This is a transcription of the workshop held in Rome on 1 June 2017 with this topic as part of the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal #ccrgoldenjubilee2017
 
The speakers were Cyril John and Denise Bergeron, with translations in English and French.
 
Cyril John lives in Delhi, India and is vice-president of the ICCRS Council. In 2012 he published a book called, 'Pray Lifting up Holy Hands: The Prayer of Intercession'.
 
Denise Bergeron lives in Canada and is part of the Centre De Prière L'Alliance which runs Intercession Training Courses.

This is the link for the video recording: https://youtu.be/ZK4134aUKCE
It is not a full recording; there are two gaps where content is missing.

(At the end of this blog-post is a 2 page PDF summary of this workshop, to enable it to be easily shared at prayer meetings.)
 
Cyril: This morning we are going to deal with a very exciting topic, that is Prophetic Intercession. This a prophetic sign of the times. Great things that the Lord is going to do in our midst. Great things that the Lord is going to do through the Jubilee Year. How many of you have heard about Prophetic Intercession before? Yes, some of you have heard about Prophetic Intercession, and some of you are going to hear for the very first time.
 
We have a very short time, but we will try to present this topic in a nutshell. And those of you who want to read more about this, you have a book on intercession that is in French as well as English.
 
So St Paul speaks about Intercession in a very powerful way, that is in 1 Tim 2:1-2. St Paul says, 'First of all, I ask that supplications, praise, petitions and thanksgivings be offered for everyone, and especially kings and those in authority'. St Paul says that it is the first and primary responsibility of every believer. Normally people think that intercession is meant for a very few people. Intercession is the responsibility of every baptised person. That is why St Paul says that it is the first priority in the life of a believer and St Paul says, 'intercede, pray for everyone' and pray especially for those in authority: those in authority in the Church, those in authority in our countries and those in authority in the renewal.
 
So, we are all called to be intercessors, and then the question is 'How do we intercede?' Some of us have been interceding for 20 years, 10 years. How do I intercede? Most of us, you know, have a notebook we write down the intentions that people tell us. We carry the notebook to our intercessory meeting and we lift up these intentions, and we have been doing this for the past many years. What I am trying to tell you today is just like we go to school in the nursery class, then Class 1 and Class 2, so we need to grow, we need to grow in our ministry of intercession. So it is good that we begin writing down in the notebook presenting it to the Lord – but it is also important that we grow in our ministry and in prophetic intercession we try to rely on the Lord.
 
A prophetic intercessor is one who opens his ears, who opens his eyes to hear what the Lord is speaking. Consider that our interpreter is Jesus and that I am an intercessor. As an intercessor I place my ears close to the heart of Jesus (visual demonstration). What am I trying to hear? The heart-beat of Jesus. What I am trying to tell you is that every moment Jesus has a burden to share with us. As intercessors we should train our ears, we should train our eyes to hear what Jesus wants to tell us and to see what Jesus wants to show us, because Jesus is The Intercessor and Jesus carries a lot of burden for the world and the church.
 
Now, Ezekiel 22:30, it says, 'Thus I have searched among them for someone who could build a wall or stand in the breach before Me to keep Me from destroying the land, and I found no one.' Ezekiel 22 speaks about the sins of Jerusalem. The Lord was going to destroy Jerusalem. And the Lord is saying, 'I have searched for someone who would build a wall or who could stand in the breach'. What is the wall? The wall is built to protect. So the Lord is looking for one person, to stand in the breach. Standing in the breach is where there is a strain or break in the relationship. The Lord is looking for someone to stand in the breach and intercede between the people and God. So every time there is a situation, the Lord is looking for intercessors.
 
You and I will be able to hear this call from the Lord and see this call with our eyes, if we become prophetic intercessors; intercessors who are willing to keep our ear and eye to the Lord. Now the Lord says, 'I have searched for someone', one person and one person can save the whole of Jerusalem.
 
Now in the first book of the bible, in Genesis, father Abraham has a prophetic role that way in chapter 18 which says, 'The Lord says to Himself (Gen 18:17) shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?' The Lord was going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah and the Lord is thinking to Himself, 'Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do to the people of Sodom and Gomorrah?' And the Lord speaks to Abraham, and Abraham intercedes. Alleluia. That is prophetic intercession. That is prophetic intercession.
 
So whenever something is going to happen, the Lord searches for people in our midst who are willing to build a wall or to stand in the breach. Amen. Shall we say Amen? Amen!
 
Do you recite the Divine Mercy chaplet? Yes or No? Yes. Sr Faustina started this. But what is important is the circumstances, the situation when this was started. Sr Faustina was praying in her cell, then she had a vision. The vision was an angel of destruction going to destroy a particular nation. Sr Faustina started praying, and nothing was happening. And Sr started praying more and says she was lifted up to heaven and she was standing before the Trinity and she was inspired and given a new prayer. She started praying and she says the angel of destruction started withdrawing from the process of destruction and the nation was saved. This is prophetic intercession.
 
So from time to time the Lord is searching for people, the Lord is looking for intercessory groups. And I remember once in Delhi the city that I live, we were praying in a group and the Lord showed us a cyclone and we started praying for the cyclone. Again next week, again the Lord showed us the cyclone coming towards coastal India. After 8 days it was announced in the news that there is going to be a powerful cyclone. So the Lord revealed to us 8 days before about the cyclone, so we all prayed and the cyclone was coming at a speed of 125 km/hr. So the speed of the cyclone was reduced to 80 km/hr and then reduced to 8 km/hr and finally the report said the cyclone went back to the sea and the commentator said it is stationed there. The commentator said, 'this is a unique phenomenon'. Amen.
 
(break in content)
 
He asked the woman, 'Did you ever think of committing suicide?' She said, 'Yes, 16 years ago I attempted suicide'. So the Lord is looking for prophetic intercessors.
 
What is needed from our side? That we need to be listening to the promptings of the Holy Spirit. We need to keep our eyes open. We need to keep our ears open. Romans 8:26-27 It says 'in the same way the Spirit comes to the aid of our weakness for we do not know how to pray as we ought'. So in prophetic intercession we rely on the Holy Spirit, for we do not know how to pray. There are many things not known to us when we pray for a situation. So when we rely on the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit reveals many hidden things and we are able to intercede powerfully and we are able to intercede strategically – with a strategy.
 
Few minutes. Stand up. We are going to have a very short workshop. Turn to your companion, 2 people each, two by two. Turn to each other. We are going to pray. Now listen. You are going to pray for a companion. You are going to ask the Lord, 'Lord make this brother or sister a prophetic intercessor, a prophetic intercessor'. And after you pray over, you are going to bless both the eyes with the Sign of the Cross and bless both the ears with the Sign of the Cross. Because you are going to ask the Lord to open the eyes to see what He wants us to see, open the ears to hear what the Lord wants us to hear. Because only when we have the eyes and the ears open to the Lord we can be prophetic intercessors. So just lay your hands and pray, and both of you at the same time and bless the eyes and the ears. So we begin.
 
(break in content)
 
Denise: Lord we thank You because You speak powerfully to us today. Some brothers and sisters among us feel maybe like they are choking and aren't able to let this fire rise up through their hearts. I invite you to abandon yourselves into God's hands. I invite you to place your faith in Him who is the source of life, and if your heart is choking up raise your hands to God, raise your arms to God and wait, wait in faith, don't hold back on what is holding you a prisoner but raise your hands to the Lord. He wants to free you today. Don't stay in darkness, but come to the light. Thank You, Lord Jesus, thank You. And I invite you now to bless the Lord and to thank Him. And I invite you now to a time of silence to receive God's word that I am now going to give you, which we can receive. God's word which is given to us today.

Matthew 10:1 and onwards. 'Having called His 12 disciples to Him, Jesus gave them authority over unclean spirits in order to be able to chase them away and to heal, to be able to heal all illness'.

That is God's calling to us today, because He always answers our prayer and that accomplishes and completes in a good way what we are doing. When the Lord is calling you He always gives you His Holy Spirit. May this word heard today come and act powerfully in our hearts so that more and more intercessors can agree to pray for their brothers and sisters.

And now Lord we want to thank You for all that You are going to do. We have offered You our lives, we have prayed for this fire to spread throughout the whole of the earth and now we want to thank You for the way in which You are going to do that and I want to end our prayer by entrusting all these intentions to the Virgin Mary. Mary intercedes for us powerfully because she is in deep communion with her Son.

Hail Mary…
Glory Be…
Alleluia.
 
…………………………………………………….
 
This talk takes on a whole new dimension of importance after hearing the prophetic word of Patti Mansfield towards the close of the Pentecost Vigil at the Circus Maximus in Rome 3 June 2017:
 
'Lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest and if you would obey Me and if you would obey the prompting of My Spirit you will yet see infinitely more than you can ask or imagine you will yet see power of my Spirit descend upon the human race. I tell you the fields are white for harvest but I need your obedience, I need your docility and I need your faith and you will yet see marvels that will astound you infinitely more than you can ask or imagine for the glory of My name.'
 
We cannot obey, unless we can see and hear what God is calling us to do.
..................................................................................
Below is the promised 2 x A4 page PDF edited summary of this talk:

Share it in your prayer groups, and pray for each other in the way that Cyril John invites.

Some of you may recall that I took the plunge last year and began an Instagram account so that I could follow our young people through their World Youth Day Krakow adventures. This was in addition to our family Facebook and Twitter accounts. Since then there has been the Proclaim 2016 conference, the Ignite Youth Conference, the Servants of Jesus annual Share the Holy Spirit conference, Disciples of Jesus Summer Schools of Evangelisation in various Australian locations the biannual Light to the Nations conference over the Easter Triduum and the big gathering in Rome for Pentecost and #ccrgoldenjubilee2017.
 
At the Proclaim 2016 conference at Chatswood in early September 2016 (#proclaim2016), there was a spread of social media savvy types in attendance who did a reasonable job collectively of live tweeting memorable parts of the conference content and using the hashtag to enable them to be easily found. The benefits being 1) that those who attended and tweeted have the possibility of connecting with each other post-conference 2) bite sized reminders of the conference content became available to read later on and get re-energised by, and 3) those who were unable to attend the conference were able to take part in it and follow it through the social media postings – thereby multiplying the numbers of those who heard those messages well beyond the number of people the auditorium could hold.
 
Go to any writers (#CYA2016 early July 2016) or business conference (#SCBWISyd) and they will do an even better job of utilizing the multiplication effect of social media. However, it does pay to have a unique hashtag that no one else is likely to use – otherwise it all gets buried under later events that use the same hashtag.
 
Hashtags are your great helper in sharing good content, and in allowing others to find it. However, to be effective the hashtag for each event needs to be unique. #aussiepilgrim was not unique for World Youth Day because lots of other non-WYD travelers abroad used it. #sse17pat was more successful as a hashtag than #sse17 because any three letter acronym can have multiple meanings, for example #ccr can refer to both the pop group Creedence Clearwater Revival and to the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. #sse can refer to the business event called the Sweets and Snacks Expo and not just Summer School of Evangelisation.

Hashtags are powerful because search engines can find them across all the major social media websites.
 
Find a hashtag for your event that is no more than 12 characters long, and make sure it is unique. Test the uniqueness by plugging your hashtag options into a search engine like Google.
 
Print that hashtag on all your printed matter for your event, and in an easy to find place on your event's website. Flash it up on the sight screens for your event 2 or 3 times a day.
 
I've been at play in the social media world for a while now: Xt3 since 2008; Blogging since late 2011; Facebook since the beginning of 2013; LinkedIn since 2014; Twitter since mid-2015 and Instagram since mid-2016. So I have seen the power of social media at work to disseminate information, and know that it can be used for great good. That's why I get so utterly frustrated when I see it being used poorly.
 
