On Pentecost Sunday 2020 the Reports from the Plenary Council’s six Writing and Discernment Groups were released. I have read Philippa Martyr’s and Fr John Miechels’s commentaries on these Reports. Both commentaries are well worth reading. But they do make a person reluctant to read the Reports themselves.

But read them I sadly must.

Before I do that, I wish to outline the lens from which I am approaching these documents.

From the start I thought that the process was flawed, because we know what God wants us to do – it has been outlined in Novo Millennio Ineunte and in Evangelii Gaudium. The question is how to do it authentically in an Australian context.

While the phases of the Plenary Council up till now have had paperwork reminding us to ‘Listen to what the Spirit is saying’ and ‘What do you think God is calling us to do’, in practice people have been answering very different questions, viz ‘What do you think the Church ought to be doing?’, ‘What would you like to see change in the Church?’, ‘What could we actually, concretely do, towards these themes at diocesan, deanery and parish level?’. Notably absent has been any question about what God wants me to do to contribute, and likewise absent any consideration about where all these mythical people and unlimited resources who are going to make it happen are going to come from (and how to motivate them). In practice people have been told, ‘This Plenary Council is your chance to change things, speak up for what you want, the more vocal you are, the more likely something will happen’.

In such a climate, consensus is not a reliable indicator of the will of the Holy Spirit.

Further absent, and most disturbing, is how often God’s action is left out of the deliberations: it’s a kind of, ‘He can join in if He wants to’ mentality, instead of seeking His input, guidance and power first and foremost. How strange it is when we say we are guided by the Holy Spirit, and then act as though only more committees and layers of hierarchy are needed to achieve anything.

God’s will and purposes have not changed. Always He calls us back to the original blueprint. Even before the Bible existed, family was the foundation of God’s plan. The Bible is the story of the family of Abraham, and it contains the accumulated wisdom about how God wants that family to live in fulness of life. As the family goes, so goes the Church. Where do we get the power to live as members of the family of God? From the Holy Spirit. A new evangelisation is not possible unless there is a new Pentecost, and there is no Pentecost without the Holy Spirit.

Thus for me, Scripture, Family and the Holy Spirit are the non-negotiable essential keys for discovering what God wants us to do in this Great Southern Land of the Holy Spirit. However none of them were referenced in the titles of the 6 Themes of the Plenary Council, and this continues to disturb me greatly.

So as I read (plough through) the 6 Reports, I am going to tally up any references to Scripture, Family and the Holy Spirit, and if I come across any ideas worth pursuing, I will list them.

Obviously it was not an easy task for the Writing and Discernment Groups because they had so many answers to the wrong questions to sift through.

Scripture references are counted when they occur in the body of the text (not in the footnotes) and are recognisable quotations (not cf.’s). Family has to be specifically referenced, references to parts of families eg women, children, elderly etc do not count. All too often we do not view families holistically, which is strange if we believe that each family is a domestic church, and when there is plenty of evidence in the Scripture for God entrusting specific ministries to specific families in perpetuity. Recently during the pandemic lockdown without the usual institutional church structures, we had to live church as domestic churches and began to rediscover this ancient reality. Both ‘Spirit’ and ‘Holy Spirit’ are counted.

Please take these as ‘about right’ numbers and not as exact tallies. Your own tally is likely to be different to mine, but definitely similar.

Theme 1: Missionary and Evangelising
Scripture references: 23
Family references: 6.5
Holy Spirit references: 10
(from page 6) The renewal of our world begins with personal renewal of our lives lived according to the Gospel which invites us to a personal encounter with Jesus, who offers us the gift of God’s love.
(from page 12) For our sacramental initiation to bear fruit, our journey will be one of growing in our relationship with Jesus, the community of His followers and our wider society. This growth is facilitated through the family, the school and the parish community.
(Prioritised Question 6) Given the importance of the family for the missionary and evangelising activity of the Church, how can we best promote a Catholic vision of marriage and family?

Theme 2: Inclusive, Participatory and Synodal
Scripture references: 16
Family references: 4
Holy Spirit references: 7
(from pages 6 & 10 ) Inclusion recognises that every person is a doorway into the mystery that is the Body of Christ.
(from page 9) Our society has become increasingly indifferent, sometimes even hostile, to family life in all its stages, and to those who make family a priority. At each stage of the growth of their children, families experience unique joys but also struggles which, if left unattended, can lead to disengagement and rift, both with each other but also the Church.
(from page 16) Catholics must tirelessly and fearlessly affirm the unique dignity of each and every child, and the inestimable value of the labours of every parent.

Theme 3: Prayerful and Eucharistic
Scripture references: 15
Family references: 6.5
Holy Spirit references: 11
(from page 7) The family is the usual birthplace of faith and the Church recognises that parents are the first and foremost educators of their children (Gravissimus Educationis
(from page 12) When we are formed in the Gospel, God’s people recognise Jesus in daily life.
(from Proposals for Change 1b) Equip each of our Church communities and organisations to support the creation of small communities of faith and life, centred on prayer with Scripture and sharing heart to heart. Encourage these small communities to gather regularly for the development of faith, the sharing of life over a meal and for spiritual nourishment.
(Are not families also small communities?)

Theme 4: Humble, Healing and Merciful
Scripture references: 13
Family references: 1.5
Holy Spirit references: 5
(from page 11) We are invited to witness the wounds of Jesus in those who have been wounded by the Church.
(from page 12) God is asking us to recognise it is restoration to the family of God that brings true wholeness, and that all the faithful have a role to play in the healing of the wounded.
(from page 12) We cannot separate Christ from the wounded: “just as you did it to one of the least of my family, you did it to me” (Mt 25:40).

Theme 5: Joyful, Hope-filled Servant Community
Scripture references: 3
Family references: 5.5
Holy Spirit references: 1
(from page 5) Australia is a land that prizes freedom, equality and egalitarianism, a ‘fair go’ and mateship. However, mental illness, sickness, loneliness, family or financial pressures afflict many Australians.
(from page 8) “the joy of love experienced by families is also the joy of the Church.” (Amoris Laetitia)
(from Challenge 1, page 11) Particular attention should be given to the reasons why so many young people and their families are absent from our parishes, and how schools and parishes might address this concern.

Theme 6: Open to Conversion, Renewal and Reform
Scripture references: 5
Family references: 3.5
Holy Spirit references: 3
(from page 5) “...if the parish proves capable of self-renewal and constant adaptivity, it continues to be ‘the Church living in the midst of the homes of her sons and daughters.’” (Evangelii Gaudium 28)
(from page 11) The consultation highlights the importance of a personal encounter with Christ as the basis of the life of faith, and the need for a supportive and faith-enriching Church community in which to deepen and live out our Catholic identity. Catholics sense a call for greater integration of faith and life, for discerning ways of discipleship — at home and at work, online and in local communities.
(from Question 2a on page 15) How can the structures and ministries of the local churches reach out and be more connected to today’s Catholics in their family life, communities, workplaces, culture and leisure?

                         - - -    - - -   - - -  

If we believe that the Holy Spirit is the soul of the Church, and the goal of the Christian life is the acquisition of the Holy Spirit (St Seraphim of Sarov), then is it not exceedingly strange that the charisms of the Holy Spirit were not referenced in any of the Theme Reports? How can we possibly do the work of the Kingdom of God without prophecy, healing, intercession, discernment of spirits, words of knowledge, words of wisdom, miracles, deliverance, signs & wonders, and those with anointings from the Holy Spirit to preach, teach and evangelise? Working out how to make room for them in normal parish life, and normal family life, is what we need. Because without God all of our efforts will be fruitless, and utter wastes of time.

