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St
John the Apostle ~ Kippax
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CANBERRA,
AUSTRALIA |
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Parish Priest Desk Archive Jan to June 08
Having been away from the parish for a year, I have been thinking a lot about what I might share with you in this column. Firstly I want to say how good it feels to be back home among you. You wont see the fruit of my year’s research in Rome till the end of the year. Though the books are completed, they need to be approved by the Archbishop as being consistent with Catholic teaching and then published. Hopefully some of what I have learned should filter through my teaching. I have already joined my thanks to that you have given Peter Wood for his ministry among you. I would like to thank you for the welcome you gave him. It has given him the confidence to accept an appointment as Parish Priest of Moonah in Tasmania. The rest of my thoughts are in the homily which I will be sharing with you at all masses this week-end. Next Saturday, 2nd February, the Church celebrates the feast of the presentation of Jesus in the temple. The Gospel of Luke (2:22-40) tells the story of Joseph and Mary bringing the child Jesus to the temple 40 days after his birth, following an ancient Jewish custom (see Leviticus 12:1-8). The loss of blood in childbirth is fraught with mysterious significance and because of the special sacredness associated with childbirth the mother was confined for 40 days for a male child and 80 days for a female child. The time for a male child was shorter probably because male children were circumcised when they were 8 days old. The mother could mix in public only after going to the sanctuary where she and her husband made an offering and received the blessing of the priest. This scene is the subject of meditation in the fourth joyful mystery of the rosary. Prior to the liturgical reforms of Vatican II, this feast marked the end of the Christmas Season. This is no longer the case as the Christmas season now ends on the Saturday before the feast of the Baptism of Jesus, which is now the First Sunday in Ordinary Time. From ancient times the feast was also known as Candlemas, because of the practice of blessing and lighting candles to celebrate the entrance of Jesus, the light of the world, into his Father’s temple. Since Vatican II the liturgical focus has shifted and is now on the beautiful words spoken by the priest, Simeon: ‘Now, Master, you can let your servant go in peace, just as you promised; because my eyes have seen the salvation, which you have prepared for all the nations to see, a light to enlighten the pagans, and the glory of your people Israel’. Next Saturday at 11:00am we will celebrate the feast with a Mass, which will begin with a blessing and lighting of candles. If you would like to have a candle blessed, please bring one along. We think that would give it more meaning for you than if we were to supply candles from the church. You might then like to keep your blessed candle on your mantelpiece or in a special place and light it for prayer on special occasions in the family such as birthdays, anniversaries etc, or have it burn on special occasions before a picture of the Sacred Heart, a crucifix or a picture of Mary. The latest MSC Theological magazine ‘Compass’ is available in the Bookstore ($7.00). The Editor, Father Barry Brundell msc has an editorial on Bishop Robinson’s Book ‘Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church: Reclaiming the Spirit of Jesus’ (John Garratt Publishing 2007). This book was published while I was overseas. I have just read it and highly recommend it to anyone who wants to think seriously about the structures of the Church we love. Barry has some reservations, but, in his view and in mine, they do not take from the importance, the clarity and the persuasiveness of Bishop Robinson’s key points. Compass also has a very interesting article on the experience of the Australian Catholic University and the Karen Students in Refugee camps on the Thai-Burma border. Father Richard Lennan, who was lecturing at the Sydney Seminary and is now at the Weston Jesuit School of Theology and who always writes well, has some important, sensitive and stimulating reflections on what he terms ‘International Priests’ and the Mission of the Church. There is also a quite excellent article by Dr Kerrie Hide who was teaching here in the Catholic University and is now a spiritual director in our MSC Spirituality Centre at Douglas Park. She writes on the ‘Sacred Heart’ and prayer. There are other articles as well that might interest you. We are entering the season of Lent. The word ‘Lent’ comes from the Anglo-Saxon word for Spring – ‘Lenchten’, for in the northern hemisphere it is spring and the days are beginning to lengthen. As the winter ice melts, the Church prays for the warmth of the Holy Spirit to enter our cold hearts, to liven them up in preparation for Easter. In the southern hemisphere, the seasons are reversed and we have to adapt the symbolism. After the heat of summer, perhaps we can pray for the grace of God’s Spirit to come with the gentle autumn rains to purify and refresh our hearts. Many of you joined us here on Ash Wednesday. The author of the ancient story of the creation of man and woman recognised that we human beings are complex. On the one hand we belong to the fragile, corruptible and mortal reality of nature. God moulded the body of Adam from the dust of the earth. ‘Adam’(human beings) come from the ‘Adamah’(earth). This is the meaning of the ashes. But we are more than ashes, for God breathed into these ashes his breath, the breath of life. When we die and return to dust, we pray that God will breathe his life into us again, as he did to Jesus, and draw us into the embrace of eternal life. Now, as we begin our preparation for Holy Week and Easter, we focus on the fragile, sinful, broken part of our being, and we focus on our need for God’s Spirit. Ashes come from fire. We are fragile, we sin, we fail in so many ways, but God is giving us his Spirit, and it is like a fire. We pray in lent that God will fire us with his Spirit and reduce to ashes whatever in us is not of love. We do not begin Lent by focusing negatively on ourselves. We begin where Jesus began: ‘The Kingdom of God is at hand, so repent!’ We begin with a profound act of faith in the desire of God to pour his Spirit into our hearts, to renew us with the fire of his Spirit. If God’s love reduces parts of our lives to ashes, so be it, for it must be necessary for him to renew the face of the earth. When Jesus’ heart was broken, life poured out for the healing of the world. Our hearts, too, need to be broken. They need to be purified. In accepting the ashes we are indicating our willingness to undergo whatever God’s knows is needed to set our hearts on fire. The question we might ask ourselves as Lent begins is: What is God gracing me to change? Where is God’s love calling me to grow? We are not the ones who are going to do the purifying. We are too scared to do it, and we haven’t the wisdom to do it well. We are branches of the vine that is Jesus and it is God who does the pruning. God loves us with an everlasting love and he will certainly be offering us the grace today, and throughout Lent, to find the courage to let him purify our hearts.On this first Sunday after the momentous day in parliament when politicians from both sides of the chamber, and in the presence of past Prime Ministers from both major parties, acknowledged the injustices inflicted by governments on our indigenous peoples, it is good to read again the words spoken by the first indigenous Catholic Deacon from Wadeye (Port Keats), Deacon Boniface Perdjert in a talk entitled The Good Things in our Way of Life: ‘When I read the Gospel, I read them as an Aborigine. So many of the things Christ said and did and the way he lived, made me think of the good tings of our way of life. Christ did not get worried about material things. He looked at them as things that get in the way and make it hard for us to get to our true country. He was born in the countryside in a cave, as many of us have been born. He walked about like us with nowhere to lay his head. He died with nothing on a cross … So many of our people die with nothing. He was strong on sharing. We do a lot of things like that. Of course he went further in the Eucharist. He shared himself with us as nobody else could.’ If you go to the Vatican website (www.vatican.va), click on ‘English’, and type ‘Aborigines’ in the search engine, you will find plenty of rich material. With the departure of the Kennedy family from the parish, we needed another ‘Contact Person’ for the Holt 4 Neighbourhood. Peter and Mercia Needham have kindly offered to accept that role. On the notice board reserved for parish groups you can find their details as well as the details of the other Contact Persons for our various neighbourhoods. The Parish Pastoral Council had its first meeting for the year on Thursday 14th February. Joe Barr was elected Chairperson of the Council and Moira Sutch was elected vice-chair. Since Compact is printed on a Thursday, it is too late to offer information to you on the weekend following the meeting. So in this column the second week after the PPC Meeting the Chairperson will include a brief statement of the topics covered. There follows Joe Barr’s statement for February. From the Chair of the Parish Pastoral Council Meetings are held on the second Thursday of each month except January. Detailed Minutes are available on the Parish Web Site or at the Parish Office after confirmation at the following month’s meeting but it is intended to provide a précis like this at an earlier date. The main subjects discussed this month were World Youth Day; the Visit of the Cross and Icon; new Senior Servers to begin after Easter; establishment of sub-committees to examine the Pastoral Letter "Catholic Schools at the Crossroads", and the National Church Life Survey; and ways of making the Parish more welcoming and inclusive to newer parishioners and visitors. A list of PPC Members is on the Parish Notice Board and members will try to remember to wear identifying badges when attending Masses and other Parish activities! Please feel free to raise your concerns with any of the members for discussion at future meetings. Alternatively, you can leave a note at the Parish Office to be forwarded to the council. Thank you to those who volunteered their time and talents last weekend for the building up of our community. Our greatest gift to the community is our presence together at Mass, encouraging each other in our shared faith journey, contributing to our shared life and mission. The new rosters begin next month. Next month we will also be introducing you to some new ‘Senior Servers’. The plan is to have one Acolyte and one Senior Server at each weekend Mass. The following have accepted this privileged role: Ljiljana Argy, Eman Basheer, Fiona Debenham, Therese Edwards, Therese Finley, Libby Glasgow, Helen Kennedy, Margaret Koenen, Sigi Kropp, Katarina Lategui, Sharon Loiterton and Joy McInerney. They join Elaine Carter, Maryanne Fergusson, Maresa Laird, Margaret Ohlin and Kerry Yard. They have already been trained. We are waiting for their robes to come from Sydney and will introduce them to the Mass community that they will be serving as soon as the robes arrive. We now have 17 Acolytes and 17 Senior Servers assisting at the Eucharist. Archbishop Mark Coleridge has asked that the Sacrament of Confirmation be offered in parishes on Pentecost Sunday. The parish priest has been delegated to preside. In view of the special universality of the sacrament I requested and obtained permission for the MSC Provincial, Father Tim Brennan to preside. Over and above the joy of having him here with us for the weekend, his presence will emphasise that the sacrament embraces our young people into the universal ‘Catholic’ church at the beginning of their adult faith journey. Their baptism was a gift to them from their parents. In this sacrament they are choosing to ‘confirm’ that gift and we look forward to their presence in the community and their contribution to our life and mission. I am absent in Sydney this weekend, celebrating the wedding of the son of one of my many nieces. This week we celebrate two special feast days, both of which are being anticipated in the Church’s liturgy because of Holy Week. The Solemnity of Saint Patrick is moved from March 17 to Friday March 14, and the Solemnity of Saint Joseph from March 19 to Saturday March 15. Mass on Friday will be at the usual times (7:00am and 9:30am). There will be a special Mass on Saturday at 11:00am. I offer you the following prayer, called ‘St Patrick’s Breastplate’, for your reflection: I bind unto myself today the strong name of the Trinity: I bind unto myself today the power of God to hold and lead: Christ be with me, Christ within me, I bind unto myself the name, the strong name of the Trinity: Today we read the story of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. The people are exultant, expecting him to reinforce their identity as God’s chosen people and their temple as the house of God. The scene is messianic, but the people are in for a profound shock and disappointment. Jesus found the religious institution symbolised by the temple to be not a vehicle of grace but a barrier to it. He was forced to empty it. This is our final chance as we begin Holy Week to ask him to cleanse away whatever in our hearts is a barrier to grace. More importantly, we are asked to take a good look at the institution of the church, especially as it is