Fiction vs Reality

   When I was in grade school, the neighborhood kids used to play Superheroes all the time. One day, one of the neighbors decided to borrow his older brother's newspaper bag, climb onto their roof, and "parachute" off of the roof.
   Kids -- Do Not Try This At Home!
   The bag did not, in the least, slow his plunge to the ground and he broke his leg. All of our parents almost broke us when they found out that we were all involved and that we were waiting to take turns parachuting!
   But we had seen stuff like that on television and were sure that it would work.
   We life in such an age where fantasy has not only met reality but, for many people, it has passed reality. For many people, fantasy is the preferred state of life and mind in which to live.
   Movies are most certainly capitalizing on this phenomenon. Take a gander at Avatar. It is a great flick! I saw it in 3-D and it knocked my socks off. The colors were so vivid, the scenes so realistic, and the story so captivating. But I knew that it was just a movie and not reality.
   I had to chuckle when I heard about support groups being set up around the country because so many people had seen Avatar and wanted to have that kind of world. Knowing that they could not have that kind of world, they became depressed and suicidal and in need of help.
   Oh boy.
   We treat so much fiction as reality and sometime treat reality as fiction. We blur the lines between fact and fantasy and become lost people.
   It is time we grow up!
   St. Paul, in today's second reading, speaks about the differences from when he was a child and when he was a man.
   We are no longer children. We are adults. As adults in the faith, we have to set aside "fantasy." That is, we have to set aside things like superstition, "no fail" novenas, and other things that reflect non-truths.
   Instead, we must embrace the truth.
   There are some truths that are eternal and no amount of fiction will make them go away.
   God is not fiction. God is real. His truth is unchanging. His love is forever. You can count on that yesterday, today, tomorrow . . . always!