Monday Reflection - Adrian Stark-Ordish

This homily was given by Adrian Stark-Ordishk, a second year ordinand, at Evening Prayer on Monday 20th June 2010. The readings was Romans 11:25-end;

I want to spend a few moments this evening thinking about leaving.

St Aloysius left family and wealth to become a Jesuit. He, as patron saint of youth, also provided the name for Sebastian Flyte’s teddybear in Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited. Sebastian is in love with his youth and struggles to leave it behind.

We here are coming up to the end of term and a leaving of our own, albeit a temporary one. Some of our community have already left for the next stage; a rather more permanent leaving. I wonder whether our, temporary, leaving is an opportunity for us to prepare for when we leave for good, whether that’s in one or two year’s time.

We have to choose between St Aloysius and Aloysius the teddybear. Will our time here be such that we are enabled to leave and move on, looking with gratitude on all that God has given us during our time here? Or will we find our time here hard to leave behind, wishing that life could remain always as it is now?

Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote that living in Christian community is not the norm; it is a blessing and must not be taken for granted. We must see our time here together in this way. We are together now, but it will not always be so. Our summer vacation is a taste of this.

How can we learn to follow the saint and not the teddybear? How can we leave energised and forward-looking rather than looking backward? We are a transient community for we are called to be ordained ministers, not seminarians. How can we prepare for this? The habits that are being formed in us here will help, but the answer will be different for each of us. However, I believe that the answer will come down to learning to love God and to love our neighbour, however these are expressed in our individuality.

This summer is an opportunity to reflect on what is ahead of us and review our preparation for it. May it be fruitful.


Let us pray…

Gracious God,
we pray for those from our community who are to be ordained this Petertide. We pray also for ourselves as we seek to follow your call and deepen our love for you and for one another.
We ask this in the name of Jesus.
Amen.

Trinity III - Fr Andrew Davison

Homily given by Fr Andrew Davison, on Trinity III, 20th June 2010.

‘As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.’

In the name of the + Father and of the + Son and of the + Holy Spirit.

You may remember that I preached towards the beginning of term. It wasn’t a cheerful sermon. It revolved around a question: why is the Church of England is so lacking in charity? Why is our zeal is so faint and our commitment so thin? Why are there are so few saints?

I will come later to today’s reading from Galatians. Paul introduces this chapter with a question of his own:

‘O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified?’

It’s the same question as I was asking in my sermon, put a different way. How can we be so apathetic in face of the Incarnation? Do we really believe that God came to us and went all the way to death on a cross?

before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified

Is our church art so much decoration? Does it not speak to us to see Christ extended upon the cross? We had these words of Isaiah, taken by the Fathers as a prophecy of the crucifixion:

I held out my hands all day long
to a rebellious people,
who walk in a way that is not good,
following their own devices;

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This last week many of us shared in our apologetics summer school. Stephen Bullivant’s lecture has been in my mind as I’ve been writing this sermon.

Stephen told us about twentieth-century responses to atheism, from people who didn’t them off as ‘a perverse and adulterous generation’. Stephen’s heroes asked why the Church was not more attractive, why the children of their time were more inspired by atheist Marxism than by the Catholic faith.

It was French theologians who had the right idea: any response to atheism must take two forms, one inward and one outward. Yes, there is work to be done in mission, but there is also work to be done renewing the church herself. Yves Congar puts it perfectly: ‘since the belief or unbelief of men depended so much on us, the effort to be made was a renovation of ecclesiology.’

Those tasks remain, and they fall to us. There is the external work of presenting the faith with passion and clarity. We have thought about that, many of us, over the past week.

Then there is the internal work. It seems to me that it falls into three parts: catechesis, charity and ecclesiology. There’s preparing a church that knows its faith; there is enflaming a church that puts its faith into action; and there is inspiring a church to know and rejoice in what it means to be the church.

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My penultimate sermon it revolved around a question: why does the Church of England look so little like the body of He who came to cast fire upon the Earth?

That is a ‘why?’ question. Its solution will be a ‘who?’ question. Who will burn with charity? There is a simple answer: it is to be us; it is to be you. It is you who must build the Church up: teaching it, stirring it up, inspiring it to be itself.

