Reality Summer (Jul/Aug) 2017

JOHN KNOX

SCOTTISH REFORMER

JULY/AUGUST 2017

S.S. BRITANNIA HER LAST VOYAGE

A NEW MODEL OF SERVICE

LISTENING TO PROPHETIC VOICES

Informing, Inspiring, Challenging Today’s Catholic

ONE MAN, ONE GOD FR ALEC REID AND THE LONG ROAD TO PEACE

THE LOUGH DERG EXPERIENCE

ISLAND OF QUIET MIRACLES

FRANCIS LEDWIDGE A CENTENARY TRIBUTE

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Reality

www.redcoms.org Redemptorist-Communications @RedComsIreland �2.50 �2.00

SUMMER

Ennismore Retreat Centre

Sat 1st July – Thurs 6th July “The Three from Nazareth and their message for today”.

Fr. Benedict Hegarty OP Cost: Res: €400 Sun 16th July – Fri 21st July Centering Prayer Intensive Retreat.

Sr. Fionnuala Quinn OP Cost: Res: €460 Sun 23rd July – Sat 29th July Individually Directed Retreat Sr. Peggy Cronin Cost: Res: €465

ST DOMINIC’S

Sat 5th Aug – Fri 11th Aug “A meditative retreat on the Trinity: God’s self-giving” Fr. Stephen Cummins OP Cost: Res: €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.

Fri 1st Sept – Sun 3rd Sept “Cry of the Earth” John Feehan.

John was a senior lecturer in environmental science at the school of Agriculture, Food Science and Veterinary Medicine, U.C.D. His ‘Farming

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

in Ireland: History and Heritage and Environment’ has been widely acclaimed.

Cost: Res. €175 – Non-Res: €100

IN THIS MONTH’S ISSUE FEATURES 12 ONE MAN, ONE GOD FR ALEC REID AND THE LONG ROAD TO PEACE A new book examines the life and ministry of Belfast’s peacemaker priest

By Mary McAleese and Rev Dr Harold Good

18 OPEN TO THE ‘WORD’ WALKING WITH US There is nothing ‘ordinary’ about Ordinary Time

By Sarah Adams

20 ISAAC HECKER: CATHOLIC APOSTLE TO AMERICA Are freedom and democracy compatible with Catholicism?

By Mike Daley

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22 FRANCIS LEDWIDGE: A CENTENARY TRIBUTE The World War I poet who grappled with some of life’s big questions

By Donal McMahon

25 A NEW MODEL OF SERVICE If we are open to the Spirit and prophetic voices, we can address the needs of today in a new way

By John Horgan

28 THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE S.S. BRITANNIA Two Redemptorist priests were on board when the India-bound ship was attacked and sunk in 1941

By Michael Kirwan

34 JOHN KNOX: SCOTTISH RELIGIOUS REFORMER

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37

OPINION

REGULARS

11 TRÍONA DOHERTY

04 REALITY BITES

17 DAVID O'DONOGHUE

07 POPE MONITOR

37 THE SANCTUARY OF ST PATRICK – LOUGH DERG

31 CARMEL WYNNE

08 FEAST OF THE MONTH

Lough Derg continues to draw people to its peaceful sanctuary

By Sharon Hearty

42 PETER McVERRY SJ

The 16th century reformer whose efforts were frustrated by political realities

By Ian Hazlett

09 REFLECTIONS 32 PRAYER CORNER 40 TRÓCAIRE 43 GOD’S WORD

REALITY BITES CONVENT CHAPEL SAFEGUARDING CREATION A “RELIGIOUS OBLIGATION” BECOMES COPTIC CHURCH VATICAN CITY

DUBLIN

REDEDICATION CEREMONY

His Holiness Pope Tawadros II with Sr Gabrielle Fox

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On Sunday May 21, Pope Tawadros II, Patriarch of Alexandria and head of the Egyptian Coptic Church, dedicated the former chapel of the Redemptoristine Monastery of St Alphonsus in Drumcondra for use as a church by the Irish members of his community. It is estimated that there are about 500 Copts in Ireland, with communities in Dublin, Cahir, Galway and Bray. Egypt is home to some 14 million members of the church – a minority of 13 per cent among Egypt’s 92 million Muslims. There is also a Coptic diaspora of about one million. The chapel has lain empty since the sisters moved to a new convent further down St Alphonsus Road, and some of the sisters attended the rededication ceremony.

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin greets Pope Tawadros II

REALITY SUMMER 2017

RAMADAN MESSAGE

Both Christians and Muslims have an obligation to safeguard the world God created, according to the Vatican’s annual message to Muslims for the end of Ramadan.

“Our vocation to be guardians of God’s handiwork is not optional, nor is it tangential to our religious commitment as Christians and Muslims: It is an essential part of it,” said Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, and Bishop Miguel Angel Ayuso Guixot, its secretary. The council publishes a message to the world’s Muslims every year in preparation for the celebration at the end of Ramadan, which this year ends on June 24.

The theme chosen for 2017 was ‘Caring for our common home’, echoing Pope Francis’ call in his encyclical on the environment, Laudato Si’. “As believers, our relationship with God should be increasingly shown in the way we relate to the world around us,” wrote

Cardinal Tauran and Bishop Ayuso. “What is needed is education, spiritual openness and a ‘global ecological conversion’ to adequately address this challenge… no one person, nation or people can impose exclusively their understanding of our planet.” This year’s message was released on June 2, the day after US president Donald Trump announced his intention to withdraw from the international Paris Accords, designed to reduce the human impact on climate change.

Pakistani Muslim men attend the first Friday prayer of the holy fasting month of Ramadan

SISTER SKILLS: 'KEEPY-UPPY' VIDEO GOES VIRAL LIMERICK

CLOSE CONTEST

A Limerick nun has found fame around the world after a video of her ‘keepy-uppy’ skills went viral. The Dominican Sister was filmed showing off her fancy footwork alongside a local Garda during the Our Lady of Limerick Triduum and festival which took place at St Saviour’s Dominican Church, Glentworth Street, Limerick on the weekend of May 25-26. The clip was posted on social media by the local Garda Síochána, with the message: “Well what can we say, this definitely isn’t something you see every day – Garda O’Connell of Henry St Community Policing Unit playing keepy-uppy with the Dominican Sisters at the Our Lady of Limerick Triduum and Festival… We’re not sure who won this time, a rematch will have to be scheduled.”

Sister Act!

The clip proved popular, with the page quickly inundated with requests by news sites and other organisations to share the video. The original clip, which can be viewed on the Facebook page of the ‘Garda Síochána – Cork, Kerry & Limerick – Southern region’, has attracted more than one million views.

N E WS

LET ST RITA PROVIDE THE WEDDING DRESS CASCIA

SISTER SEAMSTRESS

St Rita of Cascia is regarded in Italy as a particular patron of brides and married women. Many brides in the region of Cascia, where she lived in the Augustinian monastery, invoke her intercession as they prepare for their big day, and afterwards leave their wedding dresses to the monastery. One member of the community has come up with a creative solution of how to use the accumulating number of bridal dresses. Trained as a seamstress before entering the Augustinian order, Sr Maria Laura has begun running a thrifty wedding dress centre, adapting the donated dresses for new brides.

“It gives me great joy to see a young woman who can fulfil her dream of love with a dress appropriate for the happiest day of her life,” Sister Laura says. The nuns see brides-to-be by appointment, but they usually bring family members and bridesmaids to help them make their choice. Sister Laura claims she can usually guess which dress a girl will choose. “I know which one she will take; you can tell from their faces,” she said. “If you have a dream and we can make it come true, we’ll do our best.” About three women a week visit to select dresses, while up to 10 dresses a month are donated. All the dresses are offered for free and the sisters ask for a voluntary donation

Sr Maria Laura helps set the scene for a bride-to-be

according to the bride’s means. According to a newspaper report, one recent donation amounted to over €1,000. One bride explained that the sisters provided her only option to buy a dress, saying “If I can't find it here, I simply can't afford to buy one,” while another explained that she had “felt at home here from the very first minute”.

SEMINARIAN WHO SAVED BLESSED SACRAMENT ORDAINED IRAQ

NO ROSARIES HANGING FROM THE CAR MIRROR PHILIPPINES

NEW LAW

In the most recent clash between the government and the Catholic Church in the Philippines, the authorities have banned hanging rosaries and religious icons in vehicles, saying that they are a safety risk as they block the driver’s view of the road. It is part of a new law that forbids talking or texting on mobile phones, applying make-up, or eating

and drinking while driving. The ban sparked outcry in the largely Catholic country. In addition to protests from the nation’s bishops, Piston, the association of jeepney (local form of taxi) drivers and owners, said there was no evidence that rosaries and religious icons caused accidents. “Do not meddle with the drivers’ faith in God,” its president, George San Mateo, warned the government.

ISIS THREAT

Martin Baani was a 24-year-old seminarian who risked his life to rescue the Blessed Sacrament when his Iraqi hometown was invaded by Islamic State terrorists. Less than three years later, he is returning home to serve his village as a priest. On August 6, 2014, he received a call from a friend who warned that a nearby village had fallen into the hands of ISIS, and that Martin’s hometown of Karamlesh would be next. He immediately went to the parish church and took the Blessed Sacrament, to prevent the jihadists from desecrating it, and fled with three other priests.

“I was the last one to leave Karamlesh, with the Blessed

Fr Martin Baani

Sacrament in my hands,” he told the pontifical foundation Aid to the Church in Need. Despite threats from ISIS, he chose to stay in Iraq rather than flee with the rest of his family to the United States, continuing his studies for the priesthood. In September 2016, Fr Martin was ordained along with six other men. continued on page 6

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REALITY BITES ROBOT PRIEST SPARKS DEBATE WITTENBERG

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BLESSU-2

A ‘robot priest’ which delivers blessings in five languages has been unveiled in Germany as part of an exhibition to mark the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. BlessU-2, as the robot is aptly named, is intended to trigger debate about the future of the church and the potential of artificial intelligence.

The exhibition is taking place in Wittenberg, widely held as the birthplace of the Reformation as it is the town in which Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to a church door in 1517. The robot has a touchscreen chest, and offers blessings in a choice of German, English, French, Spanish or Polish, as well as a choice between a male and female voice.

When activated, it raises its arms, flashes lights, recites a biblical verse, and says: “God bless and protect you.” If requested, it will also provide a printout of its words.

Stephan Krebs of the Protestant church in Hesse and Nassau, which is behind the initiative, said the idea is to provoke debate. “We wanted people to consider if it is possible to be blessed by a machine, or if a human being is needed… People from the street are curious, amused and interested. They are really taken with it, and are very positive. But inside the church some people think we want to replace human pastors with machines. Those that are church-oriented are more critical.” He added that he did not anticipate robots being the solution to a Europe-wide shortage of priests. A robot “could never substitute for pastoral care”, he said, though he is collecting responses to the machine in the hopes of starting a discussion on the relationship between religion and technology.

REALITY SUMMER 2017

REQUIEM MASS FOR KNOCK VISIONARY JOHN CURRY NEW YORK

TRIBUTES TO HUMBLE MAN

On Saturday May 13, the remains of John Curry, the youngest witness to the Apparition at Knock, were reinterred at the Basilica of St Patrick’s Old Cathedral in New York. The Requiem Mass was celebrated by His Eminence Cardinal Dolan who gave a moving tribute to John Curry, remembering him as a quiet, pious and humble man who only talked about his experience in Knock when prompted.

A number of John Curry’s relatives were in attendance, including his namesake and grandnephew, the author of a detailed book on his life.

Also in attendance was a pilgrimage group from Knock Parish led by Fr Richard Gibbons, the first ever pilgrimage to fly direct from Ireland West Airport to New York. Members of An Garda Síochána and the Knights of Columbanus; cathaoirleach of Mayo County Council, Cllr Al McDonnell; Mayo CEO Peter Hynes; and Mike Hannon from the County Mayo Foundation also attended. Singer Sibéal Ní Chasaide, together with Odhrán Ó Casaide, performed a haunting rendition of Ave Maria.

Fr Richard Gibbons presented Monsignor Donald Sakano, pastor of St Patrick’s Old Cathedral, with an original piece of clay from the gable wall at Knock Shrine. He said: “We are delighted and honoured

Fr Richard Gibbons

John Curry is laid to rest

to be here for this historic occasion and to lead the parish of Knock on our first pilgrimage to this sacred place. I would like to express my warm and sincere gratitude to both Cardinal Dolan and Monsignor Donald Sakano for inviting us here and for making all of this possible. We are extremely grateful to everyone for providing us with such a warm welcome, for making the Mass so special and an experience that will be cherished for many years.”

TRIBUTES TO SPANISH VICTIM OF LONDON ATTACK LONDON

Ignacio Echeverria

DIED DEFENDING OTHERS

The Spanish government have paid tribute to a Catholic man who was stabbed to death as he tried to defend a woman from a terrorist attack in London.

Ignacio Echeverria, 39, a native of Spain who had been working in London for a year, was one of eight victims of three assailants who drove a van into pedestrians on London Bridge before they attacked people with knives and machetes in nearby Borough Market on the evening of June 3.

The Spaniard, a Catholic and the nephew of the late Bishop of Chachapoyas, Peru, Antonio

Hornedo Correa, was returning from a skateboard park when he came upon the atrocity and saw a woman being repeatedly stabbed. Witnesses reported seeing Echeverria using his skateboard as a weapon against the terrorist before he was fatally wounded himself. The Spanish government said in a statement: “The exemplary attitude shown

by Ignacio Echeverria during the attacks is a demonstration of solidarity for all to see. His bravery in defending a helpless person serves as a reminder of the need to remain united

before the scourge of terrorism, facing up to those whose only language is one of violence and terror.” Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy Brey suggested that the Silver Cross of the Order of Civil Merit should be awarded posthumously to Echeverria, who came from Las Rozas, near Madrid.

N E WS

POPE MONITOR KEEPING UP WITH POPE FRANCIS POPE FRANCIS MEETS PRIMARY SCHOOL LEAVERS Life is a long series of hellos and goodbyes so don't be afraid to let go of the past, Pope Francis told an audience of several thousand primary school leavers he met at the Vatican on June 2. He told them to remember old friends, but keep moving and be open to the new. “We have to learn to see life by seeing the horizons, not the walls that can make people afraid because they don't know what is on the other side,” he said. In the informal question and answer session, a teen named Marta told the pope how scared she was to be leaving primary school and her best friends as they head on to secondary school. “Why do I have to change everything? Why does growing up make me so afraid?” she asked.

“Life is a constant ‘Good morning’ and ‘Farewell,’” he replied, with the goodbyes sometimes being forever. Moments like these can be “a challenge”, the pope said, but “in life we have to get used to this journey of leaving something behind and encountering something new.” Those who give up and say “Enough” close off the horizons that

are out there waiting for them, and do not grow.

When asked how children of their age could change the world when it has so many problems, the pope told them they have to begin with the people and situations in their daily lives. “Think of what happens to a person’s hand when sharing sweets, for example,” he said. “It’s open

and moves toward the other person. Now think of what happens when a person wants to keep the sweets for himself or herself: the hand closes up tight and moves away from the other. Your heart has to be like the hand that is responding in a positive, generous way, not the negative, selfcentred approach.”

FIVE NEW CARDINALS On June 29, Pope Francis celebrated Mass in honour of the apostles with five new cardinals he had created at a consistory the day before. The new cardinals are Archbishop Jean Zerbo (Bamako, Mali), Archbishop Juan José Omella (Barcelona, Spain), Bishop Anders Arborelius (Stockholm, Sweden), Bishop José Gregorio Rosa Chávez (auxiliary bishop of San Salvador, El Salvador) and Bishop Louis-Marie Ling Mangkhanekhoun (Apostolic Vicar of Pakse, Laos and Apostolic Administrator of Vientiane).

This brings to 35 the number of cardinals Pope Francis has created in three consistories during his four-year papacy. While the appointments extend the list of cardinals world-wide, there were also some surprises, not least an auxiliary bishop elevated ahead of his diocesan bishop, and the inclusion of an apostolic administrator of two sees in Laos, who would not be regarded as having formal diocesan status. All the new candidates are of an age that qualifies them to take part in a papal conclave, should one be held in the next few years.

POPE FRANCIS COMES CALLING One of the customs of the Easter season widely observed in Italy is the annual blessing of homes. Even in central Rome, a priest can often be seen during the weeks after Easter accompanied by a server with the holy water making his way from palazzo to palazzo (the

traditional apartment buildings in central Rome). The visit is announced in advance at Sunday Mass, and also by notices on the buildings giving the day and time for the blessing. This year, the parish priest of Stella Maris church in Ostia, the popular seaside resort near Rome, made the customary announcement that a priest would be doing the blessing of houses in a public housing estate on the afternoon of Friday May 19.

What he did not announce was the name of the priest, so the first family to open their door when the bell rang were surprised to find Pope Francis himself come to do the blessing. It seems the Holy Father wishes to continue a practice he set up during the Holy Year, of reserving part of each Friday to do what any priest would consider as normal pastoral visits – to hospitals, old folks homes, or in this case, to the homes of ordinary members of the parish.

