Parish Letter Fourth Sunday Easter A 2008
The Gate of the Sheepfold
In the Gospel today, St John presents Jesus’ teaching on authority. He uses the image of a shepherd. There are good shepherds and bad shepherds. In the words of Jesus, as preserved for us by John: “anyone who does not enter the sheepfold through the gate, but gets in some other way is a thief and a brigand.” In contradistinction: “The one who enters through the gate is the shepherd of the flock.” The legitimacy of the shepherd is evident in that, “the gate keeper lets him in,” and, “the sheep hear his voice.” The good shepherd has an intimate knowledge of, and bond with, his flock for, “one by one he calls his own sheep and leads them out.” To his call, the sheep respond, “the sheep follow because they know his voice.”
The good shepherd is a model of legitimate authority. The word authority finds its root in the word author. An author is more than just someone who writes a book or originates a project. To be an author is to be a creator and to participate in the ongoing creative activity of God the Creator. So, genuine authorship mirrors, and flows from, the creativity of God. Similarly, authentic authority, radiates, and emanates from, the authority of God. A shepherd is good to the extents that he is a shepherd after the master’s heart, to the extent that his authority flows from that of God. The image of a shepherd is central to the biblical notion of legitimate authority. The Christian tradition that we have received espouses this idea of authority both in the church and in the state.
The opposite of authority is not simply bad authority – it is abandonment. The root meaning of abandon is; “to place under a ban or authority of another.” Abandon is the establishment of an attitude that anything goes which becomes destructive of a human and social fabric. It is the absence, or loss, of leadership that, in a former era, could have maintained a better cohesiveness in society, a cohesiveness of shared values, purposes, and dreams, even. In short, abandon represents a time of dehumanization, a culture of death, a spiritual helplessness. Abandon is the emptiness caused by the absence of a truly legitimate authority.
When the flock of sheep is without a shepherd it is abandoned. To be abandoned is, simply, to be forsaken entirely, and given up by anyone providing the basic needs for daily living. A field that is abandoned is quickly overrun with weeds and becomes unproductive. It appears useless. Likewise, a building that is abandoned ends up collapsing in ruins. A domestic animal that is not fed and cared for ends up dying. A human being uncared for and unloved becomes lonely, despairing, depressed, heartbroken, and suicidal or ultimately dies.
It is easy to imagine situations of abandonment, that is, places and people who no longer receive attention. Anything that is abandoned ceases to have value and meaning. It is fit only for the junkyard, rubbish heap, and the graveyard. Abandonment happens when authority is abdicated or usurped. Abandonment happens when someone other than the shepherd, in the words of Jesus; “enters the sheepfold in some other way” other than through the gate. When a shepherd focuses his attention on himself, at the expense of the sheep, he is abandoning them. He leaves the sheep in their sad state, discontinues feeling responsible, and ceases to have compassion, for them. We do not need to go into the specifics of abandonment and illegitimate authority in this bulletin.
Suffice it to say, again, that authority finds its root in an author, and God is the Author after whom all authors take. God is the Good Shepherd, in whose steps all shepherds must follow. Exercising authority ought to author life, give growth, increase value, engender hope, facilitate reconciliation, initiate healing, open up possibilities, and give reasons to rejoice. Those under authority need to flourish and to thrive; to actualize and to realize the liberating truth about who they truly are. Authority ennobles society and enhances humanity.
Let us pray for authority in our country, as we live through a rough patch of national history, replete with abandonment. Let us pray that God, the Author and Creator may give us leaders who participate in his creative authority. Let us pray that Our Lord Jesus, the Gate of the Sheepfold, may give us shepherds, in the church and in the country, who enter through the gate. Amen.
May God Bless You Always Fr. William Guri, C.Ss.R.

