Interesting words from Timothy Radcliffe, OP

My aunt, a Dominican nun, sent me the following thoughts of Timothy Radcliffe, OP, former Master General the the Dominican Order. I thought that the readers of this blog might be interested. --Michael Perry

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Sixth Sunday of Easter C 2004 -- Timothy Radcliffe, OP

‘If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.’ So the Church is our home. It is where God is at home in us and we are at home in God. It is where we belong, at ease, with untroubled hearts. What does this mean?

We can see what it does not mean in the first reading from Acts, these busy bodies are going around telling the Gentiles that unless they are circumcised, then they will not be saved. They do not really belong in the Church. The Church is not their home unless they become Jews. They are not proper Christians.

So the apostles gather for the first Council in the history of the Church and they decide that these Gentiles belong as they are. These presumptuous people had been acting without any authority, unsettling people. The very first major decision that the Church ever takes is to guarantee that the Church remains a large, capacious home, with room for us. The first exercise of authority by the Church is to oppose those who want to push other people out of the community.

The whole history of the Church is marked disputes, arguments and quarrels. And that is fine. It is a sign of being at home that one can argue and disagree without destroying the household. Even Dominicans squabble sometimes! But occasionally there are militant groups who want to decide who are proper Catholics, and to push out others out of nest, like a bloated cuckoo.

You may have read in the newspapers that there are very conservative groups of lay Catholics in the States who are campaigning that any politician who does not give political support to the Church’s teaching, on such issues as abortion or gay unions, must be turned away from communion. They must be rejected at the altar. Cardinal McCarrick, the Archbishop of Washington, is resisting the pressure. He says that he would be uncomfortable with denying people communion. Who are we to say whether someone is in a state of grace? And so this militant group have placed advertisements in newspapers such as The Washington Times, implying that the Cardinal is not a sound, proper Catholic either.

Clearly the issues are different from those of the first reading. The Council will decide that Gentiles do not need to be circumcised. There is no question of the Church going back on its opposition to abortion. But in both cases we see people who wish to shut people out of the Church, expel those who are not sound, proper Catholics in their own eyes.

Jesus speaks the words to the disciples at the Last Supper. Peter was about to deny him. Most of the other disciples would run away in fear. He promises that the Father and he will make their home precisely with these weak and fearful people, who are not, at this moment, exactly model Christians.

So we should all feel at home in the Church, even though, like these apostles, we may not feel that we are ‘good Catholics’. We may have doubts and uncertainties; we may disagree with the Church on some issues; we may be angry with the Church about other things. We may be living in what are called ‘irregular situations’, although they are more and more regular. But Jesus still invites us to be at home here. It is part of the beauty of Catholicism that so-called bad Catholics belong just as much as anyone else. Perhaps even more so. Jesus came to call sinners and not the just. The only people who might feel a little uneasy in this our home are the self-righteous. Not that we would wish to expel them!

Home is where you do not have to justify your presence. Blackfriars is my home. I do not have to give any reason for being here. I do not have to merit my place in the community, or establish that I am an upright friar with the correct views. I just belong.

Jesus says, to the disciples, ‘the word which you hear is not mine, but the Father’s, who sent me.’ Jesus does not own the words he speaks. They belong to his Father. And if he does not own them, then nor do we. We cannot claim possession of the word of God and use it to beat up other people and expel them from their home. The truth of the gospel is in no one’s mastery.

We are preparing for the feast of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit will dwell with us. Jesus says, ‘The Counsellor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.’ This does not mean that each of the apostles will remember everything. Some may remember Jesus’ compassion; others will remember his justice or his preaching of the Kingdom. Some will remember parables and others miracles. We have four gospels, four memories.

The Holy Spirit is poured upon us too. We each cherish some aspect of the gospel. But none of us has the right to claim that his or her memory is the only one and threaten people who cherish another. We need each other’s memories if we are to get a small glimpse of the whole truth. This is not wish washy relativism. It is building the home in which God may dwell.

‘Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.’ Let us try to build the Church as our common home in God. Here we should be untroubled and unafraid. The Church should be a large, capacious home for all sorts of oddbods, saints and sinners, progressives and conservatives, the convinced and the searching. It is Catholic, which means Universal. Let us not shrink it to the size of our own small hearts and minds.