In the last 12 months I have been paying particular attention to how big evangelistic events in the Catholic world are reported on social media. The report card says, 'Can do much better' and the surprising thing is that it is our young people - and those who lead them – who are the worst at it. Only those in diocesan curia's tasked with capturing and sharing episcopal photo opportunities seem to have a clue, and writers who have (or who hope to have) religious books published.
 
For example the World Youth Day Krakow 2016 report card goes something like this: Lots of happy pilgrim photos, lots of photos of beautiful pilgrimage sites and extraordinary churches, plenty of photos of WYD events but….poor hashtag co-ordination and if you were following a young person's pilgrimage and hoping for a snippet of teaching from one of the catechesis sessions, from one of the pilgrimage homilies or one of the Pope's speeches you were doomed to disappointment.
 
It was similar when I tried to follow the Ignite Youth conference in Brisbane. A single mention of something Sr Hilda OSB said in a workshop was the sum total of actual teaching content shared.
 
DOJ Summer Schools of Evangelisation at Bathurst and Paterson, and the SOJ Share the Holy Spirit conference were no different. There were lots of photos of happy people, but nothing at all about the teaching given.
 
Light to the Nations is a biannual event over the Easter Triduum that attracted over 1000 people this year. Again there were lots of photos of happy people and live action Stations of the Cross and candle lit Easter Vigil, but as to the teaching given? The homily on Holy Thursday night mentioned something about keeping in tune with the beat of Jesus. That is all I was able to glean - and I searched and searched.
 
The big weekend held for the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal was sadly no exception. A few photographs, and enormous difficulty locating a hashtag that people were using for it. Like WYD Krakow it was a mishmash of hashtags, and no real content. Thankfully the talks were livestreamed and I was able to watch them afterwards. I wanted to go back and transcribe them, but they were taken offline and now you have to pay to get access to them https://something-like-real-pictures.myshopify.com/ The talks were truly excellent.
 
Many of my friends were lucky enough to go to Rome for Pentecost and the preceding 3 days of conferencing and workshops, preceded by a retreat in Assisi. Several of them have had social media presences for many years, but did I find anything in their posts about what they learned or what inspired them? Nooooo! Aargh!! The most that was posted was that such and such a talk was very good, or how our souls should be like the magnificent churches in Rome as dwelling places for Jesus. It wasn't only them either, it is a global problem. Thankfully many of those talks and workshops were recorded and are available online http://www.vocepiu.it/GoldenJubilee/ Thankfully Zenit Francais tweeted some of the content from the Pentecost Vigil and Google translate did its best, but sadly they were the only ones doing it. The recording given in the Pentecost Vigil link above didn't come with any English translation voiceovers.
 
What a lot of wasted effort!
A) Because for the want of a few extra words the impact of your social media posts could have been so much greater and B) Think of the time and effort that went into preparing the talk you heard. If it was good it deserved to be shared among a wider audience than just those who heard it at the venue.
 
What a lot of very easy opportunities to share the good news of Jesus with social networks missed!
 
We often say that a picture is worth a 1000 words. That's true if you are trying to describe a scene, but many pictures lack value unless they are put in context with a few explanatory words about Who, What, When, Where and especially Why.
 
There may have been better content posted, but I wasn't able to find it because a relevant hashtag wasn't attached to it.
 
Let's look at some biblical principles
 
1 Cor 11:23 For this is what I received from the Lord, and in turn passed on to you.
 
The privilege of being at these amazing events of faith is not for ourselves alone, we need to pass the good stuff on to others. Social media is a non-threatening way of doing just that.
 
And it is so easy to do!
 
Eph 3:29b-30a Let your words be for the improvement of others, as occasion offers, and do good to your listeners, otherwise you will only be grieving the Holy Spirit of God.
 
Add some words and a hashtag to your images, words that will help you reconnect with that moment later on and words that will help your readers and viewers connect with it too.

For example, an early morning photo of the campsite says something on its own about beauty. But if you added words like, 'I woke up tired after the long Holy Thursday night session last night, but this early morning sunshine lifted my spirits. I feel it's a gift of God to me. It is like He is preparing me for the day, just like last night He prepared His disciples for the unfathomable gift of the Eucharist by washing their feet #LTTN17' it becomes something much more.
 
For the love of God don't post, 'My friend XX gave a particularly anointed talk today' and then not share some of what your friend said. It only needs to be a sentence or two. For example Damian Stayne's talk in Rome was so good it needs to be shared widely. One of the things he said was, 'The charisms are not an optional extra like the sunroof on a car, they are essential, as essential as the steering wheel.' The former is frustrating to anyone who comes across it, the latter is something worth pondering on and may even intrigue people enough to watch the video recording.
 
1 Sam 3:19 Samuel grew up and the Lord God was with him and let no word of His fall to the ground.
 
Get into the practice of taking a photo at each session you attend – usually as it begins is best - then spend a minute or two when the session ends recalling the part of it that meant the most to you. Write it down. If you have time, post it then, otherwise post it later when you can. We forget so much of what happened in a session like that, even 24 hours later most of it has faded. If you capture even a sentence that spoke to you from each session, collectively they will help you discern what God's message was to you from the whole event.
 
Even better if you are the MC for an event, or the person giving the verbal thanks after a talk, or the person giving the talk, help people to do it. It isn't difficult. Just say, 'Before we go off to morning tea (or the next session) let us pause for a moment. If anything struck you from this talk, write it down now. A single sentence summary of what you heard God say to you though it would be ideal. Or a single sentence summary of what you think is worth remembering from it. Let's do that now….Good. Our speaker is happy for you to take a photograph. If you are on social media, share what you want to remember using the hashtag (and remind them what the hashtag for your event is).
 
Sharing even one of those thoughts on social media could help someone else enormously.
 
For an event, I'm likely to pick the best one-liner of the day and Tweet that when I get home. After each talk I'm likely to do a quick summary on Instagram. If it is very good, I will take the time to write out my notes in full and share them in a blog-post. Then if the content warrants it, the blog-post gets shared via Facebook and/or Twitter. Using the event hashtag on all of them, of course.
 
Do what works for you, but do something to share the good teaching you have received.
 
The days of people who believe in Jesus not being on social media need to be over. Realise that more and more people are thinking that if you can’t find something on the internet or on social media, then it didn't happen.
 
Facebook is the best social media site for connecting with people in your own locality. Parishes and youth groups, and those seeking to run Alpha courses and RCIA courses, you need to understand this and use it for good. It is possible, if you pay a small fee, to get posts targeted to postcodes.
 
Twitter is where the thinkers are. Twitter is where you can easily share links to good blog-posts or newspaper articles, and where you can find the good stuff too. There are a lot of good and holy people producing excellent content that doesn't get the readership it deserves because too few believers are online, reading and liking and retweeting.
 
If you want to be able to find a particularly good bit of content later on, for Facebook share it, and for Twitter re-tweet it. That content will then show up on your profile page for whichever social media site you used.
 
Instagram is where the youngsters are. If you want to connect with them, you need to be using it. Instagram is where the creatives are. Mobile devices are what Instagram works with. Instagram access via computer has much less functionality. It is much harder to share a link on Instagram, but then you aren't restricted to 140 characters and can write as much or as little as you wish.
 
Remember your likes, comments, shares and retweets matter. The more a social media post gets, the wider it gets shared and the more likely it is via the various algorithms to hit your inbox and the inbox of your friends. Those who posted them need the encouragement, too. Even if you share a social media post, only a fraction of your friends will see it pop up in their social media feed. However if both you and a friend share the same post, a higher number of both your friends will see it. The increase is lesser for likes, but they still make a difference, and comments are somewhere in the middle.
 
Trolls. Yes, they exist. Don't be one. Don't feed them attention. They roam around the online sphere looking for something they disagree with and then let it rip. The better your content is, the more likely it is to help someone towards conversion to Jesus, the more likely the first comment will be from a member of the trolls. Reading 'One Body, Many Blogs' will help.
 
But if you are called to be a social media apostle, then you really should be blogging. Of all the social media options, the work you do on a blog is the most long lasting, posts on Facebook and Twitter will eventually get buried by new content, and that happens even faster with Instagram and SnapChat.
 
If this sounds like you (and heaven knows we need social media apostles and many more of them), view this interview with Brendan Vogt on The Journey Home program back in 2011. Get a vision for it from him.
 
Hint: If you don't leave home without a notebook and pen, and always take notes when listening to a talk, then you should definitely consider a ministry in social media. It doesn't have to be much of a commitment, just a regular one; like 30 mins once a week reading and liking and sharing, and 30 mins once a week writing and posting about something that matters to both you and God.
 
If you are a grandparent and you believe that Jesus is the Son of God, then you most definitely need to be on social media in order to connect with your grandchildren and to provide some occasional online reminders that God is real and active in people's lives. You don't have to be on all the social media sites, just the one your grandchildren use the most.
 
For those who have waded through all my rants and pleas, a reward is in order.
 
Towards the end of the Pentecost Vigil at the Circus Maximus in Rome, gathered together with the Pope and some 30-50,000 others, Patti Mansfield one of the two earthly protagonists of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal was inspired to give a prophetic word. It is about 15 minutes from the end of the video recording, just after everyone say, 'Spirit of the living God, fall afresh on me'.
 
'Lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest and if you would obey Me and if you would obey the prompting of My Spirit you will yet see infinitely more than you can ask or imagine you will yet see power of my Spirit descend upon the human race. I tell you the fields are white for harvest but I need your obedience, I need your docility and I need your faith and you will yet see marvels that will astound you infinitely more than you can ask or imagine for the glory of My name.'
 
Everyone needs to hear this, and act on it…but I am still waiting for those who actually were there to share this prophetic word and mention in online. We have a duty to share the good stuff. Please join me in doing it.

Our Lady, Queen of the Apostles, pray for us.
St Paul, Apostle to the Gentiles, pray for us.
St Maximillian Kolbe, Media Apostle, pray for us.  
 

The final session of Proclaim 2016 was a plenary one, with a Discussion Panel made up of many of the keynote speakers and workshop presenters.

The Discussion Panel consisted of:
Fr David Ranson, Parish Priest of Wahroonga and Vicar General of Broken Bay diocese (DR)
Cardinal Donald Wuerl, Archbishop of Washington (DW)
Bishop Nicholas Hudson, Auxiliary Bishop of Westminster (NH)
Dr Susan Timoney, Secretary for Pastoral Ministry and Social Concerns for the Archdiocese of Washington (ST)
Jude Henessey, Confraternity of Christian Doctrine (CCD) Wollongong (JH)
Sophy Morley, Diocesan Pastoral Coordinator and the Coordinator for Liturgy in the Diocese of Sale (SM)
Professor Brother David Hall, dean of the La Salle Academy at Australian Catholic University (ACU) for Faith Formation and Religious Education (Br D)

(As usual, expect that these notes will be rough, but will give you the gist of what was discussed.)

Fr David Ranson (DR) facilitated the discussion panel.

DR: Thank you for all the questions that have been submitted. We will focus on the themes that were found in those questions. The American priest and sociologist Andrew Greeley, wrote that ‘the Catholic parish is one of the most ingenious communities that human skill has ever created. Its overlapping networks of religious, educational, familial, social and political relationships has created … “social capital"’. No other community can accompany the human journey in such an effective and sustained way. Would you agree that our definition of parish is changing? It still has a mostly geographical definition, but increasingly membership is more by affiliation.

ST: Urban mobility is both an opportunity and a challenge. Diversity of experience in a parish is a sign of vitality. We see parish as our spiritual home, and want the newcomers to be able to claim it as home too. If the community is changing rapidly, then more flexibility is needed. We need to both extend welcome, and to honour the history of our parish.

DR: How do we keep cohesion between the newcomers and the old timers? The latter feel displaced and the former bring new energy, but how do we maintain the identity of the parish?

