Page 19 - The Priest, Summer 2015

St Thomas, “My Lord and My God.” We say from the depths of our hearts, “Lord I am nothing; you are everything.” We of- fer ourselves daily as the Lord’s servants, acknowledging that we can do nothing of ourselves.
We also need to embrace the life of the Kingdom of Heaven. We must be acutely aware that it is a spiritual struggle that we are engaged in. We know that the forces of darkness are powerful and effective. We cannot contest them by ourselves. We are completely reliant on the grace of God. We know that we are to be agents of the Kingdom of God which is not of this world. We are willing to seem powerless before the world because the Kingdom is the mysterious working of God.
We know that our own efforts are so lame, yet God can do great things in and through us. It is all God’s work; we are un- pro table servants.
The focus of all that we do is Christ, certainly it is never about ourselves. We only want Christ known and loved. We only want Christ glori ed. He alone is the saviour, the redeemer, the Lord.
We have only one message in the end. We proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord. More particularly we invite people to know Christ as the cruci ed one. We boldly hold
forth the cruci x. Behold your cruci ed Lord. In the cross is found the power of the Kerygma.
As we live the Kerygma ourselves we will nd the Kerygma inspiring our preaching and teaching. We will be apostles of the essential Christian message.
Living the Kerygma will also be for us a path to priestly holiness.
The message of the Church today
So what is the message of the Church to the world? Again in its essence what do we proclaim to the world?
To answer this I would like to turn to our recent popes.
On 22 October 1978, Pope John Paul II began his ponti cate with these words: “Do not be afraid. Open, I say open wide, the doors for Christ.” St John Paul II had this message at the heart of his ponti cate. He urged people to open their hearts and their lives to Jesus Christ. He echoes St Pe- ter at Pentecost.
Pope Benedict at the rst homily of his ponti cate concluded with similar words: “If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors
of life opened wide. Yes, open, open wide the doors to Christ, and you will nd true life.”
These two popes offer us a valuable insight. The message of the Church is to call people to open their hearts and their lives to Jesus Christ. It is not so much the preaching of a moral code, or even high spiritual ideals, but it is inviting people to discover Jesus Christ.
This indeed is also the message of Pope Francis. He speaks of discovering joy by discovering Christ. Pope Francis has no doubt that rstly we as Catholics need to discover the joy of our own faith. The way to do this is to enter more deeply into our relationship with Christ. He says in Evan- gelium Gaudium:
I invite all Christians, everywhere, at this very moment, to a renewed personal en- counter with Jesus Christ, or at least an openness to letting him encounter them; I ask all of you to do this unfailingly each day. No one should think that this invita- tion is not meant for him or her, since “no one is excluded from the joy brought by the Lord.”1
As we live the spirituality of the Keryg- ma, we will nd new conviction and ef - cacy in proclaiming Christ to the world.Ä
1 Francis, Evangelium Gaudium, no. 3.
Journal of the Australian Confraternity of Catholic Clergy
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A group shot of the 2015 National Conference, following the Conference Mass
at St Mary’s Cathedral, Hobart. Archbishop Porteous was principal celebrant. Copyright © Archdiocese of Hobart, 2015. Used with permission.