Lent 5: a sermon

For the final time this Lent, we are turning to Tomáš Halík book, The Afternoon of Christianity, for wisdom in how to frame the question of the place of Christian faith in our contemporary world. I am grateful to Halík for not framing the question in terms of what the church must do to survive in challenging circumstances. To see the question in this way – which is very tempting – leads only to further introversion, retrenchment and turning away from the world. Instead, he frames the question as one of how people of faith respond to the needs to the world around them. The church’s survival is a matter of God, the church’s task is to live a life of faithful service.

Halík describes the pressing need of the world around us in this way: ‘We need awareness of the meaning of life as much as we need air, food, and drink; we cannot live permanently in inner darkness and disorientation. Since time immemorial, people have demanded that religion and philosophy help them cope with contingency – with ‘train wrecks’ – to help them process new, disruptive events. They need to be given a name and a place in people’s image of the world and their understanding of life.’

The deepest crisis of our world is a spiritual one – it’s a question of how we relate to the world from a place of depth and integration. The neurologist Suzanne O’Sullivan has recently written about the mental health crisis we face and how the deepest problems are not necessarily best dealt with by more diagnosis and more medication. Speaking about her book on the radio a couple of weeks ago, she asked where people can go to be supported in the face of the ordinary sufferings that life throws up. My immediate thought was, is that not what the church is for?

Halík offers four images of the kind of church that might be best able to respond to such a level of human need. The first is the church as God’s people journeying through history. The church’s goal is only met beyond the horizon of historical time and that goal is our full encounter with Christ at what scripture calls the marriage banquet of the Lamb. Our Eucharist anticipates that feast and points towards it, but its fulfilment lies ahead of us. This understanding is important because it prevents us from imagining that the institution of the church is identical to the Kingdom of God: we cannot offer heaven on earth, but we can and do offer a foretaste of it, both in the sublime act of worship and in the healing and nurture we offer. As people on the way, we modestly realise our limitations while never abandoning our calling to serve. To borrow a phrase, we aim not to be really perfect, but to be perfectly real in our response to the world.

The second image he offers is that of a school – a school of life and a school of wisdom. Halík’s vision is of ‘Education for a thoughtful and mature faith [that] has not only an intellectual and moral aspect but also a therapeutic one; such a faith protects against the contagious diseases of intolerance, fundamentalism and fanaticism … offering, from the treasure of our tradition, new and old experiences of how we can open ourselves to the mystery we call God.’ Contrary to what our detractors sometimes suggest, traditional Christianity is a friend of intellectual inquiry and critical thinking, and these virtues are more urgent in our day than ever before. What a lovely picture to offer – the church as a place of learning, growth, exploration and imparting the skills of living well.

Halík’s third image is one I’ve mentioned several times before, and it is that of the field hospital, an image beloved of Pope Francis. People are

hurting, and they need a place of healing that fosters a climate that favours the healthy development of the human person. Again, the disease of our present age has a spiritual character – it stems from an unfamiliarity with the depths of our being, an allergy to silence, an addiction to superficial ways of seeing life as a completely comprehensible interaction of predictable physical forces. The healing we have to offer is one that, by contrast, savours silence, is unafraid to explore the depths, knows how to wait, and offers a patient and caring accompaniment to all who are willing to plumb these depths in search of meaning. Patience, stillness, care, commitment, wisdom, acceptance, deep listening – these are the healing arts we have inherited as a Christian community, so let’s use them as fully and as practically as we can.

Halík’s final image of a church for our times is that of a spiritual centre – ‘a place of adoration and contemplation as well as of encounter and conversation, where experiences of faith can be shared.’ We know well, as a city centre church without any meaningful residential community around us, that a territorial parish only makes sense in a minority of locations. People are more likely to be drawn by the opportunities we offer for an encounter in the depths than by something that has the character of a local club. For whom do we exist? Whom do we serve? How do we make sure that what we have to offer is not hidden away, but offered generously and humbly to anyone who seeks that encounter in the depths? A field hospital is a world away from a member’s club – it exists for the needy, not the signed-up.

In today’s Gospel, Mary of Bethany lavishes costly ointment on Jesus in preparation for his imminent burial. Judas chastises her for this wastefulness, but Jesus recognises her action for what it is – an act of pure love and service, a gift in time of need. What does the church do with its treasures? Does it squirrel them away for a rainy day, or does it offer them generously in a time of need? What can we do to release the fragrance of a healing balm on a world desperate for loving care?

Anything we have to offer is simply the wisdom of one hungry person who tells another hungry person where they have found bread. In the two weeks that lie ahead of us, we will remind ourselves that the bread we have found is not from our own storehouses, but from one who called himself the bread of life, bread made from the grain of wheat that falls into the ground and dies so that it may bear fruit. We will see that bread broken apart on Holy Thursday before it is shared again on the road to Emmaus. It is not the bread shared at the exclusive tables of a private club, but, as Jesus said, is the bread of his own flesh, given for the life of the world. Nourished by this bread, let us give all we can for the life of the world.

Fr John, Sermon: April 6, 2025

Questions:

1. What resources do we have as a church community that we can devote to the care of others?
2. What kind of healing can a church community offer?
3. If church is a school, what kind of life skills do we seek from it?