Parish Letter Third Sunday of Easter 2008

The Road to Emmaus – Jesus our Hope

In today’s Gospel we encounter the two disciples on the Road to Emmaus. They had spent Passover weekend in Jerusalem. They had gone up to Jerusalem with great excitement and expectations. They had real hopes that this Passover would change their lives significantly.
Upon arriving in Jerusalem, they were told that, only the week before, Jesus had been welcomed into the Holy City as a King. They quickly joined onto the great expectation that during Passover week Jesus was going to transform their lives. He was the Messiah who they had waited for and they hoped that he would liberate them. They had been oppressed for far too long. They could not imagine going into another week of the same wretched living they had been subjected to. So this change was welcome. The Messiah was badly needed and the stage had been set for the final showdown between their Saviour and all the forces that assailed them.
The death of Jesus must have been a disappointment of unimaginable proportions for the Emmaus disciples, and all the people who had pinned their hopes on him. When people are making sacrifices in anticipation of a new dispensation, they don’t care about the cost. When that dispensation fails to come, then people feel utterly crushed by the cost of the sacrifices made. They feel robbed, cheated, used, fooled, taken for a ride and betrayed. They feel bad about themselves. They get depressed; see no point in living and some may even take their lives. Sad things do happen to people whose hopes have been shattered, whose dreams have been stolen, and whose chances for change have slipped out of their grasp like a handful of sand. It is very difficult to find a new reason for living, a purpose for going on and even the desire to do anything that was formerly pleasant. The saddest human thing is not just to die – it is to have one’s dream and hope killed, taken away or in some other way destroyed.
This week I have seen the Emmaus disciples on the streets of Harare. I have been one of them. I have seen our people walking back to the same life that they had hoped much, and sacrificed much for, to change. The recent elections have given us an acutely painful experience of anxiety. We could never have been more similar to the frightened Emmaus disciples. We walked in the dark, trudging home-ward, downcast, wounded, bruised, hurting, to face the same fate we have been trying to shake off our backs for almost a decade. We walked homeward dreading the worst.
I found great solace in the prayer that we say after the Our Father: “Deliver us, Lord, from every evil, and grant us peace in our day. In your mercy keep us free from sin and protect us from all anxiety as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Saviour Jesus Christ.” I leant anew, that Jesus is the Lord who comes in the times of our greatest human need. Through this prayer, at Mass and at many other times during the day, I felt the presence of Jesus in the midst of our collective national darkness. That presence was comforting for me, and I shared that prayer with many others, who felt the same. Jesus is not far away when we come face to face with evil, when we are tempted to sin, and when we are harassed internally by anxiety. Tuning in to his presence is what made the day for the Emmaus disciples. We can learn from the Emmaus turnaround.
On the road to Emmaus, the Lord Jesus joined the dejected disciples. They opened up to him, and he opened the scriptures to them. He opened their minds and hearts to a new vision, a new hope. He restored their shattered dreams. Through their generosity and care, they invited Jesus into their home. He took their bread, broke it and shared it with them. Then they realised it was he. They realised that he had been with them all along the path of dejection and hopelessness. They were filled with a new enthusiasm and even the darkness of the night did not bother them. They were galvanised to go and share the good news that he had risen, all was not lost, a new life was still possible for all.
We have come to the Eucharist today after a week of walking like the sad Emmaus disciples. We come to meet Jesus who is risen, who has conquered death and evil. We come to meet our Saviour, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world. May our Eucharist be a meeting with Jesus; to walk along the difficult road of our lives with him, to listen to the enlightening scriptures with him, and to break and share bread with him. It is by inviting Jesus into the sadness of our life, that we are filled with a new and transforming enthusiasm, and no amount of darkness and evil can take that away from us. Let us allow Jesus to feed our tired hearts with his word and sacrament in this Eucharist.
Yours in the Risen Christ Fr. William Guri, C.Ss.R.

