Day to day mystery

Father Tim

This reflection begins in a humdrum manner but try and stick it out. On Tuesdays the clergy have their weekly meeting to discuss various Cathedral items such as Holy Week prep, annual leave and pancake parties. This week we met online instead of person because two of the team, myself and the Canon Missioner, had to be at home because we both had plumbers calling at unspecified times. My plumber arrived and I showed him the issue with my shower, I went back to work, he fixed it without much more input from me, I signed off that it seemed to be working, and now I can use my shower again without thinking much more about it. This information doesn’t really require much from you, in fact you may be a little bored, as at first suggested. But here comes a bit of typical priestly maneuvering into theological territory. It just so happened that as the plumber was doing his work, I was reading Sam Wells for prep work on the dissertation I am undertaking this year, and the subject of plumbing came up.

It is related to the divine working of salvation. That Jesus is not like a plumber who arrives to do a job, to come and fix us, so that we can get on with our lives without much involvement, and we can get on with humdrum activities of life knowing we can get into heaven. There was certainly work to be done by Jesus, that we could not do ourselves, but salvation activity is not a box ticked on a divine worksheet but what Wells describes as a mystery entered, Jesus finds a way for to overcome our isolation from God and each other. We enter into the day to day mystery of a relationship with the divine. It’s not a mere job done and then we don’t need to think about it anymore.

A day to day entering into the mystery of relationship with the divine should transform our day to day reality. A normal Tuesday may contain come fairly routine activities but they are done with the reality that Christ is lovingly with you and seeks to deepen the mystery of that liberating relationship that helps us flourish not merely get through the day to day.

With prayers and blessings,
Father Tim