Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
Parish Priest: Fr Mike Delaney
Mob: 0417 279 437
Mob: 0417 279 437
Assistant Priest: Fr Paschal Okpon
Mob: 0438 562 731
paschalokpon@yahoo.com
Priest in Residence: Fr Phil McCormack
Mob: 0437 521 257
Mob: 0437 521 257
Postal Address: PO Box 362
Parish Office: 90 Stewart Street
(Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday 10am - 3pm)
Office Phone: 6424 2783 Fax: 6423 5160
Email: merseyleven@aohtas.org.au
Secretary: Annie Davies
Finance Officer: Anne Fisher
Finance Officer: Anne Fisher
Parish Mass times for the Month: mlcpmasstimes.blogspot.com.au
Weekly Homily Podcast: mikedelaney.podomatic.com
Archdiocesan Website: www.hobart.catholic.org.au for news, information and details of other Parishes.
PLENARY COUNCIL PRAYER
Come, Holy Spirit of Pentecost.
Come, Holy Spirit of the great South Land.
O God, bless and unite all your people in Australia
and guide us on the pilgrim way of the Plenary Council.
Give us the grace to see your face in one another
and to recognise Jesus, our companion on the road.
Give us the courage to tell our stories and to speak boldly of your truth.
Give us ears to listen humbly to each other
and a discerning heart to hear what you are saying.
Lead your Church into a hope-filled future,
that we may live the joy of the Gospel.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord, bread for the journey from age to age.
Amen.
Our Lady Help of Christians, pray for us.
St Mary MacKillop, pray for us.
Come, Holy Spirit of the great South Land.
O God, bless and unite all your people in Australia
and guide us on the pilgrim way of the Plenary Council.
Give us the grace to see your face in one another
and to recognise Jesus, our companion on the road.
Give us the courage to tell our stories and to speak boldly of your truth.
Give us ears to listen humbly to each other
and a discerning heart to hear what you are saying.
Lead your Church into a hope-filled future,
that we may live the joy of the Gospel.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord, bread for the journey from age to age.
Amen.
Our Lady Help of Christians, pray for us.
St Mary MacKillop, pray for us.
Parish Prayer
Heavenly Father,
and calling us to serve as your disciples.
as we use our gifts to serve you.
as we strive to bear witness
to the Gospel and build an amazing parish.
Amen.
Our Parish Sacramental Life
Eucharistic Adoration - Devonport: Every Friday 10am - 12noon, concluding with Stations of the Cross and Angelus
Benediction with Adoration Devonport: First Friday each month - commences at 10am and concludes with Mass
Legion of Mary: Wednesdays 11am Sacred Heart Church Community Room, Ulverstone
Prayer Group: Charismatic Renewal – Mondays 7pm Community Room Ulverstone
and calling us to serve as your disciples.
as we use our gifts to serve you.
as we strive to bear witness
Amen.
Our Parish Sacramental Life
Baptism: Arrangements are made by contacting Parish Office. Parents attend a Baptismal Preparation Session organised with a Priest.
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)
Eucharistic Adoration - Devonport: Every Friday 10am - 12noon, concluding with Stations of the Cross and Angelus
Benediction with Adoration Devonport: First Friday each month - commences at 10am and concludes with Mass
Benediction with Adoration Devonport: First Friday each month - commences at 10am and concludes with Mass
Legion of Mary: Wednesdays 11am Sacred Heart Church Community Room, Ulverstone
Prayer Group: Charismatic Renewal – Mondays 7pm Community Room Ulverstone
Weekday Masses 25th – 29th March, 2019
Monday: 12noon Devonport … The Annunciation of the Lord
7:00pm Ulverstone
Tuesday: 9:30am Penguin
Ministry Rosters 30th & 31st March, 2019
Devonport: 
Ulverstone:
Penguin:
Latrobe:
Port Sorell:
Readings this Week:
Third Sunday of Lent – Year C
PREGO REFLECTION ON THE GOSPEL:
Readings Next Week:
Fourth Sunday of
Lent – Year C
First Reading: Joshua 5:9-12
Your prayers
are asked for the sick:
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Rose
Kirkpatrick, Neville Ross, Robert McLaren, Pat Mapley, Rita Dawkins, Graeme Sheridan, Carina
Ubay, Sandra Allison, Joan Carter
Let us pray
for those whose anniversary occurs about this time: 21st – 27th March
Myra Dare, Peggy Leary, Thomas Sage, Eva Rogers, Peter Bolster, Antonia Sciamanna, Doreen Alderson
May they Rest in Peace
Weekly
Ramblings
Two weeks ago I included a letter with the Bulletin sharing
something of the vision of the Christian Churches in the Devonport area and
mentioning that we will be holding a 24 hour Prayer Vigil at OLOL Church on the
evening of 17th April. There are sign-up forms in the foyer of each
Mass Centre inviting Parishioners to put their name down for one of the time
slots – we will be joined by members of the other Devonport Churches who are
similarly signing up for a time of prayer.
