Easter Thoughts from Bishop Tom Wright

Bishop Tom Wright is the Anglican bishop of Durham. As Canon Theologian of Westminster Abbey he spent several weeks in Rome as a visiting lecturer at the Gregorian University and as a guest of the Pontifical Irish College. Quite apart from being a world-renowned Pauline scholar, he's also written a very fine book about the Resurrection. His piece in today's Times is well worth a read. It's a good mix of rigorous academic thought and solid preaching that characterises much of his writing:

Easter was the pilot project. What God did for Jesus that explosive morning is what He intends to do for the whole creation. We who live in the interval between Jesus's Resurrection and the final rescue and transformation of the whole world are called to be new-creation people here and now. That is the hidden meaning of the greatest festival Christians have.
This true meaning has remained hidden because the Church has trivialised it and the world has rubbished it. The Church has turned Jesus's Resurrection into a “happy ending” after the dark and messy story of Good Friday, often scaling it down so that “resurrection” becomes a fancy way of saying “He went to Heaven”. Easter then means: “There really is life after death”. The world shrugs its shoulders. We may or may not believe in life after death, but we reach that conclusion independently of Jesus, of odd stories about risen bodies and empty tombs.
(...)
Let's be clear: the stories are not about someone coming back into the present mode of life. They are about someone going on into a new sort of existence, still emphatically bodily, if anything, more so. When St Paul speaks of a “spiritual” resurrection body, he doesn't mean “non-material”, like a ghost. “Spiritual” is the sort of Greek word that tells you,not what something is made of, but what is animating it. The risen Jesus had a physical body animated by God's life-giving Spirit. Yes, says St Paul, that same Spirit is at work in us, and will have the same effect - and in the whole world.

Now, suddenly, the real meaning of Easter comes into view, as well as the real reason why it has been trivialised and sidelined. Easter is about a new creation that has already begun. God is remaking His world, challenging all the other powers that think that is their job. The rich, wise order of creation and its glorious, abundant beauty are reaffirmed on the other side of the thing that always threatens justice and beauty - death. Christianity's critics have always sneered that nothing has changed. But everything has. The world is a different place.

Easter has been sidelined because this message doesn't fit our prevailing world view. For at least 200 years the West has lived on the dream that we can bring justice and beauty to the world all by ourselves.

Good and faithful servant...

It's hard to believe that it's 4 years since the passing of Pope John Paul II. I was in pilgrimage in Lourdes during the last week of his life, and happened to be returning to studies in Rome with a fellow seminarian on the last day of his life. Getting from Lourdes to Rome involved a couple of flights, and at each stop-over my colleague and I anxiously sought news of the Pope's condition. He was still alive when we landed in Rome, but as we reached the door of our residence the church bells of Rome began to toll. The only Pope we ever knew, that grandfatherly presence, that great man had passed from this life.
The next couple of weeks were to be unforgettable - the whole world gathering in Rome to pay their last respects, the hours of queuing in order to pay a final tribute to his remains, the memorable homily of Cardinal Connell who offered a requiem Mass for the Pope in the presence of Rome's Irish community and the almost unbearable sense of emptiness during the Eucharistic Prayer when the Christians of Rome had neither Pope nor bishop to pray for.
Curiously, the most eloquent tributes paid to the pontiff were drawn by the cartoonists of the world. Some of these sketches captured the mission of the Pope and the unique charism of John Paul II better than newspaper editorials and lengthy obituaries.
Ar dheis De go raibh a anam dilis.

Year of Priesthood

Via Northampton Seminarian:

It was announced this morning by the Holy Father that there will be a "Year of the Priesthood" from 19th June 2009 - 19th June 2010. The theme will be "Faithfulness of Christ, Faithfulness of the Priest." The year will be opened at Vespers on 19th June (Solemnity of the Sacred Heart) by Pope Benedict. The year coincides with the 150th anniversary of the death of the Curé d'Ars, St John Mary Vianney. At the end of the year, the saint will be declared patron of all the priests in the world.

