The Female Theologian

In a week when Oceania has seen a huge change, I was fortunate to see an art show that strangely took me back mentally to the massacre in the mosque in Christchurch. The note ‘They are us’ written by Jacinda Ardern captured the essence of our multicultural societies and the shift to a more inclusive community.

Dr Daniel Connell, in his art show CoViv, captures this sense of community. How frustrating it must have been to have lived within the shadow of a temporary visa during covid times, challenged to find employment, uncertain about the future.

Both Ardern and Connell remind me of our shared humanity. Additionally, in preparing a lesson on Easter I listened to a Youtube by Fr James Marchionda OP last Easter in which he addressed the struggle of Easter in war-torn Ukraine. We are all human. Connell captured it beautifully on the canvas, Ardern cited her humanity in her need to step down, Fr James honoured the suffering across the globe in spite of humanity. We are all innately human. How we express our humanity matters greatly. Words matter. Images matter. Artistic expression matters. They matter because they speak to something deep within us, our humanity.

Within the Catholic Tradition we are taught from an early age that Jesus was fully human and fully divine – a challenging concept to rationalise. We also learn that he was the perfet expression of humanity. We tend to mess it up a bit. And we say well – we are only human. But to be fully human is to be like Jesus, so perhaps, in our flaws, we are failing our humanity, not giving in to it. To what extent do we use everything we have in our own human existence to be the best we can be? We seem to be a bit Augustinian saying ‘Not yet God’. We want to have our cake and eat it too. Maybe later, God, we will do more, be more. Later I will be the amazing human you created me to be.

Perhaps this is our escape. We say ‘only human’ to give ourselves a way out, an excuse. In doing so, however, have we then negatively impacted how we view our fellow humans – that being human is not, on it’s own, awesome? Is this why we tend to offer respect not to simply a fellow human, but to a fellow scholar, a fellow religious, a fellow familiar?

If we painted our view of our global brethren in humanity would we see beyond colour, race, ethnicity? For how long will we continue to operate in a ‘they’ and ‘us’ world?

A new year. We develop our own rites of passage to mark the shift from one year to the next. What will our approach be to the next 365 days and nights?

If the last few years have taught us anything it is that there are so many things beyond our control. We can only direct how we respond to situations. Ultimately, we may not be able to predict our circumstances but if we do not let our emotions drive our bus then we can have a say in our response.

One of the great gifts of the last few years has been kindness. I wonder if it is just me or if others have noticed that many people are more tolerant, more patient and more kind today than a few years ago. Perhaps the common challenge of covid has convinced us to collaborate with our fellow humans and realise that we all walk the same earth and share a common humanity.

What would Jesus do in covid times? Now there is a question that involves far too much analysis. We would have to consider what his context was and how he responded and derive the essence of his approach and then apply it to today’s world. I can’t manage that – can you?

All I can say is that Jesus would have loved. I don’t know what that would look like and that is ok – because if I am going to follow his example then I just need to do the best I can to be loving in all situations. Some times I will fail (probably many) but some times that love will be the difference.

So let us start 2023 with love.

Christmas, the religious festival that transcends most cultures. Perhaps it is a nod to the power of the Church in the Middle Ages, but somehow Christmas speaks to those of the faith and not alike.

Of course, the meaning of Christmas is very different to religious people such as myself; Jesus is (after all) the reason for the Season! Sometimes I think we lose sight of the fact that ours is a faith centred on love and family. We start the liturgical year with Advent – a time to get ready for Christmas. We start the religious year thinking about how amazing the birth of a child is, how joyous that time, and specifically that child. The most amazing gift of hope to ever grace the earth.

We all need hope and we all need family. Perhaps this is why Christmas is so socially acceptable and significant. The cynic in me wonders about the money-spinner component to Christmas, but never to the point that I don’t come back to hope and family, which I think is the true light of Christmas.