lived in our local community. Are we as a church an instrument of grace to those outside and a way of holiness for those within? If not, Jesus will have to do to us what he did to the temple. We should not overlook the point that the crowd who welcomed Jesus with such enthusiasm became just as enthusiastic in calling for his crucifixion. That our following of Jesus might be more sincere, the Church asks us to listen today to the Passion Story. Surely it will move us to gratitude and love and a renewal of faith and commitment. As in imagination we walk the way of the cross with him let us hear him speaking to us: ‘My friends – yes, that is what you are – my friends. My life was not complete till I crowned it with my death. You must complete my death with your life. Accept each moment as it comes to you with faith and trust. Do not look for me in empty tombs or far off places. I am in you. I am in your neighbour. I am in your home, your office, your factory, your schoolroom. Wherever you are, I am there with you. As you leave this church, take up your cross and follow me. Complete the way of the cross we have walked together today.’ This Holy Week hundreds of millions of people remembered the death of Jesus of Nazareth. As a politically motivated murder of an innocent and loving man, it runs to a pattern with which our world is, unfortunately, all too familiar. Yet there is something about the crucifixion of Jesus that continues to haunt our minds and hearts. Why? It witnesses to the folly of people attempting to define the divine, the folly of an established group thinking that they alone possess the truth and have a mission to impose it on others. Those responsible for the death of Jesus were convinced that they knew God. They knew where to find God and they knew how God was to be worshipped. They failed to recognise God at the heart of the love of this Galilean carpenter. Their laws, their traditions and their theology contained much that was inspired and that could reveal the divine and draw people into communion with God. But they seem to have lost the sense of wonder, and they failed to share their traditions humbly and with joy, open to the new wine of God’s continual self-revelation. Religion was being used to prop up authority and power, when it should have been a way of keeping people in touch with their own hearts and with God. Religion continues to be used and abused in this way today. For all our religious posturing, Jesus’ way of dying reminds us that the ultimate experience of the divine is found in love. This is all symbolised in the terrible act of the man who thrust a lance into Jesus’ heart. In that act we see the awful reality of our personal sins, and the sins of which we tend to wash our hands, but for which we are responsible. Whenever we sin against the truth, whenever we betray or abuse love, we thrust the lance again into the heart of Jesus. The blood and water that flowed from his broken heart symbolise the sacraments through which the risen Jesus communicates his life to us. If our hearts were moved this week by what Jesus offers us, let us commit ourselves to carry on his mission of love. That we might be able to do this, let us re-commit ourselves to the community of faith that comes together to hear his word and to receive him in communion. Parish Pastoral Council Meeting The PPC met on Thursday 13 March. The major items discussed were: the visit of the Cross and Icon; World Youth Day; ways of improving communication between the Parish community and the PPC; and a calendar to improve the scheduling of appeals to the generosity of parishioners. The PPC congratulated Sarah Sams on the success of the visit of the Cross and Icon and on the work that she and her helpers are doing to prepare for World Youth Day. Fund-raising for the visit of international delegates to St John’s Parish will begin soon. Felicity Bate, the Minute secretary for the PPC is also coordinating fund raising for the World Youth Day. If anyone has ideas or is interested in assisting her with fundraising her contact number is 6255 3750. As we celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus and look forward to our own, I thought that you might appreciate my repeating some points I made in this column three years ago. The key problem with talking about the physical body of the risen Jesus is that both ‘physical’ and ‘body’ are open to a range of different understandings. Our language best describes what we ordinarily experience. It is necessarily inadequate to speak about the profound mysteries of our faith. We declare that we believe in the ‘physical’ resurrection. If by the word ‘physical’ we mean ‘of the same material substance as the body we have in this life’, the New Testament is perfectly clear that the risen ‘body’ is not the same as the body we now have. It is like Jesus’ risen and glorious ‘body’. In his First Letter to the Corinthians, having insisted on the central importance of our belief in the resurrection, Paul writes: ‘Someone will ask: How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?’(1Corinthians 15:35). Paul considers the question foolish, and goes on to speak about all the different kinds of bodies that we know. He concludes by stating that the body that we now have is defined in relation to our soul (he uses the Greek word ‘psychikos’), whereas the raised body is ‘pneumatikos’(‘spiritual’ – that is, defined in relation to the Spirit; 1Cor 15:44). The word ‘physical’ comes from the Greek word ‘physis’, which means nature. Our faith is that the whole of Jesus person, all that makes him human, is raised by God to life, but so transformed that it is beyond description or comprehension. We believe that it will be so also for us, but we must know that any attempt to imagine or describe in familiar terms what the risen ‘body’ will be like must be inadequate and can even lead to the kinds of ideas that Paul rightly considered to be ‘foolish’. When tradition insists on the ‘physical’ resurrection, we are being told that the risen person is not some whisp-like, wraith-like ghost such as people imagined inhabited Hades (or the Jewish Sheol). We believe that Jesus’ whole human reality has been taken by God into God’s eternal embrace, totally transformed in love by the power of God’s Spirit. We should be content to live in faith and hope, believing, as Paul assures us, that ‘eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him’(1Corinthians 2:9). Special Ministers of the Eucharist and Readers. When you are rostered it is essential that you arrive at church ten minutes before the Mass begins. Otherwise the acolytes will have to spend time looking for a substitute. For new ministers and readers, there will be a practice in the church on Friday 11th April at 7:00pm. If you cannot make that time, please ring and I will try to set a time aside to fill you in on