COVID TIMES; TAKE STOCK

                                  

 

 

We have almost completed nine months of isolation and distancing due to the Covid virus. This has been a long and difficult time for everyone. Each one must stand back and take stock over what we have lost during these nine months, and what we have to look forward to in the next seven months (about the time it will take to do about half of the vaccinations in this country). 

 

When we take stock of what we have lost, it will spur us on to treasure and value what we have lost. Eighty years ago the generation that grew up during the great depression (1930-39) knew how important it was to work hard and build up security for their family’s future. The suffering of deprivation made them very determined to preserve the values of security for others (their own family).

 

Great good could arise out of the sufferings of this pandemic.

 

We have been deprived of our social contacts, family members, friends and the necessary and meaningful gatherings that we need to navigate life. We are ever so conscious that our grandparents are not hugging their grandchildren, our elderly and lonely parents have only one or two designated visitors, and we struggle that our family Christmas celebration may be limited to only five people. Our bodies and spirits cry out for daily social contact.

 

In all of our Canadian society we are painfully aware of the inadequate care that we are providing to our seniors in the long-term care homes. We have  structured our care with the minimum of care workers. The inadequacy has now come home to roast and it is not pleasant. 

 

The pandemic has brought to the fore the inequality between the various racial groups, the disparity between the lower wage earners and the newcomers to Canada and the long-time citizens. Daily we ae confronted with the shortcomings of our Canadian society.

 

Canadians who walk a spiritual life and are part of a faith community lament the absence of praying together, supporting each other and being nourished by spiritual worship in their own faith communities. This pain, this absence, is felt by all spiritual people, of all the religions practiced in Canada.

 

Now, what are we going to do with this pain, these gaping holes in our lives? 

 

This time of crisis is very much a time of opportunity. As Christian believers we must ask what God is leading us to embrace.

 

Hopefully we will turn to a life filled with more solidarity with one another. Human beings only thrive when they are connected and supportive of one another.  Hopefully we will work harder at building community, at all levels: family.  This rugged individualism is leaving us very lonely and unsupported. 

 

May our future be filled with a stronger desire and spiritual plan to build stronger bridges with our fellow believers, the neighbors who live right around us and all the new comers that are trying to make Canada their new home. 

 

 

 

 

I WILL DO IT MY WAY

 

 

 

One of the most profound lesson I learnt about our Christian faith happened some years ago when an insistent mother demanded to have her baby baptized. There was no connection with the Church and strong resistance to any teaching of our faith. 

 

I pointed out to her as gentle as I could that what she was asking was not baptism. She looked at me so firmly and stated her non-negotiable position, “I’ll make it what I want!”

 

This is the way most people actually live out their religious faith, or live out the poverty of their religious faith, by making themselves the standard. What I do is good enough! 

 

In the dregs of the Catholic experience there is much untruth and unpleasant memories. I use the word ‘dregs’ to indicate that we need to be aware of what is festering in our Catholic psyche. Probably this young mother was coming from a background where there was so much fear that if you did not find a priest to pour the water on your baby and something negative would happen, you would be a terrible parent for the rest of your life. Your ‘unbaptized’ baby was no good before God. Never doubt the hold that superstition can have on peoples’ lives. 

 

If you are like this young mother you are convinced that you are right and no one can challenge you with the truth!

 

Religion has its bad side. People will hang on for generations to their fears that this baby will be condemned to a limbo because God is so terrible. 

 

Not everyone lives in a healthy functioning church. When you are a living part of a faith community you will be challenged and have to readjust some of your thinking about God, Church, sin, redemption and eternal life. When you are part of a healthy church you will be questioned and challenged on some of your interpretations. This is a healthy part of spiritual and human growth.

 

Built into this “ I will make it what I want” is the resistance to conversion to the Gospel way of life. Jesus challenges us to turn toward God’s plan for humanity. He calls us to make a radical change in our lives and follow the Good News of the Gospel. Each believer must undergo conversion on their adult journey. 

 

But how can you hear the call for conversion if you are already leading a satisfactory religious life?

 

It is not only individuals who resist conversion. The entire Church can get locked in to mindset that resists the call by the prophets among us to change our way of being Church, to change our unjust business practices and the ways that we exclude the poor from the benefits of our society. 

A healthy Church is a faith community that is responding to the call of Jesus to change our lives. It demands a real turning towards the sharing life in Christ. It demands that we get on board with the life-project that Jesus brings us, that is to grow into the likeness of Jesus Christ in our own space and time

 

 

 

 

TURNING THE CHURCH TOWARD THE POOR

            

 

Pay attention to who your leaders are. A leader always sets the tone of the group whether it be country, school or workplace. Now tone is something that is difficult to define in words but you sure can feel it in practice. 