It is said that where you have been under the greatest attack from the evil one is the very place to expect the greatest victories. All aspects of family life, from conception to the grave, have been under extreme attack. Is not this where we should no longer be on the defensive, but positively placing our resources to assist the growth of families as domestic churches and households of grace?

And neither can happen without returning to the Scriptures and sincerely studying how God relates to families, and how to co-operate with the Holy Spirit.
  
To focus on family, on the Holy Spirit, and about what God has to say about them in the Plenary Council deliberations, with those two aforementioned papal documents for guidance, now that would be truly worthwhile.

#plenarycouncil  #plenarycouncil2020

​In my roving internet travels I came across a post that grabbed by attention. The gist of the post was that an intercessor wanted a seat at the leadership team table, and the response was 'No', with the major argument being all leaders are intercessors but not all intercessors are leaders.
 
It struck me that the situation was handled poorly, when it could have had quite positive outcomes if handled better. The context seemed to imply that the leadership felt a bit threatened and weren't too keen on the personality of the intercessor.
 
So I want to come at this situation from 2 angles. The first angle is where intercession sits in the body of Christ, and the second angle is 'Why would a request like this be made in the first place?'
 
Each believer in Jesus Christ who has been incorporated into His Body through baptism shares in the priestly, prophetic and kingly ministry of Jesus. The priestly ministry is offering up prayer and sacrifice for others, the prophetic is telling of God's good news of salvation, and the kingly is service of the needy and vulnerable (eg traditionally widows, orphans and strangers).
 
We know that Jesus is continually interceding for us. Heb 7:25 'His power to save is utterly certain because He is living forever to interceded for all who come to God through Him'. We know that we are to follow Him and to imitate Him, our leader and Head.
 
This means that intercession for others is an expected and normal part of being a Christian. But just as with the prophetic and kingly ministries of Jesus, we share in them in various degrees according to the call of God upon our lives.
 
There is the ordinary call as given in 1 Tim 2:1-2, 'First of all, there should be prayers offered for everyone – petitions, intercessions and thanksgiving – and especially for kings and others in authority so that we may be able to live religious and reverent lives in peace and quiet'.
 
To some the Holy Spirit gives a charism of intercession, which can take the form of a gift, ministry or office.
 
The gift normally manifests itself in an impulse or nudge from God to pray for a certain person or situation, and that impulse or urge lifts when the breakthrough is obtained. These tend to be short in duration and carry a degree of urgency eg You get woken up in the night with the need to pray for your nephew, you pray until peace comes, and the next day you find out he had been in a life and death situation. God can operate a gift like this in anyone at any time. You have a certainty that God wants you to pray for this person or situation, to pray right now, and even an understanding of how you are to pray – including what tools in your prayer arsenal you are to use in prayer. This is far beyond sitting in a circle and praying one after each other for your best guess at what the greatest needs are and your best guess at what prayers are aligned with God's will.
 
The ministry is the next level of charism where the Holy Spirit places prayer burdens upon a person, with some regularity and frequency, and involves responding with fasting and commitment and can include the experience of travailing in prayer. Generally the community catches on that when this person prays, God seems to answer quickly and powerfully, and those with a ministry of intercession get invited to intercessory prayer meetings.
 
The office is the next level of charism where it becomes increasingly obvious to the person and to the community that there is a special anointing upon their lives to pray for 'big stuff', think John Sanford and his intercessory metron for weather patterns and natural disasters. Other metrons could be for a city, a region, a nation or for particular groups of people (law enforcement, catechists) or particular situations or causes (cessation of abortion, conversion of teenagers, prayer partnering a ministry of the community). Those with an office like this usually develop mentoring and impartation roles to others less experienced in being used by the Holy Spirit with this charism.
 
If we recall the parable of Jesus about the persistent widow and the unjust judge, Luke 18: 1-8, then you can expect those with this charism to be people of perseverance, 'pester power', a bit intense at times, and maybe even a little pushy (think Abraham in Genesis 18:22-33). But if you remember that God made them this way for His special intercessory purposes, then you won't take too much offence at them, and give them a bit of leeway because you don't know just how heavy a burden God has placed upon them, and such a burden makes a person less able to see the big picture and wider perspectives. That is why they need good and understanding leadership which takes time to really listen to them - when the temptation is to fob them off at the first opportunity because they feel like an annoyance.
 
All leaders have a duty to intercede and pray for those who have been entrusted to their leadership. It is part of the job of a leader. Often those prayers are at the ordinary level unless there is a major threat or opportunity coming towards the community, when the charism at gift level will manifest. Leaders with prophetic gifts will have associated intercessory gifts because many times the promises of God require long term intercession in order to come to fruition.
 
Frequently a prophetic charism will lead to growth in intercessory charisms and an intercessory charism will lead to growth in prophetic charisms.
 
Why would a request like this be made in the first place?
 
It could be a genuine request according to the Will of God.
It could be a symptom of something lacking in the way leadership is conducted.
Or a bit of both.
 
A good leader will know whether the person claiming to be an intercessor has the charism of intercession and at what level he/she has it. If you don't know, then you will have to ask questions, listen carefully, and pray for discernment. It is part of the task of a leader to see the beginnings of ministry level charisms, to notice them, to nurture them, and to put boundaries, protections and communication channels in place to enable them to grow safely.
 
A wise leader will have communication channels in place so that regular updates of what God is doing in and through the prophets and intercessors in the leader's community are received. If independent reports from your intercessors show a shift to several intercessors praying for unmarried mothers, then that's probably a heads up from God about where He wants to develop the community's next outreach ministry.
 
If your leadership pipeline has stalled, and there have been no changes in senior leadership team in the last 5 – 10 years, then this request could be a symptom of not raising up the next generation of leaders.
 
If there has been a leadership emphasis and community culture of honouring those in visible positions of ministry leadership (preachers, pastors, worship leaders, youth leaders, administration) and not giving honour to the invisible positions of ministry (intercession, street evangelism, caring for the infants, sick and elderly, hospitality), then there is going to be various levels of frustration and not feeling valued among those in invisible positions of ministry and corresponding desires to be seen and appreciated. There is a human tendency for this imbalance to happen, and it has to be consciously fought against on a regular basis.
 
The request could be a disguised plea for help in discerning where God wants them to serve and/or the manifestation of a desire to be more involved and committed.
 
Therefore the first thing to do when a request like this comes to your leadership is to see it as a gift and opportunity, and not as a hassle.
 
Then you do your due diligence and work out whether at what level of charism the person is experiencing God's action in his/her life. The higher the level, the more likely God is in the request.
 
Then you do your due diligence and determine whether there are other charisms of the Holy Spirit regularly active in his/her life. The more there are, the more likely God is in the request.
 
Then you obtain some objective assessment of leadership potential. The StrengthsFinder questionnaire is a very good tool for this. The presence of influencing themes means that he/she should be in some form of leadership. Your task is then to work out where that should be happening, and the other theme results will give good clues to that answer. For example if the person is high in empathy and harmony, and has a theme from the influencing domain, then leadership of a hospital visitation or aged care visitation group might be the answer.
 