Parish Letter Easter Sunday A 2008 He is risen Alleluia!!
I saw a large poster once, outside the precincts of a great city, which was placed so as to catch the attention of every comer and goer. It read ‘Christ is the Answer.’ The cynic in me retorted inwardly, ‘What is the question?’ I am sure many people are tempted to ask the same question when they see bold proclamations like ‘Christ is the Answer!’ In a world full of many unanswered questions, it is little wonder that such a hunger for answers exists. People like me can easily miss out on the reality of the unanswered questions that we live with daily, because of our fleeting cynicism. When I got myself to take that poster more seriously, I did go through an endless list of unanswered questions. Some of them are my own.
I was fascinated most by those that tended to have a theological bent to them. Why do we die? Why do people die young? Why is there so much suffering around? Why do people have to suffer long illnesses when they are going to die anyway? Why do some people seem untouched by pain and suffering at all in their life, while for some pain and suffering is their daily bread? Is God aware of human suffering? Does God care that we suffer? Is God interested in human suffering? Does God allow human suffering? Can God stop or end human suffering? Will God use pain and suffering in the next world? Do we suffer in proportion to our sinfulness? Is there any point in suffering? What is the meaning of suffering? The list of questions invoked by human suffering can go on and on.
Some of the questions are generic and others are specific to time, place and person. There is a host of unanswered questions specific to our time, to our country and our nation. We are living in this country with some questions that are very difficult to answer. As a nation we have become accustomed to have these questions unanswered and keep on going. Some of these questions query God’s goodness, presence among us, and for care us. As a priest I often bear the brunt of the of a questioning nation. The faithful, too, are put on the bar because our unanswered national questions challenge the heart of our Christian faith. We enter into the celebration of Jesus resurrection with these questions. Our hope as a nation is that the resurrection may shed a light on our plight and, perchance, help us to find answers for the hard questions that have become or daily bread in recent years.
Jesus is the answer to these questions. In his obedience to the Father, Jesus became a human being. He did not become a human being the way that actors become a historic person in a play. Jesus became fully and truly a human being. He was open to all human experience; its joys and delights, its sorrows and pains. He was like us in everything, except sin. So he became in every sense part of suffering humanity, party of questioning humanity. He lived with our frailty and vulnerability. He experienced the ambiguity of our condition – prone to both happiness and sadness.
Jesus brought to humanity the ability to remain steadfast despite suffering. Through his teaching, preaching, healing, celebrating life, enduring the realities of life, Jesus showed us the way to be faithful, straightforward, committed, happy, compassionate and caring in spite of the human condition. He showed us that being a human being is not an excuse for not loving, not caring, not being happy and not being compassionate. In a much more profound way, Jesus showed us that it is possible to remain a good human being even when all odds are against you. His passion and death on the cross, and how faithfully obedient to the Father he remained, just proved his teaching and practice about the ability of human being to triumph despite suffering. In his humanity Jesus transformed the experiences that inspire the most dread in human being namely suffering and death. By his stripes and wounds, we are healed. By his dying we are brought to a life that does not end. The resurrection is this triumph. It is Jesus’ triumph and it is our triumph too, for we are his followers. We celebrate the resurrection today and remind ourselves that if we are faithful and obedient to God, nothing, absolutely nothing, can stop us. Even death cannot stop us! Jesus is indeed the answer! In the risen Jesus Christ, humanity has the answer to all its most perplexing questions.
Wishing you all a very happy Easter Fr. William Guri, C.Ss.R.

Parish Letter Easter Sunday A 2008 He is risen Alleluia!!
I saw a large poster once, outside the precincts of a great city, which was placed so as to catch the attention of every comer and goer. It read ‘Christ is the Answer.’ The cynic in me retorted inwardly, ‘What is the question?’ I am sure many people are tempted to ask the same question when they see bold proclamations like ‘Christ is the Answer!’ In a world full of many unanswered questions, it is little wonder that such a hunger for answers exists. People like me can easily miss out on the reality of the unanswered questions that we live with daily, because of our fleeting cynicism. When I got myself to take that poster more seriously, I did go through an endless list of unanswered questions. Some of them are my own.
I was fascinated most by those that tended to have a theological bent to them. Why do we die? Why do people die young? Why is there so much suffering around? Why do people have to suffer long illnesses when they are going to die anyway? Why do some people seem untouched by pain and suffering at all in their life, while for some pain and suffering is their daily bread? Is God aware of human suffering? Does God care that we suffer? Is God interested in human suffering? Does God allow human suffering? Can God stop or end human suffering? Will God use pain and suffering in the next world? Do we suffer in proportion to our sinfulness? Is there any point in suffering? What is the meaning of suffering? The list of questions invoked by human suffering can go on and on.
Some of the questions are generic and others are specific to time, place and person. There is a host of unanswered questions specific to our time, to our country and our nation. We are living in this country with some questions that are very difficult to answer. As a nation we have become accustomed to have these questions unanswered and keep on going. Some of these questions query God’s goodness, presence among us, and for care us. As a priest I often bear the brunt of the of a questioning nation. The faithful, too, are put on the bar because our unanswered national questions challenge the heart of our Christian faith. We enter into the celebration of Jesus resurrection with these questions. Our hope as a nation is that the resurrection may shed a light on our plight and, perchance, help us to find answers for the hard questions that have become or daily bread in recent years.
Jesus is the answer to these questions. In his obedience to the Father, Jesus became a human being. He did not become a human being the way that actors become a historic person in a play. Jesus became fully and truly a human being. He was open to all human experience; its joys and delights, its sorrows and pains. He was like us in everything, except sin. So he became in every sense part of suffering humanity, party of questioning humanity. He lived with our frailty and vulnerability. He experienced the ambiguity of our condition – prone to both happiness and sadness.
Jesus brought to humanity the ability to remain steadfast despite suffering. Through his teaching, preaching, healing, celebrating life, enduring the realities of life, Jesus showed us the way to be faithful, straightforward, committed, happy, compassionate and caring in spite of the human condition. He showed us that being a human being is not an excuse for not loving, not caring, not being happy and not being compassionate. In a much more profound way, Jesus showed us that it is possible to remain a good human being even when all odds are against you. His passion and death on the cross, and how faithfully obedient to the Father he remained, just proved his teaching and practice about the ability of human being to triumph despite suffering. In his humanity Jesus transformed the experiences that inspire the most dread in human being namely suffering and death. By his stripes and wounds, we are healed. By his dying we are brought to a life that does not end. The resurrection is this triumph. It is Jesus’ triumph and it is our triumph too, for we are his followers. We celebrate the resurrection today and remind ourselves that if we are faithful and obedient to God, nothing, absolutely nothing, can stop us. Even death cannot stop us! Jesus is indeed the answer! In the risen Jesus Christ, humanity has the answer to all its most perplexing questions.
Wishing you all a very happy Easter Fr. William Guri, C.Ss.R.

