Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
Parish Priest: Fr Mike Delaney
Mob: 0417 279 437
mike.delaney@aohtas.org.au
Deacon in Residence: Steven SmithMob: 0411 522 630
steven.smith@aohtas.org.au
Priest in Residence: Fr Phil McCormack
Mob: 0437 521 257
pmccormack43@bigpond.com
Deacon in Residence: Rev Steven Smith
Mob: 0411 522 630
steven.smith@aohtas.org.au
Postal Address: PO Box 362, Devonport 7310
Parish Office: 90 Stewart Street, Devonport 7310
(Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday 10am - 3pm)
Office Phone: 6424 2783 Fax: 6423 5160
Email: merseyleven@aohtas.org.au
Secretary: Annie Davies
Finance Officer: Anne Fisher
Pastoral Council Chair: Felicity Sly
Mob: 0418 301 573
fsly@internode.on.net
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
THE FOLLOWING PUBLIC ACTIVITIES ARE SUSPENDED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE
Eucharistic Adoration Devonport, Benediction with Adoration Devonport,
Legion of Mary, Prayer Group.
NO PUBLIC MASSES UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE DUE TO THE COVID-19 (CORONAVIRUS) PANDEMIC
DAILY AND
SUNDAY MASS ONLINE: You
will need to go to the following link and register: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_gHY-gMZ7SZeGMDSJyTDeAQ
Sunday 26th April 9:00am 3rd Sunday of Easter
If you are looking for Sunday Mass readings or Daily Mass readings,
Universalis has the readings as well
as the various Hours of the Divine Office - https://universalis.com/mass.htm
Your prayers are asked for the sick:
Barry Mulcahy, Mark Aylett, Tony Kiely, Sand Frankcombe, Judith Xavier, Pat Barker, Paul Richardson, & …
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Irene Blachford, Barry Quinn, Peter Phair, Vanessa Beasley, Lorna Watson, Graham Taylor, Bill Bracken, Bill Halley, Elizabeth Heckscher,
Charles Johnson, Edward King, Annette Camaya
Let us pray for those whose anniversary occurs about this time: 22nd – 28th April, 2020
John Redl, Lillian Stubbs, Lola O’Halloran, Fr Terry Southerwood, Joyce Sheehan, Flo Smith, Emily Sherriff, Courtney Bryan, Rita McQueen, Ellen Lynch, Ronald Allison, Delia Soden, Ron Batten, Cedric Davey, Maureen Beechey, Frances Hunt, Beverley O’Connor, Mark McCormack, Brian Leary, Heather Mahoney.
May the souls of the faithful departed,
through the mercy of
God, rest in peace. Amen
PREGO REFLECTION ON TODAY’S GOSPEL:
I come to my place of prayer and give time to entering gently into God’s
presence.
I then read this long but beautiful text slowly.
Perhaps I can imagine the scene, and walk with the disciples.
I try to enter into their feelings which may be, or may have been, mine –
feeling aimless, lost, downcast, discouraged, disappointed, grieving ...
Jesus walks with them.
How am I aware of this in my life?
How have I been helped by him in the guise of a friend, a teacher...?
I join the disciples at table.
I may give thanks for the gift of the Eucharist,
for companionship, for receiving strength to return to my family, my
community with a new heart.
Weekly Ramblings
We continue with our Livestreaming and Prayer session
during this coming week – 9am for Mass each morning except Monday and prayer at
midday on Wednesday. There will also be a couple of Fr Mike’s Ramblings during
the week as well as a couple of emails keeping you updated on what is
happening.
Thanks to those who have reached out to others in our
community to let us know how people are getting on. I know that there are still
heaps of people who aren’t getting newsletters or emails – please, if you know
of someone who is missing out can you ask them to contact us in the Parish
Office so we can reach out to them. I was in the supermarket the other morning
and got an email address – can happen anywhere.
I will continue to add articles and thought pieces to the
Daily Living Page (https://mikeadelaney.blogspot.com)
and invite you to drop by and have a look at what people from around the world
are saying about the Church and the challenges facing the Church at this time.
Again, I would like to thank Deacon Steven Smith for his
great work in getting our FaceBook page up and running, and keeping it running.
Let family and friends know about the site – it becomes easier to find the more
people who like and follow the page. You can find the page here - https://www.facebook.com/MLCP1/
Again, please stay safe, stay sane and if possible stay at
home, cheers
CONTEMPLATIVE
PRAYER:
·
Centering
Prayer - a receptive method of silent
prayer
· Chanting
– a contemplative practice of praying the psalms which naturally draws our
focus to the present and calms the dualistic mind.
If you are not familiar with these
forms of prayer, I encourage you to give it a go. In this initial program over 4 weeks there will be appropriate
teaching to enable you to engage and incorporate into your own prayer. When?
Wednesdays at 7 pm. Could you
please let me (John) know by email if you are interested in this initial
program, and then I can send you the log in details. Email:
john.leearcher@gmail.com
ONLINE GIVING:
Please support the work of Caritas/Project Compassion by
making your Project Compassion offering online: Bank: CBA, Account Name:
Caritas Australia. BSB: 062438
Account No: 10038330. Reference please put Agent Number 187907 then your
surname.
Letter From Rome
A Church (And World) In Denial That Just Can't Stop Itself
The pandemic has shown that even Catholics believe they are what they do - Robert Mickens, Rome, April 24, 2020.
This article is from the La-Croix International website - you can access the site here but complete full access is via paid subscription
The coronavirus pandemic has thrown a wrench in the whole world's plans.
The fact of the matter is that we must stop our normal activity, especially if it includes gathering in any proximity to other people.
We must stop life as we once knew it until scientists find a cure or a vaccine for COVID-19. Otherwise, there is a risk that hundreds of thousands or even millions more people will die.
As I write, the disease has already killed nearly 200,000 people. The figure is moving towards 50,000 deaths in the United States alone.
Lockdown, the serious way
Here in Italy, where more than 25,000 have died of the coronavirus, we are completing the sixth week of home confinement. That's right – a month-and-a-half of serious lockdown.
Streets are devoid of cars and the usually crowded piazzas are deserted. Hardly anyone is seen outside and almost all the shops and business remain closed.
Except for three or four regions in the very north of the country, this draconian lockdown has successfully kept hospitalizations and the death toll to levels that would have been even more horrific otherwise.
France and Spain have done pretty much the same as Italy. The United States and England have not.
After just a few weeks of confinement, people – most who live in spacious, freestanding homes with gardens – already have "cabin fever", said Donald Trump, and are itching to get back to life as it was before this pesky virus brought a sudden halt to the greatest economy in the history of anything.
One US politician, whose father made a financial killing on the evasion of Iraq and near obliteration of a big section of the Middle East, said brashly that America (sic.) is a great nation that cannot be slowed by sickness.
Talk of war
World leaders talk about the pandemic as if waging a war against an invisible enemy. Might may make right in an economic and social system rigged in favor of the rich and powerful, but it cannot stop a lethal virus.
The only possible war metaphor that can be applied here (and even this is way off the mark) is that of an unarmed population being continuously bombed. The only response in such a situation is to duck and take cover – to hide.
You cannot fight it. You cannot go about your normal, everyday lives. If you try, more and more and more people will die.
But it seems some world leaders and local politicians are willing to move in that very direction. The mayor of Las Vegas, for example, wants to re-open all the casinos in her fabulous adult entertainment capital of the world.