DW: By getting them to realise they share the same values. We pass them on through community life and the welcoming nature of our communities. Pope Francis tells us that parish is supposed to be flexible, and to be able to grow and develop. I read Andrew Greeley's 'The Church in the Suburbs' during my college days.

DR: Perhaps the opposite situation is faced by those in stable rural communities, whose challenge is how to keep the message fresh.

SM: We do have large parishes in country Victoria, but they are remote. I travel to each parish. They are mainly 'anglo' parishes. There is an asylum seekers support group liaising with Melbourne. Through the Marist Fathers there is some solidarity with the East Timorese. Rural parishes have strong bonds of community. When other races and religions come into a small community, most people have no idea what to do with them. But this is only due to ignorance. With the Sudanese the breakthrough came through song and story, they love to sing and they love to hear and share stories. Once you get the connection, it all works.

NH. With 214 parishes in the Diocese there is lots of mobility. So we have to be more strategic. We have to ask ourselves, 'How are we meeting the needs of all groups in the parish?' With constant demographic change in each 12 month period, we need to take the pulse systematically. Are there large groups that don't come to certain activities, or some who come to some activities and never to other ones?

DR: Let's talk about parish collaboration.

JH: Wollongong diocese resides along a coastal strip with parishes close together. We are looking at clustering. But how to form the smaller communities into one community is a big challenge. We've visited the megachurches in the USA, and they look at areas on maps that are within a 30 minute driving circle firstly to pick locations without competition and secondly to make small groups viable.

Br D: The future requires collaboration, but brutal realities have to be faced. Who will get the youth? Who will get the young professionals, and by extension, the money? To make it work requires lots of respectful dialogue. It is a good concept, but less attractive in its reality.

DR: What does the sociological reality of communion look like in a parish?

DW: Communion is a spiritual reality, a grace of God poured out on us. Baptism is the foundation of communion, but it has to be manifested and expressed. What do our congregations do when they gather geographically or ethnically? They do what the first parish did, as described in the Acts of the Apostles: Acts 2:42: the disciples anointed by the Holy Spirit prayed, listened to the teaching of the Apostles, grew in the bonds of communion, and celebrated the Eucharist. How does this communion happen? Through solidarity, working together and collaboration. It takes practical day in day out effort. Our challenge is to find ways to manifest the presence of the Holy Spirit together so that everyone feels a part of it and is invited into it. At the same time we recognise that members don't have to be 'in everything'.

DR: St John Paul II in Novo Millennio Ineunte spoke about the need to promote a spirituality of communion and said that our external structures of communion rely on this inner reality.

NH: We are here because Pope Francis has a dream for a missionary option. He tells us in Evangelii Gaudium that if we respond to the call to evangelise that we will really experience joy. But we need to include the most marginalised, because joy is also found with the poor. Our structures must serve communion, and then that communion fuels mission. Vision without strategy is hallucination. Goals without means for achieving those goals – are illusory. We must organise our parishes as teams. Pastors need to acknowledge that they can't do all this alone. Laity acknowledges that we can't possibly do this without our pastor. What can you do with a reluctant pastor? Persevere with the Evangelii Gaudium vision, and choose 2 people to go and say to Father, 'We cannot do this without you'.

DR: We live in an age of migration, and many of our priests are from cultures alien to our own. This has the potential for richness, but also the potential for great difficulty. How should we deal with the difference in culture between the pastor and his community? There have been as many responses to this situation as there are communities, and we acknowledge that religious orders are helping a lot. A key factor is the quality of the induction of our foreign priests. It has to go much deeper than a 2 day course, and we need to allow more time for this induction process to take place.

ST: There are 21 language Masses each Sunday in Washington DC. We share a lot of catholicity and we all share Marian devotion. The challenge is how to weave devotions and practices together. A pastor is ineffective without the collaboration of parishioners.

JH: Wollongong has lots of cultural groups and chaplains. They are part of the richness of the body of Christ.

SM: This is a challenging experience for our parish communities, but we find that once the pastor begins to share his background stories then things soften. We held a day for clergy. Around 1/3 of them were from overseas. So we asked this 1/3 to tell the others what it was like to be a priest in this diocese. That broke down a lot of barriers. We have developed close links with a Nigerian diocese. Fear is normally our first response. We have to get out of our comfort zone and appreciate that these priests from overseas are on fire with Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.

DW: As integration begins to happen, it becomes easier. We need the virtue of patience. We have so much migration and so much merging going on between cultural experiences. The perfect vision should not become the enemy of the good reality. Small steps will get us there.

DR: We are called to be centres of inclusion. I've heard of a Tuscan village where the altar servers have mental disabilities. They stand at the Eucharistic prayer and have their elbows on the altar. How can we become more inclusive?

Br D: Inclusivity is a wonderful concept, which is now politically correct. It is good up to the point that it is cute, fun and OK, but when it brings confrontations…? Zacchaeus wanted in, and Jesus was seeking to find the lost. Are we courageous enough to bring them in? 'I'm going to have dinner tonight at his place.' I have to be open to being changed by those included. We must dialogue, and be open to be changed by the other. We need to be very honest with each other. The cycle of partial inclusion, followed by a road block (obstacle to further inclusion) and an 'I'm out of here' has to end. However there will always be limits to our ability to be inclusive – because of what we stand for, and we need to be absolutely honest about those limits with those on the way in.

DR: How do we advocate for the poor? What is the prophetic role of the local parish?

SM: Advocacy requires walking with people and making ourselves vulnerable. They might have personal issues that are threatening to us. If we look at the Emmaus story we see that Jesus didn't jump in, but that He first asked questions and let them talk. It is necessary for us to meet people where they are at and find out their passions. We are inspired by places like Paris and parishes that don't lock their doors, but leave them open so that the beautiful artworks can touch the soul. In our parish there were migrants who wanted to work hard, so we developed an unemployment help service – a project which is still going on. Other groups came together to help with finance and budgeting. These works did draw people in gradually.

DR: Whom is the Jesus you love and worship? In Benedict XVI's essays on Christology we see Jesus first at prayer. If the world looks at us at prayer, who does it see?

DW: We hope they see what we claim to be: the Body of Christ worshipping the Father thanking for the Spirit and rendering thanks that we are One in that Body. Coming to Mass expresses what we already are through Baptism, and is always an expression of the faith we profess in the Creed.

Bishop Comensoli: We thank our guests and our panel for what they have shared with us. Our thanks goes too to all of the workshop presenters and booth holders. Thanks to the many volunteers present here at the conference and to the other volunteers who worked in preparation for it. This huge team have been evangelising us through service. Thanks too for the representatives from the dioceses of Ballarat and Maitland Newcastle who have been with us. You have been through much pain, and you are hope and encouragement to us. My personal thanks to Daniel Ang and Natalie from our diocesan Office for Evangelisation. Bishops with ideas are dangerous and you made those ideas reality. I acknowledge the Bishops Commission for Evangelisation and thank them for all being here. We are committed to Proclaim 2018, but whether it takes place on the east coast or on the west coast is still to be decided.

David Patterson expressed thanks to the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, the sponsors, Chatswood parish, exhibitors, volunteers, musicians and the Concourse staff.

Daniel Ang: It is coming to an end, our wonderful three days together. To the over 500 delegates who came, thank you for your grass roots work. Thanks to Bishop Comensoli for his confidence and trust and for taking Proclaim 2016 on as a continuing gift to the Church. Special thanks to my personal staff Natalie and Jenny. Thanks to our two MC's David and Alison. We now call upon the Holy Spirit to help us to return and to do.

Hymns, prayers and a blessing followed, together with a reading from Luke 5:1-11

Now it happened that Jesus was standing one day by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the crowd pressing round Him listening to the Word of God, when He caught sight of two boats at the water's edge. The fishermen had got out of them and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats - it was Simon's - and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Then He sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When He had finished speaking He said to Simon, 'Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.' Simon replied, 'Master, we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if You say so, I will pay out the nets.' And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear, so they signalled to their companions in the other boat to come and help them; when these came, they filled both boats to sinking point. When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.' For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching.' Then, bringing their boats back to land they left everything and followed Him.

We were sent to serve the needs of the Church and to strengthen our bonds of communion.
……………………………………………………………….
My response

The panel covered some very pertinent questions that I think most of us would have liked to have heard more in depth discussion on.

One of the things that came home to me as I talked with people at the conference was the dichotomy between the experience of the speakers (mostly leaders and curial officials from large well-resourced dioceses and archdioceses) and the situations of the delegates (mostly pastors and parishioners from regional and remote parishes with extremely limited resources).
​
For Proclaim 2018 I would very much like to see speakers from ordinary non-Cathedral parishes in Australia that have been growing at healthy rates. If time was spent this year finding those parishes and learning their stories and sharing them, the protagonists of them would be just as big drawcards to the next Conference as any 'big names'. I'd like less people to go away despondent because they know what needs to be done, and know what is possible in bigger places, but can't see how to apply it in their own context and more people to leave with true hope 'that if Kincumber, Mount Isa and Geraldton can do it, by George, so can we!'.
 
This is the last issue in the Proclaim 2016 series.

As we look to this momentous Pentecost, #ccrgoldenjubilee2017 can we do better than pray prayers to the Holy Spirit inspired by the very person God chose to remind the Church of the power and action of the Holy Spirit?

The Holy Spirit Chaplet by Blessed Elena Guerra

This prayer to the Holy Spirit originated with the exhortation of Pope Leo XIII. Indeed the same Pontiff in a Papal brief promulgated on May 5, 1895, exhorted all Catholics to devoutly make this Holy Spirit Novena. On this occasion, the Pope suggested a special formula of prayer: “Send forth your Spirit and renew the face of the earth.” He strongly recommended this to be prayed. With this in mind, in 1896, Blessed Elena Guerra, “The Holy Spirit Apostle of modern times,” composed these invocations, to ask the Holy Spirit for the grace of a new Pentecost which renews the face of the earth.

– O God, come to my assistance.
– O Lord, make haste to help me.
– Glory be to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end, Amen

In Each Mystery, ask for a gift of the Holy Spirit (then)
Repeat seven times on seven beads.
“Father in the name of Jesus, send forth your spirit and renew the world”
Conclude with
“O Mary, who by the work of the Holy Spirit, conceived the Saviour, pray for us.”

The Seven Mysteries invoking the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit
1- Come, O Spirit of Wisdom, detach us from earthly things and infuse in us a love and taste of heavenly things.
2- Come, O Spirit of Understanding, enlighten our minds with the light of your eternal truth and the riches of holy thoughts.
3 – Come, O Spirit of Counsel, make us docile to your inspirations and guide us in the way of salvation.
4- Come, O Spirit of Fortitude , and give us strength, constancy and victory in the battle against our spiritual enemies.
5- Come, O Spirit of Knowledge, be the Master of our souls and help us to put into practice Your teachings.
6- Come, O Spirit of Piety, come to live in our heart to possess and sanctify all of our affections.
7- Come, O Spirit of the Fear of the Lord, reign over our will and make us always disposed to suffer every evil rather than to sin.

O most pure Virgin Mary, by your Immaculate Conception you were constituted by the Holy Spirit a chosen tabernacle of Divinity. Pray for us.
May the Divine Paraclete come soon to renew the face of the earth. Hail Mary…
O most pure Virgin Mary, by the Mystery of the Incarnation you were constituted by the Holy Spirit true Mother of God. Pray for us.
May the Divine Paraclete come soon to renew the face of the earth. Hail Mary…
O most pure Virgin Mary, persevering in prayer with the Apostles in the Upper Room, you were abundantly inflamed by the Holy Spirit. Pray for us:
May the Divine Paraclete come soon to renew the face of the earth. Hail Mary…
Let us pray:
Send Your Spirit, Lord, and transform us interiorly with Your gifts. Create in us a new heart that we may please You and be conformed to Your will.
Through Jesus Christ Our Lord. Amen.
​
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Our Lady, Help of Christians, Queen of the Apostles, Queen of Pentecost, Spouse of the Holy Spirit, pray for us.
​Blessed Elena Guerra, pray for us.

