Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
Mob: 0417 279 437; mdelaney@netspace.net.au
Assistant Priest: Fr Alexander Obiorah
Mob: 0447 478 297; alexchuksobi@yahoo.co.uk
Postal Address:
Parish Office: 90 Stewart Street , Devonport 7310
(Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday 10am - 3pm)
Office Phone: 6424 2783 Fax: 6423 5160
Email: mlcathparish-dsl@keypoint.com.au
Email: mlcathparish-dsl@keypoint.com.au
Secretary: Annie Davies / Anne Fisher
Pastoral Council Chair: Mary Davies
Pastoral Council Chair: Mary Davies
Parish Mass Times: mlcpmasstimes.blogspot.com.au
Weekly Homily Podcast: mikedelaney.podomatic.com
Parish Magazine: mlcathparishnewsletter.blogspot.com.au
Year of Mercy Blogspot: mlcpyom.blogspot.com.au
Our Parish Sacramental Life
Baptism: Parents are asked to contact the Parish Office to make arrangements for attending a Baptismal Preparation Session and booking a Baptism date.
Reconciliation, Confirmation and Eucharist: Are received following a Family–centred, Parish-based, School-supported Preparation Program.
Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults: prepares adults for reception into the Catholic community.
Marriage: arrangements are made by contacting one of our priests - couples attend a Pre-marriage Program
Anointing of the Sick: please contact one of our priests
Reconciliation: Ulverstone - Fridays (10am - 10:30am)
Devonport - Saturday (5:15pm– 5.45pm)
Penguin - Saturday (5:15pm - 5:45pm)
Care and Concern: If you are aware of anyone who is in need of assistance and has given permission to be contacted by Care and Concern, please phone the Parish Office.
MERSEY LEVEN CATHOLIC PARISHHoly Week & Easter Ceremonies 2016
DEVONPORT: Our Lady of Lourdes Church
Good Friday: Commemoration of the Passion 3.00pm
Holy Saturday: EASTER VIGIL 7.00pm
Easter Sunday: Easter Mass 11.00am
PORT SORELL: St Joseph’s Mass Centre
Good Friday: Stations of the Cross 10.00am
Easter Sunday: Easter Mass 8.00am
LATROBE: St Patrick’s Church
Good Friday: Stations of the Cross 11.00am
Easter Sunday Easter Mass 9.30am
SHEFFIELD: Holy Cross Church
Good Friday: Stations of the Cross 11.00am
Easter Sunday: Easter Mass 11.00am
ULVERSTONE: Sacred Heart Church
Holy Thursday: Mass of the Lord’s Supper 7.30pm
(Adoration till 9pm followed by Evening Prayer of the Church)
Good Friday: Commemoration of the Passion 3.00pm
Easter Sunday: Easter Mass 9.30am
PENGUIN: St Mary’s Church
Good Friday: Stations of the Cross 11.00am
Easter Sunday: Easter Mass 8.00am
Reconciliation
Monday 21st March - Our Lady of Lourdes 7pm
Wednesday 23rd March - Sacred Heart 7pm
|
Weekday Masses 15th - 18th March, 2016
Tuesday: 9:30am - Penguin
Wednesday: 9:30am - Latrobe
Thursday: 10:00am - Karingal Nursing Home
12noon - Latrobe - Feast Day
Friday: 11.00am - Mt St Vincent Nursing Home
Next Weekend 19th & 20th March, 2016
Saturday Vigil: 6:00pm Penguin & Devonport
Sunday Mass: 8:30am Port Sorell
9:00am Ulverstone
10:30am Devonport
11:00am Sheffield
5:00pm Latrobe
Devonport: concluding with Stations of the Cross and Angelus
Devonport: Benediction with Adoration
Legion of Mary: Sacred Heart Church Community Room
Ulverstone, Wednesdays 11am
Prayer Groups:
Charismatic Renewal – Devonport Emmaus House
Thursdays commencing 7.30pm
Christian Meditation - Devonport, Emmaus House
Wednesdays 7pm.
STATIONS OF THE CROSS: 7pm each Friday of Lent at Our Lady of Lourdes Devonport, Sacred Heart Ulverstone, St Mary’s Penguin & St Pat’s Latrobe. Also Sacred Heart Ulverstone 10am on Tuesdays.
Ministry Rosters 19th
& 20th March, 2016
Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord
Devonport:
Readers: Vigil: 1st C
Kiely-Hoye 2nd M Williams
Gospel: Narrator
- A McIntyre, Other: A Stegmann
Prayers of the faithful: M Knight
10.30am: 1st E Petts 2nd K
Douglas Gospel: Narrator - F Sly
Other J Phillips
Prayers of the faithful: A Hughes – Please ring Kath
if you are unavailable.
