STEWARDSHIP - Week One Talk by Simon Thorrington, October 14th & 15th 2006

“Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever.” This is a phrase taken from St Paul’s letter to the Hebrews, and used by Pope John Paul II in his Apostolic Letter “Novo Millennio Ineunte”, which was written to celebrate the end of the great Jubilee year of 2000. He was putting forward for discussion some thoughts about the challenges facing the Church in the new Millennium. The Church – we - he said, must always be pursuing renewal and new life in Christ. The late Pope set an agenda of risk-taking. “Put out into the deep”, he wrote, and “Let us go forward together in hope”.   

The Parish Pastoral Development Group and Fr Greg have invited Dympna Magee and myself over the coming weeks to share with you some thoughts about the future for your wonderful parish. These thoughts are about a process which we hope may help you, as a parish in the 21^st century, to go forward in hope. To invite you to consider and be honest with yourselves about your individual talents and gifts. To suggest how, against this background of change in the Church – though some would say decline – how we all have so much to offer in our communities and in the world, which will help to re-establish a clear vision and purpose and be confident again in our faith.  Today more than ever before the world is badly in need of the message of Jesus and the Gospel, and yet as a Church at times we seem to have lost our way, struggling to understand and interpret some of the conflicting messages and signals we see and hear. Pope John Paul invited us in these circumstances to not be afraid of taking a bit of a risk, something not usually which the Church is known to do, and to try out a few new ideas.

So this week and next we’d like to explore ideas about how the many gifts and talents in the parish can be recognised and called forward, even more than they already are, and about how this can be used and moulded into renewed vision and purpose for the future. What is it that being a parish in the 21^st Century really means, and what is the part that we all will play in this? Several parishes in the diocese and indeed around the country have begun this stewardship journey, interestingly mainly in the north rather than the south, and it has brought some very exciting and eye-opening results. The genuine involvement of everyone in all aspects of Church Life and Church Leadership is something that we seem to have talked about a lot but not really developed. But in these stewardship parishes, where the gifts of the people have been genuinely called upon, surprising numbers of people have come forward and offered themselves to participate in a much bigger way in parish life and parish leadership, and a rediscovery of true mission and purpose.

Within this process I also want to talk, more next week than this, about one of the nuts and bolts issues of parish life, a real-world necessity if we are to continue as beacons of the Gospel, and that is your family financial contribution to the parish as well as the contribution of your many other gifts and of your time. I’ll do this quite openly and unashamedly, for while no-one likes having to talk about money and the Church, it is a responsibility we all have, to ensure that the parish is stable and secure for the future, and able to provide and offer all that you want it to do. It is your parish, and it needs all of your gifts to move forward. But, as I say, that will be more next week.

The last 20 or 30 years in the Church in this country have seen much change and uncertainty. Parishes and parishioners are responding and adapting to many changes in church practice, and where this response is successful, even though fewer people regularly attend mass and practice their faith in the traditional way, and even though there are fewer priests, nevertheless parishes are seeing new life and opportunity, once again showing what they truly are: welcoming and warm beacons for their wider communities. Within this process, parishes and parish leaders are recognising the significant role that everyone can play in renewing the life of the Church in a new era.

“Stewardship” and “steward” are words that seem to have crept more and more into everyday vocabulary in recent years. Often, outside the Church, these words are used within the context of the environment: in these days of global warming and greenhouse gases we frequently hear that during our short stay in this world we are stewards of the planet and its natural resources, and all that it provides. And so we are. We have a duty of care and responsibility for each-other, by caring for the earth and its resources and all that it gives to humanity, and not only for today’s generation, but equally, if not more importantly, for the generations that will follow us.

 I like that: for it sums up very well what I have also come to understand as the meaning of the Christian Stewardship of all of our gifts.  All is gift, and all are gifted and called to participate. We are here on this earth for but a short while, during which we have the gifts and talents to make a real difference. Perhaps sometimes we forget: I know I did. All that we have comes from God, and we have a duty to apply this gift for mission, renewed mission to a new age.

 The dictionary defines a steward as a keeper, one who is in charge of something on behalf of someone else. The steward is a manager of something entrusted to him or her; perhaps a responsibility for other people, for resources, or for someone else’s possessions. S/he must be faithful and loyal to the owner, and manage according to the owner’s intentions.

 But for we Christians there is much more. To be a Christian Steward calls for something much deeper. Being a Christian steward isn’t about writing cheques from our God-given riches; or about doing good works using our God-given talents. Yes indeed these are wonderful expressions of Christian Stewardship, but what should be the real driving force behind these acts? It is that we have all been called to participate; each of us from our baptism has a personal vocation to follow Jesus and to accept the commitments and responsibilities of the roles to which God calls us. Through seeing ourselves as true Disciples of Jesus and stewards of the gifts given to us, we can respond, by recognising and doing the best with our talents and resources to follow Him.

It is an acknowledgement that all things in life, indeed life itself, do not belong to me, but that they belong to God. Nothing is mine, everything is God’s. All my gifts, skills and talents belong to him: I am merely here for a while to care for them, to use them wisely, to nurture and develop them, and then to return them. I come with nothing, and I shall leave with nothing. But in between times I am called to do many things.

Christian stewardship calls on us all to create our personal mission statement for life, based upon four characteristics: gratitude; accountability; generosity; and willingness to develop. We are responsible for those close to us, our families and friends. Then we are stewards of and responsible for our communities and our parishes. And finally we are called to foster a strong sense of universal stewardship, caring for those far from us, mission to the poor and oppressed, outreach.

Parishes where a stewardship process of regular commitment and recommitment of our gifts of Time Talent and Treasure is introduced are becoming revitalised, both through personal faith and through community faith and mission.

So that’s the context. Over the next few weeks more of these ideas will be developed, and you will be invited to consider your own personal gifts, and how you feel about them and how they can be used in the mission of the parish. Next week as part of this process I will talk a little about some of those nuts and bolts I mentioned earlier, how for example your financial contribution plays a part; and also inviting you to consider the strengths, weaknesses and opportunities of the parish as you start to plan ahead.

Between now and next weekend I would like to ask you all, both individually and as a family, to think during the week about your contribution to the life of the parish. What is it that your Christian, catholic faith means to you today? What do you truly see as your role within this worshipping community? And are you offering what deep down you know you can offer? Much is already done for the parish, for which all are extremely grateful, but the potential in all parishes is for so much more.       

I could go on a lot longer, because over the years I have become quite passionate about the subject, but I should finish. I’d like, though, to repeat the opening quotation from Pope John Paul II: “Let us go forward together in hope”. These words ring out for us today just as they did six years ago when they were written: they invite us to remember the past with gratitude, to live the present with enthusiasm and to look forward to the future with confidence and hope: times and circumstances change, but "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and for ever".