Franciscan at Home

I do not always find forgiving easy. Indeed, I sometimes find it a real struggle. Yet I know that if I am to follow the teaching and example of Jesus, I must forgive everything, always, and unconditionally. This is, of course, only possible through the grace of God.

Let us look at the teaching of Jesus and the New Testament. Jesus taught us to pray: ‘And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors’ (Matthew 6:12). We are to forgive ‘seventy times seven’ (Matthew 18:22), which means we are to forgive indefinitely. And Jesus gave us the perfect example by forgiving those who put him to death: ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do’ (Luke 23:43).

There is also a beautiful passage in St. Paul: ‘As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.’(Colossians 3:12-13).

We are the first victims of our unforgiveness. When we do not forgive, or in so far as we do not forgive fully, we do not experience the peace and joy which Jesus wishes to give us. Moreover, unforgiveness, which is a spiritual sickness, can also affect our physical health. Statistics show us that during the eighteen months after the departure or death of a spouse, when there can be much unforgiveness, bitterness, resentment and anger, people are considerably more likely to get cancer than at other times.

In July 2008, Fr. Cash addressed a group of 300 catechetical leaders at the St. John Bosco Conference in Steubenville, Ohio. This article is based upon that talk.

My brothers and sisters, if we are going to transform the world; if we are going to set this world on fire with the love of God; if we are going to claim the world for Christ, then the spiritual heart of our ministry needs to be that we know and deeply experience the Lord Jesus Christ’s profound love for us!

One of Pope John Paul II’s constant refrains in his Apostolic Exhortation, Ecclesia in America, is that we must have a personal encounter with the Risen Jesus, like Paul, if we are to make possible conversion in our modern atheistic culture, which has become dead to faith in God. Pope John Paul was not saying anything new. Pope Paul VI said in Evangelization in the Modern World that what the Church and the world needs now is witnesses—the Greek being martyria—witnesses who know the love of Christ. This is an imperative for catechists.

St Paul can help us to understand how suffering can be a grace.

Two questions have plagued the minds of Christians and non-Christians alike: Why is there suffering? Why does God allow suffering? In St. Paul’s writings we find profound insights into the meaning of suffering. Pope John Paul II explains why St. Paul writes so much on suffering: ‘The Apostle shares his own discovery and rejoices in it because of all those whom it can help—just as it helped him—to understand the salvific meaning of suffering’ (Salvifici Doloris, 1).

The Complete, Compact Catechist Prayerbook

Reflecting on Sr. Mary Michael’s article in this issue of The Sower, “The Spirituality of the Catechist”, I realized that many of us involved in catechesis identify with the “hallmarks of the catechist spirituality”. However, we may also contend that we don’t have time to go to daily Mass or pray the Liturgy of the Hours, and some of our volunteer catechists may not even know what the Liturgy of the Hours is. Does that mean we are “disqualified” or “unqualified” as catechists? No, it just means we need to be more creative.

When I was Confirmation Coordinator of our parish, in the pre-children stage of my life, Mass and meditation were part of my daily routine. Now, married with six children ages 10 to 2, my time is no longer my own. My path to holiness comes through being a wife, mother, housekeeper, laundress, tutor, chauffer, referee, cook and catechist, not to mention a catechetical publications director. In this day and age we are all multi-tasking, but this busy activity of doing God’s will needs to flow from the “wellspring of worship”, as Sr. Michael noted.

The monthly publication Magnificat has been the creative resource that allows me to continue to pray weekday Mass, without being physically present in the pew. More than a missalette, Magnificat is also the busy layman’s Liturgy of the Hours, giving an abbreviated version of that which priests and religious use.

While finishing a postgraduate specialization in catechetics, I had the delight of getting to know a number of young, up-and-coming catechists who would boast of possessing one or another spirituality. ‘Sister, I just love Saint Dominic!’ one would brag. ‘Therese is my girl!’ beamed another. ‘I’m a die-hard Ignatian,’ declared a third. And always there were plenty of those carefree souls who follow the Poverello from Assisi!

As I spent more and more time with these eager young people, I found myself trying to show them that, while each of the various spiritualities in the Church has its own particular ‘flavor,’ as future catechists they would need first to develop a taste for the particular ‘spirituality of the catechist.’ Unlike the ‘Dominican’ or the ‘Franciscan,’ the ‘catechist’ has no founder as such from whom to draw a specific charism. Instead, the spirituality of the catechist ‘springs from (his) vocation and mission.’ [i]

This beautiful, contemplative piece is taken from a Belgian catechetical journal, Parole et Partage, and was written by a catechist working on the ivory coast.

Many Christians say, ‘It isn’t important to me to know that there are three persons in God’. This is a pity, because if God makes known to us this mystery of the Most Holy Trinity, it is not so that we can become more learned, but so that we can live from it.

