May Reality Magazine 2019

CYCLONE IDAI APPEAL

APRIL 2019

VERONICA O'BRIEN: LEGION OF MARY AND ROYAL MATCHMAKER

PURE IN HEART: CELEBRATING SEXUALITY

Informing, Inspiring, Challenging Today’s Catholic

WORKING FOR

CLIMATE JUSTICE THE CLIMATE PILGRIMAGE

WOMEN'S SPIRITUALITY

RADICALLY DIFFERENT FROM THE EXPERIENCE OF MEN

SILENCE IN LITURGY WORDS VERSUS STILLNESS

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IN THIS MONTH’S ISSUE FEATURES 12 THE CLIMATE PILGRIMAGE Pilgrims set out on a 1,500 kilometre walk from the Vatican to Poland where the UN climate conference was due to take place.

By Jane Mellett

19 BE STILL FOR THE PRESENCE OF THE LORD: SILENCE IN THE LITURGY We honour the Lord with words of praise. But is it all 'words, words, words' or do we need silence too?

By Sarah Adams

22 PURE IN HEART INSPIRING LONG-TERM LOVE Pure in Heart is a movement of young adults who, through prayer and friendship, try to learn the meaning of human sexuality.

By Susan Gately

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26 WOMEN’S SPIRITUALITY The experience of women, especially in sexual intimacy, child-bearing and motherhood, shapes their path to God in a way that is radically different to men.

By Carmel Wynne

32 JESUS CARRIES HIS CROSS We follow Jesus through the streets of Jerusalem to Calvary.

By Fr George Wadding CSsR

26

32

34 CYCLONE IDAI APPEAL

By Fr Gerry O'Connor CSsR

OPINION

REGULARS

11 BRENDAN McCONVERY

04 REALITY BITES

18 JIM DEEDS

07 POPE MONITOR

40 A ROYAL MATCHMAKER

31 CARMEL WYNNE

08 SAINT OF THE MONTH

Middleton-born Veronica O’Brien was an early propagator of the Legion of Mary on the European mainland and became the unexpected marriage broker for a king

By Anthony Edward Dundon

44 PETER McVERRY SJ

38 MSGR JOHN OESTERREICHER An Austrian Jew who became one of the architects of a new Catholic dialogue with the Jewish people.

By Mike Daley

09 REFLECTIONS 42 TRÓCAIRE 45 GOD’S WORD

REALITY BITES AWARD FOR IRISH SISTER

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Loreto Sister Orla Treacy laughs as she talks with students in the Loreto Primary School, Rumbek.

SOUTH SUDAN

"OUR BUSINESS IS THE PEOPLE"

Wicklow-born Loreto Sr Orla Treacy has been awarded the ‘International Women of Courage Award’ for her work in South Sudan. As principal of Loreto Secondary School, a boarding school in Rumbek in Lake States which is considered the leading girls’ school in this poverty-stricken country,

Sr Orla has spent more than a decade empowering thousands of pupils through education, despite ongoing civil conflict and prevalent discrimination against young women, such as forced marriage. The award is presented annually by the United States Department of State to women around the

Image courtesy of Misean Cara

world who have shown leadership, courage, resourcefulness, and willingness to sacrifice for others, especially in promoting women's rights. It was founded by Condoleezza Rice in 2007. Highlighting the dangers faced by many missionaries, Sr Orla says that in recent years two missionaries have been murdered in the country, but as religious “our business is not the war, our business is the people”.

ROMANIAN STAMP IN HONOUR OF BISHOP BUCHAREST

STAMPED APPROVAL

The path to canonisation of seven GreekCatholic bishops, killed by the communist regime in Romania in the mid-20th century, has been advanced by the declaration that they died as martyrs. Bishops Valeriu Traian Frentiu, Vasile Aftenie, Ioan Suciu, Tito Livio Chinezu, Ioan Balan, Alexandru Rusu, and Iuliu Hossu were declared to have been killed “in hatred of the faith” between 1950 and 1970, during the Soviet occupation of Romania and during the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu. Each of the bishops was REALITY MAY 2019

arrested and held in a prison or camp until he died, often from isolation, cold, hunger, disease, or hard manual labour. Most were never tried or convicted, and were buried in unmarked graves, without religious services. A year before his death, Bishop Iuliu Hossu was created a cardinal “in pectore” (his name was not announced publicly but Pope Paul VI included him in the list, and when eventually named, he would take precedence

from his nomination). After spending years in isolation, he died in a hospital in Bucharest in 1970. His last words were: “My struggle is over, yours continues.”

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TRUE EXTENT OF FAITH CRISIS LIMERICK

REASSESS, RETHINK, RENEW

Addressing a Church of Ireland audience in Limerick, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin said that many people do not have a realistic sense of the crisis of faith facing the Irish Catholic Church. He said 48 per cent of Catholics between the ages of 24 to 29 in the Archdiocese of Dublin registered at the 2016 census as "of no religion". On the other hand, some parishes in the diocese have never been as vibrant at any time in their history as they are today.

Dr Martin said that Irish culture had drifted from being a largely faith-based community into a heavily secularised one, and that for many today, faith plays no role in their lives.

This does not prevent them, however, from being good, honest and caring people. He also recalled the Taoiseach’s speech during the visit of Pope Francis last August in which he said that the time had come to build a new relationship between church and state, “a new covenant for the 21st century." The archbishop expressed regret that so far, the Government

had made little progress in developing this idea, and he underlined the importance of this kind of dialogue for the future of the country, even if it entailed changes in attitude for faith communities.

He said a major challenge for the future of the Catholic Church lies in women's issues and questions of sexual morality, where the church's teaching is either not understood or is simply rejected as out of tune with contemporary culture. The church must reassess its dominant role in Irish society while not renouncing its prophetic and critical role.

Recalling the apostolic visitation of the Irish church in 2010, the archbishop noted that several dioceses were left without bishops for years, and that some of the ideas raised at the visitation were put back into the freezer, such as the rationalisation of the number of dioceses.

He believed this is still necessary, as is the revision of “the arcane workings of the Irish Episcopal Conference”. The training and recruitment of future priests is also in need of review.

5 From left to right: Bishop Kenneth Kearon, Anglican bishop of Limerick; Archbishop Diarmuid Martin; Bishop Brendan Leahy of Limerick; and Dean Niall Sloane, Dean of Limerick, at St Michael's, Pery Square, Limerick.

Image courtesy of ireland.anglican.org

TRUMP’S RELIGIOUS SUPPORT WASHINGTON

THUMBS UP TO TRUMP

More than two years into Donald Trump’s presidency, white evangelical Protestants in the United States continue to express overwhelming support for him. According to a recent Pew Center poll (January 2019), roughly seven-in-ten white evangelical Protestants (69 per cent) say they approve of how Trump is handling his job as president. This shows a slight decline since the beginning of his administration when almost eightin-ten white evangelicals (78 per cent) approved of his job performance. White mainline Protestants and white Catholics are less approving of Trump’s performance, but more approving of him than are religiously unaffiliated Americans. In the 11 surveys conducted by the centre since Trump’s

inauguration, between 46 per cent and 55 per cent of white mainline Protestants have expressed approval, including 48 per cent in the January 2019 survey. Around half of white Catholics have approved of Trump in these surveys, including 44 per cent in January. Most black Protestants and non-white Catholics also have disapproved of the way the president handles his job. In the early months of Trump’s presidency, weekly Massattending Catholics were 12 points more likely than less-regular attendees to approve of Trump’s performance. In the January poll, 52 per cent of white weekly Mass-going Catholics approve of Trump, while for those who attend less often, the figure is 45 per cent. continued on page 6

REALITY BITES CRUCIFIX REMOVED FROM CITY HALL

The crucifix (circled) that was removed from council chambers of Montreal's Image courtesy of CBC City Hall

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A crucifix that has hung on the wall of Montreal’s City Hall since 1937 will be taken down for a renovation project and will not be replaced.

According to Councillor Laurence Lavigne-Lalonde “The crucifix was installed during an era that was completely different than the one we live in today. We now live in a society that has evolved and is represented by democratic institutions that must be secular, neutral and open to all citizens.” Montreal is the largest city of French-speaking Québec and traditionally Catholic. City officials said they will also be removing a crucifix from another room in city hall.

The Archdiocese of Montreal issued a statement saying that the crucifix is a symbol of Canada’s Christian roots and does not need to be removed in a religiously pluralistic society. “As a sign revered by Christians, the crucifix remains a living symbol. It symbolizes openness and respect toward all peoples, including toward other faith communities and religious traditions, which rightfully adhere to their own signs and symbols,” said Archbishop Christian Lépine.

However, Québec immigration Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette said this does not mean that the Québec National Assembly has to remove the crucifix from the National Assembly. "They can do what they want. The National Assembly has always decided to maintain the crucifix, and that's the position of the government because it's a historical symbol," he said.

A hospital employee walks to the elevator at the main entrance of the SaintSacrement hospital, Québec, where a crucifix was re-installed following hundreds Image courtesy of Jacques Boissinot/Canadian Press of complaints.

REALITY MAY 2019

ASH WEDNESDAY IN SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT The Scottish Parliament hosted a blessing and distribution of ashes, with Archbishop Leo Cushley of St. Andrews and Edinburgh presiding. The Ash Wednesday service took place in a committee room in the parliament’s Queensberry House, according to a press release from the archdiocese. It was sponsored by Labour Member of Scottish Parliament, Elaine Smith, who said in a statement that “it was lovely to have the Archbishop come and distribute ashes to those who work within the Scottish Parliament”.

Anthony Horan, parliamentary officer for the Scottish Bishops Conference, said he was pleased to see “such a cross-party representation” of members of parliament and their staff and that the church has something good and positive to offer society. He hopes more Catholic events will take place in parliament in the future. Last year, Mass was celebrated for the first time in parliament during Holy Week.

Archbishop Leo Cushley distributes ashes during an Ash Wednesday service in Image courtesy of Paul McSherry, Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh a Scottish Parliament building.

HOLY STAIRS RESTORED For the first time since 1723, the thick wooden panels covering the marble steps of the Scala Sancta (the Holy Stairs) in Rome will be removed. For the Holy Week and Easter period, people will be able to touch and climb the bare stones that, according to tradition, are those Jesus climbed when Pontius Pilate brought him before the crowd and handed him over to be crucified.

The restored Scala Sancta will be revealed on April 11 during a rededication ceremony. The wood panelling will be cleaned and put in place later. This is the final stage of a 20-year restoration of the sanctuary overseen by the Vatican Museums and funded by private donors, foundations and the patrons of the Vatican Museums.

Paolo Violini, the Vatican Museums' head fresco restorer, and his team were so astonished at the extent to which the steps had been worn away by the footsteps of pilgrims that they felt it should be seen by today's visitors.

Tradition holds that St Helen, mother of the Emperor Constantine, brought the stairs to Rome from Jerusalem in 326 AD. The present sanctuary of the Scala Sancta was originally part of the papal Lateran Palace, but was constituted as a separate building in the late 1580s when it was richly decorated with images of the Passion. The sanctuary is currently in the care of the Passionists.

N E WS

POPE MONITOR KEEPING UP WITH POPE FRANCIS POPE FRANCIS' TRAVELS Holy House of Loreto a home for the young, families, and the sick. After Mass, he signed the “Letter to Young People” composed at last November’s Synod for Youth. After lunch with his hosts, Pope Francis returned to Rome in the afternoon.

PAPAL VISIT TO MOROCCO

Crowds gather for Mass at Loreto

PAPAL VISIT TO LORETO To mark the feast of the Annunciation, Pope Francis visited the Sanctuary of Loreto. According to a medieval legend, the Holy Family’s house was borne by angels from Nazareth to Loreto in the Italian province of Ancona. It has long been a place of pilgrimage, and it is where the famous Litany of Loreto in honour of the Blessed Virgin originated. Pope Francis made the one-hour journey by helicopter. During his homily at the Mass, he said the Sanctuary is “a privileged place to contemplate the mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God”, since it is “the house of Mary”. Many pilgrims, he said, come from around the world to the “oasis of silence and piety” to draw strength and hope, calling the The pope prays at the shrine of our Lady of Loreto

Pope Francis undertook the second visit of his pontificate to a predominantly Muslim country on March 30-31. There are only about 50,000 Catholics in a total population of over 31 million and most of these are of French or Spanish origin. During his visit, Pope Francis met with King Mohammed VI as well as the country’s priests and religious sisters and celebrated Mass for the Catholic community in a sports stadium in the capital. He met members of the migrant community at the Caritas centre, run by the Missionaries of Charity of Mother Teresa, as well as to a social centre outside Rabat, the capital. One of the highlights was a visit to a training institute for imams that seeks to be a bulwark against Islamic extremism. The institute, named after the king, attracts Moroccan, sub-Saharan and European students, including women, wishing to become Muslim prayer leaders and preachers. Opened in 2015, it now hosts over 700 students a year and is part of the Moroccan government’s efforts that began in 2004 to counter terrorism and fundamentalist Islam. During the visit, Pope Francis and King Mohammed VI signed a joint statement appealing to international leaders to protect the status quo of Jerusalem as a place of worship for the followers of the three monotheistic faiths of Judaism, Islam and Christianity. The Holy See has long supported a two-state solution in the Middle East, and supports the international community’s position that Jerusalem is a city of religious and political importance that transcends any one state.

President Trump and some other American states have recently recognised Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, but they are in a minority. During the in-flight press conference on the way back to Rome, Pope Francis emphasised the need for on-going dialogue. Speaking of those who prefer to build walls instead of bridges he said “they will end up imprisoned by the walls they have built”, while those who build bridges will go a long way. He conceded however that building bridges takes a great deal of effort.

