AN ODE TO THE CHURCH

Perhaps with the news that we received the last news, the report released by Archbishop Gustavo, the penitential liturgy that our pastor Fr. Martin did last weekend we have a cloud of sadness and disappointment... Every time we see the dark and human part of the Catholic Church, perhaps our faith suffers. Today, with this gospel narrative, we have a great opportunity to say the same words of Peter, words so full of faith and courage: Master, we have worked hard all night (…) but at your command I will lower the nets… at your command I will lower the nets… There is a reflection written by a little-known Italian author who could perhaps help us this morning to make a moment of prayer, and also to renew our commitment of love not only with the Lord but also with his wife the Church. «How enigmatic you are, oh Church, and yet how much I love you.  How much you have made me suffer, and yet how much I owe you! I would like to see you destroyed, and yet I need your presence.  You have given me so much scandal and yet you have made me understand what holiness is.  I have seen nothing in the world more devoted to obscurity, more compromised, more false, and yet I have touched nothing more pure, more generous, more beautiful.  How often I have wanted to shut the doors of my soul in your face, and how often I have prayed to die in the safety of your arms.  No, I cannot free myself from you, because I am you, and besides, where would I go? Would I establish another Church? I would not be able to establish another one but with the same faults and sins, and if I did establish another, it would be my Church, not the Church of Christ.  I am old enough to know that I am no better than anyone else. …  You, Church, you can take me to holiness even when you are made up of sinners, like me, and what kind of sinners! You, Church, have the power to transform the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ, and that power you leave in the hands of sinful men but at the same time strive to continue walking in holiness. You, Church, you speak of peace and reconciliation, although at some point in your history you sent your armies to end the heretics and the rebels.  You, Church, you sometimes seem more interested in money and power than in service and prayer. When I was young, I did not understand why Jesus chose Peter as his successor (…), even though he abandoned Him. Now I am no longer surprised and I understand that by founding his Church on the tomb of a traitor (…) He is warning each of us to remain humble, by making us aware of our fragility. (…)  What matters is the promise of Christ, what matters is the cement, the glue that unites the bricks, which is the Holy Spirit.  Only the Holy Spirit is capable of building the church with such poorly moulded bricks as are we.  And that is where the mystery lies! This mixture of good and bad, of greatness and misery, of holiness and sin that makes up the church. The deep bond between God and His Church, is an intimate part of each one of us. To each of us God says, as he says to his Church, “I choose you as my spouse forever” [1]. despite your mistakes, your infidelities, the times you have fallen. Yes: God re-establishes our virginity no matter how many times we have corrupted our bodies, spirits and hearts. In this, God is truly God, the only one who can make everything new again.  So, it is not so important that He will renew heaven and earth. What is most important is that He will renew our hearts. This is Christ’s work. This is the divine Spirit of the Church [3] ».  And the text goes on and on, but I think that this is enough…  Today, after hearing in the Gospel the encounter between the poverty of Peter and the magnificence of Christ we can renew, in the silence of our hearts, our love and fidelity to the Lord and his wife the Church, to this Church dirty and sinful but holy and immaculate, to this Church in which we can continue to receive the Eucharist and the forgiveness of sins • AE

[1] Cfr. Hosea 2,19. [2] Ezekiel 24,12. [3] Carlo Carretto (1910-1988) was an Italian religious and member of the congregation of the Little Brothers of the Gospel.