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Final post from Archbishop Mark
1st July, 2009 - Posted by Archbishop Mark -
I’m now in Manhattan which in some ways couldn’t be further from the world of St Paul through some of which we have journeyed on this pilgrimage. Distance - if not time, given that it’s only a day ago that we bade farewell to each other - lends a certain perspective. So I find myself asking, What did it all mean? Of course the question is impossible to answer; each pilgrim will have a different story to tell. A bit like World Youth Day, this was a complex experience that moved in many different directions and at many different levels. Perhaps in the end only God can take the full measure of it. But I’m certain that each pilgrims will never hear or read St Paul again in quite the same way. They said as much as the final dinner we had on our last night in Rome. What they meant is that, trudging around some of the places where Paul’s mission unfolded and hearing his words in situ, they met the man himself in a new way.
One of the things I said to them early on was that we can have a problem with Paul because we hear only snippets of him at Mass; and even those snippets are wedged between readings from the Old Testament and the Gospels which are linked thematically. That tends to make Paul the Cinderella of the Lectionary as we now have it; his voice has been strangely and unintentionally muffled, which is one of the reasons why it was such a good thing Pope Benedict did in giving us the Year of St Paul. The Apostle’s voice has also become somewhat disembodied, by which I mean removed from the intensely human context in which his mission unfolded and his letters were written. That’s what the pilgrims came to see in a new way: Paul is a fascinating human being with a fascinating story. Once you set him and his letters within that story - places, people, problems, persecution…the blood, sweat and tears of it all - then you can really get to know him as a man, a mystic, a missionary and a martyr. And that is one of the great experiences of the Christian life; it certainly has been for me. With Paul, you can’t just take the message and forget the man, because the man is the message is so many ways. That’s why he says in the Letter to the Galatians that “God was pleased to reveal his Son in me”; Paul became the revelation and he remains that to this day. In getting to know and (dare I say?) love the man better you can’t fail to understand his message in the deep and instinctive ways that true understanding implies.
The word that I stressed from first day to last was the Greek word koinonia. It means “communion”, and I think is one of the keys to an understanding of Paul (and also to understanding the Church). It means communion at every level and in every direction; and for Paul, it can come only if there is (pardon the Greek again) a kenosis, which means the self-emptying of love. Then, and only then, can there come the joy, the chara, which is the fruit of the Spirit and the goal of the Christian life. The group’s experience of communion on the road was an important part of the pilgrimage. We were a very mixed bunch and often enough we were under pressure. Things can go badly wrong in groups like this, but the pilgrims were splendid in the way they lived communion on the road. That’s one of things that made the pilgrimage a great experience of the Church. There was something bigger than our differences, our irritations, our frustrations, our disagreements. We sensed that above all each time we celebrated the Eucharist. Looking back, I think all the pilgrims would say that the Masses - celebrated in places as different as a rock in Corinth and the crypt of St Peter’s - were the highlight of the pilgrimage. That wasn’t perhaps what we expected, but it’s what we got. They were unforgettable moments - for the most part utterly simple but deep in unusual and moving ways.
The blog has been an extension of the communion that lay at the heart of the pilgrimage. It has meant the circle could grow larger and grace could spread further. I’m not sure what it means for our evangelising straregy as we move into the future, but I’m sure it means something - and I’m equally sure that Paul would be interested to know what. When you follow in his footsteps as we did, you can’t help but ask questions about how he actually operated, questions about his missionary strategy. Because whatever else Paul was he was a master strategist. That didn’t mean that he made no mistakes; he made plenty. But he never ceased to grapple with the question of how best to preach the Gospel in this situation at this time. The same question is ours; and the experience of coming to know Paul better is surely one of our prime resources in grappling with the question in our own very different time and place.
Thanks to all who have been part of this journey - to the CatholicLIFE team who have done a magnificent job, to the pilgrims - especially Neil and Ursula - who kept the blog humming, and to all of you virtual pilgrims who were a greater boost to us than you might realise. One pilgrimage may now have come to an end, but another stretches before us. “May the peace of God which is beyond all understanding keep our hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God and of his Son our Lord Jesus Christ”.
Tags: Archbishop Mark Coleridge, Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn, footsteps of saint paul, Neil Harrigan, pilgrimage, st paul, Ursula Stephens
Posted on: July 1, 2009
Filed under: Archbishop Mark's teachings
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