Even normal folks are finding it hard to grasp the reality of what a pandemic means – that it is everywhere, all over the world.
Traveling to the state of denial
Millions of people have had to cancel trips to other countries they were scheduled to make this spring and summer.
Some have told me breezily that they hope to re-schedule these foreign travels for October or November, even those who have found that almost no airline is taking reservations right now.
Still, they are determined to get on with life as usual.
All this, friends, is called denial.
We cannot continue life right now as it was before the pandemic. And we probably won't be able to do so for quite some time. But, even then, it will not be exactly the same.
The coronavirus should be making us all stop. But, instead, it's "go, go, go"! The world's modus vivendi is really its modus faciendi.
And where are our Catholic spiritual leaders in all this? Unfortunately, a great many of them are acting no differently that certain politicians and civic officials. Rather than stop, they are trying to do everything they can not to stop.
They have doubled down on clerical activism.
What happened to "being is more important than doing"?
The only thing more shocking about this is that more of the Catholic faithful are not shocked. Too many of them have also responded in the same way – trying to keep everything going as before in the virtual reality of a cyber-church.
Popes and priests for a very long time have been warning people of the dangers of a consumerist lifestyle, trying to convince them that "being" is much more important than "doing" or "having".
But the way many of our ordained clerics have responded to the coronavirus makes them seem more like pop psychologists who turn important truths into silly-sounding slogans: "You are who you are, not what you do".
The forced lockdown should have been the moment for spiritual leaders to stand up and calmly, but firmly, remind their people that this is an opportunity – a summons – to stop "doing".
And since this is going to last for a long while yet, they still have the chance to practice what they preach.
Instead, most priests – and even the pope – have been trying to find ways NOT to stop. They want to keep doing – saying Mass, preaching, lecturing, telling people how to run their spiritual (and material) lives… even if that is over a TV screen or computer monitor.
"The Christian of the future will be a mystic…"
This is a time when our spiritual leaders should be helping their people accept that there can be no "doing" right now. One would hope they have been given the spiritual formation to help people find ways of navigating this time of non-doing.
Let's be clear: we cannot really "participate" in a virtual Mass any more than we can share a virtual handshake, hug or kiss. Some things demand real presence. It's amazing how many Catholic priests and people seem to have forgotten this.
Karl Rahner, who was one of the most important theologians in the initial years following the Second Vatican Council (1962-55), had a clear sense of what it would mean to be a believer in the post-confessional age.
"The Christian of the future will be a mystic or will not exist at all," the German Jesuit said.
Other theologians have since debated whether he was right or not. And they've even argued over what he meant.
But it seems his point was that Christians in a largely de-Christianized world would have to find their union with God, not in places and things that primitive religion marks out as "sacred", but in that which it abhors as "mundane".
What would Rahner say about the Church's response to COVID-19?
Rahner wrote extensively about the incarnate (and incarnational) God and said this God can and must be "experienced" in the living reality all around us.
Rather than mundane, this created reality is infused with transcendence, precisely because of the Incarnation of God in the person of Jesus the Christ.
There are, no doubt, many Catholics – including priests – who would disagree. For them, so-called "temple worship" is what is most essential. Their spirituality (or religious duty) can only be exercised within the confines of sacred spaces and with holy things.
That is certainly not how Rahner saw it.
The Jesuit theologian died in 1984, shortly after reaching his 80th birthday. So we don't now exactly what he would have thought of the way Catholics have been dealing with the liturgical lockdown imposed by the current pandemic.
But he probably would not have approved. In fact, some of his more progressive-thinking admirers might be surprised that he opposed televising the Mass.
"The desire to be modern may very soon turn out to be highly un-modern," he said in the late 1950s.
"Once the TV set has become part of the ordinary furniture of the average person, and once he is used to being the spectator of just about anything between heaven and earth on which an indiscriminately curious camera preys, then it will be an unbelievably exciting thing for the philistine of the twenty-first century that there still are things which one cannot view while sitting in a recliner and chewing on a burger."
Contemplative Consciousness
This article is taken from the Daily Email sent by Fr Richard Rohr OFM from the Center for Action and Contemplation. You can subscribe to receive the email by clicking here
I’ve heard some concerns over the years that contemplation
is a practice of “Eastern” meditation wrapped in a Christian disguise. Some
Christians have even been taught that seeking union with God through silence
makes room for the “devil” to get in. While understandable, these apprehensions
are based on a lack of knowledge about Christian heritage. In addition to
Jesus’ own practice of prayerful solitude, we also have the lives and teachings
of the Desert Fathers and Mothers. Starting with Anthony the Great in 270 CE,
thousands of Christians moved to the deserts of Egypt, Syria, and Palestine to
form alternative Christian communities. These brave souls were on fire with
love for Jesus and sought to become more like him through a disciplined rhythm
of life and prayer.
The desert mystics focused much more on the how than the
what, which is very different from Christianity’s primary emphasis on beliefs
and doctrines in recent centuries. The desert tradition offers a rich teaching
of surrender, through contemplation, to the wonderful and always too-much
mystery of God. Some have said that the Desert Fathers (abbas) and Mothers
(ammas) are like the Zen Buddhist monks of Christianity. Their koan-like
sayings cannot usually be understood with the rational, logical mind, which is
perhaps why their teachings fell out of favor during the Enlightenment.
Above all, the desert mystics’ primary quest was for God,
for Love; everything else was secondary. Thomas Merton (1915–1968) helped
modern Christianity recover an awareness of contemplative practice, in part
inspired by his reading of the Desert Fathers and Mothers. Merton wrote: “All
through the Verba Seniorum [Latin for Words of the Elders] we find a repeated
insistence on the primacy of love over everything else in the spiritual life:
over knowledge, gnosis, asceticism, contemplation, solitude, prayer. Love in
fact is the spiritual life, and without it all the other exercises of the
spirit, however lofty, are emptied of content and become mere illusions. The
more lofty they are, the more dangerous the illusion.” [1]
The Desert Fathers and Mothers focused on these primary
practices in their search for God: 1) leaving, to some extent, the systems of
the world; 2) a degree of solitude to break from the maddening crowd; 3) times
of silence to break from the maddening mind; and 4) “technologies” for
controlling the compulsivity of mind and the emotions. All of this was for the
sake of growing a person capable of love and community.
Contemplation became a solid foundation for building a
civilization and human community—not just in the wilderness centuries ago but
in the world today. Contemplative consciousness labels things less easily and
does not attach itself to one solitary definitive meaning. In contemplation,
one experiences all things as somehow created in the image of God and therefore
of equal dignity and deserving of respect.
[1] The Wisdom of the Desert: Sayings from the Desert
Fathers of the Fourth Century, trans. Thomas Merton (New Directions: 1960), 17.
Churches As Field Hospitals
This article is taken from the archive of Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. You can find this article and many others by clicking here
Most of us are familiar with Pope Francis’ comment that today the church needs to be a field hospital. What’s implied here?
First, that right now the church is not a field hospital, or at least not much of one. Too many churches of all denominations see the world more as an opponent to be fought than as a battlefield strewn with wounded persons to whom they are called to minister. The churches today, in the words of Pope Francis, have often reversed an image in the Book of Revelation where Jesus stands outside the door knocking, trying to come in, to a situation where Jesus is knocking on the door from inside the church, trying to get out.
