The Special

This past weekend we celebrated our grandson’s 11th birthday. His birthday was actually on Halloween but due to scheduling, the family portion, including all of the cousins, aunts and uncles, was celebrated on Saturday. We had a lot of fun together with the highlight being the opening of presents topped off with grandma’s Hummingbird Cupcakes. Three dozen cupcakes don’t go very far with six grand-kids around. The few that were left were finished off for breakfast the next morning. Having all our children and grandchildren together made me realize once again that family is all important.

After breakfast Sunday, grandpa had to take his walk so our eleven year old grandson, our son, and my wife took off for the mountains for a change of pace instead of walking in the neighborhood. What a beautiful venue on a beautiful fall day. Our goal was The Whale Rock. After finding our way on the trail through the woods and avoiding most the horse droppings, many hidden by leaves which made it extra challenging, we arrived at the whale rock. It’s amazing to think that this twenty foot high rock was deposited by a glacier some 10 to 20 thousand years ago. Nature is amazing.

The final event before returning home was watching a movie with the grand-kids. There we were, sitting on the couch with three grandsons snuggled in next to us watching “The Lego Movie”. I have to admit, it was funny and had a message that made it well worth watching – that we all have talents and abilities and that we are unique and special.

In the Lego universe, the wizard Vitruvius attempts to protect a super-weapon called the "Kragle" from the evil Lord Business. He fails to do so, but prophesies that a person called "The Special" will find the Piece of Resistance capable of stopping the Kragle. Emmet is an ordinary, rule-following, LEGO minifigure who is mistakenly identified as that most extraordinary person, “The Special”, and the key to saving the world. Emmet starts to believe that and starts convincing the LEGO Master Builders to help save the world. But the wizard is killed, and before he dies, he reveals that he made up the prophecy.

Emmet is no longer “Special” so the Master Builders don’t believe in him anymore and they are all captured and about to die. The wizard returns as a spirit and tells him it is his self-belief that makes him Special. Emmet then offers his own life to save the lives of all the Master Builders. Ultimately, (spoiler alert) the world is saved through the creativity (and specialness) of every individual.

As we were sitting there with our three grandchildren snuggling around us, I thought of how we told our children when they were young that they could be anything they wanted to be and now they are telling their children the same thing. We are each unique and have talents and capabilities and creativity that no one else has. Goethe, the German writer and philosopher said, "God's gift to us is more talent and ability than we'll ever hope to use in our lifetime. Our gift to God is to develop as much of that talent and ability as we can in our lifetime."

In this Sunday’s Gospel, Jesus uses the parable about a master entrusting talents (money) to three servants, each according to his ability. Two of the servants were able to double their money using their God-given talents and ingenuity. The third one did not want to risk losing his money so he did nothing which cause the master to be extremely upset. We all have unique talents, gifts and capabilities, those given us by God. We are “The Special” and need to develop and use our gifts.