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FEAST OF THE MONTH ST MAELRUAIN OF TALLAGHT

8

July 7

th

Just as the name of Martin Luther springs to mind at the mention of the Protestant reformation of the 16th century, so we associate St Maelruain of Tallaght with the 8th century reform in Ireland.

The life of the church goes from one reformation to another, and in an Irish context these reforms happen in cycles of about 400 years. Thus we have a reform in the 8th century, another in the 12th, the Protestant reformation in the 16th, and the Vatican II Reform in the 20th century – something still in progress.

Reform is usually a response or reaction to a perceived need. Thus the 8th century reform was in response to the slide towards growing secularisation and laicisation in relation to monastic life, and the decline in standards of older monasteries; something well illustrated by the references to murder of abbots and bishops, the burning and spoliation of churches, battles between monasteries and power-struggles for abbatial positions. It is also in the 8th century that the phenomenon of coarbs or lay abbots began to appear.

Maelruain wasn’t the very first to launch the reform. That seems to have begun along the south coast. However, it was the monastery of Tallaght founded by Maelruain in 774 that became the vortex of the movement. Under his governance he enforced the rule with justice but without tyranny. The monastery of Finglas on the northern fringes of Dublin pre-existed Tallaght by about two decades. Its abbot, Dublittre, was imbued by the same spirit of reform but seems to have sat more comfortably on the saddle than his hardline colleague on the west side.

The 8th century reform is often referred to as the Céilí Dé Reform Movement. A Céile Dé (anglice Culdee), simply means a companion, spouse, friend, or slave of God. In Tallaght the Culdees probably formed the entire community, but in some other centres such as Terryglass, Lorrha and Iona, formed a separate community either within or at some distance from the older monastery. On Iona for example, the site of the Culdee settlement beyond the monastic boundary is still pointed out.

Nevertheless these anchorites or hermits maintained some sort of bond with the parent community but reflected in their lives the ascetical spirit of the monks of the Syrian and Egyptian desert. They practised a lot of vocal prayer and penitential exercises such as fasting, cross-vigil, genuflections, prostrations, frequent sign of the cross, going without sleep and the like.

They were extra strict on the use of red meat because they maintained that it increased sexual desire, and further they maintained that women had one third more sexual libido than men. Those under the direction of St Maelruain had their food-intake steadily reduced until the sexual desire was killed off and in practice that meant that they were often brought to death’s door by sheer starvation. The abbot of Finglass, never an extremist, wasn’t averse to allowing a bottle of beer to his monks on celebration days and he blamed Maelruain’s crippling arthritis on over-doing the penances.

There is another important dimension to the Céilí Dé spirituality that must not be forgotten.

Among his varied strategies in the pursuit of perfection through monastic life Maelruain stressed study, especially the study of Scripture and the development of an appreciation of the depth of the mysteries hidden in the Sacred Liturgy.

It is thanks to the 8th century reform and the Céilí Dé literary legacy that we still possess such treasures as the Martyrology of Tallaght composed by Aengus the Céilé Dé, the Book of Armagh containing among other things St Patrick’s Confession, Leobar na h-Uidre compiled in Clonmacnoise, and the Book of Leinster, a product of the scriptorium in the Céilí Dé stronghold of Terryglass. Without the literary and studious tradition of the Céilí Dé much of our history would have been forgotten.

Maelruain himself may have come from the vicinity of Lorrha on the Tipperary side of the Shannon.

He is thought to have studied at the island monastery of Darinis in the estuary of the Munster Blackwater. But it is as first abbot of Tallaght and leader of the Céilí Dé that he is best remembered.

John J O’Riordan CSsR REALITY SUMMER 2017

Reality Volume 82. No. 6 July/August 2017 A Redemptorist Publication ISSN 0034-0960 Published by The Irish Redemptorists, Unit A6, Santry Business Park, Swords Road, Dublin 09 X651 Tel: 00353 (0)1 4922488 Web: www.redcoms.org Email: sales@redcoms.org (With permission of C.Ss.R.)

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Redemptorist Communications is a ministry of the Irish Redemptorist Province in which lay people and Redemptorists collaborate to communicate the Gospel message – to inform, inspire and challenge through pastoral publications and other media

REFLECTIONS In the summer, the days were long, stretching into each other. Out of school, everything was on pause and yet happening at the same time, this collection of weeks when anything was possible.

SARAH DESSEN

Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.

JOHN LUBBOCK

Always there are doors that are not closed.

Look for the doors that are at least a little bit open, enter and talk about common things and go on. Step by step.

POPE FRANCIS

The Holy Scriptures were not given to us that we should enclose them in books, but that we should engrave them upon our hearts.

ST JOHN CHRYSOSTOM

Despite all the lunacy of the last century, all the absurdity of war and genocide, we believe that humans being are rational and are made to seek the truth.

TIMOTHY RADCLIFFE OP

In the past, Irish politicians lined up to show how antiBritish they were. Today, many politicians do the same when it comes to the Church.

DAVID QUINN

I'm still discovering, right up to this moment, that it is only by living completely in this world that one learns to have faith.

I mean living unreservedly in life's duties, problems, successes and failures, experiences and perplexities.

In so doing, we throw ourselves completely into the arms of God.” DIETRICH BONHOEFFER

Angry people are not always wise.

JANE AUSTEN

If you are a theologian, you will pray truly. And if you pray truly, you are a theologian.

EVAGRIUS THE SOLITARY

I have always believed that life is too short for rows and disagreements. Even if I think I'm right, I would prefer to apologise and remain friends rather than win and be an enemy.

MAEVE BINCHY

Ní hé lá na gaoithe lá na scoilb.

(A windy day is not a day for thatching.)

You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.

GK CHESTERTON

To gain that which is worth having, it may be necessary to lose everything else.

BERNADETTE DEVLIN

I have read in Plato and Cicero sayings that are wise and very beautiful; but I have never read in either of them: “Come unto me all you that labour and are heavy laden.”

IRISH PROVERB

Ireland is a great country to die or be married in.

The true Christian reaction to suffering and sorrow is not the attitude of self-pity, fatalism or resentment; it is the spirit which takes life's difficulties as a God given opportunity, and regards its troubles as a sacred trust, and wears the thorns as a crown.

SAINT AUGUSTINE

ELIZABETH BOWEN

JAMES STEWART

The national anthem of hell is, “I Did It My Way.” PETER KREEFT

9

From Redemptorist Communications

ONE MAN, ONE GOD The Peace Ministry of Fr Alec Reid C.Ss.R.

By Martin McKeever C.Ss.R.

Fr Alec Reid made an extraordinary contribution to the Northern Ireland peace process. As a member of the Clonard community for over forty years, Fr Alec’s peace ministry emerged from a religious community deeply rooted in west Belfast.

Fr Alec saw himself as a servant of Christ in a situation of political conflict. He felt prompted by the Holy Spirit to reach out and work for peace. His contribution to peace in Ireland is immeasurable, and there would not have been a peace process without his hard work and determination.

This unique book by Fr Martin McKeever C.Ss.R. explores the extraordinary work of this good and simple priest.

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EDI TO R I A L UP FRONT TRÍONA DOHERTY

LOOK FOR THE HELPERS

The

day after the Manchester Arena attack of May 22 this year, which killed 23 people and injured 119, I came across an excellent short video on the CBBC website aimed at helping parents and children to discuss the event. Entitled ‘Advice if you're upset by the news’, the message of the video was this: “When things like this happen, it’s normal to feel upset and worried, to think things like ‘Why did this happen?’ Although events like this are very sad, they are also rare…

Remember, when things like this happen, most people are there to help.”

The task of approaching such an upsetting subject with children is particularly challenging, as youngsters will be asking the same sort of questions as adults: Why did this have to happen? How could anyone do such a thing? Am I, and my family and friends, safe?

As we reflect on these events so close to home, it is also deeply unsettling to remember that people in many parts of the world live with this sort of fear on a daily basis.

The positive focus of the CBBC video brought to mind a quote from Fred Rogers that often surfaces in the wake of confusing and tragic events: “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’ To this day, especially in times of disaster, I remember my mother’s words, and I am always comforted by realising that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world.”

The helpers were out in force in the aftermath of the Manchester bombing, when the hashtag #roomformanchester began to trend on social media. In the midst of the chaos of the attack, locals immediately made offers of help to those who had been affected by the incident. People who lived nearby opened up their homes, offering refreshments or a bed for the night; hotels took in children who had been separated from their parents; taxi drivers

offered free lifts home. Kindness and solidarity seemed to be the natural response to such a senseless and violent act.

Sadly, within a matter of days, another terrorist attack at London Bridge killed eight people and injured 48. Although both incidents were roundly condemned by Muslim leaders, there were reports of a five-fold increase in Islamophobic attacks and a 40 per cent increase in racist incidents in their wake.

Hatred and prejudice prevailed across many platforms. The ugly atmosphere visited closer to home too, with Irish Muslims experiencing attacks and insults. Imam Khaled Ghafour of the mosque in Dooradoyle, Limerick reported several acts of vandalism and the receipt of offensive items in the post. Rocks were thrown through the windows of the Masjid Maryam Mosque in Galway while up to 100 people were at prayer.

Naturally, the majority of people were horrified, and again, many were keen to help.

The evening after the attack on the Galway mosque, more than 100 people took part in a solidarity rally organised by the Galway Anti Racism Network. The group shared tea and biscuits with the Ahmadiyya community, and Imam Ibrahim Ahmad Noonan spoke of the “goodwill” that had been shown by the people of Galway. In an attempt to increase understanding of Islam, he held an open day at the mosque which was well attended.

Thankfully, the voices of hatred were once again drowned out by the ‘helpers’, who stood in solidarity with those who had been wronged.

The many small acts of kindness shown in the aftermath of the attacks all add up to a greater movement. Our only response to terror and prejudice must be increasing love and unity.

One touching video that did the rounds showed a young Muslim man, Baktash Noori, standing blindfolded on a Manchester street, alongside a sign that read “I’m Muslim and I

trust you. Do you trust me enough for a hug?”

One by one, hundreds of people approached and hugged him, with many offering words of support and comfort. “You’re not alone, kid, don’t think you’re outside,” said one man.

No matter who is wronged – whether it’s those we perceive to be ‘like us’ or people from another community, religion or culture – we always have a duty to speak up and to help in any way we can. President Michael D. Higgins has described solidarity as “the heartbeat of our society”. “Our bonds are stronger than we think, and stronger than that which at times divides us. The complex world in which we live challenges us, but it does not pose greater challenges than those faced and overcome by previous generations, or by brave movements of the oppressed in world history.”

Pope Francis, too, often calls for harmony. In early June, the Vatican published a message to mark the Islamic month of Ramadan and the feast of Eid al-Fitr, expressing the Catholic Church’s “prayerful solidarity” with Muslims during this time.

Natural as it is to become disheartened at the evil happening in the world, there is always something we can do. It is up to each of us to tackle injustice, speak out when we see or hear prejudice or hate speech, and show solidarity when a group is unfairly targeted. Look for the helpers; but be the helpers too.

Tríona Doherty Editor

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One Man, One God FR ALEC REID AND THE LONG ROAD TO PEACE

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ON TUESDAY JUNE 6, THE LAUNCH TOOK PLACE IN BELFAST OF ONE MAN, ONE GOD: THE PEACE MINISTRY OF FR ALEC REID CSsR. THE BOOK, BY FR MARTIN McKEEVER CSsR, EXAMINES THE LIFE AND MINISTRY OF THIS EXTRAORDINARY PRIEST WHO PLAYED A PIVOTAL ROLE IN THE NORTHERN IRELAND PEACE PROCESS. HERE, MARY McALEESE AND REV DR HAROLD GOOD REFLECT ON HIS LIFE AND LEGACY.

Few

p e op l e mad e a big ger contribution to the Northern Ireland peace process than Fr Alec Reid. A member of the Redemptorist community in Belfast’s Clonard monastery for over 40 years, he was moved by the suffering of people on both sides of the political divide to work for an end to violence. His contribution to peace in Ireland is immeasurable. Written by Fr REALITY SUMMER 2017

Martin McKeever, a Redemptorist professor of moral theology in Rome who hails from Belfast, One Man, One God provides unique insight into what motivated Fr Alec, and what kept him going during years of disappointment, frustration and seeming failure.

Former President of Ireland Mary McAleese, and Rev Dr Harold Good, a former president

of the Methodist Church in Ireland who played a prominent role in the peace process, spoke at the recent book launch. Their very personal reflections reveal a man whose faith in the Gospel of Christ inspired him to seek every possible opportunity for peace-making, and to develop a ministry of listening and dialogue that would eventually lead to the Good Friday Agreement.

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GREEN SHOOTS OF PEACE

By Mary McAleese Not far from where I live in North Roscommon there is a little known forest walk. Its tall skinny beech trees bear testimony to the fact that it is not an ancient forest but a relatively new planting, maybe just 30 years or more old. In recent years the magnificent carpet of bluebells that once started at the forest’s edge has spread like Brigid’s cloak, so that wherever your eye lights on an April or May day, the sheer beauty takes your breath away.

And on a dry morning after a night of rain the most delicate enchanting perfume fills the air. Heaven feels very close.

I was walking there one morning lately with my cousin who has lived nearby for 70 years but was making her first visit to the forest, half disbelieving my enthusiastic descriptions of the changes that had taken place there. She was stunned by the beauty that had taken root so unobtrusively in a once unpromising landscape that she thought she knew intimately. For some reason on the way home, Alec came into my mind. I reckon the forest was planted and the wildflower seeds scattered, 30 years ago, just as he was writing to Cardinal Tomás Ó Fiaich: “We must begin by lifting our eyes to what we want to create”.

Alec’s letter was not about beech trees

or bluebells or horticulture. It was about creating a landscape where the flower of peace would colonise the space once occupied by the toxic weed of conflict, where love would triumph over hate, and where a new generation would take responsibility for planting and nourishing the seeds of justice, dignity, parity of esteem, good neighbourliness, companionship and dialogue on which peace thrives. In 1986 Alec’s views were regarded as bonkers. Today we hail him as the man who kept his eyes and ears so close to the ground that he was the first to observe the tiny green shoots of peace growing in unlikely places, in the hearts and minds of paramilitaries; the first to

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Republican prisoners, talking to loyalist paramilitaries, befriending Protestant clergy and neighbours, listening, listening, hearing in those quiet spaces words that were drowned out in the public space, words that dared not be spoken out loud. Those words led him to believe that behind the bluster and the bullying, behind the partisanship, the paramilitarism and the paralysed politics, there was a well of Christian sentiment, of untapped compassion and forgiveness that was enough to “make a start” on the long, slow, tedious, treacherous road to peace and partnership.

Alec’s faith told him this was a journey he could not dodge. In fact it was a journey all Christians worthy of the name had to make, for as he put it: “the conflict in Northern Ireland… is a source of anguish to the Christian heart”. His health was against him, his colleagues were sceptical. He was Sisyphus, flattened time and again as the big stone rolled back down the hill over him, but each time like the Tipp hurler he was, he got up and took to the pitch again.

Crucial to Alec’s success as a peacemaker was his belief in the power of the written

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Martin and Mary McAleese pictured with Fr Alec at Clonard

intuit the opportunity for making peace that others missed because the silos in which they operated restricted their view and insulated them from hearing crucial voices.

Alec’s first lesson to all of us was and remains that if you want to end endemic conflict it is essential to engage with “all the participants through ongoing communication and dialogue”. You must listen to the other, learn and discern; that was Alec’s single transferable message. It is hard to credit now in this post Good Friday Agreement world just how radical that thinking was and how subversive it was thought to be by the powers that be. Governments would not talk to ‘terrorists’, paramilitaries had no faith in democratic politics or politicians, REALITY SUMMER 2017

Christians of one denomination would not talk to Christians of another denomination, the gravitational pull of party politics was an obstacle course to consensus building, the past kept tripping up the present, the future looked bleak. A pall of sectarianism cloaked our common humanity under one God. We simply could not see each other as God saw us. And all the time the litany of death and destruction mounted.

A lot of people just did nothing. A lot of people made things worse. Some tried valiantly to make things better, among them this quiet, unobtrusive priest who worked the shadows and the tiny spaces, crossing the lines and the barricades, entering the places where few were willing to venture; visiting

Alec’s lesson and legacy from his life on the streets of a divided Northern Ireland is that we who claim to be Christian have a moral imperative to be the guardians of this precious peace word – in fact in the power of a lot of written words. Once he intuited that peace was a possibility, that Republican paramilitaries could be persuaded to politics, that Unionists could be persuaded to parity of esteem, he began to painstakingly construct the roadmap to the alternative strategy that

would forever take the gun out of Northern Irish politics. It would lead in time to the Good Friday Agreement but first the complex views of all the constituencies had to be ascertained and woven into a comprehensive one-size-fits-all text that was refined and fine-tuned, revised and rewritten, trawled for synchronicities, raided for rays of hope, honed to accommodate competing perspectives and hard-to-shift vanities. It took years, but Alec hawked it hopefully from the margins to the centre, from hierarchies to governments, from prisons to politicians, skirting the spotlight and gathering secret momentum as one by one he brought on board a team of champions who trusted his intuition, seeing in it and in him the hands of God’s work.