I think an aspect of Christmas is making sure the majority feel hope, following our call to be bringers of light. As parents of young children, we desire to give them a magical experience – to bring joy to their hearts in a special way. As adult children of aging elders we need to look to help them regain the sparkle of joy we were gifted with in our youth. As siblings and friends and colleagues we seek to bring moments of love and joy to others. As compassionate citizens we support organisations that help those in need more so at Christmas than any other time of the year. Much of Christmas is looking to the other.

But perhaps, given the all-too-fluid definition and experience of family, we need to give pause and make sure we do not lose any of our own sparkle. (After all we cannot look to the guide the other from darkness if we cannot see the light ourselves) If your life circumstance has changed this year then find your new tradition, don’t wait for it to find you – it probably isn’t looking.

There is a sadness that comes when Christmases change, and we miss the joy we felt with days past. We are, after all, human. Change often elicits grief. It is normal to miss what was which brought us joy, we just need to understand that finding a new joy is our own responsibility.

I don’t have a big family and a crowded house at Christmas (although I would dearly love to cater that sort of event) but I love my Christmases, even though my children are now adults and refuse to watch The Polar Express. And even when it is me and the pets (who will watch The Polar Express and a plethora of Hallmark Christmas films) I’m going to find things to do to remember that this is a day about hope. Life can really throw us a few curve balls, but I bet Joseph and Mary had zero intention of having a baby in a cave when they set off on the census to Bethlehem, and yet this night became the greatest of nights. Life can throw curve balls, but when you connect with it and the ball flies through the air, life can also push us to do things we thought previously unattainable. Go hit a home run!

What will you do this Christmas to recharge your inner light and help you truly feel hope and joy this year?

As the sun begins to wane in the sky at the end of the first week of Advent, we are called to light the second candle. The faith candle reminds us of the faith of Mary and Joseph as they made the journey to Bethlehem. What a journey that must have been! Perhaps we all have our pilgrimage through the uncertain, along an unfamiliar path to a destination that we may not have chosen, but ultimately is where the universe needs us to be.

Faith is an interesting concept today and means different things to each person. I see my faith as a blessing, but I know there are those who find expressions of faith manifestations of irrationality, and others who profess their faith acts as the only way to salvation – it is all a very personal thing. I cannot imagine getting through all that life has thrown at me without my faith in a loving and compassionate God.

Tonight, in preparation for the second Sunday of Advent, I reflect on all the faiths in the world. With covid we saw how we can unite and that ultimately, we share a universal humanity and profess faiths that promote common values.  Perhaps one day faith will only be a strength and not a divider within society. If only ignorance was not shouted quite so loudly over those whispers of faith that stir us to act with kindness and love. Perhaps it is Faith in something beyond what can be explained that will bring us the gift of deeper self-knowledge and infinitely more compassion.

Today we light the first candle of Advent, the prophet’s candle, which reminds us we have hope because Jesus is coming. Today more than ever we need hope. Hope is something you cannot fake, cannot buy, cannot command and it comes from our deepest desire to be all we were called to be. Without hope the world descends into darkness. We have hope. This is a gift. It is not a wrapped present under a tree but comes from the presence of others in our lives who show us glimmers or flames of love which remind us we matter; we have a purpose, and we are meant to be. Interesting that tradition connects prophets (who let’s face it were never believed by the people they were with) with hope. Perhaps it is to remind us that when our world seems blind and deaf, we still hold tight to hope in a prophetic way as we know and believe the truth to be beyond the surface, to not be killed by lies but to still exist, living, breathing, just waiting to be revealed and be acknowledged.

Several years ago I discovered the TED talk by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie about the danger of a single story. It was a fabulous presentation that I used many times with students to encourage them to think about thinks from a wider perspective and to avoid stereotyping. Just recently I came across it again and it gave me pause for reflection. (If you have not seen it, I recommend you google it).

