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Apr 13
Waterholes: 14 April 2013
Welcome
Welcome to Waterholes, the Anam Cara Community newsletter for the week beginning 14 April 2013.
Christ is Risen!
Why this newsletter? This newsletter is one of the ways by which we hope to promote community. The Anam Cara Community is intended to be much more than simply a group of likeminded people. We hope it will continue to grow into a community that is a sign of God’s presence in and love for the world, a dispersed community of contemplatives whose lives and action bring peace and healing to all of God’s children. We are a Community of Prayer, and believe that as we pray together, God calls us deeper into fellowship with one another.
Who is welcome? The Anam Cara Community is proud to welcome anyone, from any background or faith community (or none!). We are an open and inclusive community that affirms the dignity and worth of all humans, the value of the environment, and seeks to model a way of living with one another and the world that points to the love and care of God for everyone. Individuals who wish to formally join the Community are welcome to become associates. You may now join or renew and pay electronically using PayPal. Find out more about the Servant Leaders, and read the Community Statement.
School for Prayer: In 2013 we are offering School for Prayer (SfP), a one year program for people who wish to begin, continue and deepen a life of prayer. We have a purpose designed website, and resources to support those who wish to make this journey. The material from our first School for Prayer day is now available, and includes audio of Bishop John's talks. The material from the second School for Prayer day is also available, and includes audio of Anne's talks.
Check out our new information brochure.
Contributions? If you have a piece of writing you’d like to share with the Community, feel free to send it on to Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org). Work of all sorts is welcome.
For your prayers
Part of the joy of the Anam Cara Community is the gift of being called to pray for others. If you would like the Community to pray for you, or for someone else, please email or phone Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org, 0403 776 402) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org) who will add them to the prayer list, and ensure they’re included in the next issue of the Newsletter. At present, your prayers are asked for:
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Barb Logan, who had surgery in the past weeks. She is recovering well, but please hold her, her family, and those who care for her in your prayer.
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Jenny Ramage, who is unwell.
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Chris Bennie, who is undergoing some medical tests, and is generally less than well.
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Anne Turner, elder of the Community. Anne is experiencing further signs of physical deterioration. Please hold her, and Brian as he cares for her, in your prayers.
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Ray and Joyce Elliot, associates of the Community whose beloved daughter Kathy died recently
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Larissa Dial, who has relapsed cancer, and her family.
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Helen Adamczyk, who is discerning God's wisdom and guidance.
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Jane Macqueen, whose ministry is busy and demanding.
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Karena and her family.
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Bishop John McIntyre, as he ministers to us and among us.
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Greg Reynolds, and the faith community of Inclusive Catholics in Melbourne, as they seek God and build new community.
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Michael Kelly, for his ministries and health.
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Alexander Shaia, as he prepares to return to Australia to teach and minister.
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Pope Francis and Archbishop Justin Welby as they begin their new ministries.
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Catherine Eaton, as she discerns God's will for her.
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The Abbey of St Barnabas, Edie Ashley the Abbey Priest, and all who work to realise the vision of the Abbey.
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Colin Thornby, who continues to recover from the stem cell transplant he received recently.
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The Servant Leaders of the Community, who met on 16 March 2013, to continue to discern God's call, plan and reflect.
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Don Saines, as he ends his ministry at St Paul's Cathedral in Sale, and begins a new ministry as Academic Dean at the United Faculty of Theology
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Chris Venning, in a time of discerning God's will
Coming Soon
Community Day: Conversations with a Quaker
Come and spend a day learning from the wisdoms found in a different Christian tradition. At the Community Day in Traralgon there will be an opportunity to learn and share with a Quaker, Joan Good. Joan has been a member of the local Quaker Community for many years. She will speak to us and also share in conversation what it means to be a Quaker. We will learn more of their forms of worship. Throughout the years the Quaker community has included long periods of silence as an integral part of their worship. They also have great concern for social justice issues in our community and throughout the world. They know the importance of the inner journey to God and how this guides and supports our outer journey.
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Community Day offered by the Western Region
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32 Kassandra Drive, Traralgon (Map)
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Saturday 4 May 2013, 9.30am to 4pm
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Suitable for everyone
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Cost – Nil to $15 depending on means
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BYO lunch, tea and coffee provided
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More information? Contact Carolyn (oliverraymond@wideband.net.au, 03 5174 3455) or Marion (mjdwhite@printedvisions.com.au, 03 5623 3216)
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RSVPs would be appreciated for planning and catering purposes
Read a report on the day held on 2 March 2013: 'Enduring Love'
Read a report, and access resources, from the SfP day held on 6 April 2013: 'Praying with Scriptures'
Scripture reflection
Colin Thornby
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Zephaniah 3:14–20
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Acts 9:1–20
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John 21:1–19
This final chapter of John’s Gospel is a chapter full of echoes, back to the earthly ministry of Jesus and forward to the life of the Church after the ascension. For example, compare the story of the miraculous catch of fish here in John’s Gospel with the stories in Mark and Luke of the calling of Peter, and you will see all kinds of similarities—you might like to look, in particular, at Luke 5:1–11, which is not, according to Luke, the first time that Peter sees Jesus, but is the moment at which he makes a commitment.
In the early stories of the calling of the disciples, the excitement is palpable. They recognize in Jesus something dynamic, and they willingly throw in their lot with him. They expect drama and glory, without too much responsibility—Jesus will tell them what to do. But if the stories at the beginning of the Gospels are the honeymoon period, what we see here in John’s Gospel is the commitment ‘till death do us part’. Once, Peter thought that being a fisher of men was going to put him in the spotlight, to be admired and loved, but now he has seen Jesus crucified and risen, and he knows that the calling to follow Jesus is grim and costly. John pulls no punches here, clearly linking Peter’s call to feed the sheep with the death that Peter is to suffer.
And if Peter initially left his nets to follow Jesus in the throes of a kind of hero worship, he now takes up the charge Jesus gives him without any illusions. He knows that he has betrayed Jesus; he knows what kind of mission Jesus’ is—at last; he knows that he will not be able to rely on Jesus to rescue him from tricky or terrible situations. He is prepared for the awesome responsibility of caring for people as Jesus did.
It is characteristic of John’s theology that Peter’s mission is based onlove. In John 21:5, Jesus calls out ‘children’, to attract their attention in the boat. This is the word that John’s Epistles use as the main description of the Christian community to which they are written. In this story, as in the Epistles, there is no doubt that the children are beloved. What is in doubt is how they show that love, which is what brought them into being and is the whole reason for their existence. They are more than willing to accept the love of God, but are they also willing to share it? So when Jesus gives Peter his hard and dangerous task of bringing the Christian community, the Church, into existence, he does not say to Peter, ‘I love you and trust you.’ Instead he asks, ‘Do you love me?’ It is only when Peter acknowledges that loving God is about giving, not just about getting, that he can play the part that God has for him.
Today’s New Testament readings show us the two leaders on whom the Church is built accepting their commission. Paul’s meeting with Jesus on the road to Damascus, like Peter’s meeting with the risen Christ, is not primarily a joyous occasion. Jesus’ words to Paul are almost harsh. Nothing about forgiveness or love, but a ruthless forcing on Paul of the understanding that to persecute his followers is to persecute Jesus. It is, if you like, the other side of Peter’s commission, to love Jesus by loving the ‘children’. Just as Peter had to learn, at last, to let go of all the illusions of greatness that he had cherished when he started to follow Jesus, so Paul, too, has to let go of all the things he thought he knew and start again. The dazzling light that brings darkness is the symbol of what will happen to Paul, the journey of abnegation that he will have to undertake, letting go of his own sight and learning to see with Jesus’ eyes.
Peter and Paul, the founders of the Church, both accept their responsibilities for God’s people because they know their own need. Could this be some kind of a parable for the Church? Could it be that we are not actually called always to be right, but simply to demonstrate by our own gratitude and love that God can and will forgive? If God can go on loving and forgiving the Church, which has been such a sorry mess for so much of its history, then his power to love and forgive must be enormous indeed.
Over and over again, as Zephaniah bears witness, God has forgiven his people, out of his great love for us. What we have to do is be grateful, and pass it on.
Back to the top
What Christianity feels like: The Chronicles of Narnia and the Power of Myth
Why are C.S. Lewis's "Chronicles of Narnia" – especially their showcase opener, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe - so popular, fifty years after their author's death? Many answers might be given, from the obvious fact that they are stories well told, to the suggestion that they call us back to a lost childhood. But perhaps there is something deeper going on here.
To understand the deep appeal of Narnia, we need first to appreciate the place of stories in helping us to make sense of reality, and our own place within it. The "Chronicles of Narnia" resonate strongly with the basic human intuition that our own story is part of something greater and grander – something which, once we have grasped it, allows us to see our situation in a new and more meaningful way. A veil is lifted; a door is opened; a curtain is drawn aside; we are enabled to enter a new realm. Our own story is now seen to be part of a much bigger story, which both helps us understand how we fit into a greater scheme of things, and discover the difference we can make.
Like his Oxford friend J.R.R. Tolkien, Lewis was deeply aware of the imaginative power of "myths" – stories told to make sense of who we are, where we find ourselves, what has gone wrong with things, and what can be done about it. A "myth," as Lewis uses the term, is not a false story told to deceive, but a story that on the one hand resonates with the deepest structures of reality, and on the other has an ability to connect up with the human imagination. Tolkien was able to use myth to saturateThe Lord of the Rings with a mysterious "otherness," a sense of magic which hints at a reality beyond that which human reason can fathom. Lewis realized that good and evil, anguish and joy, can all be seen more clearly when "dipped in myth." Through their "presentational realism," these narratives provided a way of grasping the deeper structures of our world at both the imaginative and rational levels.
Lewis may also have come to realize the power of myth through reading G.K. Chesterton's The Everlasting Man, with its classic distinction between "imaginary" and "imaginative," and deft analysis of how the imagination reaches beyond the limits of reason. "Every true artist," Chesterton argued, feels "that he is touching transcendental truths; that his images are shadows of things seen through the veil."
For Lewis, a myth is a story which evokes awe, enchantment and inspiration, and which conveys or embodies an imaginative expression of the deepest meanings of life – meanings that prove totally elusive in the face of any attempt to express them in purely abstract or conceptual forms. For Lewis, God authorizes the use of myth as a means of captivating the human imagination and engaging the human reason.
Lewis thus declares that human beings construct myths because they are meant to. They have been created by God with an innate capacity to create myths as echoes of a greater story or "story of a larger kind." Early Christian writers spoke of the logos spermatikos, a "seed-bearing word" implanted within creation by God, preparing the ground for the definitive revelation of God in Jesus Christ. Tolkien and Lewis both – though in slightly different ways – work with the notion of mythos spermatikos, a "narrative template" embedded within the human soul as part of the created order. Once more, these prepare the ground for the definitive revelation of God in the story of Jesus Christ. This approach is not about Jungian archetypes (although they may perform a similar function); it is rather a fundamentally Christian insight about the deeper structure of reality, and the best ways of representing and experiencing it by those who bear the "image of God."
Lewis argues that, since "God chooses to be mythopoeic," then we in our turn must be "mythopathic" – that is to say, receptive to God's myth, recognizing and acknowledging its "mythical radiance" and offering it an "imaginative welcome." And, since God uses myths as a means of communicating both truth and meaning, why should not humans do the same? Particularly those wishing to encourage their culture to offer an "imaginative embrace" to the Christian faith? Lewis offers a powerful imaginative alternative to the dull over-intellectualized apologetics of his own generation, which limited the appeal of the Christian faith to our reason.
Steeped in the riches of medieval and Renaissance literature, and with a deep understanding of how "myths" work, Lewis managed to find the right voice and the right words to get past the suspicions of a "fully waking imagination of a logical mind." Somehow, Narnia seems to provide a deeper, brighter, more wonderful and more meaningful world than anything we know from our own experience. Though the "Chronicles of Narnia" are clearly a work of fiction, they nevertheless seem far more "true to life" than many supposedly factual works. These evocative stories help us grasp that it is possible for the weak and foolish to have a noble calling in a dark world; that our deepest intuitions point us to the true meaning of things; that there is indeed something beautiful and wonderful at the heart of the universe; and that this may be found, embraced and adored.
Tolkien's Lord of the Rings is about finding a master ring – the ring that rules the other rings, which then must be destroyed because it is so dangerous and destructive. At the deepest level, Lewis's "Chronicles of Narnia" are about finding a master story – the story that makes sense of all other stories, which then must be embraced because of its power to give meaning and value to life.
But which is the true story? Which are merely its shadows and echoes? And which are fabrications, tales spun to entrap and deceive? At an early stage in the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the four children begin to hear stories about the true origins and destiny of Narnia. Puzzled, they find they have to make decisions about what persons and what stories are to be trusted. Is Narnia really the realm of the White Witch? Or is she a usurper, whose power will be broken when two Sons of Adam and two Daughters of Eve sit on the four thrones at Cair Paravel? Is Narnia really the realm of the mysterious Aslan, whose return is expected at any time?
Gradually, one narrative emerges as supremely plausible – the story of Aslan. Each individual story of Narnia turns out to be part of this greater narrative. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe hints at (and partially discloses) the "big picture" which is expanded in the remainder of the Narnia series. This "grand narrative" of interlocking stories makes sense of the riddles of what the children see and experience around them. It allows the children to understand their experiences with a new clarity and depth, like a camera lens bringing a landscape into sharp focus.
Yet Lewis did not invent this Narnian narrative. He borrowed and adapted one that he already knew well, and had found to be true and trustworthy – the Christian narrative of creation, fall, redemption and final consummation. Following his late-evening conversation with Tolkien about Christianity as the "true myth" in September 1931, Lewis began to grasp the explanatory and imaginative power of an incarnational faith. Lewis came to believe in Christianity partly because of the quality of its literary vision – its ability to give a faithful and realistic account of life. Lewis was thus drawn to Christianity, not so much by the arguments in its favour, but by grasping its compelling vision of reality, which he could not ignore – and, as events proved, could not resist.
The "Chronicles of Narnia" are an imaginative re-telling of the Christian "grand narrative," fleshed out with ideas Lewis absorbed from the Christian literary tradition. The basic theological themes that Lewis set out in Mere Christianity are transposed to their original narrative forms, allowing the deep structure of the world to be seen with clarity and brilliance. A good and beautiful creation is spoiled and ruined by a Fall, in which the creator's power is denied and usurped. The creator then enters into the creation to break the power of the usurper, and restore things through a redemptive sacrifice. Yet even after the coming of the redeemer, the struggle against sin and evil continues, and will not be ended until the final restoration and transformation of all things. This Christian metanarrative – which early Christian writers called the "economy of salvation" – provides both a narrative framework and a theological underpinning to the multiple narratives woven together in Lewis's "Chronicles of Narnia."
