[00:00:00] Jim Jansen: Hey everybody, welcome to the EquipCast. So today I sit down with Bishop Fintan Gavin of the Diocese of Cork and Ross in southern Ireland. And we have a great conversation talking about the dramatic changes in the mission field and the cultural landscape in Ireland over the last generation the rise of secularism, the dangers of cultural Catholicism the limitations of just doing things as they've always been done, and the beautiful things the Lord does when we come to Him with humility and trust.

Bishop Fintan shares a little bit about his own story, and the beautiful things that are beginning to happen in the Diocese of Cork and Ross. Now, for those of you in the States, you're gonna find this conversation very familiar.

The challenges that our friends in Ireland face isn't that much different than our own. And, to my friends in Ireland thank you for your example, for your faith. You're gonna love today's conversation. Take a listen.

All right. Bishop Fintan Gavin of Cork, Ireland, welcome to the EquipCast. How are you doing today? 

[00:01:37] Bishop Gavin: Very good, Jim. Delighted to be joining you and your listeners.

[00:01:40] Jim Jansen: I'm so excited you've got an opportunity to join us. You're actually an EquipCast listener, and you've got a beautiful rural parts of your diocese. I just kind of imagined you driving through, lush green hills with sheep listening to the EquipCast. I don't know if that's true. I'm hoping that's true.

[00:01:57] Bishop Gavin: Absolutely. Well, West Cork is beautiful. Cork City is nice. So it's a beautiful diocese to be in. For those of your listeners who know Ireland, we're here in the south of Ireland, really as close as we can be to the Atlantic. I go right out to the peninsulas there. So it's, quite a big diocese geographically.

I came here as bishop in 2019, during COVID I learned what Spotify was. I learned how to listen to podcasts, and I have found your Equip podcast really very helpful, I have been surprised at the amount of synergies and connections in different people that you have interviewed and the different stories, particularly when you got into some of your own A Clear Pathway and some of the different examples.

And again, from listening to the different people that participated, I think you have that mixture of rural as well. So we have the second city in Ireland. So you have Dublin and Cork, obviously Belfast in the north. So it's quite a big city. However, we also have West Cork. So Cork and Ross became one diocese in the 1950s, Bishop of Cork and Ross. and you're bringing together a city population and a rural population. So yes, it's a very beautiful part of Ireland.

[00:03:02] Jim Jansen: The rural-urban environment, it feels very familiar, to those of us here in Omaha, where Omaha is a, good size city. There's parts of it that feel very urban, but then we have lots of rural areas. Bishop, give everybody just a little bit of your story. How did you meet the Lord? When did you feel the call to mission? Give us a little context on your story. 

[00:03:21] Bishop Gavin: Well, I'll just go back to the beginning. I'm Not from Cork originally. I'm a Dub. I'm from Dublin. I grew up in a, normal family, seven children. And I suppose life and faith were very much part of our normal life.

[00:03:34] Jim Jansen: Is seven a normal because that's a large family here in the states.

[00:03:38] Bishop Gavin: I think even in Ireland, it's a relatively large family. but there are many other families of seven, but it would be on the large side. So a, a very happy family and I think when you're one of seven, families have ways of helping you to learn from one another, knock the corners off one another we often say.

So it was normal in the sense that we were very much part of the culture. So I was an altar server, I was in a folk group, I was an athlete. I also played our own national sports, hurling and football. And I suppose in my secondary school I was educated by the Irish Christian Brothers. They're a group of brothers who give their lives to education. They're not priests. They're, consecrated men. One of them used to have a prayer group on a Friday night, and I can look back on it now, but he really taught us how to pray.

He introduced us to the divine office to Eucharist adoration, to reflecting on what was happening in our lives. It was a group of six or seven of us. We used to meet every Friday evening. We'd pray, and then we'd have a cup of tea and a chat. So prayer then as a result became a very natural part of my life.

For my secondary school, daily mass was part of my routine. So when I was finishing high school or the Leaving Cert as we call it here, I did begin to think about vocation, so already that notion of call was there. My parents were anxious I'd have a bit of experience of life, and they asked me, would I not try, get some experience and then make the decision.

So I started training as a residential social worker, and through that experience I felt drawn more and more to diocesan priesthood. I think before that, I probably, like any 17, 18-year-old, saw the world in very black-and-white terms, and I was going on mission. I thought I'd be heading off to Africa, somewhere, where it was very, on, on a kind of a mission.

And yet the more I worked in this residential unit for children who maybe hadn't got the opportunities that I had, I realized that somehow Christ was in that messiness of ordinary life. And so I then joined the diocesan seminary. From that, I had my seven years of formation, which again because the seminary was in Dublin City Centre meant we had lots of pastoral opportunities.

