We are each priest prophet king

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about why we need to take charge of the Church's teaching that we each are priest, prophet and king. In Lumen Gentium the Church reinforced St Paul's teaching that we share these roles through our unity as part of the body of Christ. Paul VI wrote that

the faithful are by baptism made one body with Christ ... they are in their own way made sharers in the priestly, prophetical, and kingly functions of Christ.

I was brought up in a Church which left all of that the the clergy - but it is a sign of the growing maturity of the Church in our time that unordained people are taking responsibility for their own growth as spiritual people - and accepting the roles given to us by Jesus, and reinforced (in word if not always in practice) for 2000 years.

So what does "priest, prophet, king" look like when I see it?

When Martin Luther made the "priesthood of all believers" one of his three central insights, he was not inventing the concept: he was demanding that the old idea be renewed. The tired Catholic Church of the time had let it slide - and perhaps Protestantism has found it a little hard as well.

Working in business, communications, politics, parenting or any other role, is priestly because it allows us to connect our beliefs to our everyday actions, giving us purpose in our work and equipping us to serve others and make a difference in the world.

Peter calls us “living stones, being built up as a church for a holy priesthood.” He goes on to say, “We are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession that we may proclaim the excellences of Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvellous light.” (1 Peter 2)

I’m not an expert, but it seems to me that gives us direction and expectation:

1. In Jesus’ time, only the high priest could enter into the Holy of Holies, but Jesus gave us all a direct line to God. When I was growing up, real prayer was priests’ work. However more and more over the last 30 years I have seen ordinary Christians like myself taking responsibility for more than formulaic prayer. Meditation and contemplation have moved out of the monasteries and into the daily lives of people: Christian and non-Christian.
2. Our sacrifices are not the bulls, goats and doves of Jesus’ time, but sacrifices such as prayer, praise, thanksgiving, repentance, justice, kindness, blessings and love. Peter says we are a holy priesthood in order to “offer up spiritual sacrifices wholly acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”
3. We are to be modern-day prophets. As a “royal priesthood,” Peter tells us one of our responsibilities is to “declare the wonderful deeds of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.” We are expected to be prophetic (in our words and actions) about things we see that are unjust, and leading reconciliation in our work, our families, schools, and communities.
4. So we must work for change, shining God’s love in a dark and troubled world. Many of us think being king is a political role - and it is - but Jesus also emphasised the shepherding role of a good king. Our job here is to work for unity of all God's people - and to look after the people at the margins of our society: the refugees, the outcast, the ill, the disturbed, the imprisoned.
   

If we see ourselves as serious followers of Jesus, part of the body of Christ - regardless of our job, we will confront problems in the Church and in the world. We will be able to live as we believe in our work and in our human interactions. We will be agents of reconciliation, ambassadors, and mediators. In other words, we will be kings, priests and prophets in our society.

With this revolutionary mindset toward all areas of life, we come boldly into God's presence, confident in our relationship with our Creator, prophetic about injustice, and agents of forgiveness in our jobs, schools, families and communities.

These are expectations for each us, regardless of our denomination or church attendance. As people created by God, we are called to the fullness of life - for ourselves - and for our brothers and sisters.

Carpe Diem

Unbelievable! 

Daylight saving already. 

Where has the time gone? 

School holidays - then the final term and exams. Soon we'll be counting down to Christmas.

Time passes so quickly, so it is really important that we make good use of the time we have. We get plenty of advice on that ...

• In The Sound and the Fury Nobel laureate William Faulkner wrote of a father's wisdom: "Clocks slay time. He said time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by little wheels; only when the clock stops does time come to life.”
• There is a little saying that we often hear at funerals: It's not the years in your life that matters; it's the life in your years!
• The Scots have a saying that I seem to remember from one of the Wisdom books in the Jewish bible too: be happy while you're living, for you're a long time dead.
• As a teacher I remember hearing (and saying too) "last week of term" with a real sense of relief. Each time I heard myself say it, I tried to moderate the comment with another one from my childhood: "Stop wishing your life away!"

Life (and time) are gifts from God - to be used to live fully. That is the message captured in the quotes and sayings above. We have plenty to accomplish - we have plenty of personal growth to take responsibility for - so wasting time is something we need to be very aware of.

Procrastination is a very human thing: we all (to some degree) put off the hard things, or the unpleasant things, or the repetitive things. We are all aware (to some extent) that we are putting our lives on hold.

We all have times when we are too tired, or too unmotivated to "do" something - and we allow the tv, or the internet, or the pub, or going to the mall, or some other time-filler, take some of the time we have available in our lives.

Jesus' advice was to be childlike in our attitude to life - see the newness and wonder all around us - be part of it - live life! seize the day!

