By Mgr John Devine OBE

​

The pandemic and lockdown accelerated the use of the internet and allowed working from home, Zoom meetings and, in the Church, online Mass. I write this at the end of an online directed retreat. I have done several of these, but this time it was extra special because it was my first retreat since retiring at the beginning of September.

​

I am still getting used to this change in my life. I have negotiated changes before. The first was leaving home at the age of 12 to go to the seminary at Upholland. The next was leaving Upholland after 13 years as a newly ordained priest. The move to South America was another change, as was my return home after nine years. A series of changes followed, the last of which was 10 years in the Isle of Man; a big change going there and another change at the end of it. Each of these changes has been to embark on a new adventure. Was the Isle of Man my final adventure, or could retirement be a new adventure too?

 

As a priest I have spent a lifetime doing stuff for other people; responding to their needs, spiritual and temporal. A temptation of priesthood is to live behind a mask; to define myself by what I do for others. I have heard the ideal priest described as “a man for others”. What happens when there are no “others” to be there for? This was the frame of mind that I brought to my retreat.

​

I spent the final day of the retreat sitting with the last chapter of John’s Gospel. Peter says, “I’m going fishing.” His fellow disciples say, “We’ll come with you.” Just a few years previously Jesus had said, “Follow me, I will make you fishers of men.” A new world opened up for them as they abandoned their boats and their livelihood. But now with the death of Jesus, they are reverting to what they did before: fishing for fish. Unsurprisingly, they caught nothing.

 

Then daylight comes and Jesus is standing on the shore. They are no longer fishing in the dark. Has Jesus been there all night, too? It is John who f irst recognises the tell-tale signs of Jesus’ presence in the abundant catch of fish: “It is the Lord.” The same Jesus who produced gallons of wine at Cana and multiplied five loaves to feed 5,000 people is still with them. His identity is confirmed when “He took the bread and gave it to them”.

 

There follows a potentially awkward conversation with Peter who had betrayed him and was resigned to running away yet again. Three times the Lord asks him, “Do you love Me?” He asks Him to “follow Me”, just as he had said to Peter when he was first called. So there is one more adventure after all: a new Advent.