Thanks to those people who have indicated that they are
willing to assist with the running of our Thursday Bingo Fundraising. Your
support is greatly appreciated – but, and there’s nearly always a But, we would
be grateful for any further help anyone is able to provide. The more people
able to help the greater our reserves and the less that is ‘demanded’ of our
willing volunteers. Anyone able to assist is asked to contact the Parish Office
or speak to Tony Ryan or Merv Tippett who can give you more information.
This Monday (25th) is the Feast of the
Annunciation and there will be Masses at OLOL (12 noon) and Sacred Heart (7pm).
All parishioners are encouraged to attend Mass if they are able.
A reminder that there is a Meeting for those who are
involved in the preparation for our Holy week and Easter ceremonies next
Saturday afternoon (30th) at 2pm at the Parish House.
At the time of writing I don’t know the winner of the Geel
v Coll game on Friday night but I do know that the Footy margins fundraiser is
an important part of our Parish Fundraising activities. For $2 per week you are
in the running to win $100 – but you have to be in it to win it (to quote an
old game show!). Tickets available at various Mass Centres or from the Parish
Office.
Please take care
PROJECT
COMPASSION – GIVE LENT 100%
Peter is thrilled to now have clean water
on tap at his boarding school. Long walks to unsafe water sources were tiring
for Peter, who is living with a disability. With more free time and fewer
illnesses caused by dirty water, Peter can fulfil his hope of focusing on his
studies, providing him with a brighter future.
OUR LENTEN LITURGY IN 2019:
- After
the introduction, Mass begins with the priest greeting from the rear of
the church and then proceeds while Kyrie
Eleison or Lord have mercy is
sung. On each of the Sundays of Lent, the Rite of Sprinkling (Asperges)
will take place during the singing of the Kyrie. The name ‘Asperges’ comes from the first word in the 9th
verse of Psalm
51
in the Latin
translation, the Vulgate.
- By
having moments of silence before and after the readings and after the
homily RGIRM (2007) 45.
- At
the breaking of the bread (the Fraction Rite) there will be a short
narrative before intoning the Lamb of God
- There
is no Gloria or Alleluia verse (replaced by a Gospel acclamation).
- The
second collection will be taken up when stickers are being given to
children - not during the reflection hymn.
A huge thank you to everyone who contributed and helped at
the St Mary’s Church Penguin BBQ last Saturday night. It was a sumptuous
meal and a good community gathering. Also thank you for all of the good
wishes to us on our 50th wedding anniversary.
Yvonne & Ray Downes.
There will be a special collection after Mass at Penguin on
Saturday
March 30th to raise funds to assist in the Chaplaincy work at the
Penguin School.
MACKILLOP HILL:
SACRED HEART SCHOOL FAIR:
Buttons Avenue Ulverstone, Saturday 6th April
10am – 2pm. Entry is free – featuring cake stall (donations of cakes,
slice grateful accepted) produce, chocolate wheel, rides, craft, food live
entertainment and much more. Come along and have some fun!
OUR LADY OF LOURDES SCHOOL:
Thursday Nights - OLOL Hall,
Devonport. Eyes down 7.30pm!
Callers Thursday 28th March
– Tony Ryan & Graeme Rigney.
Many Ways Of Knowing
This article is taken from the Daily Emails from Fr Richard Rohr OFM and the Center for Action and Contemplation. You can subscribe to receive the emails here
Unknown to many post-Reformation Christians, early centuries
of Christianity—through authoritative teachers like Origen, Cyril of
Alexandria, Augustine, and Gregory the Great—encouraged as many as seven
“senses” of Scripture. The literal, historical, allegorical, moral, symbolic,
eschatological (the trajectory of history and growth), and “primordial” or
archetypal (commonly agreed-upon symbolism) levels of a text were often given
serious weight among scholars. These levels were gradually picked up by the
ordinary Christian through Sunday preaching (as is still true today) and
presumed to be normative by those who heard them.
These different senses of Scripture were sometimes compared
to our human senses of hearing, seeing, tasting, smelling, and touching, which
are five distinct ways of knowing the same thing, but in very different
“languages.” After both the Reformation and the Enlightenment, Western
Europeans reduced our ways of knowing to one for all practical purposes—the
supposedly rational/literal/historical. We have largely compacted and limited
the Bible to this single sense for several centuries now, in both its Catholic
and Protestant forms. Our bandwidth of spiritual access to the Bible was
consequently severely narrowed, it seems to me—and as many would say—to the
least spiritually helpful level. That something supposedly literally happened
in one exact way, in one moment of time, does not, of itself, transfer the
experience to now, me, or us. I believe that such transference is the
transformative function of any spiritual text.
