Memory is one of our most important capacities. It is a blessed gift. James M. Barie said, “God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December.” But it is more than recalling beauty. Memory gives us a sense of meaning. We are who we are because of memory. When we begin to lose memory, we become disconnected from life. Amnesia, often brought about by some shattering, life-threatening experience, is the loss of memory and a disconnection from life.
We are who we are and the church us who it is because of memory. Memory is the ongoing source of life for the Christian community.
I wrote recently about the church losing dramatically in membership. The Church…. What Has Happened
Only 47% of Americans today are affiliated with a church. From 68% twenty years ago, to 47% today. That’s dramatic. I made the claim that of more concern should be the fact that the younger the generation, (Generation Z vs Generation X), the smaller the percentage of affiliation.
I contend that memory is not only the source of life for the Christian community, how memory functions in our community life shapes how life is ordered and expressed. Memory keeps the Christian community alive. The Christian faith, in its liveliness in the world as a redemptive community, is dependent in large part upon its “living memory” of God’s act of grace in his Son, Jesus.
I believe we are losing millennials and younger ones because we have not lived and shared the fact that being Christian is being in a distinctive community that is created and empowered by the Holy Spirit. If we are questioning the cause of the dramatic decline in church membership, I urge us to look at the fact that there is no Christian tradition apart from a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That memory must be kept alive because it is that experience of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ that characterizes those who make up the Christian community.
The living Christ is not to be experienced only on occasion; His presence is to be the dominant reality and the shaping power of our lives.
This is what the Gospel is all about: life that comes to us now as we allow the presence of Christ to come to full expression in our lives. What does it look like, this presence of Christ in full expression in our lives?
It looks like acceptance experienced by a despised tax collector.
It looks like forgiveness experienced by a woman who had sold her body, and was about to be stoned by those who didn’t understand such forgiveness.
It looks like new meaning for a person estranged from her community, who comes to the well at mid-day to find a mysterious young Jew who tells her about the refreshing waters of eternal life.
I don’t know anyone who gathers up the meaning of the gospel in her life and in the ministry that she fosters than Mother Theresa, the contemporary saint who gave her life for the poorest of the poor. On one occasion she observed, “We all long for heaven where God is, but we have it in our power to be in heaven with him right now, to be happy with him at this very moment.” Then she added a challenging word: “But being happy with him now means: Loving as He loved, helping as He helped, giving as He gave, Serving as He served, rescuing as He rescued”
Again there is no Christian tradition apart from a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Are we doing our share in keeping that memory alive? When have we last shared with another the refreshing waters of eternal life?