Change and its implication for faith

 No matter how we look at the world around us there are a couple of certainties other than death and taxes. The most prominent one is the prospect of change in our comfortable spaces. No matter who we are the very thought of change makes us shiver and become somewhat afraid. It does not matter whether the change is one that is sponsored by ourselves, such as a change in direction, home, living arrangement, career, etc or comes to us from an outside source COVID 19, restructure of work environment, new laws, etc. The very mention of the word creates division and this was understood by Christ as he spoke of the future to his disciples (Matt. 10.34-39). As Christians who have died to Christ (Rom 6.3-5) we must expect significant change in our lives, not only when we accept Christ but also when we continue with Christ in our lives.

In speaking about change we seem to accept the enormous change that Christ brings because we have died but wish to negate that change when it effects our more mundane lives. It is as if we believe that what ever spiritual or faith change is undertaken our secular and normal lives must remain unaffected. This is clearly not the answer as the Gospel passage indicates. Christ lets us know, in no uncertain terms, that the traditional place of comfort, the family, cannot remain the same when we take up the cross and follow Christ. If our safe place, our traditional place of comfort and security is no longer a safe haven to retreat to then how can we expect the world to be a safe place amidst change. The disruption that has occurred to our lives and the changes that must happen as we move forward into the unknown future must for us become a force that allows us to increase our resilience in the face of the inconsequential upheavals that we face on a daily basis. Just think of the changes in the life of Hagar and Ishmael faced in the wilderness when cast out by Abraham at the behest of Sarah (Gen. 21:14-21). The indication here is that no matter how cast out from our family we are God has a greater purpose that shows us a path along which we must strive.

We change our diet as we mature otherwise we do not grow

Any young person faces the challenges of change in the  formative years of their adulthood. In leaving home they must strive to find their place in an ever changing society and yes sometimes the challenges in this process of change are significant. At other times we shelter them from the raw experiences of life so that they can find safety in the bosom of their family but... It is a big but for even the family cannot shelter us in the long term. Just as we cannot expect in naivety that what we have always experienced will always remain the same. Christ calls us deliberately into something that changes leading us away from our comforts so that we too can change our own way of thinking to bring the Good news into those areas which are not ministered to as a result of our neglect. We often have to find a new way to express ourselves, away from that which is comfortable, how else can we spread God's love if we do not enter into new places. Remaining within the comfort of what we know and understand places us into the sheltered space. Yes, occasionally we have to place ourselves in that space but we cannot remain there or we will stagnate and die. A pond that does not refresh itself with a stream of water is likely to stagnate and die. If a herd of animals remained in one place they would stagnate and starve. We will not get the same ongoing sustenance if we remain in one way of thought and it is quite often the case that we also stagnate and die.

Even when we want to be fed we automatically want what we have had before or what we believe is life sustaining for ourselves. Once again we fall into a trap because if we are to grow we need to seek out new richness in the food that is provided. Like a child or a baby we require so much more than our initial serving. Baby food cannot sustain our growth into adulthood and so the diet is changed: can we expect any less with our faith journey? Christ calls us to grow into God's presence and life this is not something that can be done if we only have the food that sustained the beginning of growth. Any farmer knows that crops have to be nourished and as they grow they get different feed. This automatically means change, something we need not be afraid of or hostile to but rather open and encouraging so that we can get a fresh vision of God's path.

Discernment is difficult to form a plan

 Sometimes we think we can do it all.  I can undertake all the ministries in the Church and in the world.  All I have to do is put my hand up and I will be there.  If we are excited to participate we jump all over the place and try and put our hands on the wheel, so to speak, in as many different places as we can.  What happens is that we get ourselves mixed up and eventually cause a disaster as we tangle everyone else up.  Christ sends his disciples out in a deliberate and calculated manner (Matt. (9.35-10.8 ff) having understood what was required.

At baptism we pray that the child / adult will be filled with the charisms of the Holy Spirit.  If it is a child, I do not think that we expect him/her to jump up and speak in tongues immediately.  These gifts take time to develop and come to maturity just as the child grows.  The same is true for an adult, occasionally the gift manifests itself immediately but often there is a period of maturing and discerning before the full gift is manifest in the life of the individual.  There are times when we need to set time aside and pray about our situation before undertaking a course of action.  This is of course quite easy for a child as it has its parents and God parents to guide it in its first tentative steps towards making a decision in faith.  But what of an adult, as we can be extremely impulsive especially when it comes to our likes and dislikes, our comforts and our intrusions, our future and our past.  We have a tendency to see where others are not stepping up and feel that we need to fill the gap.  At the end of the day we become rag and bones because we are not doing what God wants us to do but what we want to do.