From that I worked five years in schools, and then I was sent back to Rome to do post-graduate studies, and that ended up being canon law. So again, I was asked, one of the auxiliary bishops met me and said, "What would you like to study?" And I said I'm not sure about scripture because the languages.

I'd have no interest in canon law." And he just laughed at me and said that's what we need. That was providential. It obviously framed my life in that sense. So I spent six years then in Rome doing the various degrees, a license, a specialization in Roman jurisprudence, and then a doctorate in canon law.

And during that time I got to do a lot of work with young people and with homeless people. They were my pastoral outlet that allowed me to combine studies and a kind of a pastoral life at the same time. So that brought me back to Dublin. Then I worked in the field of canon law.

I was vice chancellor and chancellor in Dublin for, oh, I suppose, nearly 20 years and I combined that with other ministries. That was my full-time ministry . I worked with young people. I worked with the Italian community for a number of years. I was chaplain to our children's pilgrimage to Lourdes, which again is another feature of the diocese.

So I've had a lot of variety in my life. So for that, I'm grateful. And the call of God has been there from the beginning. I think one of the things that the years in Rome taught me was the Italians are great for expressing what's going on within them, and that notion of a personal relationship, encounter with Christ, even though I had it, they helped me probably to articulate. So I learned a lot from the young people that I worked with there, and that's helped to inform the ministry over the years.

[00:07:06] Jim Jansen: You mentioned that part of your pastoral assignment was working with Italians in Ireland. Is there a significant Italian population in Ireland?

[00:07:15] Bishop Gavin: I think in recent years there has been a lot of new Irish, as we call them, people from all over the world. But a significant amount, particularly in a city like Dublin, of Italians. There were young Italians coming to make a new life and a new career, and they came to the archbishop and said like, "We have this life at home in our parishes, in our different movements.

What can we do here?" So then the archbishop asked me to work with them. So it was quite a fruitful ministry. It brought its own linguistic challenges. But once you got over that it was great fun.

[00:07:45] Jim Jansen: 'Cause you had picked up probably a little bit of italian, studying in rome. 

[00:07:49] Bishop Gavin: I had done a doctorate, so I'd spent six years in Italy. I'd worked in Paris. So I kind of had the language and then, but when you're using it on a daily basis and with a chaplaincy, obviously it refines it. It's something that flowed naturally.

The hard work was when I was sent to Rome back in the early years, '96, when I had to learn, Italian, Latin, later then Spanish for the studies. That's part of that world. It's a very international world.

[00:08:11] Jim Jansen: I appreciate also, I don't know how many people know, but there is a significant homeless population in the city of Rome. I mean, It's just, it's a huge city like any other, and the opportunities for ministry and service to the poor there are significant.

Were you in the Irish college at the time? 

[00:08:27] Bishop Gavin: I lived in the Portuguese college. It was Italian speaking. The ministry was really through a new movement that had grown up, the Salesians, and they worked a lot with young people, and there was this outreach. So those of your listeners that know Rome will know that there's Termini, which is the main train station, and then there's Tiburtina, which is the international where the trains that come from France and different places come in.

So it's open 24 hours a day, so it's heated, it's lighted. So that's where a lot of homeless people gather. So we used to have mass in the evening at 7:00, and then we'd cook dinner. We went to a, a nearby parish, prepared dinner, and then came back, and we were in the station then until 10:00, 11:00.

And you befriend the people. I feel like the dinner was also an opportunity for a conversation and befriending. It was a very rich experience and something that probably, framed my life through that experience. 

[00:09:17] Jim Jansen: We've clicked off a number of different countries here. I'm glad you added Portugal. Of course, you were staying at the Portuguese college. I wanna give you an opportunity to talk about the influence of Lourdes and maybe even Fatima, two very well-known, Marian apparitions here in the US. They have had a significant impact on your life, the faith of the people of Ireland. Talk about Lourdes.

[00:09:40] Bishop Gavin: Most dioceses in Ireland have a pilgrimage to Lourdes. So in about two weeks' time, I will travel with 450 pilgrims from the diocese. Almost 100 of those will be what we call our VIPs. They will be people who are sick or infirmed, and they stay in, what's known as the hospital. There's a, a special place where there's more care. And with those we bring a group of students from high school, and then young adults, as well as our volunteers. So you have volunteers who support these VIPs. But it's a wonderful opportunity to spend more time with people.

So you're with them for five days together. There's a mass at the grotto. There's a number of different spiritual elements that make up Lourdes, from the baths to the grotto mass to your stations of the cross. So you do those together as a group, and there's a great unity that comes with it.

In recent years we have been growing the pilgrimage, but we've also been inviting parish groups to come as parishes within the diocese. And so you get this sense of a diocese, the individual parishes coming together and the different age groups, from your young people to your young adults, to your adults, and then you have people in the latter stages of their life.