The narrow, rational/literal/historical approach largely
creates an antiquarian society that prefers to look backward instead of
forward. In my experience, it creates transactional religion much more than
transformational spirituality. It idealizes individual conformity and group
belonging over love, service, or actual change of heart.
Literalism was discredited from the beginning of the New
Testament through the inclusion of four Gospel accounts of the same Jesus
event, which differ in many ways. Which is the “inerrant” one?
The earlier centuries of Christianity were much closer to
the trans-rational world of Jesus and his storytelling style of teaching (which
does not lend itself to dogmatic or systematic theology). The Gospel says, “He
would never speak to them except in parables” (Matthew 13:34). The indirect,
metaphorical, symbolic language of a story or parable seems to be Jesus’
preferred way of teaching spiritual realities.
Almost all of Jesus’ parables begin with the same phrase:
“The Reign of God is like. . . .” Jesus fully knows he is speaking in metaphor,
simile, story, and symbol. But in recent centuries, many Christians have not
granted him that freedom, and thus we miss or avoid many of his major messages.
We are much the poorer for it.
Adapted from Richard Rohr, What Do We Do with the Bible?
(CAC Publishing: 2018), 9-12, 14-15.
Our Struggle For Proper Celebration
This article is taken from the 2019 Archives of Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. You can find the original article here
We don’t know how to celebrate things as they’re meant to be celebrated. We want to, but mostly we don’t know how. Generally we celebrate badly. How do we normally celebrate? By overdoing things; by taking a lot of the things we ordinarily do, drinking, eating, talking, singing, and humoring, and bringing them to excess. For most of us, celebration means eating too much, drinking too much, singing too loudly, telling one joke too many, and hoping that somewhere in all that excess we will find the secret to make this occasion extraordinary.
We have this odd idea that we can find special joy and delight by pushing things beyond their normal limits. But there’s precious little real delight in this. Heightened enjoyment is found in connecting with others more deeply, in feeling our lives expanded, and in experiencing love and playfulness in a special way. But that doesn’t happen in a frenzy. Hence our celebrations are mostly followed by a hangover, physical and emotional. Why? Why is genuine celebration so hard to do?
Perhaps the main reason is that we struggle congenitally to simply enjoy things, to simply take life, pleasure, love, and enjoyment as gracious and free gifts from God, pure and simple. It’s not that we lack this capacity for this. God has given us this gift. More at issue is the fact that our capacity to enjoy is often mixed with inchoate feelings of guilt about experiencing pleasure (and the greater the pleasure, the deeper our feeling of guilt.) Among other things, because of this, we often struggle to enjoy what’s legitimately given us by God because, consciously or unconsciously, we feel that our experience of pleasure is somehow “stealing from God.” This is an uneasiness that particularly afflicts sensitive and moral souls. Somehow, in the name of God, we struggle to give ourselves full permission to enjoy, and this leaves us prone to excess (which is invariably a substitute for genuine enjoyment).
Whatever the reasons, we struggle with this and thus many of us go through life deprived of a healthy capacity to enjoy and, since nature will still have its way, we end up alternating between rebellious enjoyment (“pleasure we steal from God”, but feel guilty about) and dutiful discipline (which we do without a lot of delight). But we’re rarely able to genuinely celebrate. We rarely find the genuine delight we are looking for in life and this pushes us into pseudo-celebration, namely, excess. Put simply, because we struggle of give ourselves permission to enjoy, ironically we tend to pursue enjoyment too much and often not in the right ways. We confuse pleasure with delight, excess with ecstasy, and the obliteration of consciousness with heightened awareness. Because we cannot simply enjoy, we go to excess, burst our normal limits, and hope that obliterating our awareness will heighten it.
And yet, celebrate we must. We have an innate need to celebrate because certain moments and events of our lives (e.g., a birthday, a wedding, a graduation, a commitment, an achievement, or even a funeral) simply demand it. They demand to be surrounded with rituals which heighten and intensify their meaning and they demand that they be shared in a special, highlighted way with others. What we cease to celebrate we will soon cease to cherish.
The same is true of some of our deeper loving, playful, and creative moments. They too demand to be celebrated: highlighted, widened, and shared with others. We have an irrepressible need to celebrate, that’s good. Indeed the need for ecstasy is hardwired into our very DNA. But ecstasy is heightened awareness, not obliterated consciousness. Celebration is meant to intensify our awareness, not deaden it. The object of celebration is to highlight certain events and feelings so as to share them with others in an extraordinary way. But, given our misunderstandings about celebration, we mostly make pseudo-celebration, that is, we overdo things to a point where we take our own awareness and our awareness of the occasion out of the equation.
We have a lot to overcome in our struggle to come to genuine celebration. We still need to learn that heightened enjoyment is not found in excess, deeper community is not found in mindless intimacy, and heightened awareness is not found in a frenzied deadening of our consciousness. Until we learn that lesson we will still mostly trudge home hung-over, more empty, more tired, and more alone than before the party. A hangover is a sure sign that, somewhere back down the road, we missed a sign post. We struggle to know how to celebrate, but we must continue to try.