Quoting novelist Ivo Andric's novel The Bridge on the Drina he said that the bridge is made by God with the wings of angels so that men can communicate, while walls are for isolation and those who build them will become prisoners.

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Pope Francis with King Mohammed VI of Morocco

PAPAL VISIT TO ROMANIA Pope Francis will visit Romania from May 31-June 2. There are less than a million Catholics in the country (4.3 per cent of the total population). In the 2011 census, more than 80 identified themselves as members of the Romanian Orthodox Church. A large number of Catholics belong to the Romanian Greek-Catholic Church, and the principal aim of the papal visit is to beatify six martyr bishops of this church. On the day of his arrival, in addition to meeting civic leaders, the Pope will meet the permanent Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church at the home of the Patriarch. Before returning to Rome on Sunday afternoon, he will meet members of the Roma Community.

REDEMPTORIST SAINT OF THE MONTH BLESSED NICHOLAS CHARNETSKYI 1884-1959

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Nicholas Charnetskyi was born on December 14, 1884 in the Western Ukraine, the eldest of nine children. He was ordained to the priesthood in 1909 and continued his postgraduate studies in Rome.

At the beginning of the 20th century, some Belgian Redemptorists had adopted the Greek Catholic Rite to facilitate their mission work among Ukrainian emigrants in Canada. In 1913, with the agreement of the Major Archbishop of the Ukrainian Church, Metropolitan Andrei Sheptytsky, a foundation was made in the Ukraine and began the work of parish missions.

By the outbreak of World War II, there were 120 Greek-Rite Redemptorists working in the Ukraine and the Carpathian region of Czechoslovakia. Young Fr Nicholas was attracted by their lifestyle and mission work. In October 1919, he entered the novitiate and made his religious profession the following year. He spent his early years as a Redemptorist preaching parish missions in the Ukraine. In 1931, he was appointed bishop and apostolic visitor for Ukrainian Catholics in the Volyn and Polissia regions, near the Polish border.

Bishop Nicholas came to Ireland to take part in the first Dublin Eucharistic Congress in 1932. While in Dublin, he stayed with the Redemptoristine Sisters in their monastery in St Alphonsus Road, and when it was over, he visited the other Redemptorist communities in Ireland. As part of the official Congress programme, he celebrated the Pontifical Divine Liturgy according to the Byzantine (Greek-Catholic) Rite in the Jesuit Church of St Francis Xavier, Gardiner Street, Dublin. This was probably the first public celebration of this form of Holy Mass in Ireland. In recent decades, many Christians, both Catholic and Orthodox, have made their home in Ireland, and use that venerable and beautiful form of the Divine Liturgy in their ordinary Sunday worship. The Greek-Rite Catholic community of Dublin commemorates him by using his name in its title, the “Community of Hieromartyr (martyred bishop) Nicholas the Wonderworker”.

At the outbreak of the Second World War, the Ukraine was overrun, first by the Germans and then by the Russians. After the war, the Ukraine came under Soviet control. The Greek Catholic Church was suppressed by the Soviet State and forcibly incorporated into the Russian Orthodox Church. Its bishops and priests, including the Redemptorists, were rounded up for interrogation.

Bishop Nicholas was arrested on April 11, 1945. After prolonged interrogation and torture, he was sentenced to ten years imprisonment as a "Vatican agent". He served his term in the gulags of Siberia, often working in coalmines. It has been estimated that he spent 600 hours under torture and interrogation and was moved around to 30 different prisons and forced-labour camps. When his health began to fail, the Soviet authorities feared that his death in prison might attract international attention to the fate of other religious prisoners of conscience. He was released in 1956 and permitted to return to the city of Lviv in the Ukraine. There he lived quietly in a poor apartment with a Redemptorist brother to care for him. Although seriously ill and almost blind, Bishop Nicholas continued to work quietly as a priest. He prepared candidates for the priesthood, and ordained at least ten of them secretly before his death in 1959. His grave became a place of pilgrimage for Roman and Greek Rite Catholics and many cures were attributed to his intercession. When the Greek Catholic Church emerged from the shadows in the 1980s, Bishop Nicholas’ cause for canonisation as a martyr was introduced. He was beatified by Pope John Paul II on April 24, 2001 along with 25 companion martyrs, including three from his own Redemptorist Congregation.

Brendan McConvery CSsR

REALITY MAY 2019

Reality Volume 84. No. 4 May 2019 A Redemptorist Publication ISSN 0034-0960 Published by The Irish Redemptorists, St Joseph's Monastery, St Alphonsus Road, Dundalk County Louth A91 F3FC Tel: 00353 (0)1 4922488 Web: www.redcoms.org Email: sales@redcoms.org (With permission of C.Ss.R.)

Editor Brendan McConvery CSsR editor@redcoms.org Design & Layout David Mc Namara CSsR Sales & Marketing Claire Carmichael ccarmichael@redcoms.org Accounts Dearbhla Cooney accounts@redcoms.org Printed by Nicholson & Bass, Belfast Photo Credits Shutterstock, Catholic News Agency, Trócaire,

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REFLECTIONS Lust is a poor, weak, whimpering, whispering thing compared with that richness and energy of desire which will arise when lust has been killed.

CS LEWIS

Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the Ark: professionals built the Titanic.

ANONYMOUS

Don't let yourself forget that God's grace rewards not only those who never slip, but also those who bend and fall. So sing!

The song of rejoicing softens hard hearts. It makes tears of godly sorrow flow from them. Singing summons the Holy Spirit. Happy praises offered in simplicity and love lead the faithful to complete harmony, without discord. Don't stop singing.

HILDEGARD OF BINGEN

It is precisely women’s experience of God that this world lacks. A world that does not nurture its weakest, does not know God the birthing mother. A world that does not preserve the planet, does not know God the creator. A world that does not honor the spirit of compassion, does not know God the spirit. God the lawgiver, God the judge, God the omnipotent being have consumed Western spirituality and, in the end, shrivelled its heart.

JOAN CHITTESTER OSB

Turn your car into a monastery.

ROBERT BARRON

In baiting a mousetrap with cheese, always leave room for the mouse.

SAKI (HH MUNRO)

Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving us wordy evidence of the fact.

GEORGE ELIOT

One cannot escape dogmas—those who hold most firmly to dogmas today are those whose only dogma is that dogmas should be feared like the plague.

SIGRID UNDSET

You will know you're old when you cease to be amazed.

NOEL COWARD

A joyful heart is more easily made perfect than a downcast one.

Dear God, I am so afraid to open my clenched fists!

Who will I be when I have nothing left to hold on to?

Who will I be when I stand before you with empty hands?

Please help me to gradually open my hands and to discover that I am not what I own, but what you want to give me.

HENRI NOUWEN

Little science takes you away from God but more of it takes you to Him. LOUIS PASTEUR

When we step into the family, by the act of being born, we do step into a world which is incalculable, into a world which has its own strange laws, into a world which could do without us, into a world we have not made. In other words, when we step into the family we step into a fairy-tale.

GK CHESTERTON

ST PHILIP NERI

An duine a bhfuil builín aige gheobhaidh sé scian lena ghearradh. (The person who has a loaf will get a knife to cut it.)

DONEGAL PROVERB

The human heart is, so to speak, the paradise of God. ST ALPHONSUS LIGUORI

If one does not understand a person, one tends to regard him as a fool.

CARL GUSTAV JUNG

What is a weed? A plant whose virtues have never been discovered.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

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Conscience: Writings from “Moral Theology”

by Saint Alphonsus Translated by Raphael Gallagher, CSsR 276-page softcover

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EDI TO R I A L UP FRONT BRENDAN McCONVERY CSsR

ONE YEAR ON

May

25 sees the first anniversary of the referendum which removed from the Irish Constitution the protection of the unborn child and prepared the way for the introduction of legislation permitting abortion. It may be an irony of history that the Government now proposes to hold a referendum on liberalising a provision in the existing divorce legislation on May 24, the day before the anniversary,.

For those of us who believe in the sanctity of unborn life and who were disappointed at the large majority in favour of removing the eighth amendment, this has not been an easy year. The Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Bill was signed into law just a few days before Christmas, and legalised abortion became a reality on New Year’s Day. Critics of the law have pointed out that it is a much more liberal law than was implied prior to the referendum. It narrowed the scope of conscientious objection, it gave a more limited definition of viability post-birth and extended the demarcation of ‘fatal foetal abnormality’ for several weeks beyond birth.

According to the law, only individuals can claim the right to conscientious objection, not institutions such as Catholic-run hospitals, and doctors are obliged, if they are conscientious objectors, to transfer their patients to another practitioner who is willing to carry out the treatment: some would argue that this is a form of indirect participation in abortion. A recent advertisement for a consultant’s post in the National Maternity Hospital included the statement that the applicants should understand that the post "includes elective terminations of pregnancy services". Will this provision be extended to further appointments in the field of obstetrics, eventually making it impossible for a pro-life doctor to find a place in maternity work, and will medical students, despite conscientious objections,

be required to take part in abortions as a ‘normal requirement’ for their training?

The argument of ‘the thin end of the wedge’ is often dismissed as alarmist when a proposed law is open to public debate.

The follow-up on the divorce legislation is an indicator that it should not so easily be brushed aside. The proposal is to shorten the time of separation before an application can be made for a divorce from four years to two. One might be forgiven for wondering if the Government has concluded that the large majority in favour of the abortion referendum was proof that the traditional Catholic view of morality is dead, and the time is right to move on a general liberalising of laws before its mandate comes to an end.

Together with proposed changes in the school system, there is little doubt that we have moved more decisively into a "postCatholic pluralist republic" in more than a decade since that term was first mooted by government minister Rory Quinn.

How do believers live in such a changed landscape? Many active and devout campaigners on the pro-life side at the last election genuinely believed that they might win, albeit by a slight margin. The size of the vote to remove the amendment took them by surprise. For some of them, the future seems to be a battle ground where proponents of traditional values will engage in a distinctively Irish form of the culture war with the liberal society as the enemy.

For models of how the war is to be fought, they look towards President Trump’s America or to the rise of populist parties within the European community. It is, sadly, a bleak and rather pessimistic view of society that risks driving the church back into a self-protecting ghetto.

The compiler of the Old Testament Book of Jeremiah faced the question of how a religious community could survive in exile

without the support of temple, monarchy and priesthood, as a minority within a culture that, if not hostile, was at least indifferent or uncomprehending. One of the gems of the book is the prophet’s letter to the exiles in Babylon and elsewhere. They are not to indulge in nostalgia for the good old days, he tells them, or to keep themselves apart.

"Build houses, settle down,” he tells them.

“Plant gardens and eat what they produce; marry and have sons and daughters; choose wives for your sons, find husbands for your daughters so that these can bear sons and daughters in their turn; you must increase there and not decrease. Work for the good of the city to which I have exiled you; pray to the Lord on its behalf, since on its welfare yours depends" (Jeremiah 29:5-7). The church’s social teaching and its emphasis on practical charity have always been the hallmark of faith. We have never hesitated to subscribe to St James’ teaching "It is by my deeds that I will show you my faith" (James 2:18). Despite criticism, the church’s record, particularly in health and education, has been a distinguished, and sometimes, a costly one. Catholics cannot withdraw from those crucial fields, but the future will require other ways of making their presence as believers count, especially at ground level.

Brendan McConvery CSsR Editor

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C OVE R STO RY

© Albert Lozada

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ON THE FEAST OF ST FRANCIS LAST OCTOBER, AN INTERNATIONAL GROUP OF PILGRIMS BEGAN A 1,500-KILOMETRE JOURNEY FROM VATICAN CITY TO THE UN CLIMATE TALKS IN KATOWICE, POLAND. ONE OF THE PARTICIPANTS CAPTURES SOME OF ITS HIGH POINTS.

BY JANE MELLETT

"There

is a problem in the atmosphere, but the bigger problem lies within our own hearts."

These are the words of Yeb Saño, former climate negotiator for the Philippines, current head of Greenpeace in South East Asia and leader of The Climate Pilgrimage.

On October 4, 2018, the Feast of St Francis of Assisi, the pilgrims left Vatican City and began a 1,500km trek on foot to Katowice, Poland. Their destination was the 24th UN Climate Change Conference, known as ‘COP24’. I joined the pilgrimage in Northern Italy and for 40 days walked almost 1,000km

REALITY MAY 2019

with an inspirational group of people from the Philippines, Europe and USA. Our group included Catholics, Quakers, believers and non-believers as this is an issue that crosses all boundaries, affecting the home we all share, Our Common Home. We carried the message of Laudato Si, Pope Francis’ encyclical on the environment, acknowledging that: “We need a conversation which includes everyone, since the environmental challenge we are undergoing, and its human roots, concern and affect us all.” (LS, 14). The purpose of the climate pilgrimage was three-fold: calling

on global leaders to agree a rule book which would ensure a quick end to the fossil fuel era; promoting a just transition to clean energy; and reflecting with communities to re-awaken a sense of awe and wonder for creation, exploring how everything is interconnected.

LOGISTICS Pilgrims walked from the Vatican, through Italy, Slovenia, Austria, Slovakia, Czech Republic and Poland. We endured every type of weather you could imagine from torrential rain and flooding in Italy, to an

The devastating effects of Typhoon Haiyan on Tacloban city, Philippines

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Super Typhoon Haiyan was the strongest storm ever to make landfall in human recorded history, killing over 10,000 people in two hours unseasonably warm October in Slovenia. The end of November and December brought us through bitterly cold weeks in the Czech Republic and Poland, with temperatures dropping well below freezing. Sometimes our water froze in our backpacks. We covered an average of 25-30 kms per day. An excellent logistics team, backed by the Global Catholic Climate Movement and Greenpeace, looked after our every need from planning our routes, food and accommodation to managing events and ensuring that we were healthy and happy. And we were, most of the time. It is hard to convey the enormity of the experience.

