The Fisherman

"I'm going fishing."

No, I'm not quoting Saint Peter as he and the other disciples set out on their fruitless fishing expedition shortly after Jesus' death and resurrection. I'm quoting one of my parishioners who is currently living with a life-threatening condition and having to endure some rather aggressive treatments with pretty awful side effects. I shall call him Fred, although that is not his real name.

Fred is understandably prone to bouts of depression, even despair, but at other times he battles bravely and defiantly with his condition. He attends Mass regularly and would be the first to say that he's a devout (Anglo) Catholic. When Fred announced that he was going fishing, it was to account for his absence from church the following Sunday. Clearly Fred finds the peace and solitude of sitting on the riverbank somehow therapeutic, and I certainly don't begrudge him that for a second.

Indeed, it's not only fishing that helps Fred, but also watching the odd Rugby match and going on holiday. Life is a gift to be celebrated and lived to the full, and there's nothing like a scary diagnosis and an uncertain prognosis to bring into sharp relief the wisdom of that very sound advice 'Carpe Diem'. I believe Fred is absolutely right to prioritise the activities that he finds relaxing and from which he derives most pleasure. So far as I can see, however - and I accept that my perspective may well be flawed - he doesn't find any great strength and comfort in his faith - or, more specifically, from his church attendance. Indeed he has candidly told me on more than one occasion that when feeling down, he simply can't face church. One might expect him to perhaps be angry with God, but I see no evidence for that. Rather it seems that God simply doesn't feature much in his thinking about his situation.

Now I'm always the first to say that people should never confuse God and the Church. The former, after all,  is wonderful, glorious and perfect, whilst the latter is flawed, imperfect and often ineffectual. I do find myself wondering, however, whether I as a priest, and the church as a whole, are somehow failing Fred as he walks through the valley of the shadow of death. After all, as a Catholic-minded priest I believe firmly that God's grace works through the sacraments and that the Holy Spirit makes up what is lacking in the humanity of which the Body of Christ is comprised.

There have been moments when I or a colleague have prayed with Fred and/or anointed him and he has been visibly moved and grateful. I know that he values my 'friendship' (and that is the word he uses) and that he feels supported by many of his fellow worshippers. But, despite his condition being common knowledge, Fred is resistant to being put on the parish prayer list and I have more than a sneaking suspicion that beyond the practicalities of friendship, the Church is doing rather less to sustain him than the peaceful riverbank.

Of course I regularly do that thing that priests do, and I internalise the issue and ask myself where I'm failing; but in my more objective moments, I recognise that Fred is far from alone in reacting in this way, and that whatever my own failures, there is also a failure at the heart of the church, certainly locally, and possibly far beyond. It is the failure to convince people of the breathtakingly  transformative nature of a relationship with the living, loving God.

When I arrived in my present parish, I was asked the somewhat bizarre question, "Are you one of those Vicars (sic) who believes that the Church is all about God?" When I answered in the affirmative, my questioner nodded knowingly and said, "Ah, well you see, we're not that sort of church. We tend to concentrate more on the social side of things."

I suppose I should be grateful that there was a refreshing degree of candour in that statement. It's true, I'm sure, that many Churches of various denominations are seen by many of their members as being principally social clubs, but I suspect few would acknowledge it quite so openly even to themselves. As a result, they become effectively 'God-lite' establishments that are neither hot nor cold.

Even where the Church retains its identity as a primary locus of spirituality and faith, there remains the danger that worship is perceived and experienced as 'routine' to the point of being little more than a habit. (A young firebrand of a Curate whom I knew many years ago described this - perhaps a little harshly - as 'Middle class bingo'.)

As a priest, I often find myself struggling to understand why so many of our regular worshippers seem to find nothing exhilarating or life-giving about their belief in God. But I need to remember that as a priest I occupy a strange land. My relationship with God is, after all, inescapable. I'm reminded of it from the moment I first don the clerical collar in the morning to when I say the final office of the day, whether gladly and enthusiastically or reluctantly and dutifully. My vocation locks me into this relationship with the divine.

This is a very privileged position that the laity do not necessarily enjoy. Unlike the priest, the average lay person does not automatically have a structure to their day that constantly reminds them of God, nor a fixed framework on which to build their prayer life. Of course, some choose to create such structures and frameworks, but it is for them a conscious decision and a matter of personal discipline. Others struggle, I suspect, to discern where God actually 'fits' into the complexity of their lives, and the temptation is to compartmentalise God, confining him to that regular (or perhaps not so regular) activity known as 'Church' whilst struggling to balance the many pressing demands of life as worker, partner/spouse, parent, neighbour etc.

Faith, is about the eternal destiny of our immortal soul. It is, therefore, quite literally, a matter of life and death, and is the most significant aspect of the believer's life. Belief in the love of God and the salvation we are offered through Jesus Christ should, therefore, be a cause of insurmountable joy, and, when the difficult times come, hopefully a source of solace and strength. I have no wish to sound judgmental, but I am genuinely perplexed when this is clearly not the case for even some of the most committed church members.

Paradoxically, of course, some people who seldom think about God and have little or no church involvement do often turn to prayer in extremis. Ironically, for them - perhaps at a subconscious level - there's a realisation that God is extraordinary and is therefore to be turned to at extraordinary times even if ignored in - and perceived as irrelevant to - the ordinary.

Perhaps for 'habitual' worshippers there is a danger that God becomes too ordinary.

When, in St John's Gospel, Peter announces that he's going fishing, I suspect it's an attempt to rediscover the ordinary and re-experience the mundane. He and the other disciples have, after all, been through a rather amazing experience - and maybe they need to step off the emotional and spiritual rollercoaster for a while. But the resurrected Jesus once again transforms the ordinary into the extraordinary as he comments on their empty nets and then tells them to cast them again, resulting in an enormous haul.

Spiritual renewal is about rediscovering the extraordinary nature of God and realising afresh its implications for both life and death. Interestingly, my dictionary's generic definition of the term renewal is "the replacement or repair of something". Spiritual renewal is the repair of a faith that has become reduced to the ordinary or the habitual.

None of this, I hasten to add, is intended as a criticism of Fred. I have great affection for him and enormous respect for the courage and patience with which he's facing his current challenges.  If, however, as I suspect, his faith isn't the main springboard for this courage and patience, then I need to ask hard questions of myself and of my church, and the process of  Spiritual Renewal in which we are currently engaged surely becomes all the more urgent.

One of the most well known and much loved modern worship songs by Matt Redman includes these words which I can seldom sing without a lump in my throat:

And on that day
when my strength is failing
the end draws near
and my time has come
Still my soul will
sing your praise unending
Ten thousand years 
and then forevermore 

I long for the day when my entire congregation can sing those words and really mean them. In the meantime, the challenge to those of us who are priests and to the church as a whole is to present them afresh with the extraordinary nature of God and indeed to be fishers of people.