Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
Mob: 0417 279 437; mike.delaney@aohtas.org.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.
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Weekday Masses 19th - 22nd April, 2016
Tuesday: 9:30am - Penguin
Wednesday: 9.30am - Latrobe
Thursday: 10:30am - Karingal
Friday: 9:30am - Ulverstone
Mass Times Next Weekend 23rd & 24th April, 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:
Every
Friday 10am - 12noon, concluding with Stations of the Cross and Angelus
Devonport: Benediction with Adoration - first Friday of
each month.
Legion of Mary: Sacred Heart Church Community Room,
Ulverstone, Wednesdays, 11am
Christian Meditation:
Devonport, Emmaus House - Wednesdays 7pm.
Prayer Group:
Charismatic Renewal
Devonport, Emmaus House - Thursdays 7.30pm
Ministry Rosters 23rd & 24th April, 2016
Devonport:
Readers: Vigil: A McIntyre, M Williams, C Kiely-Hoye 10:30am J Phillips, K Pearce, P Piccolo
Ministers of Communion: Vigil M
Heazlewood,
B & J Suckling, G Lee-Archer, M Kelly, P Shelverton
M
Barrientos, M O’Brien-Evans
Cleaners 22nd April: G & R O’Rourke, M & R Youd
29th April: Knights of the Southern Cross
Piety Shop 23rd April: L Murfet 24th April: D French Flowers: M Knight, B Naiker
Ulverstone:
Reader: S Lawrence Ministers of Communion: E Reilly, M & K McKenzie, M O’Halloran
Cleaners: V
Ferguson, E Cox Flowers: E Beard Hospitality: S & T Johnstone
Penguin:
Greeters: G & N Pearce Commentator: Y Downes Readers: J Barker, A Landers
Procession: T Clayton Ministers of Communion: M Hiscutt,
E Nickols
Liturgy: Penguin Setting Up: E Nickols Care of Church: G Hills-Eade, T Clayton
Latrobe:
Reader: M Chan Ministers of Communion: M Kavic, M Eden Procession: Parishioners Music: Hermie
Port Sorell:
Readers: V Duff, G Duff Ministers of Communion: D Leaman, L Post Clean/Flowers/Prepare/ B
Lee, A Holloway
Readings this Week: Fourth Sunday of Easter
First Reading: Acts: 13:14, 43-52
Second Reading: Apocalypse 7:9, 14-17
Gospel: John 10:27-30
PREGO REFLECTION ON TODAY'S GOSPEL:
Jesus as Good Shepherd, and the community of followers as
his sheep, is a well-loved image that has stood the test of time. It speaks of
security, protection and care. I may like to bring to mind times when I felt
that Jesus the Shepherd was protecting me. How did it make me feel? Perhaps
there have been times when I felt outside the safety of the sheepfold. What was
it like? The sheep know the Shepherd’s voice. I can never be lost or stolen. In
what ways does the familiar, reassuring voice of the Shepherd give me a sense
of belonging? I ponder. Jesus says “The Father and I are one”. I may want to
spend time reflecting on the way Jesus describes his relationship with his
Father. What does his invitation to share in the very life of God mean for me?
How do I think and feel about it? I spend some minutes with Christ my shepherd,
pondering his call for me to follow him and to participate in the shepherding
of his worldwide flock. I pray for whatever grace I need to respond to his
call.
Readings this Week: Fifth Sunday of Easter
First Reading: Acts: 14:21-27
Second Reading: Apocalypse 21:1-5
Gospel: John 13:31-35
Archbishop Adrian
Doyle, Connie Fulton, Thomas McGeown, Lorna Jones, Geraldine
Roden, Joy Carter &...
Let us pray for those who have died recently: Kathleen Smith, John Roach, Jack
Becker, Elizabeth Muffet, Graham Nicholson, June Bennett and Bernard Gillon.
Let us pray for those whose anniversary occurs about this time: 13th – 19th April
Jonathan Martinez, James Flight,
Gillian Ibell, Daphne Walker, Mondo Di Pietro,
Valma Lowry, Sandy Cowling, Geraldine Harris,
Kate Morris, Ray Breen,
Terrence McCarthy, Dawn Ashman, Molly Dunphy, Harold Cornelius,
William Newland & Stephen Gibbons.
May they Rest in Peace
WEEKLY
RAMBLINGS:
This past week has been interesting with some new
experiences for me – including sitting in a Centrelink Office for some time
watching as people went about their business and waited for things to happen. A
little different from waiting on a phone for someone to answer our call but
time spent waiting. I suppose for many it can either be a waste of time and frustrating
or a time to sit and be at peace – thankfully for me it was a time to simply be
at peace. A little different from the rest of the week.
Last Saturday we had the 1st of our Sacramental Preparation
days (and the families were great coming as they did on the 1st day of the Term
holidays – oops!). Please continue to keep the candidates and their families in
your prayers during these next few months as they continue on their journey of
faith.
During the week we also got news of the death of John Roach,
a former Priest of the Archdiocese, and a friend to many throughout the State –
John died in Massachusetts on Sunday 10th and his funeral was celebrated on
Thursday in the USA. John worked in Devonport as part of his Pastoral Placement
in the early 1990’s and was ordained to the Diaconate at Our Lady of Lourdes. John also worked with me in Glenorchy for a
time and was a great mate and good friend – may he Rest in Peace.
Several parishioners have been struggling with their health
in recent times – some have their names included in the Prayers for the Sick,
others have asked that their names not be mentioned. Just a reminder that at
the end of the list in the Bulletin there are three dots (…) they are the many
people for whom we’ve been asked to pray and who are not mentioned.
Last weekend we asked you to keep Sunday 15th May free so
that our Whole of Parish Celebration of Pentecost at the 10.30am Mass at Our
Lady of Lourdes might really reflect a Whole of Parish Response. We also asked
if there might be someone/anyone who might assist in planning for the ‘bring
and share’ meal that will follow the Mass – still hoping for some responses!!!
Also there is the Mother’s Day Raffle and the Open House
(as well as my weight loss program) as Fundraisers for WYD – your support is
greatly appreciated.
On Feast of Corpus Christi, 29th May there will
be a procession of the Blessed Sacrament from St Joseph’s Church to the
Cathedral. As we are unable to be there physically the Archbishop has invited
us to place our prayer requests in a book/s which will be on the altar at the
Cathedral at the end of the procession. The books are currently in Devonport
and Ulverstone for two weeks before moving to other Centres in the following
weeks. Please add your prayers into the book and we will ensure they get to
Hobart for the day.
Until next
week take care in your homes and on the roads
Mersey Leven Parish Community welcome
and congratulate ….
Saxon Williamson on his baptism this
weekend.
LEGION OF
MARY:
All
Parishioners are invited to the Legion of Mary annual Acias (Consecration to
Our Lady) at Sacred Heart Church, Alexandra Road Ulverstone this Sunday 17th April at 2pm with benediction, followed by
afternoon tea in the Community Room.
MACKILLOP HILL, FORTH:
SPIRITUALITY IN THE COFFEE SHOPPE:
THIS Monday 18th April (Please note change of date to the 3rd
Monday of this month) 10.30am – 12 noon.
Come along … share your issues and enjoy a lively discussion over a cuppa!
WORLD YOUTH
DAY FUNDRAISING:
There are 4 young
people from the Parish who will attending World Youth Day in Krakow, Poland in
July this year. All girls, they are Maddison Williams, Gabriella Gretton
(students at St Brendan Shaw College), Joanna Benjamin (a student at TAFE) and
Josie Emery (a teacher at SBSC).
