I used to think I could not help the Church until I got myself together. I used to think I could not further the mission of the Church until I understood my own mission. I was wrong. The Holy Spirit can work in confusion, in turmoil, when nothing seems to be turning out the way we hoped. Brother Angelo’s simple message for the weekend was drop your masks, the Church as no need of us to ‘look good’. What the Church needs is radical men of prayer. Men who let Christ shine though their mess, their brokenness and their emptiness as a beacon in the midst of the darkness.
The Church as no need of us to look good what the Church needs is Radical men of Prayer
Under the spiritual guidance of the Friars, we explored over Friday, Saturday and Sunday, our deepest desires in the light of some Gospel passages. We asked the Holy Spirit to shed his light on those hidden blind spots of our lives that prevented us from living our vocation to Holiness. A telling moment came when we were asked to list out in detail the specific activities we spend our time on. So many of us recoiled in horror as we tallied up the hours spent in mindless activities, things that were so unrelated to our spiritual life, things that brought us no rest, no desire to re-create and if we were honest with ourselves, no true joy. We promised to ourselves, a line would be drawn this weekend, this was a rallying cry to battle. No more to those things that sap us of our strength, our desire to fight the good fight, to bring about the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. We also pledged to further those missions on our hearts. Some of those missions were boldly proclaimed out loud and others were silently whispered in the silent conversations with our Father but all were promises to be honoured or broken.
In summing up the weekend the Friars were clear in their conviction: something is happening in the Church. Men are finally beginning to rise up and shake off the timidity, mediocrity and passivity that for so many years has enveloped our Parishes, our movements, our seminaries. They could see some of the ‘springtime of the Church’ present in us and they left us with the prayer, that God who had begun this good work in us would bring it to completion.
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