Jesus came and declared a wedding feast, a celebration, at the centre of life. They crucified him not for being too ascetical, but because he told us we should actually enjoy our lives, assuring us that God and life will give us more goodness and enjoyment than we can stand, if we can learn to receive them with the proper reverence and without undue fear.
WHAT ON EARTH AM I HERE FOR?
Weekday Masses 25th – 29th March, 2019
Monday: 12noon Devonport … The Annunciation of the Lord
7:00pm Ulverstone
Tuesday: 9:30am Penguin
Wednesday: 9:30am Latrobe
Thursday: 12noon Devonport
Friday: 9:30am
Ulverstone
7:00pm
Devonport …Stations of the Cross
7:00pm
Ulverstone …Stations of the Cross
Next Weekend 30th & 31st March, 2019 Saturday Vigil: 6:00pm Penguin
6:00pm Devonport
Sunday Mass: 8:30am Port Sorell
9:00am Ulverstone
10:30am Devonport
11:00am Sheffield
5:00pm Latrobe
Ministry Rosters 30th & 31st March, 2019
Devonport:
Readers Vigil: V Riley, A Stegmann, G Hendrey 10:30am: E Petts, K Pearce
Ministers of Communion:
Vigil: B O’Connor, R Beaton, B Windebank,
J Heatley
10:30am: K Hull, F Sly, E Petts, S Riley, S
Arrowsmith
Cleaners: 29th March: P Shelverton, E Petts 5th April: M.W.C.
Piety Shop: 30th March:
H Thompson 31st March: O McGinley
Ulverstone:
Reader/s: M & K McKenzie
Ministers of Communion: P Steyn, E Cox, C Singline, M Barry
Cleaners: M Swain, M Bryan Flowers: M Bryan
Hospitality: Filipino Community
Penguin:
Greeters Fifita Family Commentator:
E Nickols Readers: Fifita Family
Ministers of
Communion: P Lade,
M Murray Liturgy: Pine Road
Setting Up: A Landers Care of Church: T Kiely, J Reynolds
Latrobe:
Reader: M Eden Minister of
Communion: M Mackey
Procession of Gifts: M Clarke
Port Sorell:
Readers: L Post, T Jeffries Ministers of Communion: D Leaman Cleaners: G Richey, G Wyllie
Readings this Week:
Third Sunday of Lent – Year C
First Reading: Exodus 3:1-8. 13-15
Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 10:1-6, 10-12
Gospel: Luke 13:1-9
PREGO REFLECTION ON THE GOSPEL:
I enter this time of prayer slowly. As I prepare to ponder
this challenging Gospel, I ask for the loving guidance of the Holy Spirit and a
deeper confidence in the Lord’s compassion and love. I become still. As I read,
I notice what words strike me ... where am I being drawn? Perhaps I am like
someone trying to make sense of life’s tragedies … or trying to figure out who
deserves what and why? Maybe I sense, in the middle of Lent, that I am
face-to-face with Jesus the ‘discomforter’ … how does this make me feel? I may
recall occasions when I have suffered unfairly … or judged others unfairly,
perhaps seeing myself as ‘better’ than them? I ponder… The Lord desires to feed
and nurture me. Where, in my life, do I see God’s loving tenderness, as he
helps me grow and become more fruitful? Where might I be called to take this
same love to others, especially those who seem less deserving? Again I ponder
... How does Jesus seem to me now? I talk to him with great trust from the
heart… As I end my prayer, I ask to be aware of the Lord tending me, nourishing
me, perhaps even pruning me, so that I can bear fruit by going out and seeking
to tend others. Glory be …
Readings Next Week:
Fourth Sunday of
Lent – Year C
First Reading: Joshua 5:9-12
Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 5:17-21
Gospel: Luke
15:1-3. 11-32
Your prayers
are asked for the sick:
Jean O'Grady, Henry Piers, Thomas & Frances McGeown, Charlotte Milic, Jason Carr, John Kelly, Uleen Castles, Pam
Shephard, David Cole, Christina Okpon, Rose Stanley & ….
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Rose
Kirkpatrick, Neville Ross, Robert McLaren, Pat Mapley, Rita Dawkins, Graeme Sheridan, Carina
Ubay, Sandra Allison, Joan Carter
Let us pray
for those whose anniversary occurs about this time: 21st – 27th March
Myra Dare, Peggy Leary, Thomas Sage, Eva Rogers, Peter Bolster, Antonia Sciamanna, Doreen Alderson
May they Rest in Peace
Weekly
Ramblings
Thanks to all those who participated in the Archbishop’s
Prayer and Reflection evening on Tuesday at OLOL Church. Similar evenings are
being held throughout the Archdiocese during 2019 as part of the Archbishops
plan to fulfil his role as shepherd and teacher. Thanks also to the families
who provided beds for the Palavra Viva Community who are assisting the Archbishop
in this program.
