Sister Wendy

A few weeks ago I enjoyed a documentary on Sister Wendy Beckett & the art of the gospel. It was an inspiring insight both into the gospels, through the colourful lens of art, and a glimpse into the life of the hermit Sister Wendy.  Tonight I found the documentary on youtube. Here it is, in four 15 minute parts.

being in love

Lord, send out your Spirit

and renew the Hurunui District

In the psalm response to today’s Pentecost reading  (Acts 2:1-11) we pray: “Lord, send out your Spirit, and renew the face of the earth.” 

The face of the earth is a vast expanse. And the many faces of the people of the earth are numerous and anonymous.  How can we grasp the meaning of such a general prayer? 

As we celebrate Pentecost today, it is helpful to be specific: to think of the land that we know, and the people whom we encounter each week. The Spirit of God came to the Church in a specific place, to a single community of local people. Today, let’s consider our Good Shepherd Parish and our local Hurunui District, the people of our home neighbourhoods. Lord, send your Spirit to renew us. Lord, we are in need of your Spirit.

In the Prayer of the Church (Office of Readings) during the week leading up to today’s feast, the Church read from the Constitution on the Church (Vatican II): “By the power of the Gospel, the Holy Spirit enables the Church to grow young, perpetually renewing it...” (par. 4) What a great phrase: “grow young.”  If we want to grow young, then here is the recipe!

This week the new Parish Council for our Good Shepherd Parish met. The Council is fortunate not to have to deal with the practical issues of building maintenance since each of our seven communities will  continue to oversee this work. This enables the Parish Council to be truly pastoral, to focus on the faith-lives of the people of our parish. 

What does this mean, to focus on faith? This is an especially timely question for this Year of Faith. Too many people in the church have the sense that we (and they) are growing old. There are not as many young people active in our parish as we would like. What must we do? This was the central topic of Wednesday night’s Council meeting. 

Too many people who live in our families and our neighbourhoods think of the church as old and tired. They see the our Catholic faith as a moralistic and legalistic antique, the antithesis of the life and freedom that healthy people seek. This is a tragic reality, far from the experience of the first disciples of Jesus. 

Before their encounter with Jesus, the disciples were fearful for their survival. The burdens of daily life and the demands of the precepts of their religion weighed heavily upon them and those they loved. 

This is often our own experience too isn’t it? 

Take a moment to think back over the week just past. We carry family anxieties for ourselves and for those we love. Perhaps our health is uncertain. Then there is financial anxiety and employment stresses. Many of us live with a sense of distance from God. Our sin is real and we can feel its effects. These issues were also the central reality for the disciples, that is, until they began to live in relationship with Jesus. 

The theories, plans and projects that occupy humans are powerless to bring about a real experience of life and freedom. While commitment and discipline might be useful when working towards a goal, it takes something more to give true meaning and motivation to a human existence. Such energy and satisfaction is however found in relationship with another. At the most profound human level, it is the experience of being in love that effects real and lasting change not only to external actions but to the inner life of the human heart.

And this is the key point. If a parish community is focussed on the external signs of faith (albeit healthy and necessary signs), we will feel as though we are engaged in an unrelenting and exhausting effort to inspire parishioners and to build a community. But, thanks be to God, there is another way. When each parishioner is seeking above all else to live in personal relationship with Jesus, then the Holy Spirit of Jesus is able to respond and enter with love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, and other welcome fruits of the presence of the Spirit of God.

So the life of faith is not about demands and duty that stifle sponteneity and strangle freedom. The life of faith is a life of relationship with Jesus who answers every human need and who satisfies all human desire.

The decision to live in this relationship is not a choice we make simply alongside human relationships and occupations. Instead, human relationships only become fully possible when one is living in relationship with Jesus. This is this one relationship that enables all relationships. 

Too often we use people and projects in a futile attempt to anaesthetise our need for God. We forget that this inbuilt need for God is not a human flaw. Instead this need is the quality that turns every healthy person to the one who answers every need.

For a Catholic, the Mass and other sacraments are the heart of this personal encounter with Jesus. A parish is not a human community alongside the many other community options. While it is important that we are responsible custodians of the material assets of the parish (ie buildings, land, investments), the heart of our parish purpose is to focus on Jesus Christ, alive and active among us by the power of the Holy Spirit.

When a parishioner encounters this all-satisfying friendship with Jesus, everything else follows. WIthout complete dependance on the Spirit of God among us as our motivator and purpose, parish life will be hard work.  

