Nuala O’Loan
A woman holds a rosary at Ballyloughane
beach in Co. Galway on October 11 during
a nationwide Rosary Coast to Coast.
Photo: Clodagh Kilcoyne/Reuters The View
As a people we had come to take our way of life with all its freedoms for granted – the right to freedom of speech, of thought, of conscience, of privacy, of family life, the right of freedom of assembly…so many rights. For many of us they just were our rights and we exercised them at will, reminded, on occasion of our need to exercise them with responsibility.
As we planned Christmas last year we could not have anticipated how things would change – change utterly. We gathered in huge numbers for Midnight Mass, there were carols, nativity plays, endless shopping and lots of socialising and fun. This year is going to be so very different. Here in the North virtually everything will close on November 27 until December 11 – just two weeks before Christmas. It is all so very strange.
To be a person of faith is to know that we must take up our crosses and follow Jesus Christ”
Governments across the world are moving to impose more and more authoritarian regimes on their peoples. Who would have believed that we could be required to stay in our houses as much as possible, not to visit our elderly family members or our children who live elsewhere? Who could have expected that we would be unable to go for a coffee, or a drink or to enjoy the company of our friends? Who would have believed that shops and the hospitality trade would be closed down to such an extent that many are now closing permanently? Who could have believed that we would be forbidden to gather in Church to worship, forbidden even to sing? All this we have accepted ‘to protect the health service, and the elderly and vulnerable.’
In conjunction with this we have seen the rise of the ‘woke’ – those who use the power of social media to proclaim what is acceptable and what is not, what can be spoken and what cannot, what can be thought and what is inadmissible. Let me give you an example of this. Black lives matter. Of course they do. Every life matters. Is it right to take to the streets to proclaim one’s views? Yes, so long as one does it lawfully. Can we condemn those who take to the streets to proclaim that black lives matter and who, to make their point, destroy, burn and loot. Yes, we can. Yet the person who does so is at risk of being called racist. Those who do not subscribe to current understanding and have beliefs on fundamental matters such as the right to life are regarded as naive, old fashioned, not capable understanding the modern world! There is a perception among many that views such as that abortion is killing an unborn baby in the womb and is wrong. We now live in a world in which abortions are carried out for reasons including eugenics and gender selection. Our arguments are no longer listened to with respect and thoughtfulness in much of the public sphere.
Restricted rights
Yet it is in this world of restricted rights that we live. One of the questions I keep asking myself is ‘How have we got to this place?’ We were a people whose human rights were hard won. We were a people whose understanding of rights and freedoms derived from our experiences of what happens when freedoms are denied, and from our shared belief in God and in the teachings of the Gospels; that you should “love one another as I have loved you”.
It is fundamentally and profoundly important that we do not lose sight of what is happening, and that we do not accept that which is not true. That we accept necessary restrictions in that spirit of love which says that we will limit ourselves in what we do for the greater good – the common good; but we reject that which is untrue and destructive in a peaceful and constructive manner, seeking always to do what is right, not what is fashionable and, perhaps, easy.
He will never leave us to face our evils alone”
To be a person of faith is to know that we must take up our crosses and follow Jesus Christ. Those crosses can seem unbearably heavy – those who have lost loved ones to Covid-19, not even able to sit with them and to hold their hands at the end; those whose treatment for cancer and other life threatening conditions has been withheld because of the coronavirus; those who are endlessly lonely and isolated by pandemic restrictions, those who employment and livelihood is threatened carry such a very hard burden, yet, we have to remember that in all this suffering, loneliness and isolation God is there with us, even when we do not know it. He will never leave us to face our evils alone. He told us that he is with us always, even until the end of the world.
It can be hard to hold on at times like this. When we are not permitted to gather together in prayer, when we do not have the comfort of being able to sit before the red lamp knowing that we are in the house of God and in the presence of the Lord. When we are patronised and worse, because we believe that we are children of God, we can come to wonder what is happening to us and our Church.
Yet there is consolation even in the cross, in knowing that Christ rose again, that the Church which he established has lasted since his terrible death. Eleven of his 12 apostles died for their faith as they sought to spread his teaching: Peter was crucified, Paul was beheaded, Andrew is said to have been crucified, Thomas to have been pierced to death by the spears of four soldiers, Philip put to death for converting the wife of a Roman pro-consul, Matthew killed, Bartholomew martyred, James stoned and clubbed to death, Simon the Zealot killed, Matthias burned to death. Only John, to whom Jesus commended the care of his mother, is thought to have died of old age.
Christians
Our days may be tough, but those days after Jesus began his ministry were truly very dark, yet despite the darkness, the savagery, the killing, and the ongoing persecution of Christians throughout the ages the Church has grown and become stronger. The people of God have walked in faith.
We should remember this, during these hard days. In the Book of Numbers we are told that the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:
“In this way you shall bless the sons of Israel. You are to say to them:
‘The Lord bless you, and keep you;
The Lord cause His face to shine on you,
And be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His face to you,
And give you peace.”
May the Lord bless us and keep us during these difficult days, and may we, through the grace we receive, stay strong and resolute that we will truly love one another as he has loved us. Then we will have true freedom.