From those great mid-century theologians we have three tasks: to teach the faith, to live the faith and to understand the Church. In each you have such a role to play, but it is a servant’s role. The clergy of the Church of England cannot save it: you cannot put in enough hours; you cannot meet enough people to preach the Gospel; frankly, you cannot provide the money to keep the lights on.

The hours, the evangelistic contact and the finances will come from the laity or they will not come at all. As future clergy, your task is to reconnect the laity with their faith, to renew their passion: to hold out before them the incarnate God, as he was held out to us upon the cross.

We need catechesis because the problems of the Church and the world need theological answers, not general answers. The Church and the world need Christians who know the truths of their faith and live by them.

That would be a revolutionary thing. Stephen’s lecture contained an oblique quotation that I’ve been able to track down. In his introduction to Dorothy Day’s autobiography The Long Loneliness (the founder of the Catholic Worker movement) the peace activist Daniel Berrigan describes her as someone who lived ‘as though the truth were true’. Dorothy Day responded to the dire needs of Depression Era American. She accomplished remarkable things, and her work carries on to this day – just round the corner from us in fact. She might simply reply that she took Christian theology seriously and lived as one who believed it to be true.

We have already moved on, since catechesis and charity go together. Conversely, to life without charity may as well be life without faith. Thomas says that charity makes faith Christian. The selfish, uncharitably Christian may not really believe in God at all. The American New Atheist Daniel Dennett stopped going to church as a young man when he decided that people do not believe in Christianity; they believe in believing in Christianity.

And finally to ecclesiology, or understanding the Church. That might seem like the odd one out: catechesis, social justice and ecclesiology? It is not. As the Doctrine Commission of the Church of England put it in more confident days, ‘the church is part of her own proclamation’: we believe in One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

Rarely has the Church been under such attack. In the face of terrible scandals, the church is in some places an object of scorn and everywhere the object of derision. But more corrosive than external scorn is internal apathy. The Church of England has spent so much time worrying about the problems of the Church that she has begun to see the Church as part of the problem. But it is not: the Church is God’s solution. The Church is the Body of Christ, the place of salvation. The Church is the beginning of the recreation of the world.

One of my favourite lines of twentieth century theology comes from one of those French men, de Lubac: the Church is the new universal community in embryo. In other words, the Church is already the beginning of the reconciliation of all things.

To see that, our passage from Galatians is the perfect passage:

As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.

The Church is the first fruits of salvation. The Church is where reconciliation happens: Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female – and whatever other hostilities we need to add in our own day.

Keep the theology of the Church in view, and love the Church. Salvation is the communal reconciliation of all things in the Body of Christ. As you might perhaps read for yourselves in a forthcoming book, we believe in a church-shaped salvation. But that is not abstract idea. Church-shaped salvation means that we must work and pray for a salvation-shaped church. We are all in this together. This is work and prayer we share, wherever our paths will take us.

Trinity II - Fr Damian Feeney

Homily given by Fr Damian Feeney, Vice Principal of St. Stephen’s House, on Trinity II, 13th June 2010.

It is a great joy and privilege to be here today as we celebrate the mighty sacraments of the new covenant in the life of Ann Lee, born just over a month ago, the youngest (and, apart from Christopher Johnson, the smallest) member of our community here at St. Stephen’s House. We celebrate with her because of all we understand her Baptism to mean; the truth of her incorporation into church and kingdom; the fact of her dying with Christ, that she may share in his resurrection; the vocation which is part of the gift of grace in her life, the outworking of which is entrusted to her parents and godparents. Above all we pray that this moment of Baptism will be the moment of her knowing Christ, and that such a knowledge will be hers every day of her life; that Christ is not only her companion, high priest, host, and guest, but friend and brother. For today Father Andrew and Sara are not alone in celebrating a new family member; all of us, and Christians all over the world, have a new sister.

Our gospel reading points to one aspect of this miraculous liturgy, namely forgiveness. Today and every day the grace of forgiveness will be Anne’s. Jesus came, and comes still, to end the estrangement between human beings and God, to banish the sins and barriers which we have built up amongst ourselves and against God. Today all of this is washed away: as we rejoice with Anne, her parents and godparents, we are reminded of the fact of our own baptism, without which none of the journeys we have undertaken would be possible. We rejoice in the endless capacity for mercy that the Lord displays towards those who turn to him in sorrow for their sins. For this astonishing God does not merely wish to look down on us. Nor is he content with merely being one of us, and sharing our lives as Christ did. This is a God who longs for the shocking intimacy of our incorporation into him, even as he sees fit to dwell within us. For we celebrate a very particular kind of new life – not the life we ourselves live, but the life lived in us by Christ, who is able to accomplish in us far more than we can ever ask or imagine (as Paul reminds the Ephesians) as we are rooted and grounded in his love. Consequently we are able to grasp the length, the breadth, the height and the depth of God’s love in our very beings.