And there's this lovely harmony. There's always, those people who need assistance, they really want the young people to push their wheelchair, their cart, whatever. And we say to them, "Just be yourself". so yeah, it's it's quite significant.

We also obviously have the Shrine of Knock here in Ireland. That's an international Marian and Eucharistic shrine, and that's something that has grown. That celebrates 50 years of the basilica that's there this year. So many of your listeners will be aware of that as well.

[00:11:25] Jim Jansen: What do you see the pilgrimages doing for the pilgrims? Whether it be Knock or Fatima, Lourdes, what do you see that doing for those who participate?

[00:11:36] Bishop Gavin: I suppose listening to people's stories there, I can speak from that experience. I think people bring their lives. They don't leave their lives at home, and so they bring their families, their worries, their hopes, their expectations, and they get a space to be able to reflect on that, to bring that through Our Lady to Jesus through the shrine.

There's something very special, particularly at nighttime where it's dark, where you're at the shrine and you- it ... Just down at the- the grotto itself there's something very moving. Or the baths, there's something, there's a vulnerability. And there's great moments of healing. So we're aware of all of the, healings that have been miracles and have gone through a whole process within the church. But I've experienced it lots, both personally and listening to other fellow pilgrims . All kinds of small healings, miracles, transformations happen because you're giving those five days intentionally in a way that you wouldn't do at home, and you're also journeying with other people who are doing the same.

So there's a lot of sharing. There's a lot of, to use our own language, of communion in that sense. There's a solidarity. we probably stay in about six or seven different hotels. And so I would try and travel from one hotel to another, so I'd have a meal with each of the pilgrims at some stage over those days.

And then we gather. And this is a very Irish thing. So in the hospital, or the achi, as they call it. At nighttime, we have a sing song. So you've everything from Irish dancing to... So people bring their instruments, and there's this...

[00:13:11] Jim Jansen: Oh, that's great.

[00:13:13] Bishop Gavin: So it's just that sense of fun and, everybody from our young people to people who are still sitting in chairs can't get up and dance. Some of the other people teaching the dances that they learnt as children to the younger people, and there's just an energy. It's always hard to end those at nighttime. And we say, "Oh people have to be up early in the morning. And certainly I know for some people, it's, it just that sense of people being together, that solidarity, that friendship, that fun. 

[00:13:40] Jim Jansen: Yes. Thank you for sharing that. It's this beautiful, almost idealized picture of the church where we're vulnerable, we're coming together as a community, we're coming to the Lord, intense prayer and worship, but fun as well.

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Okay, Bishop, for those who maybe, have just a little bit of gaps in their Irish history, give us a little bit of a picture of Ireland today and the mission field that you're now called to serve.

[00:14:44] Bishop Gavin: I suppose the first thing to say is that Ireland is like any modern country. It is quite secularized. And Many of your listeners who will have had family or who have emigrated from Ireland might have a particular view of Ireland of the past. That has changed a lot. We have a lot of referendums. We have a quite a secular society.

[00:15:04] Jim Jansen: How long ago now was abortion made legal?

[00:15:07] Bishop Gavin: We're talking about is it 20 years? Divorce, abortion, same-sex marriage. All of those things were passed all in the last like, in, in my lifetime. In, if you like, in some ways, in my own adult life. So, That gives your listeners a sense. Within that, there's a very strong kind of culture of life and faith.

And I suppose the church in the past was a very important influence, much for the good. But the abuse crisis ... Because we're a small country, it was lived with an intensity. So some people have reacted against the power that was in the church in the past. The church has become much humbler. I think the other thing is that the church of today is a church that needs to invite people in. There was a time when there was no distinction between the community and the church, the local community. You can't presume that today. Number one, because there's a number of other religions have come into our country. There was a time when everybody was Catholic, but I think one in five people isn't born in Ireland now. And they come from all kinds of different backgrounds. 

[00:16:10] Jim Jansen: What are some of the larger immigrant populations coming in?

[00:16:13] Bishop Gavin: For a number of years there was a huge movement of Polish people into this country, but since they joined the European community, that's become a lot less. I would think the single biggest community now is probably the Brazilian community. We have a huge amount from India as well. Some would come as Christians, but not all by any means. They come from Buddhists to Hindus to Christians and, even within that, many Catholics as well. So it's quite broad. And then you have all of the other, groups.

You have Spain, Italy around Europe. But they would be smaller groups. And the African countries. Now again, Africa has 54 countries, so we need to be careful, but there's the african continent as well. And we would have chaplaincies to reach out to those communities within the diocese, and we would be integrating them into the diocese. We refer to them as the new Irish.

