Mass for Religious 2008

My dear brothers and sisters, in this homily I would like to mirror and draw upon the expressions of praise and hope which characterise the Word of God which has been proclaimed in this liturgy.

With the prophet Isaiah we give thanks and praise to God for his love and mercy towards us. Here are his words.  “Let me sing the praises of Yahweh’s goodness and of his marvellous deeds, in return for all he has done for us, and for the great kindness he has shown us in his mercy and in his boundless goodness.” The first movement of Christian prayer is to praise and thank God, and, as we celebrate this Mass with and for the Religious of the diocese, we happily endorse the prophet’s sentiments.

 And in words which seem prophetically to anticipate the coming of God’s Son and his work of redemption, the prophet goes on to say, “It was neither messenger nor angel but his Presence that saved them, in His love and pity he redeemed them himself.” And Jesus the Saviour and Redeemer is surely the mediator of all our praise. Out of the Church’s experience of following Jesus came that form of discipleship which we call religious and consecrated life in which men and women commit themselves in an ecclesial act of consecration to vows of obedience, chastity and poverty in the name of Jesus Christ, for the good of the Church and of the world. This evening, with appreciation and thanksgiving, we share the joy of the Religious of the diocese as they give thanks and praise to God for the vocation and grace of religious and consecrated  life, which is for them the path to holiness and for us a living example of dedication to the Lord.

St. Paul addresses to us this evening uplifting words about the Church, telling us, “You are God’s chosen race, his saints; he loves you and you should be clothed in sincere compassion, in kindness, gentleness and patience.” These words remind us all, priests, religious and lay faithful - single, married, young people and children -, of our baptismal vocation and of the Christian virtues that should characterise our lives. At the end of this passage, St. Paul writes prayerfully, “And may the peace of Christ reign in your hearts, because it was for this that you were called together as parts of one body. Always be thankful.” And this evening we recognise and are thankful for the place of religious and consecrated life in the one body of Christ which is the Church.

In an Apostolic Exhortation on Religious Life, the late Pope John Paul II reminded the whole Church that “the profession of the evangelical counsels indisputably belongs to the life and holiness of the Church. This means that the consecrated life, present in the Church from the beginning, can never fail to be one of her essential and characteristic elements, for it expresses her very nature.” 

This is surely a key authoritative insight. It means that religious and consecrated life is not an accessory to the life of the Church nor is it simply an additional reality within the Church. Christ willed the consecrated life because in some way this form of life made present the life he chose for himself. Religious life is without doubt one of the fundamental and constitutive structures of the Church. For this reason, we have every reason to give thanks for the religious and consecrated life in our diocese and to pray that religious life can flourish again here and elsewhere in the Church.

Broadly speaking, in terms of numbers, religious life is expanding in the countries and geographical areas of more recent evangelisation such as in Africa and Asia where there is the greatest pastoral need, while religious life is contracting in continents and countries of long-standing Catholic identity, such as in Europe and in North America, where Religious Orders and Institutes are re-structuring and re-organising to focus their members where they are most needed. How this global re-balancing of religious life will work out in the long term is not yet clear. But in these circumstances, I commend to all, and   especially to the Religious here this evening, the advice of Jesus to his friend Martha who was worrying herself unnecessarily: “Martha, Martha, you worry and fret about so many things, and yet few are needed, indeed only one. It is Mary who has chosen the better part; it is not to be taken from her.”  We give thanks to God with you and we pray that, for our sake, you will continue to choose the better part.

St. John’s, Port Glasgow

4^th February 2008