Let us pledge today to pray for Ann, and for all those who, in future days, we will ourselves have the privilege of baptizing in our own ministries, that she may indeed know the life of Christ welling up within her, as he draws her close to himself, and that she may know and make known his presence and joy within her.

RIP David Campbell, Priest

Pray for the soul of Revd David Campbell SSJE who past away on Saturday 12 June 2010. The funeral will be held in the chapel of St Mary's Convent(St Mary's Road, OX4 1RU) on Monday 21 June at 11.30am.

Please contact Sr Frances Dominica from All Saints' Convent on 07762 019 357 if you wish to attend.

Jesu mercy; Mary pray.

Monday Reflection - Imogen Black

This homily was given by Imogen Black, a second year ordinand, at Evening Prayer on Monday 13rd June 2010. The readings was Romans 9:1-18;

This Wednesday is the feast day of St Richard of Chichester. He hasn’t made it into our House calendar, but I feel he deserves some attention, not least from those of us who are seminarians or priests. For his holiness was well-recognised in his lifetime, to the extent that he was canonized within ten years of his death, and it seems to me that he modelled virtues we would do well to emulate.

He was, when young, like many of us here, a student at Oxford. Those who feel their grants are a little small might find comfort in the fact that Richard knew student poverty all too well – he and the two friends with whom he lived were so poor that they only had one gown between them, and so had to take it in turns to attend lectures. Yet he persevered, and became well-known for his learning – he went on to study further at Paris and Bologna before returning to Oxford University as its Chancellor.

Richard was far more, however, than just a scholar. He was not afraid to stand up for the rights of the Church against the State, personally experiencing the cost of opposition to the King. Elected as Bishop of Chichester, Henry III refused to accept him, wishing a far less competent favourite to have the see instead. When he was opposed, he confiscated the see’s revenues and property, and Richard, though consecrated by the Pope, was obliged to live in penury for two years, until the King gave way. Yet in that time Richard still pursued a fruitful ministry, visiting on foot the parishes of his diocese.

He was regarded by many contemporaries, it seems, as a model bishop. It is said of him that he was hugely generous, in almsgiving and in hospitality, his charity being “as wide as the halls of his palace”, though he was austere in his own manner of living. He was always courteous and gentle, and was not so caught up in the affairs of the Church that he did not have time for other interests. In his spare time, it seems, he was a keen gardener, with a particular skill in grafting fruit trees.

Whilst said to have looked after the people of his diocese like a nurse caring for infants, he had high standards. The laity were obliged to attend Mass regularly, and to learn by heart certain common prayers. He expected worship to be conducted with order and reverence and was not afraid to defrock members of his clergy who acted immorally.

But perhaps the most important thing that can be said of him was his clear holiness, his personal devotion to Christ. This has become enshrined in his famous prayer, attributed to him on his deathbed – that he might know Christ more clearly, love him more dearly and follow him more nearly. These aspirations were very much at the heart of his life, at the heart of his ministry. As, in this month of June, we continue to reflect on Christ’s love for us, and the devotion which we ought, in turn, to offer him, we could do well to make Richard’s prayer our own.

Let us pray.

My thanks be to thee, my Lord Jesu Christ,
For all the benefits which thou hast given me,
For all the pains and insults which thou hast borne for me,
O most merciful redeemer, friend and brother,
May I know thee more clearly,
Love thee more dearly,
And follow thee more nearly, day by day. Amen.

Concert at St Stephen's House

The music publishers Edition HH will host a concert in St John’s Church on Friday 18 June 2010 at 6.45 p.m. Entrance to the church is from Iffley Road, opposite the university sports facilities.

The programme will include works from the Edition HH catalogue for marimba, bass flute and electronics. Admission is free.