Creator God, we pray that each of us learns to see you in the sunlight on new foliage, the laughter of babies, the sudden flight of birds, the perfect moment of dance (or of a planned move), in the wonder-filled and surprising instants of your creation, and in the smile of a stranger.

Glimpse: Seeing

- What are you looking for? Can I help?

- Just looking.

A handsome young man, maybe 3 years old, continued his task wandering the hightide line, picking up shells and wave-worn driftwood, examining, discarding - except for the few interesting treasures saved into his yellow plastic bucket.

What made a knotty piece of wood interesting, what distinguished one sand-carved shell from another was never explained. It was intuition alone. A list of criteria is an adult concept and entirely useless, superfluous, irrelevant.

Later, in the shade of a very old rata, he picked each treasure out and arranged it on the sand. He was clearly seeing values and beauty that tired eyes missed. Some pieces had lost the beauty of the beach and were touched once and left. But others still held their mystery or their clever shaping, and were picked up, shown to adults (who mostly missed their perfection of colour, form and craftsmanship, but still said the right words).

I noticed that my few contributions found their way to the lower levels of the arrangement.

What had he seen that more experienced eyes skipped over?

When do we stop seeing individual items and start to see collective nouns?

How can we regain our sense of wonder in the tiny marvels of creation?

Thank you

Last weekend a large group of staff, parents, parish priests, and board members past and present, joined my wife Suellen, two of my children Jessica and Sara, and myself to celebrate my retirement from teaching.

I had not been looking forward to the the event - because it clearly ended my career of over 40 years in teaching.

But it was a wonderful and humbling night. The event was a formal dinner and everyone dressed for the occasion. There were many highlights with past staff joining present staff and partners, (some came quite some distance - thank you Leonie and my Jess.) 

MP Nick Smith was there looking very dapper and I was able to thank him for his assistance over the years.

Cardinal John sent a very flattering message with his Vicar for Education Jenny Gordon, and a wonderful certificate marking my career of 35 years in Catholic education.

With Robert Booth's help we remembered the "old days" of 15 years ago with humour, embarrassment and some nostalgia.

Jessica Le Bas read a stunning poem composed for the occasion and former dux, and our newest staff-member Roman Birch, sang a song he had composed (his latest album was released this week!)

More than 50 of our students sent messages of thanks and acknowledgement - and that included a number who had found secondary education a difficult process - but who had got through and are now thriving! That was moving and uplifting. 

Long-serving Board Chair Alan Hinton and Hostel Trust Chair Phil Donaldson spoke movingly of our progress as a school and hostel (as well as sharing a message from our patron Sir Pat Goodman), and Lewis Boyles also made sure we remembered past students who have died, and their legacy for the school.

The staff made significant presentations - and the Board also presented me with the challenge of making a pilgrimage across northern Spain: the 700km Camino (Way) to Santiago de Compostela. The city is one of the chief shrines of Christendom, built in the ninth century around the supposed tomb of the apostle James. 

It was a wonderful way to mark the end of my career - and I sincerely thank Denis, Shona, Kyle and Rebekah, Simon Pimm (driving the car of our very first Head of Arts, Rebecca) and the other organisers - and everyone who came or sent messages.

This is all new for me - but it was very moving, very affirming, and sent me on my way with a huge wave of friendship and love. Thank you.

Watch your thoughts

Your beliefs become your thoughts,
Your thoughts become your words,
Your words become your actions,
Your actions become your habits,
Your habits become your values,
Your values become your destiny.
― Mahatma Gandhi

This quote from one of the most influential thinkers of the twentieth century contains ideas that we all need to consider. And Gandhi was not all that original - a quick search on Google gives similar ideas in Paul's letter to Titus, Eleanor Roosevelt, Proverbs, Soren Kierkegaard, Marcus Aurelius among others. 

It is obviously part of shared human wisdom, but because it relates to things very close to who we are and how we live, most of us find it too hard.

Each idea on its own can be examined and most of us would probably understand it and agree (at least to some extent). However, the six steps as a whole paint a picture that is too big, too significant, or too hard - or maybe seems to tell us that our destiny is out of our hands, so why bother?

We are all immersed in a set of assumptions and beliefs from our parents, our society, and media that comment on every aspect of our lives. 

I think most of us listen to, read, and watch media that we like and agree with. We become annoyed by media that challenges our assumptions and beliefs. Our often unexamined beliefs do become our thoughts.

We say those things, often assuming that others have the same thoughts and beliefs. (Often they do, especially if they were brought up in the same culture and society.)

Our actions usually reflect our beliefs. We despise hypocrites who say one thing but do another - so acting on our conscience is a good thing. (The Church would say that we must act on our "informed" and challenged conscience - and we often forget that step!)