Homily by Archbishop Christopher Prowse at Our Lady of Lourdes, Seven Hills, Sunday 19 February 2017.
This Mass was the final event of a weekend-long celebration of the 50th anniversary of the beginning of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal #ccrgoldenjubilee2017
 
(As usual, this is only the gist of the Archbishop's homily.
The content of this homily he expressly asked to be distributed far and wide.)
 
The readings for this Mass were from the 7th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A
Leviticus 19: Be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. You must not bear hatred for your brother in your heart. You must love your neighbour as yourself.
Psalm102(103): Who heals every one of your ills: with the Response: The Lord is kind and merciful.
1 Corinthians 3: You are God's temple The Spirit of God is living among you. You must learn to be  a fool before you can be truly wise.
Matthew 5: Love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you: You must be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect.

It has been lovely to have been with you over these days.
God is not interested in our acts but in our deeds. Let us not muck around with God. Be serious with Him. Be hot or be cold, don't be lukewarm, because as you know the lukewarm get spat out.

I want to talk to you about how to have healthy prayer groups and communities.
 
Be holy
In 1965 Vatican II ended and in 1967 the Catholic Charismatic Renewal (CCR) began. The CCR prayer groups are at the heart of the Church. Pope Francis says that the apostolate of the prayer groups is to bring the Baptism of the Holy Spirit to every Catholic and beyond. To live out the vocation of the laity you need to start with the sacrament of Baptism. Let us take seriously the sacrament of Baptism. If we get that right everything else falls into place. The reason the modern controversies about the priesthood get it so wrong is that they start thinking from the sacrament of Holy Orders, when they should start their thinking from Baptism. 'God has no grandchildren. He only has children' David du Plessis used to say.

The waters of Baptism have brought us into the very heart of God. It does not need to be earned. We do not have to prove to God that we are worthy to be loved by Him. He doesn't love me for what I have done. The Father loves me because when He sees me He sees His Son. We are to draw people to Jesus by attraction, by talking to others about what Jesus means to me personally. We are the sacrament of Jesus. We are Christ in the world. Baptism is what animates us. Through Baptism into Jesus I am loved as first born in God, and inheritor of all His gifts.

Bring that Good News experientially into people's lives. We are an encounter religion. We say that we can encounter God like Thomas and Mary Magdalene. What about you? Jesus asks these questions of each of us. Who do you say I am in the depth of your being? When we experience Him, and encounter Him, our response is surrender, 'I surrender myself to you'. Mary the mother of Jesus, is The woman of Pentecost, the Yes woman, the first charismatic. Every parish should have at least one of these groups: Life in the Spirit Seminar; 4 Step Retreats run by The Community of the Risen Lord: Alpha: RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults). Say Yes if you are invited to become involved in them. It doesn't matter which one, they are all ways of sharing Jesus with others.
 
Just as Priscilla and Aquila, lay people, saw the potential in Apollos and assisted him to come into full relationship with the Holy Spirit, that is your task too. There are lots of ways of doing this. It is always good for us to pray for our bishops, but we don't have to go to the following lengths: There was a diocese in another country which had lots of prayer groups, but a very resistant bishop. In his curial office he had a bronze bust of himself on display. One of the prayer group leaders was a cleaner, and it was his regular task to clean the bishop's office. On one occasion when the premises were thought to be empty, he smuggled in members of his prayer group. In the bishop's office they prayed for their bishop. They prayed over the chair he usually sat in, asking God to guide his decisions. They prayed over the desk asking God to bless the deliberations that took place there, and knowing their slim chances of ever praying over the bishop directly they placed hands on that bronze bust of his and prayed for him personally. The Vicar General of the diocese came by and asked what on earth was going on. In some fear and trembling the prayer group said they were praying for the bishop. He let them off by saying, 'It is good to know that there has been some prayer in that office, but you had better be off and I don’t recommend you trying this again'.
 
Servant Leadership
You belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God. Our starting place is with our wounds and our vulnerabilities. It isn't easy to do because no one wants to talk about weakness, failure and losing. Everyone is in haste to succeed. Someone asked an 80 year old nun, 'When did you decide to become a nun?' and she gave a very wise answer, 'This morning'. Activate your baptism every day, today. Christianity is a today religion. We leave the past to God's mercy, and we leave the future to God's providence, and we trust God today. In this moment you can act in God. Say Yes to God in the present moment, now. If you have messed up – go to confession, do penance and get on with it. Have faith in Him. If you have been to see the tomb of St Mary McKillop you know that on it is written, 'Trust in God'.
 
You need to be a prayer group. Don't be a 'lonely hearts' group or a 'remember when' group. Don't be a gossip group. If there is something causing division among you, deal with it. Change your leaders every so often. Having the same leader for 20 years is not a good thing. Your prayer group will die out if you don't keep yourselves young. Prayer keeps you young. Seven days without prayer makes a person weak. Getting new younger members keeps you young, too. When we share our vulnerabilities we build trust. Regularly taking part in opportunities for leadership formation keeps you young. Having an apostolate for the poor keeps you young.
 
Love
Only love matters. Offer no resistance to the Holy Spirit by getting rid of all competition and jealousy. Fr Raniero Cantalemessa, the preacher to the Pope, reminds us that if all the bibles in the world vanished except one, and that one was burnt except for a barely legible page, and a single readable line, 'God is love', then the entire message of the Gospel would have been preserved. I invite you to think about all those who have been love to us in prayer groups. Be inspired by them and imitate them. How can we activate the laity? How can we grow in servant leadership? Only if we are animated solely by God, Who is love. Lay people of the Church, Awake! Revive!

In the book of Genesis we read how God breathed (ruah) into the nostrils of Adam, and he became a living being. To feel a gentle breeze or to hear a whisper we need to be still and to listen carefully. In John's Gospel we read that when the Risen Lord appeared to his apostles, He breathed on them. Our mission to be salt and light to the world began at Pentecost – the beginning of God's new creation. Without the Holy Spirit we become robotic and greedy. We need the Holy Spirit to breathe on us afresh. Take time regularly to be still and to know that God is here with you.

....................................................................
 
At the end of that Mass, the prophetic word that emerged throughout the weekend was shared in summary form:
​
•A call for unity among us as children of God. This is the third year in a row for this message: Do not ignore it!
•God is unity and love – there should be no more divisions among you.
•Be united in the one Spirit.
•The Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart were embracing us all.
•You have been given wings to fly, that the Church may be awakened and become vibrant once again.
•The future is not only in adults but in the children.
•The call to holiness is for all of us.

​This Pentecost, 4 Jun 2017, is going to be an extraordinary one. Read the long version of why here. The short version is that this year marks 100 years since Fatima, 50 years since the start of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, 120 years since the Pentecost Novena requested by Leo XIII began, 1950 years since the martyrdoms of St Peter and St Paul, and it is within the time frame of the Azuza Street prophecies.
 
If, as believers in Jesus, we are going to take back the strongholds of the enemy, then we need a massive outpouring of the power and gifts of the Holy Spirit. Nothing less can bring lasting change, but we have to do our part and go deeper in our relationship with God, and call out to Him for the gift of the Holy Spirit from the deepest places of our hearts and recognition of our need for Him.
 
It is a lot easier to do that together, than it is to do it on our own. So let's pray this Pentecost.
 
What do we pray for? Our deepest need is for charisms of preaching and teaching. When someone preaches under the charism of preaching, we forget who the preacher is because he has made Jesus real for us and we are enabled to focus on Jesus and our hearts are touched by Him. This is something far beyond any natural gift of rhetoric. When someone teaches under the charism of teaching, we feel that it is Jesus Himself teaching us. This brings about an infusion of divine understanding in students and is far beyond any natural gifts of teaching.
 
Why do we pray? Can you think of the last time any preaching or teaching 'cut you to the heart' cf Acts 2:37? Or made you feel that God was talking directly into your heart? How often do we make our way home unmoved by what we have heard and unable to recall it even a day later? Without these precious charisms of the Holy Spirit we cannot extend the Kingdom of God. Paraphrasing Romans 10:14-17: Faith comes from what is preached and taught, and since people cannot begin to believe in Jesus unless they have heard of Him, and they won't hear of Him unless a preacher or teacher is sent, we profoundly need the Holy Spirit to empower and send us. For this the Holy Spirit needs willing helpers, and the gauge of how willing we are is the depth of our prayer and asking.
 
What matters is that Jesus is preached, and that Jesus is taught. Believers of any denomination or non-denomination can agree with that. There are people that the Baptists can reach that the Anglicans cannot, and vice versa. There are people that the Presbyterians and Uniting Churches can reach that the Catholics cannot, and vice versa. But together we can unite in praying for these charisms of the Holy Spirit for us all.

When: Sunday 4 June 2017. Formal prayers from 1pm-2pm. Informal prayers from 2pm onwards.
Where: St John the Baptist Catholic Church, Woy Woy, NSW (wheelchair accessible)
Who should come? Everyone, but especially those with a ministry of preaching or teaching, and those who regularly intercede for others in their prayers: That's priests, deacons and pastors, catechists, Sunday School teachers, Kids Club teachers, Children's Liturgy teachers, primary and secondary Scripture class teachers, those who prepare children and adults to receive sacraments, those who teach newcomers and those who help adults grow in faith. If you long to be used more powerfully by God to bring people to Jesus through your regular preaching or teaching, come!
I want to come, but I am unable? Find a friend who is coming, and give them a photograph of yourself to bring with them. They will act as proxy for you.

So that there is no visible confusion between preachers and teachers, we ask that priests, deacons and pastors wear some visible sign of their office eg, clerical collar, metal crosses on lapels of shirts etc

Please use #Letuspray2017 when you spread the news about this on social media.

Here's an A4 flyer to print and share:

And here's an 8 A4 page PDF of the Formal Prayers that will be used:

​And a larger print version of them (11 A4 pages):

Print them off, and consider praying some of these prayers daily in preparation for Pentecost Sunday.
 
PS. If you live more than 100kms away, you have full permission to use the same PDFs to host a Let Us Pray 2017 in your own region as long as you 1) try to make it as ecumenical as possible and 2) do the right thing with regard to music licensing.
 
Now some of the hymns that we will use may be unfamiliar to you. Most have been chosen because they have been used by centuries of Christians before us. When we pray and sing these ancient hymns in a sense we truly pray and sing with those generations of believers who have prayed and sung them before us. So here are some recordings to listen to:
 
Veni Creator Spiritus
http://gregorian-chant-hymns.com/hymns-2/veni-creator-spiritus.html or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnUJWDEQDW4
 
Come Holy Ghost, Creator Come
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSsQ8lfgF2M
 
Litany of the Saints, John D. Becker
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kId0NBvNiCk
 
Our Father (this version is sung very flat, but I couldn't find one closer to how it is actually sung)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-QNZHL6gR8
This version is close, too, but it has a few extra notes and differences in syllable emphasis to how it is actually sung
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egar8MKQrUA
 
Sub Tuum Paesidium (although it is odds on we will say and not sing this one)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ws2b7-6OmZ8
 
Magnificat – Amazing Grace tune
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQjrrwoflEk
 
Holy God we praise Thy Name
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVBQYnfkiBM
 
God can do it again
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYPAcEDYNjU   (a bit flat)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwo5zLP0Pek  (a big high)

​Frequently asked questions
 
Will someone who is uncertain about the whole charismatic thing feel comfortable?
During the formal hour of prayer from 1pm-2pm there will be nothing overtly charismatic. The closest we will come is during the prayers for various groups of preachers and teachers. At that time those present will be invited to pray in unison using English or any other language. For some people it is more comfortable to pray in their native language or in a prayer language.
From 2pm onwards - which is optional - we will try our best to respond to the promptings of the Holy Spirit and be open to any charismatic gifts.
 
