CALLED TO DISCIPLESHIP
Filed under: Messages |
One of the blessings about being a disciple is the challenge to live in this tension between promise and fulfillment. Often I have an experience that I am sure you have had too. A familiar passage of scripture will read as something new and I am stunned that it seems I have never read the passage before. Or, during the Liturgy of the Word as a reading is proclaimed and the words wash over me I realize that it isn’t that I am not familiar with the text so much as that I hear new implications in a whole new context. And I pray that my sisters and brothers gathering with me can hear them for the first time as well.
Recently I was struck by Isaiah’s beautiful prophecy (Isaiah 62: 1-5) in which the Lord speaks like a young lover on bended knee before his wounded beloved. Does he kiss away the tears as the Beloved hiccups the names others have called her? Forsaken? Desolate? I can hear him hushing and gently patting in a tender embrace as he speaks of restored virginal innocence in a new period of betrothal before the wedding and the beginning of something new.
We need to hear those words and the images that emerge now as we stand in the wreckage and mire of these times. We are wounded and the hurled mud clings to the hems of our garments. It isn’t that long ago that we were in glory days. Remember the hope and confidence we felt in those days of renewal and how boldly the Good News was proclaimed then? Walls came tumbling down as East and West were reunited and divisions among people seemed to be healing as a new awareness of our oneness came into focus. In the process there had been terrible days of fire hoses and snarling dogs. Nightsticks and Billy clubs pummeled some. Some were numbered among the disappeared never to be seen again. Out of the ashes rose a phoenix of fraternal possibilities as we began to recognize and accept the dignity of each person, regardless of race or creed or gender or orientation.
In the church, the invitation to the exercise of Baptismal Priesthood helped many to respond to the call to ministry. It was as if, in a moment, the People of God took to heart Paul’s reminder of the many and diverse gifts given to God’s people that, if put into practice, could result in the building up of something new, the Body of Christ. Women and men, young and not so young, the able and the disabled, all were represented among those who presented themselves and said, “With the help of the Spirit we can do this. We can respond to the call.”
As I write this today, I feel discouraged. I see the wreckage of these last few years. It is as if the lights have gone out and the enthusiasm has waned, and possibilities have succumbed to the cants of prophets of doom.
People have exited the pews and turned their backs to walk away. Discouraged by scandal, they do not hear a proclamation of the promise of the Good News. They know that some in positions of authority reject the teachings of Vatican Council II and with concerted effort seek to return the church to pre-Counciliar days. The Language of Liturgy is becoming stilted and archaic in an attempt to transliterate the Latin texts instead of translating texts into the people’s vernacular. Instead of experiencing a call to full, active, and conscious participation in the Liturgy, divisions emerge and mass is said for rather than celebrated with the Assembly.
Some worship spaces have been remodeled to accommodate the Tridentine Liturgy with altars against the wall, tabernacles resting at the center of the altar, and mass said with the priest’s back to the people. Even the communion railing to separate the ordinary people from the sanctuary where the ordained may enter, are being restored.
Reservation chapels for the Eucharist are falling out of use as tabernacles return to the main worship area. Or, ignoring the canon directing that there be one place of reservation in the parish, some churches have both the tabernacle in the worship space and a reservation chapel for perpetual adoration lest Jesus be lonely in the tabernacle there. The people are not to gather to celebrate Eucharist and experience the sacramental transforming presence of Christ in the Word, in the Assembly, and in Bread and Wine; they are told to come not so much as a people but as individuals to worship the Presence in the tabernacle. Often the people do not receive from the Bread and Wine consecrated at the Eucharist they are part of but from the reserved Eucharistic Bread from the tabernacle. So much for full, active and conscious participation. Access to the Cup is being curtailed in many places, too.
I struggle with the tug of material things and find myself envying those who have much. I say that even as I recognize that, in relationship to so many of my brothers and sisters in impoverished lands, I have plenty. And I realize that the lure of materialism can enmesh even the vigilant. Schooled in the Church’s social Gospel, I believed in the responsibility we have for each other, especially for the poor, the disabled, the aged, and the disenfranchised. The poor are poor because they didn’t work as hard as the wealthy, or so some would say. The wealthiest shouldn’t be taxed to help the government meet the needs of the poor. I realize that we live in a land where the separation of church and state is established. But for a time I had rejoiced in thinking that the Church’s social Gospel was having an impact on the conscience of the people at large. Alas.
Being older is not valued today. Only the young, the beautiful, the strong and the wealthy matter in this land of increasing disparity between those who have and those who don’t. Granted, some among the Evangelical Fundamentalists see wealth as a sign of God’s favor and of the predestination in heaven of the wealthy. That is not part of our Catholic tradition. If the Forsaken and the Desolate are to experience the Lord’s embrace and be lifted out of squalor it will be through those who minister motivated by that vision of restoration.
We need another Cana. Are the stone water jars empty? Have we run out of rich wine? Or is the Lord telling us that Cana has already happened. The gifts have been given. The water jars are filled to overflowing with the finest wine. Dip some out and drink. We have to take the Lord’s word for it, take it seriously.
This is the new thing that the Lord has wrought, this time of transforming the water of our lives into the rich wine of fulfillment, dependent upon our sharing with others the gifts the Spirit empowers in us. The Lord is calling us to something new and does not wish us to sit and wait for the Lord to do something about the trouble we are in and so make renewal happen. The Lord expects us to be instruments of peace, change, and renewal. Our hearts have to change. Our responsibility is to live, vulnerable as we are and offer our giftedness, limited though that might be, and trust that the Lord who changed the water into wine at Cana can transform this raw material of ours into a renewed church with powers unleashed to transform the world.
That’s pretty heady, isn’t it? We might be inclined to pray about this for a while longer and then get back to the matter at a later date. But think of Cana and the change it promises. If we take the Marriage Feast at Cana to heart then we have to face the fact that the Lord’s hour has come and he has given us a role to play in it.
Sincerely,
Didymus
