Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
Parish Priest: Fr Mike Delaney
Mob: 0417 279 437
mike.delaney@aohtas.org.au
Assistant Priest: Fr Paschal Okpon
Mob: 0438 562 731
paschalokpon@yahoo.com
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
Mob: 0417 279 437
mike.delaney@aohtas.org.au
Assistant Priest: Fr Paschal Okpon
Mob: 0438 562 731
paschalokpon@yahoo.com
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 12th April 9:00am Easter Sunday
Monday 13th April 9:00am
Tuesday 14th April 9:00am
Wednesday 15th April 9:00am
Thursday 16th April 9:00am
Friday 17th April 9:00am
Saturday 18th April 9:00am
Sunday 19th April 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
PREGO REFLECTION ON TODAY’S GOSPEL:
I slowly begin my prayer by concentrating my inner
attention on the Lord’s presence in my life and being.
In the deepening
silence, I hand over my joys and troubles, and ask God for the grace of a
spirit of gratitude and wonder.
I read the Gospel meditatively.
In whatever way
I can, I enter the scene, allowing the narrative to touch my imagination.
Is
there something here that particularly attracts my attention?
Perhaps Mary of
Magdala, her heart filled with grief, going faithfully to attend to her Lord in
the darkness …?
Or guilt-ridden Peter, who goes right into the tomb?
Or ‘the
one Jesus loved’: the disciple who sees the empty tomb and believes?
I allow
myself to be present with each one.
Maybe I stand here in the empty tomb.
How
do I feel and react now?
How deep is my belief in the power of the
Resurrection?
Maybe there are areas of my life where I am invited to a deeper
faith?
I open my heart and soul to the Lord, speaking to him as I would to a
beloved friend.
I pray for all those who are imprisoned, in self-isolation, or
grieving today, and for those suffering without faith and hope in the loving
God.
When I am ready, I slowly draw my prayer to a close.
Your prayers
are asked for the sick:
Mark Aylett, Tony Kiely, Sand
Frankcombe, Judith Xavier,
Pat Barker, Paul Richardson, & …
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Lorna Watson, Graham Taylor, Elizabeth
Heckscher, Charles Johnson, Edward King, Bill
Halley, Rosalie McCarthy, Annette Camaya
May the souls of the faithful departed,
through the mercy of
God, rest in peace.
Amen
Weekly Ramblings
Ps Happy Easter!!
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.
We are unable to provide
receipts, Caritas will need to be contacted directly.
Letter From Rome
The Church Must Die Before It Can Rise Again
The coronavirus crisis could be a 'Catholic teaching moment', but school is currently out of session by Robert Mickens, Rome, April 9, 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 totally disrupted our lives. And for Christians it has been a cross and Lenten penance we did not expect. And certainly one we would never have chosen.
That seemed clear enough to me nearly five weeks ago when Italy decreed the first in a series of ever-more stringent measures to try to contain the spread of COVID-19.
The entire country went into forced lockdown on March 9 and public gatherings, including church services, were deemed unsafe. Public Mass was canceled. Even at the Vatican.
This was a huge cross thrust on the backs of practicing Catholics. And we have stumbled under its weight.
Some have tried to wiggle out from underneath it and resume life – specifically "liturgical" life, if it can be called that – as it was before the pandemic.
Bishops and priests, for the most part, have continued "saying" their daily Mass all by themselves and have urged their people to follow them via TV or internet.
Eucharist, public liturgy and private prayer
Their response raises serious questions about the very nature of the Eucharist, public liturgy and personal prayer, as I wrote last week.
That column drew heated and passionate reactions. One person accused me of bad judgment, though he did not say why.
Another said he was "stung" by the suggestion that virtual Mass was analogous to a virtual Thanksgiving Dinner. He said it was a "shallow analogy" because "God can work outside our structures". (No argument there.)
Furthermore, his parish has received "hundreds of responses saying how much spiritual benefit live-streamed Mass has brought people".
Both these men are Catholic presbyters and I suspect they speak for many, many of their ordained confreres. But certainly not all of them.
Some other priests and lay people said they were thankful for the observations and critiques in the article, because they would have liked to express similar sentiments, but do not feel they (especially the priests) are free to do so without facing negative repercussions.
In any case, the issues we've been discussing will not fade away once the pandemic has passed and public worship and gathering is possible again. On the contrary, the conversion has only just begun.
'School of the cross'
We have published numerous articles in La Croix International these past few weeks from regular and guest contributors – laypeople and clerics, men and women – that are opening up that conversation. And we will continue to do so.
There are certainly some clear and painful lessons that can and need to be learned from the current liturgical lockdown. But those who the Church considers to be the "authentic teachers of the faith" – the bishops – are only students themselves right now.
The entire Catholic community has been suddenly enrolled into some unforeseen "school of the cross", the likes of which we could have never imagined. Almost all but those who are ordained have been denied the possibility of gathering for worship and receiving the Eucharist.
And that means, of course, that televised or live-streamed Mass is usually an all male, clericalist performance.
At least Pope Francis has had the good pastoral sense to invite a woman religious to do the readings at the daily Mass he celebrates. He also made sure lay people proclaimed the first two readings at the Palm Sunday Eucharistic celebration.
On the other hand, there was not a woman in sight during his dramatic Urbi et Orbi supplication and blessing a couple of weeks ago in St. Peter's Square.
The first witnesses of the Resurrection, nowhere to be seen
Women, by and large, seem to be missing from the initiatives that bishops and priests have adopted in response to the prohibition on public liturgy. This should cause deep concern and prompt serious reflection.
Women were the first witnesses of the Resurrection of Jesus. They were the first to proclaim that he had risen from the dead. Yet the men are continuing to celebrate the commemoration of Christ's death and resurrection each day at Mass, usually without a woman present.
The exclusion of women from any prominent liturgical role – especially the proclamation of the Word – is a centuries-old problem. But this has become even more obvious during the current liturgical lockdown. It may be one of the lessons from the crisis we need to learn. And the Church's theologians and bishops must be the first students.
But the signs are not encouraging. This past week the Holy See Press Office announced that the pope had "decided to institute a new Study Commission on the female diaconate".
There are seven men (including a cardinal-president and priest-secretary) and five women on the commission. But not a single one appears to have done any significant research on the issue. And several are on record as being opposed to ordaining women deacons.
From Spy Wednesday to the Resurrection
Ominously, the new study commission was announced on what used to be commonly known as Spy Wednesday – the day before the Passover when Judas Iscariot went and betrayed Jesus.
All is not lost, however. We know that after suffering and crucifixion came the resurrection.
But there is no rising to new life, without first dying to how one lived before.
Christians of the West are celebrating the death and resurrection of Jesus in these days (and those in the Eastern traditional will do so a week later). Our Easter celebrations usually mean an end to our Lenten penances.
But it will be different this year. We can sing Alleluia! But, the truth is, our forced penance and Lenten fast will continue until we can gather again for Eucharist all together.
This is the Lenten cross the Church did not choose. And it's probably been more authentic, existentially, than that of any other Lent. But it's the cross God has given us.
Whether the Church embraces it willingly or not, the cross will inflict its mortal blow.
Only those who do not really believe in the power of the Resurrection would seriously think that the Church could remain exactly as it was before COVID-19.
Love At The Center
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
When we named the Center for Action and Contemplation, I
hoped our rather long name would itself keep us honest and force us toward
balance and ongoing integration beyond the first generation. However, over the
last thirty-five years, I have witnessed how many of us attach to contemplation
or action for the wrong reasons. Introverts use contemplation to affirm quiet
time; those with the luxury of free time sometimes use it for navel-gazing. On
the other hand, some activists see our call to action as an affirmation of
their particular agenda and not much else. Neither is the delicate balance and
art that we hope to affirm.