So how might our churches, our ecclesial communities, become field hospitals?
In a wonderfully provocative article in a recent issue of America Magazine, Czech spiritual writer, Tomas Halik, suggests that for our ecclesial communities to become “field hospitals” they must assume three roles: A Diagnostic one – wherein they identify the signs of the times; a Preventive one – wherein they create an immune system in a world within which malignant viruses of fear, hatred, populism, and nationalism are tearing communities apart; and a Convalescent one – wherein they help the world overcome the traumas of the past through forgiveness.
How, concretely, might each of these be envisaged?
Our churches need to be diagnostic; they need to name the present moment in a prophetic way. But that calls for a courage that, right now, seems lacking, derailed by fear and ideology. Liberals and conservatives diagnose the present moment in radically different ways, not because the facts aren’t the same for both, but because each of them is seeing things through its own ideology. As well, at the end of the day, both camps seem too frightened to look at the hard issues square on, both afraid of what they might see.
To name just one issue that both seem afraid to look at with unblinking eyes: our rapidly emptying churches and the fact that so many of our own children are no longer going to church or identifying with a church. Conservatives simplistically blame secularism, without ever really being willing to openly debate the various critiques of the churches coming from almost every part of society. Liberals, for their part, tend to simplistically blame conservative rigidity without really being open to courageously look at some of places within secularity where faith in a transcendent God and an incarnate Christ run antithetical to some of the cultural ethos and ideologies within secularity. Both sides, as is evident from their excessive defensiveness, seem afraid to look at all the issues.
What must we do preventatively to turn our churches into field hospitals? The image Halik proposes here is rich but is intelligible only within an understanding of the Body of Christ and an acceptance of the deep connection we have with each other inside the family of humanity. We are all one, one living organism, parts of a single body, so that, as with any living body, what any one part does, for disease or health, affects every other part. And the health of a body is contingent upon its immune system, upon those enzymes that roam throughout the body and kill off cancerous cells. Today our world is beset with cancerous cells of bitterness, hatred, lying, self-protecting fear, and tribalism of every kind. Our world is mortally ill; suffering from a cancer that’s destroying community.
Hence our ecclesial communities must become places that generate the healthy enzymes that are needed to kill off those cancer cells. We must create an immune system robust enough to do this. And for that to happen, we must first, ourselves, stop being part of the cancer of hatred, lying, fear, opposition, and tribalism. Too often, we ourselves are the cancerous cells. The single biggest religious challenge facing us as ecclesial communities today it that of creating an immune system that’s healthy and vigorous enough to help kill off the cancerous cells of hatred, fear, lying, and tribalism that float freely throughout the world.
Finally, our convalescent role: Our ecclesial communities need to help the world come to a deeper reconciliation vis-a-vis the traumas of the past. Happily, this is one of our strengths. Our churches are sanctuaries of forgiveness. In the words of Cardinal Francis George: “In society everything is permitted, but nothing is forgiven; in the church much is prohibited, but everything is forgiven.” But where we need to be more proactive as sanctuaries of forgiveness today is in relation to a number of salient “traumas of the past”. In brief, a deeper forgiveness, healing, and atonement still needs to take place apposite the world’s history with colonization, slavery, the status of women, the torture and disappearance of peoples, the mistreatment of refugees, the perennial support of unjust regimes, and the atonement owed to mother earth herself. Our churches must lead this effort.
Our ecclesial communities as field hospitals can be the Galilee of today.
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: BY APPOINTMENT ONLY
THE FOLLOWING PUBLIC ACTIVITIES ARE SUSPENDED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE
Eucharistic Adoration Devonport, Benediction with Adoration Devonport,
Legion of Mary, Prayer Group.
NO PUBLIC MASSES UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE DUE TO THE COVID-19 (CORONAVIRUS) PANDEMIC
DAILY AND
SUNDAY MASS ONLINE: You
will need to go to the following link and register: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_gHY-gMZ7SZeGMDSJyTDeAQ
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email
containing information about joining the webinar. Please keep this
confirmation email as that will be your entry point for all further Masses or Liturgies.
Sunday 26th April 9:00am 3rd Sunday of Easter
Monday 27th April No Mass … St Louis Grignion
de Montfort
Tuesday 28th April 9:00am … St Peter Chanel
Wednesday 29th April 9:00am … St Catherine of
Siena
Thursday 30th April 9:00am … St Pius V
Friday 1st May 9:00am
… St Joseph the Worker
Saturday 2nd May 9:00am … St Athanasius
Sunday 3rd May 9:00am
If you are looking for Sunday Mass readings or Daily Mass readings,
Universalis has the readings as well
as the various Hours of the Divine Office - https://universalis.com/mass.htm
Your prayers are asked for the sick:Barry Mulcahy, Mark Aylett, Tony Kiely, Sand Frankcombe, Judith Xavier, Pat Barker, Paul Richardson, & …
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Irene Blachford, Barry Quinn, Peter Phair, Vanessa Beasley, Lorna Watson, Graham Taylor, Bill Bracken, Bill Halley, Elizabeth Heckscher,
Charles Johnson, Edward King, Annette Camaya
Let us pray for those whose anniversary occurs about this time: 22nd – 28th April, 2020
John Redl, Lillian Stubbs, Lola O’Halloran, Fr Terry Southerwood, Joyce Sheehan, Flo Smith, Emily Sherriff, Courtney Bryan, Rita McQueen, Ellen Lynch, Ronald Allison, Delia Soden, Ron Batten, Cedric Davey, Maureen Beechey, Frances Hunt, Beverley O’Connor, Mark McCormack, Brian Leary, Heather Mahoney.
May the souls of the faithful departed,
through the mercy of
God, rest in peace. Amen
PREGO REFLECTION ON TODAY’S GOSPEL:
I come to my place of prayer and give time to entering gently into God’s
presence.
I then read this long but beautiful text slowly.
Perhaps I can imagine the scene, and walk with the disciples.
I try to enter into their feelings which may be, or may have been, mine –
feeling aimless, lost, downcast, discouraged, disappointed, grieving ...
Jesus walks with them.
How am I aware of this in my life?
How have I been helped by him in the guise of a friend, a teacher...?
I join the disciples at table.
I may give thanks for the gift of the Eucharist,
for companionship, for receiving strength to return to my family, my
community with a new heart.
Mersey Leven Parish
Community would like to wish Pat Anderson from Port Sorell
a
very happy 80th Birthday, Thursday 23rd April.
We hope your day was special Pat (celebrated in
a very different covid-19 way!)
Weekly Ramblings
This weekend as we celebrate ANZAC Day we recall the
incredible sacrifice that men and women of the Armed and Allied Services have
given for the security of our country over the past 232 years, especially the
original ANZACS 105 years ago. Like so much of what we have lived through
during recent weeks this has been a different celebration – thanks to all those
who will join/did join their neighbours at the end of their driveway on
Saturday morning to commemorate the landing at Gallipoli.
We continue with our Livestreaming and Prayer session
during this coming week – 9am for Mass each morning except Monday and prayer at
midday on Wednesday. There will also be a couple of Fr Mike’s Ramblings during
the week as well as a couple of emails keeping you updated on what is
happening.
Thanks to those who have reached out to others in our
community to let us know how people are getting on. I know that there are still
heaps of people who aren’t getting newsletters or emails – please, if you know
of someone who is missing out can you ask them to contact us in the Parish
Office so we can reach out to them. I was in the supermarket the other morning
and got an email address – can happen anywhere.