In this book we see the courage of John Hume, the persuasiveness of Gerry Adams, the pivotal importance of Martin Mansergh as Alec drew Nationalists and Republicans, North and South, into dialogue with one another. The first IRA ceasefire was born. The Irish government became persuaded. The British government was persuaded and with the American government helped persuade Unionists. It was all tentative and fragile, as the Canary Wharf bomb revealed, but the miracle of the Good Friday agreement eventually vindicated Alec’s intuition and his unshakeable faith in the Catholics and Protestants of Northern Ireland and the integrity of their prayers for peace.

“We must begin,” said Alec, in 1986, “by lifting our eyes to what we want to create”.

Peace through parity of esteem, peace through the politics of companionship, of breaking bread together, that was the landscape he desired to create. No more Protestant dead, no more Catholic dead, no more wounded, no more unspeakable sorrow, no more waste of lives and hopes. No more sectarian silos.

Alec could see a time when there would be in Northern Ireland one community under God, finessing diversity and difference through respectful dialogue and democratic politics. It is still a work in progress, a process of faithfully cultivating the seedlings of peace so that some day, like the bluebells, the peace will be a sight to behold.

No-one will ever know the fullness of Alec’s contribution to the peace and good neighbourliness we now enjoy but One Man, One God lets us know something of what we owe him. It also reveals just how shockingly difficult it is to construct an enduring peace.

Alec’s lesson and legacy from his life on the streets of a divided Northern Ireland is that we who claim to be Christian have a moral imperative to be the guardians of this precious peace. At stake is the very credibility of the gospel, of Christianity itself. Alec knew that.

It is why he made peace his ministry and why we must make it ours.

COMPASSIONATE COMPANIONSHIP

By Rev Dr Harold Good It has been said that you never really know another person until you have travelled with them! If this be so, then I am in a privileged position which enables me to speak very personally of my good friend, Father Alec Reid. Undoubtedly, the best known of our shared journeys was in 2005 when we agreed to be independent witnesses to the decommissioning of the weaponry of the IRA. Rev Harold Good with Fr Alec

Young Alec

But there were many more journeys to follow, with none more important to each of us than our shared journey of faith as fellow pilgrims in our journey with Christ.

One Man, One God is a remarkable book for many reasons. Not only does it provide a unique and detailed record of the many conversations initiated and facilitated by Father Alec which were to provide the basis for wider conversations

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culminating in the Good Friday Agreement, it also introduces us to the many diverse personalities with whom he formed remarkable relationships.

No less important than prelates, presidents, and politicians was Liz, she from “the other side” who “threw him kisses” across the physical wall that divided her community from his!

This was Father Alec’s very special gift. Wherever he and we travelled it was this gift of uncomplicated, unconditional and non- judgemental friendship which opened doors as well as conversations with total strangers, amongst whom would be perceived adversaries and doubters as well as believers. His seemingly innocent “And what is your name...?” was the reassuring key with which he unlocked the hesitancy on the part of someone he had never

For Alec, whoever he would meet on his journey was to be respected for who they were. Neither they nor their opinions were to be dismissed, however they may have differed from his own. Whatever ‘baggage’ they were assumed to carry, Alec always saw the best in everyone. When the patience of others was exhausted, he refused to give up on his vision or his mission – or on those he knew to be critical players in the process of peace.

In Father Alec’s recollections of the meetings, letters and challenges of his many years of persuasion, he has left us a very authentic historical record of a hugely important journey – a record which in itself will provide a template for those who are seeking peace in other places of as yet unresolved conflict.

As well as meticulous recording of events, this book has huge importance for those of us whose faith has been severely challenged by the cynicism of an unbelieving world which at times has had good reason to be dismissive of institutional religion and

its contribution to conflict. For Alec Reid it is his very personal faith in the simple yet profound Gospel of Christ which is the catalyst for all that he seeks to do and say. It is a faith for which he makes no apology, for this is who he is. A “Beatitude person”, committed to a “lived Gospel”, as described by contributors to this book.

Be we clergy or laity who would wish to understand what it means to be reconcilers in our world of today, there is no more important section in this book than Father Alec’s lecture on ‘The Role of the Servant of Christ in a situation of political conflict’. For him the politics of condemnation is entirely futile. Based on the example of Jesus, he speaks of a “ministry of connection” and “compassionate companionship” as distinctive alternatives to be offered by those of us who would seek to be servants of Christ in any and every situation of conflict.

If it were within my power to do so, I would make this book, and this section in particular, a mandatory textbook for every seminarian and student for ministry, of whatever tradition. I appeal to those in whose gift it may be to do so. I contend that the credibility of the church in today’s world will depend upon how seriously or otherwise we are prepared to take this message.

If he were still with us I know what this humble and very practical servant of Christ would say to all of this: “If you really want to honour me, get on with it!”

When the patience of others was exhausted, he refused to give up on his vision or his mission – or on those he knew to be critical players in the process of peace met. Could it have been more than coincidence that he always had a favourite aunt or sister or cousin who shared the same name? But it worked!

It was his way of reassuring them that they were very special to him.

REALITY SUMMER 2017

Mary McAleese; Maura Litster, Fr Alec's sister; and Fr Dan Baragry, Redemptorist Provincial, pictured at the book launch

COM M E N T THE YOUNG VOICE DAVID O’DONOGHUE

A CHRISTIANITY OF THE HEART AND MIND

THERE ARE MANY DIFFERENT WAYS OF JOURNEYING INTO FAITH. SOME TAKE AN INTELLECTUAL PATH WHILE OTHERS ARE LED BY THE HEART. One of the most extraordinary things about faith is its multifaceted nature. Its permeating of so much of the history of human civilisation and thought, as well as its innumerable manifestations through myriad interpretations and traditions, means that an understanding of and sympathy with faith is possible for people from all walks of life and all ideological positions.

Yet somehow this position seems increasingly impossible in a modern landscape where the ‘enlightened’ position seems always to presume a dogged secularism and agnosticism.

My window into faith and my journey to Christianity from a mindset of agnostic atheism was perhaps a strange one, but one much uncommented on in our discourse surrounding religion.

As a precocious teenager I prized rationalism, the pursuit of knowledge and the life of the mind over all things. I had an upbringing that instilled in me the value of education and truth seeking and which gave me a full faith in the ability of mankind to use our pursuit of knowledge and information as a tool to make the world a better place to aid our understanding of our fellow man. My heroes were intellectuals and academics, artists and activists; people who used brain power and rigorous learning to achieve transformative change as well as pursuing the furtherance of knowledge as a good in and of itself. I had distanced myself from faith and spirituality

precisely because I felt that such outmoded traditions were inherently anti-intellectual. After all, what could be more irrational than adhering to metaphysical beliefs in opposition to rational analysis? This is a view held by many, even large numbers of those nearest and dearest to me, which posits that faith is at odds with rationality and the desire to better society through intellectual dedication and what the Greeks would have called the “love of knowledge”.

And then slowly but surely I began to dig into the intellectual backgrounds of some of the thinkers and creators I most admired – William Blake, Henry David Thoreau, Leo Tolstoy, Baruch Spinoza – and began to discover that religious faith often underpinned the drive these people had toward pursing knowledge and artistry for the sake of bettering mankind. I have written extensively in these pages about the truly complementary relationship between science, reason, and religion, and the role the church and faith communities have played in creating an environment of reverence for the advancement of human reason, but I cannot overemphasise just what a revelation this discovery was to me. The whole world seemed turned on its head and I began to consume works on faith with a voracious appetite. I found within theological thinking the kind of pure and natural intellectualism I desperately

sought – simultaneously indepth and complex with its own fascinating movements and idiolects, but never removing itself from the central concern of using that knowledge to make better selves and better societies.

I had discovered that there was a path to God through the life of the mind that was well trod and lit by generations that came before me, and that wandering down it was immens ely rewarding. But in doing so I too often rejected, in my mind, those who were led to faith by the path of the heart. The path of my heart to faith remained dusty and disused, “the road less travelled” in my journey to exploring a relationship with the divine.

In finding my own accessible path to God I made an idol of intellectualism and the capacity for reason. God was to be preached about in inaccessible tomes filled with jargon and citations, expressing a purer form of faith that those Massgoers who were uninterested in lengthy conversations about the nature of the Synoptic Gospels or the neo-Platonic influence on early Christianity simply could not access. But in fetishising this Christ of scholastic achievement and monastic dedication to art, science and intellectual theology, we reject the Christ of the heart that drove of all of these brilliant men and women in the first place. We reject the Christ of the heart that makes these debates and pursuits worthwhile

in the first place. In sprawling discussions about the impact of faith on civilisations and the sociological implications of the Reformation we lose the simple, beating Sacred Heart of faith in and of itself. Christ scorned the Pharisees for just this reason.

There are innumerable people like my grandmother, who many would write off as “Mass-going little old ladies”, who know Christ much more intimately than myself without ever having opened Augustine.

For they have taken the path of the heart, in loving and living intimately with Christ as a friend, companion and teacher, and not merely a point of contention in Medieval arguments about theological matters. In creating a Christianity for a new world we must reopen the path of the mind for those who do not see it as a viable route to faith, and we must celebrate the pursuit of study, science and the arts as paths to the divine. But we must not neglect the warm and simple path of love and kindness and charity in the process. For after all, no matter all the textbooks and arguments, that is the whole of the law.

David O'Donoghue is a freelance journalist from Co. Kerry. His work has appeared in The Irish Catholic, the Irish Independent, and The Kerryman. He is the former political editor of campus.ie and holds an abiding interest in all things literary, political and spiritual.

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

OPEN TO THE

'WORD' WALKING WITH US

THE CHURCH’S ‘ORDINARY TIME’ IS MUCH MORE THAN A BREAK AFTER THE EXCITEMENT OF THE MAJOR FEASTS. IT OFFERS AN OPPORTUNITY TO ENTER MORE DEEPLY INTO THE MYSTERY OF CHRIST.

BY SARAH ADAMS

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As

a child, I was quite observant and would always notice when the priest’s vestments changed colour. My heart would sink when they turned to green. To me, the wearing of green signalled a rather long time of ‘nothing happening’. I liked the excitement of Easter and Christmas. I didn’t understand the significance of ‘Ordinary Time’, a period within the church’s year that we have just entered.

We might be forgiven for thinking that this is just an opportunity to breathe after all the excitement of major feasts. It could be seen as a time for resting before the next big event. However there is much more to Ordinary Time. The word ‘ordinary’ suggests something which is not particularly special or important. ‘Ordinary’ comes from the Latin ‘ordinalis’ which actually refers to numbers in a series. It is called ‘ordinary’ not because it is common but simply because the weeks of Ordinary Time are numbered.

Even though the season makes up most of the liturgical year in the Catholic Church, REALITY SUMMER 2017

the fact that it refers to those periods that fall outside of the major liturgical seasons reinforces the impression that they are not very interesting. This is far from the case. In reality the numbered weeks of Ordinary Time represent what we might call the ordered life of the church – the period when we are neither fasting nor feasting, but living in watchfulness and expectation for the Second Coming of Christ. Ordinary time occurs twice in the year. The first is the period between Christmas and Lent, and then from Pentecost to the end of the Liturgical year just before Advent. The Gospel for the Second Sunday of Ordinary Time always features John the Baptist’s acknowledgement of Christ as the Lamb, or Christ’s first miracle – the transformation of water into wine at the wedding feast of Cana. In other words, for us Ordinary Time is a period of time when Christ walks among us, transforming our lives. Such transformation could never be termed ‘ordinary’.

CHRIST WALKING WITH US Understanding ‘Ordinary Time’ as a time when Christ walks with us, encourages us to enter more deeply into the mystery of Christ in all its aspects. In this time we can grow closer to the Lord and deepen our spiritual lives. The Sunday readings offer us an opportunity to engage with this spiritual journey by listening, reflecting and responding to the invitation each week. As a community (assembly) we have a responsibility to engage with the Word, to listen, to hear and to respond to it with our lives. Knowing this to be the case, those of us who take on the ministry of reader (lector) have an onerous responsibility to ensure that how they proclaim the Word, does in fact allow those who listen, to hear not just physically, but spiritually. ‘Reading’ at Mass is not like reading a story to a child, though how we do that is important too. In proclaiming the word of God, the reader has a responsibility to mediate the presence of Christ to all who are present. God speaks to the gathered community through the readings.

It may seem strange, but a starting point for those of us who are Ministers of the Word, is an understanding of story. All of us hold stories within us. These are the tales of our life experiences, our fears, hopes, struggles, longings; all things which say something about our lives as individuals and as families. Some of our stories we remember vividly and some we choose to forget. However we deal with them, they remain a part of who we are and how we relate to the world around us. The world which we inhabit also has stories – cultural, ethnic and social – all of which serve to provide us with a backdrop to our own story. These bigger stories can help us to feel anchored and tell us that we belong to something bigger, something beyond ourselves.

These stories help us to deal with the highs and lows of life as we see our own story echoed and reflected in the lives of others. Forgetting our story can cause us to lose our way.

The stories contained within the scriptures which we hear each week in church, give us a view of reality that rises above the cultural trends which dominate our lives. Each week they help us to refocus on what is important. The great stories of our tradition remind us that God has always been with us and continues to be involved in our lives through the incarnation

and humanity of Jesus. These stories of our faith are essential to our formation and growth as Christians, both personally and communally.

Each time we hear them we are reminded of God’s infinite love, ever present and ever active in our struggling world. Through the experience we are encouraged and renewed as people of faith for the week ahead.

EATING OUR WORDS Given the centrality of these stories to our life of faith, how the assembly hears and appropriates them is crucial. When we switch off in the belief that they are irrelevant or become passive, we are at risk of forgetting at a profound level, who we are and where we come from. This is why those of us who proclaim the scriptures need to know how significant they are so that we can share our passion and understanding with those who are listening. This does not come simply by having a loud, clear voice or a working sound system. It requires the lector to spend time in prayer, reflecting on the readings, so that the words we read become our own. Knowing the readings thoroughly will allow the lector a better chance of looking at the assembly, and through this drawing them deeper into the story being told.

For all of this to happen, ministers need to be

In proclaiming the word of God, the reader has a responsibility to mediate the presence of Christ to all who are present.

open to and given opportunities for formation in liturgical ministry. Such training ensures that people come to a deeper understanding of the significance of their role and the responsibility carried. Some parishes take this very seriously.

They provide occasions when those who read can listen to one another, learn techniques, gain a greater insight into the Bible and critique one another in a challenging but supportive manner.

Following such formation, those who take on the role should be commissioned in their act of service to the community. Remembering that it is an act of service rather than the opportunity to show how good we are at reading, will help us to remember that God is the focus of what we do.

On a practical level, it is important, particularly on a Sunday, to have two different readers. Apart from involving more people in the ministry, it assists the assembly in hearing the different genres and context of passages of Scripture. The psalm is the people’s response to the reading they have just heard and so wherever possible it should be sung, led by a cantor. If this cannot happen the second reader may lead the psalm with people joining in the response.

In conclusion, when the Lord speaks to Ezekiel (2:7-10) we are given a true insight into what it is we need to remember in our ministry of lector: “You shall speak my words to (the people of Israel), whether they hear or refuse to hear; for they are a rebellious house. But you, mortal, hear what I say to you; do not be rebellious like that rebellious house; open your mouth and eat what I give you.” I looked, and a hand was stretched out to me, and a written scroll was in it. He spread it before me; it had writing on the front and on the back, and written on it were words of lamentation and mourning and woe.

In short – those of us who take on this important ministry – must be prepared to ‘eat’ the words we are to read, if we are to minister with integrity in our proclamation of the Word. Understanding this will help us not to dismiss Ordinary Time, but see it as a real opportunity to ensure that every member of the community can grow more deeply and profoundly in their relationship with Christ.

Sarah Adams studied liturgical theology at Maynooth. She now lives on a farm in Devon, working for the Diocese of Plymouth as a Religious Education adviser. She enjoys hiking on Dartmoor and the surrounding countryside.

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ISAAC HECKER

CATHOLIC APOSTLE TO AMERICA MORE THAN 150 YEARS AGO, FOUNDER OF THE PAULIST FATHERS, FR ISAAC HECKER, POSED A QUESTION THAT REMAINS PERTINENT TODAY: ARE THE VALUES OF FREEDOM, DEMOCRACY, AND INDIVIDUALISM COMPATIBLE WITH CATHOLICISM?

