Sister Marcia Ziska has been a member of the Benedictine Sisters at Mount St. Scholastica, Atchison, KS, for 47 years. A retired certified hospital chaplain, she has served in pastoral care, formation work and was associate director of the Sophia Center, the community’s retreat center. Sister Marcia coordinated the Rome Renewal Program for English-speaking Benedictine women world-wide from 2003-2010. She served on the National Religious Vocation Conference Board the American Benedictine Formation Conference Leadership Team. She currently is vocation director, does spiritual direction, and is a staff member for the spiritual direction training program, Souljourners. Thanksgiving
Marcia Ziska, OSB, Mount St. Scholastica, Atchison, KS
As we celebrate a Thanksgiving unlike any we've ever known, we are also preparing to move into the season of Advent.
This year Advent, with its wreath of evergreen and four candles, will arrive in the midst of a world navigating a pandemic that has left many hearts burdened. Too many families face Thanksgiving and the coming holiday season with sorrow and dread. Thousands of families have lost loved ones from Covid-19, many people are without work, some among us suffer from depression or loneliness. Still others have aching hearts due to lack of touch, a hug, or seeing family members.
Today’s solemnity marks the final week of the 2020 liturgical season. Matthew’s gospel depicting the Last Judgment challenges me, as a disciple of Jesus, to spread God’s reign in our broken world and our fragmented church. In the Gospel Jesus portrays himself as a shepherd separating the flock of sheep from the goats who were grazing in the same pasture. My image of a shepherd is that of being tender and loving, caring and compassionate. Jesus praises the sheep for being “blessed by God.” And thus begins the litany of being a good neighbor: attending to the hungry and thirsty, welcoming the stranger, clothing the naked, visiting the sick and imprisoned.
The parable offered to us in today’s gospel follows last week’s and precedes what will be proclaimed next week. It is part of the eschatological discourse in which Jesus teaches his disciples “to endure through difficult times and to live in anticipation of the Lord’s return.” The parable of the talents challenges me to consider how I have used what God has gifted me with in the building up of my family, my community, relationships? Have I invested my gifts wisely and with prudence or have I been too self-centered, perhaps, lazy and wasteful?
In these last weeks of the liturgical season all the scripture readings focus on the end times and the last judgment. The last verse of today’s gospel states: “Therefore, stay alert; because you do not know the day or the hour.” Be vigilant, be prepared, don’t be like the five foolish virgins who arrived without any extra oil. Similar wisdom comes from our holy father, St. Benedict in RB 4:46-49: “Yearn for everlasting life with holy desire. Day by day remind yourself that you are going to die. Hour by hour keep careful watch over all you do, aware that God’s gaze is upon you, wherever you may be.” Being prepared, being ready is important. 
While millions of people have already cast their ballots in the 2020 Presidential election, today’s gospel and second reading seem to, perhaps, have a message for us and our country. The Solemnity of All Saints, celebrated around the world, is an invitation to live a better life, both individually and collectively. John writes to a community disturbed by division: “see what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God.” Every human being, every American, at our core, is already a child of God. All of us have the wherewithal to be imitators of the love that God has already bestowed upon us. John’s statement is one of encouragement.
As election day draws near, today’s familiar gospel presents both a challenge and an invitation. We all know this gospel as the core of Jesus’ teaching---“the first and greatest commandment is to love God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind AND the second is like the first, to love your neighbor as yourself.” The love referred to by Jesus is not a warm, fuzzy, feeling type of love. This kind of love is self-sacrificing. 
Today is World Mission Sunday, a day set aside for the Catholic Church to remember the missionary movement and pray for all missionaries world-wide. Established in 1926, it is a reminder for all Christians of our common responsibility to provide for the material and spiritual well-being of churches in need around the world. The gospel message seems fitting for this event which always falls on the next to the last Sunday in October. 
Our tender God will “wipe every tear from our faces” says the prophet Isaiah. Death shall me no more! This God of ours endorses life, affirms life, not death. A festive banquet awaits us! What a hope-filled and consoling message when a loved one dies. It is comforting, too, during this pandemic. As I sat with one of our monastic elders who is moving toward death, I was keenly aware that her family could not be present as they would like. Grief takes on a different face now. 
October ushers in the season of autumn and harvest time. The autumn harvest in Kansas entails mostly corn and soybeans. Amazingly, there are some vineyards in northeastern Kansas! The past ten years several sisters join me in picking grapes. In a couple of hours, we can fill seven to nine five-gallon buckets with plump, purple, juicy cynthiana red wine grapes. Later, with the help of a friend, the grapes are pressed and produce a deep, rich, crimson-red juice. This harvest of good fruit provides the community several gallons of scrumptious juice and the remainder is frozen for future jelly-making.
“The Lord is near to all who call upon him.”
On this Labor Day weekend, our scripture readings invite me to listen, to listen intently. This word underscores the foundation of my Benedictine life. I listen