The Cry for Peace!

A Prayer for Peace in Syria:

O Prince of Peace, we come before you sinful and sorrowful.
We know that we are all guilty of hatred and contempt,
and yet we ask for your mercy and forgiveness.

In Syria, millions of our brothers and sisters are suffering greatly.
And it seems that their suffering may be increased by people
who themselves wish to bring peace to this land.

We know that it is you who turn our hearts to peace,
and so we ask you to turn your eyes to Syria,
so near the towns and villages where you grew up and ministered,
to look upon that Holy Land, and bring an end to violence.

Help us do all that we can, physically, morally, legally,
to support dialogue, foster reconciliation and promote justice. 
End the terrible violence directed against so many Syrians
from so many places, and turn their hearts to forgiveness, compassion and love.

Open our own hearts to the needs of the millions of refugees. 
Help us to see that they are our brothers and sisters in crisis,
for you were a refugee yourself once,
along with Mary and Joseph.

Most of all, let us not bring more violence and suffering
upon a people who have already suffered immensely. 

Bring them peace, O Prince of Peace.

(Photo: Raghad Al-Hussein, a 30-year-old Syrian refugee, holds her newborn child inside their makeshift shelter in the village of Jeb Jennine, in Lebanon.  CNS Photo: Paul Jeffrey.)

Monuments of Mercy

All smiles: Vincent and David after their profession.

I was in our friary in Ennis on Saturday as we celebrated the First Profession of our two brothers - Vincent Finnegan and David Connolly. Having completed their novitiate year they took this major step on the path of their Franciscan formation. 

This coming Sunday the friars gathered again, this time in Dublin. We have the joy of celebrating the Solemn Profession of David Collins. David will make a final, life-long commitment to live out his Christian discipleship as a Friar Minor within the Irish Province.

Witnessing the profession of a brother is a particular grace. The actual profession of vows, made 'into the hands' of our Provincial Minister, is a very radical statement. Listening to it the friar cannot but challenged.

On Saturday I realised that I need, even more than ever, to lean on, indeed to fall back on the grace of God. Any fidelity to this life flows from the action of the Spirit.

As St Francis unceasingly experienced and taught - All is Grace!

The words of Theodore Jennings are striking: 'If grace is to be real, then it must have real effects. And these effects must be palpable, visible. When the divine enters the world, it produces changes everyone can see, not invisible craters, but manifest "monuments of mercy".'

May the lives of our young brothers and all our lives be monuments of mercy!

Making Demands of God

An insightful reflection from Kayla McClurg, Church of the Saviour, on Psalm 82... a faith that can demand of God, a faith that dares to pray, hope and work for a different world. "The psalmist has experienced God as a God of justice and mercy, but when he looks at the vast needs of so many, the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer, the nations failing to serve, he has to wonder. He interrogates the Holy One, demanding response. “What’s going on, God? How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked? How long will you delay?” Would we dare such boldness? Do we have such raw and intimate relationship with God? The psalmist talks to God as one might a spouse—a spouse who has been quite a disappointment lately. Not only does he take the risk of haranguing God, he lays out in plain language what he thinks needs to be done. The psalmist gives God a “honey-do” list, a reminder of what awaits repair if God hopes to clean up the mess the world is in. Here is the psalmist’s list (I wonder what would be on mine): Give justice to the weak and the orphan; maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute; rescue the weak and the needy. Just do it already! Do you notice the psalmist does not ask for God’s intervention in his personal life and community? The relationship between them is greater than that. For the psalmist, God is not a personal peddler of goods, a well-stocked pantry to whom he goes for replenishment. In the psalmist’s daring, we hear what a deeper, more intimate connection sounds like, what it means to be in alignment with God’s own heart. When we dare to speak honestly on behalf of the silenced ones, perhaps it is because we know that God and we want the same things, that we are bonded with a covenant love that can be trusted., and we will be yoked together in the tasks at hand. In the depths of this kind of love, we can dare to ask boldly, dare to call God, our beloved, to task. C’mon, God, show us the right hammer and nails for the job. You know how to fix this!"

Clare: A Heart Free For the Lord

St Clare, whose feast we celebrate on 11 August, was a woman who responded to Christ's call and grace with magnificent courage.

Christ, poor and crucified, captured her heart. Thereafter her one desire was that she be utterly his.

She sought to allow grace form in her a heart turned fully toward the Lord, and she taught her sisters to walk the same path of absolute surrender to Christ.

The external poverty and simplicity of the life she embraced was the sacrament, the outward sign of an interior disposition - a heart utterly free for the Lord!

This passage, from her First Letter to St Agnes of Prague, reveals a woman who knew the treasure that was hers in Christ, a brave woman willing to jettison all that would hinder the deep work of his redeeming love.