In one sense, the "Chronicles of Narnia" are just a story. Yet to the initiated, they are a retelling of the greatest story of all, which no human story can ever articulate adequately. Lewis's remarkable achievement in the "Chronicles of Narnia" is to allow his readers to inhabit this metanarrative – to get inside the story, and feel what it is like to be part of it. Mere Christianity allows us to understand Christian ideas; the Narnia stories allow us to step inside and experience the Christian story, and judge it by its ability to make sense of things, and "chime in" with our deepest intuitions about truth, beauty and goodness.
Like Lewis's wardrobe, they throw open an imaginative gateway to discovering and embracing the "Great Story," for which this life is but a "title page."
Support on the journey
The Anam Cara Community’s ministry is to be a support to those who are on the inner journey into God. Each person’s journey is different, and we recognise that there are some for whom the Christian tradition is difficult or not supportive. We’re committed to finding ways to hear the needs of each Associate, and support them as we can.
The Community can offer support in a number of ways:
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Spiritual direction / soul care: Spiritual direction is a process by which one person helps another grow in intimacy with God and in right relationship with all creation. This ministry has a long and revered history in the Christian tradition and has been practised by lay people, religious and ordained ministers. The focus of this ministry is the relationship between God and the person seeking direction. For more information and a referral to a director, contact Colin (0403 776 402 or colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org)
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Quiet days: usually held monthly across Gippsland, and in Canberra. Details are in this newsletter, or on the website.
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Library: maintained in Sale, but available for borrowing by post. Contact Sue (secretary@anamcara-gippsland.org, 03 5182 5542) or visit our webpage.
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Publications: Waterholes is the news-magazine of the community. Contributions are welcome.
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Fellowship: Available at our events, by email, on the phone, and the website.
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Website: Full of news, resources, reviews and other interesting information and supports.
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School for Prayer (SfP): a one year program run throughout 2013, to help anyone who wishes to begin, continue or deepen a life of prayer
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Directing to other resources, such as events at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A’Beckett Park.
News from the Servant Leaders
The Servant Leaders met in January 2013. You can read a report of that meeting here. You can also read our report to the Anglican Diocese of Gippsland's Bishop-in-Council here.
Events at the Abbey
Edie Ashley, the Abbey Priest, writes:
Planning for The Abbey Program 2013 is well under way.
We commence The Abbey Program in April 19-21st this year with a photographic workshop led by Robert Mc Kay, an experienced photographer and teacher of photography. This is followed in May 10-12th with a workshop ‘Rescuing the Dark Ages’ led by June Treadwell.
I am really pleased to be able to offer these two workshops as part of The Abbey Program 2013 (download the flyer).
Please consider attending yourself or let others know they are coming up. If you would like any more information, or to register, please contact Sue Gibson at The Abbey, on 5156 6580 or by email: info@theabbey.org.au.
An update on Colin
As most who receive this email will know, Colin Thornby has mantle cell lymphoma, a form of cancer. The 'best chance' treatment remaining to him is a donor stem cell transplant, delivered at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. He was admitted on 13 March 2013, and began treatment on 14 March 2013. His treatment went well, and he was discharged on 5 April 2013. He will now spend a prolonged time convalescing and will appreciate your prayers and good wishes. Feel free to contact him directly if you would like:
Email: colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org
Phone: 0403 776 402 or 03 03 9015 7720
Skype: cthornby
Post: PO Box 2184, Royal Melbourne Hospital, 3050
Love and prayers
Colin Thornby and Jane Macqueen
Soul Carers
Feb 17
The Servant Leaders meet every 2 months. The last meeting was held on 12 January 2013, and a report is now available. Click here to read!
Our formal report to the Bishop-in-Council’s February 2013 meeting is also available to read.
Feb 09
Waterholes: 10 February 2013
Welcome
Welcome to Waterholes, the Anam Cara Community newsletter for the week beginning 10 February 2013.
This newsletter is one of the ways by which we hope to promote community. The Anam Cara Community is intended to be much more than simply a group of likeminded people. We hope it will continue to grow into a community that is a sign of God’s presence in and love for the world, a dispersed community of contemplatives whose lives and action bring peace and healing to all of God’s children. We are a Community of Prayer, and believe that as we pray together, God calls us deeper into fellowship with one another.
The Anam Cara Community is proud to welcome anyone, from any background or faith community (or none!). We are an open and inclusive community that affirms the dignity and worth of all humans, the value of the environment, and seeks to model a way of living with one another and the world that points to the love and care of God for everyone.
Individuals who wish to formally join the Community are welcome to become associates. You may now join or renew and pay electronically using PayPal. Find out more about the Servant Leaders, and read the Community Statement.
Check out our new information brochure.
Contributions? If you have a piece of writing you’d like to share with the Community, feel free to send it on to Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org). Work of all sorts is welcome.
For your prayers
Part of the joy of the Anam Cara Community is the gift of being called to pray for others. If you would like the Community to pray for you, or for someone else, please email or phone Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org, 0403 776 402) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org) who will add them to the prayer list, and ensure they’re included in the next issue of the Newsletter. At present, your prayers are asked for:
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For all those affected by the bushfires throughout Australia, particularly those in Gippsland.
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Anne Turner, elder of the Community. Anne is experiencing further signs of physical deterioration. Please hold her, and Brian as he cares for her, in your prayers.
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Ray and Joyce Elliot, associates of the Community who have been suffering from health issues.
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Colin Thornby, as he prepares for his stem cell transplant (his admission has been delayed by several weeks, as his donor is sick).
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Larissa Dial, who has relapsed cancer, and her family.
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Helen Adamczyk, who is discerning God's wisdom and guidance.
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Jane Macqueen, whose ministry is busy and demanding.
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Karena and her family.
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Heather Blackman, an associate of the Community, who is preparing to be ordained priest.
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Ruth Harrison, an associate of the Community, who is ministering to her grieving family.
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Bishop John McIntyre, as he ministers to us and among us.
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Greg Reynolds, and the faith community of Inclusive Catholics in Melbourne, as they seek God and build new community.
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The Abbey of St Barnabas, Edie Ashley the Abbey Priest, and all who work to realise the vision of the Abbey.
Coming Soon
A whole year of new events beginning on 16 February 2013 – click here for the program
16 February 2012 – School for Prayer, "Prayer and Being Human" led by Bishop John McIntyre at Bishopscourt, Sale. Starts at 9.30am, ends at 4pm. For more information, contact Jane Macqueen.
The Anam Cara Community’s major program in 2013 is ‘School for Prayer’ (SfP).
Every person is born with a yearning for communion with God. In the Christian tradition the way of communion with God is known as prayer.
Because we’re not always good at prayer, and because lots of things often get in the way, we need to keep coming back to the simplicity and heart of prayer.
SfP is a year long program of events, teaching and information aimed at coming back to the simplicity and heart of prayer – being in relationship with God, who loves us, and desires to be in communion with us.
There is something in SfP for everyone, whether you’ve been praying for 5 weeks or 50 years. You can commit to the whole program, or attend events that appeal to you. You can also use our online resources to brush up on prayer. Joining in events means that you’ll be with others who are committed to the way of prayer, and who, like you are yearning for communion with God.
So, make some time and space for God this year, and try out SfP.
Scripture reflection
Colin Thornby
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Exodus 34:29–35
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2 Corinthians 3:12–4:2
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Luke 9:28–36
Today’s lectionary readings give us the rare chance to see one biblical author doing a thorough exegesis of another. In the passage from 2 Corinthians, Paul is referring directly to today’s reading from Exodus. But his take on the story is eccentric in the extreme. In Exodus, there is no suggestion that the people of Israel are to be blamed for the veiling of Moses’ face. It is natural that the after-effect of an encounter with God should be so dazzling. But Paul implies that the veil is a sign of the Israelites’ determination not to see what is offered to them. He suggests that they deliberately choose to put a barrier between God and themselves, and that that barrier remains until Jesus removes it.
Paul does not choose to dwell on the figure of Moses, which has a certain poignancy in the Exodus account. As a result of his meeting with God, Moses is able to give his people the law, which shows them the nature of God, and how to be his people. But Moses also pays a price. He can now be himself only in God’s presence. With everyone else, he must be veiled. Gift and cost go together.
Instead, Paul wants to home in on other images of ‘veiling’. In particular, he is exhorting his readers not to copy the Israelites by choosing to ‘veil’ things. Christians, he urges, have had the veil removed by the Lord, the Spirit, and must now learn to live and speak openly.
Subterfuge and deceit are ‘veiled’ things. Christians live with the open truth. Is it too much to believe that Paul also has in mind the veil of the temple, torn in two at the crucifixion? If he has, then he is interpreting the Exodus story in a way that has at least some things in common with today’s reading from Luke.
Luke is reflecting on the same passage from Exodus, but he is not interested in the concept of veiling, except insofar as the meaning of the event is veiled to the disciples until later. Instead, Luke concentrates on the ‘transfiguration’—the dazzling sign of an encounter with God. But his account is also a dense and evocative study of the connection between Jesus’ transfiguration and his death.
Like a number of other vital occurrences in Luke’s account, the transfiguration happens after prayer. You might like to compare this section with the choosing of the disciples in Luke 6:12ff., and notice that they both happen on the mountain.
Luke’s use of the Exodus passage is less direct than Paul’s, though the allusion is unmistakable. But although we are meant to recognize the parallel in the transfigured faces of Moses and Jesus, Moses is actually here with Elijah as representative figures—the great lawgiver and the great prophet, symbols of God’s covenant relationship with his people.
The transfiguration comes at a pivotal moment in Jesus’ mission. Moses and Elijah talk to Jesus about his ‘departure’ (the word is exodus, of course). This might mean nothing more than that he is soon to leave for Jerusalem, but if you put the word together with the fact that the disciples are wrestling with sleep, just as they will in Gethsemane, you see where Luke is pointing us.
Peter, James and John have no idea how to interpret what they have seen but again, Luke gives us, the readers, the clues. The voice from the terrifying cloud echoes the words that were heard at Jesus’ baptism. Just as his baptism is a confirmation of his ministry, so his transfiguration is a confirmation of the next, terrible stage of the journey. After this, Jesus begins to try to prepare himself and his followers for what will happen in Jerusalem. But the words spoken by God—words of acceptance, reassurance and commissioning—are also echoed in the jeering words of the crowd at the cross. ‘Let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one’, Luke writes in 23:35, for it is exactly this certainty of who Jesus is in God’s eyes that seems called into question by his death on the cross.
Luke tells us that Peter, James and John did not understand, ‘in those days’ (9:36), what had happened on the mountain of transfiguration, but he implies that they had been given a key that they would learn to use after Jesus’ death and resurrection. They will have the guide to help them see that to be the chosen One of God, the One who fulfils the law and the prophets, is not incompatible with death on the cross.
Back to the top
Experiental knowing
Richard Rohr
Mysticism is when God’s presence becomes experiential and undoubted for a person. You can see a kind of courage and self-confidence in the mystics. That puts them in an extraordinary category. Most of us believe things because our churches tell us to believe them and we don’t want to be disobedient members of the church so we say “I believe,” as we do in the Nicene or Apostle’s creed.
A mystic doesn’t say “I believe.” They say “I know.” A true mystic will ironically speak with that self-confidence but at the same time with a kind of humility. So when you see that combination of calm self-confidence, certitude, and humility all at the same time you have the basis for mysticism in general. The only things we know at any deep and real level are the things we have personally experienced. Creedal belief, however, holds onto us until we have that experience! This is an important distinction, and why we need creeds as well. Each generation and person cannot start at zero.
Also noticed around the Internet:
Support on the journey
The Anam Cara Community’s ministry is to be a support to those who are on the inner journey into God. Each person’s journey is different, and we recognise that there are some for whom the Christian tradition is difficult or not supportive. We’re committed to finding ways to hear the needs of each Associate, and support them as we can.
The Community can offer support in a number of ways:
-
Spiritual direction / soul care: Spiritual direction is a process by which one person helps another grow in intimacy with God and in right relationship with all creation. This ministry has a long and revered history in the Christian tradition and has been practised by lay people, religious and ordained ministers. The focus of this ministry is the relationship between God and the person seeking direction. For more information and a referral to a director, contact Colin (0403 776 402 or colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org)
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Quiet days: usually held monthly across Gippsland, and in Canberra. Details are in this newsletter, or on the website.
-
Library: maintained in Sale, but available for borrowing by post. Contact Sue (secretary@anamcara-gippsland.org, 03 5182 5542) or visit our webpage.
-
Publications: Waterholes is the news-magazine of the community. Contributions are welcome.
-
Fellowship: Available at our events, by email, on the phone, and the website.
-
Website: Full of news, resources, reviews and other interesting information and supports.
-
Directing to other resources, such as events at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A’Beckett Park.
An update on Colin
As most who receive this email will know, Colin Thornby has mantle cell lymphoma, a form of cancer. The 'best chance' treatment remaining to him is a donor stem cell transplant. He was scheduled to be admitted for the transplant on 7 February 2013, but this has been delayed, as unfortunately his donor is unwell, which makes harvesting the stem cells unviable. Colin will require maintenance treatment while he waits for the transplant, and will appreciate your prayers and good wishes. Feel free to contact him directly if you would like.
Love and prayers
Colin Thornby and Jane Macqueen
Soul Carers
Feb 02
Waterholes: 3 February 2013
Welcome
Welcome to Waterholes, the Anam Cara Community newsletter for the week beginning 3 February 2013.
This newsletter is one of the ways by which we hope to promote community. The Anam Cara Community is intended to be much more than simply a group of likeminded people. We hope it will continue to grow into a community that is a sign of God’s presence in and love for the world, a dispersed community of contemplatives whose lives and action bring peace and healing to all of God’s children. We are a Community of Prayer, and believe that as we pray together, God calls us deeper into fellowship with one another.
The Anam Cara Community is proud to welcome anyone, from any background or faith community (or none!). We are an open and inclusive community that affirms the dignity and worth of all humans, the value of the environment, and seeks to model a way of living with one another and the world that points to the love and care of God for everyone.
Individuals who wish to formally join the Community are welcome to become associates. You may now join or renew and pay electronically using PayPal. Find out more about the Servant Leaders, and read the Community Statement.
Check out our new information brochure.
Contributions? If you have a piece of writing you’d like to share with the Community, feel free to send it on to Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org). Work of all sorts is welcome.
For your prayers
Part of the joy of the Anam Cara Community is the gift of being called to pray for others. If you would like the Community to pray for you, or for someone else, please email or phone Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org, 0403 776 402) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org) who will add them to the prayer list, and ensure they’re included in the next issue of the Newsletter. At present, your prayers are asked for:
-
For all those affected by the bushfires throughout Australia, particularly those in Gippsland.
-
Anne Turner, elder of the Community. Anne is experiencing further signs of physical deterioration. Please hold her, and Brian as he cares for her, in your prayers.
-
Ray and Joyce Elliot, associates of the Community who have been suffering from health issues.
-
Larissa Dial, who has relapsed cancer, and her family.
-
Helen Adamczyk, who is discerning God's wisdom and guidance.
