For the last 40 years the Holy Spirit has been focusing and directing the Church in certain areas. The jubilee year was just the last stage of this and in Novo Millennio Inuente, the pope tries to gather together all these new directions, clarifying them and pointing the Church in a really amazing direction.

Central to this is his call to the "contemplation of the face of Christ". What does this mean? That as we move into the new millennium we have simply to keep our eyes on Jesus. All the riches and treasures of God are contained in Jesus. As John of the Cross tells us: "We are always looking for a word from the Lord, but we need to remember that the greatest word we could receive from the Lord has already been spoken to us and that is Jesus."

What the pope is saying is that if we look at the problems around us it is easy to become afraid. But we must not lose focus or become distracted and risk being sucked under by the storms in our lives, the storms in the Church and the storms in our culture. Instead like Peter, when he felt himself sinking beneath the waves as he tried to walk to Jesus across the water, we should call out to Jesus to save us. There are three specific things the Pope says that the Holy Spirit has led us to discover in the last 40 years. These are:

 

1. The Church As Mystery

He reminds us that the Church is not just a social organisation or administrative unit but it is a relationship with one another and the Trinity.

 

2. The Rediscovery Of The Charismatic Reality Of The Church

Speaking at the gathering of all the renewal movements of the Church in Rome at Pentecost in 1998, Pope John Paul II spoke of "the Renewed Pentecost" the Spirit had bestowed on the Church "through the Second Vatican Council bringing about new and unexpected dynamism" and the continued working of the spirit since. He commented, "The Spirit is always awesome whenever he intervenes. He arouses astonishing new events, he radically changes people and history. This was the unforgettable experience of the Second Vatican Council, during which, guided by the same Spirit, the Church rediscovered the charismatic dimension to her identity."

The Pope also underlined that the institutional and charismatic aspects of the Church were "co-essential" to the Church's constitution. This was a very important statement and it takes great honesty and humility to admit that the charismatic dimension needs to be rediscovered. By implication too, he is admitting that the institutional dimension of the Church's life was being exaggerated and the here and now action of God and the work of the Holy Spirit was not being properly received.

The interesting thing is that the Pope is not speaking just to the CCR but to 50 different renewal movements and then he goes to speak to every Christian throughout the world. "I want to cry out Be open and docile to the gifts of the Spirit! Accept with gratitude and obedience the charisms that the Spirit never ceases to bestow." The Pope is literally shouting from the rooftops for us all to receive the gifts of the Holy Spirit and to open up to them. He is not saying, of course, that everyone should join the CCR movement but that every Christian needs to be charismatic.

Cardinal Suenens used to say the same thing. "The purpose of the CCR as a movement is to be a witness in the Church to the reality of the Holy Spirit and the gifts of the Holy Spirit which belong to everybody." When the Church has fully opened to the charismatic dimension he said, there would be no more need for the CCR as a particular movement and it would disappear. I don't believe we have reached that stage yet but we took a big step forward on Pentecost 98, even if it may take decades for what was said to be acted on and lived out.

 

3. The Rediscovery Of The Universal Call To Holiness

In the Vatican II document on the Church (Lumen Gentium) it underlines that "all the Christian faithful of whatever state or rank are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity".

We are all called to holiness says the Pope. It is intrinsic to our baptismal identity. He comments, "To ask catechumens: Do you wish to receive Baptism? Means at the same time to ask them, Do you wish to become holy?" It means to set before them the radical nature of the Sermon on the Mount: "Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Mt 5.48)"

The Pope says the reason he is canonising and beatifying so many saints is that he wants to show the whole Church how possible it is from whatever culture or nationality, and whatever our age or state of life, to reach the depths of holiness. The time has come", he says "to re-propose wholeheartedly to everyone this high standard of ordinary Christian living: the whole life of the Christian community and of Christian families must lead in this direction."

John Paul II says it is important that we hear this call to holiness for 3 reasons.

i) With the collapse of Christendom and the growth of barbaric paganism reflected in the laws and social mores of the West especially, it is increasingly difficult says the pope to survive as a Christian unless we are seeking to live a life of holiness. We can no longer coast along on the faith of others, but each person must be personally connected to Jesus Christ and walking the way of holiness.

ii) Many people, even in secular society, are searching for meaning in their lives, looking for answers in New Age practices and eastern religions and if Catholics are going to be able to propose to them Jesus Christ, they need to be living their faith at a deep level themselves.

iii) Holiness is not an option. As it says in Hebrews "Strive for that holiness without which no-one can see God".

 

Nobody Has Ideal Circumstances For Prayer

Our lack of holiness, shown in our sins and moral imperfections, make us incapable of receiving the Spirit's touch. The source of all our personal suffering, moreover, is wrapped up in sin - our sin and the sin of others. Thus the more we open ourselves up to grace and are healed and transformed, the more capable we become to love others and to be part of the solution to the problems of the world rather than being a contributor to them.

The problem is that although we might have heard about this universal call to holiness, deep down we don't feel, as ordinary Catholic lay people that it means us. With our jobs, our families, our health, and with all that's going on in our lives we often feel it is others who should be responding to this call rather than us - particularly those we consider the "professionals" - those in the priesthood and religious life or who work for the Church. After all, isn't that what we pay them for! But you soon find out that nobody feels they have ideal circumstances for prayer and there are always excuses why someone can't follow the call the holiness. This is because as St Teresa of Avila says, the main obstacle to holiness is not our external circumstances but the "sluggishness of our hearts".