By contemplation, we mean the deliberate seeking of God
through a willingness to detach from the passing self, the tyranny of emotions,
the addiction to self-image, and the false promises of the world. Action, as we
are using the word, means a decisive commitment toward involvement and
engagement in the social order. Issues will not be resolved by mere reflection,
discussion, or even prayer, nor will they be resolved only by protests,
boycotts, or even, unfortunately by voting the “right” way. Rather, God “works
together with” all those who love (see Romans 8:28).
Though “Love” is not in our Center’s name, I hope that it is
the driving force behind all we do, just as it was for Jesus who knew God’s
love intimately and fully, and for the early church who proclaimed that “God is
love” (1 John 4:7-8). In our vision statement, we profess both our hoped-for
role for CAC’s future and the energy that drives us:
We never could have become the organization that so many of
you trust if we didn’t continually return to Love as our source. It is where we
rest in times of anxiety, find strength in times of trouble, discover joy in
good times and solace in bad ones. “Love never fails” to help us grow,
question, and forgive—both ourselves and others.
We are all on this journey together and we are all in need
of liberation (which might be a better word than salvation). God’s intention is
never to shame the individual (which actually disempowers), but solidarity with
and universal responsibility for the whole (which creates healthy people). That
is an act of radical solidarity that few Christians seem to enjoy but to which
the CAC is committed to fostering.
Prayer for
Our Community:
Adapted from Richard Rohr, “Not the Center for Activism
& Introspection,” Radical Grace, vol. 4, no. 6 (Center for Action and
Contemplation: December 1991-January 1992).
The Meaning Of Jesus' Death
This article is taken from the archive of Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. You can find this article and many others by clicking here
Jesus’ death washes everything clean, including our ignorance and sin. That’s the clear message from Luke’s account of his death.
As we know, we have four Gospels, each with its own take on the passion and death of Jesus. As we know too these Gospel accounts are not journalistic reports of what happened on Good Friday but more theological interpretations of what happened then. They’re paintings of Jesus’ death more so than news reports about it and, like good art, they take liberties to highlight certain forms so as to bring out essence. Each Gospel writer has his own interpretation of what happened on Calvary.
For Luke, what happened in the death of Jesus is the clearest revelation, ever, of the incredible scope of God’s understanding, forgiveness, and healing. For him, Jesus’ death washes everything clean through an understanding, forgiveness, and healing that belies every notion suggesting anything to the contrary. To make this clear, Luke highlights a number of elements in his narrative.
First, in his account of Jesus’ arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane, he tells us that immediately after one of his disciples struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his ear, Jesus touched the man’s ear and healed him. God’s healing, Luke intimates, reaches into all situations, even situations of bitterness, betrayal, and violence. God’s grace will ultimately heal even what’s wounded in hatred.
Then, after Peter denied him three times and Jesus is being led away after his interrogation by the Sanhedrin, Luke tells us that Jesus turned and looked straight at Peter in a look that made Peter weep bitterly. Everything in this text and everything that comes after it suggests that the look from Jesus that caused Peter to weep bitterly was not one of disappointment and accusation, a look that would have caused Peter to weep in shame. No, rather it was a look of such understanding and empathy as Peter had never before seen, causing him to weep in relief, knowing that everything was alright and he was alright.
And when Luke records Jesus’ trial before Pilate, he recounts something that’s not recorded in the other Gospel accounts of Jesus’ trial, namely, Pilate sending Jesus to Herod and how the two of them, bitter enemies until that day, “became friends that same day.” As Ray Brown, commenting on this text puts it, “Jesus has a healing effect even on those who mistreat him.”
Finally, in Luke’s narrative, we arrive at the place where Jesus is crucified and as they are crucifying him, he utters the famous words: Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. Those words, which Christians forever afterwards have taken as the ultimate criterion as to how we should treat our enemies and those who do us ill, encapsulate the deep revelation contained in Jesus’ death. Uttered in that context as God is about to crucified by human beings, these words reveal how God sees and understands even our worst actions: Not as ill-will, not as something that ultimately turns us against God or God against us, but as ignorance – simple, non-culpable, invincible, understandable, forgivable, akin to the self-destructive actions of an innocent child.
In that context too, Luke narrates Jesus’ forgiveness of the “good thief”. What Luke wants to highlight here, beyond the obvious, are a number of things: First, that the man is forgiven not because he didn’t sin, but in spite of his sin; second, that he is given infinitely more than he actually requests of Jesus; and finally, that Jesus will not die with any unfinished business, this man’s sin must first be wiped clean.
Finally, in Luke’s narrative, unlike the narratives of Mark and Matthew, Jesus does not die expressing abandonment, but rather dies expressing complete trust: “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit”. Luke wants us to see in these words a template for how we can face our own deaths, given our weaknesses. What’s the lesson? Leon Bloy once wrote that there is only one true sadness in life, that of not being a saint. At the end of the day when each of us face our own death this will be our biggest regret, that we’re not saints. But, as Jesus shows in his death, we can die in (even in weakness) knowing we are dying into safe hands.
Luke’s account of the passion and death of Jesus, unlike much of Christian tradition, does not focus on the atoning value of Jesus’ death. What it emphasizes instead is this: Jesus’ death washes everything clean, each of us and the whole world. It heals everything, understands everything, and forgives everything – despite every ignorance, weakness, infidelity, and betrayal on our part. In John’s passion narrative, Jesus’ dead body is pierced with a lance and immediately “blood and water” (life and cleansing) flow out. In Luke’s account, Jesus’ body is not pierced. It doesn’t need to be. By the time he breathes his last he has forgiven everyone and everything has been washed clean.
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 12th April 9:00am Easter Sunday
Monday 13th April 9:00am
Tuesday 14th April 9:00am
Wednesday 15th April 9:00am
Thursday 16th April 9:00am
Friday 17th April 9:00am
Saturday 18th April 9:00am
Sunday 19th April 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
PREGO REFLECTION ON TODAY’S GOSPEL:
I slowly begin my prayer by concentrating my inner
attention on the Lord’s presence in my life and being.
In the deepening silence, I hand over my joys and troubles, and ask God for the grace of a spirit of gratitude and wonder.
I read the Gospel meditatively.
In whatever way I can, I enter the scene, allowing the narrative to touch my imagination.
Is there something here that particularly attracts my attention?
Perhaps Mary of Magdala, her heart filled with grief, going faithfully to attend to her Lord in the darkness …?
Or guilt-ridden Peter, who goes right into the tomb?
Or ‘the one Jesus loved’: the disciple who sees the empty tomb and believes?
I allow myself to be present with each one.
Maybe I stand here in the empty tomb.
How do I feel and react now?
How deep is my belief in the power of the Resurrection?
Maybe there are areas of my life where I am invited to a deeper faith?
I open my heart and soul to the Lord, speaking to him as I would to a beloved friend.
I pray for all those who are imprisoned, in self-isolation, or grieving today, and for those suffering without faith and hope in the loving God.
When I am ready, I slowly draw my prayer to a close.
In the deepening silence, I hand over my joys and troubles, and ask God for the grace of a spirit of gratitude and wonder.
I read the Gospel meditatively.
In whatever way I can, I enter the scene, allowing the narrative to touch my imagination.
Is there something here that particularly attracts my attention?
Perhaps Mary of Magdala, her heart filled with grief, going faithfully to attend to her Lord in the darkness …?
Or guilt-ridden Peter, who goes right into the tomb?
Or ‘the one Jesus loved’: the disciple who sees the empty tomb and believes?
I allow myself to be present with each one.
Maybe I stand here in the empty tomb.
How do I feel and react now?
How deep is my belief in the power of the Resurrection?
Maybe there are areas of my life where I am invited to a deeper faith?
I open my heart and soul to the Lord, speaking to him as I would to a beloved friend.