Haven't I already received the Holy Spirit in Baptism, Confirmation (and if applicable Holy Orders)?
You have indeed received Him in those sacraments. No question about that. The question is not how much you possess the Holy Spirit, but how much does the Holy Spirit possess you? How much do we live under His direction and guidance? We can always grow in greater responsiveness and surrender to Him. The Holy Spirit is always willing to give us fresh gifts to help us grow in holiness and to build up the Kingdom of God Eph 4:11-13. Those gifts have results beyond what is humanly possible Acts 8:4-8. The Holy Spirit acts like a gentleman, and never forces His gifts upon anyone, but we are invited to ask for them. Luke 11:9-13, 1 Cor 12: 31a, 1 Cor 14:1
 
Why the Latin hymn to begin with?
Because when you are serious about calling on the help of the Holy Spirit you dust off the very best bits of your prayer arsenal. This hymn has been used for over a millennium and for the most important occasions. It is part of our shared Christian heritage. But even more than that the melody has a lot to teach us about the respect, adoration, intimacy, longing and reverence with which we should seek the Holy Spirit.
 
What's with asking the saints for prayer?
This is another of those very best bits of your prayer arsenal. It, too, has been prayed in various formats by Christians since at least the late 3rd century, and for the most important occasions. All of us at some time or other have asked our earthly friends to pray for us. If that is OK and normal, surely it is OK to ask our heavenly friends to pray for us. Jesus Himself said, 'For to Him all men are in fact alive'. Luke 20:38b We know that the pleas of the saints expressed by the Spirit are according to the mind of God Rom 8:27b, and surely that is truer for the residents of heaven than for our holy friends on earth. The scriptures teach us that while God can act sovereignly and sometimes does, He prefers to collaborate with us. Take that strange story in Ezekiel 37 about the dry bones as an example. God could have done it all Himself, but he kept giving words to the prophet to say. When in John 12:20-22 the Greeks went to Philip and said, 'We would like to see Jesus', and Philip went and got Andrew, and together they went to Jesus – was the glory of the mediation of Jesus decreased? Of course not! Wasn't Jesus more glorified and honoured this way than if the Greeks had gone to Him directly? Didn't more people share in the good work of bringing people to Jesus? Asking the saints to pray for us and to pray with us is concretely acting upon the belief we share as Christians in the Apostles Creed: 'I believe in the communion of saints'. This particular sung version of the litany of the saints is an easy tune to pick up.
 
Can saints hear prayer? Can they answer prayer?
1 Sam 28 where king Saul decides to consult a medium rather than one of God's prophets. He wants to hear from the deceased Samuel. In the dialogue that follows Samuel knows what is going on (so yes saints can hear prayers) and God has permitted him to bring an answer to Saul (albeit one that Saul doesn't want to hear). Matt 25:21 'You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much' is a promise fulfilled on earth and in heaven. There are far too many Christian shrines dotted over the world with the testimony of crutches and other aids left behind when people were healed to deny that saints hear prayer. They hear our prayers just like any true friend would, they add their prayers to ours and take them together to God on our behalf, and when God permits they have a role in delivering God's answer back to us. Does it make you happy when your good friend gets honoured? Then why is it so hard to understand that it makes God happy when we honour His best friends? Is it hard to believe that it delights God to see His friends, earthly and heavenly, working together for the good of His Kingdom? Any honour we show them redoubles to God's glory, because God is the source and origin of their holiness.
 
Is the presence and intercession of Mary important?
Without her 'Yes' to God, Jesus would not have become incarnate for us. When it comes to collaborating in the works of grace, the mother of Jesus has no equal. She was there at the foot of the Cross of her Son when He entrusted all of the disciples He loves to her maternal care John 19:26-27. Who else but the woman overshadowed by the Holy Spirit in Luke 1:35 can best teach the believers in the Upper Room awaiting the promised Advocate about Him? Would the Holy Spirit do anything important without collaborating with His spouse? We take Jesus for our model. We know that He kept the commandments perfectly, and He kept the commandment to honour His mother. We honour her because Jesus honoured her first. He chose to involve her in all the most important parts of His life, and all of the most ordinary and hidden parts of His life too. With this example, how can we do otherwise? If God Himself wanted Mary at conception and birth of His Son, He also wanted her at the conception and birth of the Church, His body, the body of Christ. How then could we fail to take this Godly hint to invoke her presence and intercession at crucial times in the life of the Church?

What is a charism? Why would you want any?
A charism is a free supernatural gift from God for the building up of the kingdom of God on earth. Eph 4: 7,11-12. Think of the difference between a hand held paper fan and an electric powered fan as an analogy between a natural gift and a supernatural gift. Both move the air around to make it feel cooler. The hand held paper fan has a limited range, and eventually your hand tires and you stop and rest. It does a good job for the one or two people within its range, but there will eventually be burn-out. The electric powered fan is plugged into a power source (the Holy Spirit) and switched on by prayer and consent. It can cool down a whole room, will not burn-out and the amount of power released is proportional to how surrendered our lives are to God – we can set it to low, medium or high depending on our surrender and co-operation with God's grace. Our free will is never compromised, we always have the choice to decrease the power, switch off, and unplug. When a charism is operating people see Jesus in action, and hearts are changed.
 
Maybe a story will help:
St Vincent Ferrer lived in Spain between 1350 and 1419. He became a priest of the Dominican Order. He had a special God-given charism of preaching. Many people were converted to God just by listening to him preach. St Vincent counted on God. He also asked for the prayers and penance of many people for the success of his sermons. He knew it was not his words or his talents that won people over. That is why he prayed before every sermon. But one day, when he knew that a very important person was going to listen to him, he worked harder than usual on his sermon. He ran out of time to pray. This sermon which he had prepared so carefully did not affect the nobleman much at all. God let that happen to teach Vincent not to count on himself. Another time, this same important person came to listen to Fr Ferrer preach. But this time the priest did not know it. He prayed and counted on God as usual. The nobleman listened to the sermon and was greatly impressed by what he heard. The nobleman explained it like this: ‘In the first sermon it was Vincent who preached. In the second sermon, it was Jesus Christ.’ From 'Saints for Young Readers' Volume 1, April 5
 
Is it OK to feel excited and scared at the same time?
Yes. God is very generous with His gifts, but He never ever forces them on anyone. Having a charism doesn't mean you are holy, but it can be a means to help you grow in holiness. Many of them only operate when God wants them to.
 
Do you have to have experienced 'the baptism in the Spirit' to have charisms operate?
No. Sacramental baptism or the desire for sacramental baptism is sufficient, together with a desire to bring people to Jesus and the desire to respond to the gentle promptings of the Holy Spirit. Often it feels like St Peter felt when Jesus said, 'Come' and invited him to get out of the boat and walk across the water in Matthew 14: excited and scared at the same time, but trusting in the One who says, 'Come'. There is an argument that Joel 3:1/Acts 2:17 implies that the promise to pour out the Holy Spirit on all mankind covers the non-baptised as well. At the same time it must be acknowledged that the asking and yielding/surrendering to the Holy Spirit that are part of the baptism in the Spirit experience have frequently been responded to by God with the outpouring of charisms.
 
So I don't have to worry about turning into a raving loony if I ask God to give me the gifts needed for me to serve Him better and be more effective at bringing people into His kingdom?
That's right. You will still be you, just more supernaturally equipped for ministry. And you will still need to do your part to provide the raw material for God to collaborate with (ie prayer, study, preparation of lessons and/or homilies, and seeking holiness). 

Workshop 5G – Who do you say I am? Parishes proclaiming Jesus Christ: Opportunities and Challenges.

This workshop was led by Shane Dwyer, the new director for the National Centre for Evangelisation. 
https://www.facebook.com/evangeliseaustralia/

Shane has lots of theological, teaching and public speaking credentials, but he is difficult to locate on social media.

He provided a booklet containing the source material for the content of this workshop to participants, but it didn't make it onto the resource list at the Proclaim Conference website.

NB. These notes are rough, they do not contain everything said, and will lack his particular emphases and probably mismatch some of his thoughts.

Shane started with a quotation from Archbishop Christopher Prowse, 'We are all called to go out to all people with all of the Gospel message all of the time.' That is our mission!

The degree to which our parishes are beacons of light, peace, joy, mutual support and integrity is the degree to which they are places to which those responding to the invitation to walk with Christ can find the formation and support they need.

The call to evangelise is not meant to be a problem. It is meant to be an invitation.

We are not called to wait for a parish priest to tap us on the shoulder, and think that we can ignore serving the body of Christ until that happens. We are not living in an easy time, but there have been terribly tough times for the Church before during her 2000 year history. Those truly rough patches testify that is it the Holy Spirit who has kept the Church going – and that it is not a human work. Miraculously God keeps bringing something to be, and that is the cause of our hope.

Our families may be a bit shabby at times, especially when we have a black sheep, but we still love each member in their imperfectness. In ministry we often get to hear about people's disappointments. But if we think about how wonderful and beautiful the gift of faith is, and focus on that, then those difficulties get put into perspective and it becomes easier to cope with family members not on the full path.

Before having time with members of our extended family it is worth doing some preparation. What would be the best approach to speaking about Jesus with each relative? If there was a positive response, where would I recommend they go? Would their local parish be wonderfully welcoming and well equipped to help someone come back to the faith or into a deeper relationship with Jesus? What could you invite them to that would be beneficial to where they are at right now?

Our parishes and homes are called to be oases of mercy.

Our vocation can only find meaning in the context of the real world in which we live. A high school student once asked, 'How is the Catholic Church not a cult?' The answer is that we look to our leaders and teaching for truth, but we each decide how to live it. We are free sons and daughters of God, each with our own vocation, each called to take responsibility for how the truth we have received is incarnated in our daily lives.

For this reason we can say that our vocation as baptised Catholics breathes with two lungs: personal holiness (relationship with God) and mission. We need both. If either is missing we are ineffective. Mission without holiness makes us become a real nuisance. Holiness without mission, means that we are not sharing the gift we have received for others.

Sometimes it is easier to be told what to do. But each of us will be called to account to God for how we have lived our life. We each have to respond to His call. There are no back seat passengers in our faith. None.

'Simply reverence the Lord Christ in your hearts, and always have your answer ready for people who ask you the reason for the hope that you all have.' 1 Peter 3:15

It doesn't have to be rocket science. We get overwhelmed and give up. Don't start with the end point, start with this advice from St Peter, and the rest will follow.

The Church exists for one reason only – to reveal Jesus Christ to the world. That we may participate in this mission, the teachings of the Church are directed towards the transformation of every aspect of our lives so we may become more like the One into whose life we have been baptised.

For example one of the teachings of the Church is the rule about attending Mass on Sundays and Holy Days of obligation. Many complain that this is their only day off, and can't be bothered doing something someone else wants them to do. That rule is a nuisance until I am called to proclaim Jesus wholly in my heart, and realise that I need Him fully, that I have a hunger for Him, and that I need to receive Him in my heart in order to be able to live out this mission and to accept all that He is offering me. It is only then that I realise that if I don't receive Him that my spiritual life will wither up and die. Now I understand why the rule is there, and I experience sadness for those who are no longer in the pews and did not persevere until this rule became alive for them.

We are called to become 'as Christ Jesus' Phil 2:5, that we may proclaim Him to the world. He who emptied Himself to became one of us. We are all called to this mission of the Church. Resting safe and secure as we focus inwardly on the trappings of our faith may help us to feel good and holy – but it is not the mission to which we are called.