 

Our school boards have learnt this lesson long ago. They work hard to bring a functioning leader who works towards clear goals in the education process, is able to work with many different personalities and has a real love for the students and their parents. The personality and working habits of the principal colors everything in a particular school.

 

Our church has been blessed with Pope Francis. Thousands of ordinary Catholics and many non-participants are so happy with this very approachable person. But there are many others (more silent about their opposition) who are rather uncomfortable with the direction that he appears to be taking us.

 

Actually, he is challenging the entire membership of the Church to become a ‘poor church for the poor.’ Whereas people in the past may have expected the pope to shore up the doctrine and the discipline of the Church, Pope Francis is leading the way for the believers everywhere to turn toward the poor in their own country and in the world and walking with the poor of this world. 

 

Within the life of the Church, we must always be concerned that the correct doctrine is being preached and prayed by the people at the local level. But that is only half of the story. The Pope must be concerned about the correct practice of Christianity. In other words, our correct doctrines must take flesh in the daily lives of believers. 

 

This is why he has asked that this Sunday (November 15, 2020) be designated as the Sunday of the poor of this world. He wants people worldwide to pay attention to the ever-widening gap between the rich and the poor. He wants believers to pay attention to who are the poor among their population. Most often, the poor are invisible to the working citizens of a particular country. 

 

This Sunday provides an opportunity to reflect on the teachings of Jesus toward the poor of his time and place. What did he bring to those who were suffering or excluded from sharing fully in the society? How did he lift the life and value of the poor up?

 

Two centuries from now people will say that Pope Francis was on the right side of history. He is trying to move the Church to where it needs to be: among the poor and the suffering, among the people that society counts as of lesser value. This must not be a Church that triumphs in its airtight doctrines, but rather a messy Church that loves and cares about the people who get pushed aside and forgotten. 

 

This Sunday can become such a beneficial time  to enter more deeply into the call of Jesus to love the poor with the very heart of God. Take great joy that your heart is being challenged by Pope Francis’ direction to go out towards the poor of this world.

 

  

WALKING THROUGH THE HARD TIMES

          

People are under stress. Two million Canadians are unemployed. Families are suffering because their elderly parents are locked up in nursing homes. They lament that their elderly mother may be sequestered safe from the virus but she will die of loneliness. We have been locked up for too many months. These are difficult times.

 

Our faith will not give us the magic medication that will make the frustration and loneliness go away. God is not the controller of the puppet show that can make good things happen to us. 

 

We are being challenged to turn toward our faith history and seek God in this bleak season of loneliness. We are seeking purpose in all of this. 

 

We did not learn about the faithfulness and the power of God when times were good and prosperous. Our religion arises out of suffering and deep pain. Our Hebrew ancestors were slaves in Egypt. They suffered under the production quotas of Pharaoh (the powers in control of the society and the wealth of the society). There was much pain in all of this. Also, add to this suffering the efforts of the Pharaoh to control the Hebrew population. Male babies were to be killed!

 

God comes to Moses and sends him: Set my people free!

 

We have the confrontation of Moses and the Pharaoh. The slaves are freed and they escape, dryshod, through the parted waters of the Red Sea. But their years in the desert were years of trouble, rebellion and complaining, 

 

This is where our memories can give us guidance through these tough times. As we once again tell the story (i.e., the memory) of Moses and the freed slaves we must place ourselves among them. They cried out to God for help and assistance. They sought courage through the dark days where hope seem so absent. Now we are in the desert. We are crying out to God for help and assistance to get us through these dark times. 

 

Our God is not distant to our sufferings and pain. He literally was one of us when we recall the suffering and aguish that happened in the garden the night before he died and the feeling of abandonment that he experienced on the cross. Not only is the Son of God fully immersed in the struggles of human life, but he cries out for help in these terrible times of suffering.

 

We want to encourage our people to bring to God in prayer their loneliness, their confusion and their frustrations. Be unafraid to bring before God your hesitation and feelings of being down through the months of unemployment. Ask for divine help when the business that you have been trying to build up in the last few years has had to close its doors. 

 

Countless believers have shared their experiences of the tough times in life. “I would never have got through this if it was not for my faith.” In this season of isolation and lockdown (which will probably last a full year) ask God for the strength and courage you need. Ask for personal and family resilience to get you through these confusing and tough times.