I pray for all those who are imprisoned, in self-isolation, or grieving today, and for those suffering without faith and hope in the loving God.
When I am ready, I slowly draw my prayer to a close.
Your prayers are asked for the sick:
Mark Aylett, Tony Kiely, Sand
Frankcombe, Judith Xavier,
Pat Barker, Paul Richardson, & …
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Lorna Watson, Graham Taylor, Elizabeth
Heckscher, Charles Johnson, Edward King, Bill
Halley, Rosalie McCarthy, Annette Camaya
Let us pray for those whose
anniversary occurs about this time: 8th – 14th April,
2020
Vera Speers, Betty Weeks, James
Hannavy, Bob Mahony, Joan Roach, James Flight, Patricia Winzinberg, Ferruccio Candotti, Beatrice
Ntuka, Jonathan Martinez, Gillian Ibell, Glen Graham, Daphne
Walker, Mondo Di Pietro, Ian Wright and
deceased relatives and friends of the Knight, Sheridan and Bourke families.
May the souls of the faithful departed,
through the mercy of
God, rest in peace.
Amen
Weekly Ramblings
The Lord Is
Risen.
He Is
Risen Indeed, Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia!!
‘In the evening of that same
day, the first day of the week, the doors were closed in the room where the
disciples were, for fear of the Jews.’ (John 20:19)
With the simple change of the
last word from Jews to Coronavirus these words, which begin our Gospel reading
next Sunday, I suspect, echo something of the state of our community at this
time. As people of faith we rejoice that Jesus is truly Risen but, right here,
right now, we need to remain apart from others and do everything we can to
ensure not only our own and our families health but the health of our
community.
As of today copies of our
newsletters will not be delivered to the Churches for people to collect because
going out to get a newsletter is not essential activity. BUT, the newsletter can
be posted to anyone who wants one – please contact us at the Parish Office and
we will make it happen. As well, the newsletter is sent out as an email copy
each week (to almost 300 parishioners) and the internet version is available
from Saturday morning by going to https://mlcathparish.blogspot.com.
If you would like to receive the newsletter by email please contact us.
During the week Archbishop
Julian announced that when Fr Paschal returns to Tasmania he will be moving to
the Cathedral as an Assistant Priest. Movement of clergy in their first few
years is quite normal – I spent my first 18 months in Launceston before moving
to Bellerive. This is part of the practice of providing different forms of
experience to newly ordained men. Because of the uncertainty about when he
might be able to return a decision about a Parish Farewell and opportunity to
express our thanks for his work amongst us will need to be deferred – more
information when we know something concrete.
Thanks to all those who are
supporting the Parish in so many different ways – by keeping in touch with
neighbours, by contacting us with information regarding other parishioners and
how to contact them, by your continued financial support, and so many other
ways. Details about continuing your planned giving on-line and supporting
Project Compassion are included in the Newsletter – if you have any difficulties
please contact the Parish Office and we can assist you.
In this time of uncertainty
please take care and stay at home unless it is absolutely necessary to be out.
I started with the passage from next Sunday’s Gospel – I would like to end
today with the first words that Jesus spoke to his disciples: ‘Peace be with
you.’
The Lord Is
Risen.
He Is
Risen Indeed, Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia!!
Ps Happy Easter!!
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
The Church Must Die Before It Can Rise Again
The Church Must Die Before It Can Rise Again
The coronavirus crisis could be a 'Catholic teaching moment', but school is currently out of session by Robert Mickens, Rome, April 9, 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 totally disrupted our lives. And for Christians it has been a cross and Lenten penance we did not expect. And certainly one we would never have chosen.
That seemed clear enough to me nearly five weeks ago when Italy decreed the first in a series of ever-more stringent measures to try to contain the spread of COVID-19.
The entire country went into forced lockdown on March 9 and public gatherings, including church services, were deemed unsafe. Public Mass was canceled. Even at the Vatican.
This was a huge cross thrust on the backs of practicing Catholics. And we have stumbled under its weight.
Some have tried to wiggle out from underneath it and resume life – specifically "liturgical" life, if it can be called that – as it was before the pandemic.
Bishops and priests, for the most part, have continued "saying" their daily Mass all by themselves and have urged their people to follow them via TV or internet.
Eucharist, public liturgy and private prayer
Their response raises serious questions about the very nature of the Eucharist, public liturgy and personal prayer, as I wrote last week.
That column drew heated and passionate reactions. One person accused me of bad judgment, though he did not say why.
Another said he was "stung" by the suggestion that virtual Mass was analogous to a virtual Thanksgiving Dinner. He said it was a "shallow analogy" because "God can work outside our structures". (No argument there.)
Furthermore, his parish has received "hundreds of responses saying how much spiritual benefit live-streamed Mass has brought people".
Both these men are Catholic presbyters and I suspect they speak for many, many of their ordained confreres. But certainly not all of them.
Some other priests and lay people said they were thankful for the observations and critiques in the article, because they would have liked to express similar sentiments, but do not feel they (especially the priests) are free to do so without facing negative repercussions.
In any case, the issues we've been discussing will not fade away once the pandemic has passed and public worship and gathering is possible again. On the contrary, the conversion has only just begun.
'School of the cross'
We have published numerous articles in La Croix International these past few weeks from regular and guest contributors – laypeople and clerics, men and women – that are opening up that conversation. And we will continue to do so.
There are certainly some clear and painful lessons that can and need to be learned from the current liturgical lockdown. But those who the Church considers to be the "authentic teachers of the faith" – the bishops – are only students themselves right now.
The entire Catholic community has been suddenly enrolled into some unforeseen "school of the cross", the likes of which we could have never imagined. Almost all but those who are ordained have been denied the possibility of gathering for worship and receiving the Eucharist.
And that means, of course, that televised or live-streamed Mass is usually an all male, clericalist performance.
At least Pope Francis has had the good pastoral sense to invite a woman religious to do the readings at the daily Mass he celebrates. He also made sure lay people proclaimed the first two readings at the Palm Sunday Eucharistic celebration.
On the other hand, there was not a woman in sight during his dramatic Urbi et Orbi supplication and blessing a couple of weeks ago in St. Peter's Square.
The first witnesses of the Resurrection, nowhere to be seen
Women, by and large, seem to be missing from the initiatives that bishops and priests have adopted in response to the prohibition on public liturgy. This should cause deep concern and prompt serious reflection.
Women were the first witnesses of the Resurrection of Jesus. They were the first to proclaim that he had risen from the dead. Yet the men are continuing to celebrate the commemoration of Christ's death and resurrection each day at Mass, usually without a woman present.
The exclusion of women from any prominent liturgical role – especially the proclamation of the Word – is a centuries-old problem. But this has become even more obvious during the current liturgical lockdown. It may be one of the lessons from the crisis we need to learn. And the Church's theologians and bishops must be the first students.
But the signs are not encouraging. This past week the Holy See Press Office announced that the pope had "decided to institute a new Study Commission on the female diaconate".
There are seven men (including a cardinal-president and priest-secretary) and five women on the commission. But not a single one appears to have done any significant research on the issue. And several are on record as being opposed to ordaining women deacons.
From Spy Wednesday to the Resurrection
Ominously, the new study commission was announced on what used to be commonly known as Spy Wednesday – the day before the Passover when Judas Iscariot went and betrayed Jesus.
All is not lost, however. We know that after suffering and crucifixion came the resurrection.
But there is no rising to new life, without first dying to how one lived before.
Christians of the West are celebrating the death and resurrection of Jesus in these days (and those in the Eastern traditional will do so a week later). Our Easter celebrations usually mean an end to our Lenten penances.
But it will be different this year. We can sing Alleluia! But, the truth is, our forced penance and Lenten fast will continue until we can gather again for Eucharist all together.
This is the Lenten cross the Church did not choose. And it's probably been more authentic, existentially, than that of any other Lent. But it's the cross God has given us.