Holiness is for us the laity, not just for the clergy and religious. We the laity are the vulnerable front line of the Church's mission to the world. We are to be in the world, witnessing to our faith and our personal relationship with Jesus Christ in everything we say and do. That front line is experienced at every water cooler moment when I have to decide whether to speak up or not.

At times we will come across leaders who have taken on false teaching, eg 'Don’t worry if you don’t get to Mass. Nobody believes that the Eucharist is the body of Christ any more'. Remember that they are good people who are confused, good people who have been misinformed. In these cases it is better to say, 'Let's talk about that' than to shout out, 'That's a heresy!!!'

When we want to start discussions, having a good quotation to kick things off with is very helpful. Pope Francis has been providing lots of good quotations. We can share a quotation and say, 'If this is true, then it means we need to do something about it. What could we do?' And we need to allow everyone to contribute to the discussion, not just those with the best English and the best egos.

Evangelii Gaudium 27. 'I dream of a “missionary option”, that is, a missionary impulse capable of transforming everything, so that the Church’s customs, ways of doing things, times and schedules, language and structures can be suitably channelled for the evangelization of today’s world rather than for her self-preservation. The renewal of structures demanded by pastoral conversion can only be understood in this light: as part of an effort to make them more mission-oriented, to make ordinary pastoral activity on every level more inclusive and open, to inspire in pastoral workers a constant desire to go forth and in this way to elicit a positive response from all those whom Jesus summons to friendship with him. As John Paul II once said to the Bishops of Oceania: “All renewal in the Church must have mission as its goal if it is not to fall prey to a kind of ecclesial introversion”.'

Evangelii Gaudium 49.' Let us go forth, then, let us go forth to offer everyone the life of Jesus Christ. Here I repeat for the entire Church what I have often said to the priests and laity of Buenos Aires: I prefer a Church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a Church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security. I do not want a Church concerned with being at the centre and then ends by being caught up in a web of obsessions and procedures. If something should rightly disturb us and trouble our consciences, it is the fact that so many of our brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life. More than by fear of going astray, my hope is that we will be moved by the fear of remaining shut up within structures which give us a false sense of security, within rules which make us harsh judges, within habits which make us feel safe, while at our door people are starving and Jesus does not tire of saying to us: “Give them something to eat” (Mk 6:37).'

Evangelii Gaudium 120b: 'Every Christian is a missionary to the extent that he or she has encountered the love of God in Christ Jesus: we no longer say that we are “disciples” and “missionaries”, but rather that we are always “missionary disciples”. If we are not convinced, let us look at those first disciples, who, immediately after encountering the gaze of Jesus, went forth to proclaim him joyfully: “We have found the Messiah!” (Jn 1:41). The Samaritan woman became a missionary immediately after speaking with Jesus and many Samaritans come to believe in Him “because of the woman’s testimony” (Jn 4:39). So too, Saint Paul, after his encounter with Jesus Christ, “immediately proclaimed Jesus” (Acts 9:20; cf. 22:6-21). So what are we waiting for?'

Evangelii Gaudium 127. 'Today, as the Church seeks to experience a profound missionary renewal, there is a kind of preaching which falls to each of us as a daily responsibility. It has to do with bringing the Gospel to the people we meet, whether they be our neighbours or complete strangers. This is the informal preaching which takes place in the middle of a conversation, something along the lines of what a missionary does when visiting a home. Being a disciple means being constantly ready to bring the love of Jesus to others, and this can happen unexpectedly and in any place: on the street, in a city square, during work, on a journey.'

Beginning in an encounter with the living Jesus Christ, Who fosters in us an attitude of conversion and the decision to follow Him, by our living in communion with Christ and being called by Him within the communion of the Church, a sense of ecclesial belonging is strengthened and generates life.

Conferences like these help us learn that we are not alone. We get enriched by different perspectives. Sometimes we will get it wrong, but if we are not alone, then we can work on solutions together. With God we can find unity in diversity. It is easy to love in theory, it is more tricky in practice.

Let us understand that the mission has a Church: not the Church has a mission.

God is already active in people's lives, even in the absence of the kerygma proclamation. If we can get people to reflect on their own life experience, and affirm them while seeking the right moment to say, 'This is how I make sense of …….. – with Jesus'. How to pick that moment, and not too soon, is the big question. Calling on the Holy Spirit will help. We remember that Jesus is always looking for His lost sheep. With that help we can see how to look upon each situation in a positive way, and to promise that you can have all this and more with Jesus in your life.

When speaking with those who have different belief systems from our own we can ask, 'Do you believe in a supreme being? It is the same One we acknowledge. Let's talk.' Points of contact and similarities are what we need to find, and it is an art to find and express them.

Talking to lapsed Catholics is more difficult. By comparison atheists and agnostics are much easier. It is tough talking with lapsed Catholics because they think they know all they need to know, they will be defensive, and will want to tell you what's wrong with everything and won't want to listen to anything that causes them to re-evaluate their position. The integrity of how you live the faith, your prayer for them, and your willingness to answer their questions, is all we can do.

As the saying goes: 'If you can find the perfect church, go and join it – but be aware that as soon as you join it, it will no longer be perfect.'

It takes prayerfulness, confidence and boldness to bring Jesus into a conversation, but it's worth it.
……………………………………………………………………..
My response

This workshop was additional reinforcement to the previous talks and workshops at the Conference. The consistency of the message, 'Evangelisation isn't as hard as you think, yes you can do it, no it isn't optional, it is essential, and here's some more ways you can do it' was rather amazing.

The real test, of course, is whether we are alert for the opportunities to talk about the impact Jesus has had in our lives, whether we use those opportunities, and whether we are actively on the lookout for more opportunities.

I am reminded of a holy parishioner from decades past. He was a retired journalist, and poet, with a deep love for the mother of Jesus and at daily Mass until his health began to fail. He had been hospitalised and I had gone to visit him. Thinking that this was just one more of his short hospital stays, I launched into local news. But he was wiser than that, and he stopped me and said that he needed to be still and to put all his attention on Jesus. As it turned out, he only had hours left to live. However, his lesson has stayed with me. The older we get, and the wiser we get, the only thing that matters is Jesus, the rest is distraction. So increasingly any homily that brings Jesus alive for me is a good one, and anything less is a wasted opportunity.
We have a mission, to bring Jesus to others, and we won't be pleasing to Him unless we do.
​
May He help us fulfill that mission and purpose. Amen.
……………………………………………………………………
 
The next issue will be the last in the series, with notes from the panel discussion session that closed off the conference.

The 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal (CCR) was celebrated on Saturday 18 February 2017, and all of 2017 is considered to be a year of jubilee. #ccrgoldrenjubilee2017 should help you find some of those celebrations. As with any special anniversary, it is a time to look back, a time to give thanks, and a time to look forward.
 
I was able to attend celebrations over the weekend of 17-19 February 2017 in Parramatta Diocese and to watch and listen to all the sessions video recorded at the con-current celebrations at Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, where the Renewal started. Those video sessions are no longer free, but are available at www.somethinglikereal.com/ordermedia . From both I will stitch together a history from all the memories that were shared.
 
To find the real start, we need to go back to the late 1890s and Pope Leo XIII and Blessed Elena Guerra. Blessed Elena wrote several letters to Pope Leo XIII asking him to promote devotion to the Holy Spirit. Accordingly in 1895 he wrote Provida Matris, in which he recommended to Catholics special prayers at the Feast of Pentecost, for the Reunion of Christendom. In 1897 he wrote Divinum Illud Munus (On the Holy Spirit) talking about the role of the Holy Spirit in the Divine Economy and calling for a novena of prayer preceding Pentecost and attaching indulgences to that novena. (Ed. It is well worth a read.) Sadly these two requests didn't get a lot of response world-wide. Next he was asked to have the Veni Sancte Spiritus (the sequence for Pentecost) sung as he processed in for the first Mass of the 20th century. This he did. Soon after the Pentecostal revival began in 1906. As a Church if we had responded in 1897 we would perhaps be celebrating the 120th anniversary of the Renewal.
 
The world goes through the First World War, then the events at Fatima in 1917, the Great Depression and the Second World War. Along comes Pope St John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council from 1962 to 1965. Here is the prayer prayed before each of its sessions:
 
We stand before you, Holy Spirit,
conscious of our sinfulness,
but aware that we gather in Your name.
Come to us, remain with us,
and enlighten our hearts.
Give us light and strength
to know Your will,
to make it our own,
and to live it in our lives.
Guide us by Your wisdom,
support us by Your power,
for You are God, sharing the glory of Father and Son.
You desire justice for all;
enable us to uphold the rights of others;
do not allow us to be misled by ignorance
or corrupted by fear or favour.
Unite us to Yourself in the bond of love
and keep us faithful to all that is true.
As we gather in Your name, may we temper justice with love,
so that all our discussions and reflections
may be pleasing to You, and earn the reward
promised to good and faithful servants.
We ask this of You who live and reign with the
Father and the Son, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
 
The work of the 2nd Vatican Council was a major movement of grace and stirred up a lot of things and gave the Holy Spirit room to move.
 
In 1966 two professors at the small Catholic university in Pittsburgh got serious about praying daily for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit in their lives. They, too, used that anciently beautiful Pentecost sequence for the purpose. During this time they were given by friends two books to read; The Cross and the Switchblade and They Speak With Other Tongues. Reading them made it easier for them to attend a local Pentecostal prayer meeting in January 1967. Impressed, they returned, sought and received the baptism in the Holy Spirit.
 
These professors were leading students in a scripture study group. A February retreat had been planned, and a theme chosen, but they decided to change the theme to 'the Holy Spirit'. Participants were encouraged to prepare for this retreat weekend by praying expectantly, reading 'The Cross and the Switchblade' and the first 4 chapters of the Acts of the Apostles. The place they went to was called The Ark and The Dove.
 
During the retreat, at the beginning of each session they sang an ancient hymn to the Holy Spirit, the Veni Creator Spiritus. Early sessions were on Mary, on returning to God in the sacrament of Penance, and on surrendering to God as Lord and Master. Following this two students, David and Patti, proposed that they conclude the weekend with a renewal of baptismal promises. They committed to doing this even if no one else decided to. On the Saturday night of that retreat, there were some birthday celebrations downstairs. But David felt a prompting to go upstairs to the wooden paneled chapel with the box-like tabernacle. There he had a profound experience of God. Patti came into the chapel looking for students to send down to the party, and began to pray. She then had a profound experience of the presence of God that prompted her to surrender herself unconditionally to God with this prayer. "Father, I give my life to you. Whatever You ask of me, I accept. And if it means suffering, I accept that too. Just teach me to follow Jesus and to love as He loves." And she was flooded with an experience of the merciful love of God. Leaving the chapel to find the chaplain to talk about this, she came across two other girls. Patti led these two students into the chapel and began to pray, “Lord, whatever You just did for me, do it for them!” And He did.
 
Many, but not all of the retreatants made their way to the chapel that night and experienced God too. Of those that didn't, fear held them back, either fear of making such a surrender to God or fear of the strange things the others were experiencing. One had felt an inexplicable hatred for Patti the whole weekend, and was only set free to experience God when Patti and the professors prayed for her to be delivered from evil.
 
For more detail about this retreat, read http://www.arlingtonrenewal.org/duquesne-weekend.html
 
These experiences of God, and the charisms that came with it, changed their lives so noticeably that others asked to be prayed for and this work of the Holy Spirit spread rapidly throughout the United States and then to the rest of the world.
 
