Howie Hain

Athletic Artists Live Ordered Lives. Wisdom. Challenge. Gratitude. Growth.

If you want to be a great athlete, a great human being, then study the lives of the great artists, writers, thinkers... it's all one and the same. Greatness knows now boundaries... it only breaks them... continually. Expand your life, always, and in every way.

I just sat outside and read a few pages of a beautiful, old book on the monastic life. Was completely absorbed. In God. With God. Inspired. Praise God. To remember what it's like to have Christ as a friend.

There are times when asking God for something is less humble than just calling it down. What I mean, and with fear and trembling, am suggesting, is that there comes a time in our faith journey when and where we need to act as Jesus, truly. And, yes, of course, Jesus called upon the Father, but Jesus also on His own authoity, the authority given to Him by the Father, corrected, condemned, healed, proclaimed, blessed, and exorcized. Jesus used the power given to Him to bring the Kingdom within hand's reach... "on earth as it is in heaven." When we refuse to utilize the tremendous power handed over to us, by the Father, thru the Son, and with the Holy Spirit, but instead plead with one of the three persons of the Holy Trinity to do it instead, we are actually displaying a lack of faith, a false humility. We are not accepting our adult spiritual lives. We are living in our parent's basement and afraid to move out on our own. Do we really believe? Can we truly act in Jesus' name? Should we? Dare we? While we question, many suffer and suffer the worst of suffering, the spiritual suffering of anxiety, of fear, of utter loneliness, of despair. Speak! Speak in the name of Jesus, by the power of The Most Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, and rescue your neighbor... cast out crippling depression and fear... thrust into hell all those unclean, "evil spirits, who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls." Jesus wants us to be Him on Earth. You are a Jesus. So am I. Now, let's get to work. ---

Just went to Mass and listened to the homily of an incredibly humble, sincere priest. As I listened, and I was moved, in the truest sense of the word, the word 'sincerity' came to me, loud and clear. Unfortunately, I've listened to many homilies where I felt quite the opposite, and this morning, it became abundantly clear that a lack of sincerity is an awful deficit, rampant in our "modern" world. The contrast is so strong that when we do experience somebody who is sincere and actually humble, we are struck, we sense a greatness, a substantial presence unlike those we are told are great through our endless forms of media. We see not a haughty, arrogant, self-serving "servant" or "leader" who is desperately trying to change the world. No, we witness a man who is walking in simplicity. We witness a man who is changing the world. ---

Those moments when coffee, sunlight, and bird chirps combine... God is never so real... and His thoughts, His wisdom, His love, never so soothing... if only the morning could last all day... ---

Training camps are not about winning. They're actually about losing... that is, having the courage to be vulnerable, weak, and exposed in order to preemptively win potentially losing moments that have not yet arrived... and will then actually count. Truly winning always involves the real risk of appearing to lose.

Strength is not optional. How we define it is.

It's okay to be totally obsessed with a pursuit, an action, a goal... as long as that total obsession is in Christ. "...through him, with him, in him..." For a true disciple of Christ, every "action" is sacramental, every "time" and "place" is liturgical, every "thing" is from God and shall return to God. Now go forth and be obsessed.

There is no perfection that you can hold, obtain, or achieve... for only God is perfection... and He cannot be held, obtained, or achieved. Give God thanks and praise for that... for if God could be held, obtained, or achieved, He'd be no god worth giving thanks and praise.

Today's revolution: If I am to succeed in anything this next season of my life, I need to begin with physical health, and not just diet and sleep, but physical activity, and not just physical activity of any kind, but the kind that makes me become me: hard lifting, intense cardio, combat with men I respect. Game on. Exciting new time. Spring is here. New life. All that gives life, all that leads to new life, all that expands life, is Good and from God.

There are so many beautifully profound sentences in the Liturgy of the Eucharist. Focusing and meditating on one is a fruitful spiritual exercise. Here is a line from Preface II of Lent (Spiritual Penance): "For you have given your children a sacred time for the renewing and purifying of their hearts, that, freed from disordered affections, they may so deal with the things of this passing world as to hold rather to the things that eternally endure." Amen.

Good morning.

Here's a prayer. Stand in front of the Crucifix which sits high above the altar. Stand quietly, hat in hand. Look up at Him, but with eyes hung low. Stay there. Not asking. Not speaking. Not wanting anything. Wait. Just wait. Pure waiting. True waiting. True wanting. Wait. Wait for Him. And when He says, "go," then go forth... the Mass has ended... go in peace.

Feast Day of St. Joseph