Whether the Church embraces it willingly or not, the cross will inflict its mortal blow.
Only those who do not really believe in the power of the Resurrection would seriously think that the Church could remain exactly as it was before COVID-19.
Love At The Center
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
When we named the Center for Action and Contemplation, I
hoped our rather long name would itself keep us honest and force us toward
balance and ongoing integration beyond the first generation. However, over the
last thirty-five years, I have witnessed how many of us attach to contemplation
or action for the wrong reasons. Introverts use contemplation to affirm quiet
time; those with the luxury of free time sometimes use it for navel-gazing. On
the other hand, some activists see our call to action as an affirmation of
their particular agenda and not much else. Neither is the delicate balance and
art that we hope to affirm.
By contemplation, we mean the deliberate seeking of God
through a willingness to detach from the passing self, the tyranny of emotions,
the addiction to self-image, and the false promises of the world. Action, as we
are using the word, means a decisive commitment toward involvement and
engagement in the social order. Issues will not be resolved by mere reflection,
discussion, or even prayer, nor will they be resolved only by protests,
boycotts, or even, unfortunately by voting the “right” way. Rather, God “works
together with” all those who love (see Romans 8:28).
Though “Love” is not in our Center’s name, I hope that it is
the driving force behind all we do, just as it was for Jesus who knew God’s
love intimately and fully, and for the early church who proclaimed that “God is
love” (1 John 4:7-8). In our vision statement, we profess both our hoped-for
role for CAC’s future and the energy that drives us:
Amidst a time of planetary change and disruption, we
envision a recovery of our deep connection to each other and our world, led by
Christian and other spiritual movements that are freeing leaders and
communities to overcome dehumanizing systems of oppression and cooperate in the
transforming work of Love.
We never could have become the organization that so many of
you trust if we didn’t continually return to Love as our source. It is where we
rest in times of anxiety, find strength in times of trouble, discover joy in
good times and solace in bad ones. “Love never fails” to help us grow,
question, and forgive—both ourselves and others.
The only way out and through—for either side of any dualism,
including that between action and contemplation—is a kind of universal
forgiveness of Reality for being what it is; it thus becomes the bonding glue
of grace which heals all the separations which law, religion, or logic can
never finally or fully restore.
We are all on this journey together and we are all in need
of liberation (which might be a better word than salvation). God’s intention is
never to shame the individual (which actually disempowers), but solidarity with
and universal responsibility for the whole (which creates healthy people). That
is an act of radical solidarity that few Christians seem to enjoy but to which
the CAC is committed to fostering.
Prayer for
Our Community:
O Great Love, thank you for living and loving in us and
through us. May all that we do flow from our deep connection with you and all
beings. Help us become a community that vulnerably shares each other’s burdens
and the weight of glory. Listen to our hearts’ longings for the healing of our
world. [Please add your own intentions.] . . . Knowing you are hearing us
better than we are speaking, we offer these prayers in all the holy names of
God, amen.
Adapted from Richard Rohr, “Not the Center for Activism
& Introspection,” Radical Grace, vol. 4, no. 6 (Center for Action and
Contemplation: December 1991-January 1992).
The Meaning Of Jesus' Death
This article is taken from the archive of Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. You can find this article and many others by clicking here
Jesus’ death washes everything clean, including our ignorance and sin. That’s the clear message from Luke’s account of his death.
As we know, we have four Gospels, each with its own take on the passion and death of Jesus. As we know too these Gospel accounts are not journalistic reports of what happened on Good Friday but more theological interpretations of what happened then. They’re paintings of Jesus’ death more so than news reports about it and, like good art, they take liberties to highlight certain forms so as to bring out essence. Each Gospel writer has his own interpretation of what happened on Calvary.
For Luke, what happened in the death of Jesus is the clearest revelation, ever, of the incredible scope of God’s understanding, forgiveness, and healing. For him, Jesus’ death washes everything clean through an understanding, forgiveness, and healing that belies every notion suggesting anything to the contrary. To make this clear, Luke highlights a number of elements in his narrative.
First, in his account of Jesus’ arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane, he tells us that immediately after one of his disciples struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his ear, Jesus touched the man’s ear and healed him. God’s healing, Luke intimates, reaches into all situations, even situations of bitterness, betrayal, and violence. God’s grace will ultimately heal even what’s wounded in hatred.
Then, after Peter denied him three times and Jesus is being led away after his interrogation by the Sanhedrin, Luke tells us that Jesus turned and looked straight at Peter in a look that made Peter weep bitterly. Everything in this text and everything that comes after it suggests that the look from Jesus that caused Peter to weep bitterly was not one of disappointment and accusation, a look that would have caused Peter to weep in shame. No, rather it was a look of such understanding and empathy as Peter had never before seen, causing him to weep in relief, knowing that everything was alright and he was alright.
And when Luke records Jesus’ trial before Pilate, he recounts something that’s not recorded in the other Gospel accounts of Jesus’ trial, namely, Pilate sending Jesus to Herod and how the two of them, bitter enemies until that day, “became friends that same day.” As Ray Brown, commenting on this text puts it, “Jesus has a healing effect even on those who mistreat him.”
Finally, in Luke’s narrative, we arrive at the place where Jesus is crucified and as they are crucifying him, he utters the famous words: Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. Those words, which Christians forever afterwards have taken as the ultimate criterion as to how we should treat our enemies and those who do us ill, encapsulate the deep revelation contained in Jesus’ death. Uttered in that context as God is about to crucified by human beings, these words reveal how God sees and understands even our worst actions: Not as ill-will, not as something that ultimately turns us against God or God against us, but as ignorance – simple, non-culpable, invincible, understandable, forgivable, akin to the self-destructive actions of an innocent child.
In that context too, Luke narrates Jesus’ forgiveness of the “good thief”. What Luke wants to highlight here, beyond the obvious, are a number of things: First, that the man is forgiven not because he didn’t sin, but in spite of his sin; second, that he is given infinitely more than he actually requests of Jesus; and finally, that Jesus will not die with any unfinished business, this man’s sin must first be wiped clean.
Finally, in Luke’s narrative, unlike the narratives of Mark and Matthew, Jesus does not die expressing abandonment, but rather dies expressing complete trust: “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit”. Luke wants us to see in these words a template for how we can face our own deaths, given our weaknesses. What’s the lesson? Leon Bloy once wrote that there is only one true sadness in life, that of not being a saint. At the end of the day when each of us face our own death this will be our biggest regret, that we’re not saints. But, as Jesus shows in his death, we can die in (even in weakness) knowing we are dying into safe hands.
Luke’s account of the passion and death of Jesus, unlike much of Christian tradition, does not focus on the atoning value of Jesus’ death. What it emphasizes instead is this: Jesus’ death washes everything clean, each of us and the whole world. It heals everything, understands everything, and forgives everything – despite every ignorance, weakness, infidelity, and betrayal on our part. In John’s passion narrative, Jesus’ dead body is pierced with a lance and immediately “blood and water” (life and cleansing) flow out. In Luke’s account, Jesus’ body is not pierced. It doesn’t need to be. By the time he breathes his last he has forgiven everyone and everything has been washed clean.
For A Time Such As This: Your Parish And The Covid-19 Crisis
Week 3: Small Group Community
Week 3: Small Group Community
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
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
This post is the third in a series of resources dedicated to providing a potential road-map through the current COVID-19 crisis for your parish. We’ll be sharing with you what we’re doing, what’s working, and what isn’t. But honestly, we’re making it up as we go along, just like you. As always, our only credential is that, like you, we’re in the trenches figuring it out in real-time.
