In the noviciate we were presented with a classic case of “rationalisation” and how Jesuits were skilled at it. It goes like this. Would it be alright to pray whilst we were smoking? Yes was the answer. Would it be alright to smoke whilst we were praying? No was the answer. This subtle rationalisation about the connexion between prayer and work has led many a Jesuit down the road of activism. It does tie in with the theme, the Good Shepherd, for He is one who cares for the sheep; whose life is dedicated to the marginalised. Jesuits tend to rationalise that their active life must revolve around the apostolate, the ministry and the people. After all, everything can be prayer or contemplation. But, today, the Gospel actually shows us a side of the Lord’s way of proceeding and how important this side is for the apostolate, the ministry, the people and most of all, the Church.The Good Shepherd tells His disciples “You must come away to some lonely place all by yourselves and rest for a while”. Why does He do that? An analogy might help. Have you ever entered the expressway, going in the wrong direction? If you’re unlucky, you will need to travel many kilometres before you can find an interchange to make a U-turn. Many of us are not so much on wrong expressways as we are trapped in the information superhighway of immediate gratification. We want an instant connexion with the world faster than the speed of light. But, even if we were not, and were living a sedentary life, the rhythm of our life revolves around appointments, meetings, deadlines, and social engagements. But, beyond our immediate needs and this is critical, when we consider the immensity of needs around us, we are often driven by this incessant urge to fill the gap for a God who is seemingly helpless.
But, is God that helpless? Apparently not because, in the overwhelming face of hunger and sickness, there were many moments where Christ showed us how He escaped to some lonely places, to be by Himself. His going away was an act of creative absence. In fact, Christ’s absence after the Last Supper gave us the perpetual presence of His Eucharist; His absence through death gave rise to faith in His resurrection and His absence after the Ascension gave us the testimony of the Gospels.
The point here is that absence is not nothingness. Instead, absence is part of the rhythm of creation. In a sense, the Church follows this as she provides us with seasons, solemnities and feasts to remind us that our rhythm of life is not supported by our activism. Instead, the seasons, solemnities and feasts remind us that God is the foundation of our activities. Thus, doing nothing is not nothing doing. It actually allows God to enter into our space. It interrupts our “activism” to allow for “being” to stand out. As God enters our space, we come into His presence. One of the experiences I had in the Ateneo Manila University was the Angelus. The minute the Angelus bell chimes, everything stops. Conversations cease; those walking remain standing, those eating take a pause. Perhaps, an image by Jean-Francois Millet speaks a thousand words for us. He depicts a farmer and his wife both caught up in the mystery of the Annunciation. In the distant horizon, you can discern a Church spire—the reason for the silence of reverence.
Here, we are speaking ordinarily for it does not mean that the surgeon stops operating; the fireman stops putting out fire etc. In the ordinary an interruption is good. According to a historian, he says that the whole rationale of symbolic gestures requires that they disrupt and disturb the secular order. Their power to witness—not only to others but to ourselves—comes precisely from their awkwardness. It is awkward to put ashes on your forehead on Ash Wednesday. It is awkward to say to your colleagues, “I don’t eat meat on Friday”. It is awkward to process in the streets.
Unfortunately, we have removed the “awkwardness” of the Epiphany on 6th January and of Corpus Christi on Thursday after Trinity Sunday and have conveniently moved them to a Sunday. When we do away with the awkwardness of our symbolic actions, we have not just accommodated ourselves to the spirit of the world. Instead, we have failed to understand that tradition is the distinctive language of belief. When we do away with the awkwardness of our symbolic gestures, we cannot be far from devaluing our Catholic beliefs. When holy days of obligation become a matter of convenience [and Sunday Mass is celebrated on a Saturday] to make time for the practicality of our life, we have entered a slow ritual of suicide for what we believe in. Faithfulness is not restricted to doctrines to be believed or teachings simply to be obeyed but it is also the disciplines which are expressed through our symbolic gestures—ashes, abstention, pilgrimages, processions and fasting.
The Year for Priest, inaugurated at the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart this year, is offering us the opportunity to come away to some lonely place. In fact, some of us have actually been “going away” even though there is so much to do. The bombing in Jakarta, again? A young man about to be married allegedly committing suicide at the place where he had been interrogated. Finally and not the least, we are worried about the case of Herald’s restriction and our freedom to worship God. Thus, “coming away” before the Blessed Sacrament is a powerful symbolic gesture. And the parish is providing time for us to come away to be with Christ who can do for us what we cannot do.
Furthermore, in conjunction with the Year for Priest and as part of the Golden Jubilee celebration, the parish will launch an initiative where there will be semi-perpetual exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. People will be asked to come and offer an hour to accompany the Lord and to pray for the Jesuit priest serving in this part of the world. Like Jesuits, we can be so caught up with our “ability” to organise forgetting that it is God whose grace we need most to be more effective.
Someone asked me about how we are to put the initiative into practice. I told the person the “how” was not so much my concern but the “why” would be more important. Let me make a distinction between the Priesthood of Christ and the priesthood of a priest. This distinction helps explains why sacrifice is necessary. If the mystery of the priesthood is to be appreciated as God’s gift to the Church, then your prayer before the Lord is to ask that the His priesthood will become more and more the priesthood of the ordained person. Beyond what L’Oreal crudely put as “Because I am worth it”, your prayer is needed simply because of the nature of the ministry, the apostolate and the Church. So, you can see the “how” is not as important as the “why” is.
Finally, the coming away to some lonely place is our simple exercise in the Year for Priest to reclaim the awkwardness, the rhythm of practice that allows the Church to be Church and in so doing, allows Christ to be more visible in the priests that He has called to serve Him and His Church. We always talk of renewing the Church. We seem to think that renewal is for the Laity. But the 1st Reading reminds us otherwise. Vatican II started the renewal of the Church through the liturgy. Many took that seriously but forgot that the process of renewal must also involve the renewal of the priesthood and the conversion of the priest because the priest is the sacrament of Christ and the custodian of the other sacraments of the Church.