-
Jane Macqueen, whose ministry is busy and demanding.
-
Bishop John McIntyre, as he ministers to us and among us.
-
Greg Reynolds, and the faith community of Inclusive Catholics in Melbourne, as they seek God and build new community.
-
Michael Kelly, as he travels overseas to teach and minister.
-
Alexander Shaia, as he continues his teaching ministry, and prepares to return to Australia and New Zealand.
-
The Abbey of St Barnabas, Edie Ashley the Abbey Priest, and all who work to realise the vision of the Abbey.
-
Bishop Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury elect.
-
Those in the Church of England hurt by the recent decision not to ordain women as bishops.
-
The faithful and leaders of the churches of Australia, as they deal with the fall-out of the recently announced Royal Commission, and the Commissioners and staff of the Royal Commission as they undertake this important work.
-
All of those hurt by the church, and by church people.
-
The Community, as we begin a new church year, and prepare for the program for next year.
-
The Servant Leaders, who met together on 12 January to plan the new year.
-
Colin Thornby, as he prepares for his stem cell transplant (his date of admission to the Royal Melbourne Hospital is 7 February).
-
Karena and her family.
Coming Soon
A whole year of new events beginning on 16 February 2013 – click here for the program
16 February 2012 – School for Prayer, "Prayer and Being Human" led by Bishop John McIntyre at Bishopscourt, Sale. Starts at 9.30am, ends at 4pm. For more information, contact Jane Macqueen.
The Anam Cara Community’s major program in 2013 is ‘School for Prayer’ (SfP).
Every person is born with a yearning for communion with God. In the Christian tradition the way of communion with God is known as prayer.
Because we’re not always good at prayer, and because lots of things often get in the way, we need to keep coming back to the simplicity and heart of prayer.
SfP is a year long program of events, teaching and information aimed at coming back to the simplicity and heart of prayer – being in relationship with God, who loves us, and desires to be in communion with us.
There is something in SfP for everyone, whether you’ve been praying for 5 weeks or 50 years. You can commit to the whole program, or attend events that appeal to you. You can also use our online resources to brush up on prayer. Joining in events means that you’ll be with others who are committed to the way of prayer, and who, like you are yearning for communion with God.
So, make some time and space for God this year, and try out SfP.
Scripture reflection
Colin Thornby
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Genesis 2:4b–9, 15–25
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Revelation 4
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Luke 8:22–5
If you go straight from today’s Genesis reading to the reading from Revelation, you could almost imagine that the history of God’s relations with people had been one of unbroken communion. From the intimacy of the Garden of Eden to the glad worship of the heavenly court, human beings were made to live in the presence of God. But there are some subtle differences that suggest the reality of what lies between these two ‘times’ in our story with God.
In Genesis 2 we have the second story of how God made people. InGenesis 1, God makes humanity as the culmination of his labours, a kind of completion. Genesis 2, which has a much fuller and more narrative style, also sees humanity as central, but here, man is made first, and everything else is then made to keep him company. As God makes all the living creatures, we are told that he brings them to Adam, to see what he will call them (Genesis 2:19). This picture of God and Adam playing together sets the tone of this stage of the story. There is an unimaginable closeness between God and the man that he has made out of nothing.
But already the masterly story-teller has put in hints of what is to come. All the lushness of the garden is there just for Adam to enjoy, except the one tree ‘of the knowledge of good and evil’ (v. 17). (In the interests of good feminist exegesis, I must just point out that the command not to eat from the tree was given to Adam on his own, before the creation of Eve, which makes the tradition of blaming Eve for what follows even more unfair!)
And the other dark note comes in God’s understanding that Adam is lonely. Although it is hard to believe that anyone who can talk and play with God could be lonely, it is a measure of God’s generosity and understanding that he creates a companion for Adam. In other words, this act acknowledges what is basic to God’s creativity, which is that it creates something genuinely new, ‘other’. God’s artistry is such that he can make something that is genuinely different from himself.
We, the readers, know what will happen as a result of disobedience to God’s command, and how that innate separation between God and his creation will become a huge rift. But in this reading, all we get is the peace and closeness that exist between God, Adam and Eve. Notice that they do not need, explicitly, to worship their God, here in Eden; they just need to live with him.
In Revelation 4 that natural, quiet closeness has gone, and has instead been replaced by the vision of God’s splendour and our proper worship of it. This chapter, like most of Revelation, is full of allusions to the Old Testament. Echoes of the visions of Isaiah and Ezekiel are unmistakable, and it is hard not to compare the living creatures in Revelation with the beasts in Daniel, though there are very significant differences, both in their appearances and in their characters. But like Isaiah 6 and Ezekiel 1, Revelation’s description of the heavenly court is meant as much to mystify as to clarify. What is seen must be described, but in terms that show that it is beyond any human imagination.
So in this chapter, the one seated on the throne is not described in personal terms. The images that come to the author’s mind as he describes his vision are those of jewels and the rainbow—an impression of brightness and glorious light. The creatures around the throne do not fit into any ordinary earthly categories. But the 24 elders who sit around the indescribable throne are recognizable human figures, and the worship that they and the strange creatures offer can be put into words, with the assumption that we the readers can share in that, at least.
So between Genesis and Revelation, a distance has opened up between human beings and God. The familiarity and ease of the relationship between God and Adam is replaced by the awe and the knowledge of our created dependence with which this chapter of Revelation ends. But that gap can be bridged by our worship. In worshipping God, Revelation implies, heaven and earth are united, and we are again in our proper relationship, knowing who made us, and who wills our existence.
And, of course, what makes that bridging possible is Jesus. In Luke’s story, we see Jesus acting like the Creator, bringing order out of chaos, commanding the waters. The human Jesus holds together Creator and created as he stands in the boat and stills the storm.
Back to the top
Happiness is an inside job
Happiness is elusive for many people and we often search for it in all the wrong places! We seek happiness in the instant gratification of our desires, in the accumulation of possessions, accolades or relationships, in our accomplishments or in the delights of our physical senses. The pursuit of happiness motivates many of our actions and efforts in life. We spend a great deal of time, effort and money in the acquisition of ‘things’ believing that once we have the right partner, house, car, bank balance, physical attributes, possessions, holidays or children we will be satisfied and fulfilled, that happiness will descend upon us and remain our constant companion. We all want to be happy and avoid suffering as much as possible. Yet many of us have found that it is suffering that breaks us open to compassion, wisdom and understanding. It is often our suffering that enables us to realise that happiness is not derived from the outer circumstances of our lives – that indeed, happiness is an inside job.
Perhaps it is a quirk of human nature that we don’t actively seek the ingredients for real happiness until the unexpected, the unasked for and sometimes, the unthinkable happens in our life. Life is full of uncertainties. Our struggle for understanding and acceptance can cause us to find and honour the great spirit within ourselves and in so doing we find self-understanding, resolution, humour, courage, wisdom and more. In human form we can discover the peace that passes all understanding, where we are no longer defined by our physical limitations or attributes or our mental and emotional turbulence. Real happiness is not disturbed by the outer circumstances of our life. Indeed real happiness is not disturbed by trauma, tragedy, illness or death of our physical body. I have witnessed many people who, at the time of their death, were able to let go lightly of their physicality and dissolve into the great mystery from whence we come.
From the moment of our birth, our consciousness begins to enmesh itself into our physical body according to the feelings we experience. Before birth we rely on ‘womb service’, after birth, time will tell. The feelings we experience have as much a biological impact as an emotional one. Whether we feel safe, secure, loved, cared for, valued and joyful or deprived, fearful, neglected, abandoned, abused or rejected, the chemicals of our feelings flood from our brain and body and provide biological information to the cells of our body.
In the first few days and weeks of life a baby doesn’t really understand that it is physically embodied. If their limbs are left to jerk about uncontrollably he or she doesn’t yet understand what these new sensations mean. At about six or seven weeks a baby catches sight of its own hands, studies them and gradually learns that they have a direct relationship with him or herself. The baby’s focus is then on getting their physical body to respond to their desires to roll over, crawl, sit up, stand and accomplish a myriad of physical possibilities. In the best of all possible worlds, everyone in the family cheers and claps whenever the baby accomplishes any of these feats and the baby feels fabulous and rewarded for their efforts. We feel that we are absolutely gorgeous, capable, amazing, lovable, loved and loving. This becomes our biology as well as forming a platform on which more complex experiences follow.
Babies radiate love and happiness effortlessly regardless of the colour, intellect, disability, religion or wealth of the people they encounter. However, in our early weeks, months and years we are immersed in the soup of our family’s prejudices. We don’t understand the intellectual concepts that our parents articulate but there is a sound around resentment and bitterness, a sound around anger and frustration, a sound around judgement, a sound around ‘the others’. This is where we learn that there are people who belong to ‘us or our group’ and ‘the others’. If you were born into a wealthy household then poor people may have been considered less. If you were born into a poor family, then wealthy people may have been considered as different because they have ‘more’. If you were born into a Christian household then the Muslims may have been ‘the others’ and vice versa. Young children don’t understand the ‘why’ but they do pick up the feeling that we must close our hearts to other people who are different from us. Depending on our family and what they value, we begin to see people who are richer or poorer, fatter or thinner, more or less educated, fitter or less so, happier or not, religious or atheist, intelligent or not so, as belonging to our culture or not as being different from ourselves – the ‘others’.
As young children we also marinate in our family’s, ‘I’ll be happy when…’ story. We hear our parents and others proclaim that they’ll be happy when they get a pay rise, a bigger car, lose a few pounds, start exercising, stop smoking, move to a better neighbourhood, when they go on holidays, when the washer in the bathroom tap is changed or the kitchen is renovated. Before long we believe that we will be happy when Christmas comes, when we go to school, when the exams are over, when we leave school, when we find the perfect partner, get qualified, have children, when they leave, when the divorce comes through or when we retire. In this way, we are deeply programmed to postpone our sense of happiness and contentment to a future time when things look different from how they are right now.
And, all this time, we are beginning to unconsciously adapt our behaviour to fit in with the environment into which we have been born. Perhaps if we have a loud and needy older sibling, we become the quiet one or the child that trades off her looks, or of being a brave boy, or the bright one, the funny one, the athletic one, the peacemaker or the responsible one. From listening to well over 60,000 stories from people who have sought counselling with me or attended our residential programs at the Quest for Life Centre, it seems that most of us adopt a particular persona that will work within the dynamics of our own family.
So, we arrive upon the planet as a fairly clean slate. We then feel our way into existence by mastering our bodily functions and receiving feedback, by absorbing the family’s values and judgments, by adapting to the family environment into which we are born, by learning to postpone our sense of happiness to a future time, by feeling our way into an identity which will (hopefully) meet our needs for love, attention and care. Much of this biology is established through our feeling experience by the time we are aged three, before we even have a language in which to articulate our experience. We then build beliefs that explain to ourselves why we ‘feel’ that way.
Such beliefs could be, ‘I’m better than (or, not as good as) everybody else’, ‘life’s a struggle’, ‘I have to earn my right to exist’, ‘no one understands or loves me’, ‘I’m a disappointment’, ‘my value lies in my ‘doing’, not in my ‘being’, ‘I’m unlovable’ and so on. Our beliefs then dictate our behaviours, our choices.
Gradually, it becomes second nature for us to feel a particular way, to think a particular way, to react in a particular way. We all seem to understand what we mean by second nature. The issue is what is your first nature?
The search for happiness generally continues until life brings us some obstacles that cause us to question our existence and ponder how we might embrace the challenge that faces us. This challenge to our happiness might be a disappointment, a diagnosis, a disaster, a drama. Suddenly we are stopped in our tracks and we question ourselves and how we might proceed. This is a marvellous moment in time when we say to ourselves, ‘something’s got to change, and it’s me!’ We realise that it’s not about changing the outer circumstances of our life, but how we perceive and respond to these outer circumstances.
I well remember the day when this happened to me, when I realised that there was nothing to blame for my own misery. I was sitting in a small cave within a monastery in Assisi (OK), Italy (OK). I had secluded myself from the world to find some peace as I was grappling with illness and my imminent death from leukaemia. I could still be sitting there, a dusty little pile of bones now, muttering to myself, “it’s not fair! I shouldn’t have had a weird brother who told me, before he was ten years old, that he had to kill himself by the time he was thirty; I shouldn’t have had years in hospital and multiple surgeries to my legs in my teen years; I shouldn’t have been raped; I shouldn’t have got into drugs; I shouldn’t have been crippled with arthritis; I shouldn’t have had domestic violence and emotional abuse in my relationships; my brother shouldn’t have committed suicide; I shouldn’t have leukaemia, it’s not fair!’ But I realised that those things had happened and the challenge became, ‘am I willing to be defined by what has happened to me or can I be more than that?’ I knew I could trade of the wounds of the past as an excuse for my behaviour in the present or I could choose to see them as opportunities for healing and release.
Life provides us with endless opportunities to relinquish everything that has become second nature to us so that we consciously experience our first nature, which is love. Indeed, the sole/soul purpose of human existence is to release everything that has become second nature to us so that we can reveal our first nature. Once we understand this, life becomes an opportunity to embrace every moment with an open heart, free of judgement and a clear and quiet mind. Then, happiness is ours.
Also noticed around the Internet:
Support on the journey
The Anam Cara Community’s ministry is to be a support to those who are on the inner journey into God. Each person’s journey is different, and we recognise that there are some for whom the Christian tradition is difficult or not supportive. We’re committed to finding ways to hear the needs of each Associate, and support them as we can.
The Community can offer support in a number of ways:
-
Spiritual direction / soul care: Spiritual direction is a process by which one person helps another grow in intimacy with God and in right relationship with all creation. This ministry has a long and revered history in the Christian tradition and has been practised by lay people, religious and ordained ministers. The focus of this ministry is the relationship between God and the person seeking direction. For more information and a referral to a director, contact Colin (0403 776 402 or colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org)
-
Quiet days: usually held monthly across Gippsland, and in Canberra. Details are in this newsletter, or on the website.
-
Library: maintained in Sale, but available for borrowing by post. Contact Sue (secretary@anamcara-gippsland.org, 03 5182 5542) or visit our webpage.
-
Publications: Waterholes is the news-magazine of the community. Contributions are welcome.
-
Fellowship: Available at our events, by email, on the phone, and the website.
-
Website: Full of news, resources, reviews and other interesting information and supports.
-
Directing to other resources, such as events at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A’Beckett Park.
Love and prayers
Colin Thornby and Jane Macqueen
Soul Carers
Jan 19
Waterholes: 20 January 2013
Welcome
Welcome to Waterholes, the Anam Cara Community newsletter for the week beginning 20 January 2013.
This newsletter is one of the ways by which we hope to promote community. The Anam Cara Community is intended to be much more than simply a group of likeminded people. We hope it will continue to grow into a community that is a sign of God’s presence in and love for the world, a dispersed community of contemplatives whose lives and action bring peace and healing to all of God’s children. We are a Community of Prayer, and believe that as we pray together, God calls us deeper into fellowship with one another.
