Our People

Homily for the Diaconal Ordination of Saw Philip Shwe and Gregory Saw Po Gray

St Dominic’s Church, Flemington

By Most Rev. Anthony Fisher OP
Auxiliary Bishop of Sydney
28/7/2007

If the cinemas are an accurate cultural barometer, our age is crying out for heroes, indeed for superheroes. There have been three movies each of Mad Max, The Lord of the Rings, Spiderman and X-men and two series of Batman and Fantastic Four movies. Star Wars, Harry Potter and Superman will count six each. With slightly fewer powers James Bond is now up to 22 adventures and Indiana Jones and the Mission Impossible team keep adding to theirs. And there’s The Incredible Hulk, Daredevil, Transformers, Iron Man and quite a few others I don’t know much about, but I am sure were modelled on past or present seminary members.

Ours is an age in search of heroes. If only it knew Christ and his saints, it need look no further. There every power worth having, every human and supernaturally human virtue, and the greatest stories of danger, action and salvation, have already been told and they are for real. Some saints’ tales have been enlarged in the retelling, but the characters are authentic. Other stories of quieter heroism are unknown to history or legend. You do not need multi-million dollar budgets and computer graphics to make these superheroes. All you need is grace – mediated by the Word, the Sacraments and the People of God.

Enter today’s superheroes, Saw Philip Shwe and Gregory Saw Po Gray. They are, on the face of it, rather unlikely superheroes. For one thing, they are not very big. Before I learnt his name I had labelled young Gregory ‘the smile on a stick’: for, apart from his face which sports the biggest and best smile I have ever seen, there is not much more to him physically. Philip, too, can be all smiles, but like Gregory is no incredible hulk. Their stature tells us something about Christian heroes. Our kind of heroism is told in great deeds, no doubt. But unlike the cinematic achievements of superpower and muscle, our great deeds are most often acts of self-sacrifice and generosity behind the scenes. Like John the Baptist, we Christians must decrease so the Son of Man can increase. Our clergy, in particular, rightly shy away from the spotlight so as always to highlight Christ: we want all eyes on Him. Our heroes, then, are humble, self-effacing men. Men like the deacon-prophet Isaiah, called from his mother’s womb and formed to be God’s servant (Isa 49:1-6). Men like Greg and Philip. This is enough for us: to be small in this world’s eyes, but satisfactory in the service of the Creator and Redeemer of the world.

These two men are, of course, big men too. Both are brave, large-hearted, magnanimous. They are grateful for the opportunities, friendships and comfort of Australia, yet ready to return to the challenges, dangers and perhaps discomfort in Burma. They have already known physical hunger and may well return to it. In the Burma to which they return only 1% of the population are Catholic; in the villages in which Greg and Philip grew up, Mass was celebrated only once a year. God willing, Philip and Greg will be ordained priests on the Feast of St Thomas a’Becket, soon after this Christmas. We pray that is a premonition of long, high and faithful service as priests, not of the witness of blood. But this, too, has been required of many Christians in Burma, including Greg’s father, a catechist-martyr. Already these two men have experienced suffering at the hands of the troops of the military junta, communists and rebels. Their people lack freedom and face many other kinds of deprivation also. When St Paul tells the young Timothy today to “share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ… be ready to be chained for the sake of the Gospel… endure everything for the sake of those who might be saved” (2 Tim 2:1-10), such words have a poignancy for a Burmese seminarian that we Australians can barely glimpse. When Jesus says “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (Jn 10:11-18), he speaks very directly to these two shepherd-boys. Their Mission, if not Impossible, will certain require personal fortitude and divine grace.

