Fr. Rolheiser, who has facilitated retreat days with diocesan clergy before, offered different perspectives on mercy, from the dictionary to common public conception to the Old Testament to the New Testament. He began the day by emphasizing that clergy must understand their own need for God’s mercy before they can effectively show it to others.
“We’re all sinners, the trick is to admit it” he said, citing St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans. “The whole point is God’s salvation is free.”
Expanding further, Fr. Rolheiser invited the Diocesan clergy to strive for a state of metanoia, characterized by showing compassion for others above one’s self - the opposite of paranoia, he said. Human beings have both a petty and a saintly self, he went on.
“You’ve got to go to a higher place inside of you and believe it’s good news,” Fr. Rolheiser said. “It will hook you into your big heart and your big mind.”
Deacon Gonzalo Sotelo said he appreciated Fr. Rolheiser’s contrasting of mercy and metanoia with paranoia.
“It’s kind of a different way that he explained it,” Dcn. Sotelo said. “It’s a nice way to see it.”
Fr. Rolheiser then examined three measurements of mercy cited in the Old Testament and later confirmed by Jesus in the Gospels. The first related to proper practice of faith (John 14, 15); the second to care for the poor (Matt. 25); and the third to having a wise, compassionate heart (Luke 6, 35-36).
“All of them are valid,” commented Father Ed Molumby, S.T., a priest in residence at Sacred Heart Parish, Rancho Cucamonga. “Jesus verified all three.”
Later, in summarizing the reason for Pope Francis’ declaration of a Jubilee Year of Mercy, Fr. Rolheiser raised again the Holy Father’s metaphor of the Church as “field hospital” tending to spiritually broken and emphasizing Jesus as a “physician.” He said Pope Francis has initiated a shift in pastoral practice from an over-concern for preserving the life of the Church to trying to be “food for the life of the world.”
This involves greater efforts to take God’s mercy to the poor and to be more merciful to the planet,” Fr. Rolheiser said.