For Week 0 – “Our Debate About Online Church” click here
For Week 1 – “Set Priorities” click here
For Week 2 – “Communication” click here
One of the most pressing realities of this season is that of loss. Loss of jobs, loss of income, loss of senior send-offs and spring rituals. This coming week the Christian community will “lose” Holy Week and Easter, at least in the usual sense. But one of the most consequential yet under reported losses of this time of isolation is the loss of community. In fact, it is quite telling that we use the term “social” distancing rather than just physical distancing.
Thanks to modern live-stream technology, the experience of watching and participating in weekend Mass or church services has been essentially uninterrupted for many Christians in this country. But what cannot be replicated quite that easily is the inevitable community we enjoy by attending church in-person. We are made for community. Even the most entrenched introverts need social outlets to grow and flourish emotionally, and that is also true of our faith.
That is why at Nativity we have promoted Small Groups for a number of years now. Small Groups can be a catalyst for parish vibrancy. They can magnify the impact of the weekend homily, focus parish communication, foster social bonds, and grow the faith of your parishioners. But even more importantly, we like to say groups are our delivery system for pastoral care and schools for discipleship. All that, and they don’t necessarily cost the parish anything.
Here are some dos and don’ts when setting up online small groups:
Don’t – Allow your groups to become Bible studies, theology classes, therapy sessions, or gossip circles.
Do – Design your groups around life application aiming at life change.
Small groups are not meant to be just another parish program. Small groups pray together, but they aren’t prayer groups. Small groups are a place to study Scripture, but they aren’t Bible studies. Small group members support each other, but they aren’t support groups, they are a place where people support one another as they grow as disciples.
If you are having trouble attracting people to your small group program, it is likely because they misunderstand what it is. They don’t want another program on their schedule, they’re not interested in adult education. Besides, they don’t know how to pray and they’ve never read the Bible so they don’t feel like they “qualify.” Focus your messaging of small groups on the life application. Can you talk about life with a group? Then you’re qualified for small groups.
Don’t – Let groups become “silos.”
Do – Get everyone on the same page, moving in the same direction.
Your parish might actually already have a lot of ‘small groups,’ in that you have a number of small groups of people who come together for a common purpose: St. Vincent de Paul, the Ladies Sodality, the Knights of Columbus. Great groups but not necessarily focused on the mission of the parish and probably operating in complete isolation from one another.
Small groups are not meant to operate as isolated silos. They are meant to be the parish in miniature – groups of individuals growing in faith together.
We say that we don’t want to be a church that does small groups, we want to be a church of small groups. At our parish, the ‘content’ that small groups discuss comes directly from themes of the weekend homily. This way, everyone is on the same page. Our kids and student programs also work from a small group format adapted to age-appropriate themes. This powerfully unites the parish in one message and can get people moving in one direction.
Don’t – Let groups stagnate.
Do – Cultivate groups over time.
Small groups aren’t something that you simply start. They require care and attention. Members and leaders need to be recruited, groups will change and grow, multiply, or twin. Meanwhile, they all need attention and encouragement. If this sounds like a lot to take on, it can be, especially at first. Begin with a steering committee or leadership team so the work doesn’t fall to one person and become unsustainable. In the long run, a healthy small group program will save parish staff time.
This period of quarantine is the perfect time to launch small groups at your parish if you’ve been looking for an opportunity to do that. And if you have struggled to get a small group program up and running in the past, I think you’ll find it an easier sell these days. People are looking for connection now more than ever and they have more time than ever. If your parishioners have a positive experience of groups now it should be easy to keep them going following the quarantine.
Love In A Time Of Plague
It is not easy to talk about faith in the middle of a pandemic, observes Gemma Simmonds CJ as she considers the ways in which people turn to God at a time of crisis. ‘The compassion, or suffering alongside, of Jesus amid the scandal of our suffering becomes the strength and wisdom of the faith-filled person.’ This compassion is most visible over the Easter Triduum, and it calls us all to conversion through the prayer, service and remembrance that Pope Francis commends to us.
Gemma Simmonds CJ is Director of the Religious Life Institute at the Margaret Beaufort Institute in Cambridge.
This article is taken from the ThinkingFaith.org website where you can find a wide range of articles by clicking here
In Albert Camus’ novel The Plague, a Jesuit called Paneloux preaches two sermons. He preaches the first one to a cathedral packed full of desperate people, terrified by the onset of bubonic plague in their town into turning to God for the first time in years. The sermon begins:
Brothers and sisters, we are suffering. Brothers and sisters, we are getting what we deserve.
This appalling holocaust, he tells them, is God’s way of teaching people how dependent they are on divine help, how arrogant to presume that they can do without faith. The pandemic is God’s punishment for sins, aimed at bringing the townspeople back to the obedience and service that they owe. Similar suggestions were heard in the first years of the AIDS pandemic and are being voiced now.[i]
The sermon leaves unanswered the questions such an approach begs about a God who calls us to heel through sending us horrifying illness. Paneloux’s words fit neatly into a theological system but show little awareness or concern for the human cost of suffering. But the preacher is about to learn a harsh lesson. Being a good Jesuit, he volunteers to nurse the dying, and is at hand when the little son of the town’s judge dies in agony. The book’s hero, a doctor and an unbeliever, had been present at the first sermon. He looks over the child’s bed to the priest and says: ‘This one, at least, was innocent.’
Paneloux preaches a second sermon in the aftermath of the boy’s death. The cathedral is less full. God has delivered no quick rescue package, so the bereaved plague survivors have turned to other securities. The priest’s certainties are shattered, his neat theologising lying in ruins before the brutal experience of innocent suffering. His previous explanations ring hollow, even to his own ears. He can no longer preach a God who chooses to visit the sins of the world on a child. So, with humility and resignation, he preaches a mysterious God whose ways are not ours, and who permits suffering for reasons at which we cannot guess. The only answer is patience, submission and faith in God’s ultimate mercy. Shortly afterwards, Paneloux himself becomes ill and dies. He may have caught the plague, but his symptoms are ambiguous, and his death certificate reads: ‘Cause of death in doubt’. The doubt within him overwhelms him and he cannot live with it.
Preaching or writing about faith in a time of pandemic presents a unique challenge. The risk lies in sounding either smugly banal or judgmental. The hard facts of what is happening around us resist the comforts of soft religiosity. A sermon could take the approach current in parts of the media, seeking to assign blame, or at least responsibility: if only the government/the Chinese/the World Health Organisation/the medical establishment had warned us, had acted more quickly. This is the apocalypse that the climate change lobby warned us about; if only we had listened. It’s the fault of big business, or a mysterious enemy, or whichever political system or ethnic group we happen to dislike and fear the most. Such secular sermons are falling on eager ears in some quarters, but they do little to help us come to philosophical or theological terms with suffering.
What sort of a sermon might we have preached or wanted to hear in the aftermath of 9/11, at a memorial service for the Nazi Holocaust, or at the funeral of a beloved child? A person in search of faith might want a sermon that makes sense of the big questions: if God is all-loving, how can so much evil and suffering take place? If God is all-powerful, why does God not act to prevent it? A person trying to hold on to their faith might hope to reconcile their image of the loving protector and saviour with the cruel realities of life. Believers often find themselves arguing on God’s behalf, seeking to explain or even justify this One in whom they believe and trust, but whose ways are strange, not only to those who don’t believe, but also, and sometimes more painfully, to those who do. The prophet Isaiah speaks of a God who hides in mystery (Isaiah 45:15). God is a hidden God, a God rendered incomprehensible by the scandal of human suffering. Psalm 91, in contrast, speaks of a God who rescues and saves us from deadly plague, from our enemies and from any threat of violence or danger. The psalmist is honest about the human predicament, but there is a corresponding confidence that God will act and come to the rescue. But history tells us otherwise. There was no rescue in Auschwitz, in the killing fields of Cambodia, or for the murdered children whose deaths regularly haunt our newspapers. There has been no rescue so far for the thousands dying of Covid-19.
