Bishop Leo O’Reilly’s Homily
at the Rededication of St Dympna’s Church
Lavey, Co. Cavan, 12th June 2011
On the feast of Pentecost the Holy Spirit came down on the apostles and disciples of Jesus who were gathered in the upper room after Jesus ascended into heaven. During his life Jesus had brought this band of disciples together. He had taught them about the kingdom of God. He showed them by the example of his own life how they should live. He chose twelve of them to be the leaders of the new community. He sent them out to preach his message and to carry on his work of healing, reconciling and forgiving.
Their message was a message of life and hope and it was for the whole world. But they weren’t able to begin to preach that message yet. Before he ascended into heaven, Jesus told them to wait in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit came on them. Until the Spirit came they were like a new mobile phone but the battery hasn’t been charged yet. They could do nothing. Their mission could not begin until they had received the Holy Spirit.
So the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost is the beginning of the Church. And it is a very appropriate day for the rededication of this Church because this day marks a new beginning also, a new phase in the story of this Church and in the life of this community. This year also marks the 150th anniversary of the building of this Church. It was dedicated by Bishop James Browne on 13 October 1861 and cost £ 1,500 to build.
The most recent renovation, which has taken place over the past couple of years, saw the installation of new heating and lighting and a very tasteful redecoration of the church inside and out. The most significant part of the renovation is the reordering of the sanctuary and the construction of a new altar. This is a splendid achievement by the sculptor Donal McDonald from Kilkenny, who has done beautiful work in many other churches in the diocese and we are very happy that he is with us today for the rededication of the altar. I congratulation him, the architect, the contractors, and all who were involved in this work. It cost a lot more than fifteen hundred pounds, but it was done on a relatively low budget but still done to a very high standard of design and workmanship. I congratulate Fr Fay and Fr McElhinney and the parish committees who commissioned the work and saw it through so successfully. And I congratulate the whole community on your generous financial support for this worthy project.
The work on the church has now been completed and this community has a fitting house of God that it can be proud of. But his church is not just the house of God. We, who learned Irish at school, use the word ‘eaglais’ for ‘church’ or sometimes ‘seipeal’ – ‘chapel’. But the common word used by native speakers seems to be “teach a’ phobail” – the house of the community. That reminds us that we are the pobal Dé, the people of God, and that the purpose of the church is to gather us together as God’s people. It is to continue the work of Jesus who ‘came to gather the nations into the peace of God’s kingdom’. Jesus began, as I said, by gathering a small band of disciples and forming them into a community. And, with the power and the energy of the Holy Spirit, his work of gathering has continued throughout the world, down through the centuries since that first Pentecost Sunday that we celebrate today. And that gathering is happening here in Lavey right now. It’s not just this building that is a church. We are the Church.
When the priest says, at the end of Mass, ‘Go in peace to love and serve the Lord’, Christ is sending us out as he sent his first disciples to carry on his mission in our lives and families and workplaces. Like the disciples at Pentecost, we need the energy, the power of the Holy Spirit, to carry out this mission. Without the Spirit we are like the mobile phone that’s flat. We can’t do anything. We need to be recharged by the Spirit to give us the energy, the spiritual energy, to live like Christ and to witness to Christ in our lives.
So, ‘why to do I have to go to Mass on Sunday’? is the wrong question. The question is, ‘why do I need to go to Mass on Sunday’? I need to go to Mass on Sunday to recharge my spiritual batteries, so that I can go out and live like a follower of Jesus on Monday and every other day. It’s not easy living like Jesus. It’s not easy being honest and truthful, being chaste and charitable, being generous and faithful and forgiving. It’s not easy standing up for our faith or our Church when they are under attack. We can’t do it by ourselves. We need to be under the influence of the Holy Spirit. And when I am under the Spirit’s influence, then I can put my best foot forward and use my gifts and talents to build up the Body of Christ.
As I said, the work of physical building has been completed and done extremely well. The work of building the pobal Dé, the people of God, continues. I pray today that each one of us can recharge our spirits with the Holy Spirit as we come to Mass here every Sunday, and that we can then go out as enthusiastic followers of Christ to carry his message of life and hope to our world.
