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Some Past Reflections

As I journey through my seventh decade, I can and do give thanks to God for the double blessings of health and spiritual wealth, that He has graciously bestowed upon me.

So I feel the task of a personal testimonial, must be brief.

Are you aware that in Matthew 12:36, in fact the twelfth New Testament prophecy in this first Gospel, every idle word either said in anger or jest, will be accountable on the Day of Judgment.

So I have to ask myself what about every superfluous sentence and word that every author moulds and tries to fashion into literary darts for his reader's approval? Will this count as well on that fateful day, yet to come to each of us.

With this thought in mind, I suggest that the saying 'brief is best' should apply and remembering the sower in Matt.13:39, when his seeds where thrown, fell mainly on to unprepared ground. My words I hope will not share such a fate, at least I hope not.

For fourteen years, I was the Co-ordinator for the Justice and Peace in the Deanery, Vice Chairman of the Deanery Pastoral Council, occasional speaker for the presentation of Papal Encyclicals, regular mass reader, was commissioned by the diocese to author a book about my church, a member of the liturgy committee and was also part of the "Churches Together," which involved ecumenism and inter-faith.

(My old parish priest, during my book launch)

I should also say, that my family can boast of having priests in the Catholic church, with one being a canon, going back generations.

(Canon John's original ordination card)

Yet, today I am ashamed to think that in all of those years when I performed numerous charitable works, attended mass seven days a week, observed and promoted the teachings of the Catholic church, I never knew Jesus personally.

Had I died, I would have perished forever. Only when I repented and trusted in Him alone as my Lord and Saviour, was I truly and eternally saved!

(Once a family friend, now deceased priest)

How sad and tragic. Jesus just didn't enter into my limited equation. After all, the rich fabric of the church calendar sustained me, or so I thought.

Jesus, the Saviour of the World, just didn't get a look in or a mention into my little isolated world.

I had never really considered just who Jesus is or why He had to die for my sins. I was cocooned in a church that was very much a surrogate Christ.

(Remembering the Christian Conscientious Objector, Charles John Cobb)

After all I was privileged. I could feast from the full Catholic menu of rubrics, the liturgy, the vestments and the sense of the theatre that could well be a fine choreographed passion play.

I remember the funeral of cardinal Basil Hume, as I sat in a packed cathedral and watched the assorted dignities led by the Prime Minister and his wife. It all seemed so surreal, as they passed by his illuminated coffin placed before the high altar, with his cardinals biretta placed upon its oak lid. With the bright klieg lights and television cameras recording everything for live transmission the next morning, it could have been a state funeral, rather than the demise of a deceased church dignity. And if that menu offered Jesus for starters, thank you, but no thank you. It simply wasn't appetising enough for me to taste, or so I thought.

(Previous friend of the family)

Strangely enough by the mid 1990s I was beginning to slowly question the whole religious structure of all organized religions. It seemed to me that as a practicing Catholic, we in the church were pretty smug as we performed our devotional duties, yet in the town where I lived and worshipped, the thousands who passed by the church each day had no idea who Christ was or what His relevance was to their lives.

Sadly we didn't seem to think it was our sacred duty to tell any of them about the message of redemption. Ours was a safe religion and we at most times kept it to ourselves. It was a private matter never to be shared with any outsiders. But hadn't Christ urged His followers to go out and proclaim the good news to all?

The problem is of course, how do you start to promote religion? That is very different from the promise that Christ offers in John 14:6: "No man cometh unto the Father, but by me."

(Giving a talk at an ecumenical meeting)

You cannot promote any religion or proclaim any self-styled holy man or woman. They cannot save you and that has to include:

The Pope

The Virgin Mary

Your favourite saint
Vishnu
Buddha
Muhammad
Kali

Sitting Bull
The latest, fashionable guru
Or any satanic icon

You must turn away voluntarily from all organized religion, for if men have placed their soiled hands upon then it, then it is flawed.

(Preparing to serve mass in 1964)

And will not all deeds and words one day be revealed at the Great White Throne Judgment (Matt. 10:26.) None of us must be implicated in a false system that will ultimately fail us, neither can we defend it. Nor should we wish to do so.

(Berlin, Germany: sharing Jesus with this man)

Organized religion, I am afraid, carries its own heavy sackcloth of emotional baggage and particular failings, sometimes to an extreme degree. I neither need it, nor seek it. One of my own dear family members, who in the past had practiced with deep conscientiousness, all the articles of his Roman Catholic faith, for almost half a century, yet approached the final days of his life in fear of what awaited him.
This would result in him asking complete strangers in the hospital, "There must be a life here after? Mustn't there?" He desperately needed the comfort or a kind reassuring word from a total stranger.
Did he find it? I don't know. Religion, it seemed, had so assiduously failed him in his faltering hour of need. How tragic and how sad for him and his family. Later on, the gloomy prospects of purgatory and all of that cruel religious uncertainty would be debated with me by his dear wife, did I think he was still there? He must be out of there by now, don't you think? And how inadequate I was then, in offering a comforting reply to her.
How I wish I could witness to both of them now, knowing what I do. That simply, you have to get out of religion and into a personal Biblical relationship with the Lord. And that can only be an assenting association with the One who can and does promise to save you for eternity, the Lord Jesus Christ.

(Open-air street preaching)

Some years ago, I fulfilled a long held pipe dream to visit Israel. It wasn't so much a pilgrimage, more a journey of devotion. I wanted to follow in the footsteps of the Master and of course the apostles. My son James accompanied me to this very special land.

We stood in awe, when we reached those historical and spiritual locations such as Nazareth, Galilee, Capernaum, Samaria and the atmospheric Sea of Galilee, where Jesus performed so many of His most personal miracles.

(James and I in the footsteps of the Master)

It remains an enchanting rural setting that will forever be etched in my memory. Not least because of our baptism in that holy area. On that journey, James and I met a sister from Sweden by the name of Margarita. I had the privilege of baptising her in the very warm waters of that peaceful location. If she should ever read this, please contact me. You are very much in both of our thoughts.

Later that day both James and myself baptised one another in the River Jordan.

(Our friend from Sweden)

Whilst on that journey, we visited the endless plains of Armageddon. Here God's future hand of judgment will be witnessed in the Bibles final days. We did not, however, get to Jerusalem. Well not on that trip, but someday I hope to join many of the saints, who with the King of kings will reign for a thousand years in that eternal city.

What an adventure, what a privilege. And remember it is an opportunity that is offered to all who accept this free gift from the Lord.