Newspaper Page Text
February 12,1981
PAGE 5
A
Time
Out For Something Special
BY FATHER PHILIP J. MURNION
Time is a peculiar phenomenon. Some
time periods that are short according to the
calendar or the clock seem, nonetheless, to
last forever. But, some long time periods
seem to run by in a flash. Some times have a
special air about them; others are simply
boring.
Certain times are special, filled with
expectation -- like vacation time. But when
there is nothing to look forward to, time can
seem like an immense ocean without any
shores.
Time and its rhythms have always been
important in the church. And Lent has
always been one of the most interesting
times for the church. This 40-day period
before Easter goes back a long, long way in
church history. Perhaps most people think
Lent is a time to give up something, a time
for fasting, a time when the church is
cloaked in purple. It is that, and more too.
Many parishes and their people take a
special interest in Lent. The season is filled
with fascinating symbolism that is rather
easy to understand. It is a season when it is
possible to focus in special ways on the
potential of Christian life. It invites
reflection.
- It is a season when the church
concentrates a lot on baptism and its
meaning. With baptism’s theme of bringing
life from death, this is a time of thinking
about how Christians can help infuse new
life into their own worlds.
- It is a season for looking ahead to
Easter and the resurrection. With Easter’s
theme of the new creation, this is a time for
thinking about how Christians participate in
God’s creative action in the world.
-- It comes near the beginning of the
season of spring. The natural symbols of
spring, when the physical world seems to
come to life again, encourage Christians to
think about ways they can begin to grow
again.
Lent can be a time when people
endeavor, on the one hand, to avoid evil, and
on the other hand, to carry out the good
things so easy to avoid. It can, in other
words, be a time of remembering the
desirability of self-discipline and the
possibility of serving the world in ways that
are creative and helpful.
This can be a time, as scripture readings
of the Mass say, when people recall that the
sacrifices most pleasing to God involve
helping others.
In other words, Lent can be a pivotal
time in the year. It is one of those times that
place a special claim on our attention. It can
be a time when Christians emerge from the
winter of reflection into the spring of
renewed life.
Parishes are celebrating Lent in many
different ways.
1. With evening services, many make it
easier for adults to participate in Mass during
the week.
2. The “Ashes to Easter” program,
adopted in many places, offers people the
opportunity through weekly get-togethers to
consider the symbols of Lent - ashes, light,
palms, water, oils - and to understand how
these symbols relate to the rhythms of our
own lives, our pain, hope and joy.
3. Linked to Lent in many parishes is the
concerted effort to get familiar with
suffering in the world - suffering in the
forms of hunger or unemployment, for
example - and to take steps to reach out as
parishes with real help.
4. Some parishes suggest family activities,
so that at least once a week Christians do, in
their homes, talk about their Christian life
and what it could mean.
For a time, it became unpopular to talk
about giving up something during Lent. The
motive behind this trend was good:
Emphasis was put instead on what we can do
for others.
However, in a rather wealthy society, I
think people need reminders during the
Lenten season that personal desires can take
odd forms. Society frequently encourages
people to satisfy all their desires. So it is not
difficult for desires and hopes to take on the
form of greed.
Fasting and abstaining can still have
value, especially when linked with work that
deepens concern for others who suffer or
feel hopeless.
To the extent that all the opportunities
of Lent are used to consider what union
with Christ and with each other implies,
then this special season can play a very
important role in parish life.
It is a time when people focus on their
personal Christian lives. It is also a time,
many parishes have discovered, when a lot of
people want to reflect together on the
Christian life.
AN IMPORTANT PART of the ministry of the parish
is to indicate the sacred quality of time. Lent is one way of
doing this. Parishes are finding new ways of marking this
time to include all the lenten days from Ash Wednesday to
Easter Sunday. (NC Photo)
Are You A Creative Person?
WHO IS A CREATIVE PERSON?
In the liturgy for the Easter Vigil we
hear a message about creation, a
message prepared for in Lent. Just as
the light passed through the church
ends up illuminating the whole church
during the Easter Vigil, so Christians
act creatively when then they
communicate life to each other. (NC
Photo by David Strickler).
BY DAVID GIBSON
Poets are creative people. So are novelists
and film makers. Most people agree that a
list of creative kinds of people should
include music composers, ballet dancers and
artists whose paintings adorn the walls of
fine art galleries.
But is that it?
Well, no. Stretched a bit, most people
agree that they know a creative teacher.
They know creative cooks, much admired by
people who like to eat; creative office
workers who discover ways to turn things
around in a company; creative farmers who
manage to make the earth produce well
under trying economic circumstances.
So the list grows. Perhaps there are more
kinds of creative people than you think.
But, I ask: Why is someone said to be
creative?
The question is not new. Books have been
written on the topic. Creativity is hard to
define. What’s more, probably no creative
person possesses all the possible qualities of
creativity.
It is tempting to think that:
1. Creative people simply have lots of
imagination.
2. Creativity is a special power. Either
you have it or you don’t.
3. Creative people make beautiful, but
unnecessary, things.
4. Creative people always work alone.
5. Creative people get struck, as if by
lightening, with wonderful new ideas that
always appear out of the blue!
Whatever truth is found in the points just
listed, it does seem that each oversimplifies a
complex process: the creative process.
Moreover, the statements make creativity
the property of only very select people.
At the time I write this article, an exhibit
in the National Gallery of Art on the U.S.
capital’s Constitution Avenue, tells the story
of a painting by the famed artist, Picasso.
The canvas on which the painting appears
has been studied by means of X-rays.
The painting, widely regarded as a
masterpiece, is titled “Les Saltimbanques.”