I will continue to add articles and thought pieces to the
Daily Living Page (https://mikeadelaney.blogspot.com)
and invite you to drop by and have a look at what people from around the world
are saying about the Church and the challenges facing the Church at this time.
Again, I would like to thank Deacon Steven Smith for his
great work in getting our FaceBook page up and running, and keeping it running.
Let family and friends know about the site – it becomes easier to find the more
people who like and follow the page. You can find the page here - https://www.facebook.com/MLCP1/
Again, please stay safe, stay sane and if possible stay at
home, cheers
CONTEMPLATIVE
PRAYER:
The contemplative world is not just in a monastery. It can equally be in our domestic
settings. And how appropriate to be
considering such a world in our current situation. So I am offering an introduction to two
contemplative prayer forms with the view to maybe establishing an ongoing
contemplative prayer group. These are:
·
Centering
Prayer - a receptive method of silent
prayer
· Chanting
– a contemplative practice of praying the psalms which naturally draws our
focus to the present and calms the dualistic mind.
If you are not familiar with these
forms of prayer, I encourage you to give it a go. In this initial program over 4 weeks there will be appropriate
teaching to enable you to engage and incorporate into your own prayer. When?
Wednesdays at 7 pm. Could you
please let me (John) know by email if you are interested in this initial
program, and then I can send you the log in details. Email:
john.leearcher@gmail.com
ONLINE GIVING:
The details for online Planned Giving are: Bank
Commonwealth; Account Name: Mersey Leven; BSB: 067 000; Acc No: 1031 5724. In
the Description area simply add your Name or Envelope Number. Thank You
Please support the work of Caritas/Project Compassion by
making your Project Compassion offering online: Bank: CBA, Account Name:
Caritas Australia. BSB: 062438
Account No: 10038330. Reference please put Agent Number 187907 then your
surname.
We are unable to provide receipts, Caritas will need to be
contacted directly.
Letter From Rome
A Church (And World) In Denial That Just Can't Stop Itself
A Church (And World) In Denial That Just Can't Stop Itself
The pandemic has shown that even Catholics believe they are what they do - Robert Mickens, Rome, April 24, 2020.
This article is from the La-Croix International website - you can access the site here but complete full access is via paid subscription
The coronavirus pandemic has thrown a wrench in the whole world's plans.
The fact of the matter is that we must stop our normal activity, especially if it includes gathering in any proximity to other people.
We must stop life as we once knew it until scientists find a cure or a vaccine for COVID-19. Otherwise, there is a risk that hundreds of thousands or even millions more people will die.
As I write, the disease has already killed nearly 200,000 people. The figure is moving towards 50,000 deaths in the United States alone.
Lockdown, the serious way
Here in Italy, where more than 25,000 have died of the coronavirus, we are completing the sixth week of home confinement. That's right – a month-and-a-half of serious lockdown.
Streets are devoid of cars and the usually crowded piazzas are deserted. Hardly anyone is seen outside and almost all the shops and business remain closed.
Except for three or four regions in the very north of the country, this draconian lockdown has successfully kept hospitalizations and the death toll to levels that would have been even more horrific otherwise.
France and Spain have done pretty much the same as Italy. The United States and England have not.
After just a few weeks of confinement, people – most who live in spacious, freestanding homes with gardens – already have "cabin fever", said Donald Trump, and are itching to get back to life as it was before this pesky virus brought a sudden halt to the greatest economy in the history of anything.
One US politician, whose father made a financial killing on the evasion of Iraq and near obliteration of a big section of the Middle East, said brashly that America (sic.) is a great nation that cannot be slowed by sickness.
Talk of war
World leaders talk about the pandemic as if waging a war against an invisible enemy. Might may make right in an economic and social system rigged in favor of the rich and powerful, but it cannot stop a lethal virus.
The only possible war metaphor that can be applied here (and even this is way off the mark) is that of an unarmed population being continuously bombed. The only response in such a situation is to duck and take cover – to hide.
You cannot fight it. You cannot go about your normal, everyday lives. If you try, more and more and more people will die.
But it seems some world leaders and local politicians are willing to move in that very direction. The mayor of Las Vegas, for example, wants to re-open all the casinos in her fabulous adult entertainment capital of the world.
Even normal folks are finding it hard to grasp the reality of what a pandemic means – that it is everywhere, all over the world.
Traveling to the state of denial
Millions of people have had to cancel trips to other countries they were scheduled to make this spring and summer.
Some have told me breezily that they hope to re-schedule these foreign travels for October or November, even those who have found that almost no airline is taking reservations right now.
Still, they are determined to get on with life as usual.
All this, friends, is called denial.
We cannot continue life right now as it was before the pandemic. And we probably won't be able to do so for quite some time. But, even then, it will not be exactly the same.
The coronavirus should be making us all stop. But, instead, it's "go, go, go"! The world's modus vivendi is really its modus faciendi.
And where are our Catholic spiritual leaders in all this? Unfortunately, a great many of them are acting no differently that certain politicians and civic officials. Rather than stop, they are trying to do everything they can not to stop.
They have doubled down on clerical activism.
What happened to "being is more important than doing"?
The only thing more shocking about this is that more of the Catholic faithful are not shocked. Too many of them have also responded in the same way – trying to keep everything going as before in the virtual reality of a cyber-church.
Popes and priests for a very long time have been warning people of the dangers of a consumerist lifestyle, trying to convince them that "being" is much more important than "doing" or "having".
But the way many of our ordained clerics have responded to the coronavirus makes them seem more like pop psychologists who turn important truths into silly-sounding slogans: "You are who you are, not what you do".
The forced lockdown should have been the moment for spiritual leaders to stand up and calmly, but firmly, remind their people that this is an opportunity – a summons – to stop "doing".
And since this is going to last for a long while yet, they still have the chance to practice what they preach.
Instead, most priests – and even the pope – have been trying to find ways NOT to stop. They want to keep doing – saying Mass, preaching, lecturing, telling people how to run their spiritual (and material) lives… even if that is over a TV screen or computer monitor.
"The Christian of the future will be a mystic…"
This is a time when our spiritual leaders should be helping their people accept that there can be no "doing" right now. One would hope they have been given the spiritual formation to help people find ways of navigating this time of non-doing.
Let's be clear: we cannot really "participate" in a virtual Mass any more than we can share a virtual handshake, hug or kiss. Some things demand real presence. It's amazing how many Catholic priests and people seem to have forgotten this.
Karl Rahner, who was one of the most important theologians in the initial years following the Second Vatican Council (1962-55), had a clear sense of what it would mean to be a believer in the post-confessional age.
"The Christian of the future will be a mystic or will not exist at all," the German Jesuit said.
Other theologians have since debated whether he was right or not. And they've even argued over what he meant.
But it seems his point was that Christians in a largely de-Christianized world would have to find their union with God, not in places and things that primitive religion marks out as "sacred", but in that which it abhors as "mundane".
What would Rahner say about the Church's response to COVID-19?
Rahner wrote extensively about the incarnate (and incarnational) God and said this God can and must be "experienced" in the living reality all around us.
Rather than mundane, this created reality is infused with transcendence, precisely because of the Incarnation of God in the person of Jesus the Christ.