A major part of the pilgrimage was the sacred yet terrifying narrative we carried

with us in the accounts of survivors of Super Typhoon Haiyan. In November 2013 Haiyan slammed into the Philippines. It was the strongest storm ever to make landfall in human recorded history, killing over 10,000 people in two hours. A fellow pilgrim, Joanna Sustento, lost both of her parents, her brother, her sister-in-law and three-year-old nephew in the storm surge. Another pilgrim, AG SaĂąo, a marine conservationist and street artist, also survived in Tacloban city that night, but he lost his best friend. AG spent three days, with no food, helping to collect the bodies of the dead from the streets. Haiyan was so strong because it had travelled over waters in the Pacific Ocean which were 0.8 degrees warmer than normal.

Yeb SaĂąo, founder of the Climate Pilgrimage

C OVE R STO RY

© Albert Lozada

14 Greta Thunberg –her climate strike outside her school has made world headlines

REALITY MAY 2019

Super Typhoons are the new norm for the Philippines, so for my fellow pilgrims the climate crisis is not a question of a minor disruption to one’s life, it is a matter of life and death. It is easy to glaze over when one reads the latest reports on climate; with so many statistics and figures, it can be overwhelming. When you listen to the real stories, it brings home the human cost. I could not help but be moved to compassion and outrage every time AG and Joanna shared their stories. A big learning for me was the fact that 90 fossil fuel companies in the world are responsible for 70% of the carbon in our atmosphere. Yeb and AG are currently part of a climate litigation suit in the Philippines, taking 47 of these companies to the human rights courts to hold them accountable for their contribution to these extreme storms.

Every night we were hosted by communities in the local parish priest's house, a school gym or with host families. We enjoyed the best of food, warm places to sleep, somewhere to rest to recharge our bodies. Each evening we would engage on a deep level with those we encountered, whether it be a presentation in a community

Š Albert Lozada

Pilgrims taking a well-earned rest in a forest

centre or around the table of our host family. The conversations were not always easy, as this is a crisis which ultimately will affect the lifestyles of people across the world. It can be challenging for some to hear. Even those who found this topic unsettling still listened attentively to our purpose. Each meal we ate felt like a very special communion, especially when someone opened their home to complete strangers on the road. We relied on their generosity which encouraged me to be grateful every day for all that we received and helped to melt away any insecurities or worries that I might have carried on the road.

TRAGEDY On Sunday November 11 we woke to find that one of our fellow pilgrims, Alan Burns (72), had passed away in his sleep. Alan was a climate activist for over 30 years and this was his third Climate Pilgrimage. Alan’s family were clear that the pilgrimage should continue as that is what he would have wanted. Alan died doing what he loved, campaigning for climate justice. One day after his passing, we picked ourselves up and climbed out of

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C OVE R STO RY

© Albert Lozada

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Making their mark at Silesia, Poland’s coal mining province

Slovenia, crossing the border into Austria. That day we walked in silence, numb from the shock of losing a member of our pilgrimage family. It was almost surreal to be walking in such beautiful forests and countryside with our hearts broken.

Day by day, people began to join us, some former climate pilgrims, while others were locals who would tag along for a day or two. We returned to Slovenia some weeks later to lay Alan to rest, in a tiny graveyard on top of a snow-covered mountain where we had walked a few days before he died. We

Alan Burns who died while on pilgrimage

REALITY MAY 2019

were reminded of the saying, ‘Where a pilgrim stops, he rests’. Alan is now an eternal climate pilgrim.

We carried his shoes to Katowice and played his favourite Beatles music along the way to remember him.

WALKING IN SOLIDARITY On the day we entered Vienna, 30 people from local communities walked with us into the city. Marching down through the main shopping district chanting ‘Climate justice now’, Christmas shoppers looked on as we paused for photographs outside the cathedral. This marked a turning point in our own grief and helped remind us that we had a job to do, to carry our message through each city and village until we reached our destination. The following day, President Alexander Van der Bellen welcomed us to the Presidential Palace, walking in solidarity with us around the People’s Park.

There is something transformative about walking. Jesus walked everywhere, so did St Francis. You engage on a different level

with nature, with local people and changing landscapes. As we entered Poland in early December, we spent the days walking through Silesia, Poland’s coal mining province. Here we endured some of the worst air pollution I have ever experienced. In a way it was symbolic: the closer we got to COP24 the more difficult our journey became. We engaged with the coal mining communities along the way and were pleasantly surprised to be given our warmest welcome in those towns.

The people of Silesia are also victims of this crisis. Their children are breathing the equivalent of seven cigarettes a day, and families who have been coal mining for generations are starting to acknowledge that the future lies elsewhere. A local priest thought it was ironic and prophetic that we arrived to his parish on the feast of St Barbara, the patron saint of coal miners. We were greeted by school students, parishioners, bishops, mayors, presidents, UN officials and thousands of people along the road, each of them supporting us in different ways.

© Albert Lozada

The pilgrims at last arrive at Katowice

CLIMATE JUSTICE Our Christian faith teaches us ‘love of neighbour’ and that demands that we do not sit back and accept injustices on any level. Love of neighbour calls each of us to do something, whatever we can, wherever we are. Yeb Saño frequently reminded us on our journey that, “Our physical destination is Katowice and COP24, but our real destination is the minds and hearts of all those we meet on this road.”

17 and at the same time it is an amazing time to be alive. We all have very serious choices to make as a global community and as Al Gore said to the participants at COP24, “We don’t have time for despair”. I found so much hope on the pilgrimage, not in the world leaders at COP24, but in the grassroots communities along the road who shared with us their climate stories and plans. I saw hope in 15-year-old Greta Thunberg from Sweden, who stood in front of 200 climate negotiators and told them “I am not here to ask you to change, because for 24 years you have done nothing. I am here to tell you that change is coming whether you like it or not.” Greta has led a climate strike outside her school in Sweden every Friday for the past six months. The movement has spread to cities around the world, engaging thousands of young people in climate action.

You don’t have to walk 1,000km to embark on this climate journey. But a sustainable

"Our physical destination is Katowice and COP24, but our real destination is the minds and hearts of all those we meet on this road" Ultimately this pilgrimage was about conversion. One’s destination is never really a place but a new way of seeing things. It is as if a veil has been lifted and I can’t ‘unsee’ the reality of the climate crisis. It is terrifying

future depends on each of us making a journey of the heart. Instead of feeling overwhelmed, one can find hope in small actions. The church has a huge role to play in being a leader for climate action. Already 600 Catholic institutions worldwide have divested from fossil fuels, including the Irish Bishops Conference. Parishes can achieve so much at local level, for example by becoming an eco-parish. As voters we can bring this issue to politicians at every level. We are stewards of creation, part of creation and dependant on creation; we have no right to plunder it or to stand back while millions of people worldwide are suffering because of this crisis. Walking 1,000km sounds insane, but in the end, it simply involved putting one foot in front of the other, repeatedly.

Jane Mellett is a native of Carlow, a pastoral worker in the Archdiocese of Dublin and passionate about all things Laudato Si. She recently ran the Laudato Si programme of the WMOF 2018 and continues to be engaged in climate action.

COMMENT WITH EYES WIDE OPEN JIM DEEDS

SAY HELLO, WAVE GOODBYE

WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN A STRANGER SAYS “HELLO”?

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My first visit to Manhattan, New York City, was in 2006. I went out as part of a delegation of people from West Belfast who were working with young people who were vulnerable to homelessness and suicide. We took five days in New York visiting services offering support to the many thousands of young people who found themselves on the streets of the city looking for the elusive ‘American dream’. We visited homeless shelters, psychiatric facilities and mother and baby hostels. It was a profoundly moving experience for as all and a somewhat strange way to see a city for the first time.

Amongst the long days of work, we also took a little tourist time.

This consisted of walking around the city as much as we possibly could, drinking in the sights and sounds that I found most familiar from watching movies set in New York for much of my life. Indeed, it felt like I was walking around one big movie set. One particular day, as I was walking around, I did what I routinely do while walking the mean streets of Belfast, where I live– I said hello to those I encountered.

Being in one of the most denselypopulated places on the earth, I encountered a lot of people! As I did this, I discovered something that I did not expect. I was ignored! Well, that’s not entirely true. After an hour or so of walking about and getting the feeling that people thought I was invisible, I set myself a challenge of saying hello to the next 20 people I met and gauging their response.

The results were as follows; • Eighteen people ignored me completely • One person looked at me REALITY MAY 2019

be known as ‘The Way’; in other words, as a people who had a particular way of living. What was that way, I wonder? Well, we also know that there is a phrase often associated with those early days of new Christian communities– “see how they love one another!”

So the ‘way’ is a way of loving others. And one expression of the beginning of the way of loving each other is to acknowledge each other. It is the first step in building relationships and in building and keeping community cohesion. with such horror that I considered that ‘hello’ might have meant a rude word in her native tongue.

• One person stopped and looked completely beguiled that I had bothered to say hello and replied in the most New York of New York accents, "well, hellooooo!"

This one response brought a huge smile to my face. She laughed out loud, seemingly overjoyed by this greeting, and we parted ways with a skip in our both our steps.

In other ways, of course, the people of New York are very welcoming and friendly. I have visited New York a few time since then and I count it as one of my favourite places in the world. Each time I go, though, I notice the same thing. Life is so busy there and people have so much on their minds that the hurry to get somewhere else can take over the need/desire to acknowledge each other on the street.

It’s a long way from Manhattan in 2006 to Ireland in 2019 and yet…

I have noticed of late that more and more people who I say hello to on the roads where I walk do not respond at all. Some, like the New Yorkers I encountered, actually look a little bit worried or offended that I spoke to them. In some cases I think the fact that I have three dogs, with one being heavier than the average adult human, might contribute to this. I’m not sure though. I worry that something is creeping in here that had already crept into Manhattan; a kind of de-personalising effect.

If that is the case, it would sadden me. Have we, too, become too busy getting somewhere else to recognise the need to acknowledge fellow travellers on the same road?

Not to be deterred, I have stepped up my campaign to say hello to everyone I meet on my travels. I do so with a thought in mind. In the early days after Jesus had ascended into heaven and those left behind were trying to find how to live well without him, they came to

So here’s a challenge. Why not step up your campaign to say hello to those you meet?

You could do so because it is an expression of an authentic Christian way of living or you could do so because you like to live in a community where we acknowledge each other. You may need to consider that you will get ignored by some. You may even have to consider that your hello will be rejected as an offence to some who do not like to be spoken to. And sure, if that is how it goes, it won’t kill us. However, your effort to say hello may well be met with the same joyful surprise as my New York friend back in 2006. You might just put a skip in someone’s step.

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

In Tune with the Liturgy A series that highlights some of the features of the Church’s worship in the month ahead

BE STILL FOR THE PRESENCE OF THE LORD THE PLACE OF SILENCE IN THE LITURGY

19 WE HONOUR THE LORD WITH OUR WORDS OF PRAISE. WE VOICE OUR NEEDS IN PRAYERS OF PETITION. WE LISTEN TO THE LORD IN THE WORDS OF SCRIPTURE. IS IT ALL 'WORDS, WORDS, WORDS' OR DO WE NEED SILENCE TOO?

BY SARAH ADAMS

Be still for the presence of the Lord, the Holy One is here Come bow before Him now, with reverence and fear In Him no sin is found, we stand on holy ground Be still for the presence of the Lord, the Holy One is here

These

words by David Evans begin one of the most popular contemporary hymns. The desire is for stillness, to recognise and acknowledge the belief that the gathered community stands in the presence of the Lord. The words invite us into a deeper place, within and in communion with the Lord. While we may be actively singing, we are also composing ourselves, getting in touch with our inner selves.

Stillness or silence is not easy. In an increasingly frenetic world where life never seems to stop, and where noise tends to dominate, experiencing silence may be perceived as unattainable, something which can only be achieved by totally removing oneself from the crowd. It is not surprising that increasingly people are turning to contemplative practices such as meditation or mindfulness to provide times of recollection.

Real silence is not just the absence of noise

20 NOT JUST NO NOISE Real silence is not just the absence of noise.

Sometimes we can find ourselves in a very quiet place, when everyone else has gone to bed or we have walked to a remote place. Our surroundings may be quiet, but inside we may be in turmoil, distracted and anything but still. Equally, everything can be noisy on the outside, but within, we are calm and quiet, ready to encounter what our psyche requires. Within the realms of spirituality, this helps us to get in touch with our real selves and offers us the possibility to hear the ‘still small voice of God’. This is the positive dynamic of silence. We are not talking about a negative silence, the kind of silence we engage in when we are cross with someone or do not want to speak out in the face of opposition. The silence we are concerned with here is that which allows us to enter more deeply into our relationship with God and specifically within the context of the liturgy.

St John Paul II, writing in 2004 to mark the anniversary of the Second Vatican Council’s REALITY MAY 2019

document on the liturgy, reminds us that "we must foster in our communities with greater commitment…the experience of silence". He goes on to say that we need silence “if we are to accept in our hearts the full resonance of the voice of the Holy Spirit and to unite our personal prayer more closely to the Word of God and the public voice of the Church”.

The Gospels tell us that Jesus himself prayed in silence, particularly at night (Luke 6:12).

Mary’s attitude toward the mystery of her Son is to "ponder" (Luke 2:19). Silence is above all "the positive attitude of someone who prepares to welcome God by listening" writes Cardinal Robert Sarah. Our silence, when we come to the liturgy is most important, a sign of our openness and our hospitality to God. SILENCE IN THE LITURGY Silence before God is probably not a new idea to us. We may struggle with it, but we understand it. When it comes to the celebration of Mass, especially Sunday Mass, the concept of silence can be more challenging. Frequently before Mass begins

there can be a great deal of chatter as we greet friends we may not have seen since the previous Sunday. Pope Francis cautions against this: “When we go to Mass, maybe we arrive five minutes before, and we start to chit-chat with those in front of us. [But] this is not a time for chit-chat. It is a moment of silence for preparing ourselves, for dialogue, a time for the heart to collect itself in order to prepare for the encounter with Jesus. Silence is so important.”