The students wondered if what they had experienced was Catholic or not, and they found an affirmative answer in the documents of Vatican II, especially Lumen Gentium 12b:
 
'It is not only through the sacraments and the ministries of the Church that the Holy Spirit sanctifies and leads the people of God and enriches it with virtues, but, "allotting his gifts to everyone according as He wills, He distributes special graces among the faithful of every rank. By these gifts He makes them fit and ready to undertake the various tasks and offices which contribute toward the renewal and building up of the Church, according to the words of the Apostle: "The manifestation of the Spirit is given to everyone for profit". These charisms, whether they be the more outstanding or the more simple and widely diffused, are to be received with thanksgiving and consolation for they are perfectly suited to and useful for the needs of the Church. Extraordinary gifts are not to be sought after, nor are the fruits of apostolic labor to be presumptuously expected from their use; but judgment as to their genuinity and proper use belongs to those who are appointed leaders in the Church, to whose special competence it belongs, not indeed to extinguish the Spirit, but to test all things and hold fast to that which is good.'
 
Bruce Yocum was a university student who heard about the Duquesne experience in March 1967. A friend of his knew Steve Clarke and Ralph Martin. A few months later he met them through the Catholic chaplaincy, and when an opportunity came in February 1968 he was baptized in the Holy Spirit immediately. Based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, the prayer group that started as 8 people in February was 90 people three weeks later and 300 people by May. This formed the nucleus of the covenant community movement.
 
Because these young people knew each other well, they were able to organize quickly on a national and international basis. Bishop Joe McKenney got involved early. Endorsement from the bishops of the United States was obtained in 1969. Cardinal Suenens visited a few years later bringing with him Fr Wilfrid who was slightly depressive. The dramatic change in this priest after he was prayed with, and became joyful, laughing and energetic was proof for the Cardinal that this was the authentic work of the Holy Spirit, 'because only God could make this change'.
 
Alex Reichel, a professor of applied Mathematics at the University of Sydney was in Colorado for a year's sabbatical in the late 1960s when he came across the charismatic renewal and his faith became alive in a new way. Upon his return to Sydney, Alex went to the Archbishop, Cardinal Gilroy, and asked for permission to start up a prayer group on the university campus. The response was, 'Good Luck'. That prayer group started at St Michael's College in City Road.
 
At the time there was a dual science/theology student at the college by the name of Ken Barker. From his rooms he could hear the prayer group noise as he tried to study. He decided that 'if I can't beat them, I'll join them'. Good coffee and lots of hugs won him over. But he never went into the little room where people went in normal, got prayed over, and came out quite different. Yet he kept on going to that prayer meeting. He finished his science degree, and his seminary studies, was ordained and got sent to the United States for another 4 years of study. At this point he thought he was equipped for ministry, but he wasn't. Young people convinced him to attend a charismatic priest's retreat at Hunters Hill. It was there that he learned that he needed to give up self-sufficiency and say to the Lord, 'I can't do it, but yes Lord, You can do it' and to join his Yes to that of Mary's. In this he found the surrender prayer of Blessed Charles de Foucauld very helpful:
 
Father,
I abandon myself into Your hands;
do with me what You will.
Whatever You may do, I thank You:
I am ready for all, I accept all.
Let only Your will be done in me,
and in all Your creatures –
I wish no more than this, O Lord.
Into Your hands I commend my soul:
I offer it to You with all the love of my heart,
for I love You, Lord, and so need to give myself,
to surrender myself into Your hands without reserve,
and with boundless confidence,
for You are my Father. Amen.
 
After that retreat, everything changed. A prayer group next to the Cathedral in Canberra began. One day a prophetic word came 'to take the renewal to the heart of the Church'. Not sure how to respond to this, they reasoned that the cathedral was the heart of the local church. So Fr Ken asked if he and the young people could be responsible for one of the weekend Masses at the cathedral. No one wanted to serve the 7pm Sunday night Mass, so they gave him that, and the prayer group happened after that Mass. At one of those 7pm Masses a persistent thought kept coming to him, 'you can call the people forward if you want to'. So at the end of the Mass he decided to ask if anyone wanted to come forward to be prayed over, and 2/3rds of the congregation came forward. Many of them 'went down like ninepins'. When we surrender, the Holy Spirit moves.
 
Four months after Alex Reichel began that initial prayer group, Costandi Bastoli joined. At first there was some reluctance about the need for this experience. 'No, I am a Catholic, I know my theology, I have already received the Holy Spirit through the sacraments'. To which they replied, 'It is not whether you possess the Holy Spirit that matters, but whether the Holy Spirit possesses you. Surrender to Him.' Costandi said Ok, and was then asked to renew his baptismal promises, which he did, and then asked if he wanted to receive a gift from God. 'If He wants to do so, I’ll take it'. 'Relax, and the Holy Spirit will do it'. As he started to praise God he was immersed in God's love and started praying and laughing at the same time. That prayer group outgrew its premises quickly, and moved to a meeting place at Lewisham.
 
In 1973 the first international leaders' conference was held in Rome. Around this time the second in charge at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith met with Steve Clark and Ralph Martin, and on his desk was an issue of the New Covenant magazine. They spoke for an hour.
 
In 1975 another international leaders' conference was held in Rome, which around 10,000 people attended. On the Sunday of the conference, everyone went to the papal Mass with great expectation that Pope Paul VI might say something to the renewal. At the end of Mass he did, 'This renewal is an important chance for the Church.' At the closing Mass of that conference they were permitted to use the papal altar in St Peter's basilica. It was a very powerful time of prayer, praise and worship. However all of the microphones stopped working when it was time to share some prophetic word, and only the microphone at the main altar was working. A message was given about days of darkness and serious trouble coming, but followed by a great age of evangelization and days of glory when we would see people tumbling into the Church.
 
Here http://webjournals.ac.edu.au/ojs/index.php/VMAG/article/view/261/258 are a series of reflections on the first 7 years of the charismatic renewal, written by Keith Ranaghan. It was under his leadership that a very broad-based ecumenical committee prepared and led an ecumenical conference of over 60,000 in Kansas City in 1977. It was there that a message that continues to echo was given, 'Weep and mourn, for the body of My Son is broken'. Many ecumenical initiatives began as a result of that conference.
 
When a mountain river gets a good ways down the mountain it becomes deeper, broader, even more powerful but less violent- which is a good analogy for what happened in the renewal during the 1980s and 1990s. According to Lalith Perera in these years the renewal got organized and became more respectable, but perhaps started seeking official acceptance more than seeking the Holy Spirit. Both manifestations of the Holy Spirit and numbers lessened. Following years of personal crisis from 1996 to 2000, he was invited to a retreat with the Divine Retreat Centre at Potta in India. It was a time of grace for him, because God invited him to surrender to Him more than he had ever before and to relinquish his fears and let God be his security and the director of his life. He was overcome by an urge to cry and heard this, 'Cry, cry for the wasted years you lived and served without really submitting to My plan'. As he cried a new anointing of the power of the Holy Spirit came upon him. From that time everything began to flourish and large numbers started being touched by the Lord. Last year the Lord challenged him to see Him in the obstacles and problems around him. 'If I call you, I will do it for you. Do things My way'. God kept that promise. By sitting at the feet of the Lord and asking Him for the breakthroughs, all obstacles were broken by supernatural means.
 
In 2014 leaders of the renewal gathered in Bethlehem from 46 nations to seek the Lord and ask Him how He wanted the 50th anniversary in 2017 to be celebrated. One afternoon of that time was set aside specifically for listening to the Lord. It was a downstairs room with no windows. As they began, the electricity stopped. No lights, no air-conditioning. Confusion reigned. They considered abandoning the time of prayer, but those from the Duquesne weekend said no, this reminds us of the water and plumbing problems that weekend at The Ark and The Dove. As soon as the Holy Spirit came, the water came back on again. So they prayed and called out to the Lord. 'We don't have any power, we are helpless'. Someone grabbed a life-sized crucifix off the wall and brought it to the centre of the room, and said 'Look to Jesus', and the lights came back on. God wanted us to acknowledge our weakness and nothingness and to see that He is the power that we are looking for. God is drawn to our brokenness. The Holy Spirit comes to help us in our weakness. Open up to Him and let His Spirit come. To the most needy, He wants to come most. The next day 200 of us went from Bethlehem to the Upper Room in Jerusalem, and had the extraordinary gift of being able to pray there for an hour. Normally groups are only permitted in for a few minutes at a time. At that time these messages came: 'I have given you My Holy Spirit, and I will continue to give you My Holy Spirit again and again. You will receive more if you join your Yes to the Yes of the Blessed Virgin Mary.' The Lord is about order, but not routine. He brings freshness and newness. We need new weapons for new battles, not yesterday's weapons.
 
To mark the 50th anniversary a big Crucifix of the Renewal was commissioned, and unveiled and blessed on 18 February 2017 at The Ark and The Dove. The international director wanted this to happen, but didn't know how to find a sculptor. Soon after placing the project in God's hands, an email arrived from someone in the renewal who was a sculptor…and it went from there.
 
At the anniversary weekend 17-19 February 2017 the international director Michelle Moran spoke about this Cross and also about how Pope Francis has invited members of the renewal to celebrate Pentecost 2017 with him. The ICCRS team have experience with events in St Peter's Square, but Pope Francis wants this gathering at the Circus Maximus in Rome, open to the view of the city, a place from which it would be easy to send forth people to all directions of the compass.
 
The major prophetic word that weekend, given initially on Friday 17 February and repeated on the evening of 18 February was:
 
Psalm 42: Deep calls unto deep. Go deeper. Call to Him from a place of great depth.
Genesis 7: In the second month, and on the 17th day of that month, that very day all the springs of the great deep broke through and the sluices of heaven opened. It rained on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights. This is for good, not for destruction, so that the world may be filled with the presence of God as the waters cover the sea.
 
Visit http://www.societyofsaints.net/blog/category/prophecy to read an interpretation of this.
 
At the vigil Mass of that weekend Bishop Zubik impressed upon us that we must be listeners of the Word and not just hearers of it.
 
Other messages and insights from this anniversary weekend were a profound call to unity, and to reconciliation between leaders and prayer groups and communities and other Christians. That we were to link arms in solidarity just like Patti and David did 50 years ago, and that when the curtain goes up we will be surprised who we have linked arms with. When movements of the Holy Spirit have happened before throughout history, eg the Desert Fathers, St Benedict, St Francis of Assisi that grace took form in religious life. The charismatic renewal has been marked by lay leadership and lay participation, and the prayer groups and communities were how this grace has taken form in our time. But in the outpouring God has promised it will take a new form that we have never seen before. For Him to do this we have to be prepared to go where He says, to stop when He says stop, and be utterly responsive to His promptings.
 
Pentecost 2017, if we call out to the Lord persistently from our hearts for the gift of the Holy Spirit as He has asked us to do, will be momentous indeed.
 
Come Holy Spirit!!!
Holy Mother Mary of each New Pentecost, Help of Christians, pray for us
 
 
(For another history, which fills in other details of these 50 years of grace, read: http://www.jeevanjal.org/jeevanjal/origin-ccr.html )

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The 18th of February 2017 was the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. #ccrgoldenjubilee2017 : It is what happened when students from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh came together with some of their teachers for a weekend retreat at a place called 'The Ark and the Dove'. Leaders from across the world gathered at The Ark and the Dove for a weekend retreat to celebrate all that God has done in the past 50 years. Those very inspiring talks were Livestreamed, but are no longer available for free online (www.somethinglikereal.com/ordermedia is where you can find them now).
 
As you might expect when people gather to call on God's name, and to praise and thank Him, He talks to them and reveals His purpose.
 
Here is the primary prophetic word that was given at the 50th anniversary retreat. It was first shared on the Friday evening 17 February, and considered so important it was shared again on the Saturday evening 18 February once people began to understand its significance. If you have ever read the life of Blessed Imelda Lambertini, you would have come across the adage, 'gifts are given on the eve of the feast'.
 
I apologise that it is only the bare bones of that word. I was going to go back and transcribe both of them properly, but I was too late.
 