Ministers of Communion:
Vigil T Muir, M Davies, M Gerrand, S
Innes, D Peters, J Heatley
10.30am: B & N Mulcahy, L Hollister, M Urquhart, G
Fletcher, S Fletcher
Cleaners 18th March: K.S.C. 25th March: F Sly, M Hansen, R McBain
Piety Shop 19th March: R Baker 20th March: K Hull
Ulverstone:
Reader: S Willoughby
Ministers of Communion: M Byrne, D Griffin, K Foster, R
Locket
Cleaners: M Mott
Hospitality: Filipino Community
Penguin:
Greeters: G & N Pearce
Commentator: Y Downes
Readers: M & D Hiscutt
Procession: T Clayton, E Nickols
Ministers of Communion: A Guest, J Barker
Liturgy: Pine Road
Setting Up: A Landers
Care of Church: G Hills-Eade, T Clayton
Port Sorell:
Readers: L Post, T Jeffries
Ministers of Communion: E Holloway
Clean /Prepare/ A
Hynes
Readings This Week; Fifth Sunday of Lent (Third Scrutiny)
First Reading: Ezekiel 37:12-14
Second Reading: Romans 8:8-11
Gospel: John 11:1-45
As we are using the Readings from Year A there is no Prego available this weekend - it will return next weekend.
Readings Next Week; Palm Sunday
First Reading: Isaiah 50:4-7
Second Reading: Philippians 2:6-11
Gospel: Luke 22:14 - 23:56
Let us pray for those who have died recently: Lauren Crowe, Maisie
Gadsby, Bryn Peden, Glen Halley Snr, Thomas Beard, Ali Drummond, Daphne Fraser, Sheldon Broomhall, Fr Elio Proietto, Neil Cranny, Denzil Sheehan, Jan Siejka and Peta
Enniss.
Let us pray for those whose anniversary occurs about this time: 9th
– 15th March
Glen Clark, Sybil Dobinson, Patrick
O’Brien, David Gibbens, Betty Boskell, Bob McCormack, Leonie Heron, Ken Bates, Max Fulton,
Beatrice Hocking, Ernest Collings, Amaya Stevens, Edna Chatwin, Nancye
Callinan, Terence Murphy, Henry Lizotte, Stan Nelson, Norris Castles, Marion
Sage and Bernie & Frances O’Sullivan.
May they rest in peace
WEEKLY
RAMBLINGS:
Thanks
to all those people who made the effort to comment by email, phone or in person
on the proposed sale and redevelopment of the Emmaus House Site. The
overwhelming majority of comment was in favour of going ahead and so on
Thursday I contacted Chris Ryan, the Manager of Finance at the Church Office,
to move ahead with the proposal.
Several
things were made clearer to me in this process and my, mistaken, way of waiting
until something concrete is proposed doesn’t work when it comes to a
consultation process. Any further activities will be discussed as they arise –
firstly with the Pastoral Council, the Finance Committee and any particular
community who might be immediately impacted and then the broader community.
At
long last I am happy to say that tenders have been called for the driveway and
handicapped parking at Ulverstone. The plans are on view in the community room
this weekend and I will be available for a short time after Mass this weekend
to discuss them. This is only stage one of the project and further work will
occur when possible.
I
will also be available after Mass at Latrobe to discuss a proposal to subdivide
the Property there into three titles – Church, Parish House and School. There
is a drawing/Map of the proposal at the back of the Church.
The
Sacramental Program commenced with the Information Nights last week. At this
stage there are only a very few families involved; there might be a number of
reasons for this but I have contacted all the Catholic schools again (emails
had been sent to all the Government schools earlier) raising the possibility of
another information night before the 1st Preparation day. Watch this
space for further information.
Before enrolling in the Mondulkiri Community Health
Program, supported by Caritas Australia, young midwife Sreymom lacked the
practical experience necessary to safely assist childbirth. Now, with the
skills and knowledge gained through the program, Sreymom is a trusted midwife
who is helping to improve the health of indigenous women and children in her
region.
Please donate to Project Compassion 2016 and help healthcare
workers in isolated areas of Cambodia gain vital training to improve the health
and wellbeing of the region’s indigenous women and children.
ST VINCENT DE PAUL COLLECTION:
This weekend in Devonport, Ulverstone, Port Sorell, Latrobe
and Penguin to assist the work of the St Vincent de Paul Society.
LITURGY
PREPARATION GROUP:
To
assist in preparing our liturgical program for Palm Sunday and the Triduum, all
interested are invited to meet at Emmaus House at 2.30 pm this Sunday 13 March. For
further information please ring Peter on 0419 302 435.
YOUR CHANCE TO CELEBRATE
ST PATRICK’S DAY
IN OUR PARISH:
Thursday 17th March Mass at St Patrick’s Church Latrobe at midday. Followed by lunch provided by St Patrick’s Catholic School for all parishioners who wish to join them on the day.
KARINGAL MASS:
Mass at Karingal will be this Thursday 17th March at 10am. Join the residents of Karingal with a cuppa after Mass to celebrate St Patrick’s Day.
KNIGHTS OF THE SOUTHERN CROSS:
Please note meeting date change owing to clash with Easter Sunday.
The next meeting of the Knights of the Southern Cross will be held at Emmaus House Devonport on Sunday 20th March commencing at 6pm with a shared tea. We welcome any interested men to come along.
DIVINE MERCY NOVENA:
The Mersey Leven Catholic Community Rosary Group invite you to our annual Divine Mercy Novena commencing Good Friday 25th March to 2nd April at Sacred Heart Church at 10am daily and Emmaus House at 5:30pm daily.
Divine Mercy Prayer cards are available at all Mass Centres.
For further information please contact Meriam 0438 005 263, Hermie 0414 416 661 or Michael 0447 018 068
ULVERSTONE CWL EASTER RAFFLE:
Committee members will be selling tickets each Sunday after Mass, Tickets $1.00 each. Prize: Easter Basket. Raffle drawn 20th March.
