I have recently finished reading Donald Cozzens’ book The Changing Face of Priesthood, first published some fourteen years ago. A fine book, though not always an easy read. I have since found out that he has recently written a new book Notes from the Underground: The Spiritual Journal of a Secular Priest which I have just ordered and very much look forward to receiving.

I have no intention of writing a review of Cozzens’ book, but I would like to pick up on a few words.

Over my seventy or so years, I have met many, and got to know, quite a few priests, and no two were the same. Admittedly you could gather some in like-minded groups, but for those I got to know well, there were significant differences. They lived their lives with bumps and scratches, sometimes flying high with eloquence and presence, at other times muddling through their daily experience like all men and women do. At times they helped, at other times, got in the way, shared many things, stood alongside me in difficulties, shared laughter and joys.

I am sure I am not alone in such experience. How do we respond to them, how does their journey on the road help us with ours?

Cozzens writes “Gradually the priest comes to understand that he must live out his vocation under the twin banners of fidelity and integrity” (p67). That sentence could be summarised in just one word, authenticity.  We recognise the authentic person not just by what he or she says but who they are, how real they are, the relationships they make. It is a continuous thread throughout this book, how to get real, how to be authentic.

That surely, is the struggle that all priests face, in what ever context they exercise their ministry. It is a struggle that all of us share with them as we journey together.

The other phrase that struck me was a quote by Cozzens from the great Jewish Rabbi, Abraham Heschel.  “….he claimed that he preached in order to pray”. Preaching and praying are so closely intertwined, for Heschel goes on to say “….preaching is successful when it leads the assembly to prayer”.  The preacher must be a man of prayer and his prayer time gives vitality to his preaching. Early in Mark’s Gospel we are told of the Lord going off in the early morning to pray. Start the day well in other words.

There is much that we need to re-examine to appreciate authenticity in the Church of our time. In so many ways we are in a time of renewal, adjustment, a coming to terms with new circumstances. But as T S Eliot wrote in the final part of Little Gidding,  “to make an end is to make a beginning.”

How we tidy up the threads of an era that is closing and at the same time grasp the opportunities presently offered to us without fracturing continuity is the challenge we all face. The stress and difficulties, the often experienced loneliness of change were beautifully summed up by Aiden Ryan writing in the January edition of the Irish Journal, the Furrow-The last monk of Clonmacnoise.

And through it all we travel on the road together, priests and people, sustaining each other with our prayer.  Sam Beckett got it right  “Ever tried, ever failed, never mind, try again fail better

------