When we turn to Jesus with whole-hearted dependance, our parish life together becomes the fruit of our personal experience of the presence of Jesus with us, and the love of Jesus for us.

pentecost newsletter

The Pentecost Sunday newsletter for the Catholic Parish of the Good Shepherd, Hurunui District, is now uploaded at the parish website www.catholichurunui.co.nz

Orvieto and light

Pentecost, Orvieto, light and alabaster

A couple of years ago I spent a few days in the Umbrian hill town of Orvieto. The town's cathedral is a remarkable building. There are so many 'bloggable' reflections that this Duomo inspires. But I will leave these for future blog entries.

For today, just one aspect.

The nave of the Cathedral is constructed in strips of 'black' and 'white' marble. The windows from the outside are a bit distracting. It seems as though the spaces for the glass have been filled with plywood, as if the glass had broken and the glazier hadn't got around to the repair yet. Perhaps the plywood is a temporary measure to stop the weather getting in?

And then I went inside.

The interior of this magnificent building is flooded with light. There is no plywood. The windows are a most natural colour and design. Clearly an artist has been at work. No plywood, but the most exquisite glass work.

After my visit, which was the first of many visits, I sat at a little cafe reading a brochure about the Cathedral.

I had presumed that the 'plywood' windows, were made of glass. But I was wrong. These windows are alabaster. This stone is sliced paper-thin to create the windows that flood the dark interior with light.

And it is this Orvieto memory that comes to mind as I prepare to celebrate Pentecost. Let me share the reason.

The disciples of Jesus were gathered together, probably out of fear. They had good reason to be fearful. The Romans were on the warpath. They had crucified Jesus. Perhaps their little group would be next?

But within moments, at the arrival of the Holy Spirit, they realised that because the Spirit of Jesus was with them, they had no reason to be afraid. They then boldly left the room and lovingly confronted the powers they previously feared. 

Because of Pentecost, things are rarely what they seem. What appeared to be plywood, then I presumed was glass, was in fact stone.

What seems to be a cause for fear, in the light of the presence of the Spirit of Jesus with us, is in fact an opportunity for greater intimacy with Jesus who dissolves all fear.

And now, this Pentecost vigil, I remember the Holy Spirit window in St. Peter's basilica in Rome. The window appears to be the most exquisite work of a glass-crafter.

But it is in fact... alabaster.

Tap on this text for some more Orvieto images

growing young

Last week I read a reflection from the Constitution on the Church in preparation for this Sunday's feast of Pentecost. There was a line there I had not noticed before: The Holy Spirit "enables the Church to grow young..." 

That's a great thought...'growing young!'

With the passing of every year we notice the aging process in ourselves. We can no longer move as fast or jump as high. The mind lets us down. We think we don't look as good as we did just a few years ago.

The offer of a fountain of youth is very attractive. The elixir is not to be found in face creams, exercise and hair colour. The key to 'growing young' is found in life in harmony with the Spirit of God. This is what keeps the human heart beating young.

We don't have to believe this simply because the Constitution tells us. A simple experiment will give a more personal experience of the life that is on offer.

one week

Set one week in which you seek to live in harmony with all you know God to be asking of you. (much of this will have come to you through the gospels and the teachings of the church. Some of these teachings you may struggle or even disagree with. Whatever, for one week, just do it!)

pray

We know that prayer is an essential relationship in the life of the Christian. 

Notice that I call prayer a relationship. Prayer is not the reciting of incantations in order to please and appease God. Prayer is awareness of my desire to be connected to God.

Sometimes this desire is expressed in formal prayers and spoken or silent expression. At other times I am just aware of my hunger and longing for God. This fundamental human need for prayer is the most significant mark of our healthy humanity. 

This is good news for the person who is struggling and who knows their weakness. It is a bit of a challenge for the person who thinks they are doing pretty well on their own! 

As a part of your week, set regular time for prayer. Ten minutes morning and evening. One minute every time the traffic light turns red. Two minutes during the TV ads...

make good change

If you suspect God might be nudging you to change your behaviour in some way, then commit to making this change - at least for one week. For example we know that Jesus taught us to love our enemy. This is a bit of a challenge since my enemies do not deserve my love. But, for a week try it! Think too of the teaching of Jesus and the Church on care for the needy, justice and honesty, sexuality... In each of these areas, do not be afraid to make the changes you know God to be asking of you. You have nothing to lose.