The Anam Cara Community is proud to welcome anyone, from any background or faith community (or none!). We are an open and inclusive community that affirms the dignity and worth of all humans, the value of the environment, and seeks to model a way of living with one another and the world that points to the love and care of God for everyone.
Individuals who wish to formally join the Community are welcome to become associates. You may now join or renew and pay electronically using PayPal. Find out more about the Servant Leaders, and read the Community Statement.
Check out our new information brochure.
Contributions? If you have a piece of writing you’d like to share with the Community, feel free to send it on to Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org). Work of all sorts is welcome.
For your prayers
Part of the joy of the Anam Cara Community is the gift of being called to pray for others. If you would like the Community to pray for you, or for someone else, please email or phone Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org, 0403 776 402) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org) who will add them to the prayer list, and ensure they’re included in the next issue of the Newsletter. At present, your prayers are asked for:
-
For all those affected by the bushfires throughout Australia, particularly those in Gippsland.
-
Anne Turner, elder of the Community. Anne is experiencing further signs of physical deterioration. Please hold her, and Brian as he cares for her, in your prayers.
-
Ray and Joyce Elliot, associates of the Community who have been suffering from health issues.
-
Larissa Dial, who has relapsed cancer, and her family.
-
Helen Adamczyk, who is discerning God's wisdom and guidance.
-
Jane Macqueen, whose ministry is busy and demanding.
-
Bishop John McIntyre, as he ministers to us and among us.
-
Greg Reynolds, and the faith community of Inclusive Catholics in Melbourne, as they seek God and build new community.
-
Michael Kelly, as he travels overseas to teach and minister.
-
Alexander Shaia, as he continues his teaching ministry, and prepares to return to Australia and New Zealand.
-
The Abbey of St Barnabas, Edie Ashley the Abbey Priest, and all who work to realise the vision of the Abbey.
-
Bishop Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury elect.
-
Those in the Church of England hurt by the recent decision not to ordain women as bishops.
-
The faithful and leaders of the churches of Australia, as they deal with the fall-out of the recently announced Royal Commission, and the Commissioners and staff of the Royal Commission as they undertake this important work.
-
All of those hurt by the church, and by church people.
-
The Community, as we begin a new church year, and prepare for the program for next year.
-
The Servant Leaders, who met together on 12 January to plan the new year.
-
Colin Thornby, as he prepares for his stem cell transplant (his date of admission to the Royal Melbourne Hospital is 6 February).
-
Karena and her family.
Coming Soon
A whole year of new events beginning on 16 February 2013 – click here for the program
16 February 2012 – School for Prayer, "Prayer and Being Human" led by Bishop John McIntyre at Bishopscourt, Sale. Starts at 9.30am, ends at 4pm. For more information, contact Jane Macqueen.
The Anam Cara Community’s major program in 2013 is ‘School for Prayer’ (SfP).
Every person is born with a yearning for communion with God. In the Christian tradition the way of communion with God is known as prayer.
Because we’re not always good at prayer, and because lots of things often get in the way, we need to keep coming back to the simplicity and heart of prayer.
SfP is a year long program of events, teaching and information aimed at coming back to the simplicity and heart of prayer – being in relationship with God, who loves us, and desires to be in communion with us.
There is something in SfP for everyone, whether you’ve been praying for 5 weeks or 50 years. You can commit to the whole program, or attend events that appeal to you. You can also use our online resources to brush up on prayer. Joining in events means that you’ll be with others who are committed to the way of prayer, and who, like you are yearning for communion with God.
So, make some time and space for God this year, and try out SfP.
Scripture reflection
Colin Thornby
-
Isaiah 62:1–5
-
1 Corinthians 12:1–11
-
John 2:1–11
The story of the wedding at Cana is an intriguing one. The dynamic between Jesus and his mother is fascinating, as is the nature of the miracle.
The Gospels that emerged in the first few Christian centuries, under the guidance of God, as the ‘canonical’ ones are very reticent about Jesus’ childhood. John and Mark don’t mention it at all; Matthew goes straight from the Christmas stories to the baptism of Jesus; and Luke has one story of the 12-year-old boy in the temple. Some of the other writings that were circulating among Christians in the early centuries are not so restrained. They tell stories of a miraculous boyhood, of a child whittling a bird out of wood and then giving it life to fly away. Considering the human temptation to biographies, it is very interesting that the common mind of the Church rejected these stories as not essential to our faith. There are all kinds of reasons for this, but one thing that is noticeable about the four Gospels that we base our lives on is their drivenness—they tell a story that leads inexorably to the cross, and nothing is included that is not vital to that story.
But the interaction between Jesus and his mother in this first miracle story in John’s Gospel does suggest that Jesus’ childhood was not completely ordinary. Why did Mary expect Jesus to be able to do anything about the empty wine jars? What did she know about him? John’s Gospel does not tell us.
What it does show us is a gradual building of Jesus’ ministry. John’s description, in the previous chapter, of the calling of the first disciples shows Jesus as an attractive, teasing, compelling figure. People are drawn to him, and when they are with him, they know they are at the heart of something wonderful.
And then comes this lovely, happy wedding story. Jesus is there with his friends, who are already, John implies, a recognized group, invited together to the wedding. Mary, the bossy, affectionate mother takes no notice at all of Jesus’ attempt to avoid doing a sign. ‘My hour has not yet come,’ he tells her, but Mary clearly feels it is her place to decide when his hour had come, not his. She treats him almost like a sulky boy, who just needs humouring and cajoling into performing.
And perform he does. Why does he do it? Only Mary, the servants and the disciples know what has happened. Does it set up all kinds of false impressions in the minds of those closest to Jesus? Does Mary expect to continue to control his ministry? Do the disciples congratulate themselves on throwing in their lot with someone who is going to give them such a good time? If there is any such implied uncertainty in John’s narrative, then the shock of the cleansing of the temple, which immediately follows this story, is even greater. The picture of happiness and harmony is shattered as Jesus comes face to face with the reality of his mission and we, the readers, begin to sense the escalation of tension, the beginnings of the mighty conflict between darkness and light.
John tells us that this miracle at Cana was a revelation and a confirmation of faith for the disciples. They saw the exuberant, creative power of God at work in bringing uncomplicated human enjoyment to this wedding. Through the rest of their time with Jesus they had to learn many other kinds of things about God’s power, not all of them palatable, but this streak of anarchic joy is characteristic of God as we encounter him through Jesus.
It is the point that is made for us by the reading from 1 Corinthians. God works in a wild variety of ways, and does not always follow our rules. Although there is an inherent consistency in our encounters with God, we will see it only if what we are looking for is the shape of Jesus. The point of our faith is to enable us to say, and live, ‘Jesus is Lord’. Sometimes, Paul tells us, this will be accompanied by very satisfying gifts of power, but they are not the point. The point is to build a worshipping community, made up of people whose lives are directed to God. This community will rejoice in the exercise of gifts that help it to grow, but they won’t care who has the power to speak, or heal or work miracles, so long as the community as a whole is learning to say, ‘Jesus is Lord’. To see the Holy Spirit at work, building a people to praise and worship, to recognize this power, that is the true spiritual gift, one that we are all called to exercise.
Back to the top
What is an adult?
What a wonderfully provocative question: “What is an adult?” Someone asked this recently on my Facebook page and not entirely tongue in cheek! Countless people go to the grave without appreciating the gifts that adulthood allows…and perhaps also without some of the exuberance and enthusiasm of childhood that can, wonderfully, also endure throughout our lives.
Three points among so many possibilities: 1. An adult knows they have choices. You are making choices all of the time! This is true even and especially when your circumstances seem dire – or when you believe someone else “caused” you to act badly. The challenge is to make your choices consciously rather than blindly: to see and know that it’s your choices that create the person you are becoming (good to be around, capable of insight and tolerance – or not). This is key to self-confidence and to your care of other people.
2. An adult takes responsibility for the life they are creating…and (again) for the effect of this on other people. Yes: we are the product of our conditioning. And we certainly do not start or finish with similar advantages. Some of us must spend time and courage healing painful wounds. But at some point we can and must say, “This is my precious life. What am I making of it – and of myself?” Personal power lies in no other direction.
3. An adult lives a life of appreciation and gratitude rather than complaint and dissatisfaction. Someone who is struggling to grow up – or who doesn’t believe it necessary to do so – will be filled to the brim with complaints. And will find much to attack. They may regard every disappointment as a personal insult. This reduces their pleasure in life. Just as crucially, it makes them unpleasant and sometimes dangerous to be around. Living appreciatively, we don’t shy away from the suffering that’s in the world or our own hearts, but as best we can we relieve it and heal it, rather than adding to it.
All of this becomes so much easier, so effortless really, when we not only value our own gift of life, but value LIFE ITSELF. Then it becomes natural to extend care and dignity to others, even when we profoundly disagree with their views. It becomes personally far less confronting to see when we have done something idiotic or harmful and to apologise, learn from it, and avoid repeating the same mistake. (We can afford to make right what is wrong.) It also becomes easy to see what is precious, delightful, uplifting – and to have and give far more of that.
Doing this, we meet LIFE ITSELF from a far steadier and more secure place. We benefit. So does everyone else.
May we ALL be well and happy! May we ALL be well and happy!
Support on the journey
The Anam Cara Community’s ministry is to be a support to those who are on the inner journey into God. Each person’s journey is different, and we recognise that there are some for whom the Christian tradition is difficult or not supportive. We’re committed to finding ways to hear the needs of each Associate, and support them as we can.
The Community can offer support in a number of ways:
-
Spiritual direction / soul care: Spiritual direction is a process by which one person helps another grow in intimacy with God and in right relationship with all creation. This ministry has a long and revered history in the Christian tradition and has been practised by lay people, religious and ordained ministers. The focus of this ministry is the relationship between God and the person seeking direction. For more information and a referral to a director, contact Colin (0403 776 402 or colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org)
-
Quiet days: usually held monthly across Gippsland, and in Canberra. Details are in this newsletter, or on the website.
-
Library: maintained in Sale, but available for borrowing by post. Contact Sue (secretary@anamcara-gippsland.org, 03 5182 5542) or visit our webpage.
-
Publications: Waterholes is the news-magazine of the community. Contributions are welcome.
-
Fellowship: Available at our events, by email, on the phone, and the website.
-
Website: Full of news, resources, reviews and other interesting information and supports.
-
Directing to other resources, such as events at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A’Beckett Park.
Love and prayers
Colin Thornby and Jane Macqueen
Soul Carers
Jan 12
Waterholes: 13 January 2013
Welcome
Welcome to Waterholes, the Anam Cara Community newsletter for the week beginning 13 January 2013.
This newsletter is one of the ways by which we hope to promote community. The Anam Cara Community is intended to be much more than simply a group of likeminded people. We hope it will continue to grow into a community that is a sign of God’s presence in and love for the world, a dispersed community of contemplatives whose lives and action bring peace and healing to all of God’s children. We are a Community of Prayer, and believe that as we pray together, God calls us deeper into fellowship with one another.
The Anam Cara Community is proud to welcome anyone, from any background or faith community (or none!). We are an open and inclusive community that affirms the dignity and worth of all humans, the value of the environment, and seeks to model a way of living with one another and the world that points to the love and care of God for everyone.
Individuals who wish to formally join the Community are welcome to become associates. You may now join or renew and pay electronically using PayPal. Find out more about the Servant Leaders, and read the Community Statement.
Contributions? If you have a piece of writing you’d like to share with the Community, feel free to send it on to Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org). Work of all sorts is welcome.
For your prayers
Part of the joy of the Anam Cara Community is the gift of being called to pray for others. If you would like the Community to pray for you, or for someone else, please email or phone Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org, 0403 776 402) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org) who will add them to the prayer list, and ensure they’re included in the next issue of the Newsletter. At present, your prayers are asked for:
-
Anne Turner, elder of the Community. Anne is experiencing further signs of physical deterioration. Please hold her, and Brian as he cares for her, in your prayers.
-
Ray and Joyce Elliot, associates of the Community who have been suffering from health issues.
-
Larissa Dial, who has relapsed cancer, and her family.
-
Helen Adamczyk, who is discerning God's wisdom and guidance.
-
Jane Macqueen, whose ministry is busy and demanding.
-
Bishop John McIntyre, as he ministers to us and among us.
-
Greg Reynolds, and the faith community of Inclusive Catholics in Melbourne, as they seek God and build new community.
-
Michael Kelly, as he travels overseas to teach and minister.
-
Alexander Shaia, as he continues his teaching ministry, and prepares to return to Australia and New Zealand.
-
The Abbey of St Barnabas, Edie Ashley the Abbey Priest, and all who work to realise the vision of the Abbey.
-
Bishop Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury designate.
-
Those in the Church of England hurt by the recent decision not to ordain women as bishops.
-
The faithful and leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in Australia, as they deal with the fall-out of the recently announced Royal Commission,
-
All of those hurt by the church, and by church people.
-
The Community, as we begin a new church year, and prepare for the program for next year.
-
The Servant Leaders, who met together on 12 January to plan the new year.
-
Colin Thornby, as he prepares for his stem cell transplant (his date of admission to the Royal Melbourne Hospital is 6 February).
-
Karena and her family.
Coming Soon
A whole year of new events beginning on 16 February 2013 – click here for the program
Scripture reflection
Colin Thornby
-
Isaiah 43:1–7
-
Acts 8:14–17
-
Luke 3:15–17, 21–2
The first three Gospels all have the story of Jesus’ baptism by John in very similar words. John’s version of events, as so often, is slightly different—you might like to go and have a look at it in John 1:29–34. But all four Gospels are agreed that this is a moment of confirmation, when God declares his love for Jesus.
What is so moving is that this is before the start of Jesus’ full ministry. He has yet to embark upon the painful and costly path that will lead to the cross. The love of the Father is not just because of what the Son does, but because of who he is. The hectic, exhilarating and terrifying ministry of Jesus is set in motion by this affirmation—‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased’ (Luke 2:22). It is because Jesus is loved that he is obedient.
This passage in Luke also continues the story of John the Baptist. Here he is, at the height of his powers, with the crowd hanging on his every word. They have no interest in Jesus, yet. He is just one of the many coming for baptism. Their whole attention is fixed on John. ‘Who is he?’ they ask. ‘Surely he must be the chosen one of God?’ It is a symptom of the drivenness of John’s calling that he is not distracted by the flattering and tempting voices all around him. He knows what he has to do, and he knows his limits.
But what of John’s assessment of the ministry of the One who is to come? John’s preaching has been fiery and full of anger. He has preached repentance with a ferocity that has obviously got through everyone’s defensive barriers. He is sure that the Messiah will confirm everything he has said, and add to it. He waits for the Messiah to bring devastating judgement. He may be prepared to submit his own ministry to that of the Messiah, but is he prepared to have his clear message of hellfire and destruction reinterpreted? Later stories of John the Baptist suggest that he did learn that Jesus’ message was not his, and accepted that. But that is not to suggest that judgement is absent from Jesus’ preaching. On the contrary, it is a sombre and continuous note. People’s reaction to Jesus is their reaction to God, and since to hate God is to hate life, people choose their own judgement as they react to God’s beloved Son.
