HIS MAJESTY’S LOYAL OPPOSITION

 

HIS MAJESTY’S LOYAL OPPOSITION

Sometime in the 1820s this phrase was first used to describe the party out of power in Britain. It implied members would cooperate with the government even though they did not agree with them. The opposition party accepted the basic structures of civil society though they had their own ideas about how it should be governed.

I was thinking of this basic framework while re-reading John W. O’Malley’s marvellous book, What happened at Vatican II. O’Malley describes the deep-felt opposition of some of the cardinals, especially Alfredo Ottaviani, to the direction the council was taking in the first session in 1962. At one point the cardinal seems to have lost his temper as he raised his voice, ‘I have no choice but to say no more because, as Scripture teaches, when nobody is listening words are a waste of time.’

I mention this moment of tension and, when we reflect on it, we catch a glimpse of the creative dynamic at work when people have different opinions. No one tried to silence Ottaviani or those who opposed him. The bishops listened to each other inside and outside the council chamber. Gradually, over four years, a marvellous set of documents emerged which we are still trying to digest sixty years later.

In the early church there were also heated debates and reports of angry bishops pulling the beards of those they disagreed with! And, even earlier, in the Acts of the Apostles we find disagreements. The point surely is that differences of view do not have to break the unity, the communion, of people with one another. When we listen to one another with respect we discover something new and life-giving. There are leaders who cannot tolerate opposition. Opponents are labelled rebels who want ‘regime change’. When we don’t listen, we may miss out on something that could really help us move forward.

Moses, in today’s first reading, had sharp words for Joshua on this subject and Jesus, in the gospel, tells John, who wants to silence someone who is not ‘one of us’, to let him alone; ‘you must not stop him … Anyone is not against us if for us.’

Tension means ‘holding’; not too tight, not too loose. You hold a bird in your hand. If you hold it too tight, you may crush it. Too loose and it will escape. The guitar string is tightened – not too much, not too little. And so it is in the Church as we shall surely see in the Synod. Would that we could also see it in civil society, in families and indeed in all our differences.                                                                             29 Sept 2024           Sunday 26 B           Num 11:25-29         Jam 5:1-6                Mk 9:38-48

 

CHIPPING AWAY TO REVEAL YOUR BEAUTY

 

CHIPPING AWAY TO REVEAL YOUR BEAUTY

This is the second week running that we read Mark’s warning that the ‘Son of Man will suffer grievously.’ Why this insistence on this theme? This is the centre of his gospel and this is its central message. It is a message we don’t want to hear.

In Chishawasha, near to Harare, there used to be a group of stone carvers. They have had to move. I used to watch them work and I always remember their answer to my question, ‘How do you decide what to carve?’ ‘The stone itself’, one of them answered, ‘has within itself what it wants to be.’ I am blankly looking at a rock. Each rock looks much the same. But the artist sees each one differently. This one has within it the figure of an owl. That one the figure of a woman.  The sculptor sees in each rock its own unique future.

The sculptors chip away over days and even weeks, leaving a carpet of stone chips scattered around the base of the sculpture. It is an untidy scene as I wait for some hint of what the end product will look like. Paul says we are God’s field where the Lord works patiently to form us in the image he has in mind for us. He could equally have said we are God’s workshop where we are chipped away into shape. There is no escaping the chisel – whatever shape it comes to us. It could be a broken relationship, sickness, failure in exams, an accident.

Michael Paul Gallagher has a marvellous little book he calls Faith Maps. It is an account of ten well-known, and not so well-known, writers’ descriptions of our journey to faith. He starts with Newman and ends with Benedict XVI. One is Lonergan and Michael Paul uses his image of ‘the sculptor releasing a beauty hidden in stone’. But he also quotes Karl Barth who speaks of ‘the two sides of faith; the aspect of joy and the aspect of the cross.’ He quotes the joy of the mother who waits six weeks for her new born baby to look at her with a smile of recognition. But he also has us think of the beauty of the cross.