As well as Fr Mike’s
Weight Loss Fun(d)raising efforts there is a Mother’s Day Raffle and tickets
will be available from this weekend in all Mass Centres at $1.00 per ticket
with two prizes – A Home Décor Prize and a Pamper Prize – details of the makeup
of both prizes will be available next week. There is also some wood that will
also be raffled and details of that raffle will be made known shortly with
tickets to be sold mid-May (post Mother’s Day).
It has also been
suggested that Fr Mike’s next Open House be part of the Fundraising Effort. The
gathering to be held in the Ulverstone Community Room on Friday, 6th May,
will be donation entry with some (pay as you go) games and raffle tickets sold
on the night with some good prizes. As usual food and drink are all supplied
but we need people to come along and join in the fun and support our World
Youth Day Pilgrims.
FEAST DAY – ST JOSEPH MASS CENTRE PORT SORELL:
All parishioners are welcome to attend Mass at Port Sorell
on Sunday 1st May at 8:30am to celebrate the Feast of St Joseph.
Join us after Mass for morning tea!
HEALING MASS:
Catholic Charismatic Renewal are
sponsoring a Healing Mass with Fr Alexander Obiorah at St Mary’s Catholic
Church Penguin on Thursday 5th May commencing at 7:30pm. All
denominations are welcome to come and celebrate the liturgy in a vibrant and
dynamic way using the gifts of tongues, prophecy, healing and anointing with
blessed oil. After Mass teams will be available for individual prayer. Please
bring a friend and a plate for supper and fellowship in the adjacent hall. If
you wish to know more or require transport please contact Celestine Whiteley
6424:2043, Michael Gaffney 0-447 018 068, Zoe Smith 6426:3073 or Tom Knaap
6425:2442
FOOTY POINTS MARGIN TICKETS:
Round
3 – Port Adelaide by 61 point - Winners; Sam Derrico, Helen Jaffray, Kath Riseley
Thursday Nights - OLOL Hall,
Devonport. Eyes down 7.30pm!
Callers for Thursday 21st
April – Rod Clark & Alan Luxton
NEWS FROM ACROSS THE ARCHDIOCESE:
GOOD
SHEPHERD SUNDAY – 17TH April 2016
LOVE – A PROJECTION AND A REALITY
An article by Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. The original article can be found here
The famed Jungian writer, Robert Johnson, makes this observation about falling in love: “To fall in love is to project the most noble and infinitely valuable part of one’s being onto another human being. … We have to say that the divinity we see in others is truly there, but we don’t have a right to see it until we have taken away our own projections. … Making this fine distinction is the most delicate and difficult task in life. “
And indeed it is. Sorting through what is genuine in love and what is projection is indeed one of the more delicate and difficult tasks of life. We can, and do, for instance, sometimes fall in love with persons who are utterly wrong for us and know from experience that once our initial infatuation is over our passion can very quickly turn into indifference or even hatred. For this reason we might ask: Whom or what are we really loving in those magical moments of infatuation when we see so much goodness and divinity inside of another person? Are we really in love with that person or, as Johnson suggests, are we simply projecting some of our own noble qualities onto that other so that, in effect, this is more self-love than real love?
The answer to that, as Johnson highlights, is complex. The goodness and nobility we see in the other person are in fact there, normally at least; however, until a certain projection, an idealization within which we envelope the other, is stripped away we are not yet really loving and valuing that other.
As an example: Imagine a man falling in love with a woman. At that early stage of love, his feelings for her are very strong, obsessive even, and his eyes are open mostly only to her good qualities and blind to her faults. Indeed, at this stage, her faults can even appear attractive rather than problematic. Of course, as bitter experience teaches us, that won’t be the case once the infatuation wears off.
And so we are left with an important question: Are those wonderful qualities that we so naturally see in another person in the early stages of love really there? Yes. Absolutely. They are there; but they may not be what we are actually seeing. As Johnson highlights, and as spiritual writers everywhere attest to, at this stage of love, there is the ever-present possibility that the beautiful qualities we are seeing in someone are more of a projection of our own selves than actual gifts we see inside him or her. Though the other person actually possesses those gifts, what we are really seeing is a projection of ourselves, an idealization with which we have enveloped the other, so that in effect, at this stage, we is not so much in love with the other as we are in love with certain good qualities that are inside of ourselves. That’s why we can fall in love with people of very different temperaments and virtue and, at an early stage of our love, still always have the same feelings.
That’s also why falling love is such an ambiguous thing and needs the discernment offered by time and the counsel of wise friends and family. We can fall in love with many different kinds of people, including some who are very wrong for us. The heart, as Pascal asserts, has its reasons, some of which are not always favorable to our long-range health.
What’s the lesson here? Simply this: In all of our intimate relations we should be aware of our natural propensity to project our own more-noble qualities onto the other person and to be aware too that we do not truly love and appreciate that other person until we have withdrawn that projection so that we are actually seeing the other person’s goodness, not our own. The same holds true as regards hatred of someone else. Just as we tend to idealize others we also tend to demonize them, projecting our own dark side onto them and enrobing them with our own worse qualities. Thus, by Robert Johnson’s logic, we don’t have a right either to hate anyone, until we have withdrawn our own dark projection. We over-demonize just as we over-idealize.
In his classic novel, Stoner, John Williams describes for us how his main character understands love: “In his extreme youth Stoner had thought of love as an absolute state of being to which, if one were lucky, one might find access; in his maturity he had decided it was the heaven of a false religion, toward which one ought to gaze with an amused disbelief, a gently familiar contempt, and an embarrassed nostalgia. Now in his middle age he began to know that it was neither a state of grace nor an illusion; he saw it as a human act of becoming, a condition that was invented and modified moment by moment and day by day, by the will and the intelligence and the heart.”
Scripture
Week 1
Taken from the daily email series from Fr Richard Rohr OFM. You can subscribe to the
A New Experience
"Explanation
separates us from astonishment, which is the only gateway to the
incomprehensible." --Eugene Ionesco [1]
The
British-American author D. H. Lawrence said, "The world fears a new
experience more than it fears anything. Because a new experience displaces so
many old experiences." New ideas are not a problem. The world "can
pigeon-hole any idea," Lawrence said, "but it can't pigeon-hole a
real new experience." [2] A true inner experience changes us, and human
beings do not like to change.
The biblical
revelation is inviting us into a new experience and a new way of seeing.
Evolved human consciousness seems to be more ready to accept the divine
invitation, but have no doubt, the Gospel is a major paradigm shift, and there
will always be "an equal and opposite reaction" and resistance to
such things as simplicity, nonviolence, restorative justice, and inclusivity.
A major
problem is that theologians and the Church have presented the Bible as a
collection of mental ideas about which we can be right or wrong. This traps us
in a dualistic and argumentative mind, which is a pretty pathetic pathway to
Great Truth. Many people don't expect from the Bible anything good or anything
really new, which is how we translate the very word "Gospel"--good
news. So we first of all need mature people who can read texts with wider eyes,
and not just people who want quick and easy answers by which they can affirm
their ideas and self-made identities. The marvelous anthology of books and
letters called the Bible is for the sake of a love-affair between God and the
soul, and not to create an organizational plan for any particular religion. The
Gospel is about our transformation into God (theosis), and not about mere
intellectual assurance or "small-self" coziness. It is more a
revolution in consciousness than a business model for the buying and selling of
God as a product.
Some
scholars, interestingly enough, have said that Jesus came to end religion.
