Reflecting on the Christian call to pastoral ministry, I turned to scripture. The Gospels are bursting with examples of Jesus’ own pastoral ministry and his challenge to follow and serve in this way. ‘Feed my lambs . . . look after my sheep’ (Jn 21:15-16), ‘love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you’ (Matt 5:43), ‘Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all’ (Mark 9:35), ‘Cure the sick; raise the dead; cleanse those with . . . disease’ (Matt 10:8), and ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’ (Matt 22:39).
Through his words and actions, Jesus calls on us all to become pastoral workers, to engage with, and care for, others in our community and beyond. The Matthean Jesus pronounces, ‘I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me’ (Matt 31:35-36).
We all share in the baptismal priesthood of Christ – our thoughts, words and deeds affirm Christ’s presence in our midst.
BE THERE
I find it important to recall this in my daily work as a pastoral associate in a parish with an ageing, diverse and multicultural community. While we can’t hope to be everything to everyone all the time, we can be something to someone, some of the time. We won’t always be able to say or do or be just what another needs, yet there is always the hope that we can be that one thing to just one person once. To help another towards hope, to foster another’s love.
Henry Nouwen wrote, ‘The beginning and the end of all Christian leadership is to give your life for others . . . the willingness to cry with those who cry, laugh with those who laugh’. Not only those you know and love, or those who exert power and influence, not even those who can afford to pay you. All those whose paths cross with your own.
I once said to my brother-in-law, whom the world tragically lost in 2023, that when he spent time with another, he always made them feel like they were the only person in the world. A real gift. He looked at me from his hospital bed, where he lay hooked up to the machines that were keeping him with us just a little longer, and replied, ‘Well, they are the only person! The number of freak occurrences, decisions, aligning of planets, whatever, that causes two people to be in a particular space and time and with each other at any given moment, is ridiculous – every interaction is a one-off.’
SACREDNESS OF EACH MEETING
Can we truly appreciate this? Do we pass off chance encounters or do we treat each meeting as sacred?
As I sat with this beloved man, I wondered, could I take away his pain? Could I make the thought of death less terrifying, the aching dread of missing his young children’s journey towards adulthood less painful? But as his pain was also my pain, could I potentially understand it better? Could I make sense of the unthinkable for him? Perhaps. Probably not. However, I could be with him and share time. Perhaps that is enough. As Nouwen asks, ‘Who can take away suffering without entering into it?’
STRONG CALL
I feel a strong calling to pastoral ministry. Each time I answer the phone at work to a distressed call for anointing and the last rites I want to say, ‘Would you like me to come instead?’ I struggle with the idea that no matter whom I minister to, either in the church or over the phone, or perhaps in the hospital, that because of who I am and in which body I was born, I am not considered adequate. Yes, I can sit and listen. Yet, I cannot forgive sins. Yes, I can administer communion. Yet, I cannot anoint the dying body. If there is no priest available, my presence is not good enough. I am not enough.
I have sat with many friends and family in their last hours and found the experience to be rich and rewarding, however painful and traumatic. In those moments I have been enough, I am enough for people in need. I wonder, is the desire to care or be present for the dying person, and those who grieve them, more important than the presence of one who is ordained?
Seated at God’s right hand and given to us in the movement of the Holy Spirit, the Trinity, God-in-relationship, creator, healer, breath of our breath, to quote my friend, the divine musician and theologian Danielle Anne Lynch, Christ calls each of us to minister to those in need.
RELATIONSHIP WITH ALL CREATION
The God who cannot be named becomes present through us, is embodied with us, and revealed in us as we recognise our relationship with all creation, as we reach out to others and heal them with our touch, and as we draw into being the very life-force God gifted us through the birth, death and resurrection of Christ.
Karl Rahner exquisitely poeticised, ‘When the vessel of his body was shattered in death, Christ was poured out over all the world; he became actually, in his humanity, what he had always been according to his dignity, the heart of the world, the innermost centre of creation.’
Only when we truly comprehend this mystical truth will we understand that our call to love God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength, and our neighbours as ourselves, is paradoxically the simplest yet most difficult call of all. To care for the other, no matter who they are – this is the paradox of Christianity.
Angela Marquis has worked as a pastoral associate for the Passionist-led St Joseph’s Parish in Hobart and as administrative assistant for WATAC (Women and the Australian Church).