I have just read of a war correspondent, Lindsey Hilsum, who witnesses awful scenes and has to report them. She says she always carries a book of poetry with her. It helps her make sense of the dreadful things she sees. Poets reveal to us that suffering, pain and chipping away, can lead to something beautiful. Of the executions following the Easter Rising in Ireland in 1916, the poet Yeats wrote ‘a terrible beauty is born.’ Giving of oneself that may lead to suffering and even death is terrible. But it can also be noble and ‘beautiful’ in the sense that it touches something very deep in our nature. We can understand that the martyrs are fulfilled in their giving of themselves.

22 Sept 2024         Sunday 25 B    Wis 2:12-20   Jm 3:16-4:3    Mk 930-37

 

 

FLY OR DIE

 

FLY OR DIE

It is a well-known image: a caterpillar must die so that a butterfly can fly. A less well-known one is about the sea-bird, the gannet. I saw them once swirling round the rocky islands in the Atlantic off the west coast of Ireland. At a certain point, the mother stuffs her chick with food till it can take no more. Then she flies off. The chick relaxes and enjoys itself for a while. But soon enough it starts feeling hungry again. It has never done more than exercise its wings till then. But now it must leave its cosy home. It must either fly – or die.

Its like a law built into our existence. We all have to fly. Otherwise we will die a slow death of boredom, frustration or living off the work of others like that other bird that lays its eggs in another’s nest because it can’t be bothered to rear its own young. A law maybe but – better - it is the truth about life. Think of an artist – or a musician. To succeed they have to get it right. And that may take sweat and tears. Think of children. In the ‘nest’ of a good happy home, they are secure and enjoying themselves. Then they have to leave home and then the struggle begins.

Each week, we work our way through Mark’s gospel. We know the stories. We have met them many times. But then suddenly there is commotion. Jesus tells his closest friends he will be taken from them; he will be betrayed, ‘handed over’, arrested, condemned and put to death. They are aghast. They protest and he turns on them and rebukes their leader in the strongest terms; ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are trying to block the only way to truth and life!’ Jesus has set his face ‘like flint’ (Is. 50) towards Jerusalem. It is the only way for him – and for us.

We look at our high-density suburbs where people spend all their efforts that they and their families may survive for another day. We look at our rural areas where people dig deep into river beds to find a little water for themselves and their livestock. We look further at Sudan where an endless war continues, or Ukraine, or Gaza. It is all so pitiful. And it is all because those of us who have power to change things sit on our hands and do nothing. We are not prepared to fly. We prefer the slow death of ‘comfort’ and ‘security’.

So the only truth about life is the cross. This is the central message of the new world that Jesus came to create when he prayed with us, ‘Father, your kingdom come!’ And he tells us it does not end there; ‘After three days he will rise again.’ The rising of Jesus, and our rising if we are with him, is the truth, the fulfilment of life. The dancing butterfly and the soaring gannet are hints of this.

15 September 2024     Sunday 24 B               Is 50:5-9          Jam 2:14-18            Mk 8:27-35     

BE AHEAD OF YOUR CURSOR

 

BE AHEAD OF YOUR CURSOR

The cursor is that little arrow that tells you where you are when you are typing. It is like a sign post, a familiar land mark, giving a sense of security! We like security. We like to know where we are; how things work; where we will find what we need for our health, our children, our old age. It is all understandable, natural and to be expected.

Yet, if we are not wary, it leaves out one aspect which we know is life-giving: surprise. Surprise covers the unexpected, the unplanned, the mysterious. Arthur Rubinstein was one of the greatest musicians of his age. He lived music from the age of two! His talent was extraordinary. In his early years he relied on his genius and felt little need to practice. Later he realised that even he was missing something by not doing the hard work of study and practice.

So he studied and discovered new horizons he had not known. But he said it was not good to practice too much. ‘In every concert I leave a lot to the moment. I must have the unexpected, the unforeseen. I want to risk, to dare. I want to be surprised by what comes out. I want to enjoy it more than the audience. That way the music can bloom anew.’

