Fr Clyde Harvey

Thanks be to God in Christ for the grace of priesthood in the Catholic Church. From my earliest days as a priest I have been blessed with a deep appreciation of the rich spiritual tradition of which I am a part.

Even in the midst of the advancements of science and our deepening knowledge of the human psyche, I have come to see the Church in the Catholic tradition as an “expert in humanity”, which, like Christ, continues to empty herself as she works in the midst of that same humanity for that salvation which is the revelation of the Kingdom of God.

My Church is 2000 years young, even older depending on how you interpret Church. As I meditate on her history, I am in no way tempted to believe, as some new Christians, that the world is about to be flooded again by God.

Indeed God has given a pledge that that would never happen again. If God were the avenger of our disobedience, Jesus would never have come. Instead, I have come to know this all-forgiving God, who invites me to forgive seventy times seven times, because his example is limitless forgiveness in superabundant love.

My vocation as priest is to be a minister of that forgiveness, helping God’s people to see the many ways in which God forgives us all so that our lives may be one glorious hymn of thanksgiving.

It is from this new seeing that our full participation in the Eucharist blossoms. When we make this connection, the Eucharist is not just a sacrament second to the preaching of the Word. It is our life, our love.

I have seen my Church, in her history, sinning and sinned against, decimated and overflowing.  I have known that growth can be a gift of the Spirit, but it can also be a function of cancer bringing all kinds of painful realities into the body. The remnant is as much God’s will as the 3000 who responded to Peter’s preaching.  God’s Church lives and the Spirit is present in it NOW.

As a priest, trained at John Vianney’s Seminary, I have grown to love the word – thanks to Ildefons and Brodie and Johnston. I continue to be nourished by it, every time I celebrate Eucharist, every homily I prepare, every time I sit with the word.

Fr Harvey at Neal & Massy Trinidad All Stars panyard at the start of the Pan Crusade Lenten Retreat last Monday

Yet I know deep in my heart that the first Word is a living person, Jesus Christ, who lives first of all in His Church through whom I am privileged to have the Word – the Bible. The priority has always been clear to me.

I can never be tempted by the individualistic bibliolatry of my Pentecostal friends and I seek each day to share my conviction with those entrusted to my care.

 I have also come to love the sacraments – those sacraments which have existed before the word was written down. These are not appendages to the Church added on after evangelising.

They are the living expressions of the vitality of the Church, even when they are poorly celebrated.

At least two of them existed before the New Testament was put together. They go hand in hand, not seeking priority one over the other. Every sacramental celebration is rich in the word in which its meaning and power are expressed.

Of course there is a lot wrong with the Church today, just as there is a lot wrong with my own body. Yet I don’t go around comparing my body to that of other people and berating it for not being like theirs.  I thank God for all that I see in what he has given to me, even as I seek to maintain its vitality.

The body changes. The Church changes.  Sometimes the body has a virus and all systems rush to intercept.  In such moments, sometimes with some help, I know the power of the body to heal, to be renewed. I thank God for that. The healing may be painful. It is always enlightening. I am always the wiser for the experience. Yet at no time do I seek another body or decry my own.

So I love the Church. Every official prayer of the Church breathes from the Scriptural word. I hope and pray each day that our Church will become better at helping her members to appreciate that fact.

Yet I thank God that the Church is not enslaved by the written word, that she does not use it as a weapon in some so-called spiritual war.

 I always heed the words of the desert father, “You may have gone through the Bible, but has the Bible gone through you?” As that happens, I know that I don’t have to judge others by their knowledge of the Bible.

Rather I stand in awe before those whose lives are being transformed by it within the wonderful family that is the Church, the Body of the Word made flesh.

Thank you, Fr Ian, for drawing these thoughts from me. May we both meet one day in heaven with the Lord who is both Word and Sacrament.