BY MIKE DALEY

In

1896, a long simmering controversy finally erupted. The occasion for it was the French translation of a previously published biography entitled The Life of Father Hecker written by Paulist Fr Walter Elliott, a friend and religious confidant of Isaac Thomas Hecker. For some years prior, as the book’s introduction by Abbe Felix Klein suggested, Hecker had become a cause célèbre in both America and Europe revolving around the ideas of cultural accommodation and assimilation.

David J. O’Brien, author of Isaac Hecker: An American Catholic and emeritus professor of theology at the College of the Holy Cross, states that “[l]iberals pointed to Hecker as a symbol of a more effective response to freedom and democracy, conservatives found in his writings and liberal commentary on them evidence of laxness, if not heresy.”

On January 22, 1899, Pope Leo XIII issued an apostolic letter entitled Testem Benevolentiae to Cardinal James Gibbons, the archbishop of Baltimore, Maryland. In it, the pope hoped to settle any lingering theological debates and condemned a number of supposed false beliefs under the heading of “Americanism”.

Chiefly, though, the main area of concern for Pope Leo was to dismiss the idea “that,

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in order the more easily to bring over to Catholic doctrine those who dissent from it, the Church ought to adapt herself somewhat to our advanced civilisation and, relaxing her ancient rigour, show some indulgence to modern popular theories and methods.”

But who was this man whose name and beliefs had pejoratively become associated with the “phantom heresy” of Americanism?

THE SPIRITUAL SEARCHER Born in New York City on December 18, 1819, Isaac Hecker was one of five children and the youngest son of German immigrant parents.

An introspective and intellectually gifted child, Hecker was unable to pursue much of a formal education due to his family’s economic needs. His early years found him in the employ of his elder brothers who owned a burgeoning bakery business. During his travels as their delivery boy, Hecker saw firsthand the city’s great social disparities and became aware of the plight of the poor and marginalised.

Developing within him at the same time was a growing religious and spiritual appreciation. Though he never thought of himself as such, Methodism was the religion that Hecker’s mother practiced and the one

in which he was raised. Over the succeeding years, he examined the Episcopal, Mormon, and Unitarian traditions.

Yet, there also was frustration at what God wanted of him. Feelings of depression and loneliness filled Hecker. The philosophies of Kant and Hegel distracted him from business obligations. After a series of mystical dreams in 1842, his brothers thought it best to let their brother pursue his spiritual longings and the movement of the Holy Spirit in his life.

serving German immigrants, and was sent to Europe for studies in preparation for ordination to the priesthood. Returning to the states in 1851 he and a band of Redemptorists traveled across the country conducting parish missions. While Hecker saw the value of reaching out to unchurched and non-practicing Catholics, he was increasingly convinced of a higher calling.

As he shared with a Redemptorist superior, “I believe that Providence calls me…to America to convert a certain class of persons amongst whom I found myself before my conversion.”

To this end, Hecker travelled to Rome in 1857 seeking permission for a new mission to reach English-speaking Protestants and bring them to the Catholic faith.

Apparently his trip was done without prior approval from his religious superiors though, and Hecker was dismissed from the Redemptorists. However, in the end, Pope Pius IX granted recognition of a new religious community, the Missionary Society of St Paul the Apostle, commonly known today as the Paulists.

The question was still debated though: were America and Catholicism contradictory or complementary? Paulist Fr Bruce Nieli, past director of evangelisation of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, answers: “Connected with Isaac’s passion for Catholicism was his passion for America.

He was convinced that America was good for the church. He beheld the American experience of religious freedom as helping the Catholic Church grow in membership and openness to the Spirit. To Pope Pius IX’s caution that ‘in the United States there exists too unrestricted liberty,’ Hecker, in a personal audience with the pope, responded that many ‘seeing in the United States that the Church is alone and independent, begin to regard it as a divine institution, and not as necessarily connected with what they term despotism, and they return to the Church.’”

While Hecker saw the value of reaching out to unchurched and non-practicing Catholics, he was increasingly convinced of a higher calling.

Through correspondence with the future and eventually famous Catholic convert Orestes Brownson, Hecker was encouraged to join the Transcendentalist and utopian communities outside Boston of Brook Farm and later Fruitlands. It was there Hecker experienced the paradox of American spirituality. As Paulist Fr Brett Hoover, professor of theology at Loyola Marymount University, remarks, “He thought that every culture and every people had both a genius and an Achilles heel, and individualism was both for Americans. It equipped Americans for the spiritual quest and helped them appreciate the diverse gifts of the Spirit, but it also meant Americans often did not know how much they needed a real experience of spiritual community.”

CATHOLICISM AND THE PAULISTS Hecker’s circuitous path to faith appeared to be answered in 1844 when he entered the Catholic Church. Of it, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the present archbishop of New York, said of Hecker: “He’s almost an icon of this American odyssey of searching for meaning and religious identity.”

Shortly thereafter, Hecker joined the Redemptorists, a missionary community

EVANGELISING AMERICA With New York City and St Paul the Apostle

parish as their base, Hecker and his confrères set out to convert America to Catholicism.

They began the Catholic World magazine in 1865 followed by the Catholic Publication Society (today’s Paulist Press). Hecker addressed the bishops of the United States gathered at the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore in 1866 where he shared his evangelisation vision with them. All the while, he and his Paulist companions spoke to whomever and wherever they could, sharing the Catholic faith with wary American audiences.

After returning home from attending the First Vatican Council in 1870, Hecker fell seriously ill with chronic leukemia.

Attempting to improve his health and find a cure, he travelled to Europe, later visiting Egypt, where he was exposed to Islam, and the Holy Land. With his health declining, Hecker returned to America and New York City in 1875.

Hecker, a man not only of his times but, as the reforms of the Second Vatican Council would demonstrate, also ahead of his times, died on December 22, 1888.

Officially declared a Servant of God, his cause for canonisation proceeds in the Catholic Church.

In closing, as O’Brien argues, “In a thoroughly American apologetic, Hecker drew on his experience as an unchurched American to argue that Catholicism alone could answer the spiritual hungers and intellectual questions arising from the American experience of religious freedom, pluralism, and social and economic progress.”

Hecker’s Catholic America is still a work in progress.

Mike Daley is a teacher and writer from Cincinnati, OH where he lives with his wife June, and their three children. He is a frequent contributor to Reality. His latest book is Vatican II: Fifty Personal Stories (Orbis).

21

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22

FRANCIS LEDWIDGE A CENTENARY TRIBUTE

SLANE’S BELOVED POET DIED ON THE BATTLEFIELDS OF WORLD WAR I AT THE TENDER AGE OF 29. YET IN HIS SHORT YEARS THIS “POET OF THE BLACKBIRD” GRAPPLED WITH SOME OF THE DEEP ISSUES OF LIFE.

BY DONAL McMAHON

REALITY SUMMER 2017

The

anniversary of a death provides an opportunity to reflect on the life of the deceased. We go over again, slowly, the events of the person’s life story, until, in ever-widening arcs of reminiscence and wonderment, our thinking drifts off into a haze of prayers and musings about the meaning of it all. Each person’s life, whether it be someone near and dear to us or some famous person in history, can be rich material for such meditation. On July 31 we mark the centenary of the death of Francis Ledwidge, the poet from Slane, who died at the age of 29 and is buried in Boesinghe, near the Yser canal, north of Ypres. Let us pay him a centenary tribute here by meditating on his life and death.

DEATH After weeks of preliminary artillery bombardment, the major offensive of the Third Battle of Ypres was launched at 3.50am on the night of July 31, 1917 over devastated terrain turned to mud by sudden heavy rain. Ledwidge’s reserve battalion, 1 Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, formed a working party to build a road on the ground captured that night from the Germans. As his biographer Alice Curtayne puts it, “The army’s first need was men; their second, guns; their third, roads.” So Ledwidge found himself back at the work he had been doing in his early twenties for Navan Rural District Council, which, with his strong, tall frame, he had always been good at. When the men were having a cup of tea in the afternoon, alas, a shell dropped, killing Ledwidge as well as four other ordinary soldiers and an officer.

And so the brief candle of this young man’s

life was suddenly put out, the “poor birdhearted singer of a day” (as he calls himself in ‘My Mother’) had sung his last.

WAR SERVICE After a few weeks of agonising indecision in September and early October 1914 over whether to heed or ignore Redmond’s appeal to the Irish Volunteers to serve in the war, Ledwidge finally took the first option, on the grounds that England “stood between Ireland and an enemy common to our civilisation and I would not have her say that she defended us while we did nothing at home but pass resolutions”. Thomas MacDonagh, for one, took the second, destining himself as a result to be elegised

by Ledwidge in his famous lament. So while MacDonagh and the other IRB conspirators set about preparing for an armed rebellion, Ledwidge and his comrades of the 10th Division were risking their lives in Gallipoli from July to September and in the Balkans from October to December 1915.

An advance copy of his first book of poems, Songs of the Fields, reached him in the freezing cold high up in the mountains of Serbia, a world away from the plains and gentle hills of his beloved Meath. These wartime experiences provided the material for his second volume, Songs of Peace, published posthumously in 1917. When making boots out of leather bat-wings, the faeries of the poem ‘Currabwee’ sing of “Ireland glorious and free”. “So I heard Joseph Plunkett say,” reports the poet. And they warm their hands “against the light of stars”, he goes on to report Pearse as saying.

Then, delicately but firmly, Ledwidge adds his voice to Plunkett’s and Pearse’s, thereby

affirming the value of his and his comrades’ own contribution to Ireland’s glory and freedom: And I myself have often heard Their singing as the stars went by, For am I not of those who reared The banner of old Ireland high, From Dublin town to Turkey’s shores, And where the Vardar [in Greece] loudly roars?

Ledwidge’s mother, Anne, widowed when he, the second youngest of eight surviving children, was not yet five, bent herself valiantly to the task of looking after them, even to the extent of labouring in the fields.

Her son’s service in the battlefields overseas shows a similar spirit of total dedication.

THE GOLDEN GOAL Considering now the question of how a life of action like this is verbalised and justified in thought and writing, we turn from Ledwidge the labourer and soldier to Ledwidge the poet. Ledwidge wrote mainly descriptive poetry about the world he knew best, the sights and sounds of nature around Slane. “He is the poet of the blackbird,” wrote Lord Dunsany in the introduction to Songs of the Fields. But the analogy between poet and blackbird-like singer can only be taken so far. Poetry, after all, is not only music but meaning. The poet is not just singer but thinker and so cannot but be drawn, to a greater or lesser extent, into what T. S. Eliot called “the intolerable wrestle with words and meanings”.

Keats, whom Ledwidge admired, though enraptured by the nightingale’s song as much as the Irish poet was by that bird’s Irish equivalent, was, in the end, brought

23

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firmly back to earth “from thee to my sad self”.

To use another traditional term, a poet is a seer as well as singer. He (please understand “she” as well) has to interpret, see meanings and truths, try to penetrate the dark future.

Now there are one or two long poems where we witness Ledwidge attempting this task.

These “sad self” poems are often seen as poems to do with his break-up with Ellie Vaughey, who married another but died in childbirth on June 19, 1916. That being granted, I would argue that Ledwidge is also

successfully this, the abiding theme of all literature, the “old pain”, the still unanswered question of the meaning and purpose of life that haunts humanity.

CHILD OF CIRCUMSTANCE The poet wrote a very interesting autobiographical poem (‘Soliloquy’) not long before his death. Here we see him again trying to find meaning, to understand the past, understand himself, understand the immensity of what lay about him in war-torn France/Belgium. “And now I’m drinking wine in France, / The helpless child of circumstance.”

Isn’t the life of each of us shaped by “circumstance” – our parents, the time and place of our birth, the people we meet in our lives, the good fortune or otherwise that befalls us? And, beyond the individual, are not groups and nations likewise viewable as helpless creatures of the great circumstance of evolving world history? We note that while acknowledging

An advance copy of his first book of poems, Songs of the Fields, reached him in the freezing cold high up in the mountains of Serbia, a world away from the plains and gentle hills of his beloved Meath.

24

grappling here, as we all have to do at some stage, with the deep issues of life, issues that were to deepen even further for him as politics faltered and world war threatened.

“But O for truths about the soul denied!” he exclaims in ‘The Visitation of Peace’. In ‘An Old Pain’ he philosophises further about the soul: “I hold the mind is the imprisoned soul, / And all our aspirations are its own / Struggles and strivings for a golden goal.”

Here the writing reaches, for once, a level of high rhetorical generalisation; it makes a statement, however derivative in expression, of general truth about the human condition.

Of such writing is the best poetry made: “We are such stuff as dreams are made on…”.

The old pain here is humanity’s inability to understand the reason why, a pain expressed so unforgettably by the three sisters in the last lines of Chekhov’s play: “If only we knew why we live, why we suffer! If only we knew!” Chekhov was able to hold that question before him and structure it into a truly memorable dramatic meditation on the human condition. Had he lived, Ledwidge too, no doubt, would very likely have explored more deliberately and treated more REALITY SUMMER 2017

the “circumstance” he has no choice over, Ledwidge nevertheless exercises the freedom that is his to choose the kind of self he wishes to be: “A keen-edged sword, a soldier’s heart, / Is greater than a poet’s art. / And greater than a poet’s fame / A little grave that has no name.”

Unknown to Francis Ledwidge, there was someone at that very moment serving in the French army as stretcher-bearer who was exploring these vast questions of “circumstance” and its relation to the “golden goal” of world history, or “Pleroma” (Fullness) as he calls it, quoting St Paul. His name was Teilhard de Chardin SJ and his thoughts about where humanity had come from and where it was – despite the utter awfulness of appearances at that time – on the road towards were published subsequently under the title Writings in Time of War. He discerns the growth of humanity from prehistory through history towards a single unified body, with each person being a precious atomconstituent of the marvellous, miraculous whole, the “golden goal” of creation reached when history and providence completely coincide.

In ‘The Vision on the Brink’ Ledwidge presents himself as departing – for war service, very likely. When the moon is setting and a falling star “moves you to prayer”, then, says the poet to the unnamed addressee, “will you think of me / On the long road that will not ever end”. Yes, let us think of the road builder of Slane who died repairing a road in Boesinghe on July 31, 1917 as being now, with all the fallen, on the long road leading to de Chardin’s Pleroma and his own golden goal.

Donal McMahon taught English in the seminary of St Patrick’s College, Maynooth from 1974 to 2013.

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A NEW MODEL OF SERVICE POPE FRANCIS OFFERS A PROPHETIC VOICE FOR OUR TIME, CALLING ALL MEN AND WOMEN OF GOODWILL TO SERVICE. HOW CAN WE, AS A CHURCH, PUT HIS WORDS AND EXAMPLE INTO PRACTICE?

BY JOHN HORGAN

Half

a century since the end of the Second Vatican Council surely offers a good opportunity, not just for reflecting on the past, but for offering a few thoughts about the present and the future.

An extraordinary leading article was published recently in the London Guardian, a liberal, middle-class newspaper which has not

been slow in the past to adopt a somewhat patronising, and occasionally hostile, attitude towards the Catholic Church, and indeed towards Ireland This article was about Pope Francis. It started off in traditional Guardian mode, describing him as leading an organisation “that fought against democracy, liberty,

equality and feminism for nearly 200 years after the French revolution of 1789”. But then the tone changes.

Reviewing Pope Francis’ encyclical on the environment, and many of his more recent pronouncements, particularly on geopolitical and social matters, it commented: “Pope Francis has been an

F E AT U R E

astonishingly eloquent advocate for human rights, for the environment, for peace and against the ravages of capitalism. He doesn’t do fluffy. In fact, at times, he sounds like a pure revolutionary.” He is, the editor adds, a champion of humanity against the evils of global poverty, global greed, and the destruction of the environment.

unsung fashion, and perhaps that is the way it should be. The parable of the Pharisee is never irrelevant. But might it also be timely to look at a more radical adaptation of church structures and ministry to sharpen focus on where it is most needed, rather than on comfortable familiarities?

The danger with the present structures, as in all organisations, is that that their support and maintenance becomes central, rather than their original sense of purpose. This is even more problematic in an era in which church attendance is falling dramatically, clerical vocations are at an all-time low, and a largely (if in many cases nominally) Catholic electorate feels increasingly free to ignore or even reject episcopal advice that would, a few decades ago, have been treated almost as Holy Writ.

The prioritisation of structure over values and mission could be interpreted as running the risk of becoming a sort of idolatry. The future – even the survival – of our church is not in the hands of the faithful, but in the hands of the Holy Spirit; and yet it sometimes seems as if too many people believe that the continuation – indeed the preservation – of the church and its message is dependent solely on its office-holders and its present structures, and these, therefore, have to be defended as if they were the church itself.

Some time ago I was talking to one of our most respected theologians about such matters, and he observed thoughtfully: “I think the problem is not that we have ceased to believe in God, but that he has ceased to believe in us.”

If this is true, to any extent, what has to be done to re-kindle God’s faith in us?

