The readings from the Acts of the Apostles which the Church has given us for the weekdays after Easter have given us an insight into an early Christian community facing many of the same problems the New Zealand Church is beset with today.
It is now well accepted that the high consumption lifestyles of the richer nations and wealthy elites throughout the world are primarily responsible for the most threatening ecological challenge facing the planet – climate change. Human activity, especially industrialisation, continues to harm the natural climate balance.
As New Zealand politicians debate the question of trading on Good Friday and Easter Sunday, an Australian bishop has called on his government to open for scrutiny information on working conditions. In a pastoral letter issued for last Tuesday’s feastday of St Joseph the Worker (1 May) Bishop Christopher Saunders, Chairman of the Australian Catholic Social Justice Council (ACSJC), asks for regular releases of data on the terms and conditions of Australian workplace agreements.
Many religious, family members and friends of Sr Mary Genevieve gathered at St Joseph’s Convent Chapel, Upper Hutt, on 28 March 2007 for a Thanksgiving Liturgy to celebrate her life. Born in Timaru, Joan Casey received her religious name when she was professed as a Sister of Mercy in Wellington in 1942.
A ‘pastoral genius’ of the Marist order was farewelled at the end of March. Priests and brothers of the Society of Mary, family and friends celebrated the life of Fr Michael Tomasi, known universally as Mick, in St Mary of the Angels Church, Wellington, on 30 March.
Last month, throughout the world, many people, after much prayer, guidance and reflection, decided to enter the Catholic community. This really continues the tradition that we hear so much about in our Easter readings from the Acts of the Apostles. The early church, and in the millennia ever since, has responded to the deep longing of people wanting to discover the beauty and the challenge of following this man we call Jesus.
If the first human beings were so perfect, how come it did not occur to them that in falling into sin, they would lose everything that God had given them? Was God so angry that the first people suffered tremendous punishment because they ate a piece of fruit, and we are stuck with it in our throats to this day?
Faced with an abundance of painful questions, the Yahwist author asked: why do we suffer these ills? What is their origin? He is certain that they cannot come from a good and just God, who always desires what is best for humanity.
The Adam and Eve account, along with the remaining chapters up to Abraham, is unsurpassable as an account of the origin of sin. Let us be quite clear. At the beginning of last century there was a very literal approach to certain parts of the Genesis story; the existence of Adam and Eve, the appearance of the devil in the form of a snake, though how this was reconciled with ‘one of the good creatures God made’ at the time of the tempting, I can only wonder.