FR TIM'S HOMILY
TEXT OF FR TIM'S HOMILY
Down through the centuries religious orders have been founded with this radical call of Jesus to discipleship in mind and often in response to the particular challenges of a particular time in history. With the vows that we profess, it has generally been accepted that obeying the directive of a superior is the first step in knowing the will of God at any particular time or set of circumstances. Accordingly, in 2011, when I was asked to serve as parish priest of St Mary’s as well as our own Redemptorist parish of Bishop Eton, I gladly accepted the invitation, as I have all the other requests of my superiors during almost 60 years as a member of the Redemptorist Congregation and over 55 as a priest. Whereas previously our appointments had been for three-year terms, now they were to last for four years. It was not unusual for such appointments to be renewed, so I suppose that subconsciously I was reckoning that eight years would be the maximum I would be expected to fulfil these roles at St Mary’s. However, here we are, exactly 14 years later and we are all continuing to try and discern the Lord’s will not just for St Mary’s and Bishop Eton, but for the whole of the Archdiocese of Liverpool and, indeed, for the universal Church.
As you know, I take delight in looking for and finding connections and last Sunday, as we celebrated Mgr Peter Ryan’s 96th birthday, I was reminded that I first met Mgr Ryan back in 2007 (actually on July 18th) when I was holding meetings across the Portsmouth Diocese, helping to facilitate a process of reorganising the Diocese into new pastoral areas, where parishes would pool their resources and learn to work more closely together. Does this sound familiar? Well, of course it does: indeed I can trace my first experience of this back to the early 1980s, when I was the parish priest in Erdington Abbey, Birmingham, and the newly appointed Archbishop, Maurice Couve de Murville, had ordered a rationalisation of Mass times across the deaneries of the Archdiocese: that was particularly tricky for me in that in those days we had nearly 3,000 people attending over a weekend in a church, much like St Mary’s, built for a country parish in the middle of the 19th century. When I took the reins here in 2011, we were in the middle of Archbishop Patrick’s programme, Leaving Safe Harbours, and, of course, Archbishop Malcolm then called the Synod. I was slightly amused that in the end Archbishops Patrick and Malcolm seemed almost to be vying with each other as to which of them had closed more churches! And, of course, we continue to seek ways of pooling our resources as we form our families of parishes and recognise that we are being called to remain generous hearted and open to whatever new demands may be made of us.
I have shared with you before that if there is one person in the recent history of the Church who continues to inspire me, it is the French Jesuit, Fr Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. He was a brilliant scholar, a scientist as well as a theologian, and he had this wonderfully expansive vision of where to find and how to experience God. He wrote his wonderful poem, The Mass on the World, when he found himself spellbound at the beauty of the view that stood before him and moved to want to consecrate the moment. As a Christian, as a priest, he knew that the Mass is the “Source and Summit of our spiritual lives”, but he was without the means to celebrate: no bread, no wine and water, no altar. Accordingly, he wrote down the connections for us, asking us to use our imagination and expand our vision to embrace the interconnectedness of everything. Seeing the whole world as his altar, he looked beyond the horizon and saw human beings at work in the factories and the fields, the offices and the schools: he gathered it all and this was the bread he offered to God. He also saw the sufferings of humanity – aren’t we confronted or even haunted by this every day? He embraced the suffering for this was the chalice he offered to God. Likewise, Christ, in his humanity had gathered the work and suffering of the world and made the ultimate gift of it all to his Father as he died on the Cross. This is the mystery we celebrate at every Mass, for in fact there is only the one Mass, and it is being made present all over the world in every age. It seems almost certain that in the months and years ahead the Mass will not be as readily available to us as it has been, but I beg of you to treasure your faith and remain a eucharistic community, allowing the Lord to feed you with himself whenever you are able. And remember that ultimately it is leading you and me to the fulfilment of our life with Christ for all eternity. Teilhard had seen suffering, not least as a chaplain in the First World War, but also through his life. He was misunderstood by the Church and even silenced, but he remained faithful and, focused on Christ’s promise of resurrection: his dream was fulfilled as he died in New York on Easter Day 1955.
Towards the end of his life, a young girl, called Jean Houston, had met him and was enchanted by him. She had no idea who he was until years later, reading one of his books, she sensed she knew this person. A chance meeting with him in Central Park, led to a series regular encounters, which described as magical. Let me give you a taste of what she wrote: “Not only did Mr Tayer seem to have absolutely no self-consciousness, but he was always being seized by wonder and astonishment over the simplest things.” She described how he waxed eloquent when he saw a caterpillar, falling to his knees to examine it and then asking Jean to imagine what the butterfly version of her would be! She went on to say that “being with Mr Tayer was like being in attendance at God’s own party, a continuous celebration of life and its mysteries.” Now listen to this: “Always he saw the interconnections between things – the way that everything in the universe… was related to everything else and was very, very good.” I may be finishing my time as parish priest of St Mary’s, but we will remain deeply interconnected. I look back on the past fourteen years with immense gratitude to have had such an enriching experience. I want to beg forgiveness for anyone I may have offended, but above all I want to thank you for your love and generosity towards me and my fellow Redemptorists, and above all for your unfailing good will and encouragement. I know both Fr Peter McGrail and Fr Peter Murphy are looking forward to serving the parish in the years ahead and I know you will support them with the same love and enthusiasm in the Lord. And I assure Bishop Eton will strive to support the Family of Parishes which we now form.