Listen!

Sep 29, 2023

As I was contemplating - Fr Gerard Steve Theraviam

Observing the posts that come from one of my parish WhatsApp groups makes me wonder whether to laugh or to cry as I watch the antics that go on. There are those who seem to monopolise the chat with their strong opinions, trying to ‘educate’ the rest of us so that we may not fall into the errors of the world, cheered on by one or two. Others may attempt to give an alternative take on things but are always rebutted with yet another exhortation to stay on the true path of “authentic, traditional teachings of pure Catholicism”.

Others inundate the chat with identical postings, oblivious to the fact that these posts have already been put out several times over ad nauseum, obviously being trigger-happy when they see something they feel compelled to share with the world, but not willing to see what others have posted in the meantime! Some have decided to preserve their sanity by just being silent or just ‘silencing’ or ignoring the chats, in the hope that it will be safe to venture out again when there is a lull in the proceedings.

A few have decided to take the more drastic step of leaving the group. I confess I have been sorely tempted to do likewise, but have decided I need to be in touch with what goes on in the lives of my sheep so that I might ‘smell like the sheep’, or goats, as the case might be!

Reflecting on it all, my take on this is that we all need to be listening to each other. Not just so that we can rebut the other and make sure our opinion is supreme, but to listen with the heart so that we may understand the other and see what God might be saying through them. I need not agree with everything they propose and thus, sometimes, agree to disagree, but never in a disagreeable fashion. Loving acceptance and peaceful co-existence, rather than being polemical and holier-than-thou, allows us to live out the unity that Jesus prayed for. Clinging on to my own opinion for dear life may prevent me from being open to the promptings of the Holy Spirit as I am being led to a new understanding of what God might be saying to me personally and to the Church at large! It is this listening to the Holy Spirit that was behind the aggiornamento of the Second Vatican Council, and indeed, every single ecumenical council. Indeed, at the very first council, the Council of Jerusalem at around 50AD, the young Church, very much dependent on Jewish religious practice and culture, had to adapt her ways to accommodate the Gentile, Greek-speakers who soon became the majority, bringing about a new flavour in the practice of the faith. From its infancy, the Church was ever reforming — semper reformandi — in the words of St Augustine.

That dynamism and ability to adapt herself to new situations, and even crises, is what has allowed the Church to remain relevant in changing times and epochs, seeing God manifest in the world and its people, while remaining faithful to the Risen Lord, who beckons her onward in discovering His call to evangelisation in context of the joys and the hopes, the griefs and the anxieties of people in every age.

We are called to evangelise in the context of our cultures, in the way our diverse people think and live — we do not all live in Rome or in a vacuum. No-one is advocating ditching away all our past history and tradition. Yet we must be sensitive to new ways of being Church. Thus, the Church is called not towards uniformity, but instead, unity in diversity. We are, after all, called the Catholic or universal Church — surely that calls us to embrace and celebrate all expressions of the one faith. St Paul reminds us that we are all members of the one body, with each of us playing different roles. As the Synod of Bishops and their collaborators meet in October (and again next year), we are reminded of our call to Communion, Participation, Mission.

May we be always aware of our communion with each other and the cosmos in God, despite our different expressions of faith. Just as this synod, in its preparatory stage started out with the participation of people in the parishes and beyond, may we always be aware that we are all part of the one Church, called to play our respective roles and ensure that no-one is left out as we journey together in mission, empowered by the Spirit.

May God enlarge and expand our hearts to lovingly listen and embrace everyone in our efforts to be Church in the modern world. 

(Fr Gerard Steve Theraviam is the parish priest of the Cathedral of St John the Evangelist, Kuala Lumpur)