Newspaper Page Text
October 23,1980
PAGE 5
BY FATHER PHILIP J. MURNION
Many messages clamor for people’s
attention every day. Preaching is one of the
means by which messages get through to
people. But it is clearly very difficult today
to make this traditional way of
communicating achieve its maximum effect.
It is difficult to convey the message of
Christ so that it makes sense to people
inundated with information about all kinds
of value systems suggesting ways to make
life interesting or to make sense out of one’s
existence.
Each day we face the challenge: how to
make sense of life’s various experiences. In
doing so, the meaning we give to the
apparently disconnected experiences of our
lives will reflect our values and viewpoints.
The stronger these values are, the more we
are able to “decide” the meaning of our lives
and the less likely we are to be manipulated
by others. How do we “see” our lives?
Some years ago, the imaginative National
Film Board of Canada released a short silent
film composed of film remnants that had
been spliced together. It was a disconcerting
series of apparently unconnected scenes of
city streets and country roads, individuals
and groups, blinding neon lights and
intimate gestures of affection.
Many religion teachers found the film,
useful because students came up with
surprising interpretations which seemed to
make sense of it. They were able to find
meaning for it and to talk about that
meaning. The film expressed well the
confusing flood of messages and images
assaulting us each day.
Advertisers and marketing specialists
recognize that people need to choose among
conflicting messages. They have become very
sophisticated in capturing people’s attention,
appealing to emotions and motivating people
to action. They spend many thousands of
dollars packaging products so that people
respond favorably.
In the midst of this environment, people
sometimes become critical of preaching, of
the liturgy or of religious-education efforts -
efforts of the parish and its people to
communicate.
Parishes today are searching for better
ways to explain the message of Christ and to
get inside the experiences of people. Church
efforts, of course, run counter to the
methods of commercial communicators. The
church and its people are companions in the
body of Christ; they are not objects to be
manipulated.
Sometimes, formal preparation for
liturgies is a joint effort between celebrants
and lay planners. Preparation also occurs less
formally when the priest finds ways to share
the lives of people, listening to their
concerns and hopes.
As the church makes new attempts to
help people weave the threads of experience
into a design for life, it probes the Word of
God to discover the richness it offers for
personal and community growth.
At an ecumenical meeting I once
attended, a successful Protestant preacher
from Texas, on the brink of retirement, was
asked what had made him an effective
preacher. His preaching seemed to reach into
the hearts and minds of his parishioners. In
response, the minister listed what he felt
were the essentials of good preaching:
1. A good understanding of the Bible.
Accordingly, he had made the Scriptures the
object of lifelong study.
2. An understanding of people’s lives. The
preacher said he found walking in the
footsteps of others through regular reading
of biographies helpful for this.
3. An appreciation of the humor in life.
Therefore, he looked for material that
disclosed the humor in life’s seemingly
contradictory events.
4. A savoring of the mystery of life found
in poetry. The minister observed how
preaching shares with poetry the capacity
both to see things in a new way and to
observe events and objects so that they share
in the most universal and timeless qualities
of life. So he read and used poetry in his
sermons.
However besieged they are by the flood
of messages, people give endless evidence of
looking for life’s meaning. The timeless
message of Christ does not lack appreciative
hearers when it is made clear. But how can it
be made clear? That challenge requires
reflection.
Preaching can serve as a powerful force,
helping people plunge through the myriad
images that bombard them every day,
assisting them in the discovery of a new way
of “seeing” things that others cannot master.
Discussion Points And Questions
1. Father Philip Mumion says advertisers have learned many
sophisticated ways to reach people. What does he mean?
2. List and discuss two ways the Protestant minister in Father
Mumion’s article kept his preaching interesting for people.
3. Why does Father Daniel Pakenham say Sunday sermons are a
two-way street, a dialogue between preacher and hearer?
4. What does Father Pakenham say is the listener’s responsibility
when it comes to the homily? How can listeners prepare for the liturgy?
5. Father John Castelot says St. Paul concentrates on the death of
Jesus during his preaching. Why is the cross so central for Paul?
6. What kind of a preacher was St. Paul, according to Father
Castelot?
7. Why is it significant that Christianity is based on the person of
Jesus Christ?
8. Think about one sermon which especially touched you. Why do
you remember this particular sermon?
Preaching: A Two Way Street
BY REV. DANIEL PAKENHAM
The bishop, priest or deacon who is
preaching on Sunday wonders after Mass
whether anyone really heard the message he
was trying to get across.
The parishioner, settling down after the
reading of the Gospel for the homily, asks
whether this is going to be something he
wants to hear.
FATHER JOHN AURELIO of St.
Catherine of Siena parish in West
Seneca, N. Y., delivers a homily
One who gives a homily may,
immediately after leaving the pulpit, think
of something else he could have said that
might have made the Gospel message clearer!
The knowledge of the incompleteness of all
communication bears in on him. After years
of preaching, perhaps the very regularity of
it all is difficult to handle. Yet, every once in
a while, after Mass, someone says: “You
touched my soul.”
The parishioner, waiting for the homily,
during his monthly liturgy for
children. (NC Photo).
wonders whether Father knows anyone in
the church well enough to zero in on the life
of faith among the people. Then, every once
in a while, it almost seems his own soul has
been read by the homilist.
The listener, coming to worship and to
hear the Word of God, knows many things.
He recognizes the Scriptures can nourish
faith. He realizes the difficulty of listening
to a homily in a crowded church, full of
distractions.
The parishioner knows it is challenging
for anyone to present, in a very short period
of time, a concentrated reflection that is
capable of touching the lives of all those
present, each with his or her own experience
and insight.