My dear friends, these men, our brothers, are soon to be ordained to the Order of Deacons; in due course they will be ordained priests for their home diocese of Mawlamyine in Burma. As servants of the Word, Greg and Philip will proclaim the Gospel and bring Christ’s teaching to believers and non-believers alike, for as Jesus said in our Gospel passage, “there are other sheep also, not yet of my fold, and these too must I tend”. They are charged like Isaiah by God: “I will send you out as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”

For this preaching task Philip, especially, was formed in the womb by his Creator. He long prayed that God would assist him to the priesthood. Just when all hope of the required higher education seemed lost, his parish priest asked on behalf of the bishop, “Philip, do you want to study for the priesthood in Sydney?” “Yes, I would love to,” he answered. After thinking for a while he added, “But where is Sydney?” He had never heard of it! But God, Isaiah reminds us, has had plans for us from the very moment of our conception. He wants Philip to be His voice to His people. Philip, too, wants to be like the Apostles and to tell people how much God loves them. He embraces that task with courage and trepidation. From today, he does so with a sacramental grace that allows his tongue to speak Christ’s words.

As servants of the altar, Philip and Greg will prepare the Sacrifice and give the Lord’s Body and Blood to the community of believers. They may also preside over public prayer, baptize, give benediction, assist at marriages, bring viaticum to the dying and lead the rites of burial. For these tasks Greg, especially, has been formed almost from birth. His father was the village catechist and Greg as a little boy would go with him as he lead prayer services on priestless Sundays, praying also with the sick, the dying and the dead. He was especially pleased when the Parish Priest came, because people cooked him good curries! Already in primary school, Greg knew he wanted to be a priest and eat good curries! Later, when he was in the minor seminary, his father wrote to him, not long before he died, “My son, I am getting old. I have done my part. It is your turn to carry on the work of God.”

As servants of God’s people, Philip and Greg will perform works of charity in the name of the Church, so that people recognize in them the Good Shepherd, who came to serve, not to be served, and to lay down his life for his sheep. Both Greg and Philip have a keen sense of the contribution required of those who believe Deus caritas est. Again, they have learnt this at home. Greg’s widowed mother cares for fifty orphans. There are many in their homeland who need care and education. These two deacons will nourish the bodies and souls of their people.

The Archdiocese of Sydney has been pleased to host these two fine men for part of their priestly formation. They have made a deep impression on all who have known them. They have learnt much, not just in their formal studies – and I am reminded that Greg still owes me an essay – but also in their experience of a strange culture and people, the Australians. Greg, for instance, whose favourite childhood sport was monkey catching, found a decided lack of monkeys outside Good Shepherd Seminary – I will make no comment on what he found inside. Both men have learnt to eat Vegemite and sing with an Aussie accent. This took them many language classes and IELTS tests before their formal studies at the Catholic Institute of Sydney. They will return to Burma enriched by a sense of the universality of the Church and gifted with an extra language, strine.

When I asked these two young men earlier what today will mean to them, they told me this: “Once you are ordained, you do not speak or act just for yourself anymore: you speak and act for Christ. Once you are ordained, you do not belong to yourself anymore, you are for the People of God. We give God our celibacy and ourselves, so that we can belong to none and so belong to all.” These are wise words from men so young. These are heroic words. And they are words our world needs to hear.

Philip and Gregory, embrace the Office of Deacon according as St Paul’s instructions to Timothy in our Epistle today: “Stand firm, my son,” he says, “in the grace that is in Christ Jesus and only pass on to others the Gospel you have heard from me.” Never turn away from the hope which that Gospel offers: now you must not only listen to God’s word but preach it. Express it in all you say and do. Preach and teach faithfully, administer effectively, and serve the poor generously and cheerfully. Reject the false gods of unchastity, avarice and ambition: for no man can serve two masters.

Ours is an age in search of heroes. It needs you, Philip and Greg, to be all that you can be under God’s grace. As servants of the word, the altar and the people, you will be servants of God. In due course you will be priests of Jesus Christ. Draw us closer to Jesus Christ the priest, the deacon, the servant of all, our true hero, as He draws you closer to Himself.

+ Anthony Fisher OP