Please remember to bring your spare change to help out and buy a ticket (or two)!!
Thursday Nights - OLOL Hall, Devonport. Eyes down 7.30pm!
Callers for Thursday 17th March are Rod Clark & Alan Luxton.
NEWS FROM ACROSS THE ARCHDIOCESE:
The National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Catholic Council (NATSICC), together with the Bishops Commission for Relations with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, are hosting a 3 day retreat in the Heart of Australia - Alice Springs.
The retreat will focus on Reconciliation - with God, with each other and with the land. It is an opportunity for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Catholics and those working in Indigenous Ministry to strengthen their foundation of Faith through participating in formation workshops and a renewal of their Spirit in concert with fellow workers in Christ.
Location: Alice Springs, Northern Territory Dates: 19th -21st April 2016 (18th and 22nd April travel days)
Registration and Costs: http://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/formation-and-spiritual-retreat-for-those-working-in-indigenous-ministry-tickets-20138690365
For further information please contact the Tasmanian NATSICC Representative Jaimi-Lee Armstrong via email: jaimilee.armstrong@gmail.com or NATSICC Secretariat Craig Arthur email: craig@natsicc.org.au or phone: 08 8363 2963
Grace Week 2
"Not Merely an Era of Change, but A
Change of Era"
These recent
words from Pope Francis are still begging humanity to recognize the seismic
shift in consciousness that the Gospel is forever trying to bring about. But
Pope Francis is also recognizing that the planet is changing at an alarming
speed, and the church had best stop fearing change--or we are ill prepared to
announce our own message. Grace and mercy are, and always will be, a radical
shift from normal consciousness. We truly are entering a change of era. Until
recently, Christianity has largely reflected the common consciousness instead
of enlightening it. Nowhere is this more evident than in our preference for
punishment over mercy.
"Mercy
is the Lord's most powerful message!" Pope Francis proclaimed at the
beginning of his pontificate. [1] A few days later, he said, "Dear
brothers and sisters, let us be enveloped by the mercy of God. . . . We will
feel [God's] wonderful tenderness, we will feel [God's] embrace, and we too
will become more capable of mercy, patience, forgiveness, and love." [2]
This is of such crucial importance that Pope Francis has declared this year an
Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy. We will return to this theme throughout the
year to make clear how it sets people and culture on an utterly different
foundation and in a truly new direction.
I am so very
grateful for Pope Francis, who I feel is himself a gift of God's mercy to the
Christian churches and to the world in this time of counting, weighing, and
measuring everything for our own small advantage. If we truly understood
("stood under") God's mercy, we would see how we've gotten everything
"upside down and backward," as Fr. Thomas Keating loves to say. Most
of us think and act as if God is a God of retribution and even eternal
punishment. But the Bible, Jesus, and the mystics of all the world religions
reveal that God is infinite love, which really changes everything. Most
religious people have put the cart before the horse by imagining that we can
earn God's love by some kind of moral behavior. Whereas, according to the
saints and mystics, God's love must be experienced first--and then our moral
behavior is merely an outflowing from our contact with that infinite source
toward all other people and things. Love is the powerful horse; morality is
then the beautiful cart that it pulls, not the other way around.
The passion
of Pope Francis is to again make merciful love the foundation, the center, and
the goal of Christianity. Love is not just the basis on which we build
everything, but it's also the energy with which we proceed, and it's then the
final goal toward which we tend. Love has two lovely daughters, twins called
grace and mercy. Like identical twins, they are often indistinguishable: Grace
is the inner freedom to be merciful. Mercy is grace in action. And both are the
children of love.
To operate
inside of this always new and open-ended field, is to live in a truly new
era--where evil has no chance to fester, grow, or triumph--because if your only
goal is to love, there is no such thing as failure. Really! Even, and most
especially, failures are another occasion and opportunity to learn and practice
love, even toward yourself. You deserve mercy too.
References:
[1] Pope
Francis, Homily, Holy Mass in the Parish of St. Anna in the Vatican, March 17,
2013.
[2] Pope
Francis, Homily, Papal Mass for the Possession of the Chair of the Bishop of
Rome, April 7, 2013.
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, The Cosmic Christ (Center for Action and Contemplation: 2009; CD,
MP3 download);
Franciscan
Mysticism: I AM That Which I Am Seeking (Center for Action and Contemplation:
2012), disc 4, (CD, MP3 download);
and
"Francis Factor," an unpublished talk at Trinity Wall Street,
December 6, 2015.
Grace Is Key
The
following three paragraphs came to me very clearly in a very short time while I
was walking along the Pacific Ocean during my Lenten hermitage in 2012. I think
they sum up why, for me, grace is the key to accepting all deaths--and
experiencing all resurrections.
1. The goodness of God fills all the
gaps of the universe, without discrimination or preference. God is the gratuity
of absolutely everything. The space in between everything is not space at all
but Spirit. God is the "Goodness Glue" that holds the dark and light
of things together, the free energy that carries all death across the Great
Divide and transmutes it into Life. When we say that Christ "paid the debt
once and for all," it simply means that God's job is to make up for all
deficiencies in the universe. What else would God do? Basically, grace is God's
first name, and probably last too. Grace is what God does to keep all things
God has made in love and alive--forever. Grace is God's official job
description. Grace is not something God gives; grace is who God is. If we are
to believe the primary witnesses, an unexplainable goodness is at work in the
universe. (Some of us call this phenomenon God, but the word is not necessary.