There are, no doubt, many Catholics – including priests – who would disagree. For them, so-called "temple worship" is what is most essential. Their spirituality (or religious duty) can only be exercised within the confines of sacred spaces and with holy things.
That is certainly not how Rahner saw it.
The Jesuit theologian died in 1984, shortly after reaching his 80th birthday. So we don't now exactly what he would have thought of the way Catholics have been dealing with the liturgical lockdown imposed by the current pandemic.
But he probably would not have approved. In fact, some of his more progressive-thinking admirers might be surprised that he opposed televising the Mass.
"The desire to be modern may very soon turn out to be highly un-modern," he said in the late 1950s.
"Once the TV set has become part of the ordinary furniture of the average person, and once he is used to being the spectator of just about anything between heaven and earth on which an indiscriminately curious camera preys, then it will be an unbelievably exciting thing for the philistine of the twenty-first century that there still are things which one cannot view while sitting in a recliner and chewing on a burger."
Contemplative Consciousness
This article is taken from the Daily Email sent by Fr Richard Rohr OFM from the Center for Action and Contemplation. You can subscribe to receive the email by clicking here
I’ve heard some concerns over the years that contemplation
is a practice of “Eastern” meditation wrapped in a Christian disguise. Some
Christians have even been taught that seeking union with God through silence
makes room for the “devil” to get in. While understandable, these apprehensions
are based on a lack of knowledge about Christian heritage. In addition to
Jesus’ own practice of prayerful solitude, we also have the lives and teachings
of the Desert Fathers and Mothers. Starting with Anthony the Great in 270 CE,
thousands of Christians moved to the deserts of Egypt, Syria, and Palestine to
form alternative Christian communities. These brave souls were on fire with
love for Jesus and sought to become more like him through a disciplined rhythm
of life and prayer.
The desert mystics focused much more on the how than the
what, which is very different from Christianity’s primary emphasis on beliefs
and doctrines in recent centuries. The desert tradition offers a rich teaching
of surrender, through contemplation, to the wonderful and always too-much
mystery of God. Some have said that the Desert Fathers (abbas) and Mothers
(ammas) are like the Zen Buddhist monks of Christianity. Their koan-like
sayings cannot usually be understood with the rational, logical mind, which is
perhaps why their teachings fell out of favor during the Enlightenment.
Above all, the desert mystics’ primary quest was for God,
for Love; everything else was secondary. Thomas Merton (1915–1968) helped
modern Christianity recover an awareness of contemplative practice, in part
inspired by his reading of the Desert Fathers and Mothers. Merton wrote: “All
through the Verba Seniorum [Latin for Words of the Elders] we find a repeated
insistence on the primacy of love over everything else in the spiritual life:
over knowledge, gnosis, asceticism, contemplation, solitude, prayer. Love in
fact is the spiritual life, and without it all the other exercises of the
spirit, however lofty, are emptied of content and become mere illusions. The
more lofty they are, the more dangerous the illusion.” [1]
The Desert Fathers and Mothers focused on these primary
practices in their search for God: 1) leaving, to some extent, the systems of
the world; 2) a degree of solitude to break from the maddening crowd; 3) times
of silence to break from the maddening mind; and 4) “technologies” for
controlling the compulsivity of mind and the emotions. All of this was for the
sake of growing a person capable of love and community.
Contemplation became a solid foundation for building a
civilization and human community—not just in the wilderness centuries ago but
in the world today. Contemplative consciousness labels things less easily and
does not attach itself to one solitary definitive meaning. In contemplation,
one experiences all things as somehow created in the image of God and therefore
of equal dignity and deserving of respect.
[1] The Wisdom of the Desert: Sayings from the Desert
Fathers of the Fourth Century, trans. Thomas Merton (New Directions: 1960), 17.
Churches As Field Hospitals
This article is taken from the archive of Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. You can find this article and many others by clicking here
Most of us are familiar with Pope Francis’ comment that today the church needs to be a field hospital. What’s implied here?
First, that right now the church is not a field hospital, or at least not much of one. Too many churches of all denominations see the world more as an opponent to be fought than as a battlefield strewn with wounded persons to whom they are called to minister. The churches today, in the words of Pope Francis, have often reversed an image in the Book of Revelation where Jesus stands outside the door knocking, trying to come in, to a situation where Jesus is knocking on the door from inside the church, trying to get out.
So how might our churches, our ecclesial communities, become field hospitals?
In a wonderfully provocative article in a recent issue of America Magazine, Czech spiritual writer, Tomas Halik, suggests that for our ecclesial communities to become “field hospitals” they must assume three roles: A Diagnostic one – wherein they identify the signs of the times; a Preventive one – wherein they create an immune system in a world within which malignant viruses of fear, hatred, populism, and nationalism are tearing communities apart; and a Convalescent one – wherein they help the world overcome the traumas of the past through forgiveness.
How, concretely, might each of these be envisaged?
Our churches need to be diagnostic; they need to name the present moment in a prophetic way. But that calls for a courage that, right now, seems lacking, derailed by fear and ideology. Liberals and conservatives diagnose the present moment in radically different ways, not because the facts aren’t the same for both, but because each of them is seeing things through its own ideology. As well, at the end of the day, both camps seem too frightened to look at the hard issues square on, both afraid of what they might see.
To name just one issue that both seem afraid to look at with unblinking eyes: our rapidly emptying churches and the fact that so many of our own children are no longer going to church or identifying with a church. Conservatives simplistically blame secularism, without ever really being willing to openly debate the various critiques of the churches coming from almost every part of society. Liberals, for their part, tend to simplistically blame conservative rigidity without really being open to courageously look at some of places within secularity where faith in a transcendent God and an incarnate Christ run antithetical to some of the cultural ethos and ideologies within secularity. Both sides, as is evident from their excessive defensiveness, seem afraid to look at all the issues.
What must we do preventatively to turn our churches into field hospitals? The image Halik proposes here is rich but is intelligible only within an understanding of the Body of Christ and an acceptance of the deep connection we have with each other inside the family of humanity. We are all one, one living organism, parts of a single body, so that, as with any living body, what any one part does, for disease or health, affects every other part. And the health of a body is contingent upon its immune system, upon those enzymes that roam throughout the body and kill off cancerous cells. Today our world is beset with cancerous cells of bitterness, hatred, lying, self-protecting fear, and tribalism of every kind. Our world is mortally ill; suffering from a cancer that’s destroying community.
Hence our ecclesial communities must become places that generate the healthy enzymes that are needed to kill off those cancer cells. We must create an immune system robust enough to do this. And for that to happen, we must first, ourselves, stop being part of the cancer of hatred, lying, fear, opposition, and tribalism. Too often, we ourselves are the cancerous cells. The single biggest religious challenge facing us as ecclesial communities today it that of creating an immune system that’s healthy and vigorous enough to help kill off the cancerous cells of hatred, fear, lying, and tribalism that float freely throughout the world.
Finally, our convalescent role: Our ecclesial communities need to help the world come to a deeper reconciliation vis-a-vis the traumas of the past. Happily, this is one of our strengths. Our churches are sanctuaries of forgiveness. In the words of Cardinal Francis George: “In society everything is permitted, but nothing is forgiven; in the church much is prohibited, but everything is forgiven.” But where we need to be more proactive as sanctuaries of forgiveness today is in relation to a number of salient “traumas of the past”. In brief, a deeper forgiveness, healing, and atonement still needs to take place apposite the world’s history with colonization, slavery, the status of women, the torture and disappearance of peoples, the mistreatment of refugees, the perennial support of unjust regimes, and the atonement owed to mother earth herself. Our churches must lead this effort.
