After just over nine years in Oxford I've moved back to my native city, London. Over the years I've lived, worked and studied in many parts of this great - and vast - metropolis: its many faces, its energy and diversity, grandeur and history, noise and pollution, are all indelibly part of me, of my background and of who I am now. London is where I began, and where my adventure with God began.
On Saturday I emerged from all my boxes and bags and spent most of the day with our community in Forest Gate, as they celebrated their twenty-fifth anniversary since the community began. Those of us who had lived there and could come, joined them for a time of thanksgiving and for a long, leisurely lunch, in which laughter, reminiscing and seriousness interwove. I have lived there twice, the first time being when I was a candidate, taking my first steps in the Society; this house, which I called home for years, still feels very homely to me, and the area very familiar. This place, too, is where I began... my discovery of and ever-deepening journey into the Heart of God, and through it, into the heart of the world.
As it happens, while going through a box the day before, I'd found the letter I sent asking to become a novice (the next stage of formation), and reflecting on my experience thus far. In it, I wrote about the beginnings of these discoveries, these beginnings of seeing and understanding something of what it means to be RSCJ, and to live our call to contemplation and our charism of love. Thus, in September 1994 I wrote...
I have never had a "devotion" to the Sacred Heart. Although I notionally knew that it is a symbol of divine love, this was only notional... I joined the Society because that is where I felt God wanted me to be, and with a vague idea that with the Sacred Heart, at least its main focus would be Jesus. After becoming a candidate I began to hear terms like "the compassionate heart" and "the pierced heart"; but it was only when I properly moved into community that I really began to see these words being lived.
We live, as you know, in the poorest borough in London. We are surrounded by people whose daily lives are a struggle... and inspired by the example of those who work with them. I began to see how the others absorb this suffering into their lives and prayer, and thus it becomes part of the life and prayer of the whole community. It is more than simply "feeling sorry for X" or "praying for Y": it is a real compassion, a real "suffering with", which, I believe, is largely unconscious. It is a compassion which I know I do not possess - yet - but this does not worry me, as I realise it is the result of many years of living in the Society...
In the midst of all my returning to where I began my life, it has also been good to revisit where I began my being RSCJ. And in the midst of all that, it has been so good to be reminded, too, of how I began: to be reminded of my discovery of and desire for the contemplation which lies at the heart of our call and our lives. Fundamentally, it has been good to be reminded, in effect, of the essence of what drew me, because it is what I was created for, and am called to be, wherever I may be...
On Saturday I emerged from all my boxes and bags and spent most of the day with our community in Forest Gate, as they celebrated their twenty-fifth anniversary since the community began. Those of us who had lived there and could come, joined them for a time of thanksgiving and for a long, leisurely lunch, in which laughter, reminiscing and seriousness interwove. I have lived there twice, the first time being when I was a candidate, taking my first steps in the Society; this house, which I called home for years, still feels very homely to me, and the area very familiar. This place, too, is where I began... my discovery of and ever-deepening journey into the Heart of God, and through it, into the heart of the world.
As it happens, while going through a box the day before, I'd found the letter I sent asking to become a novice (the next stage of formation), and reflecting on my experience thus far. In it, I wrote about the beginnings of these discoveries, these beginnings of seeing and understanding something of what it means to be RSCJ, and to live our call to contemplation and our charism of love. Thus, in September 1994 I wrote...
I have never had a "devotion" to the Sacred Heart. Although I notionally knew that it is a symbol of divine love, this was only notional... I joined the Society because that is where I felt God wanted me to be, and with a vague idea that with the Sacred Heart, at least its main focus would be Jesus. After becoming a candidate I began to hear terms like "the compassionate heart" and "the pierced heart"; but it was only when I properly moved into community that I really began to see these words being lived.
In the midst of all my returning to where I began my life, it has also been good to revisit where I began my being RSCJ. And in the midst of all that, it has been so good to be reminded, too, of how I began: to be reminded of my discovery of and desire for the contemplation which lies at the heart of our call and our lives. Fundamentally, it has been good to be reminded, in effect, of the essence of what drew me, because it is what I was created for, and am called to be, wherever I may be...
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