suppose God Checked Your References!
- Making Connections In My Life
- What Two Days Changed Our World?
- Remember Any Sermons 30 Years Later?
- Do We “Live” the Words “All are Welcome?”
- Have You Ever Gone Out On a Limb?
- Do You Remember Your Grandparents?
- From “Sage on the Stage” To “Mentor in the Center”
- Has Pope Francis “Made a Mess?”
- When Did Christians Become Soldiers?
- Yes! I Actually Attended a Session of Vatican II
- How Have You Changed?
- Praying the Our Father With New Ears
- Are We a “Listening” Community?
- Be Honest! Do We Prefer To Serve the “Good Poor”
- Do These Images Speak To Polarization Today?
- Have You Read the Declaration of Independence Recently?
- Is July 4 a dangerous memory?
- Lessons From Those Flying Geese
- Do Mothers Have Favorites?
- What Are You Hoping For?
- A Tale of Two Tragedies At Sea
- Jeopardy and the Our Father
- Things I Did Not Know… Connections I Never Made
- Suppose You Were Asked To Be a Father To Jesus
- A “Father” Learned From His Grandfather
- Journeying From Opposites To Equals
- Lyrics That Lead to Prayer
- The NATO approach to Corpus Christi
- Imagine God Requiring a Security Deposit On “Our” Home
- I Asked the Wrong Question About the Trinity
- Mindwalking Keeps Surprising Me
- Are All Your Vacation Pictures Perfect?
- What Fire Do You Feed?
- Remember Saying, “Are We There Yet”?
- Parents – Comforters? Nudges? Both?
- Ever Know Something Was Coming But Were Unprepared?
- Learning From Roller Coasters
- What Size Is Your Dream?
- Walking In the Shoes of the Fisherman
- I Thought My Mom Knew Everything
- Surprised By Vincentian Elements at the Coronation!
- Was Jesus an “Either/Or” …or… a “Both/And” Thinker?

When Was the Last Time You Were Afraid?
Among the lessons of this feast is that all the things we can not understand now will one day be clear to us. She teaches us to trust that one day we will all understand the things that we can not understand and even rail against. Blessed is she who believed.

Can Stories Change the World?
Parents learn quickly the power of story as a pacifier. But these stories also shape values. Stories and the lived stories of their example are how we learn our values. – Jesus knew the power of stories! Do you really want to change things? Tell a story!

The Part of the Our Father We Skip
As I work my way through Pope Francis’ wonderful series of Wednesday audiences devoted to the Our Father, I have become more aware of how challenging this prayer is. Now…“forgive us our trespasses AS WE FORGIVE THOSE WHO TRESPASS AGAINST US.

Whose Daily Bread Do We Pray For – Mine? or Ours?
The bread a Christian requests in prayer is not “mine”, but “ours”.This is what Jesus wants.
“If one does not pray in this way, the “Our Father” ceases to be a Christian prayer.
If God is our Father, how can we present ourselves to him without taking each other by the hand?

Leaven or Fungus for “Thy Kingdom Come!”
Leaven is “a pervasive influence that modifies something or transforms it for the better.” Fungi are the principal decomposers in ecological systems. When are we leaven … and when are we fungi for the “Kingdom”?

August 6 – Transfiguration… or… Disfiguration?
What if we were to live in the transforming hope of Jesus’ Transfiguration and Resurrection? Will we feed the hope that can transfigure our world? If enough of us feed the spirit of the Transfiguration…
May God’s kingdom come!

Fathers and Mothers As Images of God
Our fathers and mothers give us insight into God. But “our Father in Heaven” speaks of love beyond the most loving of mothers and fathers.

Praying the Our Father For the “First Time”
I have read many thoughtful commentaries on the Our Father. Yet the Holy Father is helping me pray the Our Father as if for the first time.

Is the Our Father a Radical Prayer?
Jesus was a radical fully committed to doing God’s will. He taught “Love your neighbor (each one) as yourself.” He showed us how radical he was when laid down his life for his brothers and sisters. As he hung on the cross he said “Father, forgive them. They know not what they are doing.”

Sisters Challenging Me To Think More
No matter what era or even whether we went to a catholic school, I suspect the teachers we remember most favorably are the ones who taught us to think.