the details of how to carry out your ministry. Projection screen The white screen is unsatisfactory, but those who put work into preparing power-point presentations have convinced me that it is needed for the proper display especially of images, which do not show up well against the marble. I am in contact with a firm that is working on an i-screen which can be used with front projection. When they have perfected it we hope to have it installed. Tasmanians Father Jim Littleton MSC has just published a 109-page booklet on MSC Ministry in Tasmania 1903-2007. It sells for $10.00. It makes a very interesting read of parish life in Tasmania over those years and is available from Jim (Daramalan residence). I am happy to order it in for you should you want a copy. Compass (Autumn 2008) Contains an excellent paper by Anthony Kelly CSsR on the Catholic Intellectual Tradition. It is solid but well worth a read for anyone interested in the place of Catholic Thinking in today’s world. Compass is available in the bookshop for $7.00. The article can be found on http://dlibrary.acu.edu.au/research/theology/ejournal/aejt_5/ajk2.htm In his Letter to the Roman churches Paul writes of his longing to see them ‘so that we may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith’(Romans 1:12). This mutual encouragement happens each Sunday when somewhere in the vicinity of 800 of us gather as a community to listen to God’s word and to welcome Jesus into our hearts. It is especially evident at Easter when the number more than doubles. How good it would be for our community if we could be enriched by the faith of the Easter assembly every Sunday! I would like to use this column to thank on your behalf the many generous parishioners who made the Holy Week ceremonies so prayerful. We thank the Acolytes, Senior Servers and the young altar servers, as well as those who broke open God’s Word for us so beautifully, and those who ministered Holy Communion to us. We thank those who beautified the church with flowers, ending the starkness of Lent, as well as those who spent hours preparing the music, and those who adorned the Church with hangings. We thank the cast of thousands who waved branches, carried torches, acted as ushers, and carried chairs up and down the stairs. We thank those who kept the outside and the inside of the church clean for us, and we thank everyone for the support that your coming gives us in our faith. We all owe a special debt of gratitude to our parish co-ordinator, Marian England, and our parish secretary, Maureen Craddock, and to our parish liturgy committee ably ‘managed’ by Mike Blyth: Anne Armstrong, Di Bruce, Marian Crowley, Helen Currie, Carmel Martin, Mary Moran, Xavier Munoz, Sharon and Sarah Sams (and to many of their spouses who worked tirelessly in the background). It is a privilege to be able to welcome to our new Catholics: Sue Carling, Yvette Bayley and Tsuling (Shalin) Chang. John and Catherine Hogan, Jock and Margaret McLean, and Nadezhda Greenwood have been journeying with them since the August last year. Out thanks to them as well. Last weekend we welcomed, officially commissioned and prayed over members of our five liturgical ministries: Acolytes & Senior Servers, Junior Servers, Readers, Special Ministers of the Eucharist, and those in the Music Ministry. This weekend we do the same for the Liturgy Committee, the Catechists who care for our children in the Children’s Liturgy, the Altar Society, those who arrange the flowers, and those who clean the Church and Presbytery. All of them make an essential contribution to our community assembly. Next weekend we will welcome and bless those who, on our behalf, offer their service in the Vincent de Paul Society, in the Refugee Resettlement Committee, as Contact Persons in our neighbourhood communities, and as members of our Social Justice Group. Last but not least we thank the Finance Committee and those who give up their Sunday nights to count the money without which we would not be able to reach out as effectively to the poor and disadvantaged. WORLD YOUTH DAY Young people will be gathering from all over the world in Sydney for the week leading up to World Youth Day (July 14-20). I wish to speak with you here about the Days in the Diocese which precede that week. International pilgrims will be arriving here in Canberra on Tuesday-Wednesday July 8-9. So far parishioners have offered places for about 90, from Tuesday night through to Saturday or Sunday night. We still have no idea how many pilgrims are coming. If there are any further offers to house young pilgrims that would be good just in case. Originally we were thinking of providing a home for perhaps 150 young people. On the matter of billeting we will have more information after May 3rd and will be calling a meeting to bring those who have offered their homes up to speed as to what is asked of you. Basically it is to provide a place to sleep, breakfast, some sandwiches for lunch, and an evening meal. We will need to organise for the pilgrims to get from your home to whatever we are organising and get them back home for an evening meal and sleep. Please God it will be a beautiful experience to welcome and enjoy the company of young people from overseas for these days. As a parish we are expected to offer our own young people (number not yet settled) and the international pilgrims, an experience of our parish life and of Canberra living, which is spiritual, cultural, and environmental (nature/kangaroos!), and which gives them an idea of the service dimension of our parish. Bev Purnell has agreed to offer something on Refugee Resettlement, which would contribute beautifully to this last dimension. We are thinking of covering Wednesday night (July 9th), Thursday (July 10th) and Friday during the day (July 11th). Friday evening has already been organised: a concert in the Showground (Exhibition Park). Saturday, too, is organised: a festival at Exhibition Park from 11:30 to 4:00pm followed by a Commissioning Mass. On Sunday 13th half the pilgrims will be taken by bus to Sydney, and the rest on Monday. Sarah Sams has been doing a wonderful job as Youth Coordinator, and Felicity Bate is working on fundraising. The cost for each local pilgrim is $380.00 to register in Sydney (this is to even costs out for all attending). Added to this is $150.00 per local pilgrim to cover transport costs, and a further $50.00. The purpose of the fundraising is to provide some assistance for our local young people, and also in the hope that we can pay for the costs of two students from Hagita High School in Papua New Guinea. You can expect some news re fundraising in the very near future. John Drury has kindly accepted to be the Parish Coordinator for any programs we might set up to cover Wednesday Evening (July 9th) through to Friday 11th. We won’t have to fill in every hour. The young people