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In a letter to his parish on 25 February, Canon Peter Newsam recommended the book 'From Christendom to Apostolic Mission' by Monsignor James Shea, as "the clearest, most convincing and most revealing explanation of the real problems (and opportunities) facing the Church of today that I have come across." Canon Peter writes:

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"My dear friends,

"I had the great privilege of spending a day in London last week at a conference at Westminster Cathedral. A group of 120 or so priests (and a bishop or two), deacons and seminarians met together to listen to Mgr James Shea, President of The University of Mary in the US, who had come to speak about his book ‘From Christendom to Apostolic Mission’. I’ve mentioned the book before, but its worth speaking about it again, because this short book is the clearest, most convincing and most revealing explanation of the real problems (and opportunities) facing the Church of today that I have come across. It is 90 pages long, an easy read, and I recommend it to you all.

"Mgr Shea explains that every society or culture has what he calls an ‘imaginative vision’ - that is to say a set of assumptions, priorities, goals that are taken for granted - we all just follow them, we don’t need to argue for them, they are a part of our view of the world. You could say they are so well accepted you don’t need to justify them - democracy, for instance, in our culture: no-one has to justify it, we just take it as read.

"It is possible, over time, for a society’s taken-for-granted assumptions to change. For example, until fairly recently the imaginative vision, the way of seeing the world, the assumptions, priorities and goals of our culture were those of the Christian world view. Even people who were not Christians had the same view of the world. Such a society, based on and pursuing Christian values, we call ‘Christendom’. Over the centuries we developed structures, institutions, habits that worked well if you want to live a good life in Christendom.

"But, society has changed. With astonishing speed that way of seeing the world has been replaced by a new one. The new assumed priorities and values of our society reject the spiritual, reject anything we cannot see, or touch, or hear, or taste or smell. The Christian vision of the world sees a combination of the spiritual and the physical; the new assumptions reject the spiritual and so they are, by definition materialist. Only the physical matters. Such a view of the world radically changes how people behave.

"The problem, Mgr Shea tells us, is that in many ways we are continuing to act as if the people around us saw the world in spiritual terms - but they don’t. So, many of the institutions, practices, ways that we have always done things, just aren’t performing any more. They presume that the people around us see the world as a spiritual place - but they don’t. In fact, we too have been infected by this new way of seeing the world.

"What is to be done? We need to renew in ourselves a way of seeing the world that is authentic and true - that sees the world as it really is, charged with unseen, but very real, spiritual realities. We need to be converted back to the Christian way of seeing things. And then we need to face the reality that the people around us see the world differently. Just suggesting that they join us at Mass, and providing them with good music, nice friends, good teaching, will not be enough, because they may still be seeing the world with the poor, two-dimensional, materialist way of seeing things. Conversion, for all of us, requires a conversion to the Catholic vision of the world, rather than the materialist one.

"And, furthermore, we need to accept that so many of our institutions, habits, programmes, practices - which worked so well in the past - will jot work well now. They were created for an age when the people around us shared our way of seeing reality; but now, people don’t. In a way this is quite scary, as it requires us to develop a whole new way of doing things. But it is also very liberating, as it helps us see why it is that so many things that used to work don’t work any more.

"So, what is the programme for action? First of all, it is to understand where we are, the world we live in, and the people around us. We need to rediscover for ourselves the Great Story of God’s action in the world. This is a story that stretches way back into the past, but it reaches to this very day: each of us is an actor in the drama of God’s love for his people. Telling people about Jesus, getting them to join us at Mass, these will never be enough unless they also learn how defective and short-sighted the world view in which we live truly is.

"'THE MAIN evangelistic task in an apostolic age, a task that also needs to be directed at many within the Church, is the presentation of the Gospel in such a way that the minds of its hearers can be given the opportunity to be transformed, converted from one way of looking at the world to a different way.' (From Christendom to Apostolic Mission, p.70)

"I really recommend this important book to you. You can read more about it at the website ‘Prime Matters’, including watching a clever little film that explains much more clearly the idea of imaginative vision.

"At this crucial moment in the history of the Church - and of the world - this sort of clear, simple analysis of the issues that face us is so important. Have a great week ahead, and I hope this holy season of Lent is bearing many fruits for you all,

Fr Peter"

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This letter first appeared in the Catholic Parish of Petworth & Midhurst’s weekly newsletter. You can find out more about the parish community here.‍