Will volunteering in Canada disappear?

 

From across Canada we are hearing from many volunteer agencies that they must cut back on their services to the larger community because there are insufficient volunteers. We hear from many  “ Meals on Wheels” that they cannot respond to the requests for meal delivery because there are no volunteers. 

 

The life and strength of any society or community is supported by the volunteers. For example, if you live in a neighborhood where people look out for each other (that is pure volunteering) you are so glad when a neighbor observes that there are strange people at your house and you are on winter holidays in Arizona. 

 

You call your aged (and independent) elderly mother. She does not answer the phone. You have no hesitation to call her neighbor ana ask to check up on her. Even if we take such goodness for granted, this is volunteering.

 

Now try to imagine if you lived in a society where no one would help or volunteer for anything. What would it be like if everyone walked by the elderly grandmother who dropped her bag of groceries and was unable to pick them up? Would you ever want to live in a community where everyone charged a fee for every service?

 

We must imagine a society where there is no volunteering. When you imagine ourselves, eighty-six years old with serious mobility issues, and there would be no one who would check to make sure we were okay or no one to deliver Meals on Wheels because we could no longer cook and manage for ourselves. What a horror to imagine such a situation?

 

Now, we can see how important all forms of volunteering is. Up to now we have taken it for granted that many of our fellow citizens would help others; people they know and people they do not know. Now our volunteering agencies are experiencing a scarcity of willing hands.

 

One of the strong sources of volunteers has been church communities. A great number of the volunteers in our Canadian society are also active members of their Church community. As Canadians are less and less an active part of a church community, there is a decrease in the number of volunteers in the society.

 

Also, the strength and power of a society is located in the ‘social capital’ (what people will do for the well-being of the society). This is where people will care about their fellow citizens, help the newcomers and share their musical talent with the residents of nursing homes. The true wealth of any country is located in care and commitment that citizens bring to one another. 

 

It is time that all Canadians need to reflect on what is happening in our society. There is a crisis in volunteering and helping others.  Why would any Canadian not share their time and talent with others? Even if they are involved in an active working life, could they not share some of their energy with the fellow citizen in need?

 

Take a good look where the society is going. Will we all end up lonely and ignored in a nursing home for the last five years of our lives?

 

 

 

 

LISTEN TO YOUR OWN HEART

 

 

It is not uncommon to have a prayerful person lament that ‘there is so many moments of anger in my life. Sometime during my time of prayer I experience myself being hot and bothered by the war in the Ukraine These feelings of anger spoil my prayer.’

 

Prayer is first of all the listening to the movements of God’s Holy Spirit within our lives. The Spirit of God moves everywhere. It is our duty to be attentive to the concerns within the Holy Spirit.

 

But we also need to spend some effort listening to the concerns that are percolating within our own heart. Where is the pain within our own lives that moves us to a more vibrant service to God and love for our fellow human being?

 

Listen to the anger and the impatience that you feel in your bones over the war in the Ukraine. Stand in solidarity with all the ordinary citizens who suffer so much from the bombing of their buildings and their electrical structures that can no longer bring them heat and light.

 

Listen to the pain you feel over the many homeless people in our own country. Put your finger on the pulse of your concern for these nameless people who struggle so hard just to survive the winter cold.

 

Keep your finger on your pulse for the friends and co-workers who struggle with their health. Sometimes it is very difficult just to get enough courage to engage the next cancer treatment. Listen to the feelings of understanding and support that you have for your friends in their daily struggles to recover their health.

 

Listen to the concerns in your heart when you listen to the news media tell stories of the refugees who flee the war in the Ukraine, the poor people from central America trying to get into the USA or the people from the Middle East trying to emigrate into Europe. Feel the intensity of the concern that is erupting within your own soul.

 

Hear the faint glimmer of concern that pops up in your mind when you consider all the families in Canada who have lost loved ones from an overdose of bad drugs. These senseless deaths rob so much of a family’s life. Hear your concern for each of these families.

 

The Spirit of God is moving within your heart. There may be feelings of great anger (that will get you moving), strong feelings of compassion to walk with the suffering and painful feelings of just not knowing what to do. There is great frustration in that sense of helplessness. Listen to these feelings. They are also movements of God’s Spirit within your heart. 

 

We have not been trained to listen to the hurt and anger within our own mind. The Holy Spirit is also working in these very negative feelings.

 

Hopefully, you will sit down in prayer and ask the Holy spirit: now what do you want of me today?  What is going on in my heart that will catch fire in your Spirit?

 

 

 

 

 

TRYING TO COPE WITH CHRISTIAN HANDS

 

Christianity is not lived in our church buildings. Our faith is celebrated, strengthened, taught and nourished inside of church buildings. Our Christian faith is lived out in the world: in our families, our places of work, our civic community and among the poor who live right around us. 

Ours is a very worldly faith. 

 

When Christian people turn too much inward, you know you are in decline. There is a strong danger today when so many serious issues confront our Christian faith to retreat into the security of our church buildings. We feel safe inside the structures of our religion and threatened when we are sent into the world. And the world can be downright hostile towards people with a religious faith.

 

At its best, our Christian faith empowers us to embrace the sinful world and bring it hope and a new vision for life on this planet. Maybe the majority of the people who identify as Chriistiain are not even aware of the power that our Christian faith gives us. Too many of them think that religion is all about “dos and don’ts”; how narrow!

 

In a society that struggles with valuing human life, we are challenged to value and celebrate the life of every single individual on this planet. Every human life is of great value of itself. We must value any human life in terms of its productivity. Human life is sacred by the very fact that this particular human life exits. 

