The Obedience Before Us
To the church in the diaspora[1]
& to the church of the unchurched
Isaiah 6: 1-2a, 3-8 I Corinthians 15:1-11 Luke 5: 1-11
Poor fishing on
the
One day Jesus was close
to shore in Simon Peter’s boat on the
Poor fishing again (John 21: 1-19)
When things calmed down after Jesus’ crucifixion the
apostles went back to fishing for a living. One day Peter and his partners were
fishing again on the
We wonder who in the world took the time to count the fish
and remember the exact number. We wonder also what’s so important about that
exact number that it came to be recorded in the written gospel.
Our crisis
Twice Scripture says that
the heart of Jesus was moved with pity for the people because they were like
sheep without a shepherd (Mk
When winter hits
Another winter, I called the Vicar General of the
Houston-Galveston Archdiocese. I asked
whether I could be of some help in a parish near
The crisis is not only in
Crisis: a moment of opportunity
An oriental wisdom
sees a crisis as a moment of opportunity. God be praised for our priest shortage!
It’s a great moment of opportunity. Our crisis
forces us to ask pared-down and bare-boned questions about the
priesthood--questions we would never have thought to ask in days past when priests
abounded.
Questions like, When the
priestly people searches for a head, what should they look for? Should they look for an administrator to get
things done? Should they look for a doctrinist to tell us what the church’s
teachings are? Should they look for a legalist to tell us what the church’s
laws are? No! None of the above. When the priestly people searches for a head,
should they look for a celibate to
remind us of the superiority of non-sex over sex, or for a male to remind us
this is a man’s world? No! None of the above. When the priestly people searches
for a head, should they look for a
saint? No! Not even for a saint! When the priestly people go in search
of a head they must search not for an administrator or doctrinist or legalist
or celibate or male or even for a saint. They
must search for a priest, and the crisis before us now forces us to ask a pared-down and bare-boned question: What, at the end of the day, is a priest in
the first place?
I’ve had a good fifty
years to think that over. The answer which I have now I wish I would have had
50 years ago. But life doesn’t work that
way. Life is always a slow and painful journey into wisdom. Over fifty years I’ve cleared away the misconceptions,
the fantasies and the clutter about priesthood and have finally chiseled out
for myself a more mysterious answer befitting the mysterious reality of
priesthood.
Good at mystery
To begin with, a priest, I
now see after fifty years, is someone who is especially good at mystery. God is mystery. A priest is one who is good at mystery. A
priest is especially one who does not have God down pat and does not have all the
answers. A
priest is one who recognizes that we do not know. He, therefore, thwarts the
desire of many people who want a certain and comfortable list of things to
believe in and do in order to curry favor with the Ultimate Judge.
Again, a priest is one
who is good at mystery. Mystery is the more-than-meets-the-eye dimension
that is scattered periodically along life’s journey. That dimension is perceived
by those who are attuned to it. Good at mystery, the priest raises bread and
wine at the elevation of the Mass and plausibly claims that there’s more-here-than-meets-the
eye. He plausibly claims that what we see is not bread and wine but the body
and blood of the Lord. That moment of elevation is Sabbath rest from the fatiguing
non-mystery that wears down the
Sunday assembly all week long with its constant beat that what they see is all
there is.
Now when you're good at mystery ("the-more-than-meets-the-eye")
then you're also good at poetry
("the-more-than-meets-the-ear”). A priest, I now see after fifty years, is
one who is also good at poetry. Poetry is the language of mystery. Years ago, as a young priest, I read the
words of Karl Rahner that, "The perfect priest is perfect poet." I
liked what he said, but at that time I didn't know what it meant. I do
now. He's absolutely correct: a perfect priest
is a perfect poet.
In the Sunday assembly a priest gives thanks in the
Spring Preface for the sun that warms our mother the earth and calls forth the
bloom from the tomb of winter. In summer at the preface of the Mass he gives thanks
for the sun that lengthens the day and tans our mother the earth with rolling
field of hay. In fall he gives thanks for
the apple and the pumpkin--God bounty gathered into bins against the long
winter night. In winter he gives thanks
to the Father for the Son born for us so that we might wildly know that mercy
blankets all the land more surely than the snow. A priest is good at poetry. He
is good at using words which say more than what they say.
A priest, now I see after
fifty years, is one who is also good at revelation.
Revelation comes from the Latin revelare--to
lift a veil--to draw back a curtain. When the curtain is drawn back, we get a
glimpse at the other side. With a glimpse of the other side comes ecstasy. The priest, in fact, is good at
ecstasy. He helps the Sunday assembly
to rise to the highs of
Good at tragedy
Finally, a priest, now I
see after fifty years, is one who is particularly good at the tragic dimension
of human existence with its disasters, tragedies and long and painful illnesses
which eventually carry off the ones we love. In tragedy a priest is good not
with hollow words that try to excuse the inexcusable God, nor with pretentious
words that try to explain away the unexplainable God. Rather, the priest is one who is good simply
at wordlessly walking us through the tragic. He is one who is good not at
taking away our grief away but simply standing quietly beside it as the Stabat
Mater, Mary, stood beside her dying son.
The solution: obedience
Jesus commanded the apostles in the gospel today to launch
off into the deep and cast their nets. Though they had fished all night on the
The solution to the priest shortage—the shortage of fishers of men--is obedience to Jesus who commands us to be not afraid but to launch off into the deep when fishing for fishers of men. Jesus commands us to cast our net on the right side of the boat, for we are fishing on the wrong side. We are fishing on the wrong side of the boat when we spend our energy looking for one who is a male, a celibate and even a saint. We are fishing on the right side of the boat when we spend our energy looking for nothing less than a priest—one who is good at mystery, poetry, ecstasy and tragedy.
Conclusion
The blessed crisis before us
The solution to
the priest shortage is obedience to voice
of the Lord speaking to us in the terrible crisis before us. In our crisis we
find ourselves often praying “for young men who will be generous enough to
devote their lives to the priesthood.” It might be more profitable to pray for a
church which will be courageous enough to launch off into the deep and lay hold
of the opportunity wrapped up in the blessed crisis before us.
[1] Diaspora
is a Greek word meaning dispersion. Originally it referred to the settling of scattered colonies of
Jews outside
[2] Called also the