AFFIRMATION OF PRIESTHOOD

I remember once promising a friend on holiday that I would water the plants in her apartment. I forgot. When I rushed around all was drought and disaster. In desperation I lashed water into the cracked soil in the various pots. In no time at all, to my amazement, you could see a difference. Within a few hours the sad, withered, dying plants had revived almost entirely. Their strength had come back and, while a little the worse for wear, their firm, glossy appearance was a wonder to behold. In the most ordinary of situations I had been ambushed by the raw, untamed miracle of life.

Revelation is never so complete as when it is found unexpectedly growing in the drab landscape of the everyday. Treasure, once found, transforms the significance of the even the stoniest little field in which it lay hidden. Some things give life. They lie like batteries, invisibly connected to everything else, waiting to be switched on. Words can do that. Those common or garden things can do wonders. They can give life.

You need to be affirmed. As a priest you need it at least as much as any of the parishioners you spend your time affirming. Maybe you need it more. You need to hear those words, those life-giving, life supporting words of strength and praise. That is an entirely natural and healthy appetite. So take and eat. Take what you need to live. The labourer is worthy of his hire. Never be ashamed of needing affirmation. Never regret needing, full stop. Needing is living. Dead things, genuinely dead things have no needs. They do not turn to God, blindly, like plants to the sun, stretched out to receive His warmth and light. “For Sheol cannot thank you, death cannot praise you”. They do not put roots endlessly down into the darkness to soak up His goodness. You need and the whole point of this website is to respond to that need. God reveals Himself in the everyday. He is here now in our reaching out to you. Turn to Him in the pages of this site as you repeat with Hopkins “Mine, oh thou Lord of Life, send my roots rain”.