Send My Roots Rain

Christopher Chapman

Description

The pressure of expectations often means that priests fail to care for themselves and neglect their own spiritual life. Christopher Chapman draws on more than thirty years’ experience of spiritual direction, as well as his own experience of priesthood, to offer life-giving practices and personal disciplines for spiritual health.

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• Christian Ministry
• Philosophie et théologie

Informations

• Publié par: Hymns Ancient & Modern
• Date de parution: 30 novembre 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781786222213
• Langue: English

Extrait

For Tony, Peter, Robin, Doug, Greg, Alistair and Brian
Contents
Title
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Preface: Alleluia! Amen

1    One Who is Like His Brothers and Sisters in Every Respect
2    Under Pressure
A priest is always available
Justification by busyness
Am I meeting my targets?
Saviour of the world
Immovable faith
Living with difficult people
Omnicompetence
3    Perspectives on Priesthood
4    Rain for Roots: The Priest as Disciple
Called to be with him
Dweller with the Word
Pilgrim traveller
5    Rain for Roots: The Priest as Minister
Servant
Minister of Communion
Celebrant of the Incarnation
Herald of the Gospel
6    Rain for Roots: The Priest as Friend
With your own place to shelter
A human being, open to God
7    A Rule of Life for Priests?
8    What Can We Do to Support the Spiritual Life of Priests?