Our ecclesial communities as field hospitals can be the Galilee of today.
For A Time Such As This: Your Parish And The Covid-19 Crisis
Week 5: Using Technology To Reach The Unchurched
Week 5: Using Technology To Reach The Unchurched
This article is taken from the Blog posted by Fr Michael White, Pastor of the Church of the Nativity, Timoneum, Baltimore. You can find the original blog by clicking here
When lock-down restrictions were first implemented following the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, many church leaders reluctantly turned to live streaming technology. It is a reluctance that I understand well. When we first started live-streaming Mass at my parish, we knew we were taking a risk. Internally we fiercely debated the merits of online church: whether it really ‘counted’ for Catholics, whether it was liturgically permissible, and whether it would supplement or cannibalize physical attendance and engagement.
For our full coverage of parish life in the age of the COVID-19 pandemic, visit our response page here.
But then, a surprising thing happened. In the weeks since the lock-down started, many churches have been experiencing online viewership that is actually higher than their average weekly attendance. Our staff began to receive messages from parishioners reporting that their unchurched friends were tuning in to online church broadcasts. We heard stories of close family members who had not been to church in years asking, “What is the link to that online Mass?”
Whether you are aware of it or not, if you’re online, the unchurched are watching you. The people you have labored to reach for years are finally tuning in to your messages. Amidst all your reluctance, God is moving through your willingness to go where the unchurched are.
Which raises two questions…
Why is this happening?
In part, the pandemic evokes an incredible spiritual curiosity at this moment. Everyone’s world has just been flipped upside down and people are looking for answers. The same uncertainty that worries church leaders also worries skeptics, atheists, and the curious.
Also, Mass broadcasts are inherently approachable to those unfamiliar or uncomfortable with the church. They don’t have to worry about what to wear or whether or knowing all the responses. They know that if they ever get uncomfortable, they can just turn off the screen. But most of all, people are already used to doing things online, from Netflix to Amazon to Zoom, it’s where they’re living their lives. So, why can’t they watch mass, give online, and participate in an online small group?
What can you learn from this moment?
1) Use what you have today … but grow over time.
By now, many parishes have already been trying online streaming in some form. If you haven’t started yet, or are unsatisfied by your setup, that’s ok. Not everyone has access to world-class equipment and expertise. Our first livestream set-up consisted of one cheap camcorder pointed at the altar. That’s it.
Real and authentic is more important than professional quality right now. But it’s important to grow over time. If you have become comfortable with operating a one camera set-up, consider investing in more cameras and a video switcher. If you are currently only streaming to one location, like Facebook, consider investing in an online streaming broadcast service like Churchstreaming.tv, Boxcast, or Vimeo to simultaneously stream to multiple locations (YouTube, a Roku or Apple TV app, your website).
2) Educate yourself…but surround yourself with people who do understand
As a leader, your role is to make decisions about the direction of your church or organization. Because of this, you have a responsibility to have a basic knowledge of how this stuff works. Seek to educate yourself on the fundamentals, at least. Resources we have found helpful include:
But, don’t feel like you need to go it alone. Neither I nor Tom, my associate, are ‘tech people.’ We surrounded ourselves with people who do know what they are talking about and empower them to do what they do best. Even if these people aren’t on your staff, they are most certainly in your pews (well, not right now). Young people, especially, have an intuitive understanding of it all and can be leaders in your church.
3) Stream your Mass online … but don’t forget about other ‘STEPS’
We have been streaming online for a few years now but have just started to digitize our discipleship ‘STEPS’ in the wake of the COVID-19 quarantine. STEPS is our way of laying out a discipleship path (Serve in ministry or missions, Tithe/give, Engage in a small group, Prayer & Sacraments, and Sharing your faith). Some of these translate well to our all-digital reality while some do not. It’s something we’re experimenting with. Here are a few ideas:
- Have small groups meet with video conferencing software
- Call at-risk parishioners to check-in and offer prayer
- Send out a daily devotional, email, or social media blast
- Make online giving easy
- Move Sacramental prep classes online
- Connect parishioners with service opportunities in the community
What we started doing reluctantly can be a blessing and an opportunity. Take advantage of this opportunity and invest in technology.
The Church Facing the Covid-19 Emergency
‘The Church has always had the duty of scrutinizing the signs of the times and of interpreting them in the light of the Gospel’, as we read in Gaudium et spes. How do we interpret the signs of these extraordinary times? Cardinal Michael Czerny SJ asks us to consider whether, in our responses to the coronavirus pandemic, we are embracing the ‘saving logic’ of the gospel and all of its opportunities, or resigning ourselves to a ‘substitute logic’.
Cardinal Michael Czerny SJ is Under-Secretary of the Migrants and Refugees Section of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development.
This is an English translation of an article commissioned and published on 22 April 2020 by Religiòn Digital.
This article is taken from the ThinkingFaith.org website where you can find a wide range of articles by clicking here
The Covid-19 emergency is testing the physical, mental and social endurance of entire nations. The contagion has spread very quickly and globally, causing a deep health crisis and bringing the world economy to its knees. Like a magnifying glass, it has also revealed the weaknesses of social organisation and the vulnerability of many people. Think of families living in poverty, the elderly, prisoners, the homeless, migrants and asylum seekers, and victims of trafficking. Yet among them the Holy Father sees ‘an invisible army, fighting in the most dangerous trenches; an army whose only weapons are solidarity, hope, and community spirit, all revitalizing at a time when no one can save themselves alone.’[1]
By the end of April, the coronavirus will have infected several million people around the world. It is teaching us harsh lessons, paid for with human lives. ‘It is not permissible that we write current and future history by turning our backs on the suffering of so many people.’ The ability to provide an adequate response to the pain and poverty of those who are marginalised and rendered ‘invisible’ will be a measure of the genuine, integral, sustainable development of our countries. This pandemic can only be resisted with the ‘antibodies of solidarity’.[2]
At the same time, we read what we are living with the eyes of faith. We return to the ever-timely invitation of the Second Vatican Council to attune our ears to the voice of God who speaks through human events and experiences (Gaudium et spes, §4). This focus on history, interpreted as the place where salvation happens, is one of the crucial themes of Francis’ teaching. From the encyclical Laudato si’ to the apostolic exhortations Evangelii Gaudium, Gaudete et exsultate and Querida Amazonia, the pontiff exhorts us to read ‘the signs of the times’ and shows us how.
These signs tell us that we are now at a sort of ‘crossroads’ – in Greek, krisis. There are two roads ahead of us, two different approaches to the situation.
One road would have us hold still, waiting for the epidemic to take its course – perhaps dulling our anxiety with ‘sooner or later this will pass’ – and just trying to remain afloat in the swamp of daily problems. Such resignation feeds on the need for security; its ‘substitute logic’ has us think only about how to adapt to the present annoyances and discomforts, perhaps finding a way to continue doing what we were doing before without contravening the restrictions imposed by the authorities.
The other road has us welcome this time, actively cultivating a vital relationship with Christ and creatively seeking those who especially need our help. To embrace the ‘saving logic’ of the gospel is to reach through uncertainty and grasp a renewed identity and mission as baptised Christians and missionary disciples. We can show (be!) the beautiful face of a Church at the service of our brother and sister, in solidarity with their suffering and open to their needs. This is a Church aware of being ‘People of God’ (Lumen gentium, §9), facing the present challenges with courage, placing her hope in Christ Jesus now and for the future.