A much-repeated story tells of a man who falls over a deep precipice. Hurtling down to his doom, he grabs onto an overhanging branch and swings over the abyss. In his terror he calls out, ‘Is there anyone up there who can help me?’ God replies, ‘Yes, I’m here’. ‘Is that God?’ calls the man. ‘Yes’, replies God. ‘Will you help me?’ ‘Certainly’, says God, ‘but you need to trust me and do what I say’. The man makes desperate promises to trust, repent, go to church every Sunday for evermore if only God will rescue him. ‘Good’, says God, ‘I’ll rescue you. Now… let go of the branch.’ There is a long pause, and the man shouts, ‘Is there anyone else up there?’
God invites us: ‘Turn to me and be saved, for I am God. There is no other.’ (Is 45:22) This God is the only one we’ve got. We might want a God we understand better, or who is more predictable, but God is God, there is no other. We cannot change God, so our only hope is to change ourselves and our perspective on God if we want some insight into human suffering. In general, religiously oriented people hold one of two approaches to it. These have been called the meaning context and the support context.[ii] The meaning context presumes that God is the direct cause of suffering and causes it for a specific reason. We try to see our suffering from God’s perspective in order to understand it and therefore cope with it better. Dr Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, the pioneer of pastoral work among the dying, noticed five stages in the process of dealing with mortal illness: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. [iii] In the meaning context, we expect God to take our suffering away or mitigate it. If this is not forthcoming, we at least pray that God will reveal the reason for sending it, so that we can suffer with a sense of meaning and coherence. Many people cannot believe in God precisely because they make these attempts to understand suffering and are devastated when they fail.
In the support context, people are not asking ‘Why, God?’ but, ‘Help me, God’. The assumption is that God can and will give strength in suffering. The foundation of faith here is an experienced relationship with God, encountered both as creator and sustainer of the universe and as one who remains utterly other and mysterious. The resolution of suffering comes from the conviction that God is with us. God-with-us is made visible in Christ who hangs on the cross with us, whose body is in agony every day in the bodies of suffering children, women and men. The ability to experience oneness with the suffering Christ allows us to perceive what is potentially faith-threatening as faith-integrating.
Jesus’s followers don’t suffer less than others. His own mother had her heart pierced with the sword of sorrow. If we needed a palpable reminder that being a Christian doesn’t make suffering lighter, or significantly easier, we need only look to Italy, where priests who ministered to those suffering from the virus have been struck down themselves and elderly nuns in their care homes have died in their dozens. St Paul exclaims: ‘I have been crucified with Christ’, but he goes on to say, ‘Yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me.’ (Gal 2:20)
This union with Jesus crucified and risen is the goal of the Christian life. In him we see embodied the support context approach to suffering. Despite his pleas in Gethsemane, his suffering is neither removed nor mitigated, but he receives strength for what is to come. Like any human being faced with the fear and agony of suffering, Jesus begs to be relieved of it, but implicit in his prayer, beyond the question why, is the question how? How can I bear this? The answer is given clearly: through loving union with his God and Father. As soon as Jesus takes this to heart, we see a transformation. From then on, nothing can shake that union. When he stands before Pilate, Herod and the Sanhedrin, when he is denied by his closest friend, paraded in front of his enemies, nailed to a cross, his resolution is unshakable. He is even able to share the consolation of union that he received in the garden with a man hanging beside him: ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise’. (Lk 23:43)
Another Jesuit recently stood, not in a cathedral but in the eerie emptiness of St Peter’s Square, a lonely figure under the driving rain, as he prayed for a world stricken by a pandemic and a country brought to its knees. Solitary though he looked, Pope Francis emphasised the closeness of Jesus to the world’s pain, the commonality of suffering and the vital need of solidarity in such times,
We find ourselves afraid and lost. Like the disciples in the Gospel we were caught off guard by an unexpected, turbulent storm. We have realized that we are all in the same boat, all of us fragile and disoriented, but at the same time important and needed, all of us called to row together, each of us in need of comforting the other. We are all in this boat… together. Just like those disciples, who spoke anxiously with one voice, saying ‘We are perishing’ (Mk 4:38), so we too have realized that […] we can only do this together. [iv]
Unlike Père Paneloux, he doesn’t begin by telling us that we are being punished, but he does call on us to be honest in our scrutiny of the lives that many of us lived pre-corona.
The storm exposes our vulnerability and uncovers those false and superfluous certainties around which we have constructed our daily schedules, our projects, our habits and priorities. It shows us how we have allowed to become dull and feeble the very things that nourish, sustain and strengthen our lives and our communities.
As the days of isolation go by and we become more accustomed to living without the distractions and resources that were second nature to us, we find ourselves vulnerable to our circumstances and to the impulses embedded in our own inner world. The ‘stereotypes with which we camouflaged our egos’ fall away in the silence of isolation and we are confronted by our addiction to immediate satisfactions and our indifference to others.
Greedy for profit, we let ourselves get caught up in things, and lured away by haste. We did not stop at your reproach to us, we were not shaken awake by wars or injustice across the world, nor did we listen to the cry of the poor or of our ailing planet. We carried on regardless, thinking we would stay healthy in a world that was sick.
These are challenging words, but they are a wake-up call rather than a reproach. Pope Francis reminds us that our suffering is integrated within our faith not by insights into God’s reasons, which remain mysterious and unknown, but by the assurance of God’s strength. The compassion, or suffering alongside, of Jesus amid the scandal of our suffering becomes the strength and wisdom of the faith-filled person. Union is the most powerful answer to our questions at such a time: union with God and with one another,
In the face of so much suffering, where the authentic development of our peoples is assessed, we experience the priestly prayer of Jesus: ‘That they may all be one’ (Jn 17:21)
In an interview just published, he takes up this theme again.[v] He speaks of another literary priest, the character of Cardinal Federigo Borromeo in Alessandro Manzoni’s The Betrothed, which centres on the Milan plague of 1630. He describes the cardinal as a hero, but adds,
Yet in one of the chapters he goes to greet a village but with the window of his carriage closed to protect himself. This did not go down well with the people. The people of God need their pastor to be close to them, not to overprotect himself. […] The creativity of the Christian needs to show forth in opening up new horizons, opening windows, opening transcendence toward God and toward people, and in creating new ways of being at home.
This opening up of new horizons includes being open to people who have up till now remained ‘other’ to us,
Go down into the underground, and pass from the hyper-virtual, fleshless world to the suffering flesh of the poor. This is the conversion we have to undergo. And if we don’t start there, there will be no conversion.
All intellectual attempts to reconcile God and suffering flounder when we deal with events like the Covid-19 pandemic. No rational argument can provide a satisfactory answer to the question of why it has come upon us. The insights of scripture point to God as unknowable but also at work in us through the power of the Spirit, giving the power for our inner self to grow strong.[vi] Christ continues to be crucified in and by the world. If there is an approach, rather than an answer, to the problem of the plague, Pope Francis tells us that it is found through conversion based on reconnection with our real surroundings, coherence in our beliefs and genuine love of one another. St Ignatius’s Contemplation for Attaining Love, he points out, is based on remembering. Suffering can become a route to union when we re-member, reconnecting and reuniting ourselves in love with Jesus, the crucified and Risen Saviour, and with our crucified brothers and sisters.
[ii] For an excellent treatment of this see Richard Hauser, Finding God in Troubled Times (Loyola University Press, 2003).
[iii] Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families (Scribner, 2014).
[iv] This and following references are to Pope Francis’ Urbi et Orbi blessing, 27 March 2020 http://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/homilies/2020/documents/papa-francesco_20200327_omelia-epidemia.html.
[v] Pope Francis Interview with Austen Ivereigh:
[vi] Ephesians 3:16.