As we get older our actions do fall into patterns (mostly comfortable patterns) we can think of as habits of action, to go along with our (mostly comfortable) habits of thinking. 

We really believe in what we are doing - that hypocrisy thing again - but again we face the challenge of the "informed" conscience. How often do we truly examine and deliberately inform what we think, believe, and value? I find that I assume those things are right, so don't need to be further informed!

Over the last few years I have written often about meditation. Some readers who have followed my development in newsletters and now in these blogs may have wondered - or thought of it as one of John's eccentricities. However, working with generation after generation of young people (while steadily getting older yourself), forces educators to challenge their own assumptions.

Young people are always changing, doing things differently - not better or worse - just differently. My assumptions and answers had to be based on understanding and empathy - and going through that process forced me to see that my old thoughts, beliefs and assumptions were attempting to drive my actions. I even had to challenge my values to ensure they were not, in fact, prejudices! They sometimes were.

Our journey to becoming the people we were created to be - people created by God, not media - is a long one. We are surrounded by very human assumptions - but we need to examine them and choose the right ones. 

One of the hardest things we must examine are our thoughts. These are so influenced by our unexamined assumptions and beliefs, the messages of the world, the media, our perceived self-interest, and by our society and upbringing. This is a VERY difficult task. Meditation provides a series of techniques to become aware of our thoughts and control them.

The alternative is to let them control us. That rarely has a happy outcome.

When I retired from teaching I wrote in my blog of the time that I had things to do for my own salvation - and over the last few weeks I have had the time to reflect on my destiny - my values and actions, my thoughts and beliefs. I have come to see that I have a long way to go!

We are each on an individual journey where we choose our own paths. We are supported by our families and people we love, and by the church communities we choose - but in the end we are born one at a time, live our own lives, and return to God one at a time. We cannot sleepwalk to the fullness of God; we won't get there as the fulfilled person God imagined if we just walk everyone else's well-trodden path.

If life is about becoming the people we were created to be - if it is about salvation - if our destiny is indeed God - then we must find time and take responsibility for guarding our thoughts and assumptions. That is where the journey begins - and that is where all the obstacles on the path are to be found!

Proverbs 4, 23-27
Above all else, guard your heart,
for everything you do flows from it.
Keep your mouth free of perversity;
keep corrupt talk far from your lips.
Let your eyes look straight ahead;
fix your gaze directly before you.
Give careful thought to the paths for your feet
and be steadfast in all your ways.
Do not turn to the right or the left;
keep your foot from evil.

Bless you!

When my children were little I often came home from a meeting or an event after they were in bed and asleep. I always crept into their rooms, put my hand gently on their heads, and blessed them.

Parents and grandparents often do this.

As a teacher I often said "God bless you" when someone did something helpful for me. 

I also said "Good on you" a lot - not the kiwi goodonya - but three distinct words praying for good for the person. The kiwi greeting kia ora is another way of praying good on a person: it means "be well" or "be healthy" in an holistic sense: "I pray that you are well in your body, your mind, your spirit, and in your relationships."

In Lumen Gentium Paul VI and the Second Vatican Council tried to clarify and renew the role of the people in the Church. 

The term laity is here understood to mean all the faithful except those in holy orders and those in the state of religious life specially approved by the Church. These faithful are by baptism made one body with Christ and are constituted among the People of God; they are in their own way made sharers in the priestly, prophetical, and kingly functions of Christ; and they carry out for their own part the mission of the whole Christian people in the Church and in the world.

These words were an important part of my upbringing in the Church. Whenever I said anything hinting at criticism of the Church, I was met with the quick reply "But you are the Church".

And I am!

I am created by God in the image of God.

I am part of the "one body with Christ", one of the "People of God".

I am a sharer in the "priestly, prophetical and kingly functions of Christ".

And I have a duty to pass that on - to share that blessing around. It is important that we can finish letters and conversations with "God bless you", take a lead in blessing the food we eat, and acknowledge God's presence in those we have contact with.

Parents seem to know that instinctively. 

We bestow sacraments and graces on our children almost automatically. We wash them clean - sometimes with total immersion - and sometimes with just a quick wipe!

We forgive them and restore them to the full love of the family when they make mistakes. We heal them with a kiss or a quick rub or a heartfelt hug when they are hurt.

We feed them and help them grow with love and healthy food and drink. 

We are quick to confirm our love, and their place in the family community. 

Our children are part of our marriage - they were when the two became a trinity - and they are when they come crawling into our beds on stormy nights, when they are frightened, or when they feel unwell.

And we bless them, and others in our lives - a really important part of our humanity as we share the priestly, prophetical, and kingly functions of Christ.