Researchers have found that, underneath
this painting, lies a separate work done by
The Meaning Of Freedom
BY FATHER JOHN J. CASTELOT
There were always people in St. Paul’s
communities who questioned his authority
as an apostle when they disagreed with him.
Some Corinthians argued that, since he
didn’t exercise the rights of an apostle, he
must not be an authentic apostle.
In Chapter 9 of First Corinthians Paul
shatters this specious reasoning by answering
two pointed questions: “Am I not free? Am
I not an apostle?” He takes up these
questions in inverse order, demonstrating
first that he is indeed an apostle.
Paul then takes up the second question:
Am I not free? He says, “Although I am not
bound to anyone, I made myself the slave of
all so as to win over as many as possible.”
Only one who did not feel shackled by
restraints or laws could have exercised the
flexibility which characterized his ministry.
If he followed Jewish customs when
preaching in a Jewish community, it was not
because he felt bound by those customs.
Instead, he subjected himself to these
restraints simply in order to establish some
sort of rapport. It would have been
impossible for him even to get his foot in the
door if he, a known Jew, had offended
Jewish sensibilities by acting contrary to
their cherished lifestyle.
In no way did he abrogate his freedom, as
he is quick to point out in the parenthetical
remark inserted into this sentence: “To
those bound by the law I became like one
who is bound (although in fact I am not
bound by it), that I might win those bound
by the law.”
When he approached gentiles, “those not
subject to the law,” he lived according to
their customs as far as possible, and from the
same motives: to establish rapport with
them and to accept them as persons.
In all of this he was following the lead of
Jesus, who associated freely with Jews and
gentiles, with saints and sinners, with men
and women. Both Paul and Jesus took
people where they were and as they were --
and won their hearts.
The mention of those not subject to the
law seems to have reminded Paul of a
problem he treated earlier: the attitude of
the “strong,” who fancied themselves free of
all constraint whatever, even the constraint
of love and considerateness for others. This
may be why he mentions at this point his
own attitude to the “weak,” Christians of
rather delicate conscience:
“To the weak I became a weak person
with a view to winning the weak.” It is not
only prospective converts who have to be
“won;” Christians too, have to be won over
to even greater progress in the Christian life.
Paul is free enough to be flexible, to
identify with all sorts of people. He is not
locked into a rigid position where it is
impossible to bend. “I have made myself all
things to all men in order to save at least
some of them.”
Finally, Paul reminds those Corinthians
who think they are perfect, so ‘spiritual’ that
they consider what they do with their bodies
totally irrelevant, that life is a race which is
not over until one crosses the finish line.
If one doesn’t stay in shape, failure is
always possible: “I do not run like a man
who loses sight of the finish line. I do not
fight as if I were shadowboxing. What I do is
discipline my own body and master it, for
fear that after having preached to others I
myself should be rejected.”
Picasso in the process of working out the
themes of his final creation. The X-rays
show a very different painting under the
finished product.
Did the idea for this work by Picasso
spring out of the blue like a bolt of
lightening? Not in finished form. And he
would have loads of company in this kind of
process. Writers, like the late Flannery
O’Connor, have told how hard they worked
to produce anything worthwhile. Along with
In a sense, the season of Lent focuses the
attention of Christians on the need for
creativity in this world. The early Christians
often called Easter the Eighth Day - the day
of the new creation. Lent and Easter are
times when people say: It is possible to act
creatively by imitating Christ’s actions, and
continuing the work of the new creation.
There are plenty of places for Christians to
apply creative impulses: to personal
situations and family problems, for example.
KNOW
YOUR FAITH
(All Articles on This Page Copyrighted 1981 By N.C. News Service)
V J
the gift of imagination, it seems creative
peoople need a gift for hard work. And -
- Creative people seem to have a certain
kind of faith. They believe it is possible for
new things to be accomplished.
-- Courage also seems needed for
creativity -- the courage to do something
with insights, vision or intuition.
-- Then, creative people seem to see in
special ways, from fresh perspectives.
Perhaps this is because they look very
carefully at people, at the things of the
world or at complex situations.
- Again, creative people may benefit
from the power of hearing well what people
say and what people mean. But perhaps they
make a point of listening carefully.
It should be possible to gain
understanding of creativity by looking into
the book of Genesis, where the story of
God’s creation of the world is told. Some
scholars say that when the ancient Israelites
heard the story of God’s creative activity,
they understood it differently than we
sometimes do today.
The Israelites understood that the God of
creation was their own very faithful God.
They understood God’s creativity as the
work of the God of love - an action of love.
Belief, courage, careful looking and
listening, hard work and love. How often do
those qualities appear on lists of the qualities
of creative people?
Discussion Points And Questions
1. Why does Father Philip Mumion say that the rhythms of time are
important in the church? Why is Lent a special time for Christians?
2. Father Mumion says that for a time it became unpopular to talk
about giving something up for Lent. But the practice of giving
something up can be valuable. Why? And, do you agree?
3. Discuss two ways Father Mumion says parishes are celebrating
Lent.
4. David Gibson has some very definite ideas on who is a creative
person. But he also seems to think more of us can be creative than is
generally believed. What are some qualities of creativity, according to
Gibson?
5. Gibson asks if you are a creative person. Using his qualifications,
answer the question and give your reasons. Are there, for example,
ways to apply one’s creativity to difficult family situations or to
personal problems?
6. According to Father John Castelot, St. Paul considered himself
free of Jewish customs because he was a follower of Christ. Why then
does Paul say he takes on the customs of the Jews?
7. In Father Castelot’s article, why does Paul talk about the need to
discipline his own body?
8. Think about this week’s KYF articles for a few moments. Then
think about what Lent means to you. In past years, have you been
satisfied with the way you prepared for Easter during Lent? What can
you do this year to make this special season more valuable? Can
creativity be brought into your life during Lent?