But John’s preaching is a sub-plot in today’s readings. You have to remember it, because it will come back later in the story. But for the moment, the emphasis is somewhere else. It is on the loving interaction of the Trinity.
In the Gospel reading, the love of the Father for the Son is made visible by the Holy Spirit, descending like a dove, descending ‘in bodily form’, verse 22 says. What the Son does for us, which is to make God’s love incarnate, the Holy Spirit does for the earthly Jesus. The Holy Spirit gives Jesus the confirmation that he is, indeed, the Beloved Son of the Father. Is it heretical to think that Jesus might need such a confirmation as he embarks upon his mission, or is it yet another part of his saving identification with us?
Acts gives us a further elaboration of the way in which a relational, Trinitarian God works. This is actually a very odd little passage. It is easy to get distracted by the intriguing question of what was missing when the good people of Samaria were baptized only in the name of Jesus. What dramatic gifting did Peter and John convey with their prayers and their laying on of hands? But the ‘magic’ is a fatal distraction, as the verses immediately after today’s set reading make clear. The point of it is that Jesus’ ministry is not about himself: it is about the Father who has sent him, and the Holy Spirit who keeps the love of the Father an ever-present reality. Christian baptism is baptism into the loving community of God.
This, then, is what we are called to: to hear God say to us, as to Jesus, that he loves us and is pleased with us. The resounding joy of today’s reading from Isaiah is what we are promised in Jesus’ baptism, as he takes up his mission for us. We are created by God, Isaiah says, for his glory, and that is why he chooses to redeem us. Not because we are worthy but because, inexplicably, he loves us.
Back to the top
10 days to greater calm
Day 1 Claim – and exercise – your POWER TO CHOOSE your responses, even in tense situations. Know what presses your “buttons”. Know what “throws you off your perch”. You will be far more reactive and far less calm (and wise) when you are tired, hungry, self-pitying, depressed or angry. Take care of yourself physically and emotionally. Most crucially, take seriously your chance to be someone others can rely on. This can be your highest ambition: to make your world calmer, kinder and far more joyful.
Day 2 Check where you are making most effort: in “controlling” other people – or your own moods and reactions. When you are safely “in charge” of your own responses, behaviour and attitudes, you will be far more accepting and supporting of others. You will be calmer. You will also be far more loveable. And when things go wrong? Apologise. Never blame others. Re-group. And move on.
Day 3 Move your attention away from yourself. Check how your choices and attitudes are affecting other people. Watch. And listen. Even ask. Are you EASY to be around? Do you know how to put others at their ease? How to reassure them…support them…thank and encourage them? Make it your business to bring calm to others. This will always, always help you to calm yourself. (And life will instantly be far more interesting.)
Day 4 Wherever you are, you affect the emotional atmosphere before you say a single word. Those thoughts brewing in your head literally shift the atmosphere for better or worse. Let yourself be a beacon of calm and good humour. Make it easy for other people to trust you and feel safe around you. Cultivate good humour, openness and patience – even when you are NOT getting your own way. Take it for granted that others have a right to their views, their agenda. This is maturity. This is freedom.
Day 5 Rediscover PATIENCE. And practise it on a daily basis. This means: taking the time needed rather than the time available; giving others the time they need; not over-scheduling; pausing, looking around, “chilling”; overlooking small set-backs…remaining cheerful, even stoic in more serious moments; moving at others’ pace; letting your mind rest; checking what a situation needs, rather than what you are imposing. All of this withdraws much of the sting in contemporary life. And what a gift to other people! Patient people are a delight to be around. They contribute to a kinder, calmer world. It’s that simple.
Day 6 Take it for granted things will sometimes go wrong. And people won’t do exactly what you want when you want. So what? Very few events justify a fuss – or are helped by them. When problems arise (and they will), simply ask: “What’s needed here?” And move on. See yourself as some who solves problems rather than creates them; who minimises “fusses”; who can clearly see the difference between a mountain and a molehill and can respond like a grown up.
(For some of you this may be the most helpful day of all.)
Day 7 Be brave enough to NOTICE when you need to regain your precious self-control. Don’t look for anyone or anything to blame. It’s up to you to change the inner and outer atmosphere. Use slow, conscious breathing. For as long as it takes. Or go for a long, fast walk. Remove yourself from agitating triggers and NEVER react (condemn, explode, accuse) when your emotions are running high. Your thinking is least coherent at those times and most dangerous. Making these changes is a mighty gift to yourself and others. You will grow in self-confidence and happiness. Everyone benefits.
Day 8 Know what lifts your spirits. And do much more of it. (Put it at the TOP of your list – for everyone’s sake.) When you are enjoying life – and spreading joy far and wide – you are far less likely to fall into negativity, self-pity or global gloom. With inner stability comes energy, optimism, hope and care. All priceless treasures! And yours for the taking.
Day 9 Dare to be spiritually ambitious! Be the loving presence who routinely reassures, calms and comforts others, who forgives and doesn’t blame, and who can gracefully receive comfort and care when it is offered. Such blessings and joy will follow. And when you fail or fall down? Get up and start again. It’s not the falling that matters; it’s the rising.
Day 10 See your world and yourself through the eyes of APPRECIATION. Always. Banish criticism. Lavish praise (gratitude, interest, kindness). And not just for what people do – appreciate and rejoice in who they are. No change in perspective and behaviour brings greater blessings, ease and happiness. Every day can be a good day.
Support on the journey
The Anam Cara Community’s ministry is to be a support to those who are on the inner journey into God. Each person’s journey is different, and we recognise that there are some for whom the Christian tradition is difficult or not supportive. We’re committed to finding ways to hear the needs of each Associate, and support them as we can.
The Community can offer support in a number of ways:
-
Spiritual direction / soul care: Spiritual direction is a process by which one person helps another grow in intimacy with God and in right relationship with all creation. This ministry has a long and revered history in the Christian tradition and has been practised by lay people, religious and ordained ministers. The focus of this ministry is the relationship between God and the person seeking direction. For more information and a referral to a director, contact Colin (0403 776 402 or colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org)
-
Quiet days: usually held monthly across Gippsland, and in Canberra. Details are in this newsletter, or on the website.
-
Library: maintained in Sale, but available for borrowing by post. Contact Sue (secretary@anamcara-gippsland.org, 03 5182 5542) or visit our webpage.
-
Publications: Waterholes is the news-magazine of the community. Contributions are welcome.
-
Fellowship: Available at our events, by email, on the phone, and the website.
-
Website: Full of news, resources, reviews and other interesting information and supports.
-
Directing to other resources, such as events at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A’Beckett Park.
Love and prayers
Colin Thornby and Jane Macqueen
Soul Carers
Jan 05
Waterholes: 6 January 2013
Welcome
Welcome to Waterholes, the Anam Cara Community newsletter for the week beginning 6 January 2013.
This newsletter is one of the ways by which we hope to promote community. The Anam Cara Community is intended to be much more than simply a group of likeminded people. We hope it will continue to grow into a community that is a sign of God’s presence in and love for the world, a dispersed community of contemplatives whose lives and action bring peace and healing to all of God’s children. We are a Community of Prayer, and believe that as we pray together, God calls us deeper into fellowship with one another.
The Anam Cara Community is proud to welcome anyone, from any background or faith community (or none!). We are an open and inclusive community that affirms the dignity and worth of all humans, the value of the environment, and seeks to model a way of living with one another and the world that points to the love and care of God for everyone.
Individuals who wish to formally join the Community are welcome to become associates. You may now join or renew and pay electronically using PayPal. Find out more about the Servant Leaders, and read the Community Statement.
Contributions? If you have a piece of writing you’d like to share with the Community, feel free to send it on to Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org). Work of all sorts is welcome.
For your prayers
Part of the joy of the Anam Cara Community is the gift of being called to pray for others. If you would like the Community to pray for you, or for someone else, please email or phone Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org, 0403 776 402) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org) who will add them to the prayer list, and ensure they’re included in the next issue of the Newsletter. At present, your prayers are asked for:
-
Anne Turner, elder of the Community. Anne is experiencing further signs of physical deterioration. Please hold her, and Brian as he cares for her, in your prayers.
-
Ray and Joyce Elliot, associates of the Community who have been suffering from health issues.
-
Larissa Dial, who has relapsed cancer, and her family.
-
Helen Adamczyk, who is discerning God's wisdom and guidance.
-
Jane Macqueen, whose ministry is busy and demanding.
-
Bishop John McIntyre, as he ministers to us and among us.
-
Greg Reynolds, and the faith community of Inclusive Catholics in Melbourne, as they seek God and build new community.
-
Michael Kelly, as he travels overseas to teach and minister.
-
Alexander Shaia, as he continues his teaching ministry, and prepares to return to Australia and New Zealand.
-
The Abbey of St Barnabas, Edie Ashley the Abbey Priest, and all who work to realise the vision of the Abbey.
-
Bishop Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury designate.
-
Archbishop Rowan Williams, as he prepares to lay down his ministry as Archbishop of Canterbury.
-
Those in the Church of England hurt by the recent decision not to ordain women as bishops.
-
The faithful and leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in Australia, as they deal with the fall-out of the recently announced Royal Commission,
-
All of those hurt by the church, and by church people.
-
The Community, as we begin a new church year, and prepare for the program for next year.
-
The Servant Leaders, as they meet together on 12 January to plan the new year.
-
Colin Thornby, as he prepares for his stem cell transplant (his date of admission to the Royal Melbourne Hospital is 4 February).
Coming Soon
A whole year of new events beginning on 16 February 2013 – click here for the program
Scripture reflection
Colin Thornby
-
Isaiah 60:1–6
-
Ephesians 3:1–12
-
Matthew 2:1–12
The wise men have always had enormous appeal. Everything about them has been elaborated in poetry and story. They have become kings; they have been depicted as representing youth, maturity and old age; they have been given the features of different races; they have been named. They function as our representatives; all of us Gentiles were not actually there.
That is the connection that runs through these three passages, and forms the theme for today. It is the theme of God’s great self-revelation to the world.
In Isaiah, the scene is in darkness. The figure might be asleep, or might be prostrate with grief. Suddenly an incandescent light shines, illuminating the central figure and emphasizing the darkness all around. Behind the figure, the light gathers, brighter and brighter, forming into a clear, majestic shape, made of brilliance. Gradually other shapes come on to the stage, drawn by the light, shuffling out of the darkness. The whole stage erupts into a party, as the light spreads further and further. The one who was alone and in darkness is now surrounded by light and laughter. Bit by bit, through the happy sounds, the central character’s voice is heard, singing a hymn. Gradually other voices pick it up, until the whole stage coalesces into one song, a song of praise to the Light.
This is how Isaiah sees God’s revelation. It is to be a time of vindication for his people, but in their triumph they are generous. They are thrilled not only by the wealth and honour that recognition brings, but also by the fact that the nations can now share in their worship of God. The culmination of today’s passage is the picture of community united to ‘proclaim the praise of the Lord’ (Isaiah 60:6).
This is how Ephesians sees it, too. The point of God’s epiphany is that everyone should be drawn to him. Huge claims are made for Paul—and, by implication, for all Christians—in this passage. In Ephesians 3:2–3 it is said that the ‘mystery’ of God’s inclusive call waits upon Paul’s conversion and commission. To Paul and, it is rather grudgingly admitted, to ‘the holy apostles and prophets’, is entrusted the revelation that all can share in the gospel. The enormity of this claim is clear—God’s original plan for his whole creation, thus far ‘hidden … in God’, is now entrusted to the Church. The ‘rulers and authorities in the heavenly places’ (v. 10), who may have felt that they had rights over the Gentiles at least, are shown a community drawn from all races and owing allegiance only to God. Perhaps the church you attend Sunday by Sunday does not always remind you of ‘the wisdom of God in its rich variety’, but it should.
But again, as with the passage in Isaiah, the purpose of this self-gift of God to his people is not to elevate believers above others, but to enable worship. We can now approach God, knowing that we are called, loved, wanted.
What strange messengers God chooses for his gospel—the dark, mourning figure in Isaiah; the difficult, touchy apostle Paul, whose mission often lands him in prison; the infantile, squabbling Christian Church. And that brings us full circle to the wise men, again. If you actually read the passage in Matthew, trying to forget the preconceptions you bring to it, you will see that they are very odd figures. We don’t know where they come from, just that it is ‘the East’; we don’t know how many of them there are, just how many presents they bring; we don’t know their status, though they do have the confidence to call at Herod’s palace. What they saw, in the end, cannot have been what they were expecting. They were tracking a king, so they looked for him in a palace, and brought presents that must have looked singularly out of place to Mary and the child Jesus. Not for them the direct visitation of the angels, with clear instructions on how to find the baby—that is reserved for the shepherds. The wise men follow the bright, enigmatic star, using their intelligence to calculate its path, making assumptions in their visit to Herod—and with what fatal consequences.
So the real story of the wise men seems to be about the challenge of God’s coming. God’s kingship is not what you might expect, and his revelation is blindingly unpredictable. But at least the wise men do recognize their journey’s end when they see it. We are told that they are ‘overwhelmed with joy’. They leave their strange presents and go home satisfied. Let us hope that in that, at least, they are our representatives.
Back to the top
Brother Alois of Taize on the Epiphany
Christmas sets before us a humble event that took place one day in Bethlehem. Epiphany shows us that this event has a universal and even a cosmic dimension. The Wise Men are guided by a star and represent all peoples, all cultures.
Today we would like to understand how the light of Christ can enlighten all people. To achieve this, like the Wise Men we must leave our habits and some of our beliefs behind. We must leave ourselves behind, bending down and entering the stable. Any other attitude would cause us to miss the God who humbled himself to the point of being born in a hidden place.
Let us spend time with them. May our prayer, before being petition, be, like theirs, adoration. When we look towards the light of Christ, it gradually becomes an inward light and the mystery of Christ becomes the mystery of our own lives as well.
The spirit of adoration is not easy in a world where immediate results matter so much, where the mere thought of a long process of maturation arouses impatience. As for the Wise Men, a journey is necessary to allow us simply to remain in the presence of God. In long silences where nothing seems to happen, God is at work in us, without our knowing how.
[Our] stained-glass window of the Epiphany shows the Wise Men adoring the Child. Let us look at that child to understand who God is. Let us consider the extreme humility of God. Let us see that, as a poor child, he comes to beg for our love! And let us see too that he restores human dignity to those who have lost it.
To adore means to discern the presence of God. God is present in his Word (at the recent Synod of Bishops in Rome, the "sacramental" character of the Bible was recalled). God is present in the Eucharist. Christians of the East know that icons also lead us into communion with God. God is present in the humble events of our lives. And the Gospel insists: God lets himself be found among the poorest of the poor.