However the absence of influencing themes doesn't let you off the hook. You then need to look at the mix of themes of everyone on your senior leadership team and compare them with your intercessor requester. If the themes of the intercessor requester fill in the domain weaknesses of your senior leadership team, then God is in the request and you need to at least give it a 3 month trial and see how it goes.
 
If there no influencing themes and the themes they do have will not bring greater balance to the senior leadership team, then that's not where they are called at the moment. But there could be other ministry teams in the community for which they are a perfect fit. Work out where that is and plug him/her into it, reminding them that every leader is only as effective as the team they have around them, and every 'supporting the leader' role is important.
 
The bottom line is that if a person comes to you with a request to join your leadership team, you do them, yourself and the community a grave disservice unless you help get them into the ministry role that God has uniquely equipped them for.

The next stage of the Australian Plenary Council 2020 https://plenarycouncil.catholic.org.au/ has begun with the release of the 6 themes aggregated from responses across the country. Here they are:

Missionary and evangelising
Inclusive, participatory and synodal
Prayerful and Eucharistic
Humble, healing and merciful
A joyful, hope-filled and servant community
Open to conversion, renewal and reform

It is a significant feat to have found 6 themes, especially since the earlier iterations of the website expected 20 themes.

Of themselves the themes seem innocuous enough. The trouble starts when you look at the quotations grouped on the sub-pages of the website. Many, many of those quotations show how poorly the ancient deposit of faith has been presented to our current generations.

While I can understand the argument that what people actually said has to be acknowledged, it does give the false impression that these things will be discussed. I doubt that those preparing the Plenary Council want it reduced to a lengthy session of catechesis.

I am just as sure that many of these quotations answered the questions, 'What do you think? 'Where do you think the church in Australia needs to change?' and 'What do you want to tell your bishops and those in leadership?' and not the actual question: viz, 'What is the Holy Spirit calling the church in Australia to do?'.

I know that the preparation session I attended was a travesty of what it was designed to be. We were supposed to independently write down our answers to that fundamental question, and then share them. Similar answers were then supposed to be grouped together, and the biggest group (consensus) was to be discussed in depth. The leader of my session didn't do that at all; the leader rattled off a long list of controversial themes and encouraged people to make personal submissions on those themes. Several attendees didn't get a chance to say anything. We were supposed to be listening to the Holy Spirit and to each other, but we really only got to listen to the leader of the session.

I have heard that some places did it properly, and for that I am very grateful.

But I have also read the results from one parish's feedback, around 200 individual responses, and none of them began 'I think the Holy Spirit is calling us to……'; they were all comments on what mattered to them. Of those responses, the biggest consensus was a profound concern for effectively handing on the faith to the young.

That this overriding concern was not a theme of its own is a worry.

It is the very first thing Jesus asked Peter to do if he loved Him, 'Feed my lambs'.

I find that correlation of the sensum fidei rather consoling.

Before I go any further, let us put some matters to rest
•Women priests. If Jesus did not ordain His mother and Mary Magdalene, then He didn't want women ordained as priests. If Jesus didn't do it, then we have no mandate to do it.
•Married priests. This is not a solution to the vocations crisis, nor a solution to the child abuse crisis. It might make the married priest less lonely than the celibate priest, but it places enormous burdens on the wife and children. What happens if he dies? What happens to them, then? What happens if they divorce or one of them is accused of adultery? Your wife is ill and you get a call to visit a dying parishioner – who do you put first? – and how to do live with the consequences?
•Support same sex marriage. It isn't going to happen! God made them male and female and said be fruitful and multiply, He designed our bodies, He created family and marriage.
•Restore the 3rd Rite of Reconciliation. After all the abuses that happened while it was permitted…it isn't going to happen. The 3rd Rite was designed for emergency life and death situations faced by a group of people eg. going into battle, going into a rescue situation where your own life is at risk, sudden situations where there just isn't time to hear the confessions of everyone, with the expectation that if they survived they would make a proper personal confession afterwards. Did you see any of the multitudes coming together prior to Christmas and Easter for the 3rd Rite going to a personal confession in the weeks afterwards? Me neither.

Another worry is this refrain, 'We want more …..', 'We want better……', 'We need to do better at ……..'. It is a worry because at no point did I ever see a 'and I am willing to do the hard work to make it happen'. There's this strange expectation that all I have to do is ask, and someone else will dedicate themselves to making it happen. Call it a consumerist mentality if you will. Perhaps we may have received more quality responses if the question was, 'What is God calling me to do?' rather than 'What is God calling us to do?'

But then what God is calling us to do is already clear: to be missionary disciples of the Gospel. The real question is: how is He calling us to do this effectively in our lives as Australians and as His church in Australia? What we need is to seek His strategies that will engage our Australian culture and bring Australians into a life giving encounter with Jesus. That is the true work of the Plenary Council.

Yet it isn't enough to seek God's will and His strategies, because if we don't also ardently seek His power to accomplish it we are doomed to failure.

To see a theme about growing in responsiveness to the Holy Spirit and about ways of accessing and releasing His charisms for ministry, and learning how to use those precious and powerful charisms in teamwork would have excited me. It is the only thing that really matters. If a gift of preaching gets released multitudes get saved, not just a few hundred. If a gift of discernment of spirits gets released, spiritual battles get won and the rubble is cleared away for many conversions to take place. Without His charisms, without His power, we can achieve nothing. With His charisms, with His power, the whole nation can be converted.

May the Holy Spirit mercifully take control of this whole Plenary Council process. Amen.
​
Only with Him in charge do we have any hope of avoiding the numerous pitfalls along the way. 

From the Acts of the Apostles and other writings in the New Testament we learn that the charisms of the Holy Spirit were in widespread daily use by the early Christians for evangelisation and building up the body of Christ and extending the kingdom of God.

In our own era we have seen the beginnings of a return to that 'normalcy', and as we expect grace to superabound where sin abounds, Romans 5:20, it means that as our world slips deeper into moral darkness, manifestation of the charismatic gifts of the Holy Spirit will increase.

It is therefore prudent for information about how the charismatic gifts operate to become more widespread in the church, so that if God starts working in your life that way then you can embrace it and co-operate with Him more fully, and if He starts working in someone else's life and they come to you bewildered you will have the knowledge to bring them peace, encourage them and give them effective guidance.

That's why the International Catholic Charismatic Renewal Service (ICCRS) ran a Charism School in Melbourne in March 2019. Presented was a compendium of what has been learned about the revelation and power gifts of the Holy Spirit over the past 52 years.

A 32 page transcript of that Charism School is provided below. For those who prefer video or audio, contact the Melbourne CCR office for details https://www.ccr.org.au/ or centre@ccr.org.au

The titles of the talks given are:

Charisms, Gifts and Fruit
Co-operating with the Charisms
Workers in the Harvest

Gift of Tongues
Gift of Wisdom
Mass Homily: Spiritual Warfare
Spiritual Maturity and Inner Freedom
The Gift of Leadership

Gifts of Revelation and Inspiration
Prophecy and the Word of Knowledge
Mass Homily: Mercy and False Guilt
Hearing the Voice of God
Discernment

The Charism of Faith
Healing
Mass Homily: Surrender to God's Will
How to Pray for Healing
Deliverance

Mass Homily: Interior Life
​
Please read the document and share it widely, especially with former and current members of prayer groups and people in Christian leadership. Fluent readers will take around an hour to read it, unless they digress down one of the hyper-links or wish to compare bible translations.