That's not as bad as it might sound. Archaic religion was usually an attempt to
assure people that nothing new or surprising would happen, and that the gods
could be controlled. Most people want their lives and history to be entirely
predictable and controllable, and the best way to do that is to try to
manipulate the gods. Low-level religion basically teaches humans what spiritual
buttons to push to keep our lives and God predictable. This kind of religion
initially appeals to our lowest levels of egocentric motivation (security and group
status) instead of moving us to our highest (generosity and trust). Jesus had a
hard job cut out for him!
For most of
human history, God was not a likable, much less lovable, character. That's why
every "theophany" (an event where God breaks through into the human
realm) in the Bible begins with the same words: "Do not be afraid."
People have too often been afraid of God--and afraid of themselves as a result.
When God appeared on the scene, most people did not see it as good news, but as
bad news with fearful questions arising: Who has to die now? Who needs to be
punished? By and large, before the biblical revelation, most of humanity did
not expect love, much less intimate love, from God. Even today, most humans
feel that any notion of a Divine Lover is quite distant, arbitrary, and surely
impossible to enjoy or expect.
This
fear-based pattern is so ingrained in our hardwiring that in the two thousand
years since the Incarnation of God in Jesus Christ, not much has really
changed--except in a rather small percentage of humanity which is still growing
toward a critical mass (Romans 8:18f). In my experience, most people still fear
or try to control God instead of learning to trust and return the love of a
very loving God. When one party has all the power--which is most people's very
definition of God--all you can do is fear and try to control.
The only way
this can be changed is for God, from God's side, to change the power equation
and invite us into a world of mutuality and vulnerability. Our living image of
that power change is Jesus! In him, God took the initiative to overcome our
fear and our need to manipulate God and made intimate Divine relationship
possible. During the next two weeks I'll explore how we can trace the thread of
God's loving-kindness throughout Scripture--which is simultaneously a history
of humanity's resistance, denial, and rejection of that very loving-kindness,
reaching its climax in the crucifixion of Jesus. This movement both forward and
backward is the story line of the whole Bible.
References:
[1] As
quoted by Rosette C. Lamont, Ionesco: A Collection of Critical Essays
(Prentice-Hall: 1973), 167.
[2] D. H.
Lawrence, Studies in Classic American Literature (Shearsman Books: 2011), 41.
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media:
2008), 7-10;
and New
Great Themes of Scripture (Franciscan Media: 2012), disc 1 (CD).
Three Steps Forward, Two Steps Backward
Life itself
is always three steps forward and two steps backward. We get the point and then
we lose or doubt it. In that, the biblical text mirrors our own human
consciousness and journey. Our job is to see where the three steps forward
texts are heading (invariably toward mercy, simplicity, inclusion, nonviolence,
and trust) and to spot the two steps backward texts (which are usually about
vengeance, exclusion, a rather petty and insecure god, law over grace,
incidentals over substance, and technique over actual relationship).
The Bible is
an anthology of many books. It is a record of people's experience of God's
self-revelation. It is an account of our very human experience of the divine
intrusion into history. The book did not fall from heaven in a pretty package.
It was written by people trying to listen for and to God. I believe that the
Spirit was guiding the listening and writing process. We must also know that
humans always see "through a glass darkly . . . and all knowledge is imperfect" (1 Corinthians
13:12). Prayer and patience surrounding such human words will keep us humble
and searching for the true Living Word, which is exactly how the Spirit always
teaches (1 Corinthians 2:10,13). This is what it means to know something
"contemplatively."
We must
trust that there is a development of the human capacity for divine wisdom and
human response inside the Bible. We must be honest and recognize that things
like polygamy, slavery, genocide, torture, racism, sexism, stoning, and
mutilation of sinners--things that are often fully accepted in the ancient
text--become more intolerable as the text matures. God does not change, so much
as we do. If believers cannot begin to be honest about this, we are going to
lose most future generations to any sincere or faith-filled reading of the
Bible. Far too many have already thrown the Bible out when they really did not
need to. But they had no good teachers to guide them.
Woven
throughout these developing ideas are what I call "the Great Themes of
Scripture." (This was the title of my very first recordings in 1973.) I
try to mine these timeless, essential themes from the text. My approach is
almost so simple, it is hard to teach. It is what I call the "Jesus
hermeneutic." (Hermeneutic is a method of interpretation.) My approach is,
quite simply, to interpret and use the Bible the way that Jesus did.
When we get
to the Risen Jesus, there is nothing to be afraid of in God. Jesus' very breath
is identified with forgiveness and the Divine Shalom (see John 20:20-23). If
the Risen Jesus is the full and trustworthy unveiling of the nature of God,
then we live in a safe and love-filled universe. It is not that God has
changed, or that the Hebrew God is a different God than the God of Jesus; it is
that we are growing up as we move through the texts and deepen our experience.
Stay with the text and with your inner life with God, and your capacity for God
will increase and deepen.
Just as the
Bible takes us through many stages of consciousness and history, it takes us
individually a long time to move beyond our need to be dualistic, judgmental,
accusatory, fearful, blaming, egocentric, and earning--and to see as Jesus
sees. The Bible itself is a "text in travail," according to Rene
Girard's fine insight. It mirrors and charts our own human travail. It will
offer both the mature and the immature responses to almost everything. In time,
you will almost naturally recognize the difference between the text moving
forward toward the mercy, humility, and inclusivity of Jesus and when the text
is regressing into arrogance, exclusion, and legalism. Even a child can see the
difference, but an angry or power-hungry person will not. They will favor the
regressive and violent passage every time.
References:
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media:
2008), 12-13;
and Richard
Rohr and Joseph Martos, The Great Themes of Scripture: Old Testament,
(Franciscan Media: 1988), 1.
Order, Disorder, Reorder
The Bible
reveals the development of human consciousness and human readiness for a Divine
Love Affair. The differences between earlier and later Scriptures clearly show
an evolution of human capacity, comprehension, and depth of experience. Jesus,
for me, represents the mature image of what God is doing in history. In
Israel's growth as a people we see the pattern of what happens to every
individual and to every community that sets out on the journey of faith. Israel
is the "womb of the Incarnation," for it is in their history that the
whole drama is set in motion. Jesus fully grows up inside that womb. And we
must grow up too. Little by little, human consciousness is prepared to see how
God loves and liberates us. But we will face plenty of resistance, revealed in
the constant hostility to Jesus even and most especially from religious people,
ending in the very "killing of God."
There are
many models of human and spiritual development. We could describe three stages
as Simple Consciousness, Complex Consciousness (both "fight and
flight"), and Non-Dual Consciousness ("the unitive way" or
"third way"). More recently, I have been calling the developmental
stages Order > Disorder > Reorder. In short, I see this pattern in the
Bible and in human lives:
1. Order: We
begin with almost entirely tribal thinking, mirroring the individual journey,
which starts with an egocentric need for "order" and
"self." Only gradually do we move toward inclusive love.
2. Disorder:
We slowly recognize the invitation to a "face to face" love affair
through the biblical dialogue of election, failure, sin, and grace, which
matures the soul. This is where we need wisdom teachers to guide us through our
"disorder."
3. Reorder:
Among a symbolic few, there is a breakthrough to unitive consciousness (for
example, figures like Abraham and Sarah, Moses, David, the Psalmists, many of
the prophets, Job, Mary, Mary Magdalene, Jesus, and Paul). This is also what
some call enlightenment or salvation.
