Can you think of anything that actually requires only three minutes for you to accomplish?

Have you noticed that whenever someone requests your presence “for just three minutes,” it usually consumes at least fifteen, if you’re lucky?

We’re all besieged daily by ten thousand demands for our attention, not only in live human relationships, but also from constant electronic typhoons spun by newsmakers, merchants, special-interest websites, scam artists, and well-meaning friends who send three emails when one would suffice.

How do we sort it all out? How can we find God in the midst of the hurricane?

I seldom write book reviews, and this is the first time I have offered one here. But today I want to share with you a compact devotional primer: Three Minutes with God: Reflections and Prayers to Encourage, Inspire, and Motivate by Monsignor Frank Bognanno (Franciscan Media, 2022).

The book cover copy reveals that this book is a compilation of the author’s long-time series of televised 3-minute sound bites, “Thought of the Day” and provides an author’s resume that includes a host of other prestigious credentials: weekly program host for EWTN, chaplain to the Knights of Malta, member of the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre, spiritual director for the Christ Our Life International Conference.

(Fair disclosure: The author is a long-time friend, and I want to share some stories you won’t find listed among his formal qualifications.)

When I was a mother of two young boys, he blew into my wealthy, elderly, and seriously uptight parish like a pastoral whirlwind. Children were suddenly welcome to act like children in the pews. He regularly confronted the diocesan schools’ scariest principals on behalf of difficult students.

He accompanied pilgrims who were robbed on a train to Rome into dangerous neighborhoods, to help them retrieve—and protect—emergency funds wired to them by their families. Although we called him “The Pink Panther,” in those days he already had a reputation in our diocese as “the Energizer Bunny,” earning the moniker in late August of 1979, when Bishop Maurice Dingman abruptly called him downtown to the Chancery.

The bishop had just learned that Pope John Paul II had decided to include Iowa in his United States tour, in response to a personal letter from a small-town farmer. His Holiness would arrive in just six short weeks.

Father Bognanno was told to make the impossible possible.

“I was 39 years old, and my brain was still developing. I didn’t have enough sense to say, ‘Get somebody, anybody, else,’” he told the Des Moines Register on the 40^th Anniversary of the papal visit in 2019.

The precise calibration of 350,000 Midwestern clergy, religious, and laypeople on the fields of Living History Farms in Urbandale, Iowa on October 4, 1979, remains legend to this day. The morning had started out in rain showers, but the sun broke through just as the crowd looked up to see the Holy Father’s helicopter circle down from the clouds. Weather remained clear and bright throughout that historic first—a Pope celebrating mass on Iowa soil.

 Monsignor Bognanno is a cancer survivor who hiked to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro to celebrate mass on the peak for his doctors. He’s a son who visited a full day every week for ten years, after senility stole his father’s ability to speak, and cried while celebrating the funeral.

The author of Three Minutes with God has served our Church for fifty-six years. At eighty-three, he’s still the Energizer Bunny, living his own amazing life with God, three minutes at a time. Then three minutes more. He’s culled it all down to the essentials, and what he’s learned can be trusted.

Here’s a short excerpt from Three Minutes with God:

“It is you, my equal, my companion, my familiar friend, with whom I kept pleasant company.” – Psalm 55:13-14

A young married man recently told me that he and his wife were going to take a short vacation without their three children . . . This is a very wise young couple . . . The stronger their bond, the happier and more secure their children feel .

Prayer

Lord, help married couples see how spending quality time together strengthens their bond.

Amen.

(From Bognanno, Monsignor Frank, Three Minutes with God: Reflections and Prayers to Encourage, Inspire, and Motivate, Cincinnati, Ohio: Franciscan Media, 2022, p. 41).

© 2023 Margaret Zacharias

Jesus is The Reason

Cookie baking, shopping, wrapping packages, writing cards, and looming deadlines. Santa, take me away!

It’s easy to become caught up in the hustle and bustle of the Christmas Season. Even today, I find myself at the very edge of a deadline, with the excuse that there are five Fridays this month. However, deep down, I know I would be better organized if I lived in the present rather than in the chaos.

The Advent season begins peacefully, and I do well to live in the moment of each day. I am spiritually energized and ready to prepare my heart for the birth of Jesus. I love the devotionals and the messages of Hope and Joy. Holiday specials on the birth of Christ are a valuable resource for keeping my heart and mind centered on why I celebrate the birth of my King. 

Despite the prayerful encounters and organization of Advent, every year, there comes a moment of pandemonium. Disarray takes hold somewhere between when I light that first purple candle and when I light the final candle. I can usually spot the warning signs, and I rely on my strong faith to pull me back and refocus. Letting go of the anxiety surrounding whom I still haven’t shopped for or having no clue what kind of cookies I am making this Sunday when my family arrives. Staying present is easier said than done, but it’s necessary to enter into the true meaning of Christmas. Jesus is why we celebrate, and the emphasis should be on Him.

Everyone handles this time of year differently. Some welcome the busyness of it all, while others prefer a quieter approach. The commonality is awaiting the birth of Jesus.  Recently, I watched a show called The Chosen. In season two, episode three, as  particular scene stood out to me and helped put the true meaning of Christmas into perspective.  Surrounded by the disciples, Mother Mary remembers Jesus’ birth, and from the point of view of a mom, she shines a light onto the blessed night. 

The Chosen Scene: Mary Remembers Jesus’ birth – YouTube

The video clip shares a teaser, “Can you imagine what the birth of Jesus must have been like, particularly for a teenage mom?”  Imaginative or contemplative prayer can help us to immerse ourselves in that event. However, we are invited more profoundly into the story by hearing Mary and seeing the emotions on her face and in the disciples. The way in which they are all seated around the campfire, for me, resembles those gathered in the nativity. 

In this scene, we hear Mary’s account of things being not what or how she expected them to be. Amid a fleeting moment of doubt and the assurance that Jesus needed her, we are brought into the heart of Mary during the precious moments of Jesus’ birth. There is no mention of cookie recipes or meal preparation, only the gift given to us, the birth of Jesus. 

I am not setting out to discount the traditional preparations or things that we like to do this season. Instead, I invite you to bring Jesus into the process. In keeping our hearts set on Jesus as the reason, perhaps we can bring the anxiety of it down a notch. Often our Christmas celebrations do not turn out as we expected, perhaps there is a blessing in them, just as it was for Mary. Amidst the deadlines, lists, and meal preparation, sprinkle in downtime for prayer. Let Jesus know you need Him because He needs you just as much.   

Copyright 2022 Kimbery Novak. Images copyright Canva.