Upon this document, dear Holy Spirit, we seek your unction.
May the prayers of Mary, the mother of Jesus, who prayed so ardently with the Apostles and Disciples as they waited for the promised gift of the Father, accompany it.
May Blessed Elena Guerra, Pope Leo XIII, St Philip Neri, and all the Saints who had special devotion to the Holy Spirit, intercede for each person who reads it.
May the holy angels guide the distribution of this document far and wide, especially to those who most need it.
​Amen.

​Notes from Day 1 of The Ark and Dove Week Online Conference 11 Feb – 15 Feb 2019

These are rough notes only; very rough in places; that convey the gist of what was said.

Day 1, Monday 11 Feb 2019

Talk 1: Memory, Hope, Vision and Mission by Johnny Bertucci (video 12:51 mins)

Greetings and welcome. I am the chairman of the Ark and Dove Worldwide.

In 2015 the CCR (Catholic Charismatic Renewal) in the U.S.A. was notified that the Ark and Dove site was up for sale. Trusting in Providence, we figured out a way to procure the property. We simply could not not buy it. On 18 Dec 2015 we signed the act of sale.

The Ark and Dove was built in 1924, as two buildings, for the Bell Telephone Company, as a place of rest for female employee, and the smaller building was for the caretakers. Later on it became a boarding school. In 1964 the diocese of Pittsburgh purchased it, and invited nuns from Holland, the Ladies of Bethany, to run it. They were the ones who renamed the property, 'The Ark and Dove', and they operated it as a retreat centre.

As you know the 1967 Duchesne weekend took place here.

In 1979 the Sisters of Divine Providence purchased the property and named it 'Providence Villa'.

We have reclaimed the name, 'Ark and Dove'.

The CCR now having ownership of the property, we looked at each other and said, 'OK, now what?' It's ours. How could we use this place for unity and for passing on the grace of the Baptism in the Spirit?

No one would be excluded, it is considered as belonging to all in the CCR.

We were excited that we had the property in time for the 50th anniversary of the CCR (Feb 2017), and to be able to celebrate the Jubilee here, including that sense of people being restored to their land that the biblical concept of Jubilee has. We had a big celebration and fitted some 120 people into this place.

On that Jubilee weekend there was a prophetic word from Genesis 7:11, 'In the 2nd month, on the 17th day of the month, the fountains of the great deep burst forth and the windows of the heavens opened'.

It meant a lot to us that it was part of the story of Noah, the Ark and the Dove, and that both the original Duchesne weekend and this 50th anniversary were held 17 Feb 1967 and 17 Feb 2017. We felt like it was a note from God underlining just how special this day was.

Unity is to be our calling card. Unity is to be our mantle and our cry.

On that Jubilee night in 2017 Patti retold the story of the Duchesne weekend, and we crammed 45 people into the chapel with her, in that upper room, and we recorded it. On Friday 15 Feb during this Ark and Dove Week you will get to see that recording. It is a great love story. It was also a great night of praise and worship.

The mission we have been given is far from over.

The Ark and Dove is poised to be a beacon and clarion call for unity.

It is your place, your home. When you come to visit, you come as a member of the family coming home. Come and be refreshed.

We need to foster this unity.
........................................................................................... 

Talk 2: The Holy Spirit outpoured at the Ark and Dove by Patti Mansfield Gallagher (video 6:51 mins)

When I was a little girl I would ask my mother to tell me the story about how you and Daddy met. I never got tired of hearing it.
In a similar way how God started the Catholic Charismatic Renewal is a love story, and I get to retell the story.

That retreat weekend somehow I left my makeup at home. That helped remind me that I wasn't here for a new boyfriend, but for a spiritual purpose. This was by first ever retreat, and I went with a bit of fear and trepidation. I had a plan for my life.

Since I was from a poor immigrant family, all I had was a public school education. So this retreat for me was scary, but I was excited too. I was scared God might call me to be a nun.

I discovered I need to both ask of God and to surrender to Him. My prayer was 'teach me to follow Your Son Jesus'. Somehow my unconditional surrender was needed.

There were no chairs or pews in the chapel that weekend, just cushions.

When I went into the chapel that night I knelt and trembled at the awesomeness of God. I felt it.

I asked myself, what is happening? This is something we didn't plan.

Then I was flat on my face in the chapel, and somehow my shoes were off my feet. I experienced immersion in the love of God. My prayer was, 'Stay, don't leave me'. I was basking in the love and mercy of God.

Somehow I knew that if I could experience this, others could too. Jesus is alive. Jesus is real.

After visiting the chaplain and telling him my story I saw two girls on the retreat. They said my face was glowing. I took them up to the chapel with me. I had never prayed out loud in my life before, but I asked God to do for them what He had done for me.

There were about 12 of us that night, sovereignly drawn into the chapel.

I felt a tingling all over, like I was on fire.

I was there as a witness, but it's not my story, it is God's story.
.............................................................................................
 
Talk 3: The Holy Spirit outpoured at the Ark and Dove by David Mangan (video 11:13 mins)

I am delighted to be here. God has used what happened here at the Ark and Dove with me and others to advance His purpose in the Church and the world.

When I arrived at the Ark and Dove for that retreat weekend I was lacking in motivation. Having had a long day at work, all I wanted to do was sleep. I heard there was a lovely meditation on Our Lady that Friday night, but I missed it.

I knew I wanted to experience the Lord. We had been asked to read Acts Chapters 1 to 4 and 'The Cross and the Switchblade', but most of it went over my head.

I had been asked to do the talk on Acts Chapter 1, but I asked someone else to give that talk because I didn't know enough about the Holy Spirit. In that Acts Chapter 1 talk, the person who gave it said some things that changed my life. He said that the word in Greek translated as power came from the same root word as dynamite.

I wanted to follow God, but on my own steam. However I realised I was not tapped into God. I asked, 'Where's the dynamite? Surely the sacraments give us His Holy Spirit, so where's the dynamite?'

The second talk was on Acts Chapter 2, and the speaker said, 'This still happens today'. After that talk I wrote in my notebook, 'I want to hear someone speak in tongues – me.'

In the discussion after that talk, I was back to the dynamite question. Baptism is something we affirm later in life if we were baptised as infants. Confirmation, too, was similar. What about providing an opportunity to renew our Baptism and Confirmation commitments on this retreat? I was disappointed that when this idea was presented to the whole group there wasn't enthusiasm for it.

Then it was lunch time. After lunch I walked around the grounds of the retreat centre with Patti, continuing this discussion. I decided that even if no one else is interested in this, I'm going to do this. And Patti said, 'Me, too'.

Going back into the retreat centre, a leader said that the water pump had broken.

I knew I was on the trail of something, and I didn't want the retreat to end so soon. What about praying for water? OK, let's go to the chapel to pray, and a handful of us went off to do that.

I asked the Lord for water, and I was given a great burst of faith that God had given it – so I prayed in thanksgiving. I went down and turned the tap in the kitchen, and the water came out strongly. We discovered later that the repairman had a change of heart, and worked on it. God answered, it didn't matter how.

I went back to the chapel to give thanks, and the presence of God was so thick and tangible. I was on my face before the tabernacle, explosions in my body. I sat Indian-style on the floor, about to say thank you, and I started speaking a language I did not know.

