The Eve of All Saints' Day

You were very remiss, I never had an invitation to your Halloween party. There I was, all dressed up as a thirteenth-century Dominican friar and ready to go. I waited in all evening with the priory cat. Whatever possessed you?

We do need the right clothes when we party. Jesus told a story about a gate crasher who was identified by his jeans and trainers, or their equivalent. But in the vision of St John the saints are wearing proper clothes, white garments, with palms to wave. When we baptise someone we tell her, see in your white garment the sign of your Christian dignity. White stands for purity and innocence and above all it is the symbol of joy. So join the Dominicans and you can wear a white garment every day!

But seriously, you are a new creation in Christ. You have put on Christ, as a person puts on a suit of clothes. It means you are called to holiness. Does that mean you are holy already?  Perhaps you are not sure but you know you are excited by the idea.  Was Mrs Thatcher a good public speaker? Not everyone thought so but she was excited by the idea. She took great pains with her voice.  What would be the point of being a follower of Christ unless you want of him want he wants for you, to make you a saint? Surely all who entertain this hope must purify themselves, just as he is pure.

The feast of All the Saints is like a resting place on a journey. We see already in the far distance our home that lies ahead. Though there is still a long way to go we are encouraged by the sight, we are already the children of God and what we are to be in the future will be revealed one day.  The amazing thing is not simply that there is forgiveness of sins, that would be splendid, or that we know that we are loved, wonderful though that is. But there is more waiting for us. We are called to share God’s own life, to be his adopted sons and daughters, to live through love in His presence.  Not to be postponed for the age to come, already by our Baptism and the Eucharist, in the here and now.

St Therese of Lisieux tells us that we can become holy by following the little way of love. So it is not complicated. It is tough. It is always a struggle, the silent struggle to stay true to one’s promises, to defend the poor, to care for justice also for the unborn, to get alongside the unloved.  To be always genuine in our dealings.  To be merciful and single-minded (what pure in heart means) and people of peace.

Now we are so used to hearing about this personal path to holiness that’s meant for me, I can try for myself.  But in fact, when it comes to brass tacks, I cannot do it all alone, my competitive mentality and my comfort-seeking hunger for consumer goods always get in first.  Holiness implies a desire for wholeness, and that is the world’s problem, not a personal ambition. If the natural resources of the world are plundered, if the earth is trashed by our waste, fragile ecosystems put at risk, if we cannot think and plan as though the poor nations counted, what future?  What kind of world not only for the poor nations but for our own grandchildren too?

The beatitudes of Jesus contain a catalogue of discontents: here are the spiritless, the bereaved, those broken by poverty, those who never get their fill of justice in this world, those who are persecuted for the cause of right. Are these just personal accidents that some people are lucky enough to avoid?  Well the Ebola disaster was not inevitable.  It results from decisions about how investments are made and resources shared – or ring-fenced for the developed world.   So there is a problem.  How can we join the company of the saints in light and be complicit in injustice?

Pope Francis writes in The Joy of the Gospel: “an authentic faith is never comfortable or just something private to oneself. It always involves a deep desire to change the world, to transmit values, to leave the world somehow better than we found it.  We love this magnificent planet on which God has put us, and we love the human family which dwells here, with all its tragedies and struggles.  The earth is our common home and all of us are brothers and sisters.  Pope Benedict said, the Church cannot remain on the sidelines in the fight for justice.  And, our loving response to God isn’t to be an accumulation of small personal gestures, a kind of charity à la carte to ease our consciences.  The gospel is about the kingdom of God, it is about loving God who reigns in our world.  Christian preaching and life are meant to have an impact on society, (to promote) fraternity, justice, peace and human dignity” (180-183).

Should the Church interfere in politics?  Well, it interfered in religion, didn’t it?

Are the Beatitudes of Jesus to be read as a pat on the back for his listeners?  Or aren’t they the programme for struggle, indeed for a permanent revolution?  We need to hear the Lord saying to us that there really is a blessedness about all this, that in and through the struggle we are called to the company of saints by the one who says, Come you blessed of my Father and inherit the kingdom prepared for you.  Yes, for you. We already received our party clothes when we were baptised so now, we can come as we are. Amen.

text by fr Bob Eccles OP

St Dominic kept asking: What will become of sinners?

It depends on us.



With thanks to @Grimkjell

Only in America?

Can't wait to stumble on this sort of scene here in England!

@dominicanadhs

'Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel'

Thus writes St Francis Xavier, SJ in a letter to St Ignatius, this extract from which forms part of the Office of Readings on 3 December, his memorial:

We have visited the villages of the new converts who accepted the Christian religion a few years ago. No Portuguese live here, the country is so utterly barren and poor. 

The native Christians have no priests. They know only that they are Christians. There is nobody to say Mass for them; nobody to teach them the Creed, the Our Father, the Hail Mary and the Commandments of God’s Law. 

I have not stopped since the day I arrived. I conscientiously made the rounds of the villages. I bathed in the sacred waters all the children who had not yet been baptised. This means that I have purified a very large number of children so young that, as the saying goes, they could not tell their right hand from their left.  