Only when listening and in harmony with God do we grow

There are a number of questions that we need to ask ourselves as we grow into our charisms and as we educate our children towards the next step in faith that they need to take.  In asking these questions of ourselves we take a step back and allow God's Spirit to interact with us through prayer, contemplation and the discernment of others.  We need to ask, Is this truly what God is calling me to and how am I to know that this is God's call on my life? Sarah was certain that she would not bear a child in her old age and scoffed at the suggestion (Gen. 18:12). We often do not know what God has in store for us and scoff at suggestions. However, when we start to reflect and answer the the questions or encourage our children to answer these questions we actually have to do some work.  It is not a question of "Oh this is what I think I want to do"  which is typical of children taking their first steps towards adulthood.  It actually means that we have to sit down and discern where God is calling me. How?  By listening to what others are saying and reflecting on that in relation to the choices that we are making.  By spending quiet time with God and allowing God to speak (we so often speak and don't actually listen to God).  By allowing God's Spirit to call to you in the quiet moments of your life.  Only through such a process do we discern a true call into ministry.

We allow our children room to discover these options of listening through their lives if we are being true to our baptismal call.  We go out of our way to encourage others to rightly discern the paths of God's Spirit in their lives through encouragement and listening.  We are present to the other as sounding boards so that we discern with the community the charisms of our neighbours and our fellow sojourners in Christ.  It will be Christ who leads us as he becomes manifest in our lives and as we are encouraged in the path of discernment for ourselves.  Only when we recognise the Christ that is indwelling in our own selves will we understand the gifts of the Spirit and how we release them into the community.  It is only when the gifts begin to hep the other and encourage those who are lost that we can know that the Charisms of the Spirit are invigorating the community.

Walking a new trail

 It is not often we have the opportunity to blaze a new trail in the world. More often then not the road that we travel is one that countless others have traipsed over in the eons of time prior to our arrival and will continue long after we are dead. We sometimes get to admire those who have led the way and blazed a new trail towards a fresh beginning or a new place. Most often than not those that take the trail blazing way do so with a large amount of backing, especially in this day and age. If we were to think about such things we would perhaps be looking towards giants such as Branson, Hilary, Allum or Lee as possible examples. In a similar vein within the faith journey we are perhaps in the most comfortable of spaces having only to spare limited thought to those who have gone before as our journey is perhaps the easiest it has ever been as things of struggle do not appear upon our horizon except as a celebration as to what has been achieved; the Trinity, Christ's Resurrection, etc. The big named things have been conquered and our journey is smooth without awkward interactions.

We pay tribute to those of ancient times who paved the way, as we rightly do today for Barnabas who is known as an encourager, in celebration and praise, much as Job comments (29:11-16). However, this is done without much thought to the milieu that was let alone the present for us as we move forward into a modernity with little wish for such people. A world that now somehow relegates the faith into a back corner of life to remain their neglected or shamed or bullied for archaic stances that do not fulfil the apparent needs of the world. We can perhaps consider our own circumstances of struggle to find and define the means of bringing the hope that is present in the Christian faith into a modern culture of ennui and disinterest. If all of these things are to be considered, then what makes for a new Barnabas? Instead of celebrating what has been why can we not celebrate what can be or what could be should we be those who truly follow where Christ has led the way. The disciples were sent out into the countryside of Palestine without anything, according to Matthew (10:5-10), to proclaim the Good News. This is not about establishing establishments which is all we seem to think about. It is about going out into world without anything other than the knowledge that God is with you and speaking of that love and what it means. Perhaps, we have become to comfortable with the 200 years of the Christian story that we no longer understand what it means to proclaim God's presence in the community.

Blazing new trails is not easy either in the past or today

Make no mistake this is hard work and yes the establishment provides for many in  a number of ways. Just as Melbourne and other dioceses are attempting to seek new ways we also have a tendency to fall back on what has been. No matter how we consider the future we are likely to continue to create ourselves through our past not through the accepting of Christ who comes from the future. New initiatives such as Saint Agnes House are welcome expressions of freshness and a listening towards the future. It is only a new and refreshing expression of God's presence if it is seen as such. Parishes, unfortunate holdovers that they are, are archaic institutions of the past that prop up previous behaviours and population groups, if there is no innovation towards God's presence that reaches out as the disciples in Matthew and the likes of Barnabas encouraged who brought God to life in a dangerous and unfriendly milieu. The systemic issue of expecting change with reducing resources and undertaking the same things as previously undertaken to achieve new results. Until we have the courage of Barnabas' encouragement and the other early disciples to utilise what God has granted for something novel, new and innovative then we will continue to bemoan what we had rather than celebrate what God has given. Let us rather be like Barnabas and the others taking what God has given and reaching out into the wild untouched parts of society with all the dangers that that brings.