 

As humanity tries to come to terms with global warming and the threat to survival of all life forms on this planet, we are being challenged to recapture (which we have lost over the past five centuries) the value of everything and every life form on this planet. Caring for the earth and human society is an essential part of our Christian faith. We are trying to recover the sacredness of the earth that we lost. The average Christian has only a vague sense of what our Catholic social teaching actually offers us. 

 

And then there is the respect that we must reclaim as women reclaim their power ‘that you will no longer hurt or exploit us.’ This is such a profound issue of justice that must be implemented in all societies. This is not a North American phenomenon. Practicing justice and respect is such a strong part of our Christian faith.  

 

As oppressed minorities, First Nations peoples throughout the world and nations that were founded on slavery, claim their history, we Christian people are challenged to walk with them in solidarity and to allow the power of repentance sink into our national and personal history. We want to enter into the healing season of reconciliation with all who have been oppressed.

 

Our prayer does not direct us to run and hide from the troubles of this world in a secure church building. Rather, the teachings of Jesus empower and enable us to embrace the brokenness of the world. Our faith and the teachings of the Church open our vision to the struggles of peoples and the world. This is an empowering religion.

The ritual at the end of each Sunday Eucharist sums it all up well. Go forth, into the world, and bring the love and mercy of God to all you meet. May this worship be like planting a tree: it may start small but it will grow into a mighty tree. 

 

Jesus trusts in us. Jesus sends us forth into the world.

 

 

 

 

THE SCRIPTURES: WE ARE STILL WAITING

 

It is almost sixty years since the Vatican Council launched the Church into renewal. We need to reflect what has taken hold in the life of Church and what has not.

 

One of the questions that I ask is, ‘why has the Scriptures (the Bible) not gripped the imagination and prayer life of the Church as it was hoped at the Vatican Council?”

 

We are a people of revelation. The Word of God is the gift of divine life to lead and support the life and ministry of the Church. Somehow it should demand more energy from the Church than it actually does.

 

The answer to my question is found in the actual prayer life of the people of the Church. For four and a half centuries the prayers of the Sunday worship were completely dominated by the priest and were spoken in a foreign language. The people adapted by their own personal prayer devotions, primarily the rosary. The laity lead a very vibrant prayer life that was parallel to the Sunday Mass. 

 

If you compare this to huge hill, the introduction of the Scriptures as our source of prayer and liturgy had an uphill battle. The mountain of personal prayer and devotion was just too big. No one had to change or adapt to the introduction of the Scriptures into our prayer life. We already had sufficient tools to nourish our spiritual life.

 

To picture this in a biblical image: Moses was sent to move the mountain, but the mountain wouldn’t move!

 

What was hoped for was the proclamation of the Word of God at the Sunday Mass and the people of the Church would pray, sing, wrestle with and be nourished by the Good News of the Gospels each Sunday. It was meant to be a nourishing moment for the people of the Church.

 

Unfortunately, so little of this happened. If you ask the Catholic in the pew, many would say that “I get something out of the gospel reading but the rest just washes over me.”

 

Learning the story of the Bible, using the words of the Gospel in our daily prayers was not part of the religious upbringing of the majority of Catholics. We must continue to work hard to educated and help all our people become comfortable with using the texts of the Bible in their daily prayer.

 

The three year cycle of readings has been a gift to all of Christianity. The goal is to have the entire Church work through the entire Bible every three years. In the three year cycle of readings we have read the entire New Testament and the significant parts of the Old Testament.

 

There is much work to be done. We have only begun to scratch the surface of becoming a Church of the Bible, a people of the Word of God.

 

 

 

CHARTING OUR FAITH ON NEW PATHS

 

  

 

To honestly live our Christian faith today is to be a pilgrim in the true sense of the word. We know that our final destination is God. The journey is uncertain; there are many doubts , hesitations and mistakes. This is a hard time. 

 

As a pilgrim, there are times when we only have hope that God is with us and that we are on the correct path. These are tumultuous times. We feel so often that we are like the Hebrew slaves that Moses lead out of Egypt. We have only God to lead us: a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night!

 

There are so many serious issues that confront us. There will be many people in our Church who just turn their backs on the big issues of the day and retreat into the safety of a ‘private spirituality.’ This is a fearful but dishonest response.

 

Be honest with yourself. You cannot deal with all the issues. There are many times when you feel that you are trying to get a drink of water out of fire hose! Too much water! Too much pressure!

 

In each of the issues, look for God. What is the Spirit of God trying to teach us? Lead us? Support us? Look for God in the mess of life.

 

The atmosphere is warming up. Will humanity survive? And we know the cause of  grobal warming?? How is the Spirit of God leading us back to value all living creatures, the earth itself as connected to human well-being? What are the values and teachings that our Catholic tradition brings us? What tools, what spirituality does our Catholic experience provide us?  

Does the average parishioner even know about the teachings of the encyclical (2015) Laudato si? 

 

The question of the survival of the earth (and every living creature within) should be a burning issue for the Christian believer. Where is God leading us on this question?

 

All the peoples of the first world (one fifth of the world’s population) must come to grips with their colonial past. In all countries that the Europeans moved into there was the mistreatment of the original populations. Everywhere aboriginal peoples have been treated very badly. Then there are the three hundred years of slavery to the Americas. Canada also has a touch of the slave history. What is God trying to teach us with this dark and violent history?

 

Daily in the media we are bombarded with stories of violence against women. This hits very close to home. What insights and action plans does God want to give us in the face of this violence?

 

God fills the earth and every part of it.  Our task is to be alert for the movements of the Spirit of God in all these difficult questions. How is the Spirit of God acting to be our light? Our strength in these storms?