My Name is Perry Calisi. My wife Linda and I have been parishioners at St Clare for 16 years. God has blessed us  with three wonderful children; Bianca, Gino and Elaina, a wonderful  extended family including my mother and two sisters (one who is with us today), and all of you! For who are strangers? They are Friends we haven’t met yet.

When I was asked to share my resurrection story, or “how has God affected my life?” I thought now?
It’s too soon! What do I say? What is my story? Well, as I began to think about it, four thoughts came to my mind:

1. Love people and use things
2. The Kingdom of Heaven
3. John the Baptist
4. Forgiveness

Love people not things:  As I hold up the book given to us two years ago titled “Rediscover Jesus”, I said: We are so fortunate that we’ve been receiving books on Christmas Eve for the past two years. Although I’m a little behind, I’ve been reading this one and I highly recommend it. It is an easy read with very short chapters. I leaned so much from reading it. But the greatest lesson I’ve received was that society and the world has changed our priorities around. We are lead to USE people and LOVE things (and even use people to get those things). We must get back to LOVING all people and USE things. God doesn’t mind if we have things but we cannot attach ourselves to them, that’s where we get trapped by this world.

The Kingdom of Heaven:
I was born into this Christian faith of ours. Always went to church, but my first epiphany happened when I was 18 years old away at college. I attended Mass one Sunday and Suddenly was struck  with the realization that this breaking and blessing of the bread that we do every Sunday was Christ calling us to discipleship , to be modern prophets and to share the good news. Since then I have had a few more of these striking moments of clarity either from reading the bible or attending Mass. I call them revelations and I’ve written about them. Some people have said to me, “I have faith but my faith is private” or “I’m not outgoing like you” BUT God does not want us to keep the good news inside, but rather in our own way, to share. And he provides opportunities. This brings me to the Kingdom of Heaven. Probably the GREATEST SINGLE THING WE CAN ACCOMPLISH IN OUR LIVES IS: To bring people to the Kingdom of Heaven. Simply put: To Awaken faith in others starting with our own families and children.

One verse I’ve written about is Mathew 10: 26-33. My revelation of this verse is this: “He’s counted every hair upon your head. Most precious are you BUT remember what he said: Everyone who knows me in front of other men, I will also know him in the end. It is written yes indeed, Matt 10:26-33. We are all servants of the Lord!” Now you can see and hear the John the Baptist reference I spoke of before and how these revelations have affected me when they strike. It’s high octane, hard hitting and truth is always clear and undebatable! 

Forgiveness:
Last week I was interviewing a caregiver for my homecare business. I am fortunate that I can set the tone for my business which includes discussions of faith. I was sharing the passage of Mathew 18:18
“Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in Heaven. And whatever is loosed on earth will be loosed in Heaven”. I was bouncing back and forth from the New Testament to the old and it hit me hard again that this whole binding and loosening idea could have begun when Pharaoh Rameses (the 2^nd) told Moses in Exodus 10:28, “LEAVE MY PRESENCE AND SEE TO IT THAT YOU DO NOT APPEAR BEFORE ME AGAIN! THE DAY YOU DO APPEAR BEFORE ME, YOU SHALL DIE!”  With his own words and from his lips, Pharaoh bound himself, his own family AND all of Egypt to a fate of death to all first born. What Pharaoh bound on earth God bound Pharaoh with! So with that clear example, WE MUST FORGIVE EVERYONE FOR EVERYTHING! For in doing so, we will free ourselves from harsh judgement upon us when we meet GOD.

Lastly, I’d like to say that everyone’s resurrection story is an ongoing journey until we take our last breath.

Thank you all for allowing me to share with you today.
Perry Calisi