As humans we have a ‘single story’ (in a way) of those we interact with. Our experience of the other shapes our emotional interpretation – I’m sure our rational elucidation sometimes discounts much of this experience but it always remains there. One of the challenges of life in a modern world is that one person does not have a single story of otherness to others. I may be thoughtful and kind to you, but to someone else their experience is vastly different, perhaps I have seemed aloof and uncaring. How hard it is to let go of the hurt of a single story, when that interaction has caused real harm to a person (not just mild offense but actual harm)? And yet another may see this individual as a saint. It begs the question of where is accountability and whose responsibility is it in a world of so many single stories? We cannot expect the victim to sort it all out. What if it is a person in power? Who then calls them to account? Why is it we are expected to let it go just because this person has a different single story with another? It does not take away the harm. It does not undo the damage.

For years I have read about not judging and leaving that to God – after all who are you to judge. But what about accountabiliity? Surely, we are all accountable for our own actions. So why does the single story of one impact on the single story of another? How is that fair? Where is justice in this world of politics, power, pretense and performance?

I think back to the line in Scripture – ‘give back to Caesar what belongs to Caesar’. Most businesses and institutions (I believe) would have a board or a governing body that should hold its managers accountable, this is kind of like the Caesar reference – there are laws and expectations and we need to uphold them – and we should be accountable for our actions – and in the workplace there must be an unbiased body that can safeguard all of the employees. Instead of protecting the people they put in power perhaps justice would be found if they held them accountable (as they are called to), maybe then we could avoid some of the bullying, gaslighting and victimisation that exists in the isolated single stories that still matter and deserve restoration.

2000 years ago Jesus taught the Jews how to live out the spirit of the law in the social context in which they existed. I wonder what he would teach us today in this social context? Surely he would help us create a more just system that preserves our human dignity.

At Mass yesterday the responsorial psalm had the antiphon – our help is from the Lord who made heaven and earth.

We face so many difficulties in life and at no point does a celestial being sweep in and fix everything. Even so, the refrain stuck with me as true. Our help is from God, it is to God we need to turn in times of trial. And yet the rationalist in me says how is this so?

Ultimately, we are responsible for our own actions, situations and the way in which we evolve. When things go wrong, as they will, we try and fix our ‘situation’. Perhaps what we need to remember is that we need to fix what is broken within first. This is where we need to heed the antiphon. ‘Our help is from the Lord who made heaven and earth’. It is God who helps us heal within and without this help we will never be truly whole. When we have healed our inner selves then, and only then, can we really begin the work of remedying our physical and emotional situation. We may have a crack at it from a broken core, but will we ever really move forward consistently if our inside self is held together with band-aids?

How do we cooperate to heal that which is within? We pray with faith. We pray with hope. We pray with love. Oh, what peace awaits our soul when we do! And doesn’t it make sense to build that foundation first? After all a castle built on sand will never stand the test of time.

Let us love one another, for love is from God.

Love has to be one of the most ill-defined and yet most universal terms known to humanity. From a faith perspective we are called to love everyone. As individuals we seek to be loved because feeling loved is the easiest way to find self-validation from an outside source without facing the challenging adventure of believing in one’s own self-worth because of who one is on the inside. And yet, despite this being a God-like quality (to love) we fall in and out of love at fairly alarming rates. How can a quality that stems from God, turn to hate which is the antithesis of love?

Ancient scholars defined different types of love, but does this mean only some are from God? I think, perhaps, we have ‘bastardized’ the concept of love from the time of the Gospels when we heard that ‘God is Love’ because we simply could not comprehend that level of benevolence. Somehow along the way, love came to be synonymous with desire and love became an excuse for behaviours that we knew, deep down, were questionable. Perhaps it is our ongoing human predilection to seek that which we should find within, from others. Surely love has to come from within. If love stems from God, and our relationship with God is grounded and founded in our soul, then does it not follow that love stems from within and is not a response to something external?

If then love stems from within, how can someone not be worthy of that love? Therefore, it follows that we can love all. I have heard it said (when perhaps making poor choices) that a person does not deserve my love. This is potentially true. After all, do we deserve God’s love? Does it then follow that if I love someone and they have done nothing to warrant this love, am I behaving in a God-like manner? This is where I think semantics have led us astray. There are degrees of worthiness and the difference between humans can never truly equate to the difference between humanity and God. To love someone with no hope of return and to truly wish them well is – I think – within the arena of love. To love someone who does not wish it, to try and force this love on them, is not love – that is desire.