In fact, sometimes it gets in the way of the experience, because too many have
named God something other than grace.)
2. Death is not just our one physical
dying, but it is going to the full depth, hitting the bottom, going the
distance, beyond where I am in control, and always beyond where I am now. No
wonder it is scary. Such death is called "the descent into hell" in
the early Apostles' Creed, while in other sources, "the pit,"
"the dark night," "Sheol," or "Hades." We all die
eventually; we have no choice in the matter. But there are degrees of death
before the final physical one. If we are honest, we acknowledge that we are
dying throughout our life, and this is what we learn if we are attentive: grace
is found at the depths and in the death of everything. After these smaller
deaths, we know that the only "deadly sin" is to swim on the surface
of things, where we never see, find, or desire God or love. This includes even
the surface of religion, which might be the worst danger of all. Thus, we must
not be afraid of falling, failing, going "down."
3. When you go to the full depths and
death, sometimes even the depths of your sin, you can always come out the other
side--and the word for that is resurrection. Something or someone builds a
bridge for you, recognizable only from the far side, that carries you
willingly, or even partly willingly, across. All that we hear from reputable
and reliable sources (mystics, shamans, near-death visitors, and
"nearing-death experiences") indicates no one is more surprised and
delighted than the traveler himself or herself. Something or someone seems to
fill the tragic gap between death and life, but only at the point of no return.
None of us crosses over by our own effort or merits, purity, or perfection. We
are all carried across by an uncreated and unearned grace--from pope, to
president, to princess, to peasant. Worthiness is never the ticket, only deep
desire, and the ticket is given in the desiring. The tomb is always finally
empty. There are no exceptions to death, and there are no exceptions to grace.
And I believe, with good evidence, that there are no exceptions to
resurrection.
Reference:
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self (Jossey-Bass:
2013), xx-xxii.
Implanted Desire
The idea of
grace first develops in the Hebrew Scriptures through the concept of election,
or chosenness, and is finally called "covenant love" because it
becomes a mutual giving and receiving. This love is always initiated from
Yahweh's side toward the people of Israel, and they gradually--very gradually--learn
to trust it and respond in kind, just like each of us. The Bible shows a
relentless movement toward the actual possibility of intimacy and divine union
between Creator and creatures. For this to happen, there needs to be some
degree of compatibility, likeness, or even "sameness" between the two
parties. In other words, there has to be a little bit of God in us that wants
to find itself. (Yes, read that again!)
We see the
message of implanted grace most clearly in Jesus. He is able to fully recognize
that he is one with God. Jesus seems to know that it is the God part of him who
does the deep knowing, loving, and serving. He seems able to fully trust his
deepest identity and never doubts it, which is probably the unique character of
his divine sonship. We doubt, deny, and reject our sonship and daughterhood
much of the time. Humans find it hard to believe in things we did not choose or
create ourselves. Such unaccountable gratuity is precisely the meaning of grace
and also why we are afraid to trust it. "I am not the source," the
ego says, "so it cannot be happening." Yes, it is God in you that
always seeks and knows God; like always knows like. We are made for one another
from the beginning (Ephesians 1:4-6). Maybe the ultimate grace is to fully know
that it is entirely grace to begin with! It is already a grace to recognize
that it is grace.
In
Deuteronomy, God says to Israel, "If Yahweh set his heart on you and chose
you, it was not because you were greater than other peoples. In fact, you were the
least of all the peoples. It was for love of you and to keep the covenant that
he swore to your fathers and mothers that Yahweh has brought you out with his
mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery" (7:7-8).
This passage
and the continuation of this same pattern throughout Scripture emerges as the
supreme theme of grace, which is concretely taught by Paul. In fact, I would
call it the theme of themes. God does not choose to love the Israelites,
anybody else, or us today because we are good. God loves us from a completely
free, deliberate, and arbitrary choice. This recognition is the engine that
drives the entire divine drama. Without it, we have nothing but sterile
requirements and rituals. From the very beginning, receiving God's love has
never been a "worthiness contest." This is very hard for almost
everyone to accept. It is finally a surrendering and never a full
understanding. The proud will seldom submit "until they are brought down
from their thrones," as Mary put it (Luke 1:52). It just does not compute
inside our binary, judging, competing, and comparing brains.
God does not
love you because you are good; God loves you because God is good. And then you
can be good because you draw upon such an Infinite Source. The older I get, the
more I am sure that God does all the giving and we do all of the receiving. God
is always and forever the initiator in my life, and I am, on occasion, the
half-hearted respondent. That's just true! My mustard seed of a response seems
to be more than enough for a humble God, even though the mustard seed is
"the tiniest of all the seeds" (Matthew 13:32).
Yes, God is
both very humble and very patient, if everything we see about the universe is
true. God makes use of everything that we offer and seems most grateful for the
smallest bit of connection or response from our side. Otherwise it would not be
a covenant (mostly unilateral), but a mere coercion. God "does not want
slaves but friends" (John 15:15). And it only gets better: God even creates
the desire within us to do the desiring for love and for God. So all we need to
do is to keep praying for the desire to desire, especially on those many days
when the well feels dry, ordinary, or boring.
