It’s still Easter, so let’s experience God’s earthly presence in the members of the multitude of humanity!
Loving God, you created and brought forth humanity to flower as a multitude of cultures. Open our eyes and ears to your ways so that each day we can better experience your earthly presence and praise you. Help us to grow in wisdom and goodness witnessing that you sustain all that exists. AMEN
Filed under Daily Reflections, Easter, L'Arche, Mission
‘When I stand before thee at the day’s end thou shalt see my scars and know that I had my wounds and also my healing.’ Tagore
Pere Hamel had worked hard, networked hard, to help his local Muslims integrate and feel welcome in the neighbourhood of Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray. But on this morning in 2016 he was cut down while celebrating early morning Mass. Two men of the Islamic State terror group wanted to keep hold of the differences between people rather than celebrate our unity before the God who made us.
May those who bring violence to our streets, homes, churches and schools, have their scars anointed and healed.
from “Stray Birds” by Rabindranath Tagore
Filed under Daily Reflections
In my reading about Archbishop Arthur Hughes there was a story from 1938 about his boss worrying. This priest was a great worrier, as it happened, but he was regional superior for Uganda, and the Superior General insisted he stay in the job.
On this occasion, Arthur Hughes was at the annual scout camp as an assistant county commissioner, not as chaplain, although there was daily Mass.
Father Superior had expected to see a separate Catholic Scout Movement such as still exist in France. It was not like that in Uganda.
Arthur Hughes and other fathers were dining with the leaders, and Father Hughes was wearing not his habit but full scout uniform including his shorts, or ‘petite culotte bombo’, apparently with the local Bishop’s approval. Hughes was ‘Mess President, General Secretary, Man of all work, and chief raconteur’, according to an unidentified newspaper report. No doubt he was enjoying himself, but why were the fathers taking orders from Protestant laymen?
Well, we might ask, why not?
Mr Lameka Sekaboga was appointed Assistant County Commissioner during the camp; even as Father Superior fretted, the organisation was being put into competent lay, Ugandan hands. It was surely better for Catholics to work with others to make this happen, Arthur Hughes could see that, his Superior could not, but concentrated on the differences that appeared to define Catholics, and within the church, to define clergy against lay people.
We now see many ministries working ecumenically: Street Pastors, food banks, refugee care, the list is long. What we can share, we should share. And salute those who made the first steps towards Churches working together.
Filed under Christian Unity, Daily Reflections, Mission
The Archbishop of Canterbury, The Most Rev Justin Welby issued the following message on New Year’s Day:
Living together is never easy. Families have all sorts of arguments. At this time of year especially, we get together, enjoy company, but sometimes get on each other’s nerves.
Here at Lambeth Palace, where Archbishops have lived and worked for centuries, we’ve been trying an experiment. Since 2015 we’ve been bringing together young Christians from around the world to live as a community for ten months.
They have an extraordinary range of backgrounds, cultures and opinions. They live together, cook together, volunteer with charities together, pray together, and – because they’re human- they clash together. That can be over something as small as the washing up, or as big as their politics.
They are united by one thing: their faith in Jesus Christ. But their own faith is not what holds them together.
In John’s Gospel, Jesus says to his disciples: “I have called you friends […] I chose you.” He didn’t always get on with them – in fact, sometimes they drove him up the wall. But they were united by something greater than their differences, his friendship.
In this community, I find it so powerful that these remarkably different people decide to choose each other. There’s a parallel with our country today. We’re wonderfully much more diverse than we used to be. Yet we disagree on many things. And we are struggling with how to disagree well. Turn on the television, read the news, and you see a lot that could tempt you to despair.
Hope lies in our capacity to approach this new year in a spirit of openness towards each other. Committed to discovering more of what it means to be citizens together, even amid great challenges and changes.
That will involve choosing to see ourselves as neighbours, as fellow citizens, as communities each with something to contribute. It will mean gathering around our common values, a common vision, and a commitment to one another.
With the struggles and divisions of recent years, that will not be easy. But that difficult work is part of the joy and blessing of being a community. Whether it’s the twenty people here – or millions of us.
So: will we choose each other again? Because in that choosing lies our hope.
I wish all of us a happy and – more importantly – hope-filled New Year.
Filed under Daily Reflections, Interruptions
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