Parishes have the potential to be “key prophetic voices” in an
increasingly fragmented and diverse world, according to the auxiliary
bishop of Down and Connor, Bishop Donal McKeown.
In his New Year’s message, Bishop McKeown said that at the start of
the second decade of the second millennium, all Christian churches were
facing huge challenges.
Referring to the current economic context, he
acknowledged that there is a “lot of anger and fear around” and added
that there is “more talk of revolutions than of resolutions” in some
quarters.
The religious context had witnessed a decline of religious practice
in Ireland, Bishop McKeown said.
“Across modern Ireland, not having any
real connection with church is the assumed default position,” he said.
This situation showed the need for a new proclamation of the Gospel
and was the motivation behind the publication of the National
Catechetical Directory that will be launched by the Primate of All
Ireland, Cardinal Seán Brady, next week.
Describing the context in which churches are now trying to bring
their message of faith,
Bishop McKeown said all religious bodies face
huge challenges “in a culture where secularism has developed a strident
voice.”
“The Catholic Church in Ireland has a particularly big mountain to
climb in order to develop its credibility as a humble and
self-sacrificing proclaimer of God’s dream for the world,” he said.
An apt New Year’s resolution for Catholics, the Bishop suggested,
would be to look again at the papal document Novo Millennio Ineunte,
which was issued by the late Pope John Paul II immediately after the
Jubilee Year of 2000.
Bishop McKeown identified two principal lessons
in the document. Firstly, “since the first call of all believers is to
be holy, all Christian bodies have to be ‘schools of prayer’.”
If parishes, schools or church organisations are not actively places
where can people grow in holiness, he warned, they risk becoming a waste
of time.
“In the 21st century, they risk becoming mere holy huddles,
gatherings of the pious, cosy coteries of the spiritually childish,” he
said.
The Bishop added, “If groups which bear the name of Christian are not
places where spiritual and human maturing is actively and consciously
promoted, then it is not surprising that people are walking away from
them.”
“Being a ‘school of prayer’ is a risky business as it means being
open to discerning God’s way forward and not just in seeking divine
support for our little plans. Those movements and groups thrive which
nourish the human hunger to worship the Father ‘in Spirit and in
truth’.”
In a forthright criticism, Bishop McKeown said, “A Mass with little
sense of prayerfulness and either a shallow or a rambling sermon
nourishes neither the head nor the heart. It does justice neither to
God nor to his people.”
The late Pope John Paul II was clear in Novo Millennio Ineunte that a
healthy Christianity would not proclaim Christ by having just any form
of spirituality or prayer, he said.
“True Christian prayer needs to
promote a ‘spirituality of communion’. An excessively pietistic
‘me-and-Jesus’ relationship, a smug sense of self-righteousness or a
vague espousal of ‘the spiritual’ should not be confused with
Christianity”, Bishop McKeown underlined.
“The one who went to the Cross invites people to take a spiritual journey that is not a comfortable road to walk,” he added.
The auxiliary bishop of Down and Connor said that a world that
emphasises self-fulfilment will not see “a community open to
self-transcendence” happen by accident.
“It comes from prayer,
conversion and a generous heart. In an alien cultural environment that
tends to prioritise ‘having’ rather than ‘being’, a spirituality of
communion needs conscious nourishment”, the Bishop said in his
statement.
Reminding parishes of their obligations locally, Bishop McKeown said
that while fundraising
for projects in the developing world demonstrated
the generosity of Irish people, he warned that this sort of generosity
is not a substitute for local action.
“A spirituality of communion involves not just putting your hand in
your pocket but also getting your hands dirty nearer home. A parish may
get a great buzz out of raising money for a project in Africa but that
concern needs to be matched with action with the local struggling
inner-city parish”, he said.
He concluded his New Year’s message by saying that by focusing on
these two lessons from Novo Millennio Ineunte would prepare Catholics
from the “sometimes painful and grace-filled evolution or even
revolution” their faith entailed.
SIC: CIN/IE