The liturgy operates on many different levels employing a variety of languages including words, music, gesture, use of different colours and silence. The purpose of all this is to engage the whole person. Alongside other elements, silence is integral. Silence enables us to experience and hear the voice of the Holy Spirit and join our personal prayer more closely, not only to the Word of God but to the community voice of the church.

During liturgical silence we each respond in our own way and, like Mary, we ponder what we have heard. Within the liturgy this is a collective ‘pondering’, something which

In Tune with the Liturgy

we share together and through it we support and sustain each other in prayerful solidarity.

Such activity demands a stillness and concentration which the priest celebrant and those ministering can help to bring about.

This active participation is firstly internal. Our thoughts reflect what we hear, do and say during the liturgy. Secondly it is external; in our gestures and outward bearing we express our inner participation in the liturgy. What then does this look like? How do we enable it in our communities?

The General Instruction on the Roman Missal (GIRM) makes clear that the purpose of the Introductory Rites is "ensure that the faithful, who come together as one, establish communion and dispose themselves to listen to the Word of God and to celebrate the Eucharist worthily" #47. For this to happen there is a slight pause for silence after the opening invitation, to allow us time to "acknowledge our sins, and so prepare us to celebrate the sacred mysteries". Following this Penitential Act we are invited to pray in

The period after Communion is a time for total silence. It is a time of collective ‘pondering’, an opportunity to give thanks for what we have received and prepare ourselves to go out to the world and share the gift.

WORD AND SILENCE The Roman Missal points out several places in the Mass where silence is encouraged.

It is important to note that there will be differences in the length and purpose of a silence during the celebration. Some will be short moments of reflection whilst others will be longer and potentially deeper.

silence before we hear the opening prayer.

This is an opportunity for us to become aware of God’s presence and bring our prayer to God. The Liturgy of the Word is an important opportunity for reflection and meditation.

Ministers have a responsibility to enable people to engage with the movement of the liturgy at this time. Rushing through the readings without pauses is to be avoided.

Ideally, there will be more than one reader and someone to sing the psalm. A prayerful silence following the reading and before beginning the psalm or next reading is recommended. This allows people the opportunity to absorb what they have heard and to reflect upon it. Inevitably this places great onus on readers or cantors to do so in such a way that it allows people to fully appreciate what they have listened to. The time of reflection following each reading will be enhanced by those who are ministering remaining at the ambo.

Far from being a time to read the newsletter, the homily provides us with a further opportunity for God to speak to us, following which a longer period of silence allows us to take the word of God to heart and prepare our response to it in prayer. It is

recommended that following the homily the priest or deacon return to their place and sit down. In this way, they indicate the length of silence before continuing with the Profession of Faith and the Prayer of the Faithful. Again, the opportunity for silence comes in the short pause following the brief intention of each prayer and then respond from the heart to what they have heard.

SACRAMENT AND SILENCE Within the Liturgy of the Eucharist, the Eucharistic Prayer is the centre and high point of the entire celebration. Apart from the necessary responses, this is a time for joining with the priest in faith as he prays the Eucharistic Prayer. As we listen with reverence and in silence we join with Christ in praising the great deeds of God and in the offering of sacrifice. As the consecrated elements are raised up we gaze on them in faithful contemplation before responding to the Mystery of Faith.

Finally, during the Communion Rite we pray quietly as we prepare to receive Christ. The Communion procession is an opportunity to have gentle, quiet music which draws people into contemplation and inner readiness to receive this great gift of life. The period after Communion is a time for total silence.

Musicians tend to want to fill this silence but this is a time of collective ‘pondering’, an opportunity to give thanks for what we have received and prepare ourselves to go out to the world and share the gift.

Many people struggle with silence for all kinds of reasons. Our desire to enter into it when we come to Mass, ensures that everyone has the possibility of listening to and attending to the voice of God. It is our gift to one another and it is our gift to God.

Sarah Adams is the director of adult education and evangelisation for Clifton Diocese, England. She has a Masters in Theology with a focus on liturgy from Maynooth.

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G OD 'S S U R P R I S E S II

Pure in Heart

INSPIRING LONG-TERM LOVE

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PURE IN HEART IS A MOVEMENT OF YOUNG ADULTS WHO, THROUGH PRAYER AND FRIENDSHIP, TRY TO LEARN, LIVE AND SHARE THE TRUTH, BEAUTY AND MEANING OF HUMAN SEXUALITY.

BY SUSAN GATELY PHOTOGRAPHS OF STAFF BY MICHAEL GATELY

I

met members of Pure in Heart at their offices in Merrion Square on Ash Wednesday. It was striking to meet young people sporting crosses on their REALITY MAY 2019

foreheads. They were the only people I saw in Dublin that day marked with ashes. One of them tells me he went into a shop and the girl at the till wondered what

had happened his forehead. Was it a tattoo?

Pure in Heart is certainly swimming against the tide of 21st century culture. It began

in the early 1990s when during a trip to Medjugorje, two young Irish women, Anne Wright and Edel Reynolds, felt a call to do something to promote purity.

Alexandria

Marta

Jason

They began to speak of chastity in schools and at retreats. In 2002 Pure in Heart was registered as a charity, describing itself as an “international Catholic movement of young adults, who through prayer and friendship, strive to learn, live and share the truth, beauty and meaning of human sexuality”.

“People see chastity as ‘No sex before marriage’,” Dave Hunt, general manager of Pure in Heart explains. “We look at sex in a whole new way. We see the dignity of the human person, our own self worth and respect.”

THEOLOGY OF THE BODY But it would be wrong to consider Pure in Heart as merely a few people waxing lyrical on the joy and freedom of living a chaste life. The life of the movement springs from a spirituality rooted in St Pope John Paul II’s ‘theology of the body’, prayer, the sacraments and deep friendships. At the core of the community is a weekly prayer meeting in Dublin.

Marta Nakonieczna from Poland, on a half-year internship in Dublin from Hamburg University, has been coming to the prayer meetings for five months. “Pure in Heart is kind of ‘hard-core’,” she laughingly tells me “because it starts with Rosary, then Mass, an hour of Adoration and then the talk and social. It’s intense!” Marta was initially struck by the numbers of people coming and the length of time dedicated to prayer.

“These people come here for God,” she thought. Through her contact with Pure in Heart she has understood that chastity touches all her relationships, including friendships, as together they live an ‘Agape’ type love – love as a decision which wants the good of the other.

Dave Hunt saw this ‘Agape love’ in action in his parents' relationship when his father “carried” his mother through Parkinson’s Disease for seven years. “It gave me a clear idea of what chastity is.”

Growing out of the Pure in

Dave

We look at sex in a whole new way.

We see the dignity of the human person, our own self worth and respect

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G OD 'S S U R P R I S E S II

"I want to be a good father, a good husband, to be faithful to my wife and faith – I keep my eye on the bigger picture"

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Heart community, involving around 150 people and a priest spiritual director, is the Mission Team made up of two young people who give talks in schools, and at youth retreats.

It is a courageous ministry, at times evoking criticism n the media from irate parents who don’t like the idea of their children hearing about chastity at school. For this reason the group is focussing more now on parishes and reaching out through videos and blogs on their website.

Alex and Jason leading a session

REALITY MAY 2019

HARD QUESTIONS Jason Osborne (22) from Dublin joined the team earlier this year.

“If you’d told me two years ago that I’d be doing mission work today, I wouldn’t have believed it,” he tells me. Jason grew up in a nominally Catholic family, attending a yearly Mass on Christmas day. By late secondary school he was “intensely atheistic” and “mildly liberal” reading Dawkins, Hitchins and Sam Harris. In 2016 he began to study English and Philosophy in UCD.

His thoughts took a different direction however when his grandfather died in February 2017.

“I had never been in a room as someone passed away. It planted a seed in me. How strange existence was, why should anything exist at all? God plagued me with existential questions.”

Jason began to read the philosophers – modern and classic.

“I had a suspicion that something was going on behind the scenes and the material world was not all there was.” His reading evolved to Eastern and Christian mysticism. Reading C.S. Lewis was a “game changer”.

With an “openness to Catholicism” he moved onto Lord of the Rings and “subjectively” returned to Christianity. “I saw beauty and truth are convertible. God literally reached into my life.”

Ironically it was the Katie Ascough anti-impeachment campaign in UCD that brought him in touch with young Catholics. [As student union president, she had refused to endorse the pro-choice campaign and was removed from office.] At a Faith Forum he met “joy-filled, well informed [people] delighted to share what they had”. In the autumn of 2018, he joined the Pure in Heart prayer group, eventually volunteering

for the Mission Team. Meanwhile his new-found faith was rubbing off at home, with both his parents now accompanying him to Sunday Mass.

“Lust is one of the most swollen demons [in a world] rampant with pornography which glorifies sex in the wrong way,” he tells me. “God’s plan for marriage and sexuality and the worth you have as a person is a message that no-one hears these days – it is so fresh.”

REACHING OUT TO OTHERS Jason and his co-worker Alexandria Nestor (19), see that young people have not heard this message before.

Their presentation, which usually lasts one and a half hours, explores ‘Agape’ love and freedom. They study the ‘relationship pyramid’ seen by many as Attraction (on the bottom) leading straight to Sex (at the top). Instead in their pyramid, Attraction leads to Friendship, to Intimacy (meaning letting down all your masks) and finally to Marriage.

They talk about the science of sex, and the hormone oxytocin, released during sex, which is designed to create a strong bond.

“Sex is blinding,” comments Dave Hunt, “because it fills in the blanks in other parts of the relationship.”

When feelings of physicality fade, he

Spreading from Ireland, Pure in Heart is now present in the UK, the United States, Haiti, France, Liberia and Kenya. Many couples have met and married through the group, and one former member is now a Dominican priest.

For further information see www.pureinheart.ie

explains, you see the person for who they are and often the relationship falls apart. When this happens people can feel worthless. “Many fall into the trap of feeling, that if they don’t give sex away, a person won’t want to be with them. That relationship isn’t about love.”

With Catholic groups, the team emphasises God’s plan for sex and marriage, and Confession which gives everyone the chance to start again.

They also speak to young people from other Christian churches.

The choice of a chaste lifestyle is at times a challenge, but Dave has never

REDEMPTORIST

PARISH MISSIONS

regretted it. “You’ve got to keep an eye on the goal – what kind of life you want. I want to be a good father, a good husband, to be faithful to my wife and faith – I keep my eye on the bigger picture.”

Alexandria Nestor, who joined the Mission Team last July, loves the work

they do. “It’s an important mission because you might be the only one to tell a person how worthy of love they are.”

Suan Gately is author of God’s Surprise - the New Movements in the Church, published by Veritas, and is a regular contributor to Reality

Breaking the Word in May 2019

Please pray for the Redemptorist Teams who will preach the Word and for God’s People who will hear the Word proclaimed this month in: Mother of Perpetual Help Novena St Gerard’s, Antrim Road, Belfast (26th April – 4th May 2019) Novena preached by Denis Luddy CSsR and Helena Connolly Anaclone, Dromore Diocese (4th – 10th May) Parish mission preached by Laurence Gallagher CSsR and Ciarán O’Callaghan CSsR

Mother of Perpetual Novena, Priorswood, Dublin (18th – 26th May) Novena preached by Denis Luddy CSsR and Margie Kennedy Mother of Perpetual Novena, Foxrock, Dublin (20th – 28th May) Novena preached by Laurence Gallagher CSsR and Peter Morris CSsR

Mother of Perpetual Help Novena, Hansworth, Birmingham (13th –23rd May) Novena preached by Derek Meskell CSsR and Clement McManus CSsR The details above are accurate at the time of printing. If you have any views, comments or even criticisms about Redemptorist preaching, we would love to hear from you. If you are interested in a mission or novena in your parish, please contact us for further information. And please keep all Redemptorist preachers in your prayers.

Fr Laurence Gallagher CSsR, Email: missions.novenas@redemptorists.ie Tel: +353 61 315099

SP IRI T UA LI T Y

WOMEN’S SPIRITUA

26 THE LIVED EXPERIENCE OF WOMEN, ESPECIALLY IN THE HUMAN HIGHPOINTS OF SEXUAL INTIMACY, CHILD-BEARING AND MOTHERHOOD, SHAPES THEIR PATH TO GOD IN A WAY THAT IS RADICALLY DIFFERENT TO MEN.

BY CARMEL WYNNE

Saint

Ignatius of Loyola, who founded the Jesuit order, challenged the idea that profound mystical experiences could be found only in the silence of a monastic cell or in a hut in the desert. His teaching about finding God in all things resonates with people of simple faith who don’t have a background in theology but are open to being led by the Spirit.

I need hardly mention that caution is required when seeking to discern the workings of the Spirit. Down through the centuries we find saints who had experiences that are credited with being authentic mystical experiences. Some heard voices, or had visions; others were gifted with bilocation, or had miraculous revelations about what God asked of them.

REALITY MAY 2019

ST TERESA OF CALCUTTA – MYSTIC? The most recently canonised saint, Mother Teresa of Calcutta started out in a semienclosed order, but later lived a very active life in the world. A priest friend who has written several books on the prayer style of Anthony de Mello S.J. met Mother Teresa when he was in India. I was not surprised to learn that she went through a period of dryness in her prayer life. My friend said that we like to imagine that Mother Teresa of all people would feel God in her life as an active presence.