God, who has made us his children, wishes to introduce us into the very heart of his Love; he wants us to love the Son with the love of the Father, and the Father with the love of the Son. This is what the Holy Spirit will do in our hearts, if we let him, he who is the love uniting the Father and the Son.

What joy! God wants to introduce us, by prayer, into the intimacy of his life of love. Understanding this will deepen and enlarge our prayer.

In this article, Bishop Blair looks at the role of the Holy Spirit and prayer in Evangelization and Catechesis.

In 2009, catechetical leaders in the United States will celebrate the 10th anniversary of the publishing of Our Hearts Were Burning Within Us: A Pastoral Plan for Adult Faith Formation, issued by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. In this article, Bishop Blair highlights and reflects upon the document’s emphasis on prayer, especially to the Holy Spirit.

The Pastoral Plan for Adult Faith Formation, Our Hearts Were Burning Within Us, states that adult Catholics ‘must be women and men of prayer’ if they are to address the widespread spiritual hunger that characterizes society today. ‘Deepening personal prayer’ is acknowledged as a significant means to achieving the first of three major goals in the pastoral plan, that is, to ‘Invite and Enable Ongoing Conversion to Jesus in Holiness of Life’. Prayer is also presented as the fourth of six dimensions of a living, explicit and fruitful Christian faith.

I would like to offer some reflections on prayer, specifically on prayer in relation to the Holy Spirit, as an essential spiritual requirement for the fruitfulness of any pastoral plan, including adult faith formation.

The work of the catechist is so apparently mundane, carried out on dark evenings in small parish rooms, on wintry afternoons in classrooms, to half-expectant, half-nervous groups of adults and restless rows of children. And yet we can occasionally glimpse something of its immense nature - and then how helpless we can feel before the task! After all, how can one begin to express the overwhelming love of the Lord for the whole of his creation, and for each person individually? What words can we find to express even a little of that Love that is without limit and without end, which reaches to the ends of the earth and pierces the depths of every heart?

Those to whom we have this word to proclaim are hungry to hear it – though they may not appear to be. They are hungry to receive the ultimate meaning that can structure and form their choices, responses and attitudes when this most foundational of all truths is spoken into their lives. There are moments in our catechesis, which we treasure, when an awe descends upon everyone, catechist and those being catechised alike, as all together are caught up in sheer wonder at the works of the Lord. And yet alongside this hunger for meaning, for truth and goodness, what barriers are thrown up, what distractions are welcomed, to provide a protection against this Love that gives all, and would ask for all in return!

This issue of The Sower focuses upon the spiritual life of the catechist. The spiritual life for which each of us is destined is a life which is consumed by the one Reality which will never pass away – Eternal Love, in whom already we live and move and have our being, and Who would be entirely our life and our being.

En la última edición de The Sower, el Padre Cash escribió acerca del encuentro personal esencial con Jesucristo como esencial para que los catequistas sean testigos auténticos de la gracia transformante que Jesús quiere compartir con todos los bautizados. En este artículo, explica los obstáculos que pueden bloquear el crecimiento en esa gracia transformante.

La fe no es solamente una manera para conocer, sino que es un don del Espíritu Santo que nos transforma como seres humanos. Penetramos en una profunda experiencia personal del conocimiento de Jesucristo. Y esa fe transforma nuestras vidas. Lo conozco a Él, y ya que me ha perdonado mis pecados, mi vida es transformada, así como la vida de todo cristiano es transformada por el conocimiento insuperable de Cristo. Entonces, ¿por qué será que no todos los cristianos tengan esta experiencia?

From the beginning of time, God has revealed himself to humanity through his judgments, his laws, which are true and righteous and emanate from the heart of love and goodness in the Trinity. As Pope Benedict XVI writes: ‘The law is the visibility of the truth, the visibility of God’s countenance….’

The relationship to God and to his judgments that once came through the law and the prophets now comes in greater fullness through personal relationship in Jesus Christ who fulfilled that law. It is important for us as Christian catechists to understand about God’s judgments in our own lives. As we learn to identify these judgments of love and discipline and then come to trust and love them, we draw nearer to our Father and share more completely in the mission of the Son.

In Part I of this article we saw how important it is for Christians to learn how to line up with God’s judgments by ‘agreeing’ with them quickly and so allow them to purify and make us more like Christ. In this second part, we’ll further consider the form God’s judgments may take in our daily lives.
God uses every circumstance, every person, and every aspect of life to communicate with his children. No evil or difficulty is greater than his ability to transform it and work it—sometimes in the form of discipline necessary for growth in humility and love— for the good of those who love him. The Scriptures give us many examples of God’s judgments coming to whole peoples as well as to individuals. These inspired accounts, particularly those about individuals such as David and St. Paul, greatly aid us in our struggles to identify and come to grips with God’s way of speaking directly into our own lives. The stories of the saints also supply these helps, for here also are real human beings who have also obviously found the secret of loving God’s life-changing judgments.