Adoration means turning away from ourselves to look towards God. If our own concerns take up all the room, how can the obstacles that cover over the source of life set within us by God be removed?
The Wise Men express their adoration by an offering. The prayer of adoration leads us to offer the best of ourselves to God and to others. It leads us to make our life a gift for those who are entrusted to us.
It is true that some suffer too much and no longer have the strength to worship God. We must have respect and compassion without limits for such people. But if the Gospel asks us to look beyond ourselves, it is in order to keep hope alive, even for those who are unable to hope any longer.
Christians of the East may feel an attitude of adoration before the mystery of God more spontaneously than Westerners do. I had that experience recently. In early December, the death of the Orthodox Patriarch of Moscow, Alexy II, touched our hearts. I had met him, and he told me he wanted to deepen cooperation with Taizé. I went to his funeral with two of my brothers.
During the celebrations in Moscow, I said to myself: we have such a need to open ourselves to the treasures bequeathed to Eastern Christianity. One of the secrets of the soul of Eastern Christians lies in a prayer of adoration where God's goodness becomes tangible. This prayer allows access to the mysteries of the faith: the incarnation of Christ, his resurrection, the presence of the Holy Spirit in the Church. And it is from these mysteries that Christians of the East draw a sense of the greatness of the human being. God became man so that humanity might participate in his divinity; every human being is called to be transfigured with Christ already here on earth.
Could our liturgies, without in any way neglecting the communal dimension, lead to more adoration, to inwardness, to a personal communion with God?
In the East, the Epiphany is called Theophany, "appearance of God." The liturgical tradition links the story of the Wise Men, the baptism of Jesus and the water changed into wine at Cana, since they are, at the beginning of the Gospels, three moments when the secret of Christ is revealed: letting the compassion of God shine forth in our humanity.
In coming to earth, Jesus manifested God's love for all people, for all nations. He inscribed God's "yes" in the depths of the human condition. God welcomes all of us just as we are, with what is good, but also with our shadows, and even our defects. We learn to accept that we are poor. And from that moment on, we cannot despair either of the world or of ourselves.
Support on the journey
The Anam Cara Community’s ministry is to be a support to those who are on the inner journey into God. Each person’s journey is different, and we recognise that there are some for whom the Christian tradition is difficult or not supportive. We’re committed to finding ways to hear the needs of each Associate, and support them as we can.
The Community can offer support in a number of ways:
-
Spiritual direction / soul care: Spiritual direction is a process by which one person helps another grow in intimacy with God and in right relationship with all creation. This ministry has a long and revered history in the Christian tradition and has been practised by lay people, religious and ordained ministers. The focus of this ministry is the relationship between God and the person seeking direction. For more information and a referral to a director, contact Colin (0403 776 402 or colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org)
-
Quiet days: usually held monthly across Gippsland, and in Canberra. Details are in this newsletter, or on the website.
-
Library: maintained in Sale, but available for borrowing by post. Contact Sue (secretary@anamcara-gippsland.org, 03 5182 5542) or visit our webpage.
-
Publications: Waterholes is the news-magazine of the community. Contributions are welcome.
-
Fellowship: Available at our events, by email, on the phone, and the website.
-
Website: Full of news, resources, reviews and other interesting information and supports.
-
Directing to other resources, such as events at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A’Beckett Park.
Love and prayers
Colin Thornby and Jane Macqueen
Soul Carers
Dec 29
Waterholes: 30 December 2012
Welcome
Welcome to Waterholes, the Anam Cara Community newsletter for the week beginning 30 December 2012.
This newsletter is one of the ways by which we hope to promote community. The Anam Cara Community is intended to be much more than simply a group of likeminded people. We hope it will continue to grow into a community that is a sign of God’s presence in and love for the world, a dispersed community of contemplatives whose lives and action bring peace and healing to all of God’s children.
The Anam Cara Community is proud to welcome anyone, from any background or faith community (or none!). We are an open and inclusive community that affirms the dignity and worth of all humans, the value of the environment, and seeks to model a way of living with one another and the world that points to the love and care of God for everyone.
Individuals who wish to formally join the Community are welcome to become associates. You may now join or renew and pay electronically using PayPal.
Contributions? If you have a piece of writing you’d like to share with the Community, feel free to send it on to Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org). Work of all sorts is welcome.
For your prayers
Part of the joy of the Anam Cara Community is the gift of being called to pray for others. If you would like the Community to pray for you, or for someone else, please email or phone Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org, 0403 776 402) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org) who will add them to the prayer list, and ensure they’re included in the next issue of the Newsletter. At present, your prayers are asked for:
-
Anne Turner, elder of the Community. Anne is experiencing further signs of physical deterioration. Please hold her, and Brian as he cares for her, in your prayers.
-
Ray and Joyce Elliot, associates of the Community who have been suffering from health issues.
-
Larissa Dial, who has relapsed cancer, and her family.
-
Helen Adamczyk, who is discerning God's wisdom and guidance.
-
Jane Macqueen, whose ministry is busy and demanding.
-
Bishop John McIntyre, as he ministers to us and among us.
-
Greg Reynolds, and the faith community of Inclusive Catholics in Melbourne, as they seek God and build new community.
-
Michael Kelly, as he travels overseas to teach and minister.
-
Alexander Shaia, as he continues his teaching ministry, and prepares to return to Australia and New Zealand.
-
The Abbey of St Barnabas, Edie Ashley the Abbey Priest, and all who work to realise the vision of the Abbey.
-
Bishop Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury designate.
-
Archbishop Rowan Williams, as he prepares to lay down his ministry as Archbishop of Canterbury.
-
Those in the Church of England hurt by the recent decision not to ordain women as bishops.
-
The faithful and leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in Australia, as they deal with the fall-out of the recently announced Royal Commission,
-
All of those hurt by the church, and by church people.
-
The Community, as we begin a new church year, and prepare for the program for next year.
-
Colin Thornby, as he prepares for his stem cell transplant (his date of admission to the Royal Melbourne Hospital is 4 February).
Coming Soon
A whole year of new events beginning on 16 February 2013
-
16 February 2013: School for Prayer – Bishop John McIntyre, Sale
-
2 March 2013: Eastern Region Community Day, Stratford
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6 April 2013: School for Prayer
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4 May 2013: Western Region Community Day
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24-26 May 2013: Retreat at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A'Beckett Park
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1 June 2013: School for Prayer
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29 June 2013: Thanksgiving Service, St Mary's Church, Morwell
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6 July 2013: Southern Region Community Day
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3 August 2013: School for Prayer
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7 September 2013: Eastern Region Community Day
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13-15 September 2013: Retreat at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A'Beckett Park
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5 October 2013: School for Prayer
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2 November 2013: Western Region Community Day
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7 December 2013: School for Prayer
Scripture reflection
Colin Thornby
To get the full picture of what is going on in the reading from 1 Samuel, we really need the verses that the lectionary chooses to leave out. The story is actually about different kinds of sonship. The contrast is between Samuel, who is not Eli’s own son, but who is growing up to reverence Eli, the temple and God, and the men who are Eli’s own sons, but who see the whole religious cult as something to be exploited for their own benefit. These ‘natural’ sons will die, but Samuel, the son by grace, will grow up to serve God’s purpose for his whole people.
The passage from Luke, too, is about different kinds of sonship. Jesus’ parents are expecting one kind of behaviour, due to them as his parents, but he has chosen another road, that reflects his true parentage, and he is amazed that Mary and Joseph have not noticed whose ‘son’ he is. We are told of Jesus, as of Samuel, that he increased in ‘divine and human favour’, both flourishing in their new ‘families’. This tension between the family of birth and the family of God’s grace is a significant undercurrent in Jesus’ message, and those who live in a world where it is culturally acceptable, if a bit uncool, to be a Christian, should remember those many Christians throughout the world who still have to make the choice between being children of God and children of their parents.
You could see today’s readings as a kind of saga of mistaken identities, of the true heir going unrecognized, in which case, the verses from Colossians add another twist. Samuel is the heir whom God has chosen, but who has no birth claim. Jesus is the one that no one thought of as the heir, but who proves to be the Son of the King. And we are the ones, Colossians tells us, who are to put on the heir’s clothes and stand in the place that he has made for us in his family.
There is a story of a corrupt young man, who has lived all his life for pleasure and profligacy, but who at last falls deeply and genuinely in love. The problem is that his beloved is a young and innocent girl, who will undoubtedly be disgusted not only by his past life, but also by the marks of dissipation that it has left upon his face and body. So he decides to wear a mask, to make himself look like a handsome and unclouded young man while he woos the girl. All goes well, until someone from his former life threatens to unmask him to the girl. Aghast, the man realizes that he cannot keep up the deception for ever, and he confesses all to the girl, and tears off his mask. He expects to see loathing on her face, but all he sees is bewilderment, for the face is exactly the same with or without the mask. His great love for the girl has transformed him into what he longed to be for her.
It is striking that we are told in Colossians to ‘clothe’ ourselves with all the virtues. We are not told that we have to become naturally good, all at once, but that we have to learn to put on goodness, as a deliberate choice, out of love. And the love that makes us want to do it is given to us as a gift to enable us to do it. If we are to act this part with any success, we have to study the true heir, Jesus, learn what he is like, copy his gestures, let his word ‘dwell’ in us ‘richly’, and ‘do everything’ in his name.
These ‘clothes’ that we are to put on are a bit like the robe that Hannah brings for Samuel on her annual visit to the temple. The thought of Hannah, year by year, remembering how big her son had been last time, making a robe a bit bigger, and allowing room for another year’s growth, is one of those little understated stories that you just can’t forget. She has sacrificed this first son, Samuel, so that she can have others, but he is still her son. Now what does that remind you of?
We are the ones who can come into the family because of the sacrifice of the Son, but God has clothes for us, too. The clothes that God makes for us to wear allow plenty of room for growth. None of us is big enough to fit into them properly, yet, because they are the clothes of the Son. But perhaps if we put them on, resolutely and with all the help God offers, they will eventually transform us into his likeness.
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About the Community
The Servant Leaders are:
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Kate Campbell (also the treasurer)
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Jo Carter (gatherer of the Southern Region, with Sue Hopkins)
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Sue Hopkins (gatherer of the Southern Region, with Sue Hopkins; and also the secretary)
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Jeanette McHugh (gatherer of the Canberra Meeting Place)
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Jane Macqueen (Soul Carer, with Colin Thornby)
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Carolyn Raymond (gatherer, with Marion White, for the Western Region)
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Heather Toms (gatherer of the Eastern Region, with Anne Turner, and Brian Turner)
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Colin Thornby (Soul Carer, with Jane Maqueen; communications person)
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Anne Turner (Elder of the Community; gatherer of the Eastern Region with Heather Toms and Brian Turner)
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Brian Turner (gatherer of the Eastern Region with Heather Toms and Anne Turner, and also the chair of the Servant Leaders’ Group)
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Chris Venning
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Marion White (gatherer, with Carolyn Raymond, for the Western Region)
Leadership within the Anam Cara Community is modelled after the leadership and ministry of Jesus, who taught his disciples:
'So Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must be the slave of everyone else.”'
We understand this to be servant leadership. Robert Greenleaf describes servant leadership in this way:
'The servant-leader is servant first… It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive or to acquire material possessions…The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.
'The difference manifests itself in the care taken by the servant-first to make sure that other people’s highest priority needs are being served. The best test, and difficult to administer, is: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society? Will they benefit or at least not be further deprived?'
Servant leadership within the Community is mediated through human beings, gifted and called by God and commissioned by the Bishop and the Community to serve the Community.
The Community Soul Carer is the chief servant leader of the Community. The Community Soul Carer is appointed by the Bishop to guide, support, lead, teach and inspire the Community, and the individuals within it. We understand our Soul Carer to hold an important place within our Community, to have much responsibility and to be in need of our love, support and prayer.
Soul Carers are nominated by the Community’s Leadership Group on the recommendation of the Community Soul Carer in accordance with Diocesan policy and procedures on the ministry of Spiritual Directors. Together with the Community Soul Carer they guide, support, lead, teach and inspire individuals within the Community.
Gatherers are nominated by the Community’s Leadership Group, and are responsible for supporting and leading individuals in designated geographical areas (Meeting Places).
The Community Soul Carer, Soul Carers and Gatherers together with others nominated by the Community Soul Carer form the Community’s Leadership Group. This group is responsible to the Bishop for the good order, leadership, direction and care of the Community. The Community Soul Carer is the leader of the Leadership Group, but may delegate specific leadership tasks to any member of the Group. The Leadership Group will appoint individuals to specific responsibilities, including a treasurer, newsletter editor, web servant, secretary, and other offices as required.
Individuals who wish to become members of the Community are known as Associates. Associates commit to regular prayer, Bible reading, worship, and to walking in the steps of Jesus, as they are called. Associates may be from any Christian denomination. The Community’s Leadership structures exist to serve the Associates, and others who may choose to access resources provided by the Community.
The two leaders of the Community are the Soul Carers, Jane Macqueen and Colin Thornby. Gatherers have responsibility for events within their geographic area. Associates who do not live in one of the geographic areas served by a gatherer are cared for by the Virtual Meeting Place (more on that in future issues). In recognition of Anne Turner's work and service in leading the Community during its establishment, she is recognised as the Elder of the Community.
You can find out more about the Community by reading the Community Statement and visiting the Community's website.
The Servant Leaders group met together two months ago, to seek God’s will for the Community, look at the program for next year and do some work on how the organisation of the Community functions. We were led in a meaningful reflection by Kate Campbell, and joined in silence and common prayer. You can download and read a summary of the meeting.
Our next meeting is held on 12 January. If any associates have matters they'd like the Servant Leaders to consider, feel free to pass them onto Jane or Colin.
Becoming a Community of Prayer
Jane Macqueen and Colin Thornby
The Anam Cara Community has always had, as a primary focus, being a Community of prayer. We’ve understood to mean that Associates of the Community are connected to one another through God in prayer. We are one body, and in prayer that unity is given focus, offers stability and oneness, and is made more concrete.
The spiritual mothers and fathers of the Church all teach that prayer is the basis of community – even when we don’t feel that anything is ‘really happening’. Prayer forms us for relationship with God, and is a process of making peace with what IS and preparing ourselves to be the change we wish to see in our lives, the community and the world.
As the Community has grown and matured we have explored different ways and paths. The Soul Carers and Servant Leaders now feel that the time has come to be more intentional about developing a Community. The call we feel is for the Anam Cara Community to be more than a group of likeminded people. We feel God calls us to be a dispersed but united community of pray-ers who form a family in fellowship with one another. We’re not sure, yet, how that will look, but we are committed to making the journey.
The first step for this, we think, is to begin to pray together. We believe that this will have two dimensions.