One might assume that her prayers would always be responded to in an unmistakable way. The revelation that she experienced only silence and emptiness when she prayed was surprising. I had no difficulty accepting that this was true at one period in her life but was curious about how long it lasted.

ALITY

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Even though Mother Teresa normally presented a smiling face to the public, a letter to a close friend revealed a depth of suffering that lasted for over 50 years

I believed that to sustain her in her work with the poor and the dying God must have blessed her with "the peace that surpasses understanding". Not so! My friend followed up our conversation with an email. Even though Mother Teresa normally presented a smiling face to the public, a letter to a close friend, Fr Brian Kolodiejchuka, revealed a depth of suffering that lasted for over 50 years. In one letter she wrote, “I am told

that God loves me, and yet the reality of the darkness and coldness and emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul. I have no faith. I dare not utter the words and thoughts that crowd my heart."

WOMEN’S SPIRITUALITY I was so troubled about Mother Teresa’s half a century of suffering that I did what women do. I talked to knowledgeable women friends:

SP IRI T UA LI T Y

don’t mean to be disrespectful when I suggest that a celibate male spiritual director has a different perspective when he talks about a husband than a married woman who has decades of experience of living with one.

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The spirituality of married people who are blessed with faith has a richness that cannot be experienced by celibate priests and nuns some had a background in theology, all of us had personal experience of praying together and sharing in our experiences in prayer, and a few of us were spiritual directors. We believe that there is richness in women’s spirituality that men, by their very nature, cannot have. They can never have more than an intellectual understanding of the experiences of mothers.

My lay-women friends and I will cheerfully admit that we have little knowledge of the lengthy and arduous process involved in the decision to beatify and canonise a saint.

As one friend joked, “All I know is that you must have money, be a martyr or have two miracles to qualify but now you only need two out of the three, as according to the Guardian newspaper Pope Francis has overhauled the Vatican’s multimillion-euro saint-making business."

Of all the people who are called to sainthood only a tiny elite are selected to be beatified and canonised by Rome.

Mother Teresa’s friend, Fr Brian Kolodiejchuk, acted as postulator for her beatification.

REALITY MAY 2019

A postulator is an official who presents a plea for beatification or canonisation in the Roman Catholic Church. I have no doubt that Fr Brian had very good reasons for all he did to have the church declare her a saint, but from a woman’s perspective, the money might have been better spent in ways that we think Mother Teresa would have desired.

We were sad that her request that her letters to her spiritual directors be kept private was ignored. We looked on it as a breach of a sacred trust, as shocking as if the seal of the confessional was broken.

According to her friend, “for Mother Teresa, it was like a woman who loves passionately, her husband, but it seems like he couldn’t care less, and yet she is there faithfully, loving, doing all the things a loving wife would do.

Think about it this way: when you have a little spat with your spouse, it has an impact on you that’s very different than that of having the same problem with someone you don’t know who you ran into in the street. The same things have a different meaning, depending on how close you are to them." I

MARRIED HOLINESS The spirituality of married people who are blessed with faith has a richness that cannot be experienced by celibate priests and nuns. When, in the sexual expression of their love, a couple enjoy the intimacy of the deepest human connection possible, they share a lived experience of being two in one flesh. In Luke 1:41 when Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. A mother, who has personal experience of feeling her own baby moving in her womb, will connect with this text in a different way to someone who has never been pregnant.

A Gospel text such as John 17:21, "You are in me and I am in you", will feel true for mothers whose authentic experience may be theologically questionable. Our lived experience of marriage is one of many reasons why some of us look beyond priesthood and religious life as a model for women’s spirituality.

Galatians 2:20 “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” comes to mind when I think of two extraordinary women; Mother Teresa of Calcutta and the lay woman in my parish who over 40 years ago introduced a small group of women to praying with Scripture. It’s only in hindsight that I appreciate what an enlightened prayer guide she was. Our guide took Matthew 18:20 literally, “Where two or three are gathered in my name I will be there”.

After the opening prayer a few lines of Scripture were read. We had at least ten minutes of silence for prayerful reflection. What was extraordinary for me when I joined was that after the time of reflection, people prayed aloud, talking to God, believing he was present and listening. Being a witness to faithfilled conversations with God, that were painfully honest and authentic, changed my mind and heart.

SILENCE AND FRIENDSHIP As the prayer lives of the women in the group deepened, the times of silence grew longer, prayer was challenging. Some people left. Others who needed guidance with the painful challenges prayer presented sought spiritual direction. Our

experience was that women who experience aridity, dryness and emptiness in prayer usually believe it’s a reflection of their unworthiness, their sinfulness, their need for forgiveness. After ten years of wondering if her prolonged suffering was a sign of her great sinfulness and imperfection, one of Mother Teresa’s spiritual directors, Fr Neuner S.J., discerned that it wasn’t the typical “dark night” of St John of the Cross. It was special gift from God to participate in Christ’s sufferings. Accepting that this was true, Mother Teresa suffered greatly for the rest of her life.

We wondered whether depression is examined when sanctity and sainthood are discerned. We discussed whether Anthony de Mello S.J., who was a psychotherapist, would have agreed with Fr Neuner. Fr de Mello is recognised as one of the most gifted spiritual teachers of the 20th century.

Our parish priest introduced us to his prayer exercises and writings. In the book Awareness De Mello said “All suffering is caused by identifying with something, an attachment, a desire, a craving.

Drop the attachment and the suffering will go."

This was surprisingly helpful for mums who were attached to, and distressed about, children leaving home to go to college. One woman in the prayer group gave us brilliant advice. “When your children leave home, stop making yourself suffer. It’s neither good nor bad that they go away; it simply is what it is. Don’t let loneliness, sadness and emptiness disturb your peace." This was helpful advice for prayer.

As supportive friends we encouraged each other to stay with a daily practice of silent meditation, drop expectations for how prayer should be, and say 'Yes' to what is. All of us found that sitting quietly in meditation was painful at first but with practice we learned to stay quiet, stop thinking and ‘just be’.

Of course there was loneliness and sadness and emotional distress in us and in our acceptance of what is. In our own ways we accepted that nothing need disturb one’s peace, not children leaving home or marital separation or bereavement, for "In his will is our peace".

FROM REDEMPTORIST COMMUNICATIONS

MOTHER OF PERPETUAL HELP Reflections on an Icon

The icon of the Mother of Perpetual Help is probably the best known of all the images of our Blessed Lady.

In this beautiful booklet, Fr George Wadding CSsR leads us into meditation on the various messages contained in the icon of the Mother of Perpetual Help and suggests a simple prayer after each meditation. Read each meditation slowly and in an atmosphere of prayer.

You will find yourself drawn closer and closer to the hearts of Jesus and Mary.

Contact: Redemptorist Communications, St Joseph’s Monastery, Dundalk A91 F3FC Tel: 01-4922488

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COM M E N T FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS CARMEL WYNNE

ANGER AND ANXIETY

HOW DO YOU COPE WITH DIFFICULT MEMBERS OF YOUR FAMILY, ESPECIALLY IF, TO OUTSIDERS, THEY APPEAR TO BE PARAGONS OF VIRTUE? Wouldn’t it be fantastic if all our family members were pleasant, loving and caring? Unfortunately many of us have at least one family member who is not.

There are some people who, consciously or unconsciously, make life hard for those around them. Either they are unaware of the pain and distress that they cause or they don’t care about how their actions affect other people’s lives.

Everyone is aware of how a person can be a street angel and a house devil. What is not so easily recognised is that the same person can appear to have a different persona with friends, family and colleagues. A person can be fun, outgoing and gregarious in a social situation; petty, selfish, and mean-spirited within the family; and yet appear to be retiring and timid in work situations.

People are complicated. Two people can have apparently similar experiences, but because of their different preferences they have very different experiences.

For instance a couple go for a walk by the sea on a windy day.

One loves the feeling of the wind and the sound of the waves.

The other feels threatened by the stormy weather, finds the experience frightening but, afraid of spoiling the partner’s enjoyment, will not share this.

In a healthy, loving relationship each person will make an effort to understand the other’s world, to be open to hearing about a different perception of a shared

report that in 2017, there were 15,833 disclosures of domestic violence against women. The abused woman who lives in fear for herself and her children may want to leave her abuser but have no way of finding a place of safety where he will not find her. The most dangerous time for a woman who escapes a physically abusive relationship is immediately after she leaves. experience. Not having the freedom to be honest, to act as if something is enjoyable when it’s not, signals some insecurity. Early in a relationship that may seem unimportant but it’s surprising how quickly a pattern can emerge of allowing situations, which are not dealt with when they arise, grow into problems that become more difficult to resolve later.

People who are insecure in a relationship will often act as if everything is fine when it most certainly is not. Partners and spouses can’t know what you don’t tell them. A person, who acts as if s/he doesn’t mind a partner getting drunk when s/he really does, deprives the other of information that could encourage more responsible drinking or point to an issue with binge drinking.

Some people avoid talking about why they are unhappy in a relationship. They are afraid to face the consequences of talking about serious and challenging issues. In a healthy loving relationship people tell

each other the truth. A pattern of not talking about issues sets unhelpful precedents and will often enable someone who is behaving badly to avoid being challenged. The fear of family estrangement is a big factor in allowing unacceptable situations to develop and continue.

Misguided ideas about love and loyalty are common.

Battered women explain that they stay because they love their partner. A spouse covers up and makes excuses for a partner who is a functioning alcoholic to keep the family together and to avoid problems at work. A drug addict, who has been put out of the house to protect the younger children from his erratic behaviour, gets money for food and a hostel from a father. Despite the pleas of the mother who says, "He will spend that on drugs, this is enabling", Dad argues that he has no choice because he loves his son.

There is no denying that stigma and shame are issues for battered women. The figures are startling.

Women's Aid Direct Services

The Rutland Centre for the treatment of addictions says that on average five other people will be impacted when one individual develops alcoholism. Thousands of people in our society are living miserable and unhappy lives without the support they need to cope. The reluctance to open up and let family or friends know just how difficult things are is partly due to shame and fear of judgement. The admission that there are serious problems in a family generates huge anxiety.

It’s never easy to be open and to be honest about problems.

A relationship is in serious trouble when fear, anxiety and poor communication are an ongoing part of daily life. Many couples will need professional help to talk things through. The good news is that a crisis does not always signal the end of a marriage. For some people it brings a new understanding of how to love and be more loving.

Carmel Wynne is a life and work skills coach and lives in Dublin. For more information, visit www.carmelwynne.org

31

Praying with the Rosary – The Fourth Sorrowful Mystery prayer corner

32

JESU

SC ARR

IES

REALITY MAY 2019

HIS

CRO

SS

WE FOLLOW JESUS THROUGH THE STREETS OF JERUSALEM TO CALVARY. KEEP THESE PASSAGES MARKED IN YOUR BIBLE: MT 27:31-34; MK 15:21-24; LK 23:26-31; JN 19:16-24

BY GEORGE WADDING CSsR

Almost

in the same breath, Pilate declared my complete innocence, acclaimed me as king (albeit with sarcasm) and handed me over to be crucified. And here’s a great irony: I was derisively acclaimed as king at the very time when I was fulfilling my kingly duty, which was to save my people by my own death.

The soldiers yanked the ‘royal robe’ from my back, opening the wounds that had congealed and causing them to bleed profusely again. I stood there shivering like a helpless child while my own clothes were put back on. And they, too, quickly adhered to the countless open wounds all over my body. There was no trace of kindness in the way the soldiers mishandled me. To them I was just another dangerous criminal, scum of the earth, to be squashed like vermin. And no better than they to deal with my sort!

TAKING THE CROSS What I carried there was just the crossbeam.

The upright was permanently in position at the place of execution. Normally, a criminal walked naked to his execution. It was a hideous sight. I was spared this indignity on my via dolorosa out of respect for our Jewish sense of modesty.

By now, I was desperately weak and lightheaded. I felt nauseous. It was hard to breathe, and my body was screaming with pain. Every jerk on the ropes that bound me opened my wounds, and every step left a trail of my blood. I was shivering with fever. Is it any wonder that after a few steps, I collapsed under the weight of the cross? Surrounded by hatred, I thought of happier days when my mother wiped my tears and held me close to her breast or when my father picked me up, sat me on his work bench and gently removed the splinter from my finger.

Even though Golgotha, the place of execution, was not far away, the soldiers

realised I might not make it. Roman law gave them the right to pick anyone they liked for forced labour. An unfortunate pilgrim from Cyrene in North Africa was passing by with his two sons when the soldiers grabbed him and made him help me. His name was Simon.

Poor Simon! It was not for this that he had pinched and saved for years to take himself and his sons to Jerusalem for Passover.

Thank you, Simon, thank you! With your help I can breathe again. I am sorry to bring this shame and embarrassment on you and young Alexander and Rufus. I prayed that one day you would understand. Each step I took I said, "thank you". Each breath I took I said "Father, bless this angel of mercy!" Never would I forget the humiliation endured by Simon and his two sons. Never would I forget their kindness.

THROUGH THE STREETS Though Simon was now carrying the major weight of the cross, the soldiers still manhandled me, and I fell several times.

One twisted my arm; another pulled me up by my clothes, each time tearing open my wounds yet again. I tried to prevent the cross hammering against the crown of thorns, but my best efforts were of no avail. Even the slightest touch unleashed an eruption of excruciating pain on each side of my head and face. It was like all the demons of hell had been let loose to torment me. They pummelled me with their fists and kicked me without mercy. When I fell, the cross fell on top of me smashing my face into the stony road. Mud and dust and blood fouled up my face and my eyes were half closed with the sticky mix. I was truly “a worm and no man, scorned by everyone, despised by the people”.

