Thursday, July 3, 2014

Work and gratefulness




‘Come to me, all you who labour and are overburdened, and I will give you rest. 
Shoulder my yoke and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, 
and you will find rest for your souls. 
Yes, my yoke is easy and my burden light.’ 

Matthew 11:28 - 30

It is well and good to be driven to work hard, to produce great results, to gain satisfaction from a job well done. But where do we draw the line about how much we do to achieve those results. Hagiography is full of self-sacrifice, pain, suffering, loneliness, bullying and overwork – often leading to early deaths. And this is often glorified as ‘giving their lives to Christ’. No doubt some are called to give more, but we are not all called to do the same (1 Cor 12:4f).

The Christian life for the vast majority is living out the Gospel in their daily lives. Those who live ‘at the edge’ – in mission fields, with refugees, the homeless, the mentally ill, the abused, are those who remind and prompt us about how grateful we should be and encourage us to provide the spiritual and financial support they need to do their work.

That doesn’t mean that we view the world through a television screen, on the contrary, being grateful (from the same root as the word grace) means pleasing, acceptable, agreeable and welcoming. It should not be seen as something passive, to be entertained by or to experience pleasure. As a Christian being grateful means being generous with my time and resources, so that I might please God (see Philippians 4:18f).

There is no doubt that those who do the Lord’s work can indeed be overburdened. No one said it would be easy. The task of educating and supporting our young people in our Catholic schools is a vocation:

“…we must remember that teachers and educators fulfill a specific Christian vocation and share an equally specific participation in the mission of the Church, to the extent that it depends chiefly on them whether the Catholic school achieves its purpose.” (The Catholic school on the threshold of the third millennium).

As educators and support workers we bring our whole selves to this work, but we remain parents, spouses, friends, colleagues. Finding the balance between our work and wellbeing is and always will be a challenge, but it is true that when the going gets tough – turn to the Lord.

For those of you who are having a break over the next two weeks, rest up! For those who labour on, work well, work smart.


Peter


Whereabouts during the break

I'll be on leave most of next week (except Thursday).

In week two of the break I'll be in Hobart Monday to Wednesday, in the office Thursday and on leave Friday.



From Sacred Heart, Ulverstone



From St Brigid's Wynyard


From Stella Maris, Burnie


 From St Peter Chanel, Smithton


From Our Lady of Mercy, Deloraine



From St Joseph's Queenstown



From St Finn Barr's, Invermay



From St Thomas More's, Newstead


From St Joseph's Rosebery




From Larmenier, St Leonards 


From St Patrick's Latrobe



From Sacred Heart, Launceston

 

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