Waiting in Hope

Today is the forth day after the national harmonised elections. March 29 was a critical day for Zimbabwe. People went to vote in order to bring to an end, once and for all, the suffering that they have endured for almost a decade. This year has been particularly painful for Zimbabweans. With inflation in the regions of 200000% the cost of living in Zimbabwe has become acutely painful. Domestic workers earn $500million dollars a month which is just about one US dollar. In the first three months of the year the prices of basic commodities has increased hundreds of times. It is a wonder that people are still alive. They are barely making it, just surviving. The essential service delivery system has all collapsed. Unemploymetn at +80% is more the norm than the exception. So, the just ended election was looked upon by all as thier only chance for a change. A change of the regime that has throttled the life of the nation in the last 8 years. Between two presidential contestants, Morgan Tsvangirai and Simba Makoni, most urban voters were not very clear who they wanted. But that was not a big problem. What people were absolutely clear about, what they knew and wanted, was for Mugabe to go. So they voted with their feet. All they wanted to see on their presidential ballot paper was that the space next to Mugabe remained blank, unchecked, when they dropped it into the box. Then the waiting began. Waiting for the announcement of the presidential ballot has been painfully long delayed. On Sunday people had begun to gather information posted outside the polling stations. Messages were criss-crossing the country and by end of the day the results were public knowledge. People were tremendously enthused by the result which clearly favoured the exit of Mugabe. Already by Sunday people began to feel great about the new era that had dawned upon the land. They felt a great sence of efficacy for they had brouhgt about their own emancipation through the ballot. They had given one last chance to democracy, perchance, before they died. For death in one of the byproducts of the regime that they are desperately fighting to overthrow. There were cautious celebrations, and whispers of joy. People could not wait to erupt with jubilation on the announcement of the election result. On Monday the reality dawned on the nation that the announcement of the result was not going to come so easily. The Zimbabwe Election Commission began announcing parlimanetary poll results very slowly. They announced the same set of results three times in English, Shona and Ndebele. It was needless to do that - it would have sufficed to announce the result once in English. The announcement was not orderly and they shuffled randomly between the constituents. We have had to endure painfully for 3 days the announcement of the parliamentary election, even as we wait for the presidential election result. It has been very anxiety provoking. I have seen people looking absolutely dejected and hopeless. What seemed to have depressed people most is the thought that Mugabe was trying to manipulate the vote result by announcing it so slowly. People could not imagine another stolen election, another dubious Mugabe victory and another five years under this regime. If there is anything that the people of Zimbabwe want so badly now it is the truth, and they know that the truth is that they have voted Mugabe out. So why can't we just have it? Waiting for the presidential result has been a real test on hope. It has been more painful, arguably, than the 8 years that Mugabe has pontificated over the ruin of this country. How can one sustain hope in a situation like this? How can one remain motivated to live, to work and to go on with life? Can there be a hope that hopes beyond this hopelessness?