Looking towards 2012

As I mentioned previously the 50th International Eucharistic Congress will be held in Dublin in 2012. I was delighted to learn from my bishop that I'll have a role to play in the local diocesan preparations for this Congress. Now, the Congress isn't being held in my rural diocese, but I think that it's important that the collective mind of the entire Irish Church be fixed on this Congress and on the mystery which it honours. At the moment I'm brain-storming with a few friends as to how there can be some sort of Eucharistic Renewal on the ground in the run up to the Congress. I'm keen that practising Catholics should have a deeper understanding and love for the Sacrament, and that the preparations for the Congress should be an opportunity for evangelisation and re-proposing the Mystery of the Eucharist to non-practising Catholics.

What should this consist of?
Well, it's evident that any renewal needs to draw on the richness of sound Eucharistic theology. (For my own part, I've decided to focus my reading on Eucharitic theology for the foreseeable future.) Good preaching and the opportunity for the faithful to deepen their understanding of the Eucharist is a sine qua non. Additionally, I think that it's important that we should draw on the history of the Church in Ireland - and in particular the history of devotion to and the celebration of the Eucharist in Ireland - in order to make people aware of our country's deep and abiding devotion to the sacrament. Thirdly, there would seem to be scope for an engagement between culture and the Eucharist. Perhaps our artists and young people should be encouraged to consider the Eucharist and Eucharistic spirituality as a topic for consideration. Wouldn't a flourishing of writing, poetry, music and the visual arts be a worthy way of honouring the sacrament which has so much to do with Divine creativity and artistry?
There will also be the more practical question of organising groups to travel to and from the Congress, and some sort of cathechesis 'on the ground'.

Does anyone have any thoughts or suggestions as to how the Church in Ireland can make the most of this Congress?

Ash Wednesday

Remember man that you are dust, and unto dust you shall return...
Repent and believe in the Gospel

The liturgy today affords the priest a choice - he can chose either of those prayers as he applies ashes on the faithful today. This is my first year being in a parish for Ash Wednesday so I distributed ashes for the first time ever today. Between those attending the morning mass and the students in the schools I look after, I've probably distributed ashes to well over 500 people - and the evening Mass is still to come.

Now, I have a certain affection for the old-fashioned "Remember man that you are dust, and unto dust you shall return" and was always mildly irked as a layman that I never came across a priest who used it. However, as it suited the cathechesis I gave the school children, I used "Repent and believe in the Gospel" at the schools. (I was pleasantly surprised that some of the kids asked me about the whole mortality symbolism of the ashes without any prompting.)

Anyway, probably the most sombre moment of the day was when a mother and child came up for ashes at Mass. I asked the woman whether she wanted ashes for the child as well, and she nodded. It's difficult to say to a babe in arms, "Remember man that you are dust, and unto dust you shall return", but it was more appropriate than the other option. Whether we realise it or not, our death casts a shadow from the first moment of our life.

Forthcoming Canonizations

The Vatican's press office announced that there will be a gathering of the Holy Father and Cardinals to formally promulgate a number of forthcoming canonizations - including Blessed Damien of Molokai.

The story of Fr Damien was a staple of religious education classes when I was a youngster, but I suppose he's not on the new syllabus as the kids I come across seem not to have heard of him. I was discussing him with some of our primary school children recently, and I told them about leprosy and how the lepers had to gather together in an isolated area. I asked the kids what kind of life the lepers had - they realised that the lepers probably missed their families and friends and were very sad to be living in the leper colony. Then I asked them what kind of life the lepers had together. With the optimism of youth, one sharp little girl suggested that the lepers were friends with each other. Would that it were so, but I had to tell them that the lepers did not live together in peace and that their village became a place of drunkenness and fighting. The children seemed to understand that when they themselves were sad or sick or upset about something, they became quarrelsome with their parents and friends. Then I explained to them that Fr Damien's coming to live with the lepers was important - not just because he cared for their medical and material well-being, but that through his preaching and example he brought Christ to them.

Fr Neuhaus

I was surprised that there was no reference to Fr Neuhaus's passing when the February edition of First Things arrived last week. The magazine was obviously put together whilst Fr Neuhaus was still alive, and indeed includes a piece by Fr Neuhaus wherein he discusses his medical condition. I was very taken with its conclusion:

The entirety of our prayer is “Your will be done” — not as a note of resignation but of desire beyond expression. To that end I commend myself to your intercession, and that of all the saints and angels who accompany us each step through time toward home.