For more information:
http://www.editionhh.co.uk/

Arguing for Christ Today 2010

Arguing for Christ Today
Summer Apologetics Course 2010
St Stephen's House, Oxford
15-17 June 2010
[view map]


A Catholic, theological and philosophical exploration:

For the third consecutive year, St Stephen’s House is offering a course in Christian apologetics this June. The lectures and discussions will explore the subject from several angles, bringing a full range of theological resources to bear. The focus will be upon apologetics from an Anglican Catholic perspective. We will explore what it means to give a rational defence and advocacy of the Christian faith, working from a Christian understanding of reason that takes in desire and the imagination along side logic.

The lecturers and topics for 2010 are to be confirmed. In previous years, speakers and papers have included the following:

The Revd Prof Alister McGrath, Introduction to the Theory of Apologetics and , Apologetics, Science and the New Atheists
The Revd Dr Matthew Bullimore, Apologetics in the ParishÂ
The Revd Dr Andrew Davison, Philosophy, the Bible and Communication and Theological Topics for Apologetics
The Revd Prof Graham Ward, Apologetics and Contemporary Culture
Mrs Lucy Gardner, Beyond Defence: The Gospel as Good News
The Revd Dr Richard Conrad OP, The History of Apologetics with an Ecumenical Perspective
The Revd Dr John Hughes, Proofs, Arguments and Objections
The Revd Dr Canon Robin Ward, Apologetics, Catechesis and Liturgy: Some Historical Moments
The Revd Dr Alison Milbank, Apologetics and the Imagination
Dr Stephen Bullivant, Meeting Atheism in the Twentieth Century: Some Theological Responses

For more information:
http://www.ssho.ox.ac.uk/apologetics/Welcome.html

Monday Reflection - Taemin Oh

This homily was given by Taemin Oh, a second year ordinand, at Evening Prayer on Monday 7th June 2010. The readings was Romans 7:1-6;


Trinity Term is, actually very special period for many of us. Although today’s weather is not very good, it is mainly the trinity term that we can feel the dramatic change of seasons, in such a good way. And of course, for some of seminarians, it is a time of ‘leaving’ to prepare the first step of their future; ordination. So, the last couple of days, I have asked a question to some of the leavers: ‘How do you feel now?’ As you can guess, majority of them told me that they were pretty nervous but fine.

Surely, we know that the word ‘nervous’ does not mean that they are seriously afraid of doing something or they think they are not ready to be ordained! Rather, it was some sort of expression of ‘the expectation to the uncertainty of the coming future.’ Yet, it all sounds very far for me, but it does not seem to be a bad idea to think about my own situation.

Yes, they are all gone, we can see that. They are many empty seats now in this chancel and even they look quite sad. But is that all? Can we see anything other than just empty seats? As Timothy Radcliffe quotes from the classical film Brief Encounter in his book Why go to Church, it maybe possible for us to see these stalls through the concept of ‘absence’.

A board housewife and a GP meet in a railway station and fall in love, but finally they realize that they have no future together, so they must break with each other. That evening, the husband of the housewife, Laura, says to her; ‘You have been a long way away. Thank you for coming back to me.’

It sounds like nothing more than just the story of Eastenders, but Radcliff points out that it was not a physical absence of hers, but a mental, spiritual, human absence. In our real life, I am sure that we all know this ‘exist-but-not-exist’ status very well.

On the other hand, we also know that the sense of absence can bring us more than emptiness. The prodigal son in Luke’s Gospel had to empty his mind first to ask his father to forgive him and to accept him. Once the son emptied his mind, then he could fill his heart with other things. Similarly, in today’s second lesson, Paul says, ‘we have to die to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead in order that we may bear fruit for God.’ We know that to die, in Paul’s perspective, is not an easy task, because we also know that to empty our mind is not an easy thing to do. We should say ‘No pain, no gain’.

Our leavers, bravely, had emptied their seats, their old identity as laity. But soon they will have their new identity as a deacon or priest. The continuers who are in this chancel today, we also should empty our minds, so that we can fill our hearts with love, charity, and prayer for others. And this is what we need to learn, during our remaining training period.


Let us pray.

We pray for those ordained deacon this year;

Michael Bailey, James Bradley, Michael Childs, Michael Ellis, Adrian Furse, Martin Henig, Daniel Lloyd, Simon Sayer and Alysoun Whitton.