Amid the roars and the clamour, I searched for a friendly face. Right and left I looked but all I saw were faces contorted in rage as

though I had inflicted on each one of them a personal injury. Here I was in a cauldron of hatred, just five days after the same fickle mob deafened my ears with a different cry: “Hosanna! Blessings on him who comes in the name of the Lord!” Where are they now?

Where are you, brave Peter, and all my special friends? You did not listen when I foretold that all this would happen to me. You did not pray with me in the garden lest you succumb to these challenges to your faith.

Still, I understand, and one day you will too.

There are souls who have dedicated themselves to me. They profess to love me and follow me on my Via Dolorosa, but their love is measured and conditional. They resign themselves to what they cannot avoid and do not walk the extra mile with me. They seek again the little comforts and pleasures they once sacrificed for me. They place limits on their forgiveness. They justify the wants they pursue by calling them rights. They set out to be a counter-witness to the greedy world they were leaving but soon hanker again after that world’s enticements. Do they really love me at all, I ask myself?

OTHER CROSS BEARERS But there are other souls, many other souls, who carry heavy crosses that press them to the ground. I prayed for them all: for those hounded and imprisoned and tortured for their faith in me. I had already told my apostles: “No servant is greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will persecute you as well. But don’t lose hope. I will be with you to the very end. Let my perseverance be your inspiration and strength."

For this reason, I must keep picking myself up and moving forward. I am heartened by the many loving souls who, inspired by the vision of what I have suffered for them, give themselves generously to my service, not just continued on page 35

33

prayer corner

35

to help me carry my cross but to take it over from me if they could. They don’t think of merit or reward or the pain or fatigue that awaits them. Their only motivation is their love for me and the comfort they can show me.

The cross may present itself as sickness or disability or the death of a loved one. It may be betrayal or desertion by a spouse, the callous slaughter of a child by a drunken driver or any of many more tragedies. These souls, their hearts broken, look on the crucifix and join their cross to mine for the salvation of the world. They comforted me when there was no one else by the roadside to comfort me.

MEETING MY MOTHER Not true! There was one – my mother, the person I loved most in the whole world.

There she was, her heart pierced with sorrow, her eyes blinded with tears. She could not

leave me on my own, yet she knew she could not ease my pain. In fact, she knew her presence would only increase my sufferings.

Still, her presence gave me encouragement to complete the work of redemption my Father had given to me. She was so brave to venture into that crazy mob. But that is love. We were two martyrs of love. Seeing my wretched state makes her heart endure my sufferings and hearing the sob that escaped from the depth of her soul ripped my heart in two. Not a word was spoken between us, but the look we exchanged – need I say any more! Then the crowd pressed in on her and she was gone.

We arrived at Golgotha. After so much sweating and loss of blood, I was dehydrated and parched with thirst. A merciful group of aristocratic women often prepared a narcotic drink to dull the pain of criminals on the way to execution. Theirs was a gesture of pure love, the natural impulse of mothers’ hearts.

They offered me the drink, but I declined.

Despite my extreme discomfort I would not try to dampen life’s troubles and trials with the help of drugs or alcohol. There is a verse from Proverbs which says: “Give…wine to those who are in anguish; let them drink and forget their poverty and remember their misery no more” (31:6). That was not my Father’s will for me. These good women wept for me, and my heart wept for them. I saw the terrible destruction of their Holy City the slaughter of its citizens, the end of the Jewish nation. “Dear daughters of Jerusalem,” I said, “weep not for me, but for yourselves and your children” (Lk. 23:28).

We had reached the place.

Fr George Wadding CSsR is a member of the Redemptorist Community at Dun Mhuire, Griffith Avenue, Dublin.

CYCLONE IDAI 36 The roof of the hostel has been completely destroyed. Continued rain means that the building is continuing to deteriorate. This SERVE/Irish Aid-funded hostel provided a safe space for vulnerable youth to attend Young Africa, learn a new skill and lift themselves out of poverty.

The administration building at Young Africa Agri-Tech has been badly damaged.

The roof has been ripped off by the cyclone and all computers have been destroyed. The library has also been destroyed.

READERS OF REALITY ARE PROBABLY FAMILIAR WITH THE WORK OF SERVE VOLUNTEERS. YOU MIGHT LIKE TO HELP THEIR WORK WITH THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE SUFFERED GREAT LOSS AS A RESULT OF THE DEVASTATION OF CYCLONE IDAI IN MARCH

BY GERRY O'CONNER CSsR

SERVE

is an initiative of the Dublin Province of the Redemptorists. For the past 16 years, it has been preparing and sending volunteers to assist in countries as diverse as South Africa, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Thailand, the Philippines, India, and Brazil. In all these places, SERVE

REALITY MAY 2019

supports initiatives that prepare young people for employment and self-employment and integrates life-skills training into all training programmes geared toward supporting the livelihood prospects of young people. SERVE has developed a strong partnership with an organisation called Young Africa in Mozambique and Zimbabwe.

The campus restaurant in Beira provided a place of learning, study and work for students attending Young Africa who participated in the Catering Skills training course. This building is completely destroyed. It is not safe and will need to be reinforced.

APPEAL REDEMPTORISTS IN MOZAMBIQUE Irish Redemptorists, Frs John Bermingham and Brian Holmes, and until recently Fr Derek Ryan, work as members of an international group of Redemptorists in Mozambique. SERVE also supports a large water programme led by the Redemptorists in Mozambique and a programme to help orphan and vulnerable children, called the Mavambo Trust, founded by the Redemptorists in Zimbabwe.

SERVE has worked in Beira, Mozambique for 14 years, and has been instrumental, in building two youth skills training campus’ that support almost 3,000 young people, giving them high quality education

and vocational training. One of the centres, Manga, is on the periphery of Beira city: the other, Dondo, is a rural campus in the Beira region. Both were badly damaged by Cyclone Idai which struck land early in March.

It has been classified as one of the worst tropical cyclones on record to hit Africa and the Southern Hemisphere. It is estimated that it has cost the lives of more than 600 people in Mozambique and a further 400 in Zimbabwe. It also ruined more than 420,000 acres of crops. While it is impossible to estimate the total damage at this stage, it will probably be in the region of at least one billion dollars.

Food and medical supplies arriving at the warehouse in Beira. These have been distributed to the staff and students who are stranded at the Young Africa Agri-Tech training college.

WORK OF SERVE As soon as the cyclone hit, SERVE worked to establish a transport channel to deliver emergency supplies to Beira, Mozambique.

Volunteers have succeeded in delivering food, water and medicines from Maputo to Beira, to the hundreds of people taking shelter at the Young Africa campuses, including Dondo,

where there were over 200 young people stranded, including over 20 with disabilities. SERVE is committed to supporting several hundred families who have lost homes, with emergency support, helping to rebuild their lives, and to try and rebuild the two campuses that SERVE helped build over the last 14 years.

Updated information is available through the SERVE website www.serve.ie. The families of Beira are truly amongst the most wounded in the world.

If you would like to support the emergency relief effort in Beira, you can do so by donating through www.serve.ie or www.africaredemptorists.com or by contacting directly Fr Gerry O’Connor CSsR at gerry@serve.ie or gerry@africaredemptorists.com

SERVE-supported generator being repaired. The generator will provide electricity to the entire campus, allowing students in the carpentry, mechanics and metal work departments to access the workshops. It also means that the centre will now have access to clean water, as it is pumped from a bore hole.

37

F E AT U R E

MONSIGNOR

American Catholic Converts

JOHN OESTERREICHER

AN AUSTRIAN JEWISH CONVERT TO CATHOLICISM, AND LIVED MOST OF HIS LIFE IN THE UNITED STATES, BECAME ONE OF THE ARCHITECTS OF A NEW CATHOLIC DIALOGUE WITH THE JEWISH PEOPLE.

BY MIKE DALEY

In 38

October 2015, Pope Francis commemorated the signing of Nostra Aetate, Vatican II’s groundbreaking document on the Catholic Church’s relationship to nonChristian religions, with a special reference to the Jewish people: “Indifference and opposition have changed into cooperation and benevolence. From enemies and strangers we have become friends and brothers.” In a relatively brief period—50-plus years—a literal revolution has taken place in Jewish-Catholic relations. So much so that Sr Mary C. Boys, professor of theology at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, has remarked that “Our ancestors would be incredulous” at the change.

No one has better advocated for and lived this sea change in the relationship between Jews and Catholics than Monsignor John Osterreicher. He was born to a Jewish family in 1904 in Moravia which was then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire but today is part of the Czech Republic.

Through the writings of Soren Kierkegaard and Cardinal John Henry Newman, along with a book of New Testament excerpts, Oesterreicher grew attracted to the church and Jesus. It was while a medical student at the University of Vienna in 1924 though, that he converted to Catholicism. Shortly thereafter he joined the seminary and in 1927 was ordained a priest.

RISE OF NAZISM Serving as a parish priest in Vienna, Austria Oesterreicher found himself contending with REALITY MAY 2019

the rise of National Socialism in Germany. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he resisted the growing menace of Nazism. Both in print and over the radio, Oesterreicher opposed Hitler, going so far as to call him the antichrist, thus becoming “an enemy of the state”.

His pilgrimage to better relations between Jews and Christians continued in 1938 when Germany annexed Austria and he was forced to flee to Paris. With Paris’ eventual fall to the Nazis in 1940, he escaped first to Spain, then eventually found his way to America. All the while Hitler was instituting his genocide of the Jewish people throughout Europe. Tragically, Oesterreicher lost both parents in the Holocaust. Michael Wyschogrod, the noted Jewish philosopher of religion, reminds us that even though a convert Oesterreicher himself, “under the infamous Nuremberg Laws, would have been included in the ranks of the victims, had he not been able to flee in time.”

Landing in America, Oesterreicher found work in a parish, while continuing to write on the side.

In 1953, a dream of his was fulfilled when he established the Institute of Judaeo-Christian Studies, the first of its kind anywhere, at Seton Hall University. From the beginning its goal has been to foster positive relations between Jews and Christians. Oesterreicher’s abiding aim over the years was “to raise the consciousness of believers that the Church and Judaism are both rooted in the history of salvation.”

VATICAN II AND JUDAISM With Jews historically seen as cursed and rejected

by God, Oesterreicher’s ministry of reconciliation between Jews and Catholics proved difficult but not impossible. As providence would have it, he got the chance to bring forth healing on an international level with the convening of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965).

With the announcement of the council in 1959, some people approached Pope John XXIII in the hopes that it would produce a statement reversing the church’s “teaching of contempt” against the Jews. To this end Pope John created the Secretariat for Christian Unity in 1960 under the leadership of Cardinal Augustin Bea. Ultimately, it produced documents on ecumenism, religious liberty, and the church’s relationship to non-Christians. Oesterreicher was appointed to help with the last one specifically as it related to Jews and Christians.

Judith Banki, senior advisor, interreligious affairs for the Tanenbaum Center for Interreligious Understanding in New York City, reminds us that "Jews had good reasons for being apprehensive about church councils. Early councils had subjected them to humiliating and restrictive legislation. Yet, this time, Jewish organsations expressed a lively interest in the Council, they had a hugely favourable view of Pope John XXIII who had already revealed himself sympathetic to Jewish hopes that the Council would authoritatively repudiate a negative and hostile tradition of teaching about Jews and Judaism.”

Despite the many theological twists and sociopolitical turns, Servite Father John Pawlikowski, longtime professor of theology at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, remarks that

Oesterreicher was “very clever in managing the intricacies of the conciliar process in seeing Nosta Aetate through to its promulgation” on October 28, 1965.

Countering centuries of spiritual amnesia, Nostra Aetate section #4 reminded the church of its special bond with the Jewish people; encouraged mutual respect and understanding; repudiated the charge that Jews are collectively and for all time responsible for Jesus’ death; and ended by decrying “hatred, persecutions, displays of anti-Semitism, directed against Jews at any time and by anyone”. Though not his achievement alone, much of this turn from vilification and caricature of the Jews to one of reconciliation and dialogue is due to the work of Oesterreicher.

REDISCOVERING THE OLD TESTAMENT Writing several years after Nostra Aetate was promulgated, Oesterreicher said: “Time was when it was customary to say that the Old Testament was the manifestation of the God of anger and the New Testament that of the God of grace. Yet, one and same God, the God of judgment and of mercy, of wrath and of love, speaks in both Testaments. Time was when Christians used to set the Gospel against the Law, but again the whole of Scripture is Law and Gospel, Gospel and Law. Time was when Christians were wont to say that the Ancient Scriptures concern themselves only with the blessings of earthly goods, while the apostolic writings speak of spiritual blessings alone. This and all similar dichotomies are artificial, manmade, and thus wrong; they must go; they must disappear from the pulpit as well as the classroom.

These dichotomies must go because they are in keeping, neither with scholarship nor the thrust of the Conciliar Statement.”

After the council, Oesterreicher continued to serve as a consultor to the Secretariat for Christian Unity (until 1968); worked with the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops on Jewish-Catholic dialogue, and served as the head of the

Institute of Judaeo-Christian Studies at Seton Hall.

A LEGACY John Oestrreicher died in 1993, several months before the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Vatican and the State of Israel.

Relating to Oesterreicher specifically, but to converts in general, John Connelly, professor of history at the University of California, Berkeley, and author of From Enemy to Brother: the Revolution in Catholic Teaching on the Jews 1933-1965, observes: “When we look at those who carried forth this revolution in Catholic teaching, we see few if any high clerics, few men ‘in red capes.’ But we do see a rather remarkable coincidence: virtually every one of the thinkers and activists involved in bettering Catholic-Jewish relations was a convert, either from Judaism or Protestantism…. That converts to Catholicism would oppose racism and anti-Semitism makes sense.

After all, they had personal reasons to hold the church to its claims. Still, the efforts of converts like Oesterreicher and his contemporaries bring into sharp relief th e nearly negligible numbers of ‘cradle Catholics’ who gave themselves to this struggle for the church’s soul.