News arriving daily from around the world speaks of a Church mobilising on more and more fronts. Many Catholics are among those who have rolled up their sleeves and do not hesitate to spend themselves completely. Countless initiatives of effective charity bear witness to God's love at work in hidden ways, like the yeast that leavens all the dough (Mt 13:33). Think of the many who keep delivering food, essential services, public security. Think of the many doctors and nurses, priests and religious who, risking their lives, remain on the front lines and stay close to the sick. Giving themselves ‘to the end’ (Jn 13:1), they offer a shining witness to the teachings and example of Jesus, reminding everyone that care for the suffering takes precedence. At this moment it is the whole person who suffers and needs healing, and very many of them. Therefore prayer, which everyone can try to offer, is also indispensable.
Under these exceptional conditions, in this ‘suspended’ time like slow motion that is imposed on us all, we are being forced to slacken our frenetic rhythms, to change our habits, to invent new perspectives, criteria and responses. Quarantine has torn each person’s usual web of relationships asunder. Solitude can be an uncomfortable surprise. The mounting death toll is deeply upsetting for those who have never really faced the mystery of their own death.
In coming to terms with themselves and their inner life, or seeking comfort and reassurance, or rediscovering the traditions in which they were raised, many have felt the need to seek God. This is a novel turn in an age when techno-scientific progress can take people away from religion.
An important step in seeking God is to embark on a serious review of one’s life, as St Ignatius suggests in the Spiritual Exercises.[3] The certainties on which we have built our existence now seem shaky, and this allows questions of meaning to emerge: what did I live for? What will I live for? Am I capable of going beyond myself? Faith, which rattles the comfortably modern person, can slowly assist questions to emerge, while God is quick to respond.
The media can facilitate a welcome to new seekers and a rapprochement for those who have drifted away from the Church. Perhaps those lacking the courage to enter a church can today take advantage of opportunities online: to listen to the Word of God proclaimed and taught; to know the contents of the creed better; to join the Holy Father for an hour of adoration in a dramatically empty St Peter's Square; or to ‘visit’ one’s own neighbourhood parish church. Of course, these offerings also serve the many faithful who very much miss the gathering and now take part in the celebrations and rites of the Church by following them from home.
At this moment predictions hold little value because there are too many variables at play, but embracing the present and guided by the Holy Spirit, we can discern what is essential. ‘It is time to choose what matters and what passes, to separate what is necessary from what is not. It is the time to reset the course of life towards You, Lord, and towards others.’[4]
[1] Pope Francis, ‘Letter to the Popular Movements’, 12 April 2020: http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/letters/2020/documents/papa-francesco_20200412_lettera-movimentipopolari.html.
[2] Pope Francis, ‘Un plan para resucitar’, Vida Nueva, 17 April 2020: https://www.vidanuevadigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/UN-PLAN-PARA-RESUCITAR-PAPA-FRANCISCO-VIDA-NUEVA.pdf (Translation quoted in ‘Pope: Let's not be afraid to build an alternative civilisation of love’, Independent Catholic News, 17 April 2020: https://www.indcatholicnews.com/news/39382).
[3] Pope Francis has spoken of the important role that memory plays in the First Week of the Spiritual Exercises. See, for example: ‘A Big Heart Open to God’ (Thinking Faith, 19 September 2013: https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20130919_1.htm); and Austen Ivereigh, ‘Remembering our future: Pope Francis and the corona crisis’ (Thinking Faith, 8 April 2020: https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/remembering-our-future-pope-francis-and-corona-crisis).
[4] Pope Francis, ‘Extraordinary moment of prayer’, 27 March 2020: http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/homilies/2020/documents/papa-francesco_20200327_omelia-epidemia.html.
This article is taken from the Blog posted by Fr Michael White, Pastor of the Church of the Nativity, Timoneum, Baltimore. You can find the original blog by clicking here
When lock-down restrictions were first implemented following the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, many church leaders reluctantly turned to live streaming technology. It is a reluctance that I understand well. When we first started live-streaming Mass at my parish, we knew we were taking a risk. Internally we fiercely debated the merits of online church: whether it really ‘counted’ for Catholics, whether it was liturgically permissible, and whether it would supplement or cannibalize physical attendance and engagement.
For our full coverage of parish life in the age of the COVID-19 pandemic, visit our response page here.
But then, a surprising thing happened. In the weeks since the lock-down started, many churches have been experiencing online viewership that is actually higher than their average weekly attendance. Our staff began to receive messages from parishioners reporting that their unchurched friends were tuning in to online church broadcasts. We heard stories of close family members who had not been to church in years asking, “What is the link to that online Mass?”
Whether you are aware of it or not, if you’re online, the unchurched are watching you. The people you have labored to reach for years are finally tuning in to your messages. Amidst all your reluctance, God is moving through your willingness to go where the unchurched are.
Which raises two questions…
Why is this happening?
In part, the pandemic evokes an incredible spiritual curiosity at this moment. Everyone’s world has just been flipped upside down and people are looking for answers. The same uncertainty that worries church leaders also worries skeptics, atheists, and the curious.
Also, Mass broadcasts are inherently approachable to those unfamiliar or uncomfortable with the church. They don’t have to worry about what to wear or whether or knowing all the responses. They know that if they ever get uncomfortable, they can just turn off the screen. But most of all, people are already used to doing things online, from Netflix to Amazon to Zoom, it’s where they’re living their lives. So, why can’t they watch mass, give online, and participate in an online small group?
What can you learn from this moment?
1) Use what you have today … but grow over time.
By now, many parishes have already been trying online streaming in some form. If you haven’t started yet, or are unsatisfied by your setup, that’s ok. Not everyone has access to world-class equipment and expertise. Our first livestream set-up consisted of one cheap camcorder pointed at the altar. That’s it.
Real and authentic is more important than professional quality right now. But it’s important to grow over time. If you have become comfortable with operating a one camera set-up, consider investing in more cameras and a video switcher. If you are currently only streaming to one location, like Facebook, consider investing in an online streaming broadcast service like Churchstreaming.tv, Boxcast, or Vimeo to simultaneously stream to multiple locations (YouTube, a Roku or Apple TV app, your website).
2) Educate yourself…but surround yourself with people who do understand
As a leader, your role is to make decisions about the direction of your church or organization. Because of this, you have a responsibility to have a basic knowledge of how this stuff works. Seek to educate yourself on the fundamentals, at least. Resources we have found helpful include:
But, don’t feel like you need to go it alone. Neither I nor Tom, my associate, are ‘tech people.’ We surrounded ourselves with people who do know what they are talking about and empower them to do what they do best. Even if these people aren’t on your staff, they are most certainly in your pews (well, not right now). Young people, especially, have an intuitive understanding of it all and can be leaders in your church.