Two weeks ago I included a letter with the Bulletin sharing
something of the vision of the Christian Churches in the Devonport area and
mentioning that we will be holding a 24 hour Prayer Vigil at OLOL Church on the
evening of 17th April. There are sign-up forms in the foyer of each
Mass Centre inviting Parishioners to put their name down for one of the time
slots – we will be joined by members of the other Devonport Churches who are
similarly signing up for a time of prayer.
Thanks to those people who have indicated that they are
willing to assist with the running of our Thursday Bingo Fundraising. Your
support is greatly appreciated – but, and there’s nearly always a But, we would
be grateful for any further help anyone is able to provide. The more people
able to help the greater our reserves and the less that is ‘demanded’ of our
willing volunteers. Anyone able to assist is asked to contact the Parish Office
or speak to Tony Ryan or Merv Tippett who can give you more information.
This Monday (25th) is the Feast of the
Annunciation and there will be Masses at OLOL (12 noon) and Sacred Heart (7pm).
All parishioners are encouraged to attend Mass if they are able.
A reminder that there is a Meeting for those who are
involved in the preparation for our Holy week and Easter ceremonies next
Saturday afternoon (30th) at 2pm at the Parish House.
At the time of writing I don’t know the winner of the Geel
v Coll game on Friday night but I do know that the Footy margins fundraiser is
an important part of our Parish Fundraising activities. For $2 per week you are
in the running to win $100 – but you have to be in it to win it (to quote an
old game show!). Tickets available at various Mass Centres or from the Parish
Office.
Please take care
PROJECT
COMPASSION – GIVE LENT 100%
LIVES CHANGE WHEN WE ALL GIVE
100%
Peter is thrilled to now have clean water
on tap at his boarding school. Long walks to unsafe water sources were tiring
for Peter, who is living with a disability. With more free time and fewer
illnesses caused by dirty water, Peter can fulfil his hope of focusing on his
studies, providing him with a brighter future.
Please donate to Project
Compassion 2019 and help young people with disabilities gain access to clean
water in the Solomon Islands, providing hope for a brighter future. You can make
your donation through Parish boxes and envelopes or by phoning 1800 024 413 or
visiting www.caritas.org.au/projectcompassion.
OUR LENTEN LITURGY IN 2019:
Our words, actions and music in the liturgy lead us ever
deeper into the paschal mystery this Lent:
- After
the introduction, Mass begins with the priest greeting from the rear of
the church and then proceeds while Kyrie
Eleison or Lord have mercy is
sung. On each of the Sundays of Lent, the Rite of Sprinkling (Asperges)
will take place during the singing of the Kyrie. The name ‘Asperges’ comes from the first word in the 9th
verse of Psalm
51
in the Latin
translation, the Vulgate.
- By
having moments of silence before and after the readings and after the
homily RGIRM (2007) 45.
- At
the breaking of the bread (the Fraction Rite) there will be a short
narrative before intoning the Lamb of God
- There
is no Gloria or Alleluia verse (replaced by a Gospel acclamation).
- The second collection will be taken up when stickers are being given to children - not during the reflection hymn.
A huge thank you to everyone who contributed and helped at
the St Mary’s Church Penguin BBQ last Saturday night. It was a sumptuous
meal and a good community gathering. Also thank you for all of the good
wishes to us on our 50th wedding anniversary.
Yvonne & Ray Downes.
There will be a special collection after Mass at Penguin on
Saturday
March 30th to raise funds to assist in the Chaplaincy work at the
Penguin School.
MACKILLOP HILL:
Spirituality in the Coffee Shoppe. Monday 25th March 10:30am – 12
noon. Come along … enjoy a lively discussion over morning tea! 123 William Street, FORTH. Phone: 6428:3095. No
bookings necessary. Donation appreciated.
SACRED HEART SCHOOL FAIR:
Buttons Avenue Ulverstone, Saturday 6th April
10am – 2pm. Entry is free – featuring cake stall (donations of cakes,
slice grateful accepted) produce, chocolate wheel, rides, craft, food live
entertainment and much more. Come along and have some fun!
OUR LADY OF LOURDES SCHOOL:
Our Lady of Lourdes currently have places available for
enrolment in Kinder and Grade 1. Allow your children or grandchildren to
flourish in a learning community where we are Christ-centred, student-focused
with learning for life. Inquiries phone: 6424:1744 email: olol@catholic.tas.edu.au
School Tours available on request.
Thursday Nights - OLOL Hall,
Devonport. Eyes down 7.30pm!
Callers Thursday 28th March
– Tony Ryan & Graeme Rigney.