Why this was so remains an important question.

What s eems certain is that without converts

to Catholicism, the church in Europe would never have ‘thought its way’ out of the challenges of racist anti-Judaism. If Providence remains visibly active for the Catholic Church in history, it can surely be seen in how the church has absorbed light from outsiders—persons originally beyond its visible membership, who devoted their lives to a religion based on love of neighbour, and in doing so reminded us that the church is, as Jacques Maritain’s friend Charles Journet wrote in 1951, at once ‘purer and vaster than we know.’”

39

Mike Daley is a teacher and writer from Cincinnati, Ohio where he lives with his wife June, and their three children.

His latest book, co-edited with Diane Bergant, is Take and Read: Christian Writers Reflect on Life’s Most Influential Books (Apocryphal Press: Berkley, 2017.)

F E AT U R E

A Royal

Matchmaker A YOUNG WOMAN FROM MIDDLETON, COUNTY CORK, WAS AN EARLY PROPAGATOR OF THE LEGION OF MARY ON THE EUROPEAN MAINLAND AND BECAME THE UNEXPECTED MARRIAGE BROKER FOR A KING

BY ANTHONY EDWARD DUNDON

40 Veronica O’Brien

At

the end of the main street in Midleton, County Cork in Ireland, near the bend of the river, is a large, maroon-coloured house that is set back from the river bank.

Now dilapidated with boards and corrugated iron covering the doors and windows, the house is known as Midleton House.

Here the story begins of Veronica O’Brien, a glamorous mystic, devoted and enigmatic Catholic and the matchmaker to Queen Fabiola and King Baudouin of Belgium. Tall with dark hair, she had great enthusiasm for life.

Few people in Cork, let alone Midleton, will have heard of Veronica who sometimes fainted at the visions she encountered.

Many who knew her would be

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astonished to know that beneath her elegant dresses and shining pearls, she had a cross cut onto her chest and the letter M (Mary) cut into her arm for the sufferings she anticipated in life.

CHILDHOOD IN COUNTY CORK She was born on August 16, 1905, christened Louise, Mary O’Brien, and was the 11 th of 13 children of Dr and Mrs PJ O’Brien. Nicknamed ‘Lulu’, she came of elite and privileged people, and the family wealth and social standing gave her an advantage that others did not have. When she made her First Communion, she fainted “crushed by the weight of the love of God, who was coming to me in person”.

Veroni c a attend e d the

Presentation Sisters convent, Midleton. Later she went to a convent boarding school run by the Sisters of St Clotilde, southeast London. As she wanted to learn French, she later went to study with a family in Paris. There she was overcome by a revelation telling her “God loves me, and He is almighty.” From 1924 she was a postulant at the congregation of St Clotilde, and, after two years as a novice, took her first vows and took the religious name of Veronica. She took her final vows in 1930.

Veronica’s unflagging energy was daunting for many in the community, including the mother superior who considered her to be “mentally unbalanced” and “a heavy burden to the community”. In a

letter from the superior general, Veronica was asked to either change her attitude or leave the congregation. Convinced she had the vocation she was determined to stay but in 1935, after ten years as a nun, she left.

NEW BEGINNINGS: THE LEGION Veronica wanted to explore her spiritual convictions and went to Rome to pray at the tomb of St Peter. She met a Fr Garde, tutor to Fr Karol Wojtyla who would later become Pope John Paul II, who told her to “… speak to Frank Duff (who had founded the Legion of Mary in Dublin in 1921). He is the genius of the apostolate.”

She wrote to Duff and they met in 1935. He did not encourage

her to join the organisation, but she was determined to pursue her dream of forming a Marian team. They agreed that Veronica would study the Legion at its Dublin headquarters.

Determined to start the Legion of Mary in France, Veronica travelled to Paris only to have her plans interrupted by World War II. She heard of an organisation Action Catholique that was against lay apostolates. In 1940 she decided to leave France and travel to Spain. On route, she stayed at the convent of St Gildard in Nevers, where St Bernadette once lived, and met the local bishop, Monsignor Patrice Flynn. Although born in Paris, his father was from County Cork and his mother was a native of Portaferry, County Down.

On August 15, the bishop gave her permission to start the first permanent division of the Legion in France and the first praesidium (the central unit of the Legion that holds regular meetings).

While in Nevers, Veronica met her lifelong companion, Yvette Dubois, the first woman to join the Legion of Mary in Nevers.

MOVING TO BELGIUM Within five years, Veronica had established the Legion in 30 French dioceses. The legionaries visited the sick, did apostolic work and often risked their lives for others. The following year she started the Legion in Mechelen (Malines), northern Belgium, where the auxiliary bishop was Leon-Joseph Suenens, later Cardinal Archbishop of Malines.

Suenens would become a major figure in church renewal around the time of the Second Vatican Council.

She met the cardinal in July 1947, and their collaboration would last 50 years. She told him about her life and her soul, and he was impressed by her forthright manner. By the late 40s, she had established praesidia in Greece and Turkey and one in Yugoslavia in 1956.

Such was her determination even a serious car accident near Malines in 1958 didn’t stop Veronica from starting the International Legion of Mary Centre in Lourdes.

ROYAL MATCHMAKER King Baudouin I (1930-1993) ruled Belgium from 1951 until his death. A reserved man and a devout Catholic, he often prayed for a saint who would direct his spiritual aspirations. Cardinal Suenens, concerned the king needed a wife, and fully aware of Veronica’s “charismatic and forceful” personality, felt she might assist his endeavours to acquire a wife with a sufficiently aristocratic background who was also Catholic.

King Baudouin and Queen Fabiola of Belgium

Veronica met the king in March 1960. She knew about a Fabiola de Mora y Aragon who was the daughter of a Spanish nobleman.

In a letter to Cardinal Suenens, she referred to Avila (Fabiola’s code name) as “a breath of fresh air [and] tall, thin, wellbuilt, good-looking and striking, bubbling with life, intelligence and energy”.

Her next move was to invite Avila to Belgium to meet the king. Veronica had told her about Cardinal Suenens and encouraged her to become the king’s wife. This surprised Avila, and when she sensed that a plot was being hatched, she severed all associations with Veronica.

Over time, however, they patched up their differences, and Avila decided to meet the king and Veronica incognito in Belgium.

Avila and the king went to Lourdes, accompanied by Veronica and Yvette. During their stay, Fabiola said ‘yes’, and they were married on December 15, 1960, in a ceremony at Brussels Cathedral. In later years the king referred to Veronica as “my guardian angel”.

In 1981, at the time of a renewal retreat in Paray-leMonial, eastern France, centre of devotion to the Sacred Heart, Veronica helped in the initial promotion of the FIAT (Family International Apostolic Team) movement with Cardinal Suenens.

RETIREMENT Now in her 80s, Veronica felt the time had come for her to follow the example of St Anne who, aged 80, never left the temple in Jerusalem. FIAT now provided

her with an ideal home in a quiet country location in Wemmel, Belgium, where she lived for the remainder of her life with Yvette and some friends.

In 1996, Cardinal Suenens died.

He once said of Veronica that she “... lives in the supernatural and the natural worlds”. King Baudouin, meanwhile, had died of a heart attack in 1993 at Motril, Spain; he had been in poor health for two years. Just two years after the cardinal's death, Veronica O’Brien died in Wemmel. Her funeral was held at St Gildard church, Nevers where she is buried in Jean Gautherin Cemetery.

People in Midleton who knew Veronica thought her odd and strange. After her death, her sister-in-law, Mary O’Brien, said: “I found her hard to understand . . . [her] sole purpose in life was to save souls.” All this, perhaps, was epitomised by the fact that during her life and even on her deathbed, she kept a toy donkey by her bedside.

Veronica’s response: “That’s me, just carrying the Lord to others whenever I can.”

This article was first published in The Majellan, a magazine of the Australian Redemptorists which specialises in marriage and family life. www.majellan.org.au

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SERVING JUSTICE AND PEACE

Caoimhe de Barra, Archbishop Martin, Fr Mullaney of St Patrick's College

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Eamonn Meehan and Archbishop Eamon Martin

THE ARCHBISHOP OF DUBLIN, DR DIARMUID MARTIN, TOLD THE GUESTS AT THE ANNUAL TRÓCAIRE LECTURE THAT THE PUBLIC CAN BE A FORCE FOR POSITIVE CHANGE. BY DAVID O’HARE

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rchbishop Diarmuid Martin delivered the annual Trócaire lecture in St Patrick’s College, Maynooth on March 12 last, and told a packed Renehan Hall that organisations such as Trócaire have a vital positive role to play in influencing public opinion.

At the beginning of his lecture, entitled ‘At the service of Justice and Peace’, the archbishop recalled the tragic loss of life in an Ethiopian air crash several days before. He noted it was a flight used by many aid workers in east Africa. One of the victims was an Irish UN aid worker, Michael Ryan, a native of Lahinch in County Clare.

The archbishop’s address was wide-ranging and drew on his years of experience as a member of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. During this time, he represented the Holy See at major UN conferences and had negotiations with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund on international debt and poverty reduction.

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CATHOLIC SOCIAL TEACHING The archbishop said that the social teaching of the church must understand reality. "The Gospel message must become a challenge to people of goodwill to respond to the ongoing challenges of a complex world. The Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace was one of the most interesting offices of the Church. It is very much involved with getting out on the ground to see the problems facing people." Dr Martin recalled travelling extensively, often to situations of serious conflict. Their policy of staying where possible with local clergy was an invaluable learning experience of how local conditions affected the lives of ordinary people.

He said that progress has been made in many parts of the developing world, but he acknowledged also this progress is often unequal for a country’s citizens. "The poor may be becoming less poor in many parts of the world, but inequality is rising." He quoted Pope Benedict who said that "globalisation will be worthy of its name when it enhances the unity of the human family. Any form of globalisation

that breeds exclusion or marginalisation, instability or crass inequality, doesn’t have the right to call itself global."

ARMS RACE Archbishop Martin said that the possibility of an arms race similar to the one that ran throughout the Cold War is becoming a real one. "The trade in heavy weapons has been steadily increasing.

Arms sales from the US have increased by 25 per cent over the last ten years. Saudi Arabia has increased arms imports by 190 per cent over the last ten years." The archbishop wondered if, in this situation, a moral argument could hold sway over political interests.

How can ordinary citizens influence the challenge of attaining a sustained peace? The rise of international public opinion should not be underestimated the archbishop said.

Public opinion can change political policies, the archbishop said, and organisations such as Trócaire have a vital role to play in influencing

public opinion in a positive way on both the national and international stage.

Archbishop Martin concluded: "Migration should be an intrinsic dimension of a global economy and society. Migration enriches culture and society. Migration is about people who search for their dreams but it is also about those who have nothing. How we treat refugees is a barometer of our own humanity."

RECOGNITION The evening also included a very special ceremony which recognised the long service of two of Trócaire’s former directors. Archbishop Martin conferred Justin Kilcullen, director from 19932013, with a Papal Knighthood of the Order of St. Gregory the Great. Archbishop Eamonn Martin, as Chancellor of the Pontifical University, St Patrick’s College, Maynooth, conferred an honorary doctorate in theology on Eamonn Meehan, director from 2013-2018.

SUMMER

Justin Kilcullen and Archbishop Martin

Ennismore Retreat Centre

Sunday 12th May 2:30pm-5:30pm Mary – and her other Madonnas.

Reflection on Mary and her special place in our tradition.

Joe Kavanagh Cost €35 Friday 24th – Sunday 26th May Crossing the Threshold Home ….

A Celtic journey of the heart, through music, ritual, and prayer.

Deirdre Ni Chinneide.

Cost Res €175 Non Res €100 Saturday 9th – Saturday 15th June Be still and know … silence, breath awareness, relaxation, and visualisation in awareness of Divine Presence.

Louis Hughes, O.P. Cost €440

www.ennismore.ie

ST DOMINIC’S

Sunday 16th – Saturday 22nd June Catherine of Siena & Julian of Norwich Two 14th century mystics, different in almost everything except their intense focus on the presence of Jesus. We will reflect on Catherine’s dialogue & letters, and Julian’s showings.

Donagh O’Shea, O.P. Cost €440 Sunday 7th – Saturday 13th July Mystery of Love : a universe cradled in the Trinity. Scripture tells us the love of Christ extends to ‘all things’ (Col. 1:20), gathering the whole of creation into the life of God, ‘so that God may be all in all’ (I Cor. 15).

Benedict Hegarty, O.P. Cost €440 Sunday 14th – Saturday 20th July “Choose whom you will serve” (Josh. 24) In this reflective retreat, we will focus on opening ourselves to the invitation to discipleship of the heart.

Stephen Cummins, O.P. Cost €440

Sunday 21sth – Saturday 27th July Never too Late to Laugh … Hope and humour in a wobbly church !

Joe Kavanagh, O.P. Cost €440 Ennismore Retreat Centre is set in 30 acres of wood, field and garden overlooking Lough Mahon on the River Lee. It’s the ideal place for some time-out, reflection and prayer.

For ongoing programmes please contact the Secretary or visit our website Tel: 021-4502520 Fax: 021-4502712 E-mail: info@ennismore.ie www.ennismore.ie

CO M M E N T REALITY CHECK PETER McVERRY SJ

PRIVILEGE AND EQUALITY

“WHEN YOU ARE ACCUSTOMED TO PRIVILEGE, EQUALITY FEELS LIKE OPPRESSION.” (AUTHOR UNKNOWN)

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I grew up in a privileged home. My father was a doctor in a small town.

We wanted for nothing. I lived in a nice house in a nice part of town.