[00:17:03] Jim Jansen: I love that. What's happening within , this movement of secularization and now more immigrant populations coming in? The new Irish. What's happening within the church how are people responding? 'Cause these are seismic shifts.

[00:17:19] Bishop Gavin: I suppose it's one of the real challenges. People still have that kind of cultural Catholicism, so we still have large numbers coming to receive sacraments, baptism, first communion, confirmation. Probably less, you can see the change, people coming to get married in the church. A lot of people come have their funerals in the church.

And all of that is wonderful and, it's very much a sacramental life, but it's very full-time. So then if they're not engaging outside of that, It's very hard to make disciples. So the church then becomes somewhere where people come to get something rather than to participate.

So you're talking about big shift. The invitation really is to invite people through their baptism into a life within the church, into being a Eucharistic people, gathering on a Sunday, involved in different groups, handing on to faith, so we're beginning to have to develop those in a way that is appropriate for these times that's different, that's much more intentional.

Our priests have never worked harder. There's a lot of demands. Less priests , but there's still a huge amount of, sacramental moments, be it funerals, baptisms marriages, and daily mass, Sunday masses. So it's adjusting all of that, and it's trying to look at a way of moving the church forward where it's collaborative, where it's people and priests working together. And I suppose the biggest thing that I have experienced, when someone actually encounters Christ, their life gets transformed, and then they want to get involved. Rather than feeling, oh, we have to help Father Jim or Father John to run his parish, then it becomes we're working with Father Jim or Father John to run our parish together. So that's a whole kind of cultural change. For so long, our churches were full, so people didn't have to work at it. Now you have to invite people in. You have to be invitational, and the kind of cultural thing doesn't sustain, unless people have experienced Jesus and had a personal encounter with him.

And that's one of those things, I suppose, that I've learned over the years that's, how people really start getting involved and connecting. And that's a one by one. In the past you could just put an invitation out there and people came. It doesn't really work like that anymore.

[00:19:38] Jim Jansen: All of these changes you mentioned, like they're happening in your lifetime. When did you start to recognize that the standard pastoral approaches weren't bearing the fruit that they once were anymore?

[00:19:51] Bishop Gavin: When I look back on my own life, I suppose coming here as bishop was a very significant moment because I had to think about things in a very new way. And so it's not that I hadn't dealt with these things in my life in Dublin, but coming here, my predecessor had already well past 75 and was waiting for his successor. 

So for a couple of years, they were waiting for the new bishop to come. And so in the early days, there was meetings with the priests and listening to them, and from them then conversations with the people of the diocese. I think that awareness became very real talking to them.

The structures that worked in the past were no longer working. Engagement that worked in the past was no longer connecting in the same way. And so we had to look at a new way of approaching that pastoral reality.

[00:20:44] Jim Jansen: How does that feel? You've got pastoral ministry experience working with the poor, working with young people, but you're 20 years in a chancellor canon law role. Now you're Bishop of Cork and Ross, right? Cork and Ross.

What's happening in you as you're listening to your priests? They're working harder than they've ever worked before. It's not bearing the fruit. 'Cause I know on the other side of this, you found hope and new ways to kinda reach out and connect. What's happening in between there when you're just feeling the heaviness and the challenge in front of you?

[00:21:18] Bishop Gavin: In a providential way, God was very much part of this. My own prayer life deepened, and somehow I never really felt that I was carrying this on my own. This was myself working with the priests, working with the people, and listening to where God was asking us to be church today. So that brought a freedom in terms of the responsibility, and I can honestly say there's been some really big challenges and obstacles that certainly in my own power I wouldn't have been able to get through. But somehow, through God's providence, through the Holy Spirit, avenues opened up, solutions became possible.

So, , I would say I've always been very hopeful, and those signs of new life came from a relatively early stage. I came here in 2019, the end of June, the beginning of July, and we'd about six months of very busy visiting parishes, meeting people, getting to know people, and then COVID hit.

And we took COVID very seriously in this part of the world. So it was really over two years where normal life didn't take place. So there was a lot of time spent, as we are, using technology today to communicate but it also gave a bit of time to reflect and to pray and think and connect. and a lot of things changed, so you were rebuilding post-COVID. So it gave a focus to it. And certainly the hope and the expectation was done in a way that involved the priests and people reflecting on these things together, listening to where God was calling us to be church.

So the introduction of the families of parishes. So that was an idea that originally I came across, as I say, I discovered Spotify and podcasts during COVID, and one of the ones that I discovered and I was trying to understand for myself, what does a bishop do? I came across the Eyes on Jesus podcast from Archbishop Vigneron in Detroit. 

[00:23:17] Jim Jansen: Yes. 