Perhaps everything should be measured against a Scripture-based simplicity and a ruthless willingness to abandon or change it radically if it is not fit for purpose. This, of course, means first of all that there is some kind of consensus on what that

Perhaps everything should be measured against a Scripture-based simplicity and a ruthless willingness to abandon or change it radically if it is not fit for purpose

26

Perhaps this is as useful a text as any to use as a base for a review of where Irish Catholicism stands, not only within Ireland but in the increasingly globalised world in which we live.

First of all, there are undeniable positives.

Although rhetoric about the Christian response to the Third World does not always match deeds to the words, it is beginning to be accepted that deeds, including in particular providing a genuine welcome for refugees, are important. Ireland is one of the few countries in Europe without a political party that champions a thinly-disguised racism as a cheap way of aggrandising false fears and garnering votes. Many of our communities are still small enough, and closely-knit enough, for charity and altruism to dampen the fitful flames of prejudice born of ignorance and fear, provided there is the right kind of leadership.

BEYOND OUR COMFORT ZONES The stresses and strains of the past decade, however, have taken their toll. Internal competitiveness, feelings of powerlessness and exclusion, an increasing awareness of unjustifiable inequalities, and anxiety about an uncertain future, all chip away at our best instincts – and, perhaps, at our Christian beliefs and values.

There are of course many individuals, organisations, and indeed parishes which embody these values, often in a quiet, REALITY SUMMER 2017

purpose is. There is, thankfully, a reasonable template: the Beatitudes. One of Christ’s most uncompromising messages was his prediction of the fate of those who neglected to feed the hungry. And perhaps church structures and commitments should be measured against these rather than against legacy values which are tied up, all too often, with questions of bricks and mortar, power, money, status and prestige.

PROPHETIC VOICES Thankfully, real questions about the model of ministry are surfacing today, and will not go away. But the reform of ministry will not be achieved by simply bolting on additional options to a too-rigid, almost fossilised, and clericalised structure. Clericalism itself, and its historical evolution, have to be reexamined in the light of the real needs of today. Certainly, if Christianity, in some miraculous way, were to be established for the first time tomorrow, its founder might not have invented the same management and control model that has evolved after almost two centuries of trial and (often) error. This task is perhaps best approached by considering what exists currently not as a blueprint (although there are certain Scriptural hints), but as a permanent ‘work in progress’.

Liturgy can become, if we are not too fearful of change, a better celebration of what we are, and a communal, coherent expression of a sense of identity and of purpose.

Current practice has, it is true, thankfully come a long way from what someone once tellingly described as “the sacred mutter of the Mass”. But there is still, surely, room for experimentation, for bringing that celebration to communities of many different kinds, as well as maintaining the centrality of a Eucharist – perhaps celebrated with less frequency, but with more meaning – embodying the larger community to which all, the halt and the blind, the sinner and the saint, have equal access.

And perhaps there should be an alertness to the voice of prophecy, whenever and wherever it occurs, and a willingness to

celebrate and value it. It is not to be found only among the church’s ministers, although some of them have honourable records in this regard. The St Vincent de Paul Society and many individuals have prophetic voices underpinned by a deep faith but who do not wear their religion on their sleeves.

the experience of Vatican II, I wrote a short book called The Church Among the People, which was an attempt to demonstrate that within what had previously been seen as a monolithic church were many different, but not conflicting, forms of ministry, and of culturally specific expressions of belief and worship

And perhaps there should be an alertness to the voice of prophecy, whenever and wherever it occurs, and a willingness to celebrate and value it Above all, the Christian community needs to recognise its own strengths, based on our own experience and the needs of its own people, develop them, and harness them to the service of Ireland and indeed to that of the world at large.

This may also involve a recognition that, even as the world shrinks under the impact of globalisation, its particularities remain important, even vital. In 1969, emboldened by

By the time that book appeared, the tsunami of post-Conciliar publications had all but subsided, and it created hardly a ripple. Now, it is fascinating to hear what Pope Francis has to say, not just about the real world in all its variety, but about the relationship between doctrine and life. Hearing the extraordinary reactions to his leadership from the most unexpected quarters, it is tempting to believe that his is really a great voice, of and for our

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times, calling the church and all men and women of goodwill to witness and to service.

An underlying theme of much of what he says is that flexibility is not weakness, and that unity does not necessarily involve uniformity. Perhaps the church of the future may learn, in the words of the Bengali poet and philosopher, Rabindranath Tagore, that “the problem is not how to wipe out all differences, but how to unite with all differences intact.”

Dr John Horgan was a journalist at the Second Vatican Council.

He later served as a Labour TD and member of the European Parliament before becoming Professor of Journalism at DCU and Ireland’s first Press Ombudsman.

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THE LAST VOYAGE OF

THE S.S. BRITANNIA AS PART OF OUR SERIES HIGHLIGHTING STORIES FROM THE ARCHIVES, THE MARCH ISSUE OF REALITY FEATURED ‘SHIPWRECKED!’ - THE STORY OF FRS ARTHUR MOLONEY AND MICHAEL FOX WHO WERE INDIA-BOUND ON THE S.S BRITANNIA WHEN IT WAS SHELLED AND SUNK BY A GERMAN WARSHIP. HERE IS A MORE DETAILED ACCOUNT OF THE SHIP’S FATE.

BY MICHAEL KIRWAN

28

On

March 13, 1941, during World War II, the S.S Britannia sailed from Liverpool bound for Bombay, India. She was an 8,463 G.R.T. passenger ship owned by Anchor Line Ltd., under the command of 65-year-old Captain Alexander Collie. On board was a crew of 203 and 281 passengers including 38-year-old Fr Arthur Maloney CSsR and 41-year-old Fr Michael Fox CSsR, who were on their way to the missions in India.

The ship joined a convoy of ships and a few escort ships.

This was the routine to minimise an attack from German U-boat submarines. The convoy headed north around the top of Ireland and went far out into the Atlantic Ocean before turning south for South Africa and then crossing the Indian Ocean.

Twelve days out the weather was improving every day as the ship sailed south. As the

REALITY SUMMER 2017

Britannia approached the equator the other ships in the convoy had dispersed going to different destinations. Everyone was looking forward to the crossing of the line ceremony in the next day or two. However on March 24, a cargo ship was sighted on the starboard side.

On the following morning it was still steaming alongside and the captain became suspicious that all was not well.

UNDER ATTACK The next morning the ship suddenly opened fire. It turned out to be a German raider ship named Thor disguised as a cargo ship, under the command of 26-year-old Kapitän Otto Kähler.

The Britannia tried to get away but was no match for the speed of the Thor. She put up a smoke screen but this did not deter the attack. She had a gun on the aft of the ship and that was quickly

shelled and the men operating it killed.

The radio operators on board the Britannia managed to send off a SOS message in Morse code and it was picked up by Freetown Radio station. They gave their position as approximatelly 720 miles west of Freetown, Sierra Leone. However, there were no ships around to assist.

landed. I had been appointed Officer in charge of the rear gun. When I got there most of the [gun] crew were dead and the gun had been smashed. The same thing had happened to the forward gun. I heard Petty Officer Heath shout ‘People are jumping overboard. There are rafts on the top deck.’ I got to the top deck and found dead and

The decks were covered with dead and wounded. Captain Collie gave the order to “abandon ship” There was widespread panic as the ship was being continuously shelled and the starboard lifeboats, except one, were blown to bits. The decks were covered with dead and wounded.

Captain Collie gave the order to “abandon ship”.

Jack Arkinstall described the scene: “Guns blazed and shells

dying. For a moment or two I sat fascinated with a naval rating propped up against a bollard and holding on to his intestines. It was time to leave.”

After taking hits from 159 ro u n d s o f a m m u n i ti o n , the Britannia stopped and surrendered. The German raider stopped firing and gave time

for the survivors and wounded to take to the lifeboats. Due to constant shelling the only useful lifeboats were now on the port side and they were heavily overcrowded. With most of the lifeboats clear the raider fired several shells below the water line and the bow started to sink.

The stern came up in the air and she slowly slipped into the ocean bed.

The Thor’s radio operator picked up the SOS message sent by the Britannia. As they were now in fear of attack themselves they sailed off and left the survivors to fend for themselves.

HARROWING SCENES Father Maloney and Father Fox managed to get into a lifeboat.

They recalled: “We were 57 in a boat meant to hold 48 so we had to emulate the horse and sleep standing. We envied the sardines in their tins! On the third morning we sighted smoke on the horizon, waved our shirts in the approved shipwrecked style of shipwrecked mariners, and eventually were hauled aboard a cargo ship bound for the river Plate.” The ship was the Raranga bound for Montevideo.

Other boats were not so fortunate. The area was infested with sharks. Some rafts were 18 inches under water and several were attacked by poisonous jellyfish as well. During the day the sun was scorching hot and it was impossible to get cover from it.

One lifeboat under the command of 3 rd Of f icer William McVicar was grossly overcrowded carr ying 82 survivors. An article in Life magazine dated May 19, 1941

The Illustrated London News, November 1, 1941. Drawn by Captain Bryan de Grineau from notes and sketches given to him by Lieut Cox, one of the survivors.

described the conditions in the boat: “The heat nearly crazed us and the glare closed our eyes until they were slits. Our skin festered with sores from the sun and salt water. Each morning we dumped overboard the men who had died the night before. At first we buried them with a short religious cermony, but later we were too weak to do this. By the third week men began to lose their minds. An Englishman named Smith screamed deliriously for his wife until he died. Those with strength left tried to bail out the boat and clean up the vomit of

the seasick men. For food we had a daily ration of one cracker and a spoonful of condensed milk mixed with water.”

They eventually staggered ashore on a Brazilian island after 23 days. By that time 44 had died of their wounds or from exposure and the remaining 38 were in very poor health.

A Spanish ship Cabo De Homos, en route from South America to Cadiz in Spain, spotted another lifeboat and rafts. They picked up 78 survivors who had spent five days and nights in open boats. Twenty-four-year-old Alfred Warren had a lucky

escape. He dropped his leg into the sea to paddle a raft and a shark suddenly bit into his calf when he was being rescued.

Fortunately he survived and did not lose his leg.

Another 63 persons were picked up by the Spanish steamer Bachi.

On March 29, the radio operator on the Thor picked up a radio signal from the Cabo de Homos stating that she had found many survivors adrift in lifeboats and rafts in a very poor state. This had a profound effect on Captain Kähler of the Thor.

Images of the wretched people in the shark-infested waters were to haunt him and his crew for the rest of their lives.

Of the approximate 480 passengers and crew who ‘abandoned ship’, more than 200 lost their lives.

Fr Michael Fox served as a missionary in India. He died in Limerick in 1983 aged 83 and is buried in Mount St Alphonsus, Limerick.

Fr Arthur Maloney, from Dublin, served as a missionary in the Philippines where he compiled a grammar of the Cebuano language. He was Provincial of the Irish Province from 1961 to 1964. He died in 1976 and is buried in Dean’s Grange Redemptorist plot.

Michael Kirwan works for the Irish Aviation Authority at their North Atlantic Communication centre in County Clare. In the 1970s he worked as a Marine Radio Officer for Marconi Marine on various ships travelling worldwide. He has a keen interest in shipping matters and writes occasionally for shipping journals.

29

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COM M E N T FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS CARMEL WYNNE

HEALING FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS

IT IS NEVER TOO LATE TO START AN HONEST CONVERSATION ABOUT THE HURTS AND RESENTMENTS THAT CAN BE PART OF FAMILY LIFE. Does the idea of healing your family relationships sound realistic, possible or worthwhile?

Most adult children have had the experience of being upset with a parent. People who are able to talk honestly about what affected them deeply, benefit from healing childhood trauma.

Often counselling is necessary to enable one to talk about childhood distress and to forgive parents. Forgiveness is fundamentally for one’s own sake. It’s a way to let go of the pain of the past and move on with life. However it’s really important to stress that to forgive does not mean to condone the unacceptable situation that created unhappiness.

Parenting is probably one of the most difficult and rewarding jobs in the world. There is not a parent in the world who, with the benefit of hindsight, cannot identify many decisions that seemed right at the time but proved to be unwise.

When there is marital conflict in an unhappy marriage, the misery and unhappiness children have to deal with is a fact of life that is rarely given the attention it deserves. The relationship between parents determines the atmosphere in the home.

All family relationships are difficult because there are no perfect parents and there are no perfect children. The romantic couple that gets married and lives happily ever after only exists in fairytales. In real life couples have their difficulties. There is no marriage without problems.

sake of the children, appreciate this. Others don’t. Resentment at having to live with acrimony and conflict makes some people so angry and unforgiving that they are unwilling to learn about the trauma that parents who felt trapped in an unhappy relationship suffered.

The state of a parent’s marriage has an enormous impact on how secure children feel and whether or not marriage is something they might want in the future.

Children cannot feel secure in a family when there is daily evidence that mum and dad don’t love each other anymore.

A common fear is that if they stop loving each other they may also stop loving the child.

Unhappy parents, who are vocal about being dissatisfied with a spouse, may try to reassure children. A child can hear every word in the sentence, “Even though dad and I don’t love each other anymore we will always love you”, yet feel insecure and unloved. No matter how hard mum and dad try to protect children from adult issues, children sense what is going on.

When the ingredients that are necessary for a happy couple relationship are missing, children of all ages are likely to feel unsupported, insecure, angry and resentful. This is particularly hard on younger children whose sense of self-esteem is formed almost exclusively by the family in the first five or six years.

Family therapist Virginia

Satir says that, “Feelings of selfworth can only flourish in an atmosphere where individual differences are appreciated, m i s t a ke s a re to l e r a te d , communication is open and rules are flexible”. She believed that children who grew up in families with “crooked” communication, inflexible rules, criticism of their differentness and punishment for their mistakes learned to have a poor sense of self-worth.

Children grow up very quickly and their needs change rapidly as they go through different stages of development. No two children are alike. What works really well with one child may not work at all with another.

Some parents say that being a parent to younger children was easier than coping with the changes that occurred during early adolescence. Others suggest that the teenage years when their angelic child turned into a self-interested, rebellious student were more difficult. Others still would say that dealing with immature, demanding adult children is the hardest time of all.

Some adults whose parents made the sacrifice to stay in an unsatisfying relationship, for the

It takes maturity to become non-judgemental of the obese mother, who used comforteating to deal with the distress of her deteriorating relationship with her husband; the withdrawn father, who immersed himself in sport to avoid spending time around his constantly complaining wife; the blaming parent who refused to accept responsibility for his/her part in creating a cold, tense, humourless atmosphere in the home.

Parents who separated, divorced, or stayed in an unhappy relationship can do a great deal to heal family relationships with their adult children if they are willing to be non-defensive and open to answering questions. It makes it less difficult to forgive and let go of the past when the positive intentions behind the decisions that were made are understood.

The insights that occur when family relationships are healed can be the catalyst for taking the necessary steps to ensure that family history does not repeat itself.

Carmel Wynne is a life coach, cross-professional supervisor and author based in Dublin. For more information go to www.carmelwynne.org.

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In this series, Fr George Wadding invites us to take an imaginative look at some familiar Gospel stories, imagining how the characters might have told their story if they were alive today. Using the imagination can be a powerful way of entering into reflective contemplative prayer. Find a quiet corner, read the article slowly a few times, think about it and pray as the spirit leads you.

prayer corner

Simon Peter

Simon Peter did not always get it right. Far from it! Yet Jesus named him ‘Rock’ and counted him among his most trusted companions and disciples. Here we imagine Peter, in the days leading up to his own death, looking back over his time with the Master.

Read this meditation and keep your Bible handy to refer to the texts mentioned.

I

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last saw Peter a few days before he was executed. A friend of mine knew the warden and secured a pass for me to visit him in prison.

He was reflective and very peaceful. A more humble man I never met. But, as he was only too eager to remind me, he hadn't always been that placid.

“As I look back now,” he said, “I see how unstable and impetuous I was. Sometimes my impetuosity was a blessing – like when Jesus called my brother Andrew and me and we both responded straight away. (Matthew 4:18) Or again, when Jesus asked the twelve of us what we thought of him and I blurted out that he was the Messiah; that won me the greatest compliment of my entire life.

(Matthew 16:13) Using my family name he said, ‘Good for you, Simon Bar-Jonah; God's own Spirit has enlightened you!’ And that was when he gave me the nickname that has stuck with me. ‘You're a rock,’ he said, ‘so we'll call you Rock (Petros or Peter) and I will give you the keys of heaven and earth.’

“Of course I was chuffed though I had little understanding of what he meant. I imagined I would be governor in his kingdom or commander-in-chief of his armed forces – not that I would know too much about either of these commissions! Then Jesus began telling us that his enemies would get the better of him and put him to death. And here's me, acting like I was already the commander-in-chief, putting him down and telling him I would never let that happen. Jesus got cross with me and tipped me off my pedestal. A while before, he had told me God's Spirit was at work in me; now he was telling me that Satan was at work in me.

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My pedestal cracked beneath me but it didn't crumble – not yet. I would still climb up on it again and again.”

LEARNING FROM JESUS “Like the day a few of us were out fishing and a squall was threatening to swamp the boat.

