Baptism in sight after long wait for Jon

When the Prime Minister announced a change in Covid alert levels on February 14, Jon Mac from Huntly had a special reason to feel worried.

Mr Mac has been preparing to be baptised and receive the sacraments of confirmation and Eucharist at Easter, having been unable to do so last Easter because of the lockdown then in place.

On February 21, 2021, as a catechumen, he took part in the Rite of Election at the Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Hamilton. His area had moved back to alert level 1 a few days beforehand. This is the third time he has participated in the rite and been presented to a congregation, he told NZ Catholic. A previous occasion was in Pukekohe about four years ago, he said, but things did not work out for him then.

So, when the news broke about the alert levels on February 14, “I was disappointed. It is a roller-coaster emotionally”.

But he could see a lighter side. “Perhaps God thought I needed a bit longer before he wanted to let me come in the door,” he laughed.

But he was happy to have taken part in the Rite of Election this year.
“Today, it was almost like being at my own wedding in some ways. I had a few tears in my eyes.”

The Catholic faith of his late wife Deb, who died in 2007, has played a key role in leading Mr Mac to this point in his journey.

“My . . . wife led me to the Catholic Church, through a book called ‘The Eucharistic Miracles’. It changed my whole [outlook]. I just loved the Mass and the reverence of it, and the enormous history and all you can learn.”

“[Deb’s] faith and everything she taught me is, like, with me wherever I go.”

Mr Mac, who had had some involvement in Pentecostal churches previously, has been coming to the Catholic Church for over 20 years.

He has really appreciated going through the RCIA preparation process at the Cathedral parish again, with many of the same people from last time.

“Yes, it was good to see them,” Mr Mac said. “They were like family really. I think we found ourselves closer to one another than we realised, and we have become a community.”

Cathedral parish pastoral assistant Andrea Savage told NZ Catholic that 14 of the candidates and catechumens from last year in the parish “made a group decision to continue through to Easter this year, as the Easter Vigil is such a highpoint of the liturgical year”.

“There has been an increased depth of sharing in the group this year,” she said.

The cathedral group now numbers 16, she added, noting that some other parishes in the diocese decided to receive their 2020 catechumens last year, when the lockdown was over. At the Rite of Election in Hamilton on February 21, candidates and catechumens came from Hamilton, Morrinsville-Te Aroha-Paeroa, Tauranga and Taupō.

One of those from further afield at the Rite of Election this year was catechumen Vanessa Hunter, who had travelled from Taupō for the Mass.

She said she had enjoyed the RCIA process, and did not have any worries about not being able to be baptised at Easter in light of recent events, because “we only went to alert level 2”.

Like Mr Mac, a close family member had played a key role in her faith journey to this point.

“I’ve had my sister (Sophia Devlin) behind me for quite a lot of years, trying to encourage me to come into the Church, and I think, despite all the lockdowns and everything I felt this was just the right time to start getting back on track.”

In his homily at the Mass, Hamilton Bishop Stephen Lowe said that the Covid alert level shifts remind us that we live in a chaotic world, where “we are not as powerful as we thought we were”.

“[But] God is always wanting to save us, to raise us up — and we see that so often, in so many ways, in the life of Jesus.

“And I hope for those of you who are preparing for the Easter sacraments, and I hope this is true for every one of us here, that we are absolutely captivated by Jesus — because he is the one who is the living water, the one who can make sense of our crazy world, the one who can put us on our right path.”

Bishop Lowe said that Jesus “is the one who wants to pour his life and his love in us, so that, through us, he can transform the world”.

“And that is what it means to be a Christian. Just not getting the benefits of being a son or daughter of God, and that’s it, I am on the way to salvation, no, we also share in his mission of going out there to be his disciples.”

“We have to choose, every day, in so many different ways, whether to follow Christ or not,” the bishop said.

He concluded his homily by saying: “What we receive with the sacraments, we have got to live. And that remains the challenge for each one of us as we continue our hikoi of life, until we see Jesus face to face and share his glory.”