This post is the third in a series of resources dedicated to providing a potential road-map through the current COVID-19 crisis for your parish. We’ll be sharing with you what we’re doing, what’s working, and what isn’t. But honestly, we’re making it up as we go along, just like you. As always, our only credential is that, like you, we’re in the trenches figuring it out in real-time.
For Week 0 – “Our Debate About Online Church” click here
For Week 1 – “Set Priorities” click here
For Week 2 – “Communication” click here
One of the most pressing realities of this season is that of loss. Loss of jobs, loss of income, loss of senior send-offs and spring rituals. This coming week the Christian community will “lose” Holy Week and Easter, at least in the usual sense. But one of the most consequential yet under reported losses of this time of isolation is the loss of community. In fact, it is quite telling that we use the term “social” distancing rather than just physical distancing.
Thanks to modern live-stream technology, the experience of watching and participating in weekend Mass or church services has been essentially uninterrupted for many Christians in this country. But what cannot be replicated quite that easily is the inevitable community we enjoy by attending church in-person. We are made for community. Even the most entrenched introverts need social outlets to grow and flourish emotionally, and that is also true of our faith.
That is why at Nativity we have promoted Small Groups for a number of years now. Small Groups can be a catalyst for parish vibrancy. They can magnify the impact of the weekend homily, focus parish communication, foster social bonds, and grow the faith of your parishioners. But even more importantly, we like to say groups are our delivery system for pastoral care and schools for discipleship. All that, and they don’t necessarily cost the parish anything.
Here are some dos and don’ts when setting up online small groups:
Don’t – Allow your groups to become Bible studies, theology classes, therapy sessions, or gossip circles.
Do – Design your groups around life application aiming at life change.
Small groups are not meant to be just another parish program. Small groups pray together, but they aren’t prayer groups. Small groups are a place to study Scripture, but they aren’t Bible studies. Small group members support each other, but they aren’t support groups, they are a place where people support one another as they grow as disciples.
If you are having trouble attracting people to your small group program, it is likely because they misunderstand what it is. They don’t want another program on their schedule, they’re not interested in adult education. Besides, they don’t know how to pray and they’ve never read the Bible so they don’t feel like they “qualify.” Focus your messaging of small groups on the life application. Can you talk about life with a group? Then you’re qualified for small groups.
Don’t – Let groups become “silos.”
Do – Get everyone on the same page, moving in the same direction.
Your parish might actually already have a lot of ‘small groups,’ in that you have a number of small groups of people who come together for a common purpose: St. Vincent de Paul, the Ladies Sodality, the Knights of Columbus. Great groups but not necessarily focused on the mission of the parish and probably operating in complete isolation from one another.
Small groups are not meant to operate as isolated silos. They are meant to be the parish in miniature – groups of individuals growing in faith together.
We say that we don’t want to be a church that does small groups, we want to be a church of small groups. At our parish, the ‘content’ that small groups discuss comes directly from themes of the weekend homily. This way, everyone is on the same page. Our kids and student programs also work from a small group format adapted to age-appropriate themes. This powerfully unites the parish in one message and can get people moving in one direction.
Don’t – Let groups stagnate.
Do – Cultivate groups over time.
Small groups aren’t something that you simply start. They require care and attention. Members and leaders need to be recruited, groups will change and grow, multiply, or twin. Meanwhile, they all need attention and encouragement. If this sounds like a lot to take on, it can be, especially at first. Begin with a steering committee or leadership team so the work doesn’t fall to one person and become unsustainable. In the long run, a healthy small group program will save parish staff time.
This period of quarantine is the perfect time to launch small groups at your parish if you’ve been looking for an opportunity to do that. And if you have struggled to get a small group program up and running in the past, I think you’ll find it an easier sell these days. People are looking for connection now more than ever and they have more time than ever. If your parishioners have a positive experience of groups now it should be easy to keep them going following the quarantine.
Love In A Time Of Plague
Gemma Simmonds CJ is Director of the Religious Life Institute at the Margaret Beaufort Institute in Cambridge.
This article is taken from the ThinkingFaith.org website where you can find a wide range of articles by clicking here
In Albert Camus’ novel The Plague, a Jesuit called Paneloux preaches two sermons. He preaches the first one to a cathedral packed full of desperate people, terrified by the onset of bubonic plague in their town into turning to God for the first time in years. The sermon begins:
Brothers and sisters, we are suffering. Brothers and sisters, we are getting what we deserve.
This appalling holocaust, he tells them, is God’s way of teaching people how dependent they are on divine help, how arrogant to presume that they can do without faith. The pandemic is God’s punishment for sins, aimed at bringing the townspeople back to the obedience and service that they owe. Similar suggestions were heard in the first years of the AIDS pandemic and are being voiced now.[i]
The sermon leaves unanswered the questions such an approach begs about a God who calls us to heel through sending us horrifying illness. Paneloux’s words fit neatly into a theological system but show little awareness or concern for the human cost of suffering. But the preacher is about to learn a harsh lesson. Being a good Jesuit, he volunteers to nurse the dying, and is at hand when the little son of the town’s judge dies in agony. The book’s hero, a doctor and an unbeliever, had been present at the first sermon. He looks over the child’s bed to the priest and says: ‘This one, at least, was innocent.’
Paneloux preaches a second sermon in the aftermath of the boy’s death. The cathedral is less full. God has delivered no quick rescue package, so the bereaved plague survivors have turned to other securities. The priest’s certainties are shattered, his neat theologising lying in ruins before the brutal experience of innocent suffering. His previous explanations ring hollow, even to his own ears. He can no longer preach a God who chooses to visit the sins of the world on a child. So, with humility and resignation, he preaches a mysterious God whose ways are not ours, and who permits suffering for reasons at which we cannot guess. The only answer is patience, submission and faith in God’s ultimate mercy. Shortly afterwards, Paneloux himself becomes ill and dies. He may have caught the plague, but his symptoms are ambiguous, and his death certificate reads: ‘Cause of death in doubt’. The doubt within him overwhelms him and he cannot live with it.
Preaching or writing about faith in a time of pandemic presents a unique challenge. The risk lies in sounding either smugly banal or judgmental. The hard facts of what is happening around us resist the comforts of soft religiosity. A sermon could take the approach current in parts of the media, seeking to assign blame, or at least responsibility: if only the government/the Chinese/the World Health Organisation/the medical establishment had warned us, had acted more quickly. This is the apocalypse that the climate change lobby warned us about; if only we had listened. It’s the fault of big business, or a mysterious enemy, or whichever political system or ethnic group we happen to dislike and fear the most. Such secular sermons are falling on eager ears in some quarters, but they do little to help us come to philosophical or theological terms with suffering.
What sort of a sermon might we have preached or wanted to hear in the aftermath of 9/11, at a memorial service for the Nazi Holocaust, or at the funeral of a beloved child? A person in search of faith might want a sermon that makes sense of the big questions: if God is all-loving, how can so much evil and suffering take place? If God is all-powerful, why does God not act to prevent it? A person trying to hold on to their faith might hope to reconcile their image of the loving protector and saviour with the cruel realities of life. Believers often find themselves arguing on God’s behalf, seeking to explain or even justify this One in whom they believe and trust, but whose ways are strange, not only to those who don’t believe, but also, and sometimes more painfully, to those who do. The prophet Isaiah speaks of a God who hides in mystery (Isaiah 45:15). God is a hidden God, a God rendered incomprehensible by the scandal of human suffering. Psalm 91, in contrast, speaks of a God who rescues and saves us from deadly plague, from our enemies and from any threat of violence or danger. The psalmist is honest about the human predicament, but there is a corresponding confidence that God will act and come to the rescue. But history tells us otherwise. There was no rescue in Auschwitz, in the killing fields of Cambodia, or for the murdered children whose deaths regularly haunt our newspapers. There has been no rescue so far for the thousands dying of Covid-19.
