Today, with our Celtic Pilgrimage we have words with a few tangents of consideration related in the way of conrete side stories. One is a story told me by this compassionate man who contributes our "Anam Chara" reflections He is currently an important teacher for us in our RCWP Canada West and one with us in our Cloud of Witnesses initiative for you.
A former Oblate, he served in the far northern regions of British Columbia, in icy outposts
you could say and, if you examine your map of Canada, you should look for Fort St. James and Fort McMurray but I know that he was in further isolated places, "far from bishops" he has been known to repeat.. When he says that, he means that he had to invent and to do what was best in the situations with the People of God, mostly aboriginals. I atttribute his free spirit and forward looking vision of today as having first arisen from the way he engaged with people who especially required respect and adaptation to their cultures. He was that kind of pastor and it took him far ahead of his times and the times elsewhere even though to all appearances, certainly in urban areas, all would have seemed backwards.
He was just off in "the mssions" others might say. When we think of it, here in BC , just about everywhere except Vancouver and Victoria is still "the missions" in many respects because of distances, scattered resources, rural populations, but this does not mean backwardness in thought and practice, necessarily. Certainly less so in today's advancing technologically globally networked world.
I asked him what Sacrament of Penance was like for him prior to Vatican 2 and then how he experienced the shifts and changes and how he now understands Sacrament of Reconciliation?
"I sat on a sled in a snowbank," he replied. regarding the first part of my question. Then he told the story about how he sat there with his back to the building that was the Church. No pews. Nothing in it really and the people sat on the floor on cedar branches.
The people were very sensitive about respectful approach but they were not secretive. They liked to speak face to face so there was nothing about being in a shut box confessional that they would have appreciated or accepted.
So there Chris waited, in the snowbank, for the penitents to approach one by one without being seen but then they would come in front of him and they would have their conversastion of the Sacrament of Penance,
face to face.
I found this an incredible story that told me about the compassionate heart of this priest and his understanding of the necessity of respecting and honoring, of validating his congregants personally within their cultural context.I He also told me of the tenacity of the aboriginal people in expressing their needs and expecting that they would be honored.
As we know, often they were not, but that is not this story.
In other stories he tells, Chris describes his rush and dash in travel much as in the Acts of the Apostles. He traveled by boat or unlke Paul ,by plane as he moved amongst mission bases. His journeys were no less dangerous.--just in case we think St. Paul's acts in his time were only for the early Christian communities..
Today Chris says, just say I am Chris Diamond from Cobble Hill.. But signifigantly for our purposes he is Irish to the core .Now he lives in a sizeable home pressed against a mountain high enough to be eye level with the eagles of our Vancouver Island. Right now it is mating season and the eaglet eggs should be hatching around April 22nd. Chris and his spouse Naomi would see all fo this seasonal activity of nature. Across most of the front of their home they have panel windows stretched high and wide.
They are blessed by the eagles' flights right in front of them or from nearby, daily. and in all seasons..
What I am tellling you is signifigant for another reason. We are in the greening season as we have noted regarding Hidelgard of Bingen and Brigit of Kildaire and now Rose Mewhort recently completed a painting of the eagles in their nesting with their nestlings and we will be sending it to you soon as a jpeg.
Here is what Chris wrote me for Anam Cara (Chara) as I requested whether he would share his understanding with some reference to the recently deceased and well known and loved Irish priest John O'Donohue.
Chris writes:
The Anam chara has a long history, so long, in fact, that it has given rise to mystical,
mythical. romantic, and I'm sure spurious explanations of its origins. Literally,
it means Soul Friend and it indicates the
interconnectedness of life that played a major
role in the old pre-christian and christian Gaelic outlook on life. Today it is used by members of serious spiritual associations and by quacks as well; its use received a great impetus from Joh O'Donohue's book by that name.
(People often do no notice the dot over the C in the title indicated in modern spelling buy the 'h' after the C which softens the pronunciation
from the hard 'k' to the throaty 'ch' sound).
O'Donohue rightly explains "The Celtic mind was not burdened by dualism It did not separate what belongs together. The Celtic
imagination articulates the inner friendship that embraces Nature, diviniity, the underworld, and human world as one. The dualism that separates the visible from the invisible, time from eternity, the human from the divine, was totally foreign to them.
Their sense of ontological friendship yielded
a world of experience imbued with a rich texture of otherness, ambivalence, symbolism, and imagination. For our sore and tormented separation, the possibility of this imagination and unifying friendship is the
Celtic gift...(which finds its inspiration in the sublime notion of the anam c(h)ara."
A soul friend inspires creative love in the other and acknowledges the innate dignity of each person. There is no shame in its honour system; imagination and mystgery are other ways of knowing the previously unknown:
"Your forgotten or neglected inner wealth begins to reveal itself. You comne home to yourself and learn to rest within...(and ) bring
out the mystery of the inner landscape...Time is eternity living dangerously."
O'Donohue quotes from "The Bright Field" by Welsh poet R.S.Thomas" "Life is not hurrying/on to a receding future nor hankering after/an imagined past. It is the turning/aside like Moses to the miracle/ of the lit bush."
"Friendship is the naure of God. The christian conept of Gld as Trinnity is the most usblime articulateion of otherness and intimacy, an eternal interflow of freindship. Jesus is the secret anam chara of everuy indivicual."
With your anam chara you will go beyond religious experiences to the divinity of firiendship. to the koinonia that Paul and John speak of in their understanding of God, Jesus , and all of us,
together.
Prayer:
Today I ask our Godde that in RCWP international, we recognize each other for the valildity of our deep anam chara relationship with Jesus
Spirit Holy Wisdom Sophia your who infill us within the Divine in the Universe Divine in the universe bring us more deeply into the soul space of anam chara. Gift us with such blessings of soul mate friendship with each other as we build our community and prepare futher for how we will emerge with our communities we astor and serve.
Spirit Holy, light our imaginations and our trust of symbolism anew while integrating the gifts of our minds and our knowledge with our hearts.
We ask this in the name of our Loving Mother and Father God, of Jesus our Brother, and of
Holy Spirit Wisdom Sophia.
RCWP-Canada
Chris Diamond of Cobble Hill
Michele Birch-Conery of Parksville
Rose Mewhort of Galiano Island
and the Eagles of the West Coast
who know no borders
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