 

Be strengthened in the holy service you have undertaken

out of an ardent desire for the Poor Crucified,

who for the sake of all of us 

took upon Himself the Passion of the Cross.

O blessed poverty,
who bestows eternal riches on those

who love and embrace her!

O holy poverty,
to those who possess and desire you
God promises the kingdom of heaven
and offers, indeed, eternal glory and blessed life!

O God-centered poverty,
whom the Lord Jesus Christ
who ruled and now rules heaven and earth,

who spoke and things were made,
condescended to embrace before all else!

What a great laudable exchange:
to leave the things of time for those of eternity,
to choose the things of heaven for the goods of earth,
to receive the hundred-fold in place of one,
and to possess a blessed and eternal life.

Mr Obama: No Guns for Syria!

Christian leaders in USA, including the Franciscans, have written to President Obama with a clear message concerning the civil war that is tearing Syria apart.

They ask for strong diplomatic efforts, and continued humanitarian aid, but they state arms should not be sent to Syria as it will only prolong a brutal war.

The Franciscans in Syria (members of the Custody of the Holy Land) know the suffering and devastation at first hand as they struggle to protect and support those from all communities impacted by the war.

Letter to President Obama

In Rio - a Renewed Call to Rebuild!

Pope Francis has frequently spoken of St Francis and how his life and message are particularly relevant to the Church of our time.

During World Youth Day in Rio, at the Prayer Vigil, in which some 2 million youth participated, the Pope recalled the invitation from Christ that changed the life of Francis of Assisi. Praying before the Cross in the little ruined chapel of San Damiano he heard the invitation: 'Francis, go and rebuild my house!'

As part of the vigil a group constructed a 'church' on the huge stage - a symbol of our task to work with the Lord in constantly renewing his House, his People!

Pope Francis said: 'We have just recalled the story of Saint Francis of Assisi. In front of the crucifix he heard the voice of Jesus saying to him: "Francis, go, rebuild my house". The young Francis responded readily and generously to the Lord’s call to rebuild his house.'

However St Francis had to learn the deeper meaning of Christ’s invitation.

'But which house? Slowly but surely, Francis came to realize that it was not a question of repairing a stone building, but about doing his part for the life of the Church. It was a matter of being at the service of the Church, loving her and working to make the countenance of Christ shine ever more brightly in her.'

The Pope reminded the youth that this call of Christ was also given to them:

'Tonight, let us answer Christ: Yes, I too want to be a living stone; together we want to build up the Church of Jesus! Let us all say together: I want to go forth and build up the Church of Christ!

Dear friends, never forget that you are the field of faith! You are Christ’s athletes! You are called to build a more beautiful Church and a better world.'

And as he so often stresses -  this sacred space we help rebuild must be 'roomy' enough for the whole world. Pope Francis has no time for an inward looking Church, caught up in itself.

'In the Church of Jesus, we ourselves are the living stones. Jesus is asking us to build up his Church, but not as a little chapel which holds only a small group of persons. He asks us to make his living Church so large that it can hold all of humanity, that it can be a home for everyone!'

That First Smile...

The Irish Jesuit Michael Paul Gallagher likens Christian faith to the first smile of an infant:

“For weeks you smile and express your love... then one day your baby smile back. He or she has entered into a different relationship, has responded to all you have given. It is a moment of recognition, of love. Our life of faith is exactly like that in its core simplicity. God loves us in Christ; and one day you must realise it... there is a danger of reducing faith to morality or to the externals of religious belonging. If that happens behaviour in the Christian life becomes a matter of ‘I ought to’ or ‘I ought not’. Needless to say the commandments come alive and make best sense if God’s love is received and recognised – like that first smile.”

I recalled this image of the first smile when reading Pope Francis’encyclical, Lumen Fidei where he writes:

“Faith transforms the whole person precisely to the extent that he or she becomes open to love.”

Then, in turn, this love leads an ever deeper knowing.

"Through this blending of faith and love we come to see the kind of knowledge which faith entails, its power to convince and its ability to illumine our steps. Faith knows because it is tied to love, because love itself brings enlightenment. Faith’s understanding is born when we receive the immense love of God which transforms us inwardly and enables us to see reality with new eyes.”

“Love itself brings enlightenment.”

This echoes our deepest Franciscan understanding. Commenting on the profound Christian wisdom obvious in St Francis’ life, Friar Thomas of Celano, his first biographer, wrote:

 “Where the learning of the scholars remains outside, the affection of the lover enters within!”

Pope Francis emphasises frequently the link between love, faith and seeing:

"Faith is born of an encounter with the living God who calls us and reveals his love, a love which precedes us and upon which we can lean for security and for building our lives. Transformed by this love, we gain fresh vision, new eyes to see. Those who believe - see!"

And by the grace of the Spirit this seeing, this knowing can persist even when our faith enters, as it must, the various seasons of darkness on life's path.