In Mark, chapter six, Jesus cures a deaf man. Everyone is astonished. But, as we know, it never stops there with the man being able to hear. There is another layer of meaning; hearing in the gospel means ‘being open’ – Mark gives us the Aramaic, Ephphatha – not just to words but to meanings beyond the words. This opening is to what is beyond our control, beyond our cursor. It is the world of surprise, of wonder, of mystery.

Lets remember! We live in a scientific, rational, age. Everything must be understood, controlled, studied until we solve the problem. Again, this is good and shows we are using all our efforts to make sense of our world. In my first days of learning Shona, I tried to engage an old man in conversation. I started, as one does, with the weather and expressed a hope for good rains. I always remember his response, kana Mwari achida. If God wills. I don’t blame the meteorologists for not bringing God into their forecasts. It’s not their job. And anyway, even the most spiritually minded of our scientists would be wary of saying anything about God’s influence on the weather.

But the invitation stands. With all our science, we are called to recognise the mystery of human life. It goes will beyond our science and signposts. The cursor’s job is limited. It doesn’t tell us the full story of where we are; it simply prepares us for wonder, for surprise – if we are open.                                                               8 Sept 2024         Sunday 23 B         Is 35:4-7                Jam 2:1-5      Mk 7:31-37

CREATION SUNDAY

 

CREATION SUNDAY

I had a dream last night in which I was travelling in a truck. The driver was a bit distracted and did not notice, until it was too late, that the bridge ahead had been washed away. I shouted at him to stop but it was too late. His front wheels went over the edge and we were stuck with only our rear wheels to get us out of the mess. Then I woke up!

The dream was a metaphor, a parable, for me of our environmental crisis which people are more and more aware of today. Francis is the first pope to devote an entire encyclical or letter to the whole world, on the subject. He writes;

When we speak of ‘environment’, what we really mean is a relationship existing between nature and the society which lives in it. Nature cannot be regarded as something separate from ourselves or as a mere setting in which we live. We are part of nature, included in it and thus in constant interaction with it, (Laudato Si’ # 139).

People are responding and the Jesuits, for example, have made it a priority:

to collaborate in the care of our common home.

A simply stated aspiration; one that means we want to work with others to respond to the huge threat to our survival posed by climate change. There is overwhelming evidence today that human decisions - which lead to emissions of carbon, deforestation, pollution of seas and rivers and other forms of destruction of the environment – are threatening our existence on the planet. As one in his eighties, I can say this doesn’t concern me. It will happen after my time. But that would be horribly irresponsible. It concerns all of us and our grandchildren will not thank us if we do not act now.

One of the oldest texts in our patrimony will be read this Sunday in our churches:

Now, Israel, take notice of the laws and customs that I (Moses) teach you today, and observe them that you may have life and may enter and take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers is giving you, (Deuteronomy 4:1).

It does not take much imagination to transpose these words into modern terms. ‘Laws and customs’, ‘possession of the land’ and ‘that you may have life’, all can easily be applied to our situation. We are called by Moses, by Francis and by our own better selves to pay attention to the relationship between the environment and our survival and growth as people. A new type of ‘fasting’ is called for where we abstain from exploiting and destroying ‘our common home.’ We still have time - and our rear wheels - to get us out of the mess.           1 September 2024                Sunday 22B                          World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation.                                             Deut 4:1…8                          James 1:17…27                   Mk 7:1…23

UNLESS THE FATHER DRAWS THEM

 

UNLESS THE FATHER DRAWS THEM

The sixth chapter of John is a pivot calling for a decision.  Up till then Jesus gives “signs”- the marriage at Cana, the woman at the well, the multiplying of the bread - which call for a response.  That response will depend on people’s underlying attitudes in ordinary life.  Are they loving and forgiving in their relationships with one another?  Are they considerate with the poor, the weak and all who suffer?  Their daily dispositions prepare them for how they will react when something big is asked of them.