Some people say they love their life. I think it would be better to say they enjoy their life, or appreciate their life or are grateful for their life. Surely we have to come back to the meaning of love – which is grounded in the wellbeing of the other, not ourselves. Perhaps our best examples of loving in this world are children and pets. We say we love them. We put them first (often at our own discomfort) and love them even when they do not return the feeling or cause us pain. If we don’t save the meaning of the word soon – we risk the meaning becoming antiquated and then do we run the risk of losing real love in our world?

At the moment I am painting. My canvas are the walls of my room. It is at times frustrating but I hope to see the benefit of the effort when it is finished. To be honest I am not loving enamel paint and how hard it is to get off your skin. Also challenging is getting rid of those fibers of love from the three pets that, somehow every night, find their way to my room.

I do actually quite enjoy painting and I have been looking forward to the labour. To do something and see the impact straight away. So often what I do may or may not bear fruit, but I have to trust that it may occur and it is likely I will never know. Such is the way of teaching. I have to have faith that what I do matters in some small way. I think as humans we like to work, to do ‘stuff’ that we believe makes a positive difference, no matter how small, that the tiny drop of self we plop into the great pool of everything somehow is needed.

In my painting I chose to do a feature wall. I’m actually happy with how that turned out – except for one tiny bit near the electrical point where I just didn’t have the tape in the right spot and the colour I painted over shows through. It’s a bit like the canvas of life. We paint over and make change, but that glimmer of what once was seems to always be there as a reminder. And that is ok. If I think of the underlying messages inherent in the gospel narratives I see the motif of forgiveness and acceptance, that what once was shapes us but does not define us.

We need to choose our colours and paint to the best of our ability and to rejoice in the fruits of our labours.

The Prophet Amos talks about corruption. He is highly critical of those who ‘trample on the needy’ and those who throw ‘integrity to the ground.’ He talks of a ‘famine not of bread, a drought not of water, but of hearing the word of God’. It is very much a treatise on justice and the need to support (not take advantage of) those who are struggling.

Transpose this into today and we need to ask the question – who are the needy? Whilst there are many who are poor and lacking the basics, the Scripture is more about taking advantage of those less comfortable than ourselves. So without diminishing or ignoring the plight of the poor (which is real) I wish to focus on those that are still within our socio-economic sphere.

In a fairly competitive secular society to what extent do we take advantage of whatever power circumstance bestows on us? There has been many a ‘moral man’ who has used situations to their own advantage, whether to pursue power or riches or fame. Once you have the ‘foot-up’ what do you do with it? Many give back, but we need to ensure that we build our character – not our resume.

Perhaps there is a little corruption in all of us?

In the words of Amos there is still hope of restoration. We need to ‘make good the gaps’ in our own character before we can ‘restore the ruins’ of humanity. It reminds me of the message from the Gospel to take the plank ‘out of mine own eye’ before trying to remove my brothers.

However, in the words of a song:

Lights will guide you home

and ignite your bones

and I will try to fix you.

Coldplay

Firstly, we need to be open to the light. You can’t follow it if you don’t see it, or believe in the possibility of its existence. Once the realm of possibility touches your reason you need to look for the light, and evaluate which to follow, so that you are heading home. And how heart-filling is home?!

To ignite my bones – sadly my first thought was joint ache but I’m sure we can go beyond that to the urge to do good. When our bones are ignited we are ready and aching to make a positive difference; to pursue something with fervour that tomorrow may be better than today. To be restless in the pursuit of justice (unlike the community that Amos spoke to).

We need to commit to self-improvement on a deeper level. Not about looking better, running faster, achieving a higher position, but about being kinder, more consistent and more honest.

Be alone more frequently, where it is just you and God. If we surround ourselves with continuous noise how can we hope to hear that still quiet voice calling us home?