My father paid for me to go to a fee-paying school. I knew that was a passport to a good life, so I studied hard. I learnt to drive in my father’s car when I was 17 and got my full licence when I was 18. My father paid the insurance for me. I had immediate access to health care, my father paid the insurance for me. I went to college before free thirdlevel education became available, my father paid the fees for me. I had a choice of careers, maybe I would become a doctor like my father, or a dentist, or a lawyer – the choice was more or less mine. I expected to be earning €100,000 within a few years. But I wouldn’t have considered myself wealthy: some of my former school friends would be earning far more than that. I had no idea what an unemployed person got on welfare – I didn’t need to know!

A foreign holiday every year was the norm. I expected to be able to buy a nice house in a nice part of town. I REALITY MAY 2019

expected my children would also go to a fee-paying school, then to college, and on to a well-paid job and I would be able, in retirement, to visit them in their nice houses in a nice part of town.

But I joined the Jesuits!

Until then, this was my world.

Everyone I knew lived in the same world. I played golf with people like me, I went to dinner with people like me. Over dinner we discussed world affairs and talked about the foreign holidays we had enjoyed or complained about the expensive hotel which had poor room service.

I lived a very privileged life, without realising how privileged it was. To me it was all just perfectly normal.

And then I met “them”. “They” were not like “us”. They lived in the inner city of Dublin, in overcrowded, damp houses, where drugs were being sold on the street right outside their front door. They were afraid to let their children out to play for fear of the negative peer pressure which might get them into trouble with the law or onto drugs. They were

unskilled and unemployed and never expected to get much of a job. They could never afford health insurance.

A 24-year-old unemployed person could expect to get €5,000 from the welfare to live on for a whole year.

They could never own a car, afford the insurance or even pay for driving lessons. They applied each year for their children to go on holidays for a week to the St. Vincent de Paul holiday home, 20 miles away. The disappointment, if there was no place for their child that summer, was huge. Their children left school early, as education meant learning to read and write, anything else was irrelevant, as they dreamt of a parttime job in the local supermarket stacking shelves.

Many of those who live privileged lives will resist all attempts to level the playing field. And they have the voting power and the contacts to succeed.

Travellers, or even affordable housing, might be provided in the nice part of town where privileged people live will never be tolerated.

Ireland will never have a single-tier health system. Those who can afford health insurance have immediate access to treatment. A single-tier health system, based on need, not money, would mean that privileged access to treatment for those who can afford it would disappear. This will never be tolerated.

Ireland will never have equality of educational opportunity for all.

Those who can afford to pay for their children’s education, thereby providing privileged access to future employment opportunities, will never tolerate the abolition of government subsidies to fee-paying schools.

To understand poverty and exclusion, you have to research wealth and privilege.

Ireland will never have integrated housing estates, such as exist in most European cities. Any suggestion that social housing, or housing for

For more information or to support the Peter McVerry Trust: www.pmvtrust.ie info@pmvtrust.ie +353 (0)1 823 0776

GOD’S WORD THIS MONTH OVER A CHARCOAL FIRE Today’s Gospel takes place at dawn by the shore of the Sea of Galilee. The disciples THIRD SUNDAY are still unsure about OF EASTER what the Resurrection means. A night spent in the dark and cold with no fish to show adds to their disillusionment. Then a stranger calls to them from the shore, telling them to cast their net on the other side of the boat. So great is the catch that they cannot haul the net aboard but have to drag it behind them to the shore.

The Beloved Disciple is the first to recognise that something mysterious is happening here: only the Lord could have spoken with that kind of authority. Peter, impetuous as ever, jumps into the water. John conveys a great depth of meaning by small details we might scarcely notice, such as Peter stripped

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for work but putting on his clothes to meet Jesus. When he comes ashore, the first thing to meet his eyes is a charcoal fire with fish cooking on it and a small pile of bread. The last time Peter had seen a charcoal fire was in the high priest’s palace when he had denied Jesus three times. Peter probably never wanted to see another charcoal fire in his life, especially if Jesus were anywhere near it! The conversation around the fire seems uneasy – "none of the disciples was bold enough to ask him 'Who are you?'" It is Jesus who breaks the tension by asking Peter if he loves him. The question is asked three times, corresponding to Peter’s three denials.

Peter is clearly uncomfortable and finally blurts out with the impetuousness of the old Peter: "Lord, you know everything! You know I love you!"

Each of Peter’s protests of love is met with a commission – to feed the lambs and the sheep. The fisherman is to learn a new trade,

that of shepherd. It will require new skills and, in the end, will lead him to the same fate as Jesus met. In his old way of life, he was a free agent and could go wherever he liked. If he is to follow Jesus, he must be prepared to die in his service.

Reading the Easter stories, we might notice how they give us a profound insight into the life of the church. They are Eucharistic stories about meeting the Lord in broken bread. The church’s mission is founded on the Easter faith of the community in the Risen Lord.

The service of those set over the community as leaders is to be modelled on that of Jesus the Good Shepherd who laid down his life for his sheep.

Today’s Readings Acts 5:27-32, 40-41; Ps 29; Rev 5:11-14; John 21:1-19

God’s Word continues on page 46

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GOD’S WORD THIS MONTH MAY

THE GOOD SHEPHERD The Easter Gospels do not concentrate exclusively on the Resurrection stories.

FOURTH SUNDAY They return to earlier OF EASTER passages of the Gospel to penetrate more deeply into the meaning of the Lord’s death and resurrection. The Good Shepherd was one of the early church’s favourite images of Jesus.

Long before they ever carved a crucifix, the Christian of Rome and elsewhere carved or painted images of the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd was especially favoured for the decoration of tombs. The tomb of a young girl in the Roman catacombs has an image of the Good Shepherd with the inscription: “Apuleia Chrysopolis lived for seven years and two months; her parents made this for their dearest daughter.” The image of the shepherd lovingly carrying a 46 lamb gave comfort to the parents that their little girl had found a real protector.

In chapter 10 of John’s Gospel, Jesus described himself as the Good Shepherd who laid down his life for his sheep. Today’s Gospel takes up three short verses from that chapter. They emphasise first the relationship between sheep and shepherd. Just as sheep

learn to trust the sound of their shepherd’s voice, the followers of Jesus listen to his voice speaking to them. This is the source of trust between the Lord and his followers. Second there is a promise of eternal life. Just as sheep follow the shepherd confident that he will lead them to rich pastures, the followers of Jesus follow him because he has promised to give them eternal life. "Eternal life" is a mystery. Our only sense of ‘eternal’ is something without end: but something that goes on endlessly can become boring! It might be better to take the word 'life': life at its best is forever changing, exciting, opening fresh possibilities, revealing new ways of looking. That is the kind of life Jesus gives. Third, the sheep that are in the care of Jesus are also in the care of God the Father, the Shepherd of Israel. The most popular psalm of all is probably Psalm 23, "The Lord is my Shepherd". The great Easter hymn, the Victimae Paschali, reminds us that Jesus is both the paschal lamb and the good shepherd: "The Lamb has redeemed the sheep, the innocent Christ has reconciled us to the Father."

THE TESTAMENT OF JESUS Our Gospel today is taken MAY from the beginning of the ‘farewell of Jesus’. Judas, the traitor, has just left the supper room to FIFTH SUNDAY OF EASTER betray him. For Jesus, this signals the beginning of his glory. ‘Glory’ is a key word in the Gospel of John, especially in this part of it. To grasp the truth about Jesus is to "see his glory" as the only Son of God, the Word made flesh (John 1:14). The great American Catholic Bible scholar, Fr Raymond Brown suggests that we should divide the Gospel of John into two major sections – the ‘Book of Signs’

(the first 12 chapters) and the ‘Book of Glory’ (the final nine, from Supper to Resurrection).

In the eyes of the world, Jesus’ mission ended in failure when he died the death of a slave or common criminal, crucified in an unclean place outside the city. Seen from the perspective of God’s saving plan, this was no failure but a glorious triumph. If Jesus was nailed to a cross, it was so that he could be lifted up, exalted in glory. That process of glory will begin very soon. In it, Jesus will be revealed as the faithful servant of God who was despised and rejected but who would be raised to great heights (Isaiah 52:13).

A testament or will usually includes a list of bequests the person wishes to leave to his

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Today’s Readings Acts 13:14, 43-52; Ps 99; Rev 7:9, 14-17; John 10:27-30

heirs after his death. The first bequest of Jesus to his community is the love commandment – they are to love one another as he has loved them. Just before this, he had given a powerful example of this kind of love as he washed the feet of his disciples. The climax of the Book of Glory will be the crucifixion when Jesus lays down his life for his friends.

Love is the Easter mark of the disciple of Jesus.

Today’s Readings Acts 14:21-27; Ps 144; Rev 21:1-5; John 13:31-35

THE REALITY CROSSWORD NUMBER 4 MAY 2019

THREE THINGS I LEAVE YOU As we continue to read Jesus’ final discourse, we learn of three more bequests to the church – the Word, the Spirit and the gift of peace.

A sign of how much we love Jesus is keeping his Word. That does not simply mean keeping a SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER copy of the Bible on a bookshelf or even in your handbag. The Word is more mysterious and more powerful than that. Words draw us into relationships. A husband and wife who never speak, or listen to one another, will never become friends, no matter how much they do for one another and their children. Keeping the Word of Jesus means first learning from the Gospel who he is. Jesus promises that those who keep his Word will find that God – Father, Son and Spirit – will come to make their home with them. For John, this is the deepest reality of Christian life.

The believer is no longer alone. In the silence or the darkness, triune God is always there with them.

The second gift of Easter is the Holy Spirit. John’s favourite name for the Spirit is ‘advocate’. It is hard to grasp all the senses that word, paraclete, had for him in its original Greek. It can mean someone you can call for help, a faithful friend who stands alongside you when times get rough. It can mean a comforter, or someone who prays for you, or even a lawyer who pleads your defence in court. John emphasises something else about the Spirit. The Spirit is the great teacher, who reminds disciples of all that Jesus has said to them. When we are in a hurry, we are more likely to forget things. Remembering the story of Jesus needs time. It also needs peace and quiet.

That may be why the third Easter bequest is peace. Jesus knows that the disciples who have shared the Last Supper with him will eventually be called to suffer for him. The peace he promises them is not the same sort of peace that the world gives. The peace of Jesus is peace of heart that comes from knowing one is trying to walk faithfully in the way of love.

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SOLUTIONS CROSSWORD No. 2 ACROSS: Across: 1. Grotto, 5. Esther, 10. Crozier, 11. Iberian, 12. Ruth, 13. Groom, 15. Arch, 17. Yen, 19. Sirius, 21. Weimar, 22. Rubicon, 23. Aplomb, 25. Kindle, 28. Auk, 30. Gods, 31. Jesus, 32. Magi, 35. Luddite, 36. Arizona, 37. Hyphen, 38. Thrust.

DOWN: 2. Rooster, 3. Trim, 4. Orrery, 5. Edison, 6. Twee, 7. Epigram, 8. Icarus, 9. Anchor, 14.

Oedipus, 16. Burma, 18. Genie, 20. Sub, 21. Wok, 23. Angels, 24. Lady Day, 26. Deacons, 27. Elijah, 28. Aegean, 29. Kuwait, 33. Wish, 34. Bier.

Winner of Crossword No. 2 Denis Mc Greal, Claremorris, Co. Mayo.

ACROSS 1. Shiny crystal used to make very accurate watches. (6) 5. A light clear red colour. (6) 10. Ancient Gaelic game. (7) 11. No tense, free from anxiety. (7) 12. Small powerful boats used for towing. (4) 13. Biblical tower of many languages. (5) 15. Most popular Papal name. (4) 17. Former Portuguese colony now an Indian state. (3) 19. Casserole in Coronation Street pub. (6) 21. Syrupy blackcurrant liqueur from Burgundy. (6) 22. This area was home to Jesus for most of his life. (7) 23. Roman emperor murdered in March. (6) 25. Country, canal and hat. (6) 28. Utter untruth knowingly. (3) 30. Signals and suggestions for actors. (4) 31. Spanish Mission defended by Davy Crockett. (5) 32. Form of Japanese wrestling. (4) 35. Distinctive clothing worn my members of the same organisation. (7) 36. 14th century home of the Papacy. (7) 37. Tables in Christian churches. (6) 38. Gorgon with snakes for hair. (6)

DOWN 2. Strictly honourable and honest. (7) 3. Spoil or destroy something completely. (4) 4. Move left and right alternately. (6) 5. The clear front surface of the eye. (6) 6. Exercise authority over and area and its people. (4) 7. Church employees. (7) 8. Traditional roof covering. (6) 9. Handsome man and Greek god. (6) 14. South American state, capital is Sucre. (7) 16. Distinctive garments of ancient Rome. (5) 18. A song of praise or triumph. (5) 20. Thick liquid used in road-making and timber preservation. (3) 21. Small edible European brown mushroom. (3) 23. Plant that thrives in desert regions. (6) 24. Prophetic book of the Old Testament. (7) 26. This Thomas is considered one of the Catholic Church's greatest theologians. (7) 27. Rub with oil as part of a religious ceremony.

(6) 28. Domesticated pack animals of the Andes. (6) 29. Preserve a corpse from decay. (6) 33. A prolonged state of unconsciousness (4) 34. Discover something by chance. (4)

Entry Form for Crossword No.4, May 2019 Name:

Today’s Readings

Address:

Acts 15:1-2, 22-29; Ps 66; Rev 21:10-14, 22-23; John 14:23-29

Telephone:

All entries must reach us by May 31, 2019 One €35 prize is offered for the first correct solutions opened. The Editor’s decision on all matters concerning this competition will be final. Do not include correspondence on any other subject with your entry which should be addressed to: Reality Crossword No.4, Redemptorist Communications, St Joseph's Monastery, Dundalk, County Louth A91 F3FC