Reference:
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media:
2007), 163-164.
A Credo of Adjectives
Yahweh,
Yahweh, a God of tenderness and compassion, slow to anger, rich in kindness,
and abounding in faithfulness. For the thousandth generation, Yahweh maintains
his kindness, forgiving all our faults, transgressions, and sins. --Exodus
34:6-7
In this
marvelous early affirmation, we have, in the words of Walter Brueggemann,
"a formulation so studied that it may be reckoned to be something of a
classic, normative statement to which Israel regularly returned, meriting the
label 'credo.'" [1] In it are found five generous and glorious adjectives
that describe the heart and soul of Israel's belief. Somehow, against all odds
and neighbors, they were able to experience a God who was merciful (in Hebrew,
rhm), compassionate/gracious (hnn), steadfast in love (hsd), tenaciously
faithful ('emeth) and forgiving (ns'). This is the dynamic center of their
entire belief system, as it should be ours, and like all spiritual mystery,
seems to be endlessly generative and fruitful, culminating in the
full-blown--and literally unthinkable--concept of grace.
In Ezekiel,
chapters 36-37, Yahweh really chews Israel out, telling the people, in effect,
through the prophet, "You haven't done anything right, you've missed the
whole point." Yahweh disqualifies the children of Israel as a worthy
people, almost as if to tell them to throw the whole thing out and start over.
Then, seemingly out of nowhere (but really coming from divine mercy, which is
always present), Yahweh promises to rebuild the project from the bottom up, and
says, "I am not doing this for your sake, house of Israel, but for the
sake of my holy name" (Ezekiel 36:22). God is God's own reference point.
God is being true to Godself in loving. God's faithfulness has never been
dependent on our worthiness or readiness. This is restorative justice, the
divine form of justice.
The word
that is translated as "steadfast love" is often rendered
"covenant love" or "faithful love." Today we often call it
unconditional love. It's "one-sided love," if you will, because
Israel never keeps its side of the covenant, just as we never keep our side of
the relationship to this day. Yahweh has learned to do it all from God's side
since we are basically unreliable as lovers. That is the constant message of
much of the Hebrew Scriptures from Moses to Job. Yet, as Paul says, "Is it
possible that Yahweh has rejected his people? Of course not!" (Romans
11:1). Israel is a stand-in for everything.
References:
[1] Walter
Brueggemann, Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy
(Fortress: 1997), 216.
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media:
2007), 168-170.
Trust the River
Grace and
mercy teach us that we are all much larger than the good or bad stories we tell
about ourselves or about one another. Please don't get caught in your small
stories; they are usually less than half true, and therefore not really
"true" at all. They're usually based on hurts and unconscious agendas
that allow us to see and judge things in a very selective way. They're not the
whole You, not the Great You, not the Great River. Therefore it is not where
your big life can really happen. No wonder the Spirit is described as
"flowing water" and as "a spring inside you" (John 4:10-14)
or, at the end of the Bible, as a "river of life" (Revelation 22:1-2).
Strangely, your real life is not about "you." It is a part of a much
larger stream called God.
I believe
that faith might be precisely that ability to trust the Big River of God's
providential love, which is to trust the visible embodiment (the Son), the flow
(the Holy Spirit), and the source itself (the Father). This is a divine process
that we don't have to change, coerce, or improve. We just need to allow it and
enjoy it. That takes immense confidence, especially when we're hurting.
Usually, I can feel myself get panicky. Then I want to quickly make things
right. I lose my ability to be present and I go up into my head and start
obsessing. Soon I tend to be overly focused in my head to such a point that I
don't really feel or experience things in my heart and body. I'm oriented
toward goals and making things happen, trying to push or even create my own
river. Yet the Big River is already flowing through me and I am only one small
part of it.
Faith does
not need to push the river precisely because it is able to trust that there is
a river. The river is flowing; we are already in it. This is probably the
deepest meaning of "divine providence." So do not be afraid. We have
been proactively given the Spirit by a very proactive God. Jesus understands this
gift as a foregone conclusion: "If you, who are evil, know how to give
your children what is good, how much more will the heavenly Father give you the
Holy Spirit?" (Luke 11:13).
Simone Weil
said, "It is grace that forms a void inside of us and it is also grace
that fills that void." Grace leads us to the state of emptiness, to that
momentary sense of meaninglessness in which we ask, "What is it all for?
What does it all mean?" Without grace we will not enter into such a
necessary void, and without grace the void will not be filled. All we can do is
try to keep our hands cupped and open. And it is even grace to do that. But we
must want grace and know we need it.
Ask yourself
regularly, "What am I afraid of? Does it matter? Will it matter at the end
or in the great scheme of things? Is it worth holding on to?" Grace will
lead you into such fears and emptiness, and grace alone can fill them up, if we
are willing to stay in the void. It is a kind of "negative
capability" that God seems to make constant use of. We mustn't engineer an
answer too quickly. We mustn't get settled too fast. We all want to manufacture
an answer to take away our anxiety and settle the dust. To stay in God's hands,
to trust, means that we usually have to let go of our attachments to
feelings--which are going to pass away anyway (which is the irony of it all).
People of deep faith develop a high tolerance for ambiguity, and come to
recognize that it is only the small self that needs certitude or perfect order
all the time. The Godself is perfectly at home in the River of Mystery.