Many Ways Of Knowing
This article is taken from the Daily Emails from Fr Richard Rohr OFM and the Center for Action and Contemplation. You can subscribe to receive the emails here
Unknown to many post-Reformation Christians, early centuries
of Christianity—through authoritative teachers like Origen, Cyril of
Alexandria, Augustine, and Gregory the Great—encouraged as many as seven
“senses” of Scripture. The literal, historical, allegorical, moral, symbolic,
eschatological (the trajectory of history and growth), and “primordial” or
archetypal (commonly agreed-upon symbolism) levels of a text were often given
serious weight among scholars. These levels were gradually picked up by the
ordinary Christian through Sunday preaching (as is still true today) and
presumed to be normative by those who heard them.
These different senses of Scripture were sometimes compared
to our human senses of hearing, seeing, tasting, smelling, and touching, which
are five distinct ways of knowing the same thing, but in very different
“languages.” After both the Reformation and the Enlightenment, Western
Europeans reduced our ways of knowing to one for all practical purposes—the
supposedly rational/literal/historical. We have largely compacted and limited
the Bible to this single sense for several centuries now, in both its Catholic
and Protestant forms. Our bandwidth of spiritual access to the Bible was
consequently severely narrowed, it seems to me—and as many would say—to the
least spiritually helpful level. That something supposedly literally happened
in one exact way, in one moment of time, does not, of itself, transfer the
experience to now, me, or us. I believe that such transference is the
transformative function of any spiritual text.
The narrow, rational/literal/historical approach largely
creates an antiquarian society that prefers to look backward instead of
forward. In my experience, it creates transactional religion much more than
transformational spirituality. It idealizes individual conformity and group
belonging over love, service, or actual change of heart.
Literalism was discredited from the beginning of the New
Testament through the inclusion of four Gospel accounts of the same Jesus
event, which differ in many ways. Which is the “inerrant” one?
The earlier centuries of Christianity were much closer to
the trans-rational world of Jesus and his storytelling style of teaching (which
does not lend itself to dogmatic or systematic theology). The Gospel says, “He
would never speak to them except in parables” (Matthew 13:34). The indirect,
metaphorical, symbolic language of a story or parable seems to be Jesus’
preferred way of teaching spiritual realities.
Almost all of Jesus’ parables begin with the same phrase:
“The Reign of God is like. . . .” Jesus fully knows he is speaking in metaphor,
simile, story, and symbol. But in recent centuries, many Christians have not
granted him that freedom, and thus we miss or avoid many of his major messages.
We are much the poorer for it.
Adapted from Richard Rohr, What Do We Do with the Bible?
(CAC Publishing: 2018), 9-12, 14-15.
Our Struggle For Proper Celebration
This article is taken from the 2019 Archives of Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. You can find the original article here
We don’t know how to celebrate things as they’re meant to be celebrated. We want to, but mostly we don’t know how. Generally we celebrate badly. How do we normally celebrate? By overdoing things; by taking a lot of the things we ordinarily do, drinking, eating, talking, singing, and humoring, and bringing them to excess. For most of us, celebration means eating too much, drinking too much, singing too loudly, telling one joke too many, and hoping that somewhere in all that excess we will find the secret to make this occasion extraordinary.
We have this odd idea that we can find special joy and delight by pushing things beyond their normal limits. But there’s precious little real delight in this. Heightened enjoyment is found in connecting with others more deeply, in feeling our lives expanded, and in experiencing love and playfulness in a special way. But that doesn’t happen in a frenzy. Hence our celebrations are mostly followed by a hangover, physical and emotional. Why? Why is genuine celebration so hard to do?
Perhaps the main reason is that we struggle congenitally to simply enjoy things, to simply take life, pleasure, love, and enjoyment as gracious and free gifts from God, pure and simple. It’s not that we lack this capacity for this. God has given us this gift. More at issue is the fact that our capacity to enjoy is often mixed with inchoate feelings of guilt about experiencing pleasure (and the greater the pleasure, the deeper our feeling of guilt.) Among other things, because of this, we often struggle to enjoy what’s legitimately given us by God because, consciously or unconsciously, we feel that our experience of pleasure is somehow “stealing from God.” This is an uneasiness that particularly afflicts sensitive and moral souls. Somehow, in the name of God, we struggle to give ourselves full permission to enjoy, and this leaves us prone to excess (which is invariably a substitute for genuine enjoyment).
Whatever the reasons, we struggle with this and thus many of us go through life deprived of a healthy capacity to enjoy and, since nature will still have its way, we end up alternating between rebellious enjoyment (“pleasure we steal from God”, but feel guilty about) and dutiful discipline (which we do without a lot of delight). But we’re rarely able to genuinely celebrate. We rarely find the genuine delight we are looking for in life and this pushes us into pseudo-celebration, namely, excess. Put simply, because we struggle of give ourselves permission to enjoy, ironically we tend to pursue enjoyment too much and often not in the right ways. We confuse pleasure with delight, excess with ecstasy, and the obliteration of consciousness with heightened awareness. Because we cannot simply enjoy, we go to excess, burst our normal limits, and hope that obliterating our awareness will heighten it.