 

Reconnect With The Mystical Tradition

What the Holy Spirit is making clear to us today though through the Scriptures, Vatican II and the teaching of John Paul II, is that the call to holiness must start with each one of us, not someone else. To help us in this journey the Pope encourages us to reconnect with the mystical tradition of the Church and specifically to the writings of St John of the Cross, St Teresa of Avila, St Therese of Lisieux and St Catherine of Sienna. This tradition has much to offer us. It shows how prayer can progress as a genuine dialogue of love to the point of rendering the person "wholly possessed by the divine beloved, vibrating at the Spirit's touch, resting filially with the Father's heart."(NMI)

What the mystical tradition shows us is the depth of relationship with the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit that is possible. "To be totally possessed by the divine beloved" or as we tend to say in the CCR "totally under the Lordship of Jesus Christ" means that every area of our life needs to come into harmony with the will of God so that we are alert to the little whispers of the Spirit: ready to pray when we are called to pray, to be quiet when we are called to be quiet and ready to speak or to go somewhere when he prompts us.

This sensitivity to the Spirit can only come about when we are "resting filially in the Father's heart." John Paul is challenging us to move our centre of gravity from ourselves to being in God. Thus instead of looking at God from the world, we will look at the world from God's perspective and see everyone and everything through his eyes and with his love.

St Therese of Lisieux, said, "I wanted to be a saint above all but when I read about the lives of the saints I said, that's not for me. I'm not heroic like these people. I don't feel like doing big penances. Sometimes the steps I need to take to make progress in the spiritual life seem so big that I can't see how a little soul like mine can make them. I wonder if there is a spiritual elevator I could take that will help me up these steps." The spiritual elevator she discovered was the arms of Jesus. "Jesus will lift me up to the Father if I simply abandon myself to Him and Trust Him. He will take me where I need to go."

The Pope says that this kind of deep unity is not for a few mystics but is the "the lived experience of Christ's promises" in the gospels (John 14: 21 he who loves me will be loved by my Father and I will love him and manifest myself to him.)

 

Totally Sustained By Grace

He then underlines 3 elements on this journey to holiness.

• This is a journey totally sustained by grace and it is impossible to be transformed without the grace of God. In fact if we try on our own efforts we will fail. St Teresa of Avila said her self reliance almost destroyed her and completely blocked her spiritual journey. The reason so much of our activity in the Church and in our individual lives comes to nothing, says the Pope, is because we don't give the first place in our lives to Christ and his grace, looking to him for all we need.
• As well as grace, however, we need to do our part and the Pope calls us to "an intense spiritual commitment". We must really want God and be willing to pay the price for that relationship. The Lord communicated to St Teresa of Avila that one of the reasons that people made so little spiritual progress was that instead of giving their whole lives to God, they only gave him a tithe and kept the rest for themselves. God wants to give us so much, says St Teresa, but he can't because our hands are so full of other things. Thus the process of emptying and letting go, and of detachment is not an end in itself but a means to a greater fullness. Likewise all our spiritual practices of prayer and spiritual reading and going to Mass are also ways to prepare for grace.

No amount of our own efforts, will ever bring us to transforming union by itself, however, they simply dispose us for it, for God alone can do the work that is needed.

• the spiritual journey the Pope also warns us is one that is "no stranger to painful purifications" and will involve suffering of one kind or another. Because we are wounded and have sick souls which are paralysed and withered, the process of expanding and stretching them so they can receive more has painful dimensions, and we can feel pushed to our limits. In 1 Corinthians 10 Paul promises us, however, that no test or temptation or trial can come to us that is not common to everybody and the Lord will not let you be tested beyond your strength but along with the test or trial, he will supply the grace to endure it or he will get you out of it.

The Pain Of Healing

Sometimes I must admit I say to the Lord, "are you paying attention? Are you over-estimating my strength? I am on the edge." But the Lord has to keep stretching the boundaries of our love and our faithfulness, our sacrifice and our capacity for believing and hoping and loving. It has painful dimensions but it is the pain of healing - like a physical therapist working with a patient to bring him to full health. This is not a pain to be frightened of but a pain to be welcomed.

All the saints and mystics talk about the steps of spiritual growth. At the start of the spiritual journey we flee from trials and suffering. As we mature more we accept them as a necessary part of the journey and as we grow even more in love and wisdom and courage we can get to the stage when we welcome them as friends because we can see the important work they are doing in our lives conforming us to Jesus. Some will even move to a participation in the redemptive suffering of Jesus for souls.

The mystics who have gone on ahead of us in the journey and experienced mystical union, assure us that it is worth it and that the road leads to ineffable joy. When I first read John of the Cross in my early 20s I found it very dark and concluded that he was simply not for me. I picked it up again a decade ago, when I had more life experience and it really spoke to me and my reality. This led me to study him and other mystics. More recently I have been giving classes on John of the Cross, St Teresa of Avila, St Therese of Lisieux and Catherine of Sienna in various places and when I read that this quartet of saints and this direction were particularly mentioned by the Pope in Novo Millennio Inuente, I felt really affirmed in the path the Lord had been leading me personally on for I realised he was saying the same thing to the whole Church.

In Novo Millennio Inuente the Pope is calling all parishes to be schools of prayer where people can be trained in holiness. This sounds an awesome challenge but we simply have to remember as St Therese reminds us, that everything begins with little steps. We begin with conversion to Jesus Christ and a commitment simply to pray every day and then to allow the normal trials and difficulties of our everyday lives to bring us closer to God so that we can be transformed into the image of his son for our good and the good of the world.