OUR CHRISTIAN LIFE
We believe that Jesus was born in an obscure town in Israel
called Bethlehem, about 2000 years ago. During his first thirty
years he shared the daily life and work of an ordinary home.
For the next three years he went about teaching people about God
and healing sick people by the shores of Galilee. He called twelve
ordinary men to be his helpers.
He had no money, He wrote no books. He commanded no army. He wielded
no political power. He was executed by being nailed to a cross at
the age of thirty-three.
Today over 900 million people throughout the world worship Jesus as
divine - the Son of God. Their experience has convinced them that in
the wonders of nature we see God as our loving father, in the person
of Jesus we discover God as Son; and in our daily lives we encounter this same God as Spirit. Jesus is our way into finding God: we learn about Jesus by reading the Bible, particularly the New Testament and we meet him directly through the blessed sacraments and in our spiritual experiences.
Jesus taught us to trust in a loving and merciful Father and to pray
to him in faith for all our needs. He taught that we are all
infinitely precious, children of one heavenly