And yet, celebrate we must. We have an innate need to celebrate because certain moments and events of our lives (e.g., a birthday, a wedding, a graduation, a commitment, an achievement, or even a funeral) simply demand it. They demand to be surrounded with rituals which heighten and intensify their meaning and they demand that they be shared in a special, highlighted way with others. What we cease to celebrate we will soon cease to cherish.
The same is true of some of our deeper loving, playful, and creative moments. They too demand to be celebrated: highlighted, widened, and shared with others. We have an irrepressible need to celebrate, that’s good. Indeed the need for ecstasy is hardwired into our very DNA. But ecstasy is heightened awareness, not obliterated consciousness. Celebration is meant to intensify our awareness, not deaden it. The object of celebration is to highlight certain events and feelings so as to share them with others in an extraordinary way. But, given our misunderstandings about celebration, we mostly make pseudo-celebration, that is, we overdo things to a point where we take our own awareness and our awareness of the occasion out of the equation.
We have a lot to overcome in our struggle to come to genuine celebration. We still need to learn that heightened enjoyment is not found in excess, deeper community is not found in mindless intimacy, and heightened awareness is not found in a frenzied deadening of our consciousness. Until we learn that lesson we will still mostly trudge home hung-over, more empty, more tired, and more alone than before the party. A hangover is a sure sign that, somewhere back down the road, we missed a sign post. We struggle to know how to celebrate, but we must continue to try.
Jesus came and declared a wedding feast, a celebration, at the centre of life. They crucified him not for being too ascetical, but because he told us we should actually enjoy our lives, assuring us that God and life will give us more goodness and enjoyment than we can stand, if we can learn to receive them with the proper reverence and without undue fear.
WHAT ON EARTH AM I HERE FOR?
This article is taken from the weekly blog written by Fr Michael White - Pastor of the Church of the Nativity, Timonium, Maryland. You can find the blog here
We are in the third week of our Lenten message series asking the basic question “Why?” “Why am I doing this?” “What am I here for?”
Sometimes it can happen at a party when we don’t know many people or feel out of place, especially if you are an introvert like me. Or we step into a situation and it is not what we thought it was going to be. It probably, maybe definitely happened to you in school. You are sitting in some class or another, thinking, “I will never need this information.”
It’s not really a big deal, unless and until it is a question we begin asking about major areas of our life, like
- our vocation and direction in life
- our jobs and careers
- our friendships and relationships
And it is even bigger deal to know our “why” when it comes to the whole span of our lives.
In the busyness of life, the “why” question usually doesn’t get asked early enough or often enough. We’re just too busy.
But answering the question, “why” is vitally important. It provides purpose and meaning and adds value, it will get us through the difficult times and make the good times far more enjoyable.
The purpose of life is to begin to live in the light of eternity and we do that in five specific ways:
Worship – you were planned for God’s pleasure
Fellowship – you were formed for God’s family
Discipleship – you were created to be like Christ
Ministry – you were shaped to serve God and others
Mission – you were made to bring Christ to the world
Authentically living out these purposes, or even just trying, will grow our character and bear good fruit. So we’re taking the 40 days of Lent and focusing on each purpose, both in our weekend messages in big church and in our small group curriculum (both available on our web site). We’re also inviting everyone to read a chapter a day from Pastor Rick Warren’s book What On Earth Am I Here For? which is the basis for our series.
Over a decade ago we hosted this same program as a parish wide Lenten project, we called it “40 Days of Purpose.” It was, quite literally, transformative for the life of the parish, forming the foundation for our parish renewal and rebuilding and birthing our small groups program. We’re hoping for another bountiful harvest this Lent. Join us.
The Sermon And The Whisper
This article can be found on the ThinkingFaith.org website by clicking here
On 21 March each year, we celebrate a literary form that has a tendency to divide its readership. This World Poetry Day, Nathan Koblintz invites us to read works by two celebrated poets, Gerard Manley Hopkins SJ and Emily Dickinson. In letting their poems speak to us about faith, can we understand how poetry can be a way of leading us closer to God? Nathan Koblintz is a former member of the Thinking Faith editorial board.
At some point in every literature student’s career, you are handed two poems and invited to wrestle with those old beasts, Compare and Contrast. They stand guard over a cave in which we are promised some kind of revelation awaits discovery. You take the two poems and make the approach. Proximity unmasks the guardians: they are not monsters, they are bureaucrats who insist you swamp your heart with abstractions, couch your enthusiasm in unsatisfactory similes, and what we usually find behind them is an unsatisfactory essay about rhyme schemes, structure and the poet’s ‘use of language’. As a teacher I have had many students turn around once the fight is done and ask, ‘But what’s the point?’ World Poetry Day invites us to ask that same question: what is the value of poetry?
