JIM DEEDS

WITH EYES WIDE OPEN

JIM DEEDS THE MARGINS ARE OUR OWN

INSTEAD OF REACHING OUT TO ‘THE MARGINS’, WE SHOULD AIM TO REACH BEYOND OUR OWN MARGINS AND BOUNDARIES

Pope Francis intends to hold a great gathering in Rome in October 2023. It will gather under the banner of a Universal Synod, entitled ‘Synod 2021-2032: For a Synodal Church’. Unlike previous synods, which heard almost exclusively from bishops, Pope Francis wants this to be a synod that hears the opinions of all of us. In preparation for this gathering, and to ensure that as many voices as possible are heard, over the past few months most dioceses in the world will have invited people to get involved in listening to each other. This will have taken the form of online submissions, online meetings, and face-to-face listening sessions. The goal in all of this is to get better at listening to where the Holy Spirit is leading us all. And in doing so, Pope Francis wants us to get better at meeting, talking and listening to each other, supporting each other’s journey of life. He asked us, as part of the Synodal experience, to make an effort to listen to voices that we don’t often hear, or if we are honest, often don’t want to hear.

And so, we heard a lot of talk of, and genuine effort being put into, reaching out to ‘the margins’. This impulse comes from a good place, but I think we’re wrong in some fundamental ways. When we say that we want to go to the margins, what we are implying (consciously or not) is that those we are going to are other than ‘us’. But let’s remember that these are our brothers and sisters we are talking about. They are not ‘them’, they are ‘us’.

Going to ‘the margins’ doesn’t only imply otherness, it implies that those we meet are in need of us. Pushing that one, we could be saying “we’re all sorted here and now here we come to tell you all about it.” Now I know that isn’t universally true, but this notion of ‘reaching out to the margins’ runs the risk of bringing this kind of ‘holier than thou’ thinking with it.

Another thing to point out is that most people we speak of as being on the margins... actually aren’t. The church is on the margins! The church is a minority grouping in society. I’m not saying this is necessarily a bad thing. But I am saying that it is a real thing. And so, it is not accurate to say that the church can reach out to the margins, when we are already there.

There definitely is much work to be done, though. I think a better way to express that work is to say that the church needs to reach out beyond our margins. We need to go beyond our own, often self-imposed, boundaries and into what might feel like a wilderness. And yet, it is precisely there – the wilderness – that Jesus brought his followers to reflect, pray and learn. The wilderness is, by nature, a wild place, a place of messiness and uncertainty. Just for emphasis, let’s remember again how many times Jesus went into the wilderness (clue: lots of times!) And in the wilderness, Jesus told his followers to minister. “Feed them yourselves” Jesus tells them, when faced with a crowd of people in need in the wilderness (Lk 9:13).

Going beyond our own church boundaries might also mean letting go of what we currently hold as the rationale for ‘reaching out to the margins’. Do we hold that its purpose is to convert people? Do we hold that it is to teach people? Do we hold that it is to correct people? There’s nothing inherently wrong with any of that, in and of itself. But, unless we go to our margins, willing to encounter whoever we meet there, seeing and hearing and learning from them, nothing else will come of it anyhow. It is only in the encounter that we will, all of us, encounter Jesus among us.

Seeing as Jesus saw, hearing as Jesus heard, means wanting to bring love and wholeness, peace and healing, wherever we go. The margins are our own. In ways the phrase is just a defence against the realisation that were as messed up as everyone else. Yet, it’s that realisation that creates real freedom and unity among all people in the realisation that we are all in need of God’s love, and God’s mercy, and God’s forgiveness. All of us. The good news, of course, is that love is freely available to us all. Good News indeed.

In calling this synod, and in calling on us to push ourselves beyond our usual listening, Pope Francis is calling on us to go beyond our own boundaries and encounter people on our margins. I say, let’s go! “Let’s listen to all the faithful, for in every one of them the Spirit of God breathes” (St Paulinus of Nola). Let’s go with Jesus’ ears and eyes, willing to listen and see, bringing God’s love and mercy with us where we can. And in doing this, let’s watch and listen to how we are affected ourselves. I think that these encounters will indeed convert, teach and correct. And I think all of us will be the recipients of those gifts.

Belfast man Jim Deeds is a poet, author, pastoral worker and retreat-giver working across Ireland.