A much-repeated story tells of a man who falls over a deep precipice. Hurtling down to his doom, he grabs onto an overhanging branch and swings over the abyss. In his terror he calls out, ‘Is there anyone up there who can help me?’ God replies, ‘Yes, I’m here’. ‘Is that God?’ calls the man. ‘Yes’, replies God. ‘Will you help me?’ ‘Certainly’, says God, ‘but you need to trust me and do what I say’. The man makes desperate promises to trust, repent, go to church every Sunday for evermore if only God will rescue him. ‘Good’, says God, ‘I’ll rescue you. Now… let go of the branch.’ There is a long pause, and the man shouts, ‘Is there anyone else up there?’
God invites us: ‘Turn to me and be saved, for I am God. There is no other.’ (Is 45:22) This God is the only one we’ve got. We might want a God we understand better, or who is more predictable, but God is God, there is no other. We cannot change God, so our only hope is to change ourselves and our perspective on God if we want some insight into human suffering. In general, religiously oriented people hold one of two approaches to it. These have been called the meaning context and the support context.[ii] The meaning context presumes that God is the direct cause of suffering and causes it for a specific reason. We try to see our suffering from God’s perspective in order to understand it and therefore cope with it better. Dr Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, the pioneer of pastoral work among the dying, noticed five stages in the process of dealing with mortal illness: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. [iii] In the meaning context, we expect God to take our suffering away or mitigate it. If this is not forthcoming, we at least pray that God will reveal the reason for sending it, so that we can suffer with a sense of meaning and coherence. Many people cannot believe in God precisely because they make these attempts to understand suffering and are devastated when they fail.
In the support context, people are not asking ‘Why, God?’ but, ‘Help me, God’. The assumption is that God can and will give strength in suffering. The foundation of faith here is an experienced relationship with God, encountered both as creator and sustainer of the universe and as one who remains utterly other and mysterious. The resolution of suffering comes from the conviction that God is with us. God-with-us is made visible in Christ who hangs on the cross with us, whose body is in agony every day in the bodies of suffering children, women and men. The ability to experience oneness with the suffering Christ allows us to perceive what is potentially faith-threatening as faith-integrating.
Jesus’s followers don’t suffer less than others. His own mother had her heart pierced with the sword of sorrow. If we needed a palpable reminder that being a Christian doesn’t make suffering lighter, or significantly easier, we need only look to Italy, where priests who ministered to those suffering from the virus have been struck down themselves and elderly nuns in their care homes have died in their dozens. St Paul exclaims: ‘I have been crucified with Christ’, but he goes on to say, ‘Yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me.’ (Gal 2:20)
This union with Jesus crucified and risen is the goal of the Christian life. In him we see embodied the support context approach to suffering. Despite his pleas in Gethsemane, his suffering is neither removed nor mitigated, but he receives strength for what is to come. Like any human being faced with the fear and agony of suffering, Jesus begs to be relieved of it, but implicit in his prayer, beyond the question why, is the question how? How can I bear this? The answer is given clearly: through loving union with his God and Father. As soon as Jesus takes this to heart, we see a transformation. From then on, nothing can shake that union. When he stands before Pilate, Herod and the Sanhedrin, when he is denied by his closest friend, paraded in front of his enemies, nailed to a cross, his resolution is unshakable. He is even able to share the consolation of union that he received in the garden with a man hanging beside him: ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise’. (Lk 23:43)
Another Jesuit recently stood, not in a cathedral but in the eerie emptiness of St Peter’s Square, a lonely figure under the driving rain, as he prayed for a world stricken by a pandemic and a country brought to its knees. Solitary though he looked, Pope Francis emphasised the closeness of Jesus to the world’s pain, the commonality of suffering and the vital need of solidarity in such times,
We find ourselves afraid and lost. Like the disciples in the Gospel we were caught off guard by an unexpected, turbulent storm. We have realized that we are all in the same boat, all of us fragile and disoriented, but at the same time important and needed, all of us called to row together, each of us in need of comforting the other. We are all in this boat… together. Just like those disciples, who spoke anxiously with one voice, saying ‘We are perishing’ (Mk 4:38), so we too have realized that […] we can only do this together. [iv]
Unlike Père Paneloux, he doesn’t begin by telling us that we are being punished, but he does call on us to be honest in our scrutiny of the lives that many of us lived pre-corona.
The storm exposes our vulnerability and uncovers those false and superfluous certainties around which we have constructed our daily schedules, our projects, our habits and priorities. It shows us how we have allowed to become dull and feeble the very things that nourish, sustain and strengthen our lives and our communities.
As the days of isolation go by and we become more accustomed to living without the distractions and resources that were second nature to us, we find ourselves vulnerable to our circumstances and to the impulses embedded in our own inner world. The ‘stereotypes with which we camouflaged our egos’ fall away in the silence of isolation and we are confronted by our addiction to immediate satisfactions and our indifference to others.
Greedy for profit, we let ourselves get caught up in things, and lured away by haste. We did not stop at your reproach to us, we were not shaken awake by wars or injustice across the world, nor did we listen to the cry of the poor or of our ailing planet. We carried on regardless, thinking we would stay healthy in a world that was sick.
These are challenging words, but they are a wake-up call rather than a reproach. Pope Francis reminds us that our suffering is integrated within our faith not by insights into God’s reasons, which remain mysterious and unknown, but by the assurance of God’s strength. The compassion, or suffering alongside, of Jesus amid the scandal of our suffering becomes the strength and wisdom of the faith-filled person. Union is the most powerful answer to our questions at such a time: union with God and with one another,
In the face of so much suffering, where the authentic development of our peoples is assessed, we experience the priestly prayer of Jesus: ‘That they may all be one’ (Jn 17:21)
In an interview just published, he takes up this theme again.[v] He speaks of another literary priest, the character of Cardinal Federigo Borromeo in Alessandro Manzoni’s The Betrothed, which centres on the Milan plague of 1630. He describes the cardinal as a hero, but adds,
Yet in one of the chapters he goes to greet a village but with the window of his carriage closed to protect himself. This did not go down well with the people. The people of God need their pastor to be close to them, not to overprotect himself. […] The creativity of the Christian needs to show forth in opening up new horizons, opening windows, opening transcendence toward God and toward people, and in creating new ways of being at home.
This opening up of new horizons includes being open to people who have up till now remained ‘other’ to us,
Go down into the underground, and pass from the hyper-virtual, fleshless world to the suffering flesh of the poor. This is the conversion we have to undergo. And if we don’t start there, there will be no conversion.
All intellectual attempts to reconcile God and suffering flounder when we deal with events like the Covid-19 pandemic. No rational argument can provide a satisfactory answer to the question of why it has come upon us. The insights of scripture point to God as unknowable but also at work in us through the power of the Spirit, giving the power for our inner self to grow strong.[vi] Christ continues to be crucified in and by the world. If there is an approach, rather than an answer, to the problem of the plague, Pope Francis tells us that it is found through conversion based on reconnection with our real surroundings, coherence in our beliefs and genuine love of one another. St Ignatius’s Contemplation for Attaining Love, he points out, is based on remembering. Suffering can become a route to union when we re-member, reconnecting and reuniting ourselves in love with Jesus, the crucified and Risen Saviour, and with our crucified brothers and sisters.
[ii] For an excellent treatment of this see Richard Hauser, Finding God in Troubled Times (Loyola University Press, 2003).
[iii] Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying: What the Dying Have to Teach Doctors, Nurses, Clergy and Their Own Families (Scribner, 2014).
[iv] This and following references are to Pope Francis’ Urbi et Orbi blessing, 27 March 2020 http://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/homilies/2020/documents/papa-francesco_20200327_omelia-epidemia.html.
[v] Pope Francis Interview with Austen Ivereigh:
[vi] Ephesians 3:16.
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