I went down and talked to the leaders and asked them if this was a valid experience, and they said 'Yes'. As I left, one of the leaders asked if I had spoken in a non-English prayer, and suggested if I experienced it again, to let it flow.

God will do this for you, if you let Him.
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Talk 4: And the Fire came to our Nations by Andres Arango (video 25 mins)

Special greetings to all of you.
(then invocation prayer to the Holy Spirit for grace for the talk)

My book, 'Catholic Charismatic Renewal: A Current of Grace' has recently been published in Spanish.

As part of the research for the book I went to Lucca in Italy where Blessed Elena Guerra lived and died. I was able to pray in her room.

The work of God in her was a precursor of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, helping the world be aware of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Primarily this was done through her correspondence with and encouragement of Pope Leo XIII.

Because of this, Pope Leo XIII wrote an encyclical on the Holy Spirit, dedicated the 20th century to the Holy Spirit, and initiated the worldwide novena to the Holy Spirit leading up to Pentecost each year.

Pope St John XXIII, convened the Second Vatican Council and asked God for a new Pentecost. Elena was the first person he beatified during his pontificate. He called her the Apostle of the Holy Spirit. She wrote about the importance of crying out for a new Pentecost.

In 2015 Pope Francis quoted Cardinal Suenens about the river must be emptied into the sea, and the charismatic renewal as a current of grace.

In 2014 Pope Francis addressed the Renewal in these words: 'You, the charismatic renewal, have received a great gift from the Lord. Your movement’s birth was willed by the Holy Spirit to be "a current of grace in the Church and for the Church". This is your identity: to be a current of grace.'

When I was a child we went to a farm near a river, with lots of wildlife and fishing. We would spend time going to explore, and seeking the stream head for the river. It took some finding, because it was small and unassuming, and yet that is where the river began.

The Ark and Dove is like that stream head for the river, small and not well known, and yet the place from which this current of grace sprang for us.

May this retreat centre be a faithful instrument of God, helping us to fulfill the commission Pope Francis gave us to bring the baptism in the Holy Spirit to the whole Church.

How do we do this?

• By every day claiming a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
• As Pope Benedict XVI encouraged, make parishioners aware of the Holy Spirit. Ask them, 'Do you have the Holy Spirit?'
•Remembering that the baptism in the Holy Spirit is for all Christians, it is an instrument for ecumenism and unity and for collaborative evangelisation.
• By installing the culture of Pentecost as described in Acts 1:8 'You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and then you will be My witnesses not only in Jerusalem, but throughout Judea and Samaria, and indeed to the ends of the earth.'

It is our task to carry the presence of Jesus, to enable people to encounter Jesus, to fall in love with Him and to be transformed by Him.

To grow in holiness is a life style, to be lived each minute, to be filled and moved by the Holy Spirit so as to live like Jesus.

(at the end of the talk there was a prayer)
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Talk 5: Interview re CHARIS by Jim Murphy (video 5:53 mins)

CHARIS (Catholic Charismatic Renewal International Service) is the name of the new international body representing both the Communities (previously Catholic Fraternity) and the Prayer Groups (previously ICCRS) of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal.
Background information:
http://www.iccrs.org/en/charis-moderator-and-isc-announced/
https://www.nsc-chariscenter.org/charis-new-international-service-for-catholic-charismatic-renewal/
http://www.iccrs.org/en/new-charis-statutes-now-available/

Jim Murphy:

Pope Francis has a vision of a much broader community/family to live in the Spirit.

The current of grace of the Renewal is not something that can be controlled, managed or put in a box.

We have to get into the river of that current of grace and let it take us where it wants.

Let's go together, not in conformity, but unity in diversity, which requires an open heart.

All of us are invited into the current of grace, but don't tell anyone how they should swim. Let them swim their own way.

Start now and move slowly.

For example, 'Can we have lunch and talk about where God could be leading us?' We don't have to wait for the perfect plan. 'Could we just meet for an afternoon of prayer and discussion?' Let's start with that.

Then God can show us the next step.

Move slow, then it will be authentic. 'Let's get back together in 4 weeks'. Begin dialogue, call and invite, but do not push.

God is looking for the intention of the heart rather than the perfect plan.

God has to show up; because if He doesn't, then it is all over.
 
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The full videos for this online conference are available from the premium section (currently payment $56 US and login required for 12 month access) at www.arkanddoveweek.com

​'Where is the Holy Spirit blowing in your local area?'

I put this question, or at least a version of it, to a well-travelled clerical friend of mine recently, and his answers were perplexing.

He mentioned a recent ordination to the priesthood. While that is truly wonderful, and an extraordinary grace for any parish; it is the fruit of the Holy Spirit's work over a ten year or longer period.

He mentioned the good work the nuns were doing in the parish. Again, that is awesome. But it too is the fruit of the Holy Spirit's work in the hearts of women born some 10 years ago or more.

Then he mentioned a rather exciting regional meeting of bishops from several countries happening within the next 12 months. Absolutely wonderful, and it will hopefully be very fruitful for the whole region, but that's the Holy Spirit's work at a hierarchical level and not a local level.

Next year his parish celebrates 50 years of existence. This is a wonderful opportunity to give thanks and praise to God for the blessings and achievements of the past 50 years. Many special graces can come from an event like this, especially if time is taken to think through how the Holy Spirit has worked historically in this local area with a view to discerning His longer term plans. But again, it's not really about what the Holy Spirit is blowing on at the moment.

Why was I perplexed? Because his answers focussed on the activity of priests, religious and bishops who are a tiny proportion of a parish containing thousands of lay people in it. Because there is a big difference between serving a parish and empowering and encouraging a parish to respond to what the Holy Spirit is calling them to do.

It is really difficult to co-operate with the Holy Spirit's plans if you are having trouble noticing where He has been active. A pastor is best placed to notice these things, because he usually gets the best information.

For example if there has been a noticeable uplift in the numbers of couples coming to talk to him about how to grow in their marriages – that's a clue that the Holy Spirit is working locally in the area of marriage. If you notice that, you can put more emphasis on marriage enrichment courses and programmes and can preach more on communication, listening, forgiveness and showing love in daily acts of kindness.

For example in confession there has been an increase in people returning to the sacrament of penance and confessing struggles with addictions of various kinds – that's a clue that the Holy Spirit is wanting to do a major work to set people free in this area. If you notice that, you can invite people into the parish who are gifted by God in setting people free from addictions. Also you can put on an afternoon of prayer inviting the whole parish to come and pray that their loved ones be set free from addictions, and see what happens. If it goes well, and people testify to God setting them free, do it again in a month's time.

But if you are not noticing and paying attention, how can you even begin to co-operate with what the Holy Spirit is blowing on?

Some things might take a bit more digging and research to uncover.

For example, do you know what spurred your recent batch of RCIA candidates to begin the final leg of their journey home to the Catholic Church? Maybe over half of them had an encounter with the Mother of Jesus. If so, put extra effort into the next major Marian feast day, do a parish novena leading up to it, put on a free movie about an approved Marian apparition on the feast day, and a talk about how to pray the rosary.

For example, do you know what spurred your newest arrivals at daily Mass to attend? Go talk to them and find out. Maybe they were all positively influenced by another parishioner. If so, go and talk to this parishioner about how God has been leading him/her and see if there is any way you can support them in their efforts (eg books, pamphlets, rosary beads to give away, or direction to good resources for the most common questions people ask him/her).