We also pray for those ordained priest this year;

Mary Ashton, Paul Atkinson, Peter Boyland, Dexter Bracey, Milesius Brandon, Stephen Hearn, Josephine Houghton, James Rodley and Daniel Sandham.


Grant, We beseech Thee, merciful Lord,
that the designs of a new and better life,
which by thy Grace we have now formed,
may not pass away without effect.
Incite and enable us by Thy Holy Spirit,
to improve the time which Thou shalt grant us;
to avoid all evil thoughts, words and actions;
and to do all the duties which Thou shalt set before us.
Hear our prayer, O Lord,
for the sake of Jesus Christ.
Amen.

Understanding Islam 2010

Understanding Islam :
Monday 7th ~ Thursday 10th June 2010
St. Stephen's House, Oxford
[view map]

This is a course for those who want to learn more about Islam and reflect on Islam as Christians.

It aims to provide an understanding of Islam as Muslims understand it, and to address questions of Christian response to Islam and Christian co-existence with Muslims. No prior knowledge of Islam will be assumed. Most of the teaching will be provided by David Marshall; there will also be input from other speakers, Muslim and Christian (including staff at the Oxford Centre for Muslim-Christian Studies), and visits to Muslim institutions.

Topics to be covered include:

The life of Muhammad
The Qur'an
Islamic belief and practice
Islam and society
Recent developments in Islam
Islam in Britain
Christian-Muslim relations

Course director and principal lecturer: Revd Dr. David Marshall

David Marshall studied theology at the University of Oxford and Islamic Studies at Birmingham University. His doctorate, on the Qur'an, was published as God, Muhammad and the Unbelievers. He trained for ordination at Ridley Hall, Cambridge, and has worked in parishes in Leeds and Cambridgeshire, in university chaplaincy, and in theological education both in England and abroad.

From 2000-2005, David was Chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury, a post involving substantial work in interfaith relations, particularly in a number of Christian-Muslim initiatives. Since then he has taught in a range of contexts, including St Stephen's House, the Cambridge Theological Federation, the London School of Theology and the London campus of Notre Dame University. He is now serving as the Academic Director of the Archbishop's Building Bridges seminar for Christian and Muslim scholars.

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For more information: enquiries@ssho.ox.ac.uk

Leavers' Sunday 2010

Today marked the end of their time at St Stephen's House for nine of our number who left following our Sung Mass and Leavers' BBQ. We wish them all the very best for the future and send them off with assurance of our prayers. (click HERE to see some photos)

Please pray for those ordiained deacon this year:

Michael Bailey
James Bradley
Michael Childs
Michael Ellis
Adrian Furse
Martin Henig
Daniel Lloyd
Simon Sayer
and
Alysoun Whitton

Please pray for those ordained priest this year:

Mary Ashton
Paul Atkinson
Peter Boyland
Dexter Bracey
Milesius Brandon
Stephen Hearn
Josephine Houghton
James Rodley
and
Daniel Sandham

Corpus Christi - Fr Damian Feeney

Vice Principal, Fr Damian Feeney preached at the Mass on Corpus Christi. The Gospel was Luke 9:11-17 ;

The more perceptive among you will know that for some time two cats have been resident in my house. I confess to something of a love-hate relationship with them, for behind the cuteness that everyone else seems to find so appealing there are two ruthless, calculating beings. One is serene until roused – and when roused, fights ensue – the other is, quite simply, mad. The first, when hungry, ingratiates himself with temporary displays of affection. The other uses intimidation – scratches, bites, threats and blackmails of all kinds. All of this is to ensure that they are fed. And once they are fed, and full, they wander off to do …well, whatever it is that cats do. Their various strategies to ensure full stomachs are presumably part of some survival mechanism – they eat to live, that they may feel full, and they are content until they feel hungry again, and that’s the end of the story. (Actually, I know one or two humans like that as well).

Tonight we consider a very different kind of feeding - a kind which does not leave us feeling full, but which makes us aware of a greater hunger. The nourishment of the Body and Blood of Jesus, tonight here celebrated, is of a different order entirely. We rightly speak tonight in the most exalted terms of the very presence of Jesus Christ, truly God, truly human, here among us in this Mass, in this most Holy Sacrament. We will endeavour to demonstrate this belief further as we process with this Divine Presence beyond the church walls. Then we will settle down to another type of feast at our guest dinner. But there is a very particular way in which this feeding leaves us – or should leave us – unsatisfied.