3) Stream your Mass online … but don’t forget about other ‘STEPS’
We have been streaming online for a few years now but have just started to digitize our discipleship ‘STEPS’ in the wake of the COVID-19 quarantine. STEPS is our way of laying out a discipleship path (Serve in ministry or missions, Tithe/give, Engage in a small group, Prayer & Sacraments, and Sharing your faith). Some of these translate well to our all-digital reality while some do not. It’s something we’re experimenting with. Here are a few ideas:
- Have small groups meet with video conferencing software
- Call at-risk parishioners to check-in and offer prayer
- Send out a daily devotional, email, or social media blast
- Make online giving easy
- Move Sacramental prep classes online
- Connect parishioners with service opportunities in the community
What we started doing reluctantly can be a blessing and an opportunity. Take advantage of this opportunity and invest in technology.
The Church Facing the Covid-19 Emergency
‘The Church has always had the duty of scrutinizing the signs of the times and of interpreting them in the light of the Gospel’, as we read in Gaudium et spes. How do we interpret the signs of these extraordinary times? Cardinal Michael Czerny SJ asks us to consider whether, in our responses to the coronavirus pandemic, we are embracing the ‘saving logic’ of the gospel and all of its opportunities, or resigning ourselves to a ‘substitute logic’.
Cardinal Michael Czerny SJ is Under-Secretary of the Migrants and Refugees Section of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development.
This is an English translation of an article commissioned and published on 22 April 2020 by Religiòn Digital.
This article is taken from the ThinkingFaith.org website where you can find a wide range of articles by clicking here
The Covid-19 emergency is testing the physical, mental and social endurance of entire nations. The contagion has spread very quickly and globally, causing a deep health crisis and bringing the world economy to its knees. Like a magnifying glass, it has also revealed the weaknesses of social organisation and the vulnerability of many people. Think of families living in poverty, the elderly, prisoners, the homeless, migrants and asylum seekers, and victims of trafficking. Yet among them the Holy Father sees ‘an invisible army, fighting in the most dangerous trenches; an army whose only weapons are solidarity, hope, and community spirit, all revitalizing at a time when no one can save themselves alone.’[1]
By the end of April, the coronavirus will have infected several million people around the world. It is teaching us harsh lessons, paid for with human lives. ‘It is not permissible that we write current and future history by turning our backs on the suffering of so many people.’ The ability to provide an adequate response to the pain and poverty of those who are marginalised and rendered ‘invisible’ will be a measure of the genuine, integral, sustainable development of our countries. This pandemic can only be resisted with the ‘antibodies of solidarity’.[2]
At the same time, we read what we are living with the eyes of faith. We return to the ever-timely invitation of the Second Vatican Council to attune our ears to the voice of God who speaks through human events and experiences (Gaudium et spes, §4). This focus on history, interpreted as the place where salvation happens, is one of the crucial themes of Francis’ teaching. From the encyclical Laudato si’ to the apostolic exhortations Evangelii Gaudium, Gaudete et exsultate and Querida Amazonia, the pontiff exhorts us to read ‘the signs of the times’ and shows us how.
These signs tell us that we are now at a sort of ‘crossroads’ – in Greek, krisis. There are two roads ahead of us, two different approaches to the situation.
One road would have us hold still, waiting for the epidemic to take its course – perhaps dulling our anxiety with ‘sooner or later this will pass’ – and just trying to remain afloat in the swamp of daily problems. Such resignation feeds on the need for security; its ‘substitute logic’ has us think only about how to adapt to the present annoyances and discomforts, perhaps finding a way to continue doing what we were doing before without contravening the restrictions imposed by the authorities.
The other road has us welcome this time, actively cultivating a vital relationship with Christ and creatively seeking those who especially need our help. To embrace the ‘saving logic’ of the gospel is to reach through uncertainty and grasp a renewed identity and mission as baptised Christians and missionary disciples. We can show (be!) the beautiful face of a Church at the service of our brother and sister, in solidarity with their suffering and open to their needs. This is a Church aware of being ‘People of God’ (Lumen gentium, §9), facing the present challenges with courage, placing her hope in Christ Jesus now and for the future.
News arriving daily from around the world speaks of a Church mobilising on more and more fronts. Many Catholics are among those who have rolled up their sleeves and do not hesitate to spend themselves completely. Countless initiatives of effective charity bear witness to God's love at work in hidden ways, like the yeast that leavens all the dough (Mt 13:33). Think of the many who keep delivering food, essential services, public security. Think of the many doctors and nurses, priests and religious who, risking their lives, remain on the front lines and stay close to the sick. Giving themselves ‘to the end’ (Jn 13:1), they offer a shining witness to the teachings and example of Jesus, reminding everyone that care for the suffering takes precedence. At this moment it is the whole person who suffers and needs healing, and very many of them. Therefore prayer, which everyone can try to offer, is also indispensable.
Under these exceptional conditions, in this ‘suspended’ time like slow motion that is imposed on us all, we are being forced to slacken our frenetic rhythms, to change our habits, to invent new perspectives, criteria and responses. Quarantine has torn each person’s usual web of relationships asunder. Solitude can be an uncomfortable surprise. The mounting death toll is deeply upsetting for those who have never really faced the mystery of their own death.
In coming to terms with themselves and their inner life, or seeking comfort and reassurance, or rediscovering the traditions in which they were raised, many have felt the need to seek God. This is a novel turn in an age when techno-scientific progress can take people away from religion.
An important step in seeking God is to embark on a serious review of one’s life, as St Ignatius suggests in the Spiritual Exercises.[3] The certainties on which we have built our existence now seem shaky, and this allows questions of meaning to emerge: what did I live for? What will I live for? Am I capable of going beyond myself? Faith, which rattles the comfortably modern person, can slowly assist questions to emerge, while God is quick to respond.
The media can facilitate a welcome to new seekers and a rapprochement for those who have drifted away from the Church. Perhaps those lacking the courage to enter a church can today take advantage of opportunities online: to listen to the Word of God proclaimed and taught; to know the contents of the creed better; to join the Holy Father for an hour of adoration in a dramatically empty St Peter's Square; or to ‘visit’ one’s own neighbourhood parish church. Of course, these offerings also serve the many faithful who very much miss the gathering and now take part in the celebrations and rites of the Church by following them from home.
At this moment predictions hold little value because there are too many variables at play, but embracing the present and guided by the Holy Spirit, we can discern what is essential. ‘It is time to choose what matters and what passes, to separate what is necessary from what is not. It is the time to reset the course of life towards You, Lord, and towards others.’[4]
[1] Pope Francis, ‘Letter to the Popular Movements’, 12 April 2020: http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/letters/2020/documents/papa-francesco_20200412_lettera-movimentipopolari.html.
[2] Pope Francis, ‘Un plan para resucitar’, Vida Nueva, 17 April 2020: https://www.vidanuevadigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/UN-PLAN-PARA-RESUCITAR-PAPA-FRANCISCO-VIDA-NUEVA.pdf (Translation quoted in ‘Pope: Let's not be afraid to build an alternative civilisation of love’, Independent Catholic News, 17 April 2020: https://www.indcatholicnews.com/news/39382).
[3] Pope Francis has spoken of the important role that memory plays in the First Week of the Spiritual Exercises. See, for example: ‘A Big Heart Open to God’ (Thinking Faith, 19 September 2013: https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20130919_1.htm); and Austen Ivereigh, ‘Remembering our future: Pope Francis and the corona crisis’ (Thinking Faith, 8 April 2020: https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/remembering-our-future-pope-francis-and-corona-crisis).
[4] Pope Francis, ‘Extraordinary moment of prayer’, 27 March 2020: http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/homilies/2020/documents/papa-francesco_20200327_omelia-epidemia.html.
