Tag: Pope Francis

What Kind Of YMCA Do You Dream Of? [Pope Francis & the Field Hospital : via William Cavanaugh]

What would it look like for a local YMCA to be like a field hospital for those wounded in spirit-mind-body throughout our community? What if the Y was a movement of healing and strengthening, of building up friendships, renewing your purpose, of volunteering to serve? What if the work of the Y extended beyond our walls?

What is the YMCA to you? 

Why is there a Y in your community? 

How does a local YMCA fit in with the ministry of churches and Christians in a city? 

Maybe you’re just dreaming of a cleaner Y with lower membership rates and one that’s not so busy at your preferred hour. 

The “C” in the YMCA, however, is central to its origins and compelling global endurance over 175 years. 

Click here to learn more about the YMCA out in the battlefield among the wounded soldiers of the Great War

There is no Young Men’s Christian Association without collaboration of local Christian churches in their community.

Both the Y and churches are participants in the kingdom of God as proclaimed and embodied by Jesus the great healer.

So in the violence of our modern culture, of the past few years, decades and centuries- what is the role of the church and the Y in a community now?

What is Christ our Savior still doing – still calling us to join him in doing? Especially in these days and beyond?

These adapted words of Pope Francis are compelling to me – as conveyed by William Cavanaugh in answering the question, “What kind of church do you dream of?”

What kind of YMCA do you dream of?

I see clearly that the church [and the YMCA] need most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity.

I see the church [and the Y] as a field hospital after battle.

It is useless to ask a serious injured person if he has high cholesterol and about his blood sugars!

You have to heal his wounds. Then we can talk about everything else. Heal the wounds, heal the wounds.

And you have to start from the ground up.

quotes from Pope Francis, A Big Heart Open to God quoted by William Cavanaugh, Field Hospital: the church’s engagement with a wounded world

In the Y we talk about ways that we are not a church, but sometimes are like a church. 

The discussion usually gets caught up in details around programs and practices – we have prayer gatherings but not doctrinally dogmatic – we serve the community but not with a gospel presentation, etc. 

As relevant as this kind of conversation and distinction may be for YMCA and church partnerships, it misses a more fundamental reality:

Are we healers or wounders? 

Does the community see us as instigators of the battlefield or trusted enough to bind up the wounds of those afflicted? 

Is our posture one of nearness and proximity to the injured in our neighborhoods or with those wrecking havoc with their power and privilege?

At the Y our mission puts an emphasis on “building healthy spirit, mind and body.” 

That implies a hop and an effort towards bringing healing to the wounded in our midst, particularly in spirit.

When Christians in the YMCA live out their calling through the mission of the Y, they can center their motivation on this truth as stated by Pope Francis: “The most important thing is the first proclamation: Jesus Christ has saved you.”

We believe this by putting it into practice through programs that build healthy spirit, mind and body – for all. 

What adaptation would happen if Y’s became more intentional in being a field hospital for all the wounded we can see?

The world wounds; who will be the healers willing to see the reality around them?

What can a Y do to become a healing field hospital in the community

One: Answer the question: do you want that for your YMCA and the community?

Two: If yes, pay attention to the culture you are building – nourish the parts that fuel healing, address the parts of your culture that wound.

Three: Look for the wounded in your community, and for the healers, and for ways to bind them together – you find what you are looking for.

Four: Be proximate to the wounded; get healing for your own wounds.

Five: Warm your heart with nearness to the presence of Christ, strive for faithfulness in your spirit, mind and body. 

Six: Focus on healing and flourishing for all.

Seven: Let the wounded and the healed tell their stories, let them be part of the culture, the programs, the future of your Y.

What would it look like for this dream to become true in your community YMCA

Flourishing, Pope Francis, Fratelli tutti, the YMCA & the UB Church

Fratelli tutti evokes the original spirit of the Young Men’s Christian Association, as well as the founding of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ. I’ll be writing to draw out common ground for our Christian emphasis work that strengthens how we are “for all.”

The themes highlighted by Pope Francis in his most recent encyclical Fratelli tutti resonates with my spirit.

I’ll be reading it over the next several days and posting on what I glean from it.

My angle on it is as a Midwest conservative evangelical Protestant Christian pastor, ordained with the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, and employed as Director of Christian Emphasis with the YMCA of Greater Fort Wayne, Indiana.

This blog has been an attempt to connect my reflections on Christ Jesus with the YMCA mission as a UB pastor.

The kingdom of God as proclaimed through Christ, drawing on the old prophets of Israel, envisions a world where God’s mercy and justice prevail amongst his people, for the world.

The church and the YMCA, for me, are powerful catalysts for this gospel work: flourishing in spirit, mind and body for all.

The context for this is our real world in a local and global context, affected powerfully by suffering and sorrow as well as seasons of celebrations.

What Fratelli tutti does for me, upon initial reading of summaries of it, is articulate in an accessible and compelling manner these themes that have been shaping my work through the UB Church and the YMCA: The gospel, for all.

But, Pope Francis digs deep into these two ideas, expounding on the parable of the Good Samaritan as a key clue to interpreting the way the gospel is for all, the effects of the teachings and life of Christ for how his people live in this world. His international context gives him a rich and unique perspective that I value and need.

In the circles with which I live and operate professionally and personally, in Fort Wayne, in the UB Church, in the YMCA – it seems to me that Pope Francis has given Christians a tool for which we can build up our ecumenical work, our multi-faith work, our church engagement with the community, our calling to live out our mission.

My current work as the Director of Christian Emphasis with the YMCA gives me opportunities to hear from many different kinds of Christians on how they would like to see the “C” get stronger in the Y.

There are lots of similar themes, but some clear disconnects.

Where they have common ground, though, needs to be further considered in light of the multi-faith context in which the YMCA operates.

I’m constantly looking for resources that can help YMCA leaders build a stronger “C” which also helps them build an even healthier spirit, mind body “for all.”

Fratelli tutti evokes the original spirit of the Young Men’s Christian Association, as well as the founding of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ.

Togetherness, unity, brotherhood, solidarity, friendship, community, fraternal bonds – this is what the world needs now, more than ever through the people of God in imitation of our Lord Jesus Christ.

I’ll be writing out reflections of ways forward, of critiques, of observations, of gratitude for the YMCA and UB Church, via my participation in them, as shaped by my cursory understanding of Fratelli tutti.

At least for me, it will strengthen the ground upon which I stand to do my ministry.

But more than that, I hope it attunes me to what the Spirit of Christ is doing around me in the Y and UB, that I might join in accordingly.

Here is a link to the Vatican’s publication of Fratelli tutti

Here is a commentary on it by William Cavanaugh, Catholic theologian I respect, author of Field Hospital: the church’s engagement with a wounded world.

Another commentary regarding it from perspective of how it shapes politics on the left – from Catholic theologian in Australia Stuart Braun

A series of brief remarks on Fratelli tutti from various Catholic thinkers.

A quick summary of the key points of each section in the encyclical