Copyright
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Christine Smith and all at Canterbury Press for their openness to what I proposed and for their continued support.
This book rests on the experiences and insights of many priests. Some I consulted with during the early days of forming my ideas and putting them into words. Their thoughts helped to broaden the horizons of my writing. Others generously set aside time to read the text and give helpful feedback. Over the years I have listened to priests in the context of spiritual direction and retreat work; their hard-won insights helped to form the understanding of priesthood I put forward here. Still more priests have been my teachers, mentors, colleagues and friends. The views expressed in this book are my own; and they are also the fruit of this lifelong dialogue. I do not name names for fear of leaving people out, but I am grateful for what you have given me.
I am thankful for the support of friends, not least those in my book group, whose encouragement helped me stay with the task through the times when it became more challenging. Finally, though her visible footfall through these pages is small, I owe much to June, my wife, who continues to help me be a better human being, and has to put up with the days when that’s not quite working!
Preface Alleluia! Amen
I was ordained in a sports hall, wearing appropriate soft-soled shoes so as not to mark the floor. The parish church was deemed too small to host the occasion, so instead of playing badminton or five-a-side football I came along to have my life changed. The local paper covered the unusual event: ‘More than 900 Roman Catholics joined in a service marking the ordination of 26-year-old Christopher Chapman of Victoria Road, Ashford, who became the first Ashford man ordained into the Catholic Church since the Reformation.’ The parish newsletter of the following week included a quote attributed to Cardinal Manning on the priesthood:
The end of man is the glory of God. The end of a Christian is the greater glory of God. The end of a priest is the greatest glory of God.
No pressure there then! One picture of the day shows me blessing my sister. The next shows the two of us looking at each other in amazement as if to say, ‘How did this happen? What are all these people doing here?’
I received many cards and gifts on that day. The one that meant most to me had just two words: ‘Alleluia! Amen.’ The ‘alleluia’ expressed my heartfelt sense of gratitude for the way God had gone with me on my journey thus far. The ‘amen’ acknowledged the struggle it had involved and my awareness that, for all the momentous nature of the ordination ceremony, I was still the all-too-human ‘Chris’. I was putting my trust in God’s faith in me.
Each priest holds together their humanity with the received expectations of the role they say their ‘amen’ to. No formational programme can adequately prepare priests for the ministry that lies ahead. Beyond ordination day, priests still need the laying on of many hands in support, encouragement and kindness. Above all, priests need the continual refreshment that is the gift of the Spirit of God. My hope and prayer in writing is that among these words there will be rain for the roots of your being.
Easter 2019
1
One Who is Like His Brothers and Sisters in Every Respect
The Word is made flesh
He had to become like his brothers and sisters in every respect, so that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God … Because he himself was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested. 1
In time, and beyond time, God is expressed by incarnation. Wherever we are, and whoever we are, God is alongside and within us. God’s choice – always and for all – is to feel all pain, share all joy and be inside all struggle. It is this mystery that priests of our time are closest to. Through their voices the words of Jesus in the Gospel are spoken afresh; their hands take and bless the bread of our life and the cup of our salvation. Their ministry celebrates the beginnings and endings of our earthly existence. The rhythm of worship they maintain holds us in awareness of moments and seasons hallowed through God’s movement through them. In the community and care they seek to build, the Word is made flesh and lives among us.
In sharing Jesus’ cup, priests also taste his struggles. How could it not be so? For the one they serve laughs and cries, rages and rejoices in all our varied faces. Sometimes it hurts to be human, and priests must go there too – not just in the suffering of other people, but in meeting the frailties of their own humanity. Every priest must carry the burdens and gifts of their history and personality; each has to work with the uneasy blend of their strengths and weaknesses. Yet these difficult truths are also the graced places of God’s indwelling.
For the most part priests are generous and faithful people who have thrown themselves into meeting the needs of the individuals and communities they serve; sometimes they do not know when or how to stop. Expectations can weigh heavily – not least those that priests have of themselves. In the attempt to reflect the reality of God, priests can become caught in webs of perfectionism that bear no relation to who they are. The vision of the incarnation that underpins this ministry becomes mislaid when priests believe they can only express God by leaving aside their particular humanity.
For all that a priest dons clothes that suggest their difference from those they minister to, they are of one flesh. Before anything else, a priest is a disciple in need of teaching, forming, restoring, loving and belonging. God does not love everyone, but each one. Priests, who spend their lives seeking to lead others into awareness of the presence and activity of God, are challenged to let Christ take them aside, away from the crowd. Send My Roots Rain explores what might happen within this encounter and the need every priest has of it.
A spiritual house and a holy priesthood
Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ … You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.
Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. 2
For the author of the letter of Peter, the destiny of the people formed in Jesus Christ is to be a holy priesthood, chosen and consecrated for the work of God’s mercy. As this people grew in number and diversity they established an order of priests to help express their identity and mission, and to nurture their common life. Peter’s words remind all Christians of who they are and the task they share. For those who are ordained priests these words become a summons. You – as a priest – are to allow God’s hands to build you. You are a living stone, purposefully chosen, to be formed into a spiritual house. You who have received being, belonging and mercy are to draw all who are lost into the wonder of their being and belonging through the mercy of God. You are to name and proclaim the Christ who called you out of darkness into marvellous light. You are to make your life a thanksgiving offering, a sacrifice of praise, in response to the abundance of God’s giving.
Can you do that? Can you be that? The mystery the words attempt to describe is overwhelming. And yet Peter’s words also give their hearers a way into the mystery. Though you reject yourself as too small, God chooses you to be a living stone. You cannot create this life yourself; it is God who will form you into a spiritual house if you go on allowing this to happen. You must receive mercy if you are to share mercy. If you welcome God into your darkness then light will flow from your life. This is the work of God and humanity working together, never apart. The ‘holy priesthood’ is inseparable from the ‘spiritual house’. This beautiful but challenging vision of what it is to be a priest only makes sense through the very first words: ‘Come to him’.
In the midst of the very real demands of ministry it is easy to lose one’s place: the vision fades and the pressure builds. In a difficult moment – or after years of erosion – a priest might wonder, ‘Am I a living stone or a forgotten and useless rock, kicked about by those who pass by?’ Even so, the hand of the one who knows and values the form and texture of each individual stone is never far away. ‘Let yourselves be built,’ Peter implores. The formation of a spiritual house is both possible and practical, whatever our personality or context.
The tree by the waterside
Happy are those … [whose] delight is in the law of the Lord,
and on his law they meditate day and night.
They are like trees planted by strea