Psalm 42: Deep calls unto deep. Go deeper. Call to Him from a place of great depth.
Genesis 7: In the second month, and on the 17th day of that month, that very day all the springs of the great deep broke through and the sluices of heaven opened. It rained on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights. This is for good, not for destruction, so that the world may be filled with the presence of God as the waters cover the sea.
 
My initial interpretation: God wants to give us the second part very much, but it depends on us doing the first part. Think of the outpouring God wants to give like a huge balloon full of water. It is up to us to push deeper and deeper until it pierces. The deeper and more united we are across time and space and distance the better able we will be to pierce the balloon so that the torrent comes and not the trickle. But we have to get on our knees and call out our desperate need to God for the Holy Spirit. We have to feel and pray in our dryness for the Spirit's dew, we have to long for Him like for cool shade on a day of 45 degree heat. We have to be prepared to let the Holy Spirit groan our need in us. This is a privileged moment, we can praise Him any day of the week, but today His desire is that we ask and importune Him for this outpouring. The moment to obtain all He wants to give will soon pass. There are some things so big and so precious, that He can only give them to us if we ask. Asking makes a place in our hearts to receive. In the Gospels there are two things that Jesus especially asks us to plead for in prayer: vocations and the Holy Spirit.
 
My subsequent interpretation: When the sluice gates open, it takes a while for the dam water to reach the valley where the people live. We have to go deeper in our relationship with God if we want to become larger receptacles for His grace. Whenever we hear '40 days', don't we always think of Lent? That privileged time of our communal return to God in preparation for Easter, where we try to grow in prayer, in generosity and service, and in self-denial. They are our primary clues for going deeper. Pope Francis has particularly invited members of the Renewal to Rome to celebrate Pentecost with him. Instead of the big gathering happening at St Peter's Square, it is going to be at the Circus Maximus. Unlike St Peter's where there is really only one direction in and out, the Circus Maximus is a place where people can be sent forth from all directions. If you visit https://www.facebook.com/iccrsoffice or https://twitter.com/iccrsoffice the vibe is very strong that this coming Pentecost is momentous.
 
So how do we go deeper (apart from the traditional prayer, fasting and almsgiving)?
We have to go beyond where we feel safe and in control.
We can go deeper into listening to God with Christian meditation and Lectio Divina.
We can go deeper in our understanding of God through scripture study and reading the Catechism.
We can go deeper in prayer through time spent in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament.
We can go deeper by working on reconciliation with others and coming into unity with them in love. (CCC 1445: 'Reconciliation with the Church is inseparable from reconciliation with God.')
 
We can also learn a lot about going deeper by reading about what those first Duquesne students did, and doing the same.

In preparation for that retreat weekend they read the Acts of the Apostles, particularly the first 4 chapters. They also read The Cross and The Switchblade and They Spoke With Other Tongues
Every time they met together they prayed the Veni Creator Spiritus, an ancient hymn to the Holy Spirit.
Reflecting upon the Acts of the Apostles, David and Patti wanted to renew their baptismal promises, but the others weren't interested. Yet they stood their ground together and did it anyway. They were the first two God led into the upper room chapel.
They were led to pray a prayer of surrender: “Father, I give my life to you. Whatever you ask of me, I accept. And if it means suffering, I accept that too. Just teach me to follow Jesus and to love as He loves."
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For more detail, read this inspiring account: https://www.ccrno.org/TestimonyPGM.htm
 
Because I had read 'Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire' a few months ago, I was more aware of what this 'deep calling on deep' needed to be. I highly recommend it. It is the story of a young married pastor of a church in Brooklyn, New York, a church in serious danger of closing. 'When I was at my lowest, confounded by obstacles, bewildered by the darkness that surrounded us, unable even to continue preaching, I discovered an astonishing truth: God is attracted to weakness. He can't resist those who humbly and honestly admit how desperately they need Him. Our weakness, in fact, makes room for His power'. He told the Lord that he would rather die than merely tread water throughout his career in the ministry…always preaching the power of the Word and the Spirit, but never seeing it. In his need and acknowledgement that he was well and truly out of his depth as a pastor, God answered him with a promise: 'If you lead My people to pray and call upon My name, you will never lack'.
 
18 February is a feast day of St Bernadette. St Bernadette wrote, 'You want to pray like a saint, I invite you to pray like a beggar, like a pauper before God'. When Our Lady at Lourdes asked her to drink from the stream, first Bernadette had to dig, and to dig, and go deeper some more, until first the mud came and then the clear spring water. Inspired by her example let us go deeper and call out to the Lord until the Holy Spirit flows as torrentially as He desires to.
 
Mary, Mother of Jesus, Spouse of the Holy Spirit, Mother of the New Pentecost, pray for us

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This talk was given by Archbishop Christopher Prowse at Seven Hills, NSW on Saturday 18 February 2017, the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. #ccrgoldenjubilee2017
 
(As usual, this is only the edited gist of the Archbishop's talk. The content of this talk he expressly asked to be distributed far and wide.)

In this talk I want to give you a bishop's perspective on the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the Catholic Church and on the contributions of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal (CCR) over the last 50 years.
 
Australians are a practical people. In Rome you mix with all sorts, and you get to know the qualities of various nationalities. You can depend on Germans to have precision, and upon Italians to have a party with drinks and pasta. Us colonials, being practical, bring the drinks and the glasses to drink them from.
 
In this talk I would like to make 6 points with practical application for our lives.
 
The whole Church is charismatic
When the charismatic renewal began 50 years ago, it was a wide spread explosion; a tsunami of the Holy Spirit. The whole Church is charismatic because the whole Church is animated by the Holy Spirit. We are part of the same Church begun under the power of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and prefigured by Mary - the one overshadowed by the Holy Spirit when she said Yes to God. Mary was the original charismatic.
 
Expand your minds. Much depends upon the hope you have that the Holy Spirit can bring light into our darkened world.
 
St Francis of Assisi and St Benedict all started movements. Their response to God started when they were lay people and developed into a religious vocation. The CCR has been mainly led by lay people, which is something distinctive about this movement. It has been a grass roots 'bottom-up' movement. These last 50 years have seen the start of many lay Catholic movements, and most of them have origins in the charismatic movement.
 
At Vatican II Pope St John XXIII prayed for a new Pentecost, and this prayer has been echoed by subsequent popes. John XXIII was very wise and had a great sense of humour. When asked how many people worked at the Vatican, he replied, 'about half'. In the documents of Vatican II the Holy Spirit is frequently mentioned.
 
We belong to the Latin Rite of the Church, but there are 27 different Rites. The Eastern Rites have a far more developed understanding of the Holy Spirit than we have. The Ukrainian Rite understands the Trinity this way: God the Father is the source of the river; God the Son is the shape and banks of the river; God the Holy Spirit is the water of the river which flows.
 
This flow of the Holy Spirit can be seen in Rublev's icon of the Trinity, based on the story of the three men who came to visit Abraham. In it there is a circular movement. Others express this dynamic flow of the Holy Spirit as a circle of a dance.

Marriage is another way to understand the Trinity, husband, wife, and the love between them. Not too long ago I went out to Temora to share in the 65th wedding anniversary celebrations of a couple – a couple still holding hands! When asked what their secret was, the answer came, 'The secret is not the me, but the we; not the mine, but the ours'.
 
Catch the wave!
 
Kerygma
Jesus Christ is Lord and Saviour. That is the initial proclamation of the Gospel, our kerygma.
 
Finger wagging doesn’t make people disciples.
 
People can go through Catholic schools and all the sacraments of initiation and not come out the other side with a relationship with Jesus. A personal encounter with Jesus does not happen automatically on this 'conveyer belt'.
 
First we need to invite people to open their hearts to Jesus; everything else will follow after that crucial first step. Jesus won't come in unless He is asked, so our invitation has to include, 'You have to ask Jesus to come into your life and into your heart'.
 
It is only after people have asked Jesus in that we find that they want to know more about Him. That's why catechism has to come after kerygma. We have to give them a thirst for Jesus before we begin any kind of teaching.
 
A bishop is the kerygmatic and catechetical leader of his diocese.
 
Young people are tribal, they want to feel like they belong. Give them a chance.
 
Example vs Testimony
Hearing testimonies of the action of Jesus in people's lives has helped me a lot over the years.
 
The Catholic instinct knows that there is a difference between witness and testimony. A gothic cathedral gives witness to the faith of the people who built it 24 hours a day 7 days a week. But the cathedral cannot give testimony.
 
You can only give the answer when people ask the question. If people are not asking you the reason for the faith and hope and joy that you have, then you are not living your faith properly.
 
Catholics are not proselytizers, but we are inviters. We don't impose, but we propose. As Pope Francis said in his 5 Oct 2016 General Audience, 'The real mission is never proselytism, but rather attraction to Christ, beginning with strong union with Him in prayer, adoration and concrete works of charity, which is service to Jesus present in the least of our brothers'.
 
We take the scriptures seriously, but not literally in a fundamentalist way. We take Jesus as our model. Look at Him with the woman at the well (John 4). As a Jew He shouldn't have been talking to a Samaritan, let alone talking to a woman on her own especially one coming for water in the hottest part of the day (indicating that she was a social outsider) and asking her for a drink. Notice that He didn't start by saying, 'You should be a Jew and worship at the Temple'. He started in a non-threatening way, with easy conversation and dialogue – waiting for her to be intrigued enough to ask questions.
 
In a similar way with the man born blind (John 9), Jesus is patient. When the man is healed, he doesn't know what Jesus looks like. But when he has become hungry enough to want to know more who this Jesus is, Jesus comes quietly and introduces Himself.
 
There are good Catholic commentaries on the scriptures out there. Go looking for them.
 
Healing and Holiness
These things are not just for canonized Saints, they are universal calls and gifts.
 
Experientially in the charismatic renewal we learn what Vatican II taught, praying for healing and growing in holiness is what normal believers do.
 
Holiness is a gift from God. The closer you come to Jesus, the warmer your hearts are.
 
Here's what normal holiness looks like: In Melbourne there was a taxi driver who belonged to one of the early prayer groups. He would pray before he started work – for safety and for all the passengers of that day, and kept his taxi clean and sweet-smelling. He played gentle, uplifting background music. Around the inside of the taxi were various holy pictures. He took care to be a safe driver and a good listener. If his passenger wanted conversation he would take part. Many times he was asked why he was so happy and contented, or what this or that holy picture was all about – and that was his opening to talk about Jesus with them and sometimes to even pray with them.
 
Open to all
The charismatic renewal has been quite ecumenical and generally quite youthful. There has been a sense that everybody is welcome – especially in the early days.
 
Keep being open. Don't let your prayer groups devolve into places where anyone under age 70 isn't welcome. Be places where I can send our young people after their World Youth Day experiences, places where they can grow and be accepted and not be told verbally or non-verbally that 'we don't do things that way, and don't want to try' and they get the message that they are not wanted.
 
Mary
Mary, our model of the charismatic dimension of the Church is a great gift. The Peter dimension is hierarchical, and we need both. It is the interwoven circle and the triangle. The circle has the charisms and the gifts to share and serve; it has a Marian dimension of gentleness and motherliness. The circle softens the triangle.
 
Your deference to authority is good. Bishop Long asked me after Friday night's big Mass at the cathedral why there wasn't any sounds of the charismatic gifts. I told him, 'that's because you didn't give them the green light to go for it, they were just waiting for your signal of permission'.
 
I know you love the pope, and your bishops and priests. Keep loving them.
 
Don't get discouraged. Catholics think and work in 100 year blocks. It is a huge ship and it takes time to turn. We are not on a speedboat. The last 50 years is just a blink in time to the Church. Be patient as the Church comes to a greater understanding of the charismatic renewal and God's purpose for it.