[00:23:17] Bishop Gavin: He had introduced the families of parish, so through that idea, I started thinking about it and looking at our reality and then testing with other people. Obviously it was adapted, and I have to say the Archdiocese of Detroit were very helpful in sharing resources and helping us as we tried to adapt it to an Irish Cork and Ross situation.

At the same time, I came across the podcasts of Father James Mallon on Divine Renovation, and it began to put some kind of ideas on where we might move from a church of maintenance towards mission. Our Archbishop Vigneron had this kind of pastoral synod in 2016, and then he wrote a book called Unleash the Gospel, and in many ways it was him applying many of Pope Francis' ideas of joy of the gospel. So it was very much about a missionary church, it was very much about evangelization, it was very much about discipleship.

So many of those same ideas fit very easily into our new reality that was emerging , post-COVID in the Diocese of Cork and Ross. And while we might use different terms, different ideas, and yet there's such a strong sense of identity in our parishes , in our faith communities, rural and city, and trying to adjust a new way of doing ministry where priests would be shared in a way they didn't have to be in the past, where people could collaborate across parishes.

All of that has taken time. And two years into that we decided we would again try and check in to see where we were going with God and our people , and we did a whole year of prayer, listening, and discernment. So each of those parishes, families of parishes, each of the new Irish faith groups, our religious, they were met and there was conversations around baptism, Eucharist, and how the families of parishes was working.

There was huge synergies in what came back from people in that, and so that helped to reassure us we're moving in the right direction but we still have more to do and We've to learn from that. 

[00:25:23] Jim Jansen: What did you hear? 'Cause that concept, I think we've talked about this offline before that the families of parishes, some of the pastoral planning, grouping reality is still relatively new in Ireland. This is, especially here in the Midwestern part of the United States, it's very common.

We had all these, immigrants, and we built our little rural churches all the wagon ride apart. And so we've been having for decades now, having to combine, close some of them. It was relatively new in Ireland. You introduce it, and then you're like, "All right, now let's check in a couple years later." What did you hear?

[00:26:01] Bishop Gavin: I think the first thing we hear, people were overall happy with it. But we were still on a journey. People in Ireland have a very strong sense of identity and I'm sure this isn't unique to Ireland, in terms of their parish. And not only their parish, but the church that they worship in.

In many of our rural parishes, you will have two and three churches, even though they're in one parish. It does take a while to get your head around the fact that , you may have to move a bit of distance to worship and that you have to share priests and resources. So all that took time. It also meant that we continue to have those parishes, and they could continue, to work together in a new way. there was this also the shared identity and the kind of shared mission. And so people were happy that was the beginning, but they realized that this had to go deeper, and that there was, I feel like, more work to be done. One of the big challenges for the priests, and this is very real, so if you think of our church since Trent, you really had one parish and more than one priest, but you had a pastor. So how do the priests connect with their people? So they're things we're still trying to work out.

If you're all the time moving around, so you have to find new ways of connecting and being supported and nourished in your priesthood. So what does it mean to be a priest ministering to a number of different faith communities and working as part of a team, made up of priests and people working together?

And they're the things that we're beginning to develop further. So we're at a particular stage on the journey, but by no means there yet.

[00:27:33] Jim Jansen: It's so common. You could be talking about Wisconsin or Nebraska or Iowa or any number of places in the States where the experience of people's identity being tied to the place. This is where I was baptized, where I was married, where I buried my spouse.

There's this huge connection, and it's disorienting as now, "Okay, now we need to share our priest. We share our pastor." "Oh, I need to travel. We're not able to offer mass at this facility, so now I travel to mass." All of that is very disorienting. I think it's part of what...

You could trace it back, to John XXIII, John Paul II but all the way through, I think, to Pope Leo. We're all kind of experiencing this missionary conversion where we're beginning to recognize, more than just being historically, culturally Catholic, we actually have a responsibility to all of the souls in our county, in our city.

When we first met, I remember that passion, that, conviction for missionary life, a vision for evangelization that was really deep in you. How did those develop? 'Cause, knowing something new has to happen, and then developing the conviction around evangelization, invitation one-on-one. How did those convictions develop?

[00:28:56] Bishop Gavin: I think the answer is probably a combination of something that came from God, from prayer, from listening to where God is calling us to be church I'm listening, I think, to The Joy of the Gospel, Pope Francis, or go back to Paul VI, church is here to evangelize. So in that sense, it's not new. But for me personally, it was probably something slightly more recent. But it was out of a conviction that we have something really important to offer to that secular culture, to our world today, and that unless we go out and offer it people aren't going to come into it because they won't even know about it.

And to meet people who have been transformed through that encounter just made so much sense, and I've just seen this so often. The days of someone just growing up in a ... What I describe my own story, that's not everybody's story today. I think of one person particularly, and this is only one of many, who comes from a non-practice background here in the city.