We who belong to the great joy and privilege of a Eucharistic community are aware that with the privilege comes the responsibility. If we are drawn to this feast, to our High Priest, host and friend, we commune with the divine, and with the divine purpose. We reflect continually upon what it means to live with the Mass at the centre of our being, but often fail to recognize the intimate connectedness between the Eucharist we share, the Godhead we adore, and the new, transformed lives which Jesus longs for us to live. The hunger which the Eucharist brings about in us is a hunger for the world, a hunger for our neighbour, whoever he or she may be. It is a hunger which cannot be satisfied until all are fed, until all live lives of dignity which are worthy of the kingdom, until the very kingdom of God is ushered in through this divine presence and the hunger He inspires. The more exalted our attitude to the Eucharistic presence of Jesus is, the greater and more pressing is our sense of responsibility.

None of us can claim to have an attitude to such things which is anything other than cursory. All of us need to recognize and feel this hunger, a hunger which cries out with the physical and spiritual hunger of others. How good we are at dressing up such outrages as poverty and hunger with our sophisticated politics, as we endeavour to absolve ourselves from simple action. Well, I don’t believe Jesus will accept that, or own it, because the bread which he gives is his very flesh, for the life of the world. And mere charity, in the sense of the benevolent giving from the surplus of our plenty, is not enough. The charity which we seek is rather the theological virtue, the unlimited loving-kindness which expresses itself when we stand alongside the disadvantaged and share their lot as Christ did. It was this distinction which Eduardo Galeano had in mind when he wrote,

I don't believe in charity. I believe in solidarity. Charity is so vertical. It goes from the top to the bottom. Solidarity is horizontal. It respects the other person and learns from the other. Most of us have a lot to learn from other people.

Belonging to a Eucharistic community carries with it profound responsibility – to the beatitudes, to the Kingdom of God itself - the responsibilities of the kingdom – to act in ways which indicate our hunger, our dissatisfaction with the status quo. For many who dare to acknowledge this hunger, it is expressed in opposition to globalization, to a world run for the benefit of corporations, looking instead to a truly Eucharistic model of living – a world, as Timothy Gorringe puts it, ‘of mutual accountability, of just sharing, of common ownership, of non-hierarchical forms of power.’ In this sacrament, this wondrous presence, we are enabled to celebrate how far we have come, to recognize how far we still have to travel, to acknowledge the divine hunger which drives us, and the sublime nourishment and grace which will guide us home. In this mode of being we ourselves seek to become signposts of the Eucharistic heart of our faith and of all living. As Gerald Schlabach memorably writes, ‘

‘God sets a lavish table, hosting outcasts and enemies, feeding all with God’s own life. Incarnate in Jesus Christ and embodied still in bread and wine, God offers life to the world by a further miracle of incarnation through all these sinful, bumbling, short-falling Christian lives which yet become Eucharist in and for the world’.

To be Eucharist in and for the world – that is our vocation, the vocation of all the baptized, a vocation which finds distinctive focus and character in the vocation to be deacons, to be priests. I conclude with a well-known quote – well known because it is brilliant – and I offer it especially to those of you who have come out of retreat today, and who will be ordained to the diaconate within days now. It comes in the words of Bishop Frank Weston of Zanzibar, speaking to the 1923 Anglo-Catholic Congress.

. . . I say to you, and I say it with all the earnestness that I have, if you are prepared to fight for the right of adoring Jesus in His Blessed Sacrament, then, when you come out from before your tabernacles, you must walk with Christ, mystically present in you, through the streets of this country, and find the same Christ in the peoples of your cities and villages. You cannot claim to worship Jesus in the tabernacle if you do not pity Jesus in the slum. . . . It is folly, it is madness, to suppose that you can worship Jesus in the Sacrament and Jesus on the throne of glory, when you are sweating Him in the bodies and souls of His children. . . . You have your Mass, you have your altars, you have begun to get your tabernacles. Now go out into the highways and hedges, and look for Jesus in the ragged and the naked, in the oppressed and the sweated, in those who have lost hope, and in those who are struggling to make good. Look for Jesus in them, and, when you have found Him, gird yourself with His towel of fellowship and wash His feet in the person of his brethren’.