Reference:
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, Everything Belongs: The Gift of Contemplative Prayer (The
Crossroad Publishing Company: 2003), 46, 53, 142-144.
Everything Is Grace
Mercy is not
a virtue that you choose to put on one day. Mercy has to be your deepest way of
seeing, a generosity of spirit that draws from your identity, your deepest
dignity, which is love. It is basically a worldview of abundance, wherein I do
not have to withhold, protect, or hoard myself.
I liken this
deepest dignity, this True Self who we are at our core, to a diamond buried
deep within us and constantly forming under the intense pressure of our lives.
We must search for and uncover this diamond, freeing it from the surrounding debris
of guilt and shame. In a sense, our True Self must, like Jesus, be resurrected.
That process is not resuscitation of something old and tired, but a wonderful
discovery of something always new--and already perfectly formed.
For the True
Self, there is nothing to hate, reject, deny, or judge as unworthy or
unnecessary. It has "been forgiven much and so [it] loves much" (Luke
7:47). Once you live inside the Big Body of love, compassion and mercy come
easily. The detours of the false self were all just delays, bumps in the road,
pressure points that created something new in the long run, as pressure does to
carbon deep beneath the earth. God uses everything to construct this hard and
immortal diamond, our core of love. Diamonds are said to be the hardest
substance on this earth. It is this strong diamond of love that will always be
stronger than death (Song of Songs 8:6).
All,
absolutely everything, is now made use of in this great economy of grace.
"Grace is everywhere," Georges Bernanos said both at the end of his
great novel and at the very end of his life. [1] Likewise, nearing her death,
Thérèse of Lisieux said, "Everything is a grace!" [2] Living from
your core of love, you can now enjoy unearned love in yourself and allow it in
everyone else too. This patient mining process will make you compassionate and
forgiving with the unfinished diamonds of others who are on the same journey as
you are. This True Self cannot find or know God without bringing everybody else
along for the same ride. It is one great big finding and one great big being
found, all at the same time. Surely this is the meaning of the Day of Yahweh,
Dame Julian's "Great Deed," and God's Final Judgement.
You do not
find the Great Love except by finding your True Self along with it, and you
cannot find your True Self without falling into the Great Love. As you fall,
you will discover that the meaning of the universe, at its deepest and final
level, is only "mercy within mercy within mercy." [3]
References:
[1] Georges
Bernanos, The Diary of a Country Priest (Carroll & Graf: 2002), 298.
[2] John
Clarke, trans., Story of a Soul: The Autobiography of Saint Therese of Lisieux
(ICS Publications: 1996), 266.
[3] Thomas
Merton, The Sign of Jonas (Harcourt: 1953), 362.
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, "Today Is a Time for Mercy," December 10, 2015,
https://cac.org/richard-rohr-on-mercy-mp3; and Immortal Diamond: The Search for
Our True Self (Jossey-Bass: 2013), 184-185.
HOW THE SOUL MATURES
From an article posted by Fr Ron Rolheiser. The original posting can be found here
In a deeply insightful book, The Grace of Dying, Kathleen Dowling Singh shares insights she has gleaned as a health professional from being present to hundreds of people while they are dying. Among other things, she suggests that the dying process itself, in her words, “is exquisitely calibrated to automatically produce union with Spirit.” In essence, what she is saying is that what is experienced by someone in the final stages and moments of dying, particularly if the death is not a sudden one, is a purgation that naturally lessens the person’s grip on the things of this world as well as on his or her own ego so as to be ready to enter into a new realm of life and meaning beyond our present realm of consciousness. The dying process itself, she submits, midwifes us into a wider, deeper life.
But that does not come without a weighty price tag. The dying process is not a pleasant one. Most of us do not die peacefully in our sleep, comfortable, dignified, and serene. The norm rather is the kind of death that comes about by aging or by terminal disease. What happens then is not comfortable, dignified, or serene. Rather there is a painful, sometimes excruciating, almost always humiliating, breakdown of the body. In that process we lose basically everything that is dear to us: our health, our natural bodily beauty, our dignity, and sometimes even our mind. Dying is rarely beautiful, save in another aesthetic.
And so how is the process of dying calibrated to help ease our grip on this world and more gracefully move on to the next world? Dying matures the soul. How so?
Writing about aging, James Hillman poses this question: Why have God and nature so constructed things that as we age and mature and are finally more in control of our lives, our bodies begin to fall apart and we need a bevy of doctors and medicines to keep functioning. Is there some wisdom in the very DNA of the life-process that mandates the breakdown of physical health in late life? Hillman says, yes. There’s an innate wisdom in the process of aging and dying: The best wines have to be aged in cracked old barrels. The breakdown of our bodies deepens, softens, and matures the soul.
Jesus teaches us this lesson, and it is a truth he himself had to accept, with considerable reluctance, in his own life. Facing his own death the night before he died, prostrate on the ground in Gethsemane, he begs his Father: “Let this cup pass from me! Yet, not my will, but yours, be done.” In essence, he is asking God whether there is a road to glory and vision of Easter Sunday without passing through the pain and humiliation of Good Friday. It seems there isn’t. Humiliation and depth are inextricably linked. After his resurrection, talking with his disciples on the road to Emmaus, he says to them: “Wasn’t it necessary that the Christ should so suffer?” This is more a revelation of truth than a question. The answer is already clear: The road to depth necessarily passes through pain and humiliation. Kathleen Dowling Singh and James Hillman simply format this positively: Pain and humiliation are naturally calibrated to move us beyond what is more superficial to what is deeper. Pain and humiliation, and there is invariably a certain dying in these, help open us up to deeper consciousness.