Other clues to the Holy Spirit's action in your parish could just come up in conversation, or could be relayed to you by staff members. For example two women having opportunities to meet with long estranged family members could be a clue that the Holy Spirit is currently working on the restoration of family relationships. Finding a third person in this situation would be a call to action. One way to partner with this movement of grace would be to let parishioners know that the next Saturday morning Mass would be offered for the restoration of family relationships, and use one of the Eucharistic Prayers of Reconciliation, the Proper set out 'for family' or 'for relatives and friends', and specially written prayers of the faithful.

Another way to get an idea of what the Holy Spirit is blowing on; is to have a listening session. What you want to do is to identify people in the parish who have solid prayer lives and sacramental lives and are in various service roles in the parish. Invite them in groups of ten for morning or afternoon tea. Then when you are together, ask them what God has been doing in their lives recently, and pay close attention to any patterns that emerge or murmurs of agreement when something is shared that the rest can relate to. If you hear common threads of God asking them to slow down and spend more time with Him, organise a one day retreat. If you hear common threads of God asking them to trust Him more, find some stories from the internet or elsewhere about how God worked wonders when people trusted in Him, print them off, and share them around as encouragement.
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Obviously if you can pick up on the Holy Spirit's clues, what you do to partner with His action in your people's lives is going to be many times more effective than a 'let's try this new programme and hope it works' approach.

Session 5, Sunday 20 Jan 2019 with Jim Murphy, president of ICCRS

Sometimes even when we know what to do, it is still not easy to do it.

Sometimes we feel we can't jump that high – that's why He gives His Spirit.

When Jesus says, 'Take My yoke…', we know that the yoke goes across the shoulders of two animals. Normally an older more experienced animal is joked with a younger animal. The older one calms the younger one down and communicates, 'Just walk with Me, I know how to do this.' On our own we are not capable of doing what God is calling us to do.

How does the Spirit work? It starts with you and me.

God is responsible for the great revival – no one else – and He will deal with us first. Pay attention to your own piece of real estate, and only then together look at the big picture. However if you wait until you are perfect to help anyone else, you will die of old age before that happens.

This is a both/and, not either/or, and we need to seek balance. God wants to give you the power to do the things of the kingdom, and also to be and to become holy. Both are essential and necessary.

Charisms flow from the generosity of God; they are undeserved gifts from the ridiculous generosity of God. God knows how to give good things to His kids.

Have you ever sat in a car-park of a hospital, nursing home or funeral place and said, 'I don't want to go in. God help me.' and you eventually got up and went in. That was His grace at work.

Priesthood is a special example of this; God working in the man, with the man, beyond the capacity of the man.

There was a farmer's wife who came to a prayer meeting with her very reluctant husband. He had a speech problem that made putting a sentence together a laborious effort. He was prayed with for the baptism in the Holy Spirit, and nothing seemed to have happened. However at subsequent prayer meetings, he would be prompted by the Holy Spirit to stand up and speak – and out came this divine poetry. The farmer had been given an extraordinary prophetic gift that only operated under the influence of the Holy Spirit. At all other times he continued to have speech difficulties. This was an unusual charism chosen to show forth the surpassing power of God.

So don't limit God by saying, 'I could never do that', because we put our faith in the God who can do it in us.

Human effort cannot fix the world – only God can save us now.

Do not count yourself out – let Him use you to do something extraordinary – that the rest of us really need.

If God calls you to do something – do it. But you don't have to go it alone, seek out and talk to experienced people about ways to move forward in responding to that call.

Prayer groups are not the only place for charisms, they are for the water cooler interactions too. If someone at the water cooler shares what they are struggling with, seek the Lord for that person, and if there is openness and permission from him or her, take the opportunity to pray together about that situation.

Don't ever be afraid to minister in the Spirit anywhere.

The Spirit gives us the power to be something else – to be the sons and daughters of God.

Galatians 5:22 give us the fruits of the Spirit which flow from the Isaiah 11 gifts of the Spirit. When the Spirit of God fills and dwells in you, His personality starts rubbing off on you. Then the Holy Spirit's capacity for courage, wisdom etc start becoming our qualities, forming us into the likeness of Christ.

You are the temple of the Holy Spirit. Can you believe that?

When we think gift, we normally think of objects, but 'the' gift is the person of the Holy Spirit.

With some people, the room changes when that person walks in, and that person – just by their presence – brings everyone closer to God.

More people are converted by character than by charism: pick both!

This inner work in us cannot be done except by the Spirit of God.

We all need to be more open to the Holy Spirit. Ask Him, 'where is the bulls-eye on my back?' He wants to shine light on it. He will show those areas of weakness to you for the purposes of love and healing.

Human beings don't co-operate well together – but the Holy Spirit can make unity happen and can make team-work happen.

Without the Holy Spirit, there is no vision to unite us.

I invite you to journey with the Holy Spirit. Ask Him, 'what do I need to pay attention to from this weekend?' Reflect on it, but keep inviting the Holy Spirit into the process.

The only way restoration happens is by the Spirit of God.
There is no other way, no other option.
We have been called by God, to be with God for this great restoration.
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When all the talks are transcribed and blogged, a printer friendly version will be provided. There is still the Homily to go.
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My thoughts

There is outward and inward work to be done, and all under the guidance and power of the Holy Spirit. As missionary disciples, the charism gifts are the missionary part, and the character gifts are the discipleship part, and we should earnestly desire both types of gifts from God's goodness.

To think that we can do anything (prayer groups, children's liturgy, parish leadership, soup kitchens, evangelisation through social media, teaching as a catechist, youth groups, welcoming ministry, raising a family etc) without the Holy Spirit and His charisms – is sheer lunacy. But with Him all things are possible, fruitful, and effective.

If there isn't room for the Holy Spirit's charisms to operate in your corner of the restoration work – make room. Get your team together, collectively surrender your whole ministry to His leadership, beg the Holy Spirit together for the charisms your team needs, and spend time in prayer each time you come together seeking His guidance and direction, and be open to changing your plans according to His.
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Make room in your hearts and minds too. Get hold of resources that have experiential knowledge of how charisms operate, and study them. Visit ministries in similar fields to yours where charisms are operating, and let the possibilities of what God can do get you on your knees seeking Him with all your heart.

The Gospel for the weekend of 8/9 September 2018, 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B, is taken from the end of Chapter 7 of St Mark. It tells the story of a group of people bringing a man, who is both deaf and unable to speak clearly, to Jesus. In response Jesus takes the man well away from the crowd, to where he can have a very personal encounter with Jesus. As part of this encounter Jesus sighs as He commands 'Be Opened'.

This is a much longer and detailed reflection on this Gospel passage than was possible via Instagram. (@pcav3473)

Jesus is back on home turf in the ten towns of Galilee after an absence. Are the people who bring the man to Jesus hostile or friendly towards Him? Either is possible, but the more we understand what it meant to be deaf and unable to speak clearly in Jewish culture, the more the balance swings towards friendly.

Being deaf is a very isolating experience at the best of times, but it was even worse for someone living in a culture based on oral tradition. To participate fully in the religious life of a Jew you had to be able to hear: in particular to hear the sound of the shofar, the blowing of the ram's horn that is part of several important feast days, and used to sound warnings. You also had to be able to speak: in particular to recite the Shemar at the prescribed times of the day, (viz, 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is the one Lord …). Some rabbinical teachings said it was enough to try to recite it accurately, others said it didn't count unless it was recited perfectly.