John Henry Newman lived through almost the entire nineteenth century and his influence had a huge impact in the twentieth.  His contemporaries wanted a comfortable Christianity that allowed a place for religion in their lives.  But it was a “tamed” religion, drained of the painful struggle that faith demanded.  He called it a “notional” faith where people accepted the core teaching on Christianity but did not delve into its often painful demands.  He contrasted this with an “imaginative” or “real” faith where people used their mind and heart to open themselves to the mystery even though they did not understand everything.

At the end of chapter six, we are told “many left him” because he was stretching their minds and hearts beyond the accepted norms of the Jewish faith at the time and they could not take it.  It seemed safer not to venture beyond what they knew.  Peter by contrast, led the few disciples who remained into an act of real faith.  He did not understand but he had the imagination, the breath of vision, to know that if Jesus was saying something it must have a meaning even if he didn’t get it at the time.

If we look into our own hearts, do we find that we often live on the “notional” level?  Maybe we too often “take things for granted “? Or do we wonder at our world? There is one thing I give myself high marks for: flying! It is so easy to take a plane and fly off somewhere but every time I fly, I find myself pausing as the plane leaves the solid earth and takes off into the sky.  How can we take that for granted? How our ancestors would have wondered!  But we don’t.  We take it as a normal part of life. That’s what planes do! But it is amazing!

In our life in the Spirit, our life as baptised people, do we take many things for granted?  Even the Eucharist? Do we not often slip into the “notional”?  Yet we are called to wonder, to use our imagination to ponder the mystery, to make it “real”.  Jesus told the Jews, “No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father.” These words need pondering.  But if you have read this far, it surely means you have been drawn to do so!

 

25 August   Sunday 21B           Jos 24:1…...18    Ep 5:21-32    John 6:60-69

 

ASSUMED

 

ASSUMED

For centuries we have examined old truths in new ways. The facts about Mary, the mother of Jesus, are there in the gospels and the consensus of the Christian community has drawn them out over two thousand years. Catholics are often perceived as holding exaggerated beliefs about Mary but they would respond they have added nothing that is not implicit in the tradition.

In 1950, Pope Pius XII proclaimed that Mary, after her death, was ‘assumed’ into heaven body and soul. Many Christians who were not Catholics could see no sense in this definition but the pope had his reasons. First, there was a long tradition in the oriental as well as the western church of celebrating this feast as the principal one for Mary. Second, the mention of the body, as well as the soul, was an affirmation of the dignity of the human body so desecrated during the horrors of World War II. The ‘resurrection of the body’ appears as a belief in the oldest creeds.

And thirdly, mention of the body is a deliberate affirmation of human creativity. Yes, God made us ‘in his own image and likeness’ but he depended on human wombs to bring us forth.  And it is not just human life that we have a hand in fashioning; there is also all that we mean by culture. The celebration of the Assumption of Mary is a celebration of the way different groups of people have developed their own customs and beliefs, their own languages and music – all that goes to make up the genius of a people.

South African Jesuit Xolile Keteyi, who died aged 41 in 1994, was passionate about the link between the way the gospel was preached and the culture of the people of his country:

The Good News becomes part of the culture when it is expressed, and its fundamental truths are embodied, in local categories and concepts, symbols, ritual and language. But much more it become part of the culture when it is linked to the intrinsic dimension of culture that sustains human dignity and development.  

I put the word ‘embodied’ in italics as it echoes the purpose of this celebration of the Assumption of Mary. It is a celebration of the body, that astonishing reality that incarnates our life, our growth, our relationships – and our suffering and death. God assumed our humanity when the Word became flesh. He also assumed the culture, rituals and language of the Jewish people. It was through them that he announced his message of the kingdom. The Church has to assume the culture of people in depth if she is to reach their hearts – and not simply be a superficial identity wheeled out when needed.

15 August 2024    The Assumption of Mary      Rev 11:19; 12:1…10       1 Cor 15:20-26       Lk 1:39-56