And we know this already from common sense. If we honestly assess our own experience we have to admit that most of the things that have made us deep are things we would be ashamed to talk about because they were humiliating. Humiliation is what humbles and deepens us. Our successes, on the contrary, which we do like to talk about, generally produce inflations in our lives.
The famed psychologist/philosopher, William James, submits that there are realms of reality and consciousness that lie beyond what we presently experience. All religion, not least Christianity, tells us the same thing. But our normal consciousness and self-awareness literally set up boundaries that prevent us from going there. Normally, for us, there’s this world, this reality, and that’s all! The dying process helps break open that contraction in our perception, awareness, and consciousness. It is calibrated to open us up to a reality and a consciousness beyond what we presently deem as real.
But there are other paths to this too, outside the process of dying. Prayer and meditation are meant to do for us exactly what the dying process does. They too are exquisitely calibrated to loosen our grip on this world and open our awareness to another. As Singh puts it: “The path to the transpersonal realms, which the saints and sages of every age have known through the practice of meditation and prayer, appears to be the same transformative path that each of us traverses in the process of dying.”
That’s consoling: God is going to get us, one way or the other.
3 KEYS TO PLANNING AN EFFECTIVE MESSAGE SERIES
Taken from the blog by Fr Michael White, Pastor of the Church of the Nativity, Baltimore, USA. The original blog can be found here
This past week, our team of staff who plan our message series’ (what we call the “Message Oval”) set aside a day to draw up a rough sketch of the topics and themes of what I will be preaching about in the upcoming year. Yes, I did say year. We make it a point to plan way out to give us plenty of preparation and research for putting together the best possible message to reach and teach our congregation and community. One common question we get is: What types of things do you look for when putting together a good message series? Here are three key considerations that drive our message planning process.
Know Your Target Audience
We always preach to “Timonium Tim.” Tim is the quintessential unchurched person in our community, the guy (along with his family) who we want to share the good news with. This week, we took a good portion of our morning just reviewing the demographics of Timonium. Based on this demographic, we can form a pretty good profile of Tim and preach to where he is.
Where do we start when designing a message for Tim? We look at how Tim and his family spend their time, money, and attention and brainstorm what message topics will be relevant and challenging for their life.
Map Out the Year
One of the reasons we plan so far ahead is so that the whole year flows and fits from a liturgical and parish planning standpoint. We look over the entire Liturgical Year and map out dates we already know are there (Easter, Christmas, Holy Days), as well as parish programs/kickoffs and planned events (things like the Archbishop’s Annual Appeal, Stewardship Weekend, etc.). This isn’t nearly as difficult as it sounds, it just takes time. Not only are we not taken off guard by these dates, we use them to our advantage by crafting our message series around them not in spite of them. The themes and topics we’ve picked out usually find complimentary times of the year to address. Lenten series usually stress themes like repentance and spiritual discipline, or Advent as a time of grace, God’s gifts, etc.
We don’t write all the messages in one fell swoop. We write them throughout the course of the year, but it helps to have a good idea of where your message is going before you actually put pen to paper.
Look to the Lectionary
A message series has to fit the Sunday readings. Sounds obvious, but it takes some intentionality when it comes to an effective series. Rather than working against the Lectionary readings of the Liturgical Year, we think message series’ actually preach along the narrative arc of the gospels. This makes sense, because the Gospel is a continuous story or journey, not isolated events. A good series not only has a consistent message, or “bottom line” as we call it, but it also tells a good story.
‘Woman, who are you looking for?’
In this article from the ThinkingFaith.org website Brian Purfield invites us to participate in that transformation by contemplating the experience of one of these women, the first person to whom the risen Christ chose to appear – Mary Magdalene. You can find the original article here
Women play a part in every stage of Jesus’s ministry in the gospels[i] and particularly as his death approaches. Martha and Mary feature prominently in the story of the raising of Lazarus; a woman anoints Jesus with precious oil; Jesus speaks to the women of Jerusalem as he makes his way to the cross; and at his death, Mary his mother is joined by women whom Jesus met later in his ministry. Yet throughout Christian history, the contributions of these women have often been downplayed, ignored or mislabelled. For instance, Mary Magdalene has often been identified as a prostitute, though there is no evidence of this in the New Testament.
In Mark, the male disciples do not understand Jesus’s talk of himself as a suffering messiah. They reject this idea and finally abandon him. The women who followed him from Galilee to Jerusalem suddenly emerge as the true disciples in the Passion narrative. They understand that his ministry was not one of rule and kingly glory but of diakonia, ‘service’ (Mk 15:41). The women emerge as the true Christian ministers and witnesses. While Peter and the other male disciples say they will stick by Jesus and never deny him (Mk 14:31), the women are depicted as more faithful to Jesus as his death approaches. It is the difference between saying and doing. So it may not be surprising that Jesus appears first to the women.[ii]
The women are also the first to believe. Early in his pontificate, Pope Francis said, ‘The Apostles and disciples find it harder to believe in the Risen Christ. Not the women, however!’[iii] Pope Francis grasped this, but it may have been an uncomfortable truth in the largely patriarchal culture of the early Church.