There were special laws that decreed that those both unable to hear and unable to speak clearly were to be treated as minors, ie without legal status. Think about how much haggling was part and parcel of most business transactions and you can begin to understand why. Thus unless you were able to find a sympathetic advocate who took the time to question you in the approved manner, a person deaf and unable to speak clearly was unable to buy and retain property and unable to marry.

Even if this man had somehow been able to learn who Jesus claimed to be, having no legal status he would have been unable to request healing from Jesus. That is why people had to bring him to Jesus and he could not approach Jesus on his own. To do that for the deaf man, in the absence of any obvious axe to grind eg healing on the Sabbath, would require a significant level of compassion. Hence the likelihood of friendly.

Due to these known difficulties of life for a deaf person, it is no longer a surprise that Jesus does not hesitate to come to this man's assistance.

What is interesting is that Jesus takes him somewhere private. It feels like there is more to it than just needing to be away from eyes that might class these actions of Jesus (putting fingers in his ears, and spittle on his tongue) as weird. There is a layer of intimacy and personal encounter that feels just as essential as the weird stuff.

Here's the kicker.
What if this story doesn't only relate to the earthly realm, but also relates to the supernatural realm?

The citizens of the supernatural realm are able to hear God in that realm and to speak forth from that hearing for Kingdom of God purposes. These are people we would class as having prophetic gifting (prophecy, visions, dreams, word of knowledge, discernment of spirits etc). God regularly shows them His mind, His heart, His plans, His secrets. They co-operate by speaking forth these things according to God's timing and thereby bringing the active power of God to bear in the earthly realm. For example, in the passage from Ezekiel 37:1-14 about the dry bones, God commands that the prophet speak to the bones in His name.

What if access to the supernatural realm was supposed to be normal, as normal as hearing and speaking in the earthly realm is?

We know that Moses desired that everyone prophesy and be filled with the Holy Spirit (Num 11:29). We know that God promised through the prophet Joel (Joel 3:1-5) that a time would come that everyone would prophesy, dream and have visions. On the day of Pentecost St Peter declared that this promise from Joel was now a reality. Could this sigh of Jesus be an expression of His longing that this be true for everyone?

The adage 'sheep make sheep, and shepherds make shepherds' has had fresh resonance recently. Sheep making sheep is the laity going out into their daily tasks and evangelising and making new disciples of Jesus. Shepherds making shepherds is the role of leaders to not be bottlenecks but to notice those with leadership potential and to call them forth and train them to be good leaders and to surpass their mentors.

Consider the normal way people come into a living relationship with the Holy Spirit. It is person to person, a person (or persons) infilled by the Holy Spirit praying over someone who hasn't yet been filled with the Holy Spirit. But there could be around 5-10% of people for whom God acts sovereignly, infilling them with the Holy Spirit without any active human co-operation. Consider Ananias praying over the future St Paul vs the Holy Spirit coming down on Cornelius and his household while St Peter was still speaking.

Is it possible that prophetic gifting is transmitted in a similar way? For sure there are still sovereign acts of God, a la Amos and his prophetic call, and young Samuel under Eli the priests's care. But what if the usual way is for someone with prophetic gifting to pray over someone without prophetic gifting? What if the usual way is how it is described in this Mark 7:31-37 passage?

Those of us deaf to the ways of the supernatural realm have no legal standing there. We are helpless unless a group of people with prophetic gifting have enough compassion to bring us one by one to the Lord Jesus in prayer, asking Him for citizenship for us. Then knowing His ways, taking each one to places of prayer and quiet where that profound personal encounter with Jesus can happen in His timing. Extended times of personal prayer with Jesus precede the activation of those prophetic gifts and flow from those prophetic gifts.

Why is this so important?
Because in order to come into alignment with God's will, we need to have some certainty of God's will, and that comes from the prophetic gifting. Otherwise we are like deaf people trying to lip read what God is trying to communicate to us, and unable to release the kingdom power that flows from that alignment. Even the best of lip-readers only catch around 30-45% of the message through lip-reading alone.

If this is God's usual way of doing things, then it makes sense for those young in prophetic gifting to have those mature and experienced in prophetic gifting contactable during the journey to maturity in those gifts.
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But it begins with groups of those with prophetic gifting having deep compassion for those unable to function as citizens of the supernatural realm and praying for them, one by one.

​This particular Pentecost has had a huge build up, and expectations are running high. Please God, this will be the breakthrough we have all been longing for, the long promised tsunami of grace.

So what should our final preparations be?

Firstly a recognition that this is God's work; not ours. The primary witness to the resurrection of Jesus is the Holy Spirit. The rest of us are secondary witnesses. Without Him we can do nothing.

Secondly a willingness to let the Holy Spirit surprise us; an openness to Him working in unexpected ways that might initially make us feel uncomfortable.

Thirdly, and most importantly, total surrender to Him. What does this consist of? What does it look like? Putting all your hopes and dreams and plans in God's care, and being happy if none of them come to pass - as long as God's will is done in us and through us. At the beginning of the rite of ordination to the priesthood, the candidates come forward, and lay down prostrate on the floor to symbolise that they are giving themselves completely to God for His purposes, and the renunciation of everything of their own will in favour of His.
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Our model and our hope in these final preparations is the mother of Jesus. With her assistance what is most difficult becomes easier, and whatever obstacles there are decrease and dissolve. May her intercession obtain for us the grace of complete co-operation with the Holy Spirit. Amen.

This blog-post is a compilation of a few off-line emails about the topic of the charismatic gift of tongues. Maybe they might go some way to answering your own questions on this topic.

Firstly, here is some recommended reading.

The first book I’ve recommended is They Speak With Other Tongues by John Sherrill
It is a classic book, which he recently updated for its 40th anniversary. In the early 1960s he began to research this phenomenon, and obtained interviews and information and put it all together in the book. Because it is written as an outsider looking in, you can follow along and make your own conclusions. If you have read it before, go back and re-read it. I re-read it last year and have recently finished rereading it again, and I am appreciating nuances of it today that even 12 months ago would have gone over my head.

The second book is As By A New Pentecost by Patti Mansfield Gallagher
It tells the story of how the Catholic Charismatic Renewal began, and how it was preceded by the actions of Pope Leo XIII and the various Pentecostal movements of the first half of the 20th century. I have yet to read it, because it is only available in hardcopy, but I have watched a few video-clips of Patti telling the story, and it is both an inspiring and a sad story. Sad because the Catholic Church would have received this gift much earlier if it had responded to Pope Leo XIII’s requests with vigour; inspiring because it shows that God responds magnificently when we call out to Him in faith.
Here is one of those video-clips https://youtu.be/twizOkRIzLo

Primarily the Catholic Church provides holistic support for the gift of tongues because in Council under the guidance of the Holy Spirit the canon of Scripture was put together by the Church in the 3rd/4th centuries, which includes the New Testament writings about speaking in tongues. If this gift wasn't considered real and relevant we wouldn't have the Gospel of Mark, the Acts of the Apostles or 1 Corinthians in the canon of Scripture.

How do you know it’s the Holy Spirit? Usually it is an act of faith and trust, and sometimes there is evidence of God’s fingerprints. The same can be said for any method of prayer.