When she was 16, she went to U2000, began to dabble in it, then ended up in university, was befriended by one of the FOCUS missionaries here in UCC, then was invited to ... for coffees first of all. The coffees then became a Bible study, and then an invitation to join in mass in the Honan Chapel, the college chapel, and from that her life has been transformed, and now she's looking at the possibility, "Is God calling me to consecrated life?"

I see so many of those stories. That wouldn't have happened unless somebody went out and encountered. We introduced ... We were lucky enough to welcome FOCUS here three years ago to the diocese, to UCC, to the university here, and I learnt a huge amount from them in answer to your question about the invitation, the journeying with someone, the Bible study and the encounter with Christ allowing your life to be transformed, and that very personal witness of mission where I go off, I earn my own salary, I pray my holy hour every day, I give my life for mission.

In so many ways that challenged me, too. In recent times, FOCUS, as many of your listeners will know, have pulled out of Europe, but we have now in our dens a new foundation through a former FOCUS missionary working in Germany with ourselves in Ireland. And I was just with them there two weekends ago in Austria where we were beginning the final days of their training and their being missioned to go on to four campuses here in Europe in the coming year.

That type of intentional encounter, the win, build, send, where you meet someone, then you go deeper, and then they're sent on mission as well. Concrete evangelization has been really transformative. And I, I suppose I've seen it work. This probably goes back to the podcast with Divine Renovation and James Mallon, was the Alpha. Alpha use as a tool in many of our parishes. We use it with our schools, our young people with the Alpha Youth, and it's again a very transformative. And then we introduced them into other kind of formation programs.

Some of the CCO tools that your listeners will know from Canada have really been really helpful. So it's not that there's one tool fits all, but different people are at different stages. But just doing things the way we did them in the past on their own isn't enough.

[00:32:13] Jim Jansen: You know my history as a FOCUS missionary, our listeners know this. Like there really isn't any other way than concrete evangelization, rolling up your sleeves, taking a deep breath, and introducing yourself to someone who you don't know yet, and making a friend, and slowly letting that friendship and that coffee become an introduction to your best friend, Jesus.

I wish there were another easier way. But there's something about the individual person-to-person, boots-on-the-ground evangelization that... I think the Lord is blessing that because it changes us.

God bless the, social media and mass media and large group events, but there's something about the individual invitation that changes us in a way that, we need saving just as much as those we're introducing.

[00:33:08] Bishop Gavin: Yeah, we had a lovely experience here at the end of May going into June. This year the city of Cork celebrated the 100 anniversary, the centenary, of its Eucharistic procession . Those people who know our history will know we had a very difficult time at the beginning of the last century.

There was a civil war, a war of independence, and there was a lot of fractions. So the business people of the city went to the bishop, my predecessor of the day, and said, "Can we bring the people together behind the Eucharist?" And so in 1926, this Eucharistic procession, very much an answer to the people, on the streets was born.

That has been basically unbroken except for COVID, where it just couldn't physically happen, and we celebrated the 100 anniversary this year. For all kinds of providential reasons, we, had the possibility of bringing some CCO missionaries to work with 40 of our own missionaries here, young people and not so young, who all volunteered and got involved in this huge movement for two weeks, where they spoke in the parishes over a weekend.

There was 40 speaking at all the masses. They went from that into the schools. This culminated then in welcoming the relics of Saint Carlo Acutis, the first millennium saint. I'd been in Assisi three years ago, and met the curator, Monsignor Anthony, who looks after the relics, and said, that we were having this Eucharistic procession and wondered could they come in preparation to help people prepare for it.

Over 20,000 people came through the cathedral here in the city, but the cathedral also in West Cork, in Skibbereen. It was just beautiful to see a full cathedral, and some of the people in Skibbereen said, "We never had a saint in our city." So there was this police escort as the relics arrived, and the children who'd made their first communion waiting to greet them as we went in for mass, and the veneration of the relics went on the early hours.

It became a kind of transformative experience, which then ultimately led to the Eucharistic procession two weeks later. Now, it was the wettest day that we've had in years. Despite that, the numbers were huge.

It increased. It was over 5,000 out on the streets so there's something about combining the culture, leaning into the culture and what's happening with this very intentional invitation through the example of someone like Carlo Acutis, who's very much a Eucharistic saint an extraordinary man, who had a very short life, who died at 15.

To have, our young people plus all the other people that came with them, and worked with them. So there was just this transformation. One of the other elements it was very transformative. We had 100 hours of adoration in the main church in the city center continuously to celebrate the 100 years.