The Catholic tradition offers us a very useful tool to approach this question. The practice of Lectio Divina demands that we slow down and listen to a text – very different to our normal process of reading, when our main concern is to absorb the information as rapidly as possible and move on. The first stage of Lectio Divina is about spending time with words, listening rather than hunting for meaning. It is impossible to do this in a classroom or examination hall with poetry, and this is one of the reasons why many of us have never had a relationship with a poem: our first experience is having to ‘do’ a poem in a forty-minute class, with fast-tracked insight and analysis rewarded.[1]
Several years ago I wrote that poetry of any ilk can be of value to people of faith in the attention it draws to the significance of every fleck of life. This World Poetry Day I want to share the experience of linking two poems explicitly concerned with faith. Poetry does three things: it records; it communicates; and it creates a new thing in the world. In all three activities it can lead us closer to God.
The remainder of this article can be found on the ThinkingFaith.org website by clicking here
This article is taken from the weekly blog written by Fr Michael White - Pastor of the Church of the Nativity, Timonium, Maryland. You can find the blog here
We are in the third week of our Lenten message series asking the basic question “Why?” “Why am I doing this?” “What am I here for?”
Sometimes it can happen at a party when we don’t know many people or feel out of place, especially if you are an introvert like me. Or we step into a situation and it is not what we thought it was going to be. It probably, maybe definitely happened to you in school. You are sitting in some class or another, thinking, “I will never need this information.”
It’s not really a big deal, unless and until it is a question we begin asking about major areas of our life, like
- our vocation and direction in life
- our jobs and careers
- our friendships and relationships
And it is even bigger deal to know our “why” when it comes to the whole span of our lives.
In the busyness of life, the “why” question usually doesn’t get asked early enough or often enough. We’re just too busy.
But answering the question, “why” is vitally important. It provides purpose and meaning and adds value, it will get us through the difficult times and make the good times far more enjoyable.
The purpose of life is to begin to live in the light of eternity and we do that in five specific ways:
Worship – you were planned for God’s pleasure
Fellowship – you were formed for God’s family
Discipleship – you were created to be like Christ
Ministry – you were shaped to serve God and others
Mission – you were made to bring Christ to the world
Authentically living out these purposes, or even just trying, will grow our character and bear good fruit. So we’re taking the 40 days of Lent and focusing on each purpose, both in our weekend messages in big church and in our small group curriculum (both available on our web site). We’re also inviting everyone to read a chapter a day from Pastor Rick Warren’s book What On Earth Am I Here For? which is the basis for our series.
Over a decade ago we hosted this same program as a parish wide Lenten project, we called it “40 Days of Purpose.” It was, quite literally, transformative for the life of the parish, forming the foundation for our parish renewal and rebuilding and birthing our small groups program. We’re hoping for another bountiful harvest this Lent. Join us.
The Sermon And The Whisper
This article can be found on the ThinkingFaith.org website by clicking here
On 21 March each year, we celebrate a literary form that has a tendency to divide its readership. This World Poetry Day, Nathan Koblintz invites us to read works by two celebrated poets, Gerard Manley Hopkins SJ and Emily Dickinson. In letting their poems speak to us about faith, can we understand how poetry can be a way of leading us closer to God? Nathan Koblintz is a former member of the Thinking Faith editorial board.
At some point in every literature student’s career, you are handed two poems and invited to wrestle with those old beasts, Compare and Contrast. They stand guard over a cave in which we are promised some kind of revelation awaits discovery. You take the two poems and make the approach. Proximity unmasks the guardians: they are not monsters, they are bureaucrats who insist you swamp your heart with abstractions, couch your enthusiasm in unsatisfactory similes, and what we usually find behind them is an unsatisfactory essay about rhyme schemes, structure and the poet’s ‘use of language’. As a teacher I have had many students turn around once the fight is done and ask, ‘But what’s the point?’ World Poetry Day invites us to ask that same question: what is the value of poetry?
The Catholic tradition offers us a very useful tool to approach this question. The practice of Lectio Divina demands that we slow down and listen to a text – very different to our normal process of reading, when our main concern is to absorb the information as rapidly as possible and move on. The first stage of Lectio Divina is about spending time with words, listening rather than hunting for meaning. It is impossible to do this in a classroom or examination hall with poetry, and this is one of the reasons why many of us have never had a relationship with a poem: our first experience is having to ‘do’ a poem in a forty-minute class, with fast-tracked insight and analysis rewarded.[1]
Several years ago I wrote that poetry of any ilk can be of value to people of faith in the attention it draws to the significance of every fleck of life. This World Poetry Day I want to share the experience of linking two poems explicitly concerned with faith. Poetry does three things: it records; it communicates; and it creates a new thing in the world. In all three activities it can lead us closer to God.
The remainder of this article can be found on the ThinkingFaith.org website by clicking here
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