will care for each other, and there are things happening in Canberra that we can link them too. If you have any ideas, please let us know here at the Office and we will connect with John. Ideas of raising money would also be appreciated. As things develop we will keep you informed through Compact. We have just celebrated Anzac Day. At the level of public policy we are invited to reflect on the complex moral choices facing a country in a world in which some people choose to pursue what they see as their own self-interest and ambitions by inflicting violence on those whom they perceive to be thwarting their greed. I attempted t reflect on this matter with you in last Sunday’s homily (see michaelfallonmsc.com and click on homilies). Pacifism and therefore conscientious objection is a position consistent with discipleship of Jesus, and can indeed be a moral imperative for persons and communities who live within the graced environment of Christian living. But this does not make it a realistic choice for a political community which comprises a vast majority of non-saints. In this setting the pacifist performs a prophetic role of reminding all of us of a value towards which we should strive and which must be part of the agenda for practical decisions. However, Christian moral living simply cannot be lived by those who are not sustained by the Christ-life. It cannot be supposed or self-acquired. It is also morally authentic only when accompanied by commitment to repair, relieve and rehabilitate the threatened world and its inhabitants (see Catholic Catechism n. 2311). On Anzac Day we honour the courage of those who gave their life and those who risked their lives in war to defend our country. It may be that in some cases they were victims of propaganda. It may be that others did wrong in asking of them this enormous sacrifice. Certainly we must learn from their death or their risk of it to work against violence in every dimension of our personal and social life. We do not want what they went through to be in vain, and we must not forget their heroism. And so, while we struggle with the moral complexities surrounding the subject of war, we trust our loved ones and the unknown men and women who have died for us – we trust them to the love of God and pray that he embrace them in his care. We pray also for those who returned to us but are still suffering the terrible effects of war trauma, as well as the families and loved ones who have suffered the loss of a loved son or daughter, father or mother, sister or brother. While committing ourselves to build communities of love, free of prejudice and concerned to reach out to every man, every woman and every child, we ask God to give eternal life to the dead and forgiveness and healing to us all. The Catechism concludes the Church's teaching with a quotation from Vatican II: "Insofar as people are sinners, the threat of war hangs over us … but insofar as we can vanquish sin by coming together in charity, violence itself will be vanquished and these words of Isaiah (2:4) will be fulfilled: “they will beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation. They will not learn war any more”(n.2317). Mark is away for a few days celebrating his father’s 85th birthday. I am away from Sunday afternoon to Monday night conducting a staff retreat at Chevalier College. Father John Ryan is presiding at the 6:00pm Mass on Sunday and there will be a Liturgy of the Word with communion on Monday, and on Tuesday when I am lecturing in the Rheinberger Centre. Chris McPhee and Patrick Mara (novice) were in Canberra for the Olympic torch with a ‘Free Tibet’ sign. This is his reflection on their experience, given in a homily at Douglas Park. He kindly accepted to share his reflections with us. ‘If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own.’ Does the world love us? Or do we go against the current, refuse to accept the world’s values, and find resistance and maybe even rejection from those around us? For me, and maybe Pat, I think we got a taste of what it feels like to be hated just because we were standing up for human rights ... with a humble simple little sign that read ‘Free Tibet’ ... Raging eyes stared into our eyes and shrill voices hurled all sorts of obscenities ... we were intimidated, ridiculed, called idiots, fools, mad ... a waste of time! For me it was a great study of contrasts ... what groups and the majority can do to make one feel like the minority ... a feeling that I got or maybe an insight…. This is how Tibet and other small countries feel when intimidated by world powers… it makes one feel helpless – hopeless – and insignificant. For these young students who saw their national pride as paramount must have felt that both Pat and I were not ‘part of this world’ ... in fact as one said, in her own way ... ‘what planet are you from ...’ we were insane ... Maybe even some here at St Mary’s Towers thought we were insane for even going~ travelling all that way to Canberra to put our necks out on the line – as it were. It was the same when preaching about refugees in early 2000 ... and the Iraq war in 2003 ... as one parishioner told me ... we just do not want to hear about that stuff at mass. Conventional Wisdom - the world - asks us not to make waves, not to go against what everyone else thinks and believes and does - the world, conventional wisdom demands that we conform - and if we don’t, we are then ridiculed, rejected, and deemed insane. The invitation of Jesus is to live out his alternative to the world ... to see things differently... to be his heart in our world… to non-violently be a presence of peace ... to stand up for justice ... and to value all human life - that all peoples of this earth belong to the Body of Christ. This week’s experience gave me a new insight to what it means to be a presence, a God energy of peace... if we reacted with the same intimidation that we received there would have been an even more violent reaction from the group... but being a presence of peace, I believe it became a presence that disturbs - and maybe an awakening to what real freedom means... As Jesus says: ‘you do not belong to the world...’ How do we show the world what it means to live in this world but not of it? To show what really being loved means? To being on earth the heart of God ... to love with a human heart? As Jules Chevalier would put it… ‘Are our words and actions full of faith, love of God, zeal and commitment to our neighbour? Do our words and actions reveal the sacred Fire that touches, penetrates, and converts?’ Archbishop Mark Coleridge has composed a Pentecost Letter on the Liturgy. The long awaited new translation of the Roman Missal is expected to be available late in 2009. In the meantime, the Australian Bishops have set Pentecost Sunday for the implementation of two practices that directly affect the congregation.