John’s Gospel (20:1-18) tells us that early in the morning on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene goes to the tomb alone and sees that the stone has been removed. She runs to find Peter and the beloved disciple. Confused, alarmed, Mary tells Peter that the body is gone. Peter and the beloved disciple run to the tomb. The beloved disciple arrives first, peers in, but does not enter. Peter arrives, enters the tomb and sees the burial cloths. Then the beloved disciple enters, ‘saw and believed.’
But what does he believe at this point in the story? Is it Mary Magdalene’s report? Is it just the fact that the tomb was empty? Do the disciples believe that Jesus has come back to life, that he has risen? The evangelist adds rather mysteriously that they do not understand as yet the scripture that prophesied he must rise from the dead. This may be why he adds that they just went home.
Where is Mary? She ‘stood weeping outside the tomb.’ Some suggest this is a sign of her unwillingness to believe as the beloved disciple had believed, but it may also be a sign of her great love for Jesus. John mentions twice that Mary was weeping. Perhaps it is intended to be a reminder of Jesus weeping at Lazarus’s tomb (Jn 11:35-36), as if John wants to say, ‘See how much she loved him.’
As Mary weeps, she bends to look into the tomb and sees two figures in white. Notice that the angels did not appear to Peter or the beloved disciple, but to a woman. They ask her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She replies, ‘They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.’
Mary turns and, from the darkness of the tomb looks into the light of dawn. She sees Jesus, but does not recognise him. Jesus asks her the same question as the angel: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ Jesus adds another, ‘For whom are you looking?’ – echoing the question he asked Andrew and the other disciple at the beginning of John’s Gospel (1:38). The Risen Jesus understands Mary’s grief and gently seeks to help her. Then a curious line: ‘Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.”’
How did Mary not recognise the man she had followed for so long? Was she so blinded by grief that she couldn’t think clearly? Were her eyes full of tears (her weeping has now been mentioned three times)? Or does the position of her body offer a simpler explanation? Mary has stooped inside the tomb and, at the sound of Jesus’s voice, peers out. Perhaps she is staring into the bright light of dawn, and Jesus’s body is silhouetted against the light, making him hard to recognise. Or is there a more theological explanation? The glorified body did not have the same appearance as his earthly body. We do not know why, but Mary thinks he is the gardener.
Whatever the reason for Mary’s inability to recognise Jesus, what follows is one of the most tender passages in the whole gospel: ‘Jesus said to her, “Mariam.” She turned and said to him in Hebrew “Rabbouni!”’[iv] Imagine how she must have felt, hearing that familiar voice speak her name. The experience would have been unforgettable. She would surely have repeated those same words whenever she told the story, at first to the disciples, perhaps to the evangelist, and to anyone who would listen, probably until the day she died.
Only when Jesus speaks her name does Mary know him. At first she couldn’t recognise him, but Mary knew that distinctive voice: the voice that called her to wholeness when it expelled whatever demons troubled her; the voice that welcomed her into his circle of friends; the voice that told her she was valued in God’s eyes; the voice that answered her or laughed over a meal; the voice that cried out in pain from the cross. Mary knew that voice because it was a voice that had spoken to her in love. Then she knew who it was. Sometimes seeing is not believing; loving is.[v]
Often we learn to recognise the voice of God in our lives only gradually. St Ignatius Loyola said that the voice of God can be recognised because it is uplifting, consoling, encouraging. In time, we learn to listen for that voice in our hearts; it becomes easier to identify, and when we hear it clearly, it is easier to answer. God’s voice calls us to be who we are meant to be. It called Peter from his nets at the Sea of Galilee, Matthew from his tax collector’s booth, Bartimaeus from the roadside, Zacchaeus from the sycamore tree – and Mary Magdalene from whatever had kept her unfree. The good shepherd calls his sheep by name and they know his voice (Jn 10:11-16).
As Mary reaches to embrace Jesus, he says, ‘Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”’ That must have puzzled Mary further. Jesus was referring to his Ascension, which would take place in full view of the disciples. As he appears to Mary, Jesus is not in a state where he can be touched – but this changes when he appears to the disciples later. Then Jesus will show that he is corporeal by eating fish before their eyes and inviting them to, ‘Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.’ (Lk 24:39) Jesus will invite Thomas to put his finger in the nail marks on his hands, feet and side. But not now.
‘Do not hold on to me’, may have another meaning. Mary loves him so much and wants only to embrace him, but Jesus reminds her that the more urgent task is to spread the Good News. As much as we want to cling, in a sense, to profound spiritual experiences, often they are given to us that we might share them. Jesus gives Mary a mission. She runs to the disciples to carry it out and proclaims, ‘I have seen the Lord.’ She recounts all she has seen. She is the ‘Apostle to the Apostles.’ She is the one sent to announce the Good News to those who are sent to announce it.
Mary Magdalene reminds us that the most powerful tool for spreading the Good News is not knowledge, but experience. There is room for both. Scholarship and learning have provided valuable riches for the faith. But the true disciple does not simply say, ‘I have studied Jesus,’ but like Mary Magdalene, ‘I have seen the Lord.’
Brian Purfield is a member of the Mount Street Jesuit Centre team and teaches short courses in theology.
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