Can we worship a Trinity?

 At this time of year our thoughts move in the direction of God, if they are not already there.  Once a year we celebrate and worship the Trinity, I believe the rest of the year we celebrate and worship...well perhaps God the father or Jesus God the Son (probably more often than not) and rarely God the Holy Spirit, once a year on Pentecost.  During most of the year, we have in one way or the other seem to have forgotten that God is three in one which is the real difficulty that other monotheist religions have with Christianity.  How can we say that we worship one God but have three who are one?  A definite paradox that we all struggle with at some point in time.

The presentation of this paradox has been enunciated  by the various early councils of the Church as they struggled to define the reality of faith in which they lived and is the basis upon which we formulate our understanding of the Trinity.  The challenge for us today is that we hardly understand the meaning and thought processes that went to formulate what we know as the doctrine of the Trinity.  The result is that we focus our attention on specifics that we can understand rather than the whole that we cannot understand.  In this way we may focus our lives on an understanding of Jesus as being the Son of God or Christ.  We celebrate this in the incarnation and the story of the Resurrection. Or else we celebrate the Spirit and turn our attention to the spiritual gifts as given in scripture.  We concern ourselves with the fact that we are speaking in tongues or are evangelists and if we are not then we are not 'true' Christians.  In using our limited expectations in this manner we are able to cope but forget that we are sent out to make disciples and then to baptise in the name of the "Father, Son and Holy Spirit" (Matt. 28.19).  One way or another we will focus our proclamation on one of the three and not all three; we will make disciples who follow one of the three not all three; we will teach about one of the three not all three.  How can we do it any other way when we do not understand it in the first place?

The Trinity what is it and who is it? (James Keay-Bright (Welsh, 1965–), Trinity Redemption, 2013)

Let us take a very straightforward and simple issue. My question is: What is One? Just think for a minute within the sphere of mathematics. Yes, I am aware that most people do not like thinking mathematically. One is a very unusual number as it is fully dependent on the understanding of its relation to and distinct from all other numbers. Let's put it another way one can only be as a result of a relationship with the other. It does not matter how you explain it the very fact that you have one means that there must be an other. In the case of Christian faith we suggest that the one can only be as a result of relationship, which we describe for the sake of description, as being Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Matt. 28.19b). I say for the sake of description because we cannot fully describe G*d and our best analogy formulated at the early councils of the Church is this analogy. Yet, in this day and age we have to be ever mindful that the formulation to describe G*d in this manner is time dependent. What do I mean by this. Well, whilst we have all grown up and familiar with the analogy it is one that is governed by the discussions of people who only knew Greek philosophy thrown in to a Middle Eastern world view to describe something that is unfathomable. The question raised here is can we with modern philosophy and a modern world view describe the unfathomable in any better way and have we tried or are we sufficiently complacent to rest on our ancestors thoughts on the matter? This actually means that we have to set aside our previous thinking and start from the beginning. Now, that is a tough challenge.

The wisdom of the world, which is found within the indigenous peoples of the world, is the knowledge of our own interconnectedness.  This knowledge was demonstrated by the early Christians and was part of their faith journey as they tried to express this appreciation of G*d.  An interconnectedness that is encapsulated by the discussions and debates that led to the promulgation of the doctrine of the Trinity.  We in the modern secular world have lost, or rather suppressed, the ability to understand this wisdom.  Perhaps, it is because we are moving to fast and have lost our ability to slow down.  Indigenous peoples know this and try to gift it to us within the slow movement of nature to which they are attuned. This has perhaps led to an extensive enantiodromia that has seen a rising mental health crisis within our secular nations. The Trinitarian formulation has, I believe, resulted in an ever increasing divide within the faith community as we each affiliate ourselves closely with one part of the whole (either the Father, or the Son or the Spirit) without claiming the wholeness of G*d that is the underlying foundation of the Trinitarian formulation.  A foundation that is interconnected and not divided, that is a whole and not the sum of its parts. An understanding that has been lost as a result of our own paucity of explanation and understanding as well as our focus on the individual rather than on our interconnectedness that nowadays spans the globe. In glorifying one of the Trinity we tend to idolise that one conception and forget that there is more to G*d.  Until we can get around the idea that G*d is in all; a much greater G*d than we can conceive of, then we will continue to reduce our faith to an ember.  Rather we should allow G*d's wisdom to so infuse our being with wholeness so that we shine as a Christ light in the world.