Conservatives
normally get trapped in the first stage, progressives are trapped in the
second, and only a minority of either group seem to get to the third. The last
stage is considered dangerous to people in the first stage, and rather unknown
and invisible to people in the second stage. If you are not trained in a trust
of both love and mystery, and also some ability to hold anxiety and paradox,
all of which allow the divine entry into the soul, you will not proceed very
far on the spiritual journey. In fact, you will often run back to stage one
when the going gets rough in stage two. The great weakness of much Western
spirituality is that there is little understanding of the necessity of darkness
and "not knowing" (which is the transformative alchemy of faith).
This is what keeps so much religion at stage one.
Thus the
biblical tradition, and Jesus in particular, praises faith even more often than
love. Why? Because faith is that patience with mystery that allows you to
negotiate the stages of life and move toward non-egocentric love. As both John
of the Cross and Gerald May point out in their own descriptions of "the
dark night of the soul," God teaches the soul most profoundly through
darkness--and not just light! We only need enough light to be able to trust the
darkness. Trials and darkness teach us how to trust in a very practical way
that a good God is guiding us. I don't need to be perfectly certain before I
take the next step. Now I can trust that even my mistakes will be used in my
favor, if I allow them to be. This is a
wonderful way to grow in human love too, by the way. Darkness, mistakes, and
trials are the supreme teachers. Success really teaches you nothing; it just
feels good.
Love is the
source and goal, faith is the slow process of getting there, and hope is the
willingness to move forward without resolution and closure. And these are
indeed, "the three things that last" (1 Corinthians 13:13). People
who have these gifts--faith, hope, and love--are indestructible.
References:
Adapted from
Richard Rohr, Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media:
2008), 54-55.
From the Specific to the Universal
The
Israelites gradually learned the transformative power of God's action in their
lives, as we see often in Isaiah and so many of the prophets. What formed a
prophet was their ability to really trust that Yahweh was actively and
practically involved in the ordinary history of the Jewish people. One has to
wonder where such confidence came from.
Yes, as the
rain and the snow come down from the heavens and do not return without watering
the earth, making it yield and giving growth to provide seed for the sower and
bread for the eating, so the word that goes from my mouth does not return to me
empty, without carrying out my will and succeeding in what it was sent to do.
--Isaiah 55:10-11
Israel's
history is the womb for the world's initial sense of divine incarnation (God's
practical involvement in this world). In other words, they saw the patterns and
connected the dots so well, that they could trust the same would continue to
happen all the time and everywhere. The love and presence of God, when it is
planted in fertile soil, will always have an exponential yield. In gradually
accepting the daring initiative of actual intimacy from God, the Hebrew people
became a true community of faith. It was not so much that God loved Israel more
than all the other peoples of the earth, but somehow they were a people who
learned how to hear and trust God's initiatives better than almost anybody
else. That is their eternal glory and privilege! So they were in the best
position to hand the message of divine intimacy on to the rest of the world.
They produced a worldview in which a Jesus could emerge.
The Hebrew
Scriptures--what Christians unfortunately call the "Old" Testament
(implying it is out of date)--were assembled over two thousand years of
history. The New Testament or Christian
Scriptures include the four Gospels, the Book of Acts, the many letters of
Paul, John, Peter, James and others, and the Book of Revelation. These
twenty-seven books of the Christian Scriptures were probably written over a
period of a mere one hundred years of history. Yet together they have defined
Western spirituality and even culture.
Catholic
Bibles include forty-six books. Some of these are "apocryphal" and
their inclusion in the canon of Scripture has often been debated. These books
include First and Second Maccabees, Tobias, Judith, Esther, Wisdom, Sirach,
Baruch, and parts of Daniel, which our Protestant brothers and sisters do not
include. In essence, the foundational message is the same no matter which
version of the Bible we accept.
The fact
that Christians include the Hebrew Scriptures as part of our Bible should show
us that Christianity was never intended to be an exclusionary religion. We
include another religion's Scripture in our own Christian Scriptures--as two
thirds of our Bible! Jesus, who was an observant Jew, brilliantly thin-sliced
his own tradition and sacred texts, giving us a truly expert lens by which to
discover the deepest Hebrew wisdom. And Jesus' very selective interpretation of
his own Scriptures represents the interpretive key.
In the
stories of the Hebrew people we see Yahweh, the God of Israel, gradually
showing God's Self to be the hope and the promise of all those who search for
more. The principle of incarnation is this: start with the concrete, the
specific, the personal--and then universalize from there. God is saving us as
one people and, as Pope Francis has made clear, God's covenant with Israel is
permanent and enduring (Romans 11:1f) and never out of date. What was true for
them is true for all.
References:
Adapted from
Richard Rohr and Joseph Martos, Great Themes of Scripture: Old Testament
(Franciscan Media: 1988), 1-3.
Self-Critical Thinking
In the
Judeo-Christian scriptures, we read about people who found God in the actual,
in seemingly secular history, and in mundane daily life. This is the Jewish
matrix by which we were gradually prepared for the personal incarnation. It
widened, solidified, and paved the runway by which the Jesus Mystery could take
off and be understood.
The Hebrew
Scriptures, against all religious expectations, include what most of us would
call the problem--the negative, the accidental, the sinful--as the precise
arena for divine revelation. There are no perfectly moral people in ancient
Scriptures; even Abraham drove his second wife into the desert with their
child. The Jewish people, contrary to what might be expected, chose to present
their arrogant and evil kings and their very critical prophets as part of their
Holy Scriptures. They include stories and prophecies that do not tell the
Jewish people how wonderful they are but, rather, how terrible they are! It is
the birth of self-critical thinking and thus moves consciousness much higher.
No other religion has been known for such capacity for self-criticism, down to
our own time.
Jesus showed
us that self-criticism of our own religion is necessary. But if we are honest,
we rarely hear the Christian Church or its leaders being self-critical.
Christianity has seldom been known for any capacity to criticize itself until
the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s. Usually we just criticize others. I
remember when I asked a professor about Jesus' tirades against religion and the
priestly class (in Matthew 23, for example), and the typical answer was,
"Well, he was talking about the Jews." Surely not us!
The ability
to think critically about ourselves is the first necessary step out of the
dualistic mind. It teaches us an initial patience with ambiguity and mystery,
while also teaching us rational honesty. Such critical thinking is a
characteristic of the Western mind which produced the scientific and industrial
revolutions, as well as the Protestant Reformation. The Jewish and Christian
religions have the power to correct themselves from inside, and move beyond
mere superstition, because of these kinds of sacred and self-critical texts.
Jesus lived and taught in the genre of a prophet, but Christians have
over-emphasized that he was simply "foretold" by the prophets. This
changed the way we thought about the role of a prophet, and so we couldn't see
that Jesus truly was a radical prophet. There are many churches called
"Christ the King," but none, that I'm aware of, called "Jesus
the Prophet."
The biblical
account shows that Israel did not distance itself from its own contradictions
or the contradictions of life, from the horrors and sinfulness of human
history--which finally became "the folly of the cross" in Jesus.
These hard realities had already been presented in the stories of Job, the
experience of exodus and exile, and Israel's constant invasion and occupation
by foreign powers. The Jews may have often felt like saying to God what Teresa
of Avila is supposed to have said: "If this is the way you treat your
friends, no wonder you have so few of them!"
Self-criticism
is quite rare in the history of religion, yet it is necessary to keep religion
from its natural tendency toward arrogant self-assurance--and eventually
idolatry, which is always the major sin for biblical Israel. We must also point
out, however, that mere critique usually deteriorates into cynicism,
skepticism, academic arrogance, and even post-modernistic nihilism. So be very
careful and very prayerful before you own any job description of professional
critic or prophet! Negativity can do you in.
