In May 2014, igNation launched a series exploring the Jesuit identity as it is expressed in works of fiction: "Keyword: Jesuit, Genre: Fiction". This was followed by the series "Keyword: Jesuit, Genre: Biography". In these two series we hear what others think about what it means to be a Jesuit – in fiction and in biography.
This new series – “Keyword: Jesuit, Genre: Autobiography” – will explore what it means to be a Jesuit today – as told in their own words by Canadian Jesuits. The articles – written for igNation –are as different in expression and format as the men who wrote them.
Today's posting is by Greg Kennedy, SJ
Who gets ordained these days? Especially in that creaky, old building called the Catholic Church? Well, this year, May 24, I did.
In prospect the event looked dim on my horizon. “Now you’ll be part of the problem”, laughed a Jesuit priest, slapping me on the back a week before the occasion. Up until the morning of the ordination his jibe perfectly described my discomfort
The crisis for me was not one of vocation, but rather location. My call to serve the people of God sounded clear enough to my ears. The thought of entering the institutional hierarchy, however, triggered my fear of heights. Many folk, particularly of the female majority, feel looked down upon by a male-only Roman clergy. I wanted nothing—real or imagined—that would somehow elevate my vantage point. As a common churchgoer I could continue to shake my head over Vatican shenanigans. As a church leader, on the payroll, as it were, my ‘bystanding’ would suddenly become guilty. All my pretence of innocence born of distance would vanish. I was becoming a paid representative of a company with some policies I couldn’t help but reprehend.
So my guts were grumbling even as I plodded to Our Lady of Lourdes Parish the brilliant morning I was to be made a deacon. My superior, the man who would attest to my moral worthiness before the bishop, walked with me. He kept reiterating how important good public ceremony is for the cohesion of community. In such cases effort and expense should not be spared. Already the upcoming pomp had my eyes rolling behind their sunglasses. My inner space was not quite yet a Gethsemane. My prayer wasn’t so anguished as to plead: “Take this cup away from me.” But the words: “God, let’s get this over with quickly” did cross my heart often. The sooner it was done with, the sooner I hoped to slip back into my innocuous corner of the Church.
My hurry nearly botched the carefully blocked choreography. Halfway through the litany, as what felt like three battalions of saints marched across the backs of us four prostrate ordinands, I nearly jumped up and dropped the curtain on this show of theatric humility. Joe, face down beside me, must have seen my twitching for he ordered in whispers that I stick to the floor. I obeyed, not without unspoken commentary. Then it happened.
Perhaps my ears, bored of my internal complaints sought entertainment in the melodic stream cascading from the choir loft. Maybe the horizontal position induced a soporific state that disarmed my defenses. Whatever it was, before I again took to my feet an indisputable sense had entered me that the performance going on all around was not in fact a mere spectacle. It was a sacrament. The few hundred people gathered, the vibrant flowers, the polished music, the care and heightened solemnity of the event were all collaborating in a unique act of creation. This was a kind of real time revelation in which an invisible God was briefly making a cameo appearance.
That’s what cracked my smile. Suddenly I felt that we all—everyone assembled—were part of something so much more than the manufacturing of clerics. We with God were in the midst of creating Church. The ordination was merely occasion for this grander, holier performance of creation.
Any remnants of reluctance dissolved as I administered the cup at communion. A second, unsung litany of saints lined up before me. With tenderness we each exchanged looks then faith: “Blood of Christ”…”Amen”. Many of these saints were persons dear to me, many with the same reservations about the institutional hierarchy as mine. Yet they had come together as Church to affirm my entrance. Moreover, this affirmation was not grudging; it was joyful. The old, troublesome issues suddenly seemed incidental. If these living saints saw past them, then surely so must I.
What a lovely litany it was! What a soft, silver cloud of witnesses! People from all laneways of my life, Catholic and otherwise, come together, claiming Church for themselves. The litany ended in a brief note of fear that quickly resolved in a sustained chord of gratitude.
The rest of the day was banquet. God was thick all around and fully palpable in the persons my two young nieces who guilelessly charmed everyone with their infinite curiosity and joy. At night, after the crowds had cleared, I couldn’t sleep for the weight of love pressing hard on my chest.
So who gets ordained these days? I did. And to my astonishment I felt for the first time that day the essence of sacrament. The Archbishop laid hands on me, but not he alone. The entire holy, catholic and unlimited church did so as well. Thus was I touched by the Body of Christ.
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All photographs were taken by Moussa Faddoul, Fotoreflection.
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