THE
P RTAL
May 2016
Page 6
Spirituality Matters
A Church in motion
Antonia Lynn
So, Amoris Lætitia is
here at last. I’m not going to comment on the content - anyone with any
wisdom would want to spend a long time savouring the subtleties of all 325 paragraphs before offering
an opinion - but one initial response I heard interested me: “this shows a Church in motion.”
How does that strike us?
Perhaps it’s not the most
comfortable thought for
those of us who feel we’ve
come from a Church in
decidedly
vertiginous
motion; if we’re still feeling
a little seasick, we might be
longing for a quiet sit down
on the Rock of Peter. I suspect
this might be the reason
for some of the nervous
queasiness expressed about
what might be in the Holy
Father’s exhortation. But the
truth is that we are a Church
in motion, serving a God in
motion.
those who trust them will
become static and lifeless
like them.
We, however, are sent out by
the Lord without purse, bag
or sandals. If we feel heavyhearted, or resistant to the
thought of movement and
change, might it be because
we are trying to lug some
outdated idol along with us
in our mission? If our prayer
life feels static, are we trying
to cling to a static image of
God - and to worship it in a
static Church?
At Pentecost, the Church was born in wind and flame
May begins with the holy days of expectation between to be an icon of the Trinity, whose love is expressed
Ascension and Pentecost (and we’ll be praying again in perichoresis - a dance which is literally ecstatic,
with the Called to be Catholic Novena - details below). a love which goes out of itself to create and redeem.
We wait for the coming of the Spirit who swept over Pope Francis warns us: “When the Church does not
the waters before the earth took form, the Spirit who come out of herself… she becomes self-referential and
blows where he chooses.
then gets sick.”
Easter reminded us once again that we are people of
the Exodus. God led the Israelites in pillars of cloud
and fire, always on the move by day and night. They
encountered him in a tent of meeting, each time in a
different place. It is perhaps not surprising that they
longed for the security as well as the cucumbers,
melons and leeks of Egypt.
Even while Moses was talking with God in the fire
and cloud on the mountain, they were busy making
themselves a golden calf which at least would stand
still - a safer god than the living, ever-moving Lord.
Again and again we read how God’s people were
tempted by the familiarity and false comfort of idols
of wood or metal which had to be hefted about: “noses
have they, and smell not… feet have they, and walk
not”, unlike God who “does whatever he pleases”. And
contents page
Each of us was baptised in the name of the Trinity,
to become part of a Church in motion, sent out into
a world in need of the joy of love. Cardinal Charles
Lavigerie, founder of the White Fathers, urged his
missionaries to “be apostles, be nothing but apostles.”
Will you join the dance?
Once again, we invite you to prepare for Pentecost
by joining us in the Called to be Catholic Novena, 6 TO
14 MAY, 2016. Go to: www.calledtobe.org.uk/ctbcnovena.html and pray on the move on your smart
phone, tablet or laptop - or you can print the pages.
Last year we heard how the Novena was prayed
in prisons, on hillsides, by commuters on their way
to work and in quiet moments in an extraordinary
variety of places. Come, Holy Spirit!