There are many other challenges that the Gospel and scriptures put before us. These are communicated with more explanation in the teaching of the Church. It is common for Catholic's to treat these teachings as a smorgasboard of suggestions and to live only those that come most easily. The invitation of this Pentecost feast is to put yourself, one hundred percent, in the disciples Pentecost upper-room of waiting. 

When the disciples did this, their main motivation was fear. That's a good enough reason to open up to God. Perhaps you have a fear of growing old, and sickness and death? The Holy Spirit is waiting to grow you young.

time for the review

At the end of your week (or at bedtime on day two if that is all you can manage), ask yourself if you are more happy with yourself than you were a week ago. If you are happier, then keep the rhythm of life you have set going for another week. God created us to be happy, and the Spirit if given to us to enable us to live happily, and to give us eternal youth.

Te Putea reflection

One of the Publications of the Catholic Diocese of Christchurch newsletter publications is the "Te Putea" (the resource) newsletter. Phil Gourdie, the editor asked me to contribute the editorial to the most recent edition. This gave me a good opportunity to reflect on friendship and family in the life of people of faith. Here is my reflection.

Most “Te Putea” front-page reflections contributed by priests of our diocese over the years, have been addressed to “dear friends in our diocesan family.”

A couple of these words of greeting are especially worthy of our consideration, since our living encounter with Jesus Christ, the Word of God, gives our old, familiar, and often tired language, new meaning, focus and vitality.

People of faith are able to appreciate the words “friends” and “family” in a new way. Dusty dictionary definitions of social and biological connections are powerless to communicate the beauty and depth of intimacy with God and with one another.

The term “friendship” is often used of like-minded people who enjoy each other’s company and are agreeable. Such friends are fun. They don’t challenge us beyond our comforts. Neither do they disagree with us about what is important in life. Casual conversation with such companions fills free time and eases earthly ennui.

The name “family” is often reduced to a blood or legal connection. Our blood relatives did not choose us. Neither did we choose our parents or children, our sisters or brothers.

Sadly the term “family” today, has little more stability than the common contemporary experience of fleeting friendship. Instead of turning to the architect of all life to define the meaning and possibilities for human relationships, we grasp at variations and adaptations, thus tampering with divine order. 

With tragic consequences we disguise human vulnerability. We suppress the signs that are symptoms of human dysfunction. Without too much resistance (although albeit with much pain), people move from one family relationship to another without the God-centred vision that enables “till death do us part” commitment.

Our common diocesan “family” of “friends” marks people of Catholic faith as different. We are not a transient secular social society brought together by personal likes and dislikes or by common interests. Instead, we are the friends and family of Jesus Christ; that is, a family alive in the friendship of faith.

It is not our primary task as people of the parishes and chaplaincies of the diocese to create a community. Such a desire will be well intentioned. But our own efforts will ultimately falter and fail for the same reasons that secular structures rarely last beyond a few decades.

Instead our prime task as the people of this local Catholic community of the Christchurch diocese, is to relax into the fact of our Easter faith: The Word of God, Jesus Christ has become flesh and, risen from the dead, dwells amongst us. Confident in this ultimate relationship that satisfies all human desires, we can now live lovingly as the friends and family of Jesus.

In this divine relationship of love, our attitude to all human realities is transformed. Far from ignoring human structures of government and management, we allow Jesus to draw our vision beyond earthly systems. Instead of using money as a weapon of power or a god-like guarantor of security, we gift our time, talent and treasure to the one God, so offering ourselves and all we have to be transformed into tools for the building of God’s dwelling among us.

We know that when we withhold our time, talent and treasure from friendships and family, these relationships immediately suffer and soon die. When we give to our friends and family without counting the cost, even when we feel like withholding, the relationships flourish once more. We call this self-transcending generosity, “love”. When we act against our moods of selfishness, and persevere in living with loving generosity towards our family and friends, it is not too long before the experience of peace and harmony in the relationship returns. This is love.

This is the purpose of this resource, the “Te Putea” newsletter:  to remind us of the goal of the Christchurch Diocese Foundation, the Catholic Development Fund, and the parish Thanksgiving Programmes. 

To these diocesan vehicles of the mission of Jesus Christ among us, let us bring the generous gifts that are characteristic of our family life and friendships; that is, our time, talent and treasure.

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the tension of the Ascension

Ascension inspiration - thank you Fr. Alex!

Fr. Alex is the author of the blog "the depth of life" http://www.fralexz.blogspot.com/