References:
Richard
Rohr, Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media: 2008), 18-20.
Transforming Our Pain
One of the
enlightened themes that develops in the Judeo-Christian scriptures and reaches
its fullness in the crucified Jesus is the recognition of the transformative
significance of human pain and suffering. We see this most especially in the
four "Servant Songs" of Isaiah (chapters 42-53), in the biographies
of Jonah, Jeremiah, and Job, in Simeon's prophecy to Mary (Luke 2:34-35), and
in Jesus' common warning to his followers. Jesus builds on what his Jewish
tradition already recognized--how to hold, make use of, and transform our
suffering into a new kind of life instead of an old kind of death. It is the
movement from an initial self-created order, to a risky allowing of necessary
disorder, to the "third force" reordering that we call the
resurrected life. It is a long slog, which we all try to avoid as long as
possible.
The story of
Job is both the summit and also the dead end of the Hebrew Scriptures. Humanity
has never known what to do with unjust suffering--which is our universal
experience on this earth--until Jesus gives his seismic shift of an answer. One
could say that the story of Jesus is the same story as Job, who says, "I
know that I have a Living Defender, and he will raise me up at last, will set
me close to him, and from my flesh I shall look on God" (Job 19:25-26).
This is Jesus' exact faith affirmation on the cross when he first says,
"Why have you forsaken me?" (Mark 15:34), followed by, "Father,
forgive them" (Luke 23:34), and "Father, into your hands I commit my
spirit" (Luke 23:46). Jesus is the new Job, but with a way out and a way
through.
Pain teaches
a most counterintuitive thing: we must go down before we even know what up is.
In terms of the ego, most religions teach in some way that all must "die
before they die." Suffering of some sort seems to be the only thing strong
enough to both destabilize and reveal our arrogance, our separateness, and our
lack of compassion. I define suffering very simply as "whenever you are
not in control." Suffering is the most effective way whereby humans learn
to trust, allow, and give up control to Another Source. I wish there were a different
answer, but Jesus reveals on the cross both the path and the price of full
transformation into the divine.
When
religion cannot find a meaning for human suffering, human beings far too often
become cynical, bitter, negative, and blaming. Healthy religion, almost without
realizing it, shows us what to do with our pain, with the absurd, the tragic,
the nonsensical, the unjust. If we do not transform our pain, we will most
assuredly transmit it. If we cannot find a way to make our wounds into sacred wounds,
we invariably give up on life and humanity. I am afraid there are bitter and
blaming people everywhere, both inside and outside of the church. As they go
through life, the hurts, disappointments, betrayals, abandonments, and the
burden of their own sinfulness and brokenness all pile up, and they do not know
how to deal with all this negativity. This is what we need to be
"saved" from.
If there
isn't some way to find some deeper meaning to our suffering, to find that God
is somehow in it, and can even use it for good, we will normally close up and
close down. The natural movement of the small self or ego is to protect itself
so as not to be hurt again. As I shared last week, neuroscience now shows us
that we attach to negativity "like Velcro" unless we intentionally
develop another neural path like forgiveness or letting go.
Mature
religion is about transforming history and individuals so that we don't keep
handing the pain on to the next generation. For Christians, we learn to
identify our own wounds with the wounding of Jesus and the sufferings of the
universal Body of Christ (see Philippians 3:10-11), which is Deep Meaning that
always feeds the soul. We can then see
our own suffering as a voluntary participation in the one Great Sadness of God
(Colossians 1:24). Within this meaningful worldview, we can build something
new, good, and forever original, while neither playing the victim nor making
victims of others. We can be free conduits of grace into the world.
References:
Richard
Rohr, Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media: 2008), 24-25.
'Discernment charged with merciful love': Pope Francis’ Amoris Laetitia, on Love in the Family
This article can be found on the Thinking Faith website - here
Pope Francis’ Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia, published on 8 April 2016, transposes church teaching on marriage and the family from the key of law to that of virtue and should be celebrated, says Nicholas Austin SJ. This powerful new document offers ‘a Gospel-inspired vision of what family life can be, a word of encouragement for those who are not yet there, and above all another example of the discerning way of proceeding that the pope has modelled’.
The topic of family and marriage in the Church today is often associated with words like ‘crisis’, ‘problems’ and ‘impasse’. In this context, Pope Francis’ latest, much-anticipated document,Amoris Laetitia,[1] ‘The Joy of Love’, is, in contrast, infectious in its enthusiasm and, indeed, its joy.
This apostolic exhortation is the culmination of a process that began on 8 October 2013, when Francis convoked an Extraordinary Synod of Bishops to discuss the pastoral challenges of the family. ‘Extraordinary’ is a word that characterises the whole process since that day, both in the new level of openness to discussion and debate within the synodal process itself, and in the unprecedented consultation of all the faithful. Francis’ intention has not merely been to address the pastoral issues posed by what is widely seen as a crisis in family life, but to lead the Church into a more discerning way of proceeding, one that respects the role of the Bishops and also listens for the voice of the Holy Spirit expressed in the hearts and minds of the lay faithful. These reforms alone are an extraordinary contribution to the life of the Church.
What does Francis say about how best to respond to the challenges facing marriage and the family in the 21st century? Does he have solutions for those whose situations do not fit the Church’s teaching on marriage? Whatever commentators may say, or wish Francis had said, he is not changing Church teaching, as he goes out of his way to explain. Nor does he offer a set of rules, let alone a raft of new permissions. Rather, what he gives the Church is a Gospel-inspired vision of what family life can be, a word of encouragement for those who are not yet there, and above all another example of the discerning way of proceeding that he has modelled from his first days in office as leader of the Catholic Church throughout the world.
Those on either side of what the media have liked to portray as a polarised debate will be disappointed. Anyone looking for a ‘progressive’ or ‘liberal’ pope will feel as let-down as those hoping for a straightforward reaffirmation of the status quo. The pope’s attempt to address the complex issues of the family in the 21st century Church is all the more valuable because he transcends the lazy polarities that are used too often to characterise discussions within the Church. In the kind of striking image that we have come to expect from this pope, he refers to the bishops’ discussions as ‘a precious polyhedron shaped by many legitimate concerns and honest questions’. Francis insists on the many-sided, complex nature of the problem, and therefore resists viewpoints that cling too tightly only to one side of the truth. Because he is a holistic thinker, he consistently works to integrate opposites. When it comes to moral and pastoral issues, Francis is therefore neither ‘revisionist’ nor ‘traditionalist’, but simultaneously faithful, honest and creative. The result is one, the pope is happy to remark, that ‘everyone should feel challenged by’.
What, then, more concretely, are the contributions of Amoris Laetitia to pastors and above all to family life? The media will no doubt focus on what is said (or not said) about the ‘neuralgic issues’ such as second marriages, gay unions, reproductive technology, feminism. However, Francis believes that the pastoral effort to strengthen marriages is an even more urgent need than the response to cases that fall short of the ideal. The way in which the text addresses this theme, and humbly acknowledges how the Church has fallen short in its own attempts to do this, is something to be celebrated. While the contested questions cannot be ignored, to skip straight to those passages where the pope tackles many of them head on would be to marginalise what is really the central piece of the whole document, the chapter on love, based on the famous ‘hymn to love’ in 1 Corinthians 13. It is there that we must begin.
