We Are the Times: Such as We Are, Such Are the Times
As we enter the month of September there is much that seems to demand our attention and action. August seemed such a quiet and relaxing month in comparison but now we are getting emails and post asking us to pay attention so much.
Our children are beginning a new school year and next Sunday (11th September) is Education Sunday. The theme for 2022 is ‘enlightening the mind’’, taken from Ephesians 1:17-18. We are blessing our children at the end of the 9:30am Mass.
In September and October this year, the relics of St Bernadette will journey on a pilgrimage to England, Scotland, and Wales for the very first time. This very special once-in-a-lifetime event will provide an opportunity for people of all ages and backgrounds, to experience the special gifts and charisms of Lourdes. The relic will spend four days, between 24th until 28th October, at the Carmelite Marian Shrine of Aylesford Priory in Kent.
We are now in The Season of Creation, a global ecumenical celebration of prayer and action to protect our common home. It started last Thursday and finishes on the feast of St Francis, 4th October. “Listen to the voice of creation” is this year’s theme and invitation. It is a special time for all of us to pray and work together to care for our common home. Originally inspired by the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, this Season is an opportunity to cultivate our “ecological conversion”, a conversion encouraged by Saint John Paul II as a response to the “ecological catastrophe” predicted by Saint Paul VI back in 1970.
The Third Sunday in September (18th), formerly called Home Mission Sunday, is now Evangelii Gaudium Sunday. Named after Pope Francis’ first (solo) Apostolic Exhortation on the Joy of the Gospel. It gives us the opportunity to celebrate the beauty of our faith and our commitment to witness the fullness of life in Christ.
On 25th September is the 108th World Day of Migrants and Refugees 2022. The Holy Father has chosen the theme ‘Building the Future with Migrants and Refugees”‘. We were told that 1,295 people in 27 boats were intercepted after making the crossing from the European mainland on one day alone last month.
And of course, during September we give thanks for the harvest.
In addition to these events, we are remembering and reaching out to the people of Pakistan in the aftermath of the monsoon rains and continuing to pray for the people of Ukraine after over six months of fighting.
It is enough for me to put my head in the sand and say, enough, no more. I haven’t begun to include all our own personal commitments and problems.
I need to look at all this through the eyes of Christ. He is at the centre of my life. We cannot allow all these urgent matters to overwhelm the need we have to deepen our relationship of love. Cardinal Renieo Cantalamessa, in one of his retreats, said;
“One of the critical areas we need to rethink is the relationship between prayer and action. We have to move beyond juxtaposition to subordination. Juxtaposition occurs when we pray and then we act. Subordination, on the other hand, occurs when we pray first and then do what emerges from our prayer! The apostles and saints prayed in order to know what to do and not merely before doing something. For Jesus, praying and acting were not two separate things. He often prayed to the Father at night and then, when day came, he did what had been revealed to him in prayer: he chose the Twelve; he set off for Jerusalem, etc.”
To quote St Augustine: “Bad times, hard times, this is what people keep saying; but let us live well, and times shall be good. We are the times: Such as we are, such are the times.”