In the ‘They Speak With Other Tongues’ book there is a story of the author making recordings of people praying in tongues and one woman said that for her she needed to pray about a specific situation in order to do so. The author knew his wife had been having trouble writing an article with a deadline, and he suggested this situation, and the woman used the author as a proxy for his wife. She prayed over him in tongues, and he felt something spiritually and emotionally, and his wife completed the article in record time. Whether the praying woman felt anything is unknown. God's fingerprints are all over this situation.

There is an effect that St Paul talks about in 1 Cor 14:4, ‘The one with the gift of tongues talks for his own benefit’, but there are other translations eg ‘Anyone who speaks in a tongue edifies themselves’ or ‘A person who speaks in tongues is strengthened personally’.

Patti Gallagher Mansfield talks about praying in tongues as refreshment for the soul/spirit, and others writers speak about health benefits. This effect is one way you can tell that the Holy Spirit has been at work in addition to the classic signs of the activity of the Spirit of God in Gal 5:22, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, trustfulness, gentleness and self-control.

The gift of tongues is one of those situations where the adage applies, ‘For those who believe, no explanation is necessary. For those who do not believe, no explanation will be sufficient’. That blessed leap of faith is the gap between.

John Sherrill talks about an interesting experiment in his book. Together with the recordings he made from people who believed they had the gift of tongues, he added in two recordings that were pure gibberish, and then asked some linguistic experts to comment. The former mostly had discernible structures of language, the gibberish did not, and it was quite obviously different.

Do people when they pray in tongues know whether they are praising God or interceding for a situation? Not for sure they don’t. If they have formed an intention to do one or the other, then the expectation is that language will flow according to that intention. If no intention has been formed, then sometimes the rhythms and cadence will give a clue. But do we know for sure? Not unless someone is around who can interpret.

I think this is what St Paul meant when he said that you have to be willing to look foolish before you can truly be wise (1 Cor 3:18). There are few things as foolish looking as someone taking the early steps of yielding to God and letting Him control the vocal chords. But it is extraordinary and necessary training, because the same willingness to look foolish and to yield to God is necessary for the gifts of prophecy, miracles, healing etc to happen.

In preparation for the 1967 weekend at the Ark & Dove, the student group read through the first 4 chapters of the Acts of the Apostles, and also ‘The Cross and the Switchblade’. David Mangan was drawn to the Greek word used by St Luke in Acts 1:8 that gets translated ‘power’. In the Greek this word has the same roots as the word we use for dynamite. David wanted to see the dynamite power of the Holy Spirit in action, and he prayed for this.

David Mangan had reasoned it out this way. He wanted to experience the dynamite of the Holy Spirit, and he wanted to hear someone speak in tongues, but he was intelligent enough to know that he’d never believe if it was someone else, there would always be some doubt if it was someone else, so he wrote down in his notebook, ‘I want to hear someone speak in tongues: me’.

The charism list in 1 Cor 12:8-10 are all gifts that have the power to change lives dramatically: preaching with wisdom; preaching instruction; faith, healing; miracles: prophecy; recognising spirits; gift of tongues; ability to interpret them.

The gift of tongues is in that list. It wasn’t left out.

There are plenty of gifts of prayer (vocal, mental, contemplative) and many acceptable forms of prayer (liturgy of the hours, lectio divina, rosary, prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, spontaneous prayer, the Jesus prayer, singing hymns, novenas etc) and they all have their impact according to the mysterious co-workings of our efforts, His will and His grace.

But there is something about the gift of tongues that aids a connection with the dynamite of the Holy Spirit that has no comparison. When individuals and groups pray this way, the spiritual climate changes, and in some way access to the other charisms in the 1 Cor 12:8-10 list becomes easier.

Re-reading Romans 8:26-27 in the light of the gift of tongues is worth doing:

The Spirit too comes to help us in our weakness. For when we cannot choose words in order to pray properly, the Spirit Himself expresses our plea in a way that could never be put into words, and God who knows everything in our hearts knows perfectly well what He means, and that the pleas of the saints expressed by the Spirit are according to the mind of God.

This is true of all prayer, but it is especially true of the gift of tongues.

Any prayer that God Himself prays in us is going to be according to His will, and is going to have a swift answer.

The gift of tongues underlines in a dramatic manner that it is the Holy Spirit who prays in us, who causes us to call out ‘Abba Father’ (Romans 8:15)

We see human analogies of this gift in families, both with youngsters who communicate their needs quite well without words and sentences, and with adults who with insider family jargon can communicate with a specific grunt and gesture a whole page worth of meaning.

I thought the story from John Sherrill’s book was instructive, where someone gets called to a hospital to pray for a seriously ill girl, and this person has no idea whether to pray for death or for complete healing, so the decision is made to pray in tongues, because God knows what is needed and what is perfect. This person prays for a while and as the prayer continues the impression that the girl will make a full recovery grows. She indeed made a full recovery. The praying in tongues was the equivalent of praying ‘May Your kingdom come in this situation’.

We know that the pleas of the saints as expressed by the Spirit are according to the mind of God, so God is not going to curse Himself, and likewise when under His influence we are not going to curse Him either. Sons and daughters of God don’t do that.

You could say that prayer in tongues is more effective at getting God to answer the prayer the way God thinks it should be answered, especially in emergency and spiritual warfare situations.

Each of us has a multitude of weapons of prayer in our private arsenals. We turn to some forms of prayer when seeking discernment. We turn to other forms of prayer when praying for healing. We turn to other forms of prayer when we want to study the life of Jesus more closely. We turn to other forms of prayer when praying for big miracles.

You can think of the gift of tongues as just another weapon in your prayer arsenal. Like any weapon in that arsenal we can choose to use it, or ignore it. We can use to learn it well and skillfully, or bumble-footedly.

To use the same prayer weapon for every situation would be loopy, just like using a bread knife is loopy if you need to carve meat and you possess a carving knife.

If you are still on the outside looking in, the arguments boil down to:

Is God good? Mark 10:18

Does He only give good gifts? Matt 7:11

Why would God give the gift of tongues to so many people as described in the Acts of the Apostles (eg Acts 10:44-46, at Pentecost and elsewhere) if it wasn’t a good and necessary gift for the Matt 28:19-20 mission?

Are speaking in tongues a gift of the Spirit? 1 Cor 12:10

If the answers are Yes, then we have to believe that speaking in tongues is a good gift, and a worthwhile gift to have, otherwise it would not have been so widely prevalent among believers in the early Church. We know for a fact that St Paul spoke in tongues, (1 Cor 14:18), and that he thought it was a good gift, otherwise he would not have provided teaching on it. We also have him saying, 'Imitate me as I imitate Christ' (1 Cor 11:1).

If you are willing to let God be God, and to let Him be able to do things in you that are beyond your ability to comprehend, then all you have to do is ask and wait:
 
Holy Spirit I believe in You. I believe that Your power to save is mighty indeed. I believe that You bestow good gifts for good purposes among the members of the Body of Christ. Although I struggle, I believe that the gift of tongues that I have so much trouble wrapping my mind around is also one of Your gifts. If You want to give it to me, I want to receive it. I don't want to be without Your heavenly weapons in the battles that I must face against the enemies of our souls. You know my fears, You know my reluctance, but You also know that I am willing to trust You and follow where You lead me. Help me. Amen.
St Paul, Apostle of Jesus, pray for me.