The primacy of love
The Pauline hymn to love, which paints a portrait of love by expanding upon the virtues it exemplifies and the vices it avoids, is a natural choice for Francis, given his reiterated emphasis upon the virtues. He sees the Year of Mercy as an invitation to all families ‘to persevere in a love strengthened by the virtues of generosity, commitment, fidelity and patience.’[2] He commends the virtue of tenderness to both spouses and pastors, as something that can ‘stir in the other the joy of being loved.’[3] He notes the importance of cultivating virtues in the upbringing of children. He warns against vices such as those of envy, vainglory and resentment. And he appeals to many other virtues, such as those of forgiveness, kindness, humility and joy. So Francis’ selection of scriptural text expresses his desire to speak about marriage above all in the key not of law, but of virtue, of character, of the kind of persons we are called to become through grace.
To take just one example, we can look at his interpretation of Paul’s claim that ‘love is not rude’. Francis takes this as an occasion to expand upon the virtues of courtesy and gentleness. Courtesy, he notes, is an ‘essential requirement of love’, and is a kind of school of respect, sensitivity and disinterestedness. [4] In referring to the ‘gentleness of love’ he talks of the need to speak words of ‘comfort, strength, consolation, and encouragement.’[5] In this, Christ is, as ever, our exemplar:
These were the words that Jesus himself spoke: ‘Take heart, my son!’ (Mt 9:2); ‘Great is your faith!’ (Mt 15:28); ‘Arise!’ (Mk 5:41); ‘Go in peace’ (Lk 7:50); ‘Be not afraid’ (Mt 14:27). These are not words that demean, sadden, anger or show scorn. In our families, we must learn to imitate Jesus’ own gentleness in our way of speaking to one another.[6]
We are so familiar with St Paul’s hymn to love that it can appear merely sentimental. In passages such as these, Francis, breaks open the word for us afresh, and shows in a down-to-earth way how it is relevant to us all.
There is no doubt that Francis attends carefully to the Synod Fathers, and throughout the document he quotes from them liberally. At the same time, the scriptural reflection on love is new material, not present in the bishops’ final report. It is as though Pope Francis is saying that, once we get into the depths of what family life and marriage are about, we cannot talk about them merely under the rubric of canon law or a law-based moral theology. As he puts it, ‘All that has been said so far would be insufficient to express the Gospel of marriage and family, were we not also to speak of love.’[7]
Chapter Four, on ‘Love in Marriage’, is the beating heart of the whole document, and it is only when we attend to it and take its ideas on board that we can then hope to address the difficulties that affect so many families and marriages today. As Francis himself says, ‘Our teaching on marriage and the family cannot fail to be inspired and transformed by this message of love and tenderness; otherwise, it becomes nothing more than the defence of a dry and lifeless doctrine.’[8]
Francis’ Triptych: Discernment, Gradualness and Mercy
Francis paints an inspiring picture of what the gospel of family proclaims, and of what family, at its best, can be. Yet he recognises that it is also necessary to address the manifold ways in which the reality does not always measure up to the ideal. It is clear that Francis wants to avoid being drawn into legalistic thinking, whether of a ‘conservative’ or ‘liberal’ hue. Given the ‘immense variety of concrete situations’[9] a new set of laws will not do justice to the complexity of the issues facing the family today. What, then, does Francis offer in its place?
In the beautiful medieval churches of Europe, one often finds an altarpiece in the form of a ‘triptych’: a central painting complemented by two ‘wings’. What Francis offers is a kind of triptych of discernment, gradualness and mercy. That is, he offers a practice, a principle and a virtue. Together these three panels, as it were, form the basis for a pastoral response to the crisis in marriage and the family. Each has appeared in the pope’s previous teaching, but here we begin to see more clearly how they cash-out, and how, when used in concert and applied to particular questions, they have the potential to make a real difference in the life of the Church.
The central panel of Francis’ triptych is the practice of discernment. Discernment is a keystone of Jesuit life and Ignatian spirituality, and therefore one that is ‘second nature’, in the best sense, for Francis. This is not the first time Francis has mentioned the practice, and discernment is a hermeneutical key for reading his pontificate to date: his reform of the Synodal process to incorporate free discussion and consultation more fully, for example, is a manifestation of his desire for a discerning Church. Discernment is something that is known more by practice than book knowledge: it is a more personal and spiritual form of insight, one that requires the virtues of attentiveness, empathy and love, and which develops a feel for the action of the Holy Spirit in human experience. Here is Francis’ own attempt to describe it, from his interview for the Jesuit journals: ‘Discernment is always done in the presence of the Lord, looking at the signs, listening to the things that happen, the feeling of the people, especially the poor.’ [10] In Amoris Laetitia, however, there is a further clarification of the importance of discernment for pastoral practice, especially by description of what it is not. Discernment, Francis tells us, is not applying ‘rigid classifications’[11] and so pigeonholing people (e.g. ‘divorced’ or ‘remarried’ or ‘living in sin’). Nor is discernment a straightforward application of general norms without regard for concrete and personal situations. Finally, discernment it is not a rigour that ‘leaves no room for confusion’[12] or ‘thinking that everything is black and white’[13]. Discernment, rather, is not threatened by complexity. Francis, therefore, enunciates the following ‘not enough’ rule: to consider whether an action conforms to a general law ‘is not enough to discern’.[14] Religious solicitude for the law, for all its earnestness, can never on its own ensure fidelity to God in the life of an individual human person. Respect for the rule book can never eliminate the need for an attentive heart that is ‘open to God and to others’.[15]
One implication of the practice of discernment is that the teaching Church, like all good teachers, is asked to step back a little to create a breathing space for an individual to do his or her own discernment. Francis notes that a new set of canonical, universal rules cannot substitute for ‘responsible personal and pastoral discernment of particular cases’.[16] He therefore explicitly warns against expecting too much by way of definitive rulings from the teaching office of the Church. Indeed, he frankly states at the very outset of the document, ‘I would make it clear that not all discussions of doctrinal, moral or pastoral issues need to be settled by interventions of the magisterium.’[17]
Since Francis values discernment, it is not surprising to find him placing a special accent on conscience. He worries that we struggle to ‘make room’ for the consciences of the lay faithful who are quite capable, he insists, of doing their own discernment. Neither the magisterium nor pastors should substitute for the role of the individual’s conscientious discernment: ‘We have been called to form consciences, not to replace them.’[18]
To complement the practice of discernment, Francis proposes the principle of gradualness, the second panel of his pastoral triptych. This principle has a long history in Catholic moral theology, was affirmed by John Paul II in Familiaris Consortio[19] and applied by Pope Benedict XVI in his comments on HIV/AIDs prevention.[20] It is based on the insight that moral development is a step-by-step process that may not happen all at once. Moral education therefore requires a ‘patient realism’[21] in educators and pastors. Pastoral practice informed by this principle does not merely proclaim eternal truths, but accompanies a person, meeting each where she or he is now, and encourages them to take a small step, the next step. It’s a delicate balance: going to where a person actually is, and at the same time hanging on to the moral ideal.