Then again, those who listen may realize
that not very often do they take time to
read the Scriptures themselves in order to
prepare to hear a homily about the Sunday
scripture readings, nor do they often discuss
the Scriptures or the liturgy with family or
friends.
Bishops, priests and deacons are almost
universally nervous before preaching. They
know their own fragility and the significance
of what they are about to do.
Those who preach know the difficulties
of preaching to a congregation made up of
people who differ from one another in many
mays TIioss who presch know the near
impossibility of getting to know everyone in
the congregation personally. They recognize
that in preaching, as perhaps at no other
moment of their ministry, they become
transparent; their own faith and knowledge
is shown to all those present. Preaching in
front of perhaps thousands of people every
week of their lives makes great demands on
them.
Those who preach have a deep desire to
communicate the Gospel to everyone
present. But they also know the
impracticality of meeting everyone’s needs
at a specific time and place.
Both he who preaches and those who
listen know that what takes place is a
dialogue. The attitude of the congregation
greatly affects the preacher, and the attitude
of the preacher affects the listener; much
silent communication shapes the overall
effect of the preaching.
For the person who preaches, preparation
is vital. Faith, theological understanding, and
a knowledge of the people in the
congregation all go into the preparation
process.
Parishioners too can bear some
responsibility for the preaching they hear.
Besides reading the Scriptures and discussing
them, parishioners can take seriously the
need to communicate those things that
trouble their lives to bishops, priests and
deacons. Then those who preach will not
waste time preparing homilies about all
kinds of things that do not affect the lives of
anyone.
Then again, listeners may need to
recognize that the pulpit is not the font of
all answers for all practical moral questions
in life. Preaching is the proclamation of
God’s Word for the formation of our
consciences and the nourishment of our
faith. A goal: the formation of listeners who
will be able to make decisions out of moral
identity with the Gospel.
Preparation and patience are required for
good preaching. But they are not just
required of those who preach. It’s a two-way
street.
PEOPLE TODAY are inundated
with many messages. Therefore, it is
harder today to convey the message of
Christ so that it makes sense to
people. Parishes are searching for
better ways to get inside the meaning
of Jesus’ message and inside the
experiences of people so that the
homily at Mass and other means of
communicating Christ’s message cart
be much more effective. (NC Sketch
by Christopher McDonough)
How Did Paul Speak
To The People?
BY FATHER JOHN J. CASTELOT
How did St. Paul speak to the people of
Corinth? What was his approach?
Paul is not content simply to make
statements and ask people to accept them
blindly. At the end of the first chapter of
First Corinthians, he refers to his converts’
own Christian experiences in order to
illustrate the effectiveness of God’s way of
acting - so different from what their
ordinary experience wouid lead them to
expect.
Then he calls upon his own activity
among them as a further illustration of
God’s power. Alluding once more to their
fascination with the brilliance and eloquence
of Apollos, he contrasts his own approach to
them.
“As for myself, when I came to you I did
not come proclaiming God’s testimony with
any particular eloquence or ‘wisdom.’ No, I
determined that while I was with you I
would speak of nothing but Jesus Christ and
him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:1-2).
This is a salutary reminder of something
of paramount importance. Christianity is not
an abstract philosophical or theological
system; it is not just a list of propositions to
be accepted intellectually or a code of
ethical behavior.
Christianity is ultimately and essentially a
person. One does not “prove” a person. One
responds to, accepts, loves and follows a
person.
Paul concentrated on Jesus Christ, “and
him crucified.” This almost exclusive
concentration on the cross might strike the
reader as dark, forbidding, almost morbid.
But in the context of Paul’s thought, it is
nothing of the sort.
People often remark that the death of
Jesus is tjie only event in the strictly
historical career of Jesus on earth mentioned
by Paul in his letters. No miracles, no
parables, no exorcisms.
One possible explanation is that he had
never heard or seen Jesus before the death
and resurrection. While that is true, Paul
certainly must have learned many details
about the public ministry of Jesus from the
Christian communities which had links with
the original eyewitnesses of Jesus.
If Paul mentions only the death of Jesus,
it is because, for him, that one event
summed up perfectly the whole life and
activity of Jesus. It was the act which
expressed perfectly a whole life of selfless
love, of self-giving. It was the model and
dynamic source of Christian life, even of
authentic human existence.
Paul’s preaching to the Corinthians was
deliberately simple, highlighting the
essential. He was in no mood to be clever, to
dazzle people with showy eloquence. The
second missionary journey had left him
exhausted and not a little disheartened. He
needed a rest.
“When I came among you it was in
weakness and fear and with much
trepidation. My message and my preaching
had none of the persuasive force of ‘wise’
argumentation, but the convincing power of
the Spirit. As a consequence, your faith rests
not on the wisdom of men but on the power
of God” (1. Cor. 2:3-5).
This, in fact, was providential. People
would learn right away and from their own
experience that faith is not the conclusion to
a clever set of arguments but a gift of God.
It was not the power of Paul’s presentation
that brought them to believe but “the
convincing power of the Spirit” - a point of
capital importance for an appreciation of
what faith is all about.
This playing down of wisdom and
eloquence and reasoning might well impress
one as downright anti-intellectual, an affront
to the human mind. Really, it is not.
Paul himself had a brilliant mind and used
it well. He will proceed to show that there is
a very definite place for wisdom in the
Christian scheme of things. It is not that
faith is opposed to reason. It is rather a
question of appreciating the respective roles
of faith and reason and their relation to each
other.
KNOW
YOUR
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FAITH
(All Articles on this page
Copyrighted 1980 by N. C. News Service)
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