The older children would not let me say my Office or eat or sleep until I taught them one prayer or another. Then I began to understand: “The kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” I could not refuse so devout a request without failing in devotion myself. I taught them, first the confession of faith in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, then the Apostles’ Creed, the Our Father and Hail Mary.  

I noticed among them persons of great intelligence. If only someone could educate them in the Christian way of life, I have no doubt that they would make excellent Christians. 

Many, many people hereabouts are not becoming Christians for one reason only: there is nobody to make them Christians. 

Again and again I have thought of going round the universities of Europe, especially Paris, and everywhere crying out like a madman, riveting the attention of those with more learning than charity: “What a tragedy: how many souls are being shut out of heaven and falling into hell, thanks to you!” 

I wish they would work as hard at this as they do at their books, and so settle their account with God for their learning and the talents entrusted to them. This thought would certainly stir most of them to meditate on spiritual realities, to listen actively to what God is saying to them. They would forget their own desires, their human affairs, and give themselves over entirely to God’s will and his choice. They would cry out with all their heart: Lord, I am here! What do you want me to do? Send me anywhere you like – even to India.

I have much to learn, as a Lay Dominican, from this great man and other saints who, like him, burn with love for those who do not know Christ.

Here, in my place... Now, in my time...

Lord, I am here. What do you want me to do? 

St Francis Xavier, pray for all missionaries and for all preachers of the Word of God.

'Contemplare et contemplata aliis tradere' as recommended by Pope Francis

Pope Francis addressed a gathering of catechists in Rome a couple of days ago. His address is up on the Vatican website. It's not very long, and it is well worth reading.

Over at the Jesuit journal, Catholic World Report, editor James V Schall SJ reviews the Holy Father's address and in so doing he links Francis's words to our Dominican motto.

If the first step is to “stand before the Master,” the second is to imitate Christ in going out of ourselves and meeting others. This advice reflects the Dominican motto, to pass on to others what we ourselves have first contemplated in our hearts through study and silence. To do this is also “a beautiful experience—and a little paradoxical.” 

To be true to ourselves we have to go out of ourselves. The faith itself contains this direction. In an age in which everything is centered on our rights, our pleasures, our freedom to do whatever we want, to talk about taking the faith to others seems odd. Are we not impinging on others? Yet, we are to receive the faith as a gift and this, not without God’s help. We are to give it to others.

And this is what Francis says about this gift (and where he says catechist, I hear Lay Dominican!)

Where there is true life in Christ, there follows an openness to others, and so a going out from oneself to encounter others in the name of Christ. And this is the job of the catechist: constantly to go forth to others out of love, to bear witness to Jesus and to talk about Jesus, to proclaim Jesus. This is important because the Lord does it: it is the Lord himself who impels us to go forth. 

The heart of a catechist always beats with this systolic and diastolic movement: union with Christ – encounter with others. Both of these: I am one with Jesus and I go forth to encounter others. If one of these movements is missing, the heart no longer beats, it can no longer live. 

The heart of the catechist receives the gift of the kerygma, and in turn offers it to others as a gift. What a little word: “gift”! The catechist is conscious of having received a gift, the gift of faith, and he or she then gives that gift in turn to others. This is something beautiful. We don’t keep a percentage for ourselves! Whatever we receive, we give! This is not commerce! It is not a business! It is pure gift: a gift received and a gift given. And the catechist is right there, at the centre of this exchange of gifts. That is the nature itself of the kerygma: it is a gift that generates mission, that compels us to go beyond ourselves. 

Saint Paul says that “the love of Christ compels us”, but this “compels us” can also be translated as “possesses us”. And so it is: love attracts us and sends us; it draws us in and gives us to others. This tension marks the beating of the heart of the Christian, especially the heart of the catechist. 

Let us all ask ourselves: Is this what causes my heart to beat as a catechist, union with Christ and encounter with others? With this movement of “systole and diastole”? Are we being fed by our relationship with the Lord, so that we can bring him to others, and not to keep it for ourselves?

"Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you." (Luke 6:38)

A couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure to listen to a beautiful sermon about generosity. "if love is the motor of our lives, generosity is its petrol", those were the words used by the preacher. How true.

The Gospel was a beautiful passage from Luke 6, and the keyword of the entire Gospel of the morning was "giving". Give and it will be given to you.

It really resembles a cause-effect principle, and this is the way we are tempted to look at it. By giving we have been promised a "good measure, pressed down" and that "with the measure you use, it will be measured to you". The more we give, the more we'll receive. This seems to be the natural order.

What the sermon invited us to do, was actually notice that our Lord actually reverted the cause and effect.

This is the actual key: we have to be generous because we already received the good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over. Everything we have in our life is already a gift of the infinite love of our God.

This really changes the whole perspective. Our life is a gift, our time is a gift, every single thing we own is a gift.

The call to be generous then, the invitation to give, is a natural consequence of the immense love we continuously experience, we live every day, every single instant of our life.

fr Timothy Radlcliffe OP preaching in Croatia

Hat tip Bob Eccles OP