Suddenly, out of the mist and spray we saw Jesus coming towards us walking on the water. Wow! That was incredible. Instead of being sensible like the rest of the crew, Mr Big Mouth here called to him, ‘Jesus, can I do the same?’ – as if I was a magician's stooge. ‘Come on,’ he said and I jumped in. The water was solid and I took a few tentative steps. Then I remembered I wasn’t a great swimmer and I lost my nerve – too late to turn back. I sank. When I resurfaced Jesus just took my hand and landed me on the boat.

I deserved his rebuke. ‘Oh Peter,’ he said, more in sadness than irritation, ‘your faith is pitiable!’ It was a learning moment for me. I came to realise that no matter how often you walk on the water, it never turns to ice. Each new step in life requires a new step in faith. Not that I always lived by my better insights!

“Am I boring you?” he asked. “No, not at all, Peter,” I said, “Please go on.”

“Well, bad enough as all this was, worse was to come. But before getting to that, let me tell you about the day James and John and myself had the most extraordinary experience on Mount Tabor. (Matthew 17) Only six days after Jesus began telling us about his impending suffering, he invited James and John and myself to join him for prayer on the mountain. We had no inkling of what was to come. To this day I cannot find the words to describe what happened. Just to say

this: Jesus was transfigured before our very eyes.

His clothes became white as fresh snow in the morning sun. We had to shield our eyes because his face was as dazzling as the sun itself. Moses and Elijah were with him as though confirming that Jesus was the fulfilment of their prophesies.

And then, as clear as you like, a voice came through the bright cloud that had descended on us: ‘This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased; listen to him!’ The three of them had been talking about Jesus’ Passover, what we later realised was his passion in Jerusalem – as Jesus earlier had been talking to us about it. But it went over our heads, so flabbergasted were we by the whole experience. And, to my shame, all I could think of doing was to build three little commemorative shrines on the mountain top – to Jesus, Moses and Elijah – as if that made any difference to anything!

“That experience and that heavenly witness to the Lord's identity and mission should have changed my life. But soon my old faults were back to haunt me. At our last meal together (John 13) I was again out of order when I would not let Jesus wash my feet. I was just too thick to get the point of the Master being a servant.

He ticked me off for it. ‘Peter,’ he warned me, ‘if you don't let me do this it will be a parting of the ways for us.’ And again I over-reacted, telling him to wash me all over. How stupid can you be!”

BETRAYAL AND REGRET “Later at supper, he confided in us that one of the twelve would betray him. So here am I again, the Rock, the Commander-in-Chief, vowing to protect the Master at all costs. ‘Oh Peter, Peter, Peter,’ he said wearily, ‘before the

cock crows twice tomorrow morning you will have denied me three times.’

"No! Never! Never! That would never happen.

But it did. The ‘governor’ with the keys of the Kingdom in his hand, was a whimpering coward. (John 18:15f) His vaunted courage melted like butter before the challenge of a slip of a servant girl from the palace. Three times I denied ever knowing the Master. The young John alone stayed with the Master to the end. And my pedestal was now in bits.

“There's a lot I could tell you about the days after the Resurrection, but you know that already. My truly religious moment came when Jesus gave me an undeserved opportunity to repent and restore my love for him. (John 21:15) Three times, to compensate for my threefold denial, he asked for my love.

I would have given it a thousand times over, for, in spite of my weakness I did truly love the Master. The Lord's forgiveness is wonderful.

Even poor Judas would have been forgiven had he stayed with us.

“Over the years since, I have gladly laboured and suffered for him. Once, my cowardly self surfaced for the last time. I was compromising the Lord’s liberating vision to placate some radical Jews who wanted to turn our Christianity into a Jewish sect. Paul of Tarsus sorted me out on that one, bless him. (Galatians 2:11) “There is much more I could tell you. I hear that some of our Christians are trying to collect material with a view to writing an account of the Jesus movement. If the story is ever put into writing, make sure they tell the unvarnished truth about me: I was the worst of sinners, yet the Lord chose me and forgave me.

“Thanks for coming to see me. That was risky. Before you go – they are going to crucify me in a few days and I have no fear, I, who trembled before a servant girl. If you have any connection with the authorities I would like to be crucified upside-down. I don't deserve to be crucified like the Master whom I denied...

Goodbye, friend, and pray for me!”

Father George Wadding is a member of the new Redemptorist Community, Dun Mhuire, Griffith Avenue, Dublin D09 P9H9

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R E FOR M AT I O N

JOHN KNOX SCOTTISH RELIGIOUS REFORMER ONE OF THE MOST FASCINATING FIGURES OF 16TH CENTURY CHURCH REFORM, JOHN KNOX WAS A MAN OF IDEALS AND PROPHETIC ZEAL WHO FOUND MANY OF HIS EFFORTS FRUSTRATED BY POLITICAL REALITIES AND SECULAR INTERESTS.

BY IAN HAZLETT

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Despite

his historical stature, John Knox is often disparaged. Since the 18th-century Scottish Enlightenment, there has also been strong nonCatholic, anti-Knox sentiment. To David Hume, philosopher, Knox was “sectarian”, “fanatic”, “rustic”, “ferocious”, “barbaric”, “outrageous” and “uncivil”.

On the internet, some Catholic websites complement this. Catholic Answers and New Advent repeat the same thing on Knox: Knox’s religion seems to have landed him outside the pale of Christianity altogether […] he displays [not] the slightest recognition of the teachings of the Gospel, or of the gentle, mild, and forgiving character of the Christian dispensation […] the ferocity and unrestrained violence of his public utterance stand out.

The websites have recycled an outdated article on Knox in The Catholic Encyclopaedia, vol. 8 (1910). In reality, however, Knox regularly appealed to the “glorious gospel of Christ Jesus, the sweet odour of life”, so that perceptions of him are clearly selective. Other urban myths about Knox to dispel are: Knox was a misogynist. Hardly; he married twice and had five children. He had female friends and correspondents. His objection was to female

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rulers; this was conventional, if not shared by all his co-religionists.

Knox’s preaching was Old Testament hot air. Impossible to verify, since hardly any of his sermons have survived! Knox’s public speeches and controversial writings did transpose Scotland into ancient Israel, urging true religion and pure worship free of all idolatry (Roman Catholic mass and invocation of the saints); but his church and pastoral material was New Testament based.

Knox was a quintessential Scot. A misjudgement. Knox was cosmopolitan. He lived in five different countries (Scotland, England, France, Germany, and Switzerland) and spoke English, Latin, and French. He even considered a mission to Ireland. He was later mocked by some for his anglified accent.

Knox was a demagogue. Not his style, even if he had a booming voice. He disliked the “rascal multitude” as he called it. Like all other Reformers, Knox urged the removal of statues, images, and stone altars from churches. He was shocked when iconoclastic mobs trashed churches. What had been foreseen was orderly removal.

Knox’s Christianity was dismal and puritanical.

The transition from worship as a largely visual and sensual experience in the old church to a more cerebral and listening experience in reformed

churches helps explain this perception. More lively was the communion service – a festive communal meal of real bread and wine in thanks for the spiritual presence of the sacrament and true body of Christ, enjoyed by believers. As for puritanical zeal, most progressive Christian leaders from St Paul onwards were counter-cultural.

Knox was the archetype presbyterian. Not quite. He had presbyterian preferences for church government and did not like bishops, but stated that if bishops were necessary or desirable, he could go along with it provisionally.

EARLY LIFE, 1514-1549 Born near Haddington, East Lothian, Knox came from a family with a history of service to the local aristocracy. He studied at St Andrews University without graduating. At the time, the famous scholastic theologian, John Mair (or Major), taught there.

Major was a loyal Catholic, but three of his ideas seem to have influenced Knox. First: ‘conciliarism’.

This held that supreme authority in the Catholic Church should be exercised not by the papacy, but by church councils. Conciliarism may well have encouraged later corporate presbyterianism in Scotland.

Second: scepticism about the role of reason and philosophy in accessing knowledge of God. Instead, the stress is on God’s revelation to faith in trust. This enhanced the status of Scripture. It also undermined the prevalent scholastic notion of explicit faith as mental assent to dogmas. After Luther denounced human reason and the will as corrupt, such theology was radicalised.

A third idea of Major’s surfaced in the later Knox: ultimately, the legitimacy of monarchs derived from the sovereignty of (God’s) people.

A godless or tyrannical ruler justified resistance and deposition. Some medieval Catholic thinkers before John Mair had argued similarly.

Knox was ordained to the priesthood around 1539, and also functioned as an apostolic notary.

His Reformation conversion derives from two influences. First, moderately Lutheran sermons in 1543 by a Dominican prior, Thomas Guilliame; in later life, Knox remembered the Black Friar positively.

The second was in 1544-45, a preaching tour of George Wishart, burnt as a heretic in 1546. A

returned religious exile, Knox supported Wishart and dates his prophetic vocation from then. After Wishart’s execution, Cardinal David Beaton was assassinated by some zealots. Association with Wishart caused Knox to think of emigrating.

Instead he was persuaded to preach a sermon in St Andrews. He denounced the Roman Church as the “synagogue of Satan” (i.e. a maze of toxic rules and regulations), and the Pope as the “Antichrist” (i.e. one who subverts Christ as sole head of the church), tones he repeated thereafter. But he was not the originator. There were medieval precedents, but Knox took his language from Luther, who had published two uncomplimentary books on the papacy, one in 1545. Such invective was not exclusively “Calvinist”, “Scottish”, “presbyterian”, or even “Protestant”.

The Reformation movement was driven underground. Following arrest, Knox became a galley slave in the French navy for 19 months until his release in 1549. He endured that as God testing his faith, vocation and mission.

KNOX’S CAREER 1549-1572 After 1549 Knox spent most of the next decade abroad, England and then the Continent. He joined the Reformed Church of England under Edward VI (1547-1554), serving in church posts at Berwick-on-Tweed, Newcastle, and then as a royal chaplain in Windsor. Knox’s later polemical writings hit the headlines, but his gentler devotional and pastoral works are often airbrushed out. One he wrote in England was his sensitive Treatise on Prayer, in which he also quotes St Ambrose and St Augustine.

In England, Knox was offered a prestigious parish in London and then a bishopric, but refused both.

He was sceptical about the English Reformation, for he belonged to the purist party seeking reform more strictly aligned with Scripture. Hence Knox objected to kneeling at communion, fancy clerical vestments, lordly bishops, etc.

When the Catholic Mary Tudor became English queen in 1553 with zero tolerance of Protestants, Knox and about 1,000 others fled abroad. He then published a book urging English “true Christians” not to participate in “idolatry”, that is, the sacrifice of the mass and the adoration of the Eucharistic, transubstantiated host – concepts anathema to all Protestants as unscriptural. Knox also published

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R E FO RM AT I O N

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nation and its shifty leaders. He a furious tract invoking God’s could be theatrical. For example, destruction of the queen, “Jezebel”, during Mary Stewart’s first night in for her blasphemy and persecution.

Scotland, Knox led a delegation to Knox moved between Dieppe Holyrood Palace to keep the queen (France), Zurich, Frankfurt, and awake by singing psalms all night.

Geneva. In Geneva he met John Knox was disappointed with his Calvin in person and witnessed with ministry. His idealism and prophetic enthusiasm the city’s Reformation, zeal aspiring to a covenanted New especially its liturgy, congregational Scotland modelled on the Old singing, church government Israel, but with Christ as sovereign, and discipline, and educational stumbled over political realities and programme. While Calvin admired human unresponsiveness. Leading Knox’s commitment, he also advised him to balance zeal and vehemence Study of John Knox Dispensing the Sacrament at Calder House, by David Wilkie (1839) rituals of national repentance and National Galleries of Scotland. collective fasting to placate God’s in religion with humanity. wrath generated no corporate Knox returned to Scotland briefly In view of Protestant English support of the to preach. He was summoned to a heresy trial Reformation in Scotland, Knox was brought change of heart. For Knox, the chief scandals were in Edinburgh (1556), but the Catholic queen back. His hour had seemingly come. The outcome continuing underground Catholicism, impious regent, Marie de Guise, fearing serious public was the abolition of papal authority, canon law, and worldly behaviour by many government disorder, had the process stopped. The church the Roman mass, all paraphernalia connected figures, hypocrisy, immorality, feuding and still excommunicated Knox in absentia, and burnt with the cult of the saints, and the closure of duels, injustices like exploitation of the poor, his effigy. In the meantime he married his first wife, monasteries. The Scottish Parliament decided mediocre church attendance and so on. All this Marjory Bowes. this in 1560 – justified by a national confession prevented Scotland from becoming a “Christian In Geneva, Knox became minister of the English of faith penned by Knox and five others. By now commonwealth devoted to pure religion and refugee church, concentrating on pastoral, a widower, he remarried an aristocratic teenager, true worship”. For all that, Knox was a major player in the creation of the reformed Church of devotional and liturgical matters. He also wrote Margaret Stewart, a relation of the queen. a large book on (double) predestination, a There were new frustrations. First: no royal Scotland and Scottish Protestantism along with controversial topic. Concepts of the (hidden) assent, since the new monarch, Mary Stewart, was its oppositional spirit.

However, Knox was no pope of Edinburgh, ‘elect’ and ‘reprobate’ existed in biblical and church Catholic. Knox’s sometimes amicable interviews tradition, but many saw the idea of God’s alleged with her were of no avail. He was incensed that the tartan theocrat, or even boss of the Kirk’s secret decision even before Creation as speculative, Protestant government allowed the queen to have General Assembly, since on much he was arbitrary and objectionable. The defence was that a private mass. Everything remained in abeyance politely ignored. Rather than a theologian, salvation and damnation were God’s exclusive until her deposition in 1567 – not for religious scholar, writer, administrator or organiser, he prerogative, even before time. reasons, but due to her serial adultery and her was primarily a declamatory prophet of God, In Geneva, Knox authored booklets urging complicity in the murder of her second husband, modelling himself on Jeremiah, Isaiah, Elisha, and Protestants to overthrow their female Catholic Lord Darnley. In 1567 the Reformation was given Ezekiel – “watchmen of Israel”. As a mover and shaker he aroused fascination. Apart from some rulers by force – a course no other mainstream the royal assent by the Protestant new regent.

Reformer advocated. One famous title: First Blast The other problem was church restructuring. Christ-centred devotional, liturgical and pastoral of the Trumpet against the Monstrous Regiment of The 1560 parliament rejected a semi-presbyterian writings as well as correspondence, his only writing Women, refers simply to female rulers – a divisive blueprint, the First Book of Discipline, authored by of enduring value has been his History of the issue. Some saw no problem, some (like Knox) churchmen including Knox. This hit the buffers, Reformation in Scotland – a biased, but important were opposed to female monarchs on principle, chiefly because many upper-class supporters of eye-witness account. Subject to depression, he and others (like Calvin) saw them as a device of the Reformation wanted to purloin most of the found consolation in another biblical theme: God to chastise society. Calvin was annoyed with church’s wealth. Thereafter, Knox saw most of God’s way only operates truly among a “remnant” Knox due to the incidental association of these political nation that welcomed the Reformation of the genuinely faithful, a “little flock” sustained by the Spirit of Christ. tracts with respectable Geneva. Knox was also as betrayers and robbers of the church. unaware that by that time (1558), the Protestant Knox had great influence as minister of St Ian Hazlett studied at Queen's University, Union Theological College Belfast, Queen Elizabeth had succeeded Mary. He wanted Giles Church in Edinburgh. With a voice “louder the Universities of St Andrews, Münster (Germany), and Strasbourg. He is to return to England, but he was denied a visa. than 500 trumpets”, he could “blow my master’s Emeritus Professor of Ecclesiastical History in the University of Glasgow. He is an Associate of The Pope John XXIII Institute of Religious Science, Bologna, However, in 1559, he was called to Scotland. trumpet”, inspire, exhort and berate the unholy and is editor of Reformation & Renaissance Review.

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THE SANCTUARY OF ST PATRICK LOUGH DERG

37 A PLACE OF PILGRIMAGE SINCE THE FIFTH CENTURY, LOUGH DERG DRAWS PEOPLE BACK, TIME AND TIME AGAIN, TO ITS PEACEFUL SANCTUARY.

BY SHARON HEARTY

Writers

through the ages – Dante, Kavanagh, Heaney, to name a few – have been inspired to put into words the powerful magnetism of the sacred island familiarly known as Lough Derg, located in the hills of Donegal – a living place of pilgrimage that links back to the fifth century.

The latest book, published in 2016, entitled Lough Derg: Island of Quiet Miracles, is written to appeal to the people of today. It eloquently fuses the island’s history, Celtic Christian spirituality, and the personal experience of the author, Rev Professor Eamonn Conway. Both

a pastor on the island and a pilgrim, he says: “Miracles can actually happen in this sacred place – not the ones that get the headlines.

The miracles are a quiet sense of peace and healing that many people seem to come away from Lough Derg with.”