Praying together in time. We are asking those Associates who feel called to join us to put aside 10 minutes each weekday, for silent prayer or saying the Office at or close to 8am. We also ask you to put aside 30 minutes on Saturday at or close to 9.30am for silent prayer. We believe this will join us together ‘in time’, as we pray for the Community, for one another, for the world, and continue to offer ourselves in self-emptying to God. These suggestions of course in no way affect our call to contemplative prayer or the prayer time that many of us have, generally in the very early morning.
Praying together in text. There is a great joy in praying the same psalms and readings from Scripture with others. We’d like to encourage those who pray the Daily Office to use the readings from the daily lectionary for A Prayer Book for Australia. Some associates who do pray the Office use the form from A Prayer Book for Australia, some use the form from Daily Prayer from Common Worship. Others use resources such as Jim Cotter’s Out of the Silence: Into the Silence. Whatever form you chose to use, praying the Office in a way joined to others can build a prayerful and real community – praying together ‘in text’. For those who do not wish to use any form of the Office, but still wish to join in following the cycle of readings, we will list the month’s readings in Waterholes.
Can you join with us in this first stage of the journey? We hope so. If you can, and you would like to let us know, please feel free to contact Jane or Colin. We’d like to keep in touch with you from time-to-time, and see if God is offering a new vision of the way for the Anam Cara Community.
Time to join or renew?
The Anam Cara Community's membership year runs (mysteriously!) from November to November. This means that the majority of memberships are now due.
New members
You may be receiving this email, and not be a paid-up member of the Anam Cara Community – that's OK. You're welcome to do that, and we're happy to keep in contact with you. However, if you wish to make a formal commitment to the Anam Cara Community and become an associate, we invite you to join us, by either printing out and filling in the membership form and returning with your payment, or joining and paying online securely using PayPal. You can do either by visiting our membership page at: http://www.anamcara-gippsland.org/?page_id=169
Renewing members
Your continuing membership is important to us, and allows us to minister to the Community in many ways. If you'd like to continue to be an associate, please visit our membership page and either print out and fill in the membership form, and return it with your payment, or rejoin and pay online securely using PayPal. Visit our membership page at: http://www.anamcara-gippsland.org/?page_id=169
How did we use members' funds last year?
Each year our financial statements are audited and reported to members. You can view the audited statement to check what we did with money.
What are we planning to do next year?
We will:
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Continue to offer a weekly email newsletter
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Offer a program of monthly events in two streams ('School for Prayer' and regular Community days, offered on alternate months)
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Co-operate with the Abbey of St Barnabas at A'Beckett Park to offer two retreats
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Maintain our library
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Provide opportunities for spiritual directors to undertake ministry development opportunities and professional supervision
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Link associates with spiritual directors
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Work with leaders to inform about the journey inwards
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Develop more supports for those whose journey takes them outside the Christian community
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Continue to support the development of the Community in Canberra-Goulburn, and throughout Victoria
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Continue to pray daily for all associates
Any questions?
Feel free to send any questions you may have about the Community, or about your membership, to Jane or Colin.
Rowan Williams Christmas sermon at Canterbury Cathedral
Rowan Williams
Fifty-nine per cent of British people describe themselves as Christians, so the census informed us a couple of weeks ago; twelve per cent down from ten years ago. There was, of course, great delight from a couple of secularist organisations. But if I were a member of the British Humanist Association, I might want to pause before I became too excited. It remains true that three quarters of the public still want to identify themselves as having a religious faith of some kind. And what the census doesn’t and probably can’t measure is exactly how those who don’t identify as religious think about religion. Do they never give it a thought? Do they wish they could believe something? Do they see it as a problem or as a resource in society? In the deeply painful aftermath of the Synod’s vote last month, what was startling was how many people who certainly wouldn’t have said yes to the census question turned out to have a sort of investment in the Church, a desire to see the Church looking credible and a real sense of loss when—as they saw it—the Church failed to sort its business out.
There are a lot more questions to ask before we could possibly assume that the census figures told us that faith was losing its hold on society. But—and here is the challenging thing—what if those figures had been worse? What if they get worse in the next few years? Should we conclude that faith in general and Christian faith in particular had had its day and that we should give up on it? The answer has to be a resounding, ‘No: we might feel that we had made a poor job of communicating it, we might regret the enormous loss to public life and public service involved in the weakening of faith. But we simply could not conclude that faith had suddenly become impossible or incredible.’
Faith is not about what public opinion decides, and it is not about how we happen to be feeling about ourselves. It is the response people make to what presents itself as a reality – a reality which makes claims on you. Here is something so extraordinary that it interrupts our world; here is something that (like Moses in the story of the Burning Bush) makes you ‘turn aside to see’, that stops you short. Faith begins in the moment of stopping, you could say: the moment when you can’t just walk on as you did before. But even more challengingly, it is something whose claims involve change and even loss. If this is really what it seems to be, ideas, habits, hopes all change, and it is a change that is going to be painful. In the most haunting Christmas poem in the English language [The Journey of the Magi], T. S. Eliot imagined the wise men back at home after their journey to Bethlehem, ‘no longer at ease here in the old dispensation’, and wondering whether what they had witnessed was birth or death.
… I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death
Yet the wise men can’t deny that they’ve seen what they’ve seen: they really made the journey and they really saw something that persuaded them it had been worthwhile. Faith: a claim, a shock, a death, a life.
‘It was, you may say, satisfactory’, says Eliot’s wise man, in a masterpiece of Eliot understatement. The wise men found what they were looking for – and it was not at all what they thought they had been looking for. The Christian gospel firmly declares two equally necessary truths. Jesus is the hope of the nations, Jesus is what the entire human race really longs to see, the person whose presence heals all wounds and griefs. And Jesus is an utter surprise, so foreign that he is unrecognisable to those who might have been expected to welcome him. He made the world, says St John, and he spoke in its history; but the world had no room for him and the experts in revelation and religious purity turned from him in disgust (John 1.10—11).You should never open the New Testament without remembering that the religious experts and the Temple hierarchy are the ones who see Jesus as their enemy. They don’t want to be interrupted, to stop and see.
The truth of God is the most comforting and joyful presence we can imagine; and also the most disorienting and demanding. There’s a famous Old Testament story (2 Kings 5) about the great military leader of ancient Israel’s fiercest enemy, who comes to the prophet Elisha to be healed of his leprosy; and the prophet tells him simply to wash in the river. He is indignant: surely there must be something more difficult and glamorous and heroic to do? No; it’s perfectly simple. Go and wash, go and join all those ordinary humble folk who are sluicing themselves in the river after a long day’s work, or beating their laundry against the stones. Go and join the rest of the human race and acknowledge who you are. That’s the truest heroism and the hardest.
It’s a foreshadowing of the New Testament invitation: repent and believe and be baptised. Turn round and look where you’ve never looked before, trust the one who is calling you and drop under the water of his overflowing compassion. Be with him. Join the new human race, re-created in the Spirit of mutual love and delight and service.
If Jesus is strange and threatening, isn’t that (the New Testament certainly suggests) a sign of how far we’ve wandered from real humanity, real honesty about our weaknesses and limits? ‘I am the great sun, but you do not see me’ – the beginning of another wonderful poem, by Charles Causley. We are so fascinated by our own business, whether we call it religious or not, that we find it ‘hard and bitter agony’ to turn away and be still and look at the mystery of love. If we think about religion, perhaps we think of it as a set of neat answers to our questions, or as a system of behaviour, ritual and moral, or as an optional extra to ‘ordinary’ life for those who find certain sorts of problem interesting. But Jesus does not come just to answer the questions we think important. (One of the great features of all the gospels, specially St John’s, is how often Jesus refuses to answer the question put to him and asks a question in reply.) He does not come to give us a set of techniques for keeping God happy; and he certainly doesn’t come to create a harmlessly eccentric hobby for speculative minds. He comes to make humanity itself new, to create fresh possibilities for being at peace with God and each other; and he does this by summoning us to be with him.
It shouldn’t surprise us if all this doesn’t instantly win the popular vote in a census. If people hesitate to call themselves Christian, perhaps this is a sort of backhanded recognition that there is a strangeness and a toughness to what Christian faith claims that should not be taken lightly. And yet, if many people still do, in spite of everything, want to call themselves by the name Christian, that also means there is a recognition that somehow this is where we should be, where it’s natural to be – in the company of this man, Jesus Christ, listening to his words, turning aside tosee deeply into the mysterious events of his life and death and resurrection. But the one thing we can be sure of is that the truth or falsehood of faith doesn’t rest on the success of the faith in winning numbers; sometimes this seems to work and sometimes it doesn’t. We can and should try as hard and imaginatively as we can to share the faith, but we must not lose heart if it doesn’t immediately take root as we might want. We are after all, doing something rather outrageous, asking men and women to stop and look and turn around, and learn how to keep company with a figure whose outlines we often see only dimly.
Yet when a life is lived that shows what that company really means, the outline becomes less dim, and people will begin to recognise why lives like that seem, despite everything, to be ‘normal’ – the natural response to the way things are. When people respond to outrageous cruelty and violence, with a hard-won readiness to understand and be reconciled, few if any can bring themselves to say that all this is an illusion. The parents who have lost a child to gang violence; the wife who has seen her husband killed in front of her by an anti-Christian mob in India; the woman who has struggled for years to comprehend and accept the rape and murder of her sister; the Israeli and Palestinian friends who have been brought together by the fact that they have lost family members in the conflict and injustice that still racks the Holy Land – all these are specific people I have had the privilege of meeting as archbishop over these ten years; and in their willingness to explore the new humanity of forgiveness and rebuilding relations, without for a moment making light of their own or other people’s nightmare suffering, or trying to explain it away, these are the ones who make us see, who oblige us to turn aside and look, as if at a bush burning but not consumed. And to look at Jesus, who asks of us initially just to stop and reflect, to stay for a moment in the light that allows us to see ourselves honestly and to see the world differently.
That’s the heart of it, seeing ourselves honestly, seeing the world differently. That’s where faith begins, beyond the answers of a system, or the disciplines of a ritual, or the requirements of a moral code. These have their place; and those who spend time in the company of Jesus will find themselves working out all these things in the light of the scriptural witness to the new life. But it all starts with that turning aside to see. And for some, for many perhaps, it is too much to take in, and many will want to turn away. St John describes just this in a later chapter of his gospel (at the end of chapter 6) where Jesus’ hearers say that his words are just too much for them, too offensive, too exacting, too weird. Yet if – if we can let go of our conviction that our questions, our priorities and worries, achievements and failures are the most important things in the universe; if we find the freedom to stop and turn aside, then the world itself begins to turn into renewal. ‘O come, let us adore him’, says the carol. That adoration, that wondering gaze at the child in the manger, is where faith is born; and where faith is born, so is the new world of Jesus and his Spirit.
Tools for reflecting on 2012
As we come to the end of 2012, and the beginning of 2013, it can be helpful to reflect on the year past, so that we can see the year to come more clearly. You might like to use some or all of these questions as you ponder.
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What was the single best thing that happened this past year?
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What was the single most challenging thing that happened?
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What was an unexpected joy this past year?
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What was an unexpected obstacle?
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What needed to die in your life in 2012? Did you allow it to?
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What shoots of the new erupted in your life? Did you nurture them?
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Where did you find stillness?
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Where did you find peace?
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Where did you find disorder?
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Where did you find discord?
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Where did you bring peace?
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Where did you bring discord?
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Have you grown deeper?
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Pick three words to describe 2012.
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Pick three words your partner (or best friend) would use to describe your 2012 (don’t ask them; guess based on how you think your partner or best friend sees you).
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Pick three words your partner (or best friend) would use to describe their 2012 (again, without asking).
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What were the best books you read this year?
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With whom were your most valuable relationships?
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What was your biggest personal change from January to December of this past year?
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In what way(s) did you grow emotionally?
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In what way(s) did you grow spiritually?
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In what way(s) did you grow physically?
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In what way(s) did you grow in your relationships with others?
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What was the most enjoyable area of managing your life?
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What was your most challenging area of life management?
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What was your single biggest time waster in your life this past year?
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What was the best way you used your time this past year?
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What was the biggest thing you learned this past year?
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Create a phrase or statement that describes 2012 for you.
Does the church leave you cold?
You’re not alone. There are many in the Anam Cara Community who have difficulties with the church, or perhaps have different understandings of faith and spirituality. Some have been damaged by the church or church people, others have difficulties with elements of Christianity, and some wish to follow a spiritual path without adopting a specific theology.
The Anam Cara Community seeks to be a welcoming and accepting place, where all sincere seekers can find ways to follow their path. While we’re rooted within the Christian faith, we wish to nurture and encourage others without requiring them to change their own beliefs to fit with ours.
We’d like to know what we can do to become more welcoming and help you on your walk. If you’d like to share your thoughts with us, feel free to contact Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org). We will maintain your privacy and confidentiality, and honour your contributions.
Support on the journey
The Anam Cara Community’s ministry is to be a support to those who are on the inner journey into God. Each person’s journey is different, and we recognise that there are some for whom the Christian tradition is difficult or not supportive. We’re committed to finding ways to hear the needs of each Associate, and support them as we can.
The Community can offer support in a number of ways:
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Spiritual direction / soul care: Spiritual direction is a process by which one person helps another grow in intimacy with God and in right relationship with all creation. This ministry has a long and revered history in the Christian tradition and has been practised by lay people, religious and ordained ministers. The focus of this ministry is the relationship between God and the person seeking direction. For more information and a referral to a director, contact Colin (0403 776 402 or colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org)
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Quiet days: usually held monthly across Gippsland, and in Canberra. Details are in this newsletter, or on the website.
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Library: maintained in Sale, but available for borrowing by post. Contact Sue (secretary@anamcara-gippsland.org, 03 5182 5542) or visit our webpage.
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Publications: Waterholes is the news-magazine of the community. Contributions are welcome.
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Fellowship: Available at our events, by email, on the phone, and the website.
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Website: Full of news, resources, reviews and other interesting information and supports.
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Directing to other resources, such as events at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A’Beckett Park.
Love and prayers
Colin Thornby and Jane Macqueen
Soul Carers
Dec 22
Waterholes: 23 December 2012
Welcome
Welcome to Waterholes, the Anam Cara Community newsletter for the week beginning 23 December 2012. A special edition for Christmas will be distributed on 24 December 2012.
This newsletter is one of the ways by which we hope to promote community. The Anam Cara Community is intended to be much more than simply a group of likeminded people. We hope it will continue to grow into a community that is a sign of God’s presence in and love for the world, a dispersed community of contemplatives whose lives and action bring peace and healing to all of God’s children.
The Anam Cara Community is proud to welcome anyone, from any background or faith community (or none!). We are an open and inclusive community that affirms the dignity and worth of all humans, the value of the environment, and seeks to model a way of living with one another and the world that points to the love and care of God for everyone.
Individuals who wish to formally join the Community are welcome to become associates. You may now join or renew and pay electronically using PayPal.
