Fr Jim's (old) Blog

This year's Social Justice Sunday statement Everybody's Business challenges the neo-liberal principles which we take for granted run our economy and businesses. Five long established tenets of Catholic Social Teaching were used to critique the way business and the economy are run: The dignity of the human person means that people are not just units of production The universal destination of goods means that everybody deserves a share Solidarity means that the powerful, wealthy and capable must stand for and with the weak and poor The preferential option for the poor means that the more must be included in decision making The common good means that all of society, not just shareholders must be taken into account Why? Pope Francis tweeted inequality is the root of social evil  Social researched Richard Wilkinson shows in his TED talk that the inequality caused by unchecked economic growth causes social inequality which is detrimental not just to the poor but to the

The National Church Life Survey which the parish completed in November 2016 showed some good news which we celebrated on the weekend on our Holy Cross Feast Day: we have improved significantly since the last survey five years ago, and are above the diocesan average on a range of measures.

The Ladder of Inference is an idea developed by Harvard professor Chris Argyris to show how we can often make inferences in the way we perceive other people and their actions towards us. With several steps on this ladder, there is plenty of room for error on our part if we assume that we always know what is right and that we are hearing other people correctly. A humble stance can allow us to acknowledge that perhaps discernment is needed. Two examples I used in a recent homily are below.

"What is your image of God?" is a question which is often asked on retreats. We know the "right" answer will say things like God is loving, kind, and forgiving. However, sometimes beneath the surface, there are other, unacknowledged images which we actually operate from, but which are different to our professed image. These operative images of God are important to uncover, acknowledge and deal with, for sometimes, especially if they are of a harsh, judgemental or controlling God, they can undermine our faith, our spirituality, and our sense of self. Noreen Wilkie Au develops this idea in her book God's Unconditional Love: Healing our Shame

Last weekend I preached on "White privilege" as part of exploring how Jesus moved beyond his own Jewish-only worldview to embrace the Canaanite / Syro-Phoenecian woman as an individual, a woman of faith, and worthy of his attention  (Matt 15:21-18). White privilege isn't meant to be a perjorative term. Rather, it is a humble acknowledgement by white / Anglo / Caucasian people that there are privileges which I am often unaware of in my culture. Or rather, there are obstacles which others have to overcome which I don't have to consider, which make life easier. Naming and owning my sense of privilege (which can also be male and heterosexual) helps me to become more compassionate to others who don't share this privilege. Author Peggy McIntosh who coined the phrase's article is here , including 50 signs of white privilege, some of which I used in the homily.

These are photos taken by our parishioner John Lovell of a rare halo cloud, perfectly poised above the church on August 16th.