Where do I start?

I write this brief reflection at the beginning of my third day as Pastor of Stella Maris Parish. I know there is a great deal of hurt, pain and anger in the parish for a myriad of reasons, not the least of which is the difficulty of amalgamating four parishes into one and the bewilderment of so many at how the Church is dealing with the truth about the Residential School legacy. It doesn't take ecclesiastical authority to exercise moral leadership.

So, I was deeply moved yesterday as the Church remembered Saints Martha, Mary and Lazarus, and the different ways in which Marth and Mary served Jesus that day of Jesus' visit. I know deeply that any of my Martha instincts to just do what needs to be done must be rooted in my Mary instincts, to simply sit and pray at the feet of Jesus, for I know that this entire effort is His, not mine.

And today, the second reading in the Office of Readings was from a letter written by Saint Ignatius of Antioch (I was ordained on his feast day - Oct 17th) to Saint Polycarp. Here is a rather lengthy but profoundly meaningful extract for me:

"Justify your episcopal dignity by your unceasing concern for the spiritual and temporal welfare of your flock; let unity, the greatest of all goods, be your preoccupation. Carry the burdens of all as the Lord carries yours; have patience with all in charity, as indeed you do. Give yourself to prayer continually, ask for wisdom greater than you now have, keep alert with an unflagging spirit. Speak to each person individually, following God's example; bear the infirmities of all, like a perfect athlete of God. The greater the toil the richer the reward.

If you love only you good disciples, you gain no merit; rather you must win over the more troublesome of them by kindness. The same salve does not heal all wounds...

Do not be overwhelmed by those who seem trustworthy and yet teach heresy. Remain firm, like the anvil under the hammer...and above all we must bear everything for God, that that he in turn may bear with us...Read the signs of the times. Look for him who is outside time, the eternal one, the unseen, who became visible for us; he cannot be touched and cannot suffer, yet he became subject to suffering and endured so much for our sake."

So, with these wise words, I prepare for the day, ever mindful of my need for God's grace every moment of every day

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Saint Martha, Mary and Lazarus

On the day when the Church remembers Saints Martha, Mary and Lazarus, I was moved by this excerpt from a sermon by Saint Augustine:

“Do not grieve or complain that you were born in a time when you can no longer see God in the flesh. He did not in fact take this privilege from you. As he says: Whatever you have done to the least of my brothers, you did to me.

But you, Martha, if I may say so, are blessed for your good service, and for your labors you seek the reward of peace. Now you are much occupied in nourishing the body, admittedly a holy one. But when you come to the heavenly homeland will you find a traveler to welcome, someone hungry to feed, or thirsty to whom you may give drink, someone ill whom you could visit, or quarreling whom you could reconcile, or dead whom you could bury?

No, there will be none of these tasks there. What you will find there is what Mary chose. There we shall not feed others, we ourselves shall be fed. Thus what Mary chose in this life will be realized there in all its fullness; she was gathering fragments from that rich banquet, the Word of God. Do you wish to know what we will have there? The Lord himself tells us when he says of his servants, Amen, I say to you, he will make them recline and passing he will serve them.”

They: Facelessness or Personal Agency

"Resurrection Morning" by JRC Martin

“They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” -John 20:2

 

“They have closed the schools today, and it’s not even snowing that much!”

“They have raised the price of gas this week!”

“They are burning down churches across Canada!”

"They have treated indigenous people horribly!"

 

Don’t we have an interesting use of the word ‘they’. Some semi-anonymous group that seems to do things that impact our lives in some way. It seems to be an entry point to describe a depersonalized authority that has some impact on our daily lives, good or bad. However we define ‘they’ seems to depend on the point we are trying to make, maybe our political stance or assumptions. ‘They’ is depersonalized, abstract, but clearly an actor with authority. Perhaps if we put a face on ‘they’ we would be less critical, or more critical…

 

If ‘they’ is Dr. Robert Strang, it seems like many people will give him the benefit of the doubt, unless you are an anti-vaxxer.

If ‘they’ is Boris Johnson or Jeff Bezos it seems we are more prone to mockery.

 

The ‘they’ in the gospel reading today are causing Mary a high level of stress. She is simply a grieving woman and she has no idea who ‘they’ is – could it be grave robbers, the high priests, the Romans? She doesn’t know. She does know that the body of her dear friend is gone and ‘they’ did it. They - the unknown, bland, faceless people who do things behind the scenes that impact us and can afford us the opportunity to not use our own initiative.

 

‘They’ took his body and ‘we’ do not know where it has been placed.

 

‘They’ seems to be a catch-phrase for what someone else has done or needs to do.

 

‘They’ need to fix the church.

‘They’ need to talk to the indigenous people to fix this awful situation.

 

A world dominated by ‘they’ is one in which we have given our agency for action to faceless power-brokers behind the scenes and we are not in control of our destiny.

 

Mary sees a man, and in her grief says, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.”

 

Even in her grief, she confronts the anonymity of ‘they’ and is motivated by action. Not just any action, but loving action of care. Basically, she says, “Just tell me where his body is and I will take it from there.” She just needs to know where to start.

 

Who is ‘they’ for us right now, in this point of history? Whether it is residential schools, federal politics, municipal politics or parish amalgamation, there is an opportunity for us to demystify the ‘they’ by taking personal action, loving action, that shows our concrete resolve for faithful, loving action in a world that needs faithful, loving action.

 

‘They’ did not relegate Jesus to death.

‘They’ did not prevent the resurrection.

 

Some things will never change, ‘so they say’ and you can never go wrong by applying a little personal, loving action. But everything did change, Jesus Christ is alive and Mary Magdalene went and proclaimed this good news. 

 

‘They’ don’t need to proclaim the gospel. We do.

Pollett’s Cove Hike: July 2021

Photo by Rob Elford

A dear friend, Deacon David Viscount and I just returned from a beautiful hike into Pollett’s Cove, on the North-West coast of Cape Breton. It was one of the most beautiful hikes I have ever done. I hope you enjoy this video:

https://youtu.be/eoIhClkesyU