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One of the curiosities of the English language is the word we use for reporting events that have recently come to light: “the news.” Curious, because, when you think of it, it’s a rare day in September that there is anything truly “new” about the news.
The same tragedies are reported over and over. The identical victories are recorded by various societies or sports teams. Dates change, of course, but rarely does the actual substance of the matters being reported show genuine development.
I noticed this after giving the news headlines at breakfast in the dining room here in Combermere for about ten years. At the end of that time period, the headlines were virtually the same as they had been ten years earlier! And this was after a genuine effort to draw on multiple sources!
Come to think of it, a lot that goes on in my life can also have that repetitive look or sound: same old habits to deal with; same old injuries to forgive; same old sins to confess; same old feet to put socks and shoes on; same old me. Almost.
If we think about all this from a faith perspective, however, then none of the above is much of a surprise. For our faith teaches us that this world is subject to corruption and decay, and that means an incapacity to genuinely renew itself of its own power.
At best, we can extend the length of life a few years, or repair the broken faucet until the next time it needs to be fixed.
Today people are having their bodies put in a kind of (expensive!) deep freeze in the hopes that at some magical future date they can be resuscitated and get a new lease on earthly life. Of course, the first thing one might want to do after thawing out and getting a metabolic makeover would be to read the news!
Our faith teaches us that only God can do something genuinely and absolutely new. Humankind, on the other hand, can of itself at best rearrange things somewhat with the existing material.
St. Paul tells us that the true God is the one who creates a universe out of nothing and raises from the dead all who have fallen asleep in death (see Romans 4:17). And following from that, true creativity and true renewal come from faith in this same God and Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
All other spiritual programs, so called, are destined to do not much more than stir up for a time the dust of human excitement before they fall by the wayside forgotten, while the parish or community or individual starts looking for the next little high in an otherwise boring spiritual life.
These days it is seldom that the Church is sponsoring the best show in town. So people looking for same look elsewhere.
Of course, what’s meant to be happening among us is not at all a show, but a Reality coming to light in our midst.
The Second Letter of St. Peter describes it this way: But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a mighty roar and the elements will be dissolved by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be found out.
Since everything is to be dissolved in this way, what sort of persons ought you to be, conducting yourselves in holiness and devotion, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved in flames and the elements melted by fire.
But according to the promise, we await new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells (3:10-13).
This “new heavens and new earth where righteousness dwells” is meant to become visible in the lives of Christians, as we are a kind of first fruits of the new world to come.
This means, of course, that some part of each of us has to be dissolved in the flames of the Lord’s purifying fires of grace, so that the Holy Spirit can create us anew, make of us a new creation that shows the face of the transfigured and risen Christ to the world.
I suppose, granted, that this is a bit of a challenging package to advertise for a parish mission or renewal program! “Conduct yourselves in holiness and devotion—and let the interior fires roar.”…hmm. That’s a tough sell for the average pastor.
On the other hand, the best advertisement for the renewal that the Lord alone can give is someone who actually surrenders to said movement of grace in his or her life.
How glorious it is to meet someone radiant with God’s own fire! Everyone not repulsed by such things is filled with admiration and encouragement. Some even are moved to find a way to imitate that person in their own circumstances.
Like the time when I was about 19 and went to a conference in nearby Washington, DC, about the moral issues of our times.
Choosing a theme, I found myself sitting in a room before a panel discussion that included Mother (later, Saint) Teresa of Calcutta, Jean Vanier, novelist Elie Wiesel, and several others.
I was fascinated by Mother Teresa’s piercing eyes and by the passion of the engagement of these people of faith, Christian and Jewish. I determined that whatever I would do with my life, it would in some way resemble these people, or at least take its inspiration from them.
Maybe seven years later, I found myself living on the farm at Madonna House in Combermere, Ontario, Canada. I was now a member of the community, about 25 years old, and was serving as the cheese-maker.
At the same time, I was pretty sure I was being called to be a priest for the community, and the interior sense of this call was taking on a greater intensity.
On Holy Saturday morning I awoke very early, say at around 4 a.m., and suddenly a sentence flashed into my consciousness: “a priest must occupy the lowest place; he must want nothing for himself.”
So, that was it. Nothing more than a simple sentence, but its effect on me was as if I were pierced by a sword.
When it was morning (I was off that day), I walked down to the main house, a distance of about 10 km (6 miles) and woke my spiritual director up to ask him what he thought about this sentence. He agreed with me, somewhat groggily, that it was a word from the Lord.
Whatever had happened, for the next two or three days, I was almost immobilized. I was certainly dazed. It was as if a wound had been made somewhere deep inside, burning like a fire.
And this fire was purifying any ambition associated with becoming a priest and instructing me in a symbolic way as to my future “place” in the community.
After a couple of days, the dazed feeling subsided, but the wound remained open and the fire kept burning—and that is still the case today some forty years later.
Have I lived my life in accord with that word? God alone knows! But I do know that the call is permanent, and the desire consistent for the most part, to obey it as a source of constant renewal, challenge, and purification, as well as union with Jesus, the great high-priest and servant of all.
And although I can’t quite explain it, there is a joy that goes with this wound, fire, and yes, fountain. It is a joy of finding the lowest place, that secret place where Jesus does his work for us, offering his life, and renewing the Church constantly at the very foundations of her being.
It is not a bad place to spend one’s life—in obscurity of results and assurance of peace somewhere in the mystery of our Lord and Savior, the only One who can make all things new (see Revelation 21:5).
