Why “Spirituality of Communion?”

First of all, welcome to my blog! I’m really hoping to make this a bi-weekly event. It’s a great opportunity for me to start writing, what I’ve long felt called to do, and hopefully it will be a blessing for anyone who reads it.

My website is called “Spirituality of Communion” for a very specific reason, and I think it’s worth reflecting on as this blog/website is launched.

In 2001, the “Great Jubilee Year,” celebrated in the Catholic Church had ended, and Pope John Paul II released a document called Novo Millennio Ineunte. I had been deeply blessed and impressed during those years — as John Paul II had encouraged the whole world to prepare for the year 2000, not with warnings of Y2K or imminent doom, but to celebrate 2000 years since the birth of Christ.

Article 43 of that document is entitled “A Spirituality of Communion.” I remember reading that document and thinking, “Now that’s what I want to dedicate my life to!” You can read this section below:

A spirituality of communion

43. To make the Church the home and the school of communion: that is the great challenge facing us in the millennium which is now beginning, if we wish to be faithful to God’s plan and respond to the world’s deepest yearnings.

But what does this mean in practice? Here too, our thoughts could run immediately to the action to be undertaken, but that would not be the right impulse to follow. Before making practical plans, we need to promote a spirituality of communion, making it the guiding principle of education wherever individuals and Christians are formed, wherever ministers of the altar, consecrated persons, and pastoral workers are trained, wherever families and communities are being built up. A spirituality of communion indicates above all the heart’s contemplation of the mystery of the Trinity dwelling in us, and whose light we must also be able to see shining on the face of the brothers and sisters around us. A spirituality of communion also means an ability to think of our brothers and sisters in faith within the profound unity of the Mystical Body, and therefore as “those who are a part of me”. This makes us able to share their joys and sufferings, to sense their desires and attend to their needs, to offer them deep and genuine friendship. A spirituality of communion implies also the ability to see what is positive in others, to welcome it and prize it as a gift from God: not only as a gift for the brother or sister who has received it directly, but also as a “gift for me”. A spirituality of communion means, finally, to know how to “make room” for our brothers and sisters, bearing “each other’s burdens” (Gal 6:2) and resisting the selfish temptations which constantly beset us and provoke competition, careerism, distrust and jealousy. Let us have no illusions: unless we follow this spiritual path, external structures of communion will serve very little purpose. They would become mechanisms without a soul, “masks” of communion rather than its means of expression and growth.

This writing has impacted my life since that day. My understanding of this has gone from understanding it on a very personal level to understanding it on a global, inter-denominational, Jew/Gentile level. It is full of Scripture, and so there’s always more to understand, always another depth.

In January 2011, I renewed my consecration as a Sister with these words, “And so, my Lord, in the power of the Holy Spirit. . . I consecrate myself to live, proclaim, and restore a spirituality of communion as a preparation of the world for the coming of Christ in glory.”

This journey in the Spirituality of Communion has led me in these last 8 years to serve the Body of Christ in the work of unity, in a biblical understanding and love for Israel and the Jewish people, and in the ministry of healing and intercession.

So, I’d like to share parts of this journey with you — my experiences when I visit various countries, testimonies about what I see the Holy Spirit doing in the world, and perhaps a teaching or two.

Let’s pray for each other! May the Lord bless and keep you!

Sr. Mary Paul, October 15, 2019