Message of Abbot Paul - Friday 19th May 2023

It’s really difficult putting things together again once they’ve been torn apart, and that’s true of the Church’s Calendar too. I can’t remember how many years’ ago our bishops made us transfer important solemnities of Our Lord, other than Christmas Day, from the appropriate weekday to a Sunday, thus knocking out a fair number of the Sundays of the year into the bargain. A year or two ago, some but not all of these were restored to their rightful date, provided they don’t fall on a Monday or a Saturday, when they’re still transferred to a Sunday. Confused? I am. Hence people don’t know if they’re coming or going. This was clear yesterday, when only about 20% of the usual congregation came to Mass for the Solemnity of the Ascension of Our Lord, sad and upsetting, especially if you happen to be the priest celebrating those Masses. I’m not sure what the solution is. What do you think?

 

​Our short Gospel passage for today, the feast of the great English Benedictine bishops, Saints Dunstan, Ethelwold and Oswald, follows on from our pre-Ascension readings from John, (Jn 16: 20-23). Jesus is speaking with his disciples.

“I tell you most solemnly,

you will be weeping and wailing

while the world will rejoice;

you will be sorrowful,

but your sorrow will turn to joy.

A woman in childbirth suffers,

because her time has come;

but when she has given birth to the child she forgets the suffering

in her joy that a man has been born into the world.

So it is with you: you are sad now,

but I shall see you again, and your hearts will be full of joy,

and that joy no one shall take from you.

When that day comes,

you will not ask me any questions.”

This is a particularly graphic passage, in which Jesus compares the change from sorrow to joy among his disciples, either at his Resurrection or at the coming of the Holy Spirit, with the joy of a woman, who after the pain and trauma of childbirth, holds a new-born babe in her arms. Only a woman can know what Jesus is talking about. The rest of us can barely imagine. When will Jesus see them again? At his Resurrection? But that is only temporary, so it must be with the coming of the Holy Spirit, when Christ will remain with his Church and with his friends for ever. The gift of eternal life cannot be taken from us, but we begin to live it and enjoy it from the moment we open our eyes and see Christ alongside us and become aware of his presence within us through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.