Provincial Superior’s Christmas Message, December, 2016

Provincial Superior’s Christmas Message, December, 2016
Merry Christmas as We Celebrate the Gift that Each one of us Is to the Spiritan Family!

Not only in the Christian world, but also in the secular one, Christmas is a time to give gifts to family and friends. I remember, as a child, looking forward earnestly to Christmas for the gifts of new clothes, shoes, belt, and especially the monetary gifts our uncles, aunties, in-laws, grand parents, etc. will give my siblings and me. Of course, all these gifts are incomplete without an abundance of white rice and stew, with an unusually big sizes of meat, on Christmas Day itself. In reality, little attachment to or meaning came across from Christmas other than these expectations of gifts and merry making. Now that I am older, and a Spiritan, I understand better!

Now I know that theologians and biblical scholars have looked at, from different purview, and dissected into various parts, the Nativity story of Jesus, and the possible meanings enshrouded in the Incarnation of Christ. These opinions are well known, and have been repeated every Advent. What is less known is the Spiritan take on the Nativity of Jesus, especially the link between the Spiritans and the theological connectivity of the Holy Spirit to the Incarnation and the reality of every Spiritan’s Vocation. To understand the connection between Christmas as the celebration of the birth of Jesus is the idea of GIFT, God’s gift of his Son to the world. To understand the sense and meaning of this GIFT, for Spiritans, is to understand the meaning of each Spiritan’s Vocation, and the beginning of the appreciation of every Spiritan Confrere.

A neglected aspect of the Nativity Story, which is important to every Spiritan, I think, is the fact that every human life is a gift of the Holy Spirit. In fact, the Holy Spirit gives life, before he gives his seven gifts to human beings. Every doubt of this reality is cast out from the story of Jesus’ Incarnation. Jesus is the proof that God gives life, through the Holy Spirit, as his first gift. John’s gospel makes this clear, when John says, “For God so loved the world that he GAVE his only Son” (John 3:16). The GIFT of God to the world is a human being, Jesus Christ, the Son of God. This gift of LIFE, Jesus Christ, has to be received and appreciated. This is what John says, in his Prologue, to this effect: “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” (John 1:12-13).

From the one GIFT of God, Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, human beings have become one family, one brotherhood and sisterhood – children of God. Faith makes this possible, because we “receive” him in faith. The Holy Spirit, though himself invisible, makes visible what is invisible—the gift of LIFE—the “Word became flesh.” Indeed, we now have a new definition of brotherhood and sisterhood beyond consanguinity—”life” as a gift of the Holy Spirit, and a sharing in the Sonship of Jesus. This GIFT, Jesus Christ, is the reason for the season of Advent and for the celebration of Christmas. Yes, for us Spiritans, there is more: we celebrate our vocation as a unique gift of the Holy Spirit to his Congregation, the Spiritan Family.

Indeed, I want to share with all my confreres this new meaning I draw from the Christmas celebration, far beyond pecuniary gifts and sumptuous Christmas food. I want to reflect on “gift,” given by the Holy Spirit; not the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, but an incarnational gift; this time, not the miracle of the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, but the Holy Spirit’s gifts to his Congregation, The Congregation of the Holy Spirit, Under the Protection of the Pure Heart of Mary. The “gifts” in question are you and me, every Spiritan. My intuition comes from the Spiritan Rule of Life 34: “In our community each and all are looked upon as confreres, received from the Lord. Each individual according to his gifts—young, old, in health, in sickness—each one has gifts from which all draw benefit.” Look at the reciprocity: each confrere is both a gift and a bearer of gifts! In other words, God gives us to the world as gifts in order to give gifts to the world.

It follows, therefore, that each confrere is an irreplaceable gift of the Holy Spirit to our Spiritan Family. To say that a “gift” is “irreplaceable” does not mean indispensable, but it is to say that each Spiritan is unique, designed for a purpose and given to the Spiritan Family for the achievement of spectacular tasks. The value of every Spiritan’s Vocation is measured by the accomplishment of the particular task the Holy Spirit, in his magnanimity, has assigned to each Spiritan. The tragedy of every Spiritan Vocation stems from the lack of recognition and acceptance of our uniqueness and the importance of executing our Spirit-given tasks, as unique gifts of his to our Spiritan Family and to the world at large. The signs of this tragedy are jealousy, rancor and enmity. When power trumps service, when tribe becomes stronger than love, when self-interests compromise collective initiatives and projects; in a nutshell, when Cor Unum et Anima Una is sent to oblivion, then we become individuals, no longer Spiritans.

To be a Spiritan is to be endowed with a mission, just as Jesus’ mission was that of being the saviour of the world. This mission is accomplished in youthfulness or old-age, in sickness or good health, because it is a mission of witness to LIFE, Jesus who is a gift of God. It is also a vision of life, given to each one of us by the Holy Spirit. A vision with a difference, because it is a Messianic vision; this vision is the opening sentence of our Spiritan Rule of Life 1:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor (Luke 4:18).

For a Spiritan, then, to celebrate Christmas is not only the celebration of the birth of Jesus, but also a celebration of the privilege to share in the mission of Jesus Christ, the Messianic mission. So, we celebrate our vocations as unique gifts from the Holy Spirit in order to promote a world of justice and peace, to etch a place for the poor and the weak in our hearts and ministries. It is to be a permanent sign and reality of God’s gift of his Son to the world. To meet and work with Spiritans become an accomplishment of the Messianic wishes of God for all his children—Cor Unum et Anima Una. To be a Spiritan is to argue that it is possible to create oneness from different ethnicities, tribes, races, cultures and mentalities. It is to tell the world that, with the Holy Spirit, love of Neighbours is possible.

What the celebration of Christmas teaches us as Spiritans is the forgetfulness of self and the celebration of the other. When we accept one another as gifts from the Holy Spirit into one family, the Spiritan Family, then we do not ask what the Province can give us but what we can give to the Province. The moment that the reality of being a gift to the Spiritan Family dawns on us, we begin to see strength and unity in differences and diversity; to that degree does division and hatred and animosity give way to love, patience, peace and joy.

In a Spiritan Vocation, there are no guarantees beyond fidelity to God. The most predictable aspect of the Spiritan Vocation is its unpredictability, but its presence and actions are discernible and palpable in the world. In this regard, John says: “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit” (John 3:8). May the Holy Spirit blow each one of us into leaving behind us the traces of joy, peace and love on our respective missionary paths!

Merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year, 2017!
Ayodele Ayeni, C.S.Sp.