And different parish groups, different faith communities took an hour each, and so it went on right through the night. And, people would send photographs saying, "I'm here at 9 or 10 o'clock." You'd see couple of hundred people in the church. It was just one of those things.

It's moments like that that the Lord gives us that we have to lean into, and then we've to look at where do we take this going forward, and so that's one of the things we're looking at for the next kind of 12 months again, visiting the families of parishes again, looking at how can we support you? How can we celebrate what's happening? And how can we help more people to have that encounter with Christ and allow that to transform their lives?

[00:36:30] Jim Jansen: That's beautiful. We've had conversations outside of today. That's epic. 5,000 people for the rainy day procession so many people gathering for the adoration, for the talks, the veneration of the relics. What effects have you seen? Those are some extraordinary moments. What has that done for your people, for your priests?

[00:36:53] Bishop Gavin: I think it has given a lot of people confidence in their faith again. There was a lot of people feeling, "Oh," "My children aren't going to mass, going to church," or, people aren't and when you see lots of people coming back, getting involved, say, "This is something to be part of," people who weren't at the session felt they missed out on something. So the culture changes in that sense. So I think it gives a certain confidence, it gives a language, and above all, it gives the encounter.

So this isn't us, this is providence, this is the Holy Spirit, this is God working and us, if you like, leaning into the Spirit and what God's calling us to do. And just to see that alive and happening is very life-giving.

[00:37:37] Jim Jansen: I'm not asking you to make any promises here, but what do you think is next? The Lord gave you this gift. Now you're headed back out to listen, to connect with these parishes. Do you have an inkling as to where the Lord is leading?

[00:37:48] Bishop Gavin: I think the Lord is inviting us to invite more people into that personal encounter, and to go beyond those who presently gather in our parishes on a Sunday. They're the people that make up our faith community, but those doors always have to be open.

More people need to be coming in. One of the things we've seen in the cathedral parish in the last number of years which has been really very life-giving is the number of people involved in OCIA, the number of adults coming for sacraments. So we'd over 25 in the cathedral at our Easter vigil last year.

That's really transformative, and you just see the life that comes with that, and the energy. So I think we're gonna see more of that. We need to let people know we're open for business, and that we're open to inviting new people in. I think that's the real lesson.

We opened in the city center an intentional cafe. It's called the Emos Cafe. So it's a cafe for everybody, but what's different between it and Starbucks? It's Catholic. It's there where people can meet and connect. They know they'll meet their friends there. Our hope is we'll be able to run Alpha groups and different things out of it.

In the same building, it's a city center building, we had a day of formation with the young adult community that will live intentionally as a community within that family of parishes involved in Alpha, OCIA, a mass for young adults. They're going to be involved in those, outreaches during these 12 months, so they'll be enriching themselves and learning about their faith, supporting one another, but also enhancing that family of parish.

So they're just small signs of hope. So one of the other things that happened we had the Jubilee of Youth in Rome. We had over 50 young people came from Cork and Ross. Wearing my national hat, I chair the council that is responsibility for young people, youth evangelization, young adult ministry.

So we had 600 from Ireland. We were lucky enough to host our own catechesis, our own program during those days. It was quite transformative. But those people, those 50 young people from our own diocese, have stayed involved. So you say, "What's changed?" Those people have something transformed in them.

They want to connect. They said, "There's not as many young people with us in our parish every weekend. Could we not gather together?" So on the second Sunday of the month, they gather in a, center city parish, St. Peter's and St. Paul's. You can't get into that church.

Now, it's full to capacity, and there's a hospitality. And they do this themselves. They look after the servers, the music, the welcome, the hospitality, where there's tea, coffee, And that's a new thing. I know that in many of your parish in the States, that's very, that's something that happens in many parishes. It's something that's beginning to happen in parishes here.

[00:40:35] Jim Jansen: I wish it happened in more. 

[00:40:36] Bishop Gavin: well that's, that's our hope as well. But it happens there, and that's another kind of fruit. And , then you know people are beginning to come alive, and that's a Mass for everybody animated by young people, if that makes sense.

[00:40:47] Jim Jansen: And you see it spreading. It's one thing to get 50 people to Rome to have this kind of mountaintop experience, but then to have it persist and grow and spread, again, one person at a time, invitation to their friends, so that now you're, filling up Peter and Paul.

That's fantastic.

[00:41:05] Bishop Gavin: It's been one of those things, again, led by the spirit and, it just has almost looked after itself in one sense. With a little bit of minding, it has just gone from strength to strength.

[00:41:16] Jim Jansen: As we get close here on time, I wanna give you an opportunity just to dream a little bit about, what it might look like if the church in Ireland over the next few years, decade, could embrace, some of what we have talked about today.