Many personal letters from pilgrims are also testament to the island as a place of quiet miracles, through their witness of prayers being answered following their time on pilgrimage.

Pilgrim Mary wrote in 2017: “…Our prayers were answered following our visit to Lough Derg this past season. We had a very difficult

situation we had been dealing with for a few years – we also sent regular prayer petitions to you. All has now been resolved and we thank you for all your prayers. The island is a magical place where miracles happen.”

Lough Derg is not about escaping life but about getting to the heart of what life is all about. This could be one reason why it has stood the test of time and why it leaves people bereft of words as to why they continue to “do Lough Derg” – an endearing term used by many pilgrims to describe the Three-Day Pilgrimage.

F E AT U R E

A sunny day at the Sanctuary of St Patrick

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LINK WITH THE PAST Only a morsel of the narrative of Lough Derg – the place and the experience – can ever be told. The entire discourse is known only to God. The island’s spiritual roots are steeped in the monastic tradition. One of the earliest Christian settlements was founded on Saint’s Island, and in close proximity was another island which became associated with the pilgrimage from this early time. The island of pilgrimage is called Station Island and has St Patrick as its patron, because of his

Lough Derg is not about escaping life but about getting to the heart of what life is all about association with the monastery. Lough Derg is known as a sanctuary due to its links with monasticism; the wider area was also wellknown as a place of refuge. The river flowing through the nearby town of Pettigo is still known as Termon, from the Irish Tearmann, meaning sanctuary. A place where you can REALITY SUMMER 2017

go without being judged, a place where you can feel safe – these are some of the words pilgrims have used to describe Lough Derg for hundreds of years.

It was the monks from Saint’s Island who first came to Station Island, the island where the pilgrimage takes place today, a sanctuary where they could retreat from busy monastic life at the service of others in order to replenish their own spiritual resources. It was at this time that the beehive stone structures were erected on Station Island. Today the circular stones upon which pilgrims walk during theThree-Day Pilgrimage are remnants of these structures.

It was not long before the people who travelled to the monastery – not just for spiritual sustenance but because these places were centres of trade, industry, education and commerce all rolled into one – also travelled for a deeper encounter and the spiritual wisdom of the monks on Station Island. This was the very early formation of the practice of pilgrimage in Lough Derg.

Over the centuries the island has been plundered, and the Vikings destroyed the

monastery on Saint’s Island in the ninth century. Despite the destructive events that fell upon Lough Derg, it continued to be a place of pilgrimage and it was in the 1100s that international fame spread about this place, then known as St Patrick’s Purgatory.

At this time the Augustinian Canons took over administration of the settlement and they ran it as a priory with the priest in charge known as the prior. To this day this title is still in use, although the island came under the custodianship of the Diocese of Clogher in 1780.

There are many legendary stories of spiritual encounter from those who came to the island to undertake the rigours of the pilgrimage in the Middle Ages, when it lasted for 15 days with fasting and other penances, the fast only broken once daily by a simple meal of bread and water. By the 16th century the pilgrimage had been reduced to nine days. Today the pilgrimage is over three days but the act of fasting and walking barefoot on the remnants of the beehive structures continues, keeping the unbroken tradition of prayer since the fifth century.

COME AS YOU ARE In many ways Lough Derg is a contradictory place. It contradicts the accepted values of the world, offering people the opposite of what human beings are supposed to want. Comfort, nourishment, and sleep are discarded in favour of the challenge.

A pilgrim’s reflection on this contradictory place: “Lough Derg possesses a deep quietness.

The sounds to be heard are the lapping of lake water against rocks, the murmur of voices and occasional birdsong. No footsteps disturb the stillness. No TV, phones, computers to intrude here… here your outer layers are striped off.

Your mind is cleared of clutter and you set aside all the things that seemed so important on the mainland. You have stepped off the world for two days and Lough Derg removes the dead layers of mental debris. It happens almost without your awareness and as the second day draws to a close you find an inner peace seeping into your being.”

Many come back again and again, finding something that defies analysis. Maybe it is time out of life. The young, the old, the middle-aged from all walks of life people come to Lough Derg.

Pilgrim Alice puts it like this: “We went home with quiet pools of peace in our hearts, a peace formed in the hours away from everyday routine.”

The 'Prayer Beds' at Lough Derg

This reflection echoes the grace of the sacred island – an oasis of calm. Taking a detour from daily life to this place gives us the distance to establish perspective and focus on what really matters and in the silence that pervades the stillness of the island we can listen – listen to an interior voice, to be grounded in our reality, resilience, and in our relationship with God. The invitation of Lough Derg remains as it has always been: Come as you are, friend or stranger, young or old, searching or at peace, in joy or in sadness; come to the sanctuary of St Patrick a shrine of prayer and deep awakening to the presence of God. It is in this sacred island that everyone is welcome in their real rather than ideal state.

PILGRIMAGE SEASON 2017 Today we are living a more frenetic lifestyle than ever before, where the noise of life is so constant that to come to a place which is really free of the way technology can invade our lives, to be free of interruption and get in touch with our deepest selves, is really a great gift. There are a number of opportunities for people to experience this unique place of peace.

One-Day Retreats A One-Day Retreat offers the opportunity to connect with the spirituality of the island.

The day follows a set programme of prayer, reflection, contemplation and concludes with the celebration of Mass in St Patrick’s Basilica.

The retreat programme runs from 10am-4pm on certain days in May, late August, and September.

Three-Day Pilgrimage The Three-Day Pilgrimage is a faith-filled journey to inner peace – a deeply powerful experience that requires endurance and an openness to entering into the spirit of the pilgrimage. The season opens on June 1 and continues until August 13.

Themed days During the pilgrimage season there are special days where people can join us for a different experience: Quiet Days, Ecumenical Day of Friendship and Prayer, Living with Suicide retreat, and other day offerings.

For detailed information on the 2017 Pilgrimage Season visit www.loughderg.org or contact 071 9861518.

Sharon Hearty works with the communications office at the Sanctuary of St Patrick Lough Derg.

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D EV E LO P M E N T I N ACTION

LET THERE BE PEACE AFTER 50 YEARS OF OCCUPATION OF THE WEST BANK, TRÓCAIRE ARE WORKING TO SUPPORT THOSE AFFECTED BY THE ONGOING CONFLICT AND HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS IN THIS TROUBLED REGION.

BY SÉAN FARRELL (PHOTOGRAPHY BY JOHN McCOLGAN, TRÓCAIRE)

It’s

hard to believe but this is the 50th anniversary of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land in the West Bank.

When I arrived, I was immediately struck by the terrible situation people face – from the ghost town of Hebron, to the rural villages of the South Hebron hills, to the wall cutting off

the targeting of their land come in the guise of ‘security’ and ‘legal protection’.

The state of Israel has the right to safety, security and recognition, but what I saw in

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Yehuda Shaul of Breaking the Silence, an organisation of former Israeli soldiers who speak out against the occupation of the West Bank

A family gathers outside their house in Gaza.

This important anniversary should focus minds on the need to achieve a fair peace deal that allows both our Israeli and Palestinian brothers and sisters to live in peace and security, giving both sides full control of their own sovereign lands without the fear of military interference from the other.

Palestine is a place that, until recently, I never had the opportunity to visit but it always held my interest. The Holy Land holds such religious significance that, as a Catholic, the opportunity to visit the place of Jesus' birth, ministry, death and resurrection was very special to me.

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Abdelrahman Salayma from Youth Against Settlements in Hebron. Like all Palestinians in Hebron, there are certain streets where he is banned from walking down. He cannot turn right at his front door.

Palestinians from the land in the Cremisan Valley. What immediately became apparent to me is that the denial of basic human rights comes in many guises.

Over the last 20 years, I have worked in places where human rights are systematically abused – places where the powerful will do anything to retain power and ensure that communities have little or no ability to develop. In Palestine, that guise looks very different to those overtly brutal ones of my experience. Now I saw first-hand that the oppression of the Palestinian population and

the Palestinian territories is not about the security of the Israeli state. Israel maintains full military control of 60 per cent of the West Bank – the so-called ‘Area C’ – where up to 300,000 Palestinians live under military law and have done so for five decades.

Here, it is virtually impossible for Palestinians to build homes as such building applications are systematically rejected. Consequently, many families build ‘illegal’ homes that are then placed under demolition order.

According to B’tslem, the respected Israeli human rights organisation, the Israeli

government demolished at least 1,785 Palestinian homes in the West Bank in the 11 years from 2006 to February 2017 – causing 7,909 people, including at least 4,113 children, to lose their homes.

Conversely, the building of Jewish settlements across Palestinian lands continues unabated, driving farmers from their homes and fields. This needs to be seen for what it is: a land grab. Remove the rhetoric about security and legal processes and what remains is the immoral and illegal systematic campaign of forced displacement, house demolition, land seizures and occupation.

The situation facing people in the West

its health and sanitation systems, will have collapsed.

Justice is about recognising the rights and dignity of all, and for a Catholic aid agency like Trócaire it is fundamentally about speaking truth to power. We cannot turn a blind eye to abuses and oppression but must unveil the reality that many seek to hide.

To highlight the stark reality facing people in the West Bank and Gaza is not to adopt an ‘anti-Israeli’ position. It is deeply unfortunate that calls for peace are consistently portrayed this way. The bravery and courage of the people I met, both Israeli and Palestinian, who struggle to challenge this, is wonderful.

been clear for many years.

For peace to be possible, the international community must recognise Israel and Palestine as equal neighbours, not as guard and prisoner. By formally recognising the reality that the Palestinian people must be given autonomy over their own lives, we Irish would add momentum to the growing movement for peace.

Hopefully the Irish government will signal its support for restarting the much-stalled peace talks by formally recognising the Palestinian state. Far from being a hostile act, this would be a hugely symbolic gesture for peace.

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Sr. Bridget Tighe from Sligo has lived in Gaza for almost two years, providing medical help. "The people are traumatised. Six-yearold children have been through three wars.

What future have they?"

Ola Dweek is a child psychologist in Gaza: "I counsel the children affected by the trauma of war. They have constant nightmares. They are bed wetting. They have completely changed. They have lost their minds, in a way. It's heartbreaking."

Bank is a clear injustice, but in Gaza people face an entirely different crisis. Gaza is like nowhere else on earth, with 1.8 million people corralled into a tiny strip of land – half the size of County Leitrim. Gaza is cut off on all sides and can legitimately be described as the largest open prison in the world.

Israeli troops and settlers are no longer stationed in Gaza; however the sea, air and land blockade is causing a humanitarian catastrophe before our eyes. The UN has warned that in three years’ time, by 2020, much of Gaza’s basic infrastructure, including

Amed Alhalw, who was badly injured during the 2014 war in Gaza.

The Israelis who challenge their own society to come and see that the occupation destroys both the occupied and the occupier were particularly inspiring. Their bravery is something I pray for.

Our politicians know well the outline of what must happen to secure peace: a recognition of Israel’s right to exist, a dismantling of illegal settlements – or a land swap to accommodate them – and a return to borders recognised by the international community since 1967. The core basis of a political agreement to end this conflict has

Both sides have enormous compromises to make and will have to give up long standing positions. Ultimately, however, people in both Palestine and Israel will reap the enormous benefits from the peace that will follow.

Séan Farrell is director of Trócaire’s International Division.

Trócaire works in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) and Israel to support those affected by conflict and human rights violations, as well as helping to raise international awareness around the injustice of human rights violations.

COM M E N T REALITY CHECK PETER McVERRY SJ

CHRISTIAN ANGER

WE ARE CALLED TO BE OUTRAGED AT A WORLD THAT IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

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Jesus was an angry man. He was angry when he threw the buyers and sellers out of the temple; he was angry when the religious leaders would not allow him to cure a sick person on the Sabbath; he was angry when he called the Pharisees “hypocrites”.

We are often told that anger is a sin, to be confessed, that we Christians should be cultivating inner peace, serenity and acceptance. But while anger can often be an emotion which people fail to control and which explodes destructively, causing pain and hurt, nevertheless, we Christians are meant to be angry people. Anger and love are two sides of the same coin: we cannot love someone who is suffering unnecessarily without being angry at what is causing their suffering.

Every human being is God’s beloved child. God’s deepest desire, like the desire of every parent, is for all God’s children to live happy, fulfilled lives.

The world that we live in today is not the world that God desires. Christians are called to be people who are angry at the way things are, angry with all that limits or diminishes human beings, all that denies and rejects the dignity of each person. Christians are meant to be ‘protesters’, protesting against the chronic violence and injustice that blight the lives of billions of people. Christians see in every situation of suffering something unacceptable, s omething outrageous, something to be angry about. Christians are REALITY SUMMER 2017

We, Christians, should be angry that one billion people on our planet go to bed hungry every night. Every one of those one billion people is God’s beloved child and our brothers and sisters. No parent wants to see their child going to bed hungry every night and God does not want to see God’s children going to bed hungry every night. We, Christians, ought to be demanding a massive transfer of economic wealth to those who are excluded and in poverty, nationally and internationally, in order to correct the gross and growing inequality which globalisation has created.

meant to be revolutionaries, people who look at the world as it is and says: “This is not good enough.”

We, Irish Christians, should be angry at children having to wait months, often in pain, for necessary surgery, angry at the growing tide of homeless adults and children while houses remain empty and boarded up, angry at families being evicted by banks who pursue the maximum sale price, angry that women fleeing domestic violence have to be turned away from refuges because they are full, angry that children come into school hungry, angry that one in five children live in households below the poverty line, angry that people with untreated mental health problems end up in prison, angry that some children

at risk cannot be allocated a social worker because of lack of resources.

We, Christians, should be angry at the gross inequalities created by a global economic system that, while excluding millions of people, enriches a tiny number beyond precedent, who parade their wealth before the eyes of those excluded and in poverty.

We, Christians, should be angry that the economic and social institutions which were created to serve the interests of ordinary people are now serving the interests of anonymous corporations and their equally anonymous shareholders.

Decisions are made by people who are answerable to nobody, by market forces which pursue only profit. Those institutions are now often seen as part of the problem rather than its solution.

We live in a world gone wrong, where human bodies and hearts are crushed daily, a world that once crucified the Son of God and continues today to crucify the sons and daughters of God. The prophets of old denounced the way things were. We, Christians, today are called to denounce the way things are.

The peace promised by Jesus does not come from accepting the world as it is, but from the hope for what is promised for the future. The Christian community was established by Jesus in order to show a broken world how to live as the new creation which Jesus promised for the future. The Christian community, by the way we live, love, care and share with each other, is called to say ‘No’ to our world as it is, to say ‘Yes’ to the world as it should be, over which God can happily reign.

GOD’S WORD THIS SUMMER TRUST IN GOD'S PRESENCE Over the past few weeks in Matthew’s Gospel, we have heard about the dangers and trials confronting the 13TH SUNDAY IN disciples as they seek to ORDINARY TIME spread the Word of God in communities.

Understandably, there is an atmosphere of fear and trepidation amongst the group as they encounter oppositiontotheirmessageandreluctance amongst people to hear the Word of God for what it really is. A lot of the relationships between the disciples and their families and society have been lost as they attempt to plot a new course of dialogue and prayer between God and his people.

Today’s Gospel however, offers a welcome contrast for the disciples as Jesus offers them a glimpse of the fruits of their work as preachers and teachers.

They will receive a prophet’s reward. They will be welcomed into the homes of people just as Jesus Christ is welcomed.

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STIRRING INVITATION The mission of Jesus in the small towns and villages around the Sea of Galilee has not 14TH SUNDAY IN been an overwhelming ORDINARY TIME success. Immediately before the Gospel passage we read today, there is a chilling condemnation of these places. Its language, ‘woe to you,’ echoes the language of the great prophets of Israel to their contemporaries who refused to listen to their message. It is important to be aware of this context if we are to understand today’s Gospel more fully.

It has two distinct parts. The first is a deeply personal prayer of Jesus. Although his mission has met with large-scale indifference, nevertheless some people have received the message. He offers a prayer of thanks to the Father for those who have received it. It makes a clear distinction between those who have heard and those who refused to listen.

Jesus describes those who have welcomed

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And those who offer them even the smallest cup of cold water to help them on their journey, will also receiveagreatreward.Sowecansenseattheveryend of this chapter in Matthew’s Gospel, that the trials which will most definitely come the disciples’ way, will be counterbalanced by rewards that will have far greater impact. The disciples will be vulnerable like

children but their future work will be dependent on trusting in God’s power and presence in their lives.

the word as ‘mere children.’ The Greek word meant a very young child. Those who did not receive the message were the wise and clever.

Jesus’ message is also a gift that is ‘revealed’ by the Father. Those of childlike innocence have not put any obstacles in the way of receiving it. Those who failed to receive it were probably blinded by their own sophistication that prevented them from reaching the deep truth of the message of Jesus.

The second part of today’s Gospel is a stirring invitation to those who labour and are heavily laden to come to Jesus. It is very close to the language of God’s wisdom in the Old Testament who invites the simple to come to her and live. For example, Wisdom, like a careful hostess issuing an invitation to her dinner party, invites the person in search of understanding: “Come and eat my bread, drink the wine which I have drawn!

