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Greetings, SBT Readers:
In light of the Synod and the discernment process regarding the ordination of women to the diaconate, it is interesting to see how the apostles distinguished between "waiting on tables" and devoting themselves to prayer and to the ministry of the Word (Acts 6:1-7). Traditionally, women have "waited on tables" -- cleaned the church, washed the altar linens, served as ministers of hospitality, etc. However, as the working document for the Continental Stage of the Synod points out:
The Church faces two related challenges: women remain the majority of those who attend liturgy and participate in activities, men a minority; yet most decision-making and governance roles are held by men. It is clear that the Church must find ways to attract men to a more active membership in the Church and to enable women to participate more fully at all levels of Church life." (61)
Feedback from across the globe overwhelmingly supports these findings, but, as we all know, institutions move slowly. Rather than waiting for a list of solutions, policies, and mandates, it would seem that the "local church" (wherever it might be) needs to be proactive in addressing these challenges. How can we invite those who "wait on tables" to a more full, active, and conscious participation in the life of the church? And how can we create liturgies that take us beyond "Sunday obligation" into an experience of the transformational presence of Christ?
Eastertide Blessings!
Elizabeth
SCRIPTURE REFLECTION
Link to the Sunday Readings
Jesus said to his disciples:
"Do not let your hearts be troubled.
You have faith in God; have faith also in me.
In my Father's house, there are many dwelling places.
If there were not, would I have told you I am going to prepare a place for you? And if I prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to myself,
so that where I am you may also be.
Where I am going, you know the way."
Thomas said to him,
"Lord, we do not know where you are going;
how can we know the way?"
Jesus said to him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life."
Jn 14:1-12
Driving down LaGrange Road towards I-55, I am often distracted by two large billboards that flank both sides of the road. Because of a massive roadworks project, traffic is slow at this point, narrowing down to a single lane; without taking my eyes off the vehicle in front of me, I can take in the message on each billboard simultaneously: to my right, is a daper dentist who proclaims, "I Make Sexy Teeth"; to my left is a large sign that simply says, "Jesus: Your Only Way to God" (Jn 14:6). The juxtaposition of the two signs at such close range feels surreal -- almost like the collision of two worlds. I find myself wondering how other travelers are reacting and whether anyone finds the advertisements offensive. After all, Chicago's south suburbs are home to Jewish, Muslim, and Hindu communities who might not appreciate the implication that they are excluded from Divine grace.
This brings me to the question, how do we reconcile the "many dwelling places" in God's house with "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life"? On the one hand, the phrase "many dwelling places" reminds us of God's Holy Mountain, that place where all are welcome, including foreigners, if they keep the Sabbath and hold to God's covenant: "For my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples" (Is 56:7). On the other, John's Gospel is clear that the only way to the Father is through Jesus. While most Christians would not see a contradiction here, anyone engaged in interfaith dialogue would most likely find it difficult to reconcile texts that stress God's absolute inclusivity with those that show Jesus as the "only Way."
For me, this is not a new dilemma. I distinctly remember my religion textbook when I was in Form One in elementary school. It had a green hardcover with a silver drawing of Noah's Ark on the front, large print, and very few pictures inside. Apparently, that ark represented the "one true ark of salvation"
-- the Catholic Church: anyone on board was heaven-bound, while those who missed the boat would go to the "other place." Now, the issue for me at seven years of age was not about Christians v. other faith traditions but Catholics v. Protestants. Unlike most of my Maltese classmates, I had Anglican relatives -- my grandfather and Great-Aunt Helen. My conclusion -- one that I didn't dare articulate-- was that if God would send my loved ones to hell, God was not worth believing in.
This insight, far from alienating me from Catholicism, however, was the beginning of my journey towards encountering a God who is bigger than textbooks, catechism answers, or definitions of any kind. God, I would discover, is beyond any language, pictorial representations, and all imagining; beyond names, race, and gender; beyond any of our customary categories; beyond form, beyond tangibility, beyond limitation. When we claim that such a God would condemn billions of "non-Christians" -- or "non-Catholics"-- we commit the sin of blasphemy by making God too small.
Paradoxically, it was in reading Jn 14:1-14 as a teenager that I first encountered the power of the Living Word. The intimacy of this text set me on fire, intellectually and spiritually. It confirmed for me that Jesus is my Way, Truth, and Life, comforting me with the knowledge that God's House was a place where I would be welcome. At about the same time, I was relieved to discover that my thinking was not that heretical after all; one of the most significant documents to emerge from Vatican II was Nostra Aetate: The Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christian Religions (October 28, 1965). Acknowledging that religions everywhere each attempt to satisfy the restlessness of the human heart, the document declares:
The Catholic Church rejects nothing that is true and holy in these religions. She regards with sincere reverence those ways of conduct and of life, those precepts and teachings which, though differing in many aspects from the ones she holds and sets forth, nonetheless often reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men. Indeed, she proclaims, and ever must proclaim Christ "the way, the truth, and the life" (John 14:6), in whom men may find the fullness of religious life, in whom God has reconciled all things to Himself.(4)
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