Among other matters the Archbishop stresses the importance of adhering to the times of silence in the liturgy. He suggests (and many agree) that silence contributes to the sense of the sacred, which can be lost with too many words. It seems to me that we are already doing well in our attempts to enhance silence during the Mass. However, we would like to experiment with the following practice. The Mass is a gathering of the community. It is appropriate that we greet each other informally before Mass, while respecting those around us who are enjoying silent prayer. At a minute before Mass is due to commence, the gong will sound and you will be formally invited, as at present, to greet those around you. After a minute the gong will sound again to call us all into a minute’s silence before the entrance music begins. The hope is that this will provide an opportunity for each of us to recollect our thoughts and prepare ourselves better to enter with awe into the immense mystery, where, in the Liturgy of the Word and in the Liturgy of the Eucharist, we experience our communion with God and with each other as the Body of Christ. The Mass would begin better if we were able to think in terms of arriving five minutes before the Mass is due to start rather than right on the dot or a few minutes after. Of course, unforeseen things happen to make this difficult, but it would help our community celebration if we all made an extra effort in this regard. Finally, a reminder that we are encouraged to experience the full symbolism of the Eucharistic meal by drinking as well as eating. This is done by sipping from the cup (not dipping the host into the consecrated wine). 1. Front page We believe in One God. We speak of Trinity. Instead of thinking of the Trinity in terms of an abstruse mathematical conundrum, we should first think in terms of the man Jesus, of the God whom he prayed to as ‘Father’ [Abba], and of the Spirit of communion which bound Jesus to God in love. Only as we contemplate this can we project our frail human thoughts to speak of the inner mystery of a God who is Source (‘Father’), Word and Spirit in communion in love. Some thirty or so years ago I was chaplain at the University of NSW. One day a young man who was working as a gardener popped into my office and asked me to explain the Trinity to him. Fortunately I had enough sense to pause and to ask him first how he saw it. In a way that nicely avoided abstraction, he went straight to the heart of the mystery by speaking of the Trinity in terms of dance. He said that he thought of the Father as the Dance. He thought of Jesus as the Dancer, who shows us what the dance looks like. However, we will never know a dance just by watching. We have to enter into the dance with the Dancer. He thought the Spirit as the Dancing. One could speak of God as Life, of Jesus as the one who lived this life and of the Spirit as the experience of living. Perhaps best of all one can speak of God as Love. But what is love if we have no one to love us? Jesus is the Lover who expresses God’s love, and he has ‘poured the Spirit of love into our hearts’(Romans 5:5). It is the Spirit of communion between Jesus and God that is the loving that we enjoy in the communion of the Church. 2. From the Parish Priest’s Desk (continued from front page) Writers on religious experience speak of the numinous and the mystical. The numinous is our experience of God coming to us from outside: from nature, from people, from the events of our lives. The divine comes to us when we encounter the world around us. In the tradition of Israel, this is spoken of as God’s Word to us. The mystical is our experience of God at the depths of our own being. In the tradition of Israel this is spoken of as an experience of God’s Spirit. Revelation happens when the outer Word and the inner Spirit come together. Jesus is God’s ‘focal Word’ – God’s Word expressed perfectly in a human way. And it is Jesus’ Spirit that is poured into our hearts. Knowing that God is Spirit reminds us to be attentive to the divinely inspired movements of our own heart: movements of longing as we yearn for closer communion with him whose Spirit inspires us; movements of wonder and praise as we rejoice in his being with us; movement of trust as we confide ourselves to God’s love; movements of pleading as we give expression to our needs. Knowing that God is Spirit reminds us to be sensitive to these same movements in every man and every woman. Knowing that God is Word reminds us to be attentive to the words and actions through which God speaks to us, and the words and actions through which we respond to him. Knowing that God is Father, we learn to reverence the sacred ground of each person’s spirit, and be attentive to each person’s word, as together we journey towards him who is the Father of all. Let Saint John of the Cross have the last word: ‘God dwells within you. You are yourself the tabernacle, his secret hiding place. Rejoice, exult, for all you could possibly desire, all your heart’s longing is so close, so intimate as to be within you; you cannot be without God’(Spiritual Canticle 1,7). World Youth Day – July 2008. “Youth: The future and our Hope” Pope Benedict XV1. The WYD Office in Canberra has advised St John’s Parish in the past few days that it will host 110 pilgrims – 10 Canadians, 20 from Paris, and 80 from Samoa. Charnwood parish will receive another 20 pilgrims from Samoa and these will be added to the Kippax group for all activities except billeting. Details are still incomplete. We only have arrival dates for the 20 French pilgrims, who are expected to reach Canberra late in the evening of 11th July which will reduce the extent of activities the parish will be asked to offer them. The others may arrive from Tuesday 8th July and parish WYD organisers are looking at visits to Tidbinbilla, the National Museum and other activities to expose them to the cultural life of Canberra. Various parish activities are also planned which will connect the pilgrims to life at St. John’s. More details will be publicised in the weeks ahead once the advice from the WYD Office is confirmed. Meanwhile, because we now know that the majority of our billets are from Samoa:
These can include jackets/coats, pullovers, scarves, beanies etc. These items will probably go with the pilgrims to Sydney so donors should not expect to have their items returned;
It is intended that there will be meetings of all those offering billets in coming weeks. Finally, the parish will need to raise about $10,000 to cover the costs we will incur in caring for, feeding and transporting the pilgrims. Fundraising will start very soon and parishioners will be asked to be generous so that we can treat our pilgrims in a way which will truly leave them with fond memories of the time they have spent at St John the Apostle Parish, Kippax. If you can help with any of these requests, please contact the Parish Office. 6254 3236. After celebrating the season of Christmastide and the Epiphany, which were closely followed by Lent, Easter, Pentecost, and then the special feasts of the Blessed Trinity and the Eucharist, today we enter into what the Church calls ‘Ordinary Time’. This takes us right through to the end of the Liturgical Year. During Ordinary Time, Sunday after Sunday, we reflect on life and ministry of Jesus. We do this in a three-year cycle, and since this is Year A, the Gospel of Matthew is our guide. Today is the Ninth Sunday of Ordinary Time. We celebrated earlier Sundays in the period between the Epiphany and Lent. One of Matthew’s main aims in his Gospel is to present Jesus as the one chosen by God to bring Judaism to its perfect fulfilment. Again and again he refers back to the writings of the Hebrew Scriptures to demonstrate to his fellow Jews how Jesus is the glory of Israel, the perfect Jew. Just as the central writings of the Jewish Bible are the Five Books of the Torah, four of which focus on Moses, so Matthew organises his Gospel around five blocks of sayings of Jesus, interspersed with scenes in which we watch Jesus doing what he teaches in the five so-called ‘sermons’. The Gospel of today’s Mass takes us to the final words of the first block of sayings, usually referred to as the ‘Sermon on the Mount’ – sayings which take us to the heart of what it means to be a follower of Jesus. It could be called a Christian update on the ten commandments. * * * * * * * * * * Mark will be away for the next few weeks, on retreat at Douglas Park, and then visiting his sister in Mexico. I am lecturing at the Rheinberger Centre every Tuesday morning, and Mark and I have decided that he should take Tuesday morning off when he returns. So regretfully we will not be offering a Tuesday morning Mass here from now on. For those of you who wish to celebrate Mass, there is a Mass • at St Thomas Aquinas Charnwood at 7:00am, • at St Matthew’s Page at 5.30pm • and at St Monica’s Evatt at 6.15pm Here at Saint Johns there will be a Liturgy of the Word with Communion at 9.30am.
I thought that this week I would share with you a poem written by my brother, Jim. He entitled it ‘Love’s Wisdom’. "Know thyself", the wise man said: "Only thus, true wisdom shall be thine." And many's the time these words I read, And gravely made their wisdom mine. But now, these words I will not hear: I judge them as by no means wise, For I did search my heart with care, As ordered by the ancient seer: And I could utter nought but sighs For what this search to me laid bare. "Love is blind", the wise man said: "It sees no blemish, it sees no flaw". And many's the time these words I read, And sagely, by them set great store. But now, this saying I reject: Quite other the truth I now revere. For I do judge as keen love's sight. Love cares little for fault, defect, For, rightly, the good, shining clear, Love's vision has enraptured quite. The man who tries himself to know, Finds nought but pain, I do swear. One who loves, alone can show The good, the beauty, we all do share. T'was you, my love, this wisdom taught: T'was you unveiled to me my worth. Nought but the weeds, I could see, Of what I was. Your love sought And found, hid within my earth, The seeds of what God means me to be. STATIONS OF THE CROSS For a number of years I have been on the look out for Stations of the Cross that would fit in with the architecture of our church, and that would combine some of the key devotional stations from the past with the post-Vatican II desire that the stations be based more firmly on the Gospel accounts, and that they begin with the Last Supper and conclude with the Resurrection. I realise that over the life of St Johns there have been a number of attempts to beautify the church with stations, some more successful than others. I am also well aware that the choice should lie with the community, not the priests, for we come and go. This is your spiritual home. You built it and you pray in it. I had a good look in the shops in Rome while I was there. Most represent the pre-Vatican II stations that we oldies grew up with. They are also immensely expensive. It seemed to me best to look for a local artist from the community, and for one who would offer his/her work freely as an offering of prayer and faith. You would be aware that to engage an artist commercially for such a range of works as the Stations would be out of the reach of the finances of St Johns. We are not in a position to look for the best that money can buy, but we can look for simple works of art that provoke prayer and fit in with the ambience of our spiritual home. I believe that we have found the artist. Not all the Liturgy Committee or Parish Pastoral Council have the same initial response to the stations, but all agree that it is difficult to judge stations without seeing them in situ. It also takes time to appreciate art. So we have decided to hang the stations in the church some time in the week beginning Monday 23rd June, and leave them there for a period of six weeks. At the end of that time we will canvas your opinion as to their suitability. Since they are intended to help devotion, each Friday