Leave foolishness behind and you will live, go forward in the ways of perception” (Pr 9:5-6).

A yoke was a bar laid across the shoulders

of a slave for carrying a heavy burden. Many rabbis referred to the Law as a yoke placed on the shoulders of the people of Israel.

By contrast, the yoke that Jesus invites his followers to take on is not a burden but something that is gentle and life-giving.

Like Wisdom, Jesus promises refreshment and peace. It is important to catch the gentle, almost feminine language of this passage.

In many passages of the Old Testament, Wisdom is presented as a female figure. In applying the language of Wisdom to himself, Jesus is stressing the gentleness of God. This is the secret of his message that only the broken and the weary, those who were indeed the little people in the power play of politics, were able to grasp.

Today’s Readings 2 Kg 4:8-11; Ps 88; Rm 6:3-4,8-11; Matthew 10:37-42

Today’s Readings Zc 9:9-10; Ps 144; Rm 8:9.11-13; Matthew 11:25-30

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GOD’S WORD THIS SUMMER WHAT KIND OF SOIL ARE YOU? In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells the parable of the sower and seed. He uses 15TH SUNDAY IN images that would have ORDINARY TIME been familiar to people living in the fishing and agricultural economy of Galilee.

A sower goes out to sow seed. He scatters it generously. Some falls on the edge of the path and is eaten up immediately by birds. Other seeds fall on a rocky patch, where they spring up straight away, but quickly wither because there isn’t enough soil for the roots to take hold. Some fall among thorns, which grow up and choke them. Others fall among rich soil, and produce an abundant crop.

Jesus explains that the seed is the word of God, which he scatters generously. It is available for everyone to respond to. But whether God’s word will take root and bear fruit depends on

the condition of the ground. It depends on how open people are to receive it.

Jesus describes four types of hearers. The first are those who hear the word of God but they do not really understand it and are easily led astray by evil influences. The second are those who are initially very enthusiastic but who fall away as soon as trials and difficulties arise because God’s word has never taken root in them. Third are those who hear the word but are distracted by the worries and cares and riches of this life. The final type are those who listen to God’s word, and take it to heart, and respond by applying it to themselves in an effort to lead a life like that of Jesus. They will yield a rich harvest.

God’s word is still scattered generously today.

The question is how well do we respond to it. How firmly does it take root in us? Are we people like the fourth group of hearers, who listen to the word of God, take it to heart, make it their own, and have it bear much fruit?

SAINTS AND SINNERS The parables of the mustard seed and the leaven are both about the unexpected power hidden 16TH SUNDAY IN in small things. A mustard ORDINARY TIME seed looks small and insignificant but when it takes root, it becomes a shrub or even a tree.

In the same way, a woman baking bread adds a lump of leaven to her flour. She then sets the dough aside to rest for a while but when she is ready to bake, the dough has risen to produce a larger quantity than she had to begin with.

Both parables are images of the Kingdom of God. It begins unpretentiously with the preaching of Jesus in the countryside of Galilee but, like the mustard seed and the leaven, it will soon reach out to the whole world and transform it.

Today’s Gospel also contains the parable of the weed sown among the wheat. There is rivalry between two neighbours. One

begrudges the other’s wealth and tries to destroy his hopes for a good crop by sowing weeds among the wheat. When he is told that the weeds are beginning to spring up among the wheat, he recognises that an enemy has been at work. His workmen want to move in immediately and uproot the weeds. But the farmer is wiser. He realises that hasty action could damage the crop even more. Instead, he will allow them to grow side by side until harvest time. Then the task of distinguishing between weeds and wheat will be easier and it will be simply a matter of separating the two without damaging the crop.

The disciples ask Jesus to explain this parable. Matthew’s explanation looks beyond the time of Jesus to the life of the community after the resurrection. The goodwill and the enthusiasm of the first disciples will not last. By Matthew’s time, the church probably contained a good number of people whose lives and conduct did not give much edification. What was to be done about it? Some members probably wanted

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REALITY SUMMER 2017

Today’s Readings Is 55:10-11; Ps 64; Rm 8:18-23; Matthew 13:1-23

an instant clean up campaign – get them out! Wiser voices recognised that every one of these less than impressive Christians had family members or friends in the church.

While not condoning their behaviour, they might not have wanted hasty action to be taken.

For Matthew, too hasty action against the weak brother or sister, even if they are sinners, is bad. The best thing is to allow the Lord to exercise the final judgment. The question of reward and punishment should be left to the end times. Human beings, even church leaders, need to recognise the fact that the church will always have both saints and sinners.

Today’s Readings Ws 12:13.16-19; Ps 85; Rm 8:26-27; Matthew 13:24-43

A TREASURE WORTH HAVING In today’s Gospel Jesus tells two parables about treasure to describe what 17TH SUNDAY IN the Kingdom of God is ORDINARY TIME like. The situations in both parables are similar but there are also differences of social status in the two. The person who discovers buried treasure while he is ploughing a field was probably a landless labourer, employed by the day. By right, the treasure belongs to the owner of the field. To raise the money to buy the field, the ploughman has to take the biggest gamble of his life. He has to sell everything he owns. It’s a huge risk. By the time he has been able to raise the money, someone else might have discovered the treasure or bought the field. It’s a risk he is prepared to take.

The pearl merchant was probably wealthier than the farm labourer. Buying pearls was

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DO NOT BE AFRAID AUGUST Over the next few weeks, we are going to witness some extraordinar y events in Matthew’s THE TRANSFIGURATION Gospel.

Up to now, Jesus has OF THE LORD preached at length to crowds of followers about the kingdom of heaven and the responsibility we have as believers to bring about the kingdom here on earth. But today, we’re getting a glimpse of something astonishing. As Peter, James and John climb a mountain with Jesus, the appearance of their Lord changes and his face shines like the sun, his clothes a dazzling white. This is one particular event in the Gospels I would love to have been in attendance.

The true nature of Jesus is being revealed and in case there is any doubt, God the Father speaks from the clouds: ‘This is my Son.’ Understandably, the disciples are terrified

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part of his daily business but this one is out of the range of anything he has ever seen. It is going to cost him. Like the labourer he has to ‘sell everything he owns’ to buy it.

The point of these parables is clear. The Kingdom of Heaven is such a treasure that those who discover it are faced with a dilemma: will they pass by or will they make that decision ‘to sell all they have’? There is an

element of risk, of total investment of self in order to gain the treasure. It is also a moment of radical decision. It is a risk each one of us is being invited to take also.

Today’s Readings 1 Kg 3:5.7-12; Ps 118; Rm 8:28-30; Matthew 13:44-52

and the gentle touch of Jesus brings with it some peace and reassurance. I wonder was their first instinct to run down that mountain and never return? If you were to place yourself in this particular scene, how would you have responded? The disciples simply fell to the ground, terrified. Their reaction to what they had seen and heard is an indication of the truth of this event.

Jesus is revealed as both human and divine.

Despite the dramatic way this message is revealed to the disciples today, they are consoled by the words of Jesus, ‘Do not be afraid.’ They look up into the eyes of Jesus and they see their friend

Today’s Readings Dn 7:9-10,13-14; Ps 96; 2Pet 1:16-19; Matthew 17:1-9

God’s Word continues on page 46

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GOD’S WORD THIS SUMMER BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER After he sends the crowds back home, Jesus asks the disciples 19TH SUNDAY IN to go ahead of him ORDINARY TIME in the boat while he spends time alone in prayer. The Sea of Galilee can sometimes experience violent storms. The disciples in the boat are making little progress. Not only is the wind against them but it’s whipping up the water so that they seem to be in danger. They are in the middle of the lake, far from any cove or harbour where they could take shelter. It is then that Jesus comes to them, walking on the water. Whatever panic they may have felt from the storm is now compounded by what seems like the appearance of a ghost. Jesus speaks to them: “Take heart, it is me! Do not be afraid.”

Peter asks Jesus to allow him to walk to him across the water. Jesus calls him and Peter clambers out of the boat and makes his way towards Jesus. But the waves are still crashing

around him and Peter begins to panic. He calls out to Jesus to save him. Jesus grabs him by the hand and rebukes him, “Man of little faith, why did you doubt?”

By the time they get into the boat, the storm has ceased. The disciples recognise that something mysterious is happening and worship Jesus as the Son of God. This is what biblical scholars call an ‘epiphany story.’ Epiphany means manifestation or showing. Although it takes place during the life of Jesus, it has many similarities with the stories of the appearance of Jesus to the disciples after he has risen from the dead.

In the Easter stories, Jesus appears to the disciples when they least expect it. They think they are seeing a ghost, but he tells them to not be afraid, and they recognise who he really is. It also looks forward to Easter. For Israelites, the sea was a dangerous place. They believed it was a symbol of death. To walk on the sea was not so much to defy gravity as to defy death.

The story about Peter shows two sides of the apostle. The first is his generous

commitment to Jesus. He is prepared to come to him even if it means defying the wind and the waves. The second side is his impulsiveness; he is liable to collapse in time of crisis. The best illustration of those two sides will be his denial of Jesus. He followed him to the house of the high priest when the others abandoned him. While he is there, a storm will break, and Peter will deny that he knows Jesus. He will prove again that he is a man of weak faith. Yet that is not the end for Peter. The Lord, who stretched out a hand to support him in the storm at sea and help him back into the boat, will meet him again after the resurrection as the forgiving Lord and restore him to his place as leader of the community.

INCLUDING THE OUTSIDER This is the one of the AUGUST few stories in Matthew’s Gospel that takes place o u t s i d e o f J e w is h territory. Matthew sees IN 20TH SUNDAY E M the ministry of Jesus ORDINARY TI as directed in the first instance towards the house of Israel.

Only when the good news of the Kingdom has been offered to them will it be extended to ‘all nations.’

Tyre and Sidon were two towns on the coast just north of Israel that were traditionally hostile to Israelites.

As Jesus and his disciples walk along, a Canaanite woman comes up to them.

Canaanite was the name given in the Old Testament to the original non-Jewish inhabitants of the land that later became Israel. She greets him as "Lord, Son of David”

– an astonishing confession for a non-Jewish woman to make. Her daughter is tormented by a demon and she wants a cure. It is striking that Jesus, who is normally so compassionate towards anyone in need, doesn’t answer her. The disciples are becoming annoyed at the woman and ask Jesus to send her away.

In keeping with Matthew’s sense of Jesus’ mission, he answers that he is only sent to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

The story now turns into a dialogue between Jesus and the woman. She makes just a short plea: “Lord, help me.” Jesus’ reply seems unmannerly: “It is not right to take the bread of the children and throw it to the dogs.” Dog is a term of abuse that Jews sometimes used for Gentiles. This apparent put down opens a small chink of light for the woman. She proves herself to be an even better debater than Jesus. Pet dogs are allowed to eat the crumbs that fall from the

family table and she is just asking for one of those crumbs!

Her great faith makes a huge impression on Jesus. She forces him to re-think his mission, to see that it was for more than just the Jewish people. He blesses the woman for her great faith, and gives her what she asks for.

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Today’s Readings 1 Kg 19:9.11-13; Ps 84; Rm 9:1-5; Matthew 14:22-33

Today’s Readings Is 56:1-7; Ps 66; Rm 11:13-15.29-32; Matthew 15:21-28

THE REALITY CROSSWORD NUMBER 6, JULY/AUGUST 2017

WILL THE REAL JESUS PLEASE STAND UP? Jesus’ ministry has set people talking. Who is this man?

Jesus asks his disciples what people are saying about him.

Clearly, rumours are going around about who he might be. Could it be that John the Baptist had mysteriously 21ST SUNDAY IN come back to life? Or might he be Elijah? Jesus’ miracles ORDINARY TIME were so close to those of Elijah that many might have believed he was the returning prophet. If none of these, then Jesus surely was a prophet like Jeremiah or one of the others.

Jesus now asks the disciples directly: who do you say I am? Peter, acting as spokesperson for the rest, makes the most complete profession of faith: Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the living God. Attention now turns to Peter. Jesus praises him, using a typical biblical phrase – “blessed are you.” It is sometimes translated as “you are a happy man,” but it means something more like acknowledging that Peter has received a blessing, a revelation that goes beyond the mere externals of the ministry of Jesus such as his words or deeds. When people try to fathom the mystery of who Jesus is by externals alone, they are only guessing and compare him to figures of the past. That is what the crowds have done in seeing him as a returned Baptist or Elijah.

For the first time in the Gospel, Jesus uses the word ‘church.’ The mission to Israel has not met with success. No purified and renewed Israel will emerge.

What will take its place is a new kind of community, the church. The Greek word Jesus uses here is ekklesia. It has given us English words like ecclesiastical.

Its root comes from the Greek verb ‘to call.’

The distinctive mark of the church of Jesus is that it will be made up of people who are called to the Kingdom by preaching. You belonged to Israel as the people of God by birth and race. The community of Jesus will be gathered from all lands and have room for everyone, no matter what their origins.

Jesus now speaks about Peter’s role in the church. He will be the foundation stone on which the community will be founded. That is reflected in the name Peter, which comes from the Greek word petros, meaning ‘rock’. Although Peter’s faith will still show itself to be weak, nevertheless the powers of evil (‘the gates of the underworld’) will be unable to destroy the new community.

Jesus symbolically gives Peter the keys of the church.

Peter will not replace Jesus as ‘head’ of the community, but he will play a leading role in its administration. ‘Binding and loosing’ were words familiar to Jewish teachers. They referred to the authoritative decisions of leading rabbis.

In the case of doubt about how laws were to be applied, their decisions were to be respected by the people because the court of heaven would accept them. The whole episode at Caesarea Philippi ends with a command to the disciples to keep silence. The full proclamation of Jesus as the Messiah must await his resurrection from the dead and the beginning of the church’s mission.

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Today’s Readings

SOLUTIONS CROSSWORD No. 4 ACROSS: Across: 1. Scarab, 5. Praise, 10. Ignored, 11. Epitaph, 12. Pius, 13. Nazis, 15. Clue, 17. Mix, 19. Esther, 21. Temple, 22. Conceit, 23. Nimrod, 25. Pewter, 28. TNT, 30. Paul, 31. Moses, 32. John, 35. Elegant, 36. Reeking, 37. Psalms, 38. Newest.

DOWN: 2. Consult, 3. Rare, 4. Bedlam, 5. Prefix, 6. Acid, 7. Scallop, 8. Wimple, 9. Wheeze, 14.

Zircons, 16. Decoy, 18. Peter, 20. Rod, 21. Tip, 23. Nephew, 24. Mousers, 26. Tropics, 27. Renege, 28. Tortes, 29. Tehran, 33. Bawl, 34. Meow.

Winner of Crossword No. 4 Mary Sheridan, Dublin 14

ACROSS 1. Biblical truth. (6) 5. The capital of Colombia. (6) 10. A person taken from a place of danger. (7) 11. A primitive daytime clock. (7) 12. Seasoning for Lot's wife. (4) 13. Polynesian island state. (5) 15. One piece of 25A. (4) 17. A sharp, high-pitched bark. (3) 19. Rappel. (6) 21. The most important festival of the Christian Church. (6) 22. Secret or disguised writings, codes. (7) 23. Short feline sleep. (6) 25. Simple calculator for keeping count during devotions. (6) 28. Edible European mushroom. (3) 30. The highest adult male singing voice. (4) 31. Large round fruit of a plant of the gourd family. (5) 32. List of dishes available in a restaurant. (4) 35. Thor Heyerdahl's raft. (3,4) 36. The day of rest. (7) 37. A secret or underhand plan; a plot. (6) 38. A glove with just two sections. (6)

DOWN 2. People regarded as infallible authorities. (7) 3. Fruit or a highly desirable position. (4) 4. Margin of safety. (6) 5. A senior member of the clergy. (6) 6. Large metal disc which gives a resonant note when struck. (4) 7. The weapon of Poseidon and Neptune. (7) 8. Seawater inlet parted for Moses. (3,3) 9. Aircraft with no engine. (6) 14. Archangel who leads God's armies. (7) 16. A representative or deputy of a bishop. (5) 18. Greek hero who sought the Golden Fleece.

(5) 20. The edge of a hollow container or an opening. (3) 21. Make a mistake. (3) 23. Bad-tempered, irritable. (6) 24. Exceptional ship sunk in 1912. (7) 26. Absolutely usual or ordinary level. (7) 27. Teens generally. (6) 28. A light clear red colour. (6) 29. Tree-dwelling Australasian marsupial. (6) 33. Art of silent acting. (4) 34. A short death notice. (4)

Entry Form for Crossword No.6, July/August 2017 Name: Address: Telephone:

Is 22:19-23; Ps 137; Rm 11:33-36; Matthew 16:13-20 All entries must reach us by August 31, 2017 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. 6, Redemptorist Communications, Unit A6, Santry Business Park, Swords Road, Dublin 09 X651

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