Plenary, 09 Dec 2009
Meeting date: Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Official Report
420KB pdf
Time for Reflection
Good afternoon. As always, our first item of business is time for reflection. Our time for reflection leader today is Father John Campbell, from the parish of St Paul the Apostle, Shettleston, in Glasgow.
Father John Campbell (Parish of Saint Paul the Apostle, Shettleston, Glasgow):
Good afternoon.
"What are we to do with a wee lassie?" I am ashamed to say that that was my reply when my mother phoned to tell me that I was an uncle again. You see, I am the oldest of four boys, I already had three nephews, and then, after a gap of eight years, the first girl in the family arrived: a wee niece Olivia.
In a very male environment, that has been a very steep, but enjoyable and different, learning curve. When the boys were toddlers and I was out and about with them, I used to be secretly quite chuffed when people mistook me for their dad, but now I am raging when people look and say, "Oh, your granddaughter's lovely".
Olivia is a very lovely and loving child, and she likes you to carry her. However, she is amazingly restless and could easily jump out of your arms. It is not the first time that she has thrown herself backward while sitting on my shoulders and I have been left with her shrieking with delight, hanging down my back upside-down. Her restlessness comes from a desire to be up and around and enjoying life.
In the Christian community, we have just begun the season of Advent, using the Old Testament prophesies to help us to recognise our own restlessness. The prophesies present a perfect humanity, relating perfectly to each other, living together perfectly—the kind of society that we all dream of. The scriptures heighten our longing for that society, recognising that the resulting restlessness should become the motivation for turning our longings and dreams into reality. The Advent scriptures encourage us to be dissatisfied with the status quo.
I am sure that it was dissatisfaction with the status quo that led you to embrace politics as a way of turning your desire and dreams of a better life and society into activity for a better life and society. As a constituent and beneficiary of your efforts, I applaud your vision, your generosity and your activity on behalf of others.
May you be continually dissatisfied with the status quo.