at 6:00pm, we will schedule a devotional prayer as we walk around the church from station to station. It will consist in readings from the Scripture appropriate to each station, a reflection and a prayer. Perhaps some simple singing as well, depending on who comes. In this way we will be better able to decide whether the stations are, indeed, a help to prayer. Personally, I like their simplicity. In these days when we are overloaded with images, I am hoping that they will allow space for each person to bring his/her own contemplation to the stations. However, I am hoping to test out my own response as we take part in the Friday devotion. You might like to check out your own response in the same way. We will canvas your opinion in August after you have had time to check your initial response. In early August you will be invited to speak to one or other of the members of the Parish Pastoral Council offering your reaction, whether it be positive or negative. After hearing from you, the Parish Pastoral Council at its meeting on Thursday August 14th will make a decision either to take the stations down or to leave them in place. The creating of the Stations has been a journey of prayer for the artist who has understood from the beginning that the gift of the stations to the community has value only if the community finds that they fit in with the architecture of the church, and are a help to prayer. This coming Tuesday is the Solemnity of the Birth of Saint John the Baptist. Unfortunately there is no Mass here at St Johns, but you may wish to join the parish community at 9:30 for a Liturgy of the Word with Communion. As noted in last week’s column, we will be praying the Stations of the Cross in the Church at 3:30pm this coming Friday, 27th June. If you want to experience this devotion, you are welcome to come and join us. This coming Sunday is the Solemnity of Saints Peter & Paul. It replaces the Thirteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time. Today's Feast of Saints Peter and Paul was celebrated on 29th June as early as the middle of the fourth century when Constantine was erecting a basilica on Vatican hill over the grave of Saint Peter. The martyrdom of Peter and Paul and the heroism of the Roman community during the first State organised persecution of Christians under Emperor Nero, plus the significance of the city in the Roman Empire, accounts for the special place of the Roman Church and its bishop for Christians down through the centuries. In spite of the painful divisions that have torn the Christian community over the centuries, today there are over a thousand million people who claim to belong to the Catholic Church that is in communion with the Roman church and its bishop, the Pope. Many Christians in other churches also recognise the important historical and symbolic place of the Roman church in the communion of Christians. The Preface of today’s Mass speaks of: ‘Peter, our leader in the faith, and Paul, its fearless preacher. Peter raised up the Church from the faithful flock of Israel. Paul brought God’s call to the nations and became the teacher of the world. Each in his chosen way gathered into unity the one family of Christ. Both shared a martyr’s death and are praised throughout the world’. Celebrating the life and death of the apostle to the Jews and the apostle to the nations provides a good occasion to reflect on the Catholic dimension of Christianity. As it happens the Feast of Sts Peter & Paul is my Ordination anniversary (1961). In the absence of Matthew Harris, the Chairperson of our Parish Finance Committee, I was asked to present the appeal last weekend for our Planned Giving Programme for the financial year beginning July 2008. I reminded the congregation that in his report on the 2007 parish finances, Mathew mentioned that the parish experienced a decline in giving of 7.5% or in dollar terms $18,000 for the year. The current situation is that as at the end of May the income is $1,000 down as compared to the same period last year. And our expenditure has increased by $7,600 for the same period. Most of this increase is because of the rising cost of ordinary expenditure – something you would all be familiar with from your household budgeting. Consequent to last weekend’s appeal, 52 families have joined the program. 32 will contribute via the envelopes, 20 will give by Direct Credit, either Bank Account or Credit Card, and a number have decided to continue their present method of giving, but to increase their offering. In case you may have been away last weekend, we invite you to help share the load in whatever way you judge appropriate. If you wish to join the program, forms are available on the Information Desk. If you decide to pay by envelope, please fill in the small red form. The secretaries will be in touch and will organise envelopes for you. If you are continuing to give via envelopes, please collect yours from the table in the foyer. If you wish to join the program and pay by either credit card or through your bank account, please fill in the appropriate forms. There is a special form if you are continuing to pay through your bank account but intend to change the amount you are offering. * * * * * * * We have 25 pilgrims coming from Papua New Guinea. Because they completed their travel plans so late, there were no airline seats available to bring them out of PNG other than a flight on Fri 4 July. This means that they will be in Australia for the weekend of July 5-6. The MSC Community at Douglas Park has kindly offered to look after them for that weekend, so they will be arriving on Monday 7th or Tuesday 8th – according to our original expectations. * * * * * * * Thank you for the bucket collection for the expenses of caring for the pilgrims during the Days in the Diocese. We collected $2,811.00, which, added to earlier raffles etc, means that we have now collected $4,662.45. By the time you read this we will also have the money from the Trivia Night in the Parish Centre.
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