Despite its firm roots in the tradition, some worry that the principle of gradualness slides all too easily from ‘the law of gradualness’ to ‘the gradualness of the law’, for this approach does not ask a person to leap forward in one go to the fullness of what the Church teaches. When used with discretion, however, gradualness maintains both the objectivity of the moral law and the equal objectivity of a person’s actual situation, which may prevent immediate and complete change. Francis, in Evangelii Gaudium, had put it memorably: ‘A small step, in the midst of great human limitations, can be more pleasing to God than a life which appears outwardly in order but moves through the day without confronting great difficulties.’[22] In Amoris Laetitia Francis points out once again that the principle of gradualness, when employed with discernment, can help us to conform ourselves to what God wants, not in the abstract, but in the concrete and often somewhat chaotic situation in which we may find ourselves. For, through conscientious discernment, we can recognise with confidence what ‘for now’ God is asking.[23]
Gradualness is an attitude that sees both the shades and the lights in morally messy situations, and therefore coheres well with discernment’s comfort with complexity. For example, the pope refers to second marriages that are ‘consolidated over time, with new children, proven fidelity, generous self giving, Christian commitment, a consciousness of its irregularity and of the great difficulty of going back without feeling in conscience that one would fall into new sins.’[24]One might also think here, for example, of the relationship that Dorothy Day, the peace activist and co-founder of the Catholic Worker Movement to whom Pope Francis paid tribute in his speech to the United States Congress,[25] had prior to entering the Catholic Church. While she eventually made the decision in conscience to leave a partner to whom she was not and could never be married, looking back she recognised that the love that had characterised that relationship had helped her come closer to God and even to take the final step of being received into the Church. Francis states forthrightly, ‘I sincerely believe that Jesus wants a Church attentive to the goodness which the Holy Spirit sows in the midst of human weakness’.[26]
No doubt the trust Francis places in the capacity of individuals and pastors to make their own discernment will cause anxieties that he is communicating a kind of ‘I decide what is right for me’ mentality. Francis is aware of the danger. For true pastoral discernment, both genuine discretion and love for the Church and her teaching must be present. Nor is it about abandoning the general principles of morality that are known by reason and taught by the magisterium. However, as Francis points out, and a close reading of Thomas Aquinas’s moral theology confirms, moral judgment mediates between general principles and the astute perception of particular circumstances. Morality is not mathematics, and while the Church affirms some universal, exceptionless prohibitions, it is always necessary to apply moral principles in a way that fits the particularities of the case, and to do that requires good judgement. As Francis puts it, ‘It is true that general rules set forth a good which can never be disregarded or neglected, but in their formulation they cannot provide absolutely for all particular situations.’[27] Francis advocates neither a rigid legalism nor a lax permissiveness, but rather a principled sensitivity to the particular.
The final panel of Francis’s triptych is that of the virtue of mercy, and the closely related idea of integration or inclusion into the community. ‘Mercy’ in contemporary English suggests something to do with mitigating the harshness of a judicial procedure, a kind of clemency or leniency. Yet what Francis has in mind is something much richer and more important. As moral theologian James Keenan SJ explains, mercy is ‘the willingness to enter into the chaos of another, to answer them in their need.’[28] It is what the Good Samaritan, for example, exemplifies in the parable. Francis considers it ‘timely’[29] and even ‘providential’[30] that the discussion about the family takes place in the Holy Year of Mercy. The Church should follow the example of Christ who went in search of everyone without any exception: ‘She knows that Jesus himself is the shepherd of the hundred, not just of the ninety-nine.’[31] To manifest mercy in pastoral practice is not to dilute the Gospel message. For, ‘We put so many conditions on mercy that we empty it of its concrete meaning and real significance. That is the worst way of watering down the Gospel.’[32] He has characteristically strong words for attitudes of judgementalism or superiority, and warns against a ‘closed heart of one used to hiding behind the Church’s teachings’.[33] His hope is for a Church that is ‘a sign of mercy and closeness wherever family life remains imperfect or lacks peace and joy.’[34] Above all, he advocates ‘a pastoral discernment filled with merciful love’.[35]
The divorced who have entered a second union
We have looked at the principles that underlie Francis’ treatment of moral and pastoral issues; now it is time to turn to a particular question to see what they look like in practice. One of the key difficulties that led to the Synods on family life was how to respond to members of the Church who are divorced and have married again civilly. How best can they be offered pastoral care? One hotly contested issue has been the question of whether those in a second marriage should be admitted to Holy Communion; another, whether the advice to such people to live as ‘brother and sister’ (i.e. without sexual relations) is realistic or helpful. Francis, we have seen, insists that a solution in the form of a general norm will not be adequate to the polyhedral nature of the issue. Instead, he employs the triptych of discernment, gradualness and mercy to offer something better than a general rule.
One application of the principle of mercy is the task of integrating and including the civilly remarried in the life of the Church. Francis insists, for example, ‘It is important that the divorced who have entered a new union should be made to feel part of the Church. “They are not excommunicated” and they should not be treated as such, since they remain part of the ecclesial community.’[36] The ‘logic of pastoral mercy’[37] is the ‘logic of integration’[38] or inclusion, and Francis, following the Synod Fathers, speaks of the necessity of going beyond the ‘various forms of exclusion currently practised in the liturgical, pastoral, educational and institutional framework’ of the Church. The civilly remarried in particular ‘need to feel not as excommunicated members of the Church, but instead as living members, able to live and grow in the Church and experience her as a mother who welcomes them always, who takes care of them with affection and encourages them along the path of life and the Gospel.’[39]
Concerning the contested issue of communion, it is necessary here to read the text with some care. I therefore offer a full quotation, with the footnote in square brackets:
Because of forms of conditioning and mitigating factors, it is possible that in an objective situation of sin – which may not be subjectively culpable, or fully such – a person can be living in God’s grace, can love and can also grow in the life of grace and charity, while receiving the Church’s help to this end. [In certain cases, this can include the help of the sacraments. Hence, “I want to remind priests that the confessional must not be a torture chamber, but rather an encounter with the Lord's mercy” (Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium [24 November 2013], 44: AAS 105 [2013], 1038). I would also point out that the Eucharist “is not a prize for the perfect, but a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak” (ibid.,. 47: 1039).] Discernment must help to find possible ways of responding to God and growing in the midst of limits.[40]
Here, Francis stops short of positively affirming that reception of communion for the civilly remarried is acceptable; yet it seems to me equally clear that, applying the principles of discernment, integration and gradualness, he leaves it open as a possibility in certain cases. With regard to gradualness, his point is that a person in such a situation can be growing in God’s grace, and therefore clearly not in ‘a state of mortal sin’ as the old moral manualists would have had it; and that it would therefore be wrong to deny such a person the assistance of the sacraments which the Church can offer, including that of the Eucharist. With regard to discernment, the need is to recognise mitigating factors, and the difference between objective sin and subjective culpability, as well as what the realistic ‘next step’ for such a person is. As he puts it a little earlier in the document, referring to ‘“irregular” situations’:
A subject may know full well the rule, yet have great difficulty in understanding “its inherent values”, or be in a concrete situation which does not allow him to act differently and decide otherwise without further sin.[41]
One can imagine that a person in a second marriage could be in such a situation, in which separation might be just such a ‘further sin’, against the second spouse and against the children.
What I am suggesting, then, is not that Francis is advocating communion for the civilly remarried tout court, but rather that he is giving space for a discernment informed by mercy to be open to it in some cases. “Which cases, exactly?”, the legalist will ask, having failed to hear what the Pope is actually saying. This is the point: it is impossible to define all the possible factors and considerations fully in a general way in an exact formula. There will certainly be cases where it is important to challenge a person who is behaving in an unacceptable manner. But what is required is a discernment informed both by a love for the Church and its teaching, and by a capacity informed by mercy and wisdom to sense the way forward for this person here and now.