Contributions? If you have a piece of writing you’d like to share with the Community, feel free to send it on to Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org). Work of all sorts is encouraged.
For your prayers
Part of the joy of the Anam Cara Community is the gift of being called to pray for others. If you would like the Community to pray for you, or for someone else, please email or phone Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org, 0403 776 402) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org) who will add them to the prayer list, and ensure they’re included in the next issue of the Newsletter. At present, your prayers are asked for:
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Anne Turner, elder of the Community. Anne is experiencing further signs of physical deterioration. Please hold her, and Brian as he cares for her, in your prayers.
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Ray and Joyce Elliot, associates of the Community who have been suffering from health issues.
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Heather Cahill, an associate of the Community, ordained priest on 17 November.
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Larissa Dial, who has relapsed cancer, and her family.
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Helen Adamczyk, who is discerning God's wisdom and guidance.
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Jane Macqueen, whose ministry is busy and demanding.
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Bishop John McIntyre, as he ministers to us and among us.
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Greg Reynolds, and the faith community of Inclusive Catholics in Melbourne, as they seek God and build new community.
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Michael Kelly, as he travels overseas to teach and minister.
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Alexander Shaia, as he continues his teaching ministry, and prepares to return to Australia and New Zealand.
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The Abbey of St Barnabas, Edie Ashley the Abbey Priest, and all who work to realise the vision of the Abbey.
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Bishop Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury designate.
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Those in the Church of England hurt by the recent decision not to ordain women as bishops.
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The faithful and leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in Australia, as they deal with the fall-out of the recently announced Royal Commission.
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All of those hurt by the church, and by church people.
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The Community, as we begin a new church year, and prepare for the program for next year.
Coming Soon
A whole year of new events beginning on 16 February 2013
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16 February 2013: School for Prayer – Bishop John McIntyre, Sale
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2 March 2013: Eastern Region Community Day, Stratford
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6 April 2013: School for Prayer
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4 May 2013: Western Region Community Day
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24-26 May 2013: Retreat at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A'Beckett Park
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1 June 2013: School for Prayer
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29 June 2013: Thanksgiving Service, St Mary's Church, Morwell
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6 July 2013: Southern Region Community Day
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3 August 2013: School for Prayer
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7 September 2013: Eastern Region Community Day
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13-15 September 2013: Retreat at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A'Beckett Park
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5 October 2013: School for Prayer
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2 November 2013: Western Region Community Day
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7 December 2013: School for Prayer
Scripture reflection
Colin Thornby
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Micah 5:2–5a
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Hebrews 10:5–10
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Luke 1:39–45
The readings from Micah and Hebrews are so dauntingly obscure that it is tempting simply to concentrate on the lovely passage from Luke. Luke’s is the only Gospel that has any of John the Baptist’s biography before his adult entrance into the story as the messenger who prepares the way for Jesus. And what Luke tells us makes John’s willingness to be only the messenger even more moving. We are told that John’s birth is meticulously prepared for, as is Jesus’ own. His parents have given up hope of having children—like Abraham and Sarah—and his father, Zechariah, is visited by an angel, who announces what is to come. If you read Luke 1:8–17, you will see that the role John is to play is really built up by the angel. The child is to be a source of gladness, he is to be filled with the power of the Holy Spirit, from birth, and he will bring many of his own people back to the Lord. While the angel does mention the fact that John is to prepare the people for the Lord, there is really nothing in what he says to make a proud parent feel that their son is to play second fiddle in God’s orchestra. If Zechariah really remembered everything that was said to him and reported it back to Elizabeth, then surely they must have begun secretly to wonder if their son was to be the One, the Messiah, who would prepare the world for the direct rule of God.
But if Elizabeth ever had any such illusions, it seems that the child in the womb—full of the Holy Spirit as the angel had promised—had none. As soon as Mary steps into the room, the baby John leaps. And without a second thought, Elizabeth recognizes what her child is conveying to her and accepts their secondary role as a privilege. When she calls down a blessing on Mary for her obedience to the Lord, she hardly seems to notice that she, too, has earned the blessing of one who ‘believed … what was spoken to her by the Lord’.
What must it have been like for Mary at last to be recognized as faithful and obedient? She has been surrounded by suspicion, hard words and looks, and her swollen belly has been seen as a symbol of her faithlessness to the covenant, not its fulfilment. But now, Elizabeth and John see her for what she really is, the Ark of the Covenant, and John dances in the womb, just as David danced before the Ark, rejoicing in the presence of the Lord.
But when you put this lovely story into the context of today’s other two readings, what you get is the long view. You see God carefully, slowly, patiently preparing for the revelation of his Son. In Micah, we see a prophet picking up the significance of Bethlehem. As far as Micah knows, its task has already been fulfilled. It has been the source of David, the great king of Israel. But he is given this strange prophecy that seems to suggest that Bethlehem’s task is not yet over. Hebrews, too, makes the Davidic connection by putting words into the Messiah’s mouth that were originally ascribed to David in Psalm 40. And here again, the sacrificial system which was thought to be the goal of God’s plan is seen to be just one step on the way. It is now to be replaced by another kind of sacrifice, one that never needs to be made again, one that God performs for us rather than we for him.
When you see Jesus, the end-result of God’s great plan, it is easy to discount all the steps that it took to get there. But today’s readings suggest that would be fatal. The final fulfilment of God’s plan involved all those other steps—David dancing before the Ark of the Lord, Elizabeth and John accepting their second place, Mary believing what the Lord said to her—and many, many more small, even unknown events in which people say yes to God. God has deliberately made his plan out of this long chain with many links, each one of them fragile, each one of them necessary. Who knows how many times the links were broken as people rejected their place in the plan? God is never thwarted, but he does not change his plan or his methods; he simply waits and works until the chain can be mended. In Advent, we accept our place, however small, in God’s great and purposive chain of salvation, and we dance with joy that we are privileged to be part of it.
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About the Community
The Servant Leaders are:
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Kate Campbell (also the treasurer)
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Jo Carter (gatherer of the Southern Region, with Sue Hopkins)
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Sue Hopkins (gatherer of the Southern Region, with Sue Hopkins; and also the secretary)
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Jeanette McHugh (gatherer of the Canberra Meeting Place)
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Jane Macqueen (Soul Carer, with Colin Thornby)
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Carolyn Raymond (gatherer, with Marion White, for the Western Region)
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Heather Toms (gatherer of the Eastern Region, with Anne Turner, and Brian Turner)
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Colin Thornby (Soul Carer, with Jane Maqueen; communications person)
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Anne Turner (Elder of the Community; gatherer of the Eastern Region with Heather Toms and Brian Turner)
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Brian Turner (gatherer of the Eastern Region with Heather Toms and Anne Turner, and also the chair of the Servant Leaders’ Group)
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Chris Venning
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Marion White (gatherer, with Carolyn Raymond, for the Western Region)
The two leaders of the Community are the Soul Carers, Jane Macqueen and Colin Thornby. Gatherers have responsibility for events within their geographic area. Associates who do not live in one of the geographic areas served by a gatherer are cared for by the Virtual Meeting Place (more on that in future issues). In recognition of Anne Turner's work and service in leading the Community during its establishment, she is recognised as the Elder of the Community.
You can find out more about the Community by reading the Community Statement and visiting the Community's website.
The Servant Leaders group met together a few weeks ago, to seek God’s will for the Community, look at the program for next year and do some work on how the organisation of the Community functions. We were led in a meaningful reflection by Kate Campbell, and joined in silence and common prayer. You can download and read a summary of the meeting.
Becoming a Community of Prayer
Jane Macqueen and Colin Thornby
The Anam Cara Community has always had, as a primary focus, being a Community of prayer. We’ve understood to mean that Associates of the Community are connected to one another through God in prayer. We are one body, and in prayer that unity is given focus, offers stability and oneness, and is made more concrete.
The spiritual mothers and fathers of the Church all teach that prayer is the basis of community – even when we don’t feel that anything is ‘really happening’. Prayer forms us for relationship with God, and is a process of making peace with what IS and preparing ourselves to be the change we wish to see in our lives, the community and the world.
As the Community has grown and matured we have explored different ways and paths. The Soul Carers and Servant Leaders now feel that the time has come to be more intentional about developing a Community. The call we feel is for the Anam Cara Community to be more than a group of likeminded people. We feel God calls us to be a dispersed but united community of pray-ers who form a family in fellowship with one another. We’re not sure, yet, how that will look, but we are committed to making the journey.
The first step for this, we think, is to begin to pray together. We believe that this will have two dimensions.
Praying together in time. We are asking those Associates who feel called to join us to put aside 10 minutes each weekday, for silent prayer or saying the Office at or close to 8am. We also ask you to put aside 30 minutes on Saturday at or close to 9.30am for silent prayer. We believe this will join us together ‘in time’, as we pray for the Community, for one another, for the world, and continue to offer ourselves in self-emptying to God. These suggestions of course in no way affect our call to contemplative prayer or the prayer time that many of us have, generally in the very early morning.
Praying together in text. There is a great joy in praying the same psalms and readings from Scripture with others. We’d like to encourage those who pray the Daily Office to use the readings from the daily lectionary for A Prayer Book for Australia. Some associates who do pray the Office use the form from A Prayer Book for Australia, some use the form from Daily Prayer from Common Worship. Others use resources such as Jim Cotter’s Out of the Silence: Into the Silence. Whatever form you chose to use, praying the Office in a way joined to others can build a prayerful and real community – praying together ‘in text’. For those who do not wish to use any form of the Office, but still wish to join in following the cycle of readings, we will list the month’s readings in Waterholes.
Can you join with us in this first stage of the journey? We hope so. If you can, and you would like to let us know, please feel free to contact Jane or Colin. We’d like to keep in touch with you from time-to-time, and see if God is offering a new vision of the way for the Anam Cara Community.
Time to join or renew?
The Anam Cara Community's membership year runs (mysteriously!) from November to November. This means that the majority of memberships are now due.
New members
You may be receiving this email, and not be a paid-up member of the Anam Cara Community – that's OK. You're welcome to do that, and we're happy to keep in contact with you. However, if you wish to make a formal commitment to the Anam Cara Community and become an associate, we invite you to join us, by either printing out and filling in the membership form and returning with your payment, or joining and paying online securely using PayPal. You can do either by visiting our membership page at: http://www.anamcara-gippsland.org/?page_id=169
Renewing members
Your continuing membership is important to us, and allows us to minister to the Community in many ways. If you'd like to continue to be an associate, please visit our membership page and either print out and fill in the membership form, and return it with your payment, or rejoin and pay online securely using PayPal. Visit our membership page at: http://www.anamcara-gippsland.org/?page_id=169
How did we use members' funds last year?
Each year our financial statements are audited and reported to members. You can view the audited statement to check what we did with money.
What are we planning to do next year?
We will:
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Continue to offer a weekly email newsletter
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Offer a program of monthly events in two streams ('School for Prayer' and regular Community days, offered on alternate months)
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Co-operate with the Abbey of St Barnabas at A'Beckett Park to offer two retreats
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Maintain our library
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Provide opportunities for spiritual directors to undertake ministry development opportunities and professional supervision
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Link associates with spiritual directors
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Work with leaders to inform about the journey inwards
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Develop more supports for those whose journey takes them outside the Christian community
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Continue to support the development of the Community in Canberra-Goulburn, and throughout Victoria
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Continue to pray daily for all associates
Any questions?
Feel free to send any questions you may have about the Community, or about your membership, to Jane or Colin.
Laurence Freeman on Advent
Laurence Freeman
Advent (Week 4)
"From a divine son will rise a human race and a hero will dominate the world and his fame will spread over the earth." These words from a 7th century Tibetan hymn suggest how deep and universal is the anticipation for one among us who will come and lead us beyond ourselves in order that we may at last find ourselves. This one we await will be both familiar and a stranger.
The run up to the Christmas celebrations are rituals, religious, cultural and domestic. Year by year we repeat them and their familiarity is of their essence. But they are a front for a deeper level of meaning in our relationship with the one who makes his appearance in a transhistorical 'today', every day, with every breath. This one is as strange as he is familiar. He is like a fully expressed, well-chosen statement or a thought that that is not spoken casually or unconsciously but is well-considered and articulate and accurate – a true and powerful word that comes from the real silence and brings the reality of that silence with it.
'Even when manifest he is still a stranger' (Maximus the Confessor) and 'in whatever way he is understood he remains mysterious' (Dionysius the Areopagite). His coming has been worth waiting for because it is not only a gift from outside. It also implodes the awakening of our own true nature, making us conscious of the gift of our own being. Its familiarity is that it entirely human. Its being ever strange is due to its elusive divinity. When it is recognised and when it fully opens the parcel of the soul, everything is changed because we see everything as it really is.
Laurence Freeman OSB
(You may also like to watch Dom Laurence's video talk on Advent: http://youtu.be/nQC5z06_Usg and http://youtu.be/O7m2b4BwXb8
Does the church leave you cold?
You’re not alone. There are many in the Anam Cara Community who have difficulties with the church, or perhaps have different understandings of faith and spirituality. Some have been damaged by the church or church people, others have difficulties with elements of Christianity, and some wish to follow a spiritual path without adopting a specific theology.
The Anam Cara Community seeks to be a welcoming and accepting place, where all sincere seekers can find ways to follow their path. While we’re rooted within the Christian faith, we wish to nurture and encourage others without requiring them to change their own beliefs to fit with ours.
We’d like to know what we can do to become more welcoming and help you on your walk. If you’d like to share your thoughts with us, feel free to contact Colin (colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org). We will maintain your privacy and confidentiality, and honour your contributions.
Support on the journey
The Anam Cara Community’s ministry is to be a support to those who are on the inner journey into God. Each person’s journey is different, and we recognise that there are some for whom the Christian tradition is difficult or not supportive. We’re committed to finding ways to hear the needs of each Associate, and support them as we can.
The Community can offer support in a number of ways:
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Spiritual direction / soul care: Spiritual direction is a process by which one person helps another grow in intimacy with God and in right relationship with all creation. This ministry has a long and revered history in the Christian tradition and has been practised by lay people, religious and ordained ministers. The focus of this ministry is the relationship between God and the person seeking direction. For more information and a referral to a director, contact Colin (0403 776 402 or colin.thornby@anamcara-gippsland.org) or Jane (0411 316 346 or jane.macqueen@anamcara-gippsland.org)
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Quiet days: usually held monthly across Gippsland, and in Canberra. Details are in this newsletter, or on the website.
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Library: maintained in Sale, but available for borrowing by post. Contact Sue (secretary@anamcara-gippsland.org, 03 5182 5542) or visit our webpage.
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Publications: Waterholes is the news-magazine of the community. Contributions are welcome.
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Fellowship: Available at our events, by email, on the phone, and the website.
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Website: Full of news, resources, reviews and other interesting information and supports.
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Directing to other resources, such as events at the Abbey of St Barnabas at A’Beckett Park.
Love and prayers
Colin Thornby and Jane Macqueen
Soul Carers
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