[00:41:34] Bishop Gavin: I think we're beginning to see signs of that already, but I think it's a much more intentional church. It's where people are making a decision, a choice, and they want to be part of the faith community, where they want to go deeper, where they've had this encounter with Christ and they want to share that with others. They want to work together with their priests so that they can have the Eucharist every Sunday, that they can have a celebration of the sacraments, and they can go beyond that to share that with many people of all ages. Rather than something that just happened because that's what we do on a Sunday.

If you like there's a conviction around it. And a church where everybody feels that, "Yeah, there's a space for me in that church." So whatever part of the world you come from, that you're joining in it and becoming part of it, so it's enriched. And it's something that isn't static, it's dynamic. It's all the time growing as people grow and people are sharing, and that's where it's going deeper.

[00:42:32] Jim Jansen: Last thought here. We're talking about Ireland, Cork and Ross in particular, but these patterns are global. We could be talking about California or Texas, and obviously there are parts in the States and there's parts of the world where immigration is dramatically bolstering a faith community.

Not so much because disciples are being made, but because the disciples are moving from one location to another. Almost everybody listening can relate to something of what you shared. I wanna give you an opportunity to offer some encouragement for those who feel the draw to say, "Okay we gotta figure out a new way to do this.

We need to, look at some of these challenges," whether it be secularism or the workload of our priests or any of the myriad obstacles many of us in the West are facing, but they're not quite sure where to begin. What would you say to encourage them and give them a few first steps?

[00:43:30] Bishop Gavin: I think the first thing that I would do, and the first thing that we did, was to pray and to really see this as the work of the Spirit, and see where the Spirit is asking us to go into this new reality. Because sometimes we're trying to compare to a different time or a different way of doing things.

We're asked, that kind of Joan of Arc line we're asked, to do it in the here and now, in this time, not in another time. And there's something very exciting about it. There's great energy. It's not really about numbers, it's about bringing Christ. It's about, allowing the Holy Spirit to infuse us and allow us to be led by the Spirit.

There's a freedom that comes with that, and that's not to be spiritualized or naive, but then you can begin to tackle the challenge of, less priests or priests who have been so generous but are tired. We have to do things in a different way. We built, parishes in a particular way, and churches and buildings it was for a particular time and a particular need. As they change, we have to have that docility to the Spirit to look at where is God calling us? Because the important thing is Jesus. It's bringing people to that encounter through Jesus, through the sacraments, through his word, and then the faith communities grow from that.

Rather than being almost blinkered by this is the way it was and then we have to try and get back to that. The Church has always been ... if you look at Ireland even, the monastic ruins from a different time, they've come and they've gone and so that will happen again. And what we're asked to do is to live our faith in this time, to do our best, and allow the Holy Spirit to infuse everything we do, to allow ourselves to be walked with and be led by Jesus so that it's his church we're building, rather than our own.

[00:45:15] Jim Jansen: That is beautiful. Okay. I have to say I'm afraid I'm gonna ruin this, but, as we've developed our friendship, I've been reflecting, on my own Irish history. My ancestors are from Cork, and I thought, I owe so much to Ireland, and what would be a more fitting way to express my gratitude than to write a limerick?"

So I promise, I, I am not, I am not a poet. I am certainly not making fun of any of my Irish friends listening here. This is just a poor man poet's way of expressing some gratitude. So are you ready for this? 

[00:45:49] Bishop Gavin: Absolutely. 

[00:45:50] Jim Jansen: Okay, here we go. Maybe a disclaimer. I've heard that, you can fudge a little bit on the rhyme, so I might be fudging a little bit on the rhyme, but I think it works. This is the world debut, by the way, of this limerick. There once was a man from the States. He was mixed up on most of his dates. But this history he knew, that though they were few, the Irish he owed for his faith.

[00:46:16] Bishop Gavin: Lovely.

[00:46:17] Jim Jansen: Thank you. You're too kind. Your Excellency, thank you. Thank you for being with us. Thank you for sharing a little bit of your journey educating us a bit on the history and your mission field. Thank you for the hope. It radiates from you, and it's very encouraging.

[00:46:31] Bishop Gavin: Good. Thank you, Jim, and thanks to you for the Equip podcast. And your Path of Clear Discipleship, they have been two things that have certainly helped me in trying to understand where the Lord is asking us to work here in Cork and Ross in Ireland.

[00:46:46] Jim Jansen: Amen. Everybody, if you know somebody who needs to hear this I think we name-dropped almost every country in the Western Hemisphere, if you've got a friend in another country, they're like, "You know, you need to listen to this," or maybe it's just your friend in Wisconsin, when you are safe to do so share this out with a friend.

Again, thank you, Bishop Fintan Gavin. Thank you for your time. 

[00:47:06] Bishop Gavin: You're welcome. Thanks, Jim.