What about the traditional advice to the remarried, affirmed by John Paul II in Familiaris Consortio, that they should live ‘as brother and sister’, i.e. without sexual relations? The importance of the topic and the subtlety of Francis’ answer make it necessary to quote in full:
The divorced who have entered a new union, for example, can find themselves in a variety of situations, which should not be pigeonholed or fit into overly rigid classifications leaving no room for a suitable personal and pastoral discernment. One thing is a second union consolidated over time, with new children, proven fidelity, generous self giving, Christian commitment, a consciousness of its irregularity and of the great difficulty of going back without feeling in conscience that one would fall into new sins. The Church acknowledges situations “where, for serious reasons, such as the children’s upbringing, a man and woman cannot satisfy the obligation to separate”. [JOHN PAUL II, Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris Consortio (22 November 1981), 84: AAS 74 (1982), 186. In such situations, many people, knowing and accepting the possibility of living “as brothers and sisters” which the Church offers them, point out that if certain expressions of intimacy are lacking, “it often happens that faithfulness is endangered and the good of the children suffers” (SECOND VATICAN ECUMENICAL COUNCIL, Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World Gaudium et Spes, 51).][42]
Once again, Francis is not giving a blanket permission, but creates the space for personal and pastoral discernment. The Church can offer as a possible way forward staying together for the sake of the children, but living ‘as brother and sister’, and those who do so, often at some personal cost, are to be commended. Yet Francis notes that some will make the obvious reply that a lack of sexual relations can be a grave threat to a partnership, since, as the Church’s teaching emphasises, sexuality has a unitive role in a loving relationship. It could therefore be one of those cases in which mercy, discerning what is possible ‘for now’, might indicate a different route for pastoral advice than the traditional frater-soror solution.
Some may object that this whole approach of gradualness, mercy and discernment, runs the risk of watering down the teaching of the Church on the indissolubility of a consummated, sacramental marriage. Yet what Francis shows is that an approach that does not integrate these principles itself can imperil true fidelity to the living tradition of the Church. ‘Understanding in the face of exceptional situations never implies dimming the light of the fuller ideal, or proposing less than what Jesus offers to the human being’.[43] Once again we see Francis’ approach to the difficult questions facing the Church in the contemporary world: one that is simultaneously deeply faithful to the tradition, uncompromisingly honest and realistic about the current situation, and refreshingly imaginative and creative in its response.
A transposition into a different key
It would be a shame if the media (including the Catholic media) were to read this powerful new document against the background of the polemical ‘progressive versus conservative’ narrative which plagued coverage of the Synods themselves. This is a rich and complex piece of teaching. It is also a breath of fresh air. It contains an acknowledgement of the positive contribution of the women’s movement which betokens a more positive rapprochement with feminism.[44] Above all, however, a patient and attentive reading, which the pope recommends,[45] will offer hope and insight to many; families, pastors and the Church as a whole will benefit from what Pope Francis is saying.
It is impossible in a short space to deal adequately with every aspect of Pope Francis’ Amoris Laetitia. I have tried to show how Francis insists that the Christian teaching on marriage must always begin with a positive and attractive vision. I have argued that, with regard to situations that do not correspond to the Church’s ideal, Francis allows a breathing space for a formed conscience and for the pastoral triptych of discernment, gradualness and mercy. We looked briefly at the question of those who are divorced and have entered a second union.
The media will want to know: does Francis change the doctrine of the Church? I would say that Francis does not change the content of church teaching on marriage and family; he transposes it from the key of law to that of virtue, and makes the primacy of love clearer once again. He does not abandon the rules of the Church, but it is clear now, as it was when he first took office and washed the feet of a Muslim girl in a prison on Holy Thursday, that for Pope Francis, as it should be for us, the first and living rule is the person of Jesus Christ, his humility, his gentleness, his joy and his love.
Nicholas Austin SJ teaches Ethics at Heythrop College, University of London.
[1] Pope Francis, Amoris Laetitia (2016):http://w2.vatican.va/content/dam/francesco/pdf/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20160319_amoris-laetitia_en.pdf
[2] Amoris Laetitia (henceforth AL), §5.
[3] AL, §323
[4] AL, §99
[5] AL, §100
[6] AL, §100
[7] AL, §89
[8] AL, §59
[9] AL, §300
[10] ‘A Big Heart Open to God’, Thinking Faith (19 September 2013):https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20130919_1.htm
[11] AL, §298
[12] AL, §308
[13] AL, §305
[14] AL, §304
[15] ‘A Big Heart Open to God’
[16] AL, §300
[17] AL, §3
[18] AL, §37
[19] Pope John Paul II, Familiaris Consortio (1981): http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_jp-ii_exh_19811122_familiaris-consortio.html
[20] Pope Benedict XVI, Light of the World (Ignatius Press, 2010)
[21] AL, §271-273
[22] Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium (2013), §44:http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20131124_evangelii-gaudium.html
[23] AL, §303
[24] AL, §298
[25] Pope Francis, Address to the United States Congress (24 September 2015):https://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/speeches/2015/september/documents/papa-francesco_20150924_usa-us-congress.html
[26] AL, §308
[27] AL, §304
[28] James Keenan SJ, ‘The scandal of mercy excludes no one’, Thinking Faith (4 December 2015): https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/scandal-mercy-excludes-no-one
[29] AL, §5
[30] AL, §309
[31] AL, §309
[32] AL, §311
[33] AL, §305
[34] AL, §5
[35] AL, §312
[36] AL, §243
[37] AL, §307-12
[38] AL, §299
[39] AL, §299
[40] AL, §305
[41] AL, §301
[42] AL, §298
[43] AL, §307
[44] AL, §54
[45] AL, §7
GROUNDBREAKING- PART 1
From the Blog by Fr Michael White, Pastor of the Church of the Nativity, Baltimore USA. The original blog can be found here
The good news of Jesus’ resurrection was groundbreaking. The Apostles and first generation disciples carried this news out into the world and made the Church a groundbreaking movement. They led with acts of mercy, healing, and preached a message of redemption from sin and life-change. Most of all, they made disciples.
That’s what this weekend at Nativity is about, like every weekend we hope: making disciples. But this weekend is a little special. We are literally breaking ground.
If you’re a friend or follower of this blog, here’s your sneak peak into our next two Sundays Groundbreaking events. It’s a two-part blog because this week is all about what’s happening this Sunday at our formal groundbreaking ceremony with the Archbishop, and next week will be all about our huge weekend-long groundbreaking celebration. Stay tuned for that.
Here’s what’s happening this Sunday. It’s a two-part ceremony. At our 12 Noon Mass, our parish will welcome the Most Rev. William Lori, Archbishop of Baltimore, who will preside over the Mass and deliver the homily. During the closing hymn, Archbishop Lori will lead a procession out of our church sanctuary and building, around the front of the building, to the gravel lot next to the church. Parishioners are then invited to follow behind. At that spot, there will be a tent set up (symbolically located on top of the site of the future altar), where the Archbishop will lead those gathered in a blessing of the new building site taken from the “Rite of Dedication of a Church.” There will be a few prayers, a short scripture reading, and ceremonial sprinkling with holy water and then putting the first shovel in the ground and turning the soil.
A few logistics to note.
For those planning to attend at Noon, our normal seating arrangements will not be affected- kids programs will still run, and video venues are still open. (Although, it will be the last weekend you will have the chance to sit in the chapel venue before that is closed permanently for construction.) Due to our outdoor tent and standing room for the Groundbreaking Rite, there will not be available parking in the gravel lot. Just another opportunity to use our shuttle service from the Timonium Light Rail lot, which will only become more helpful and convenient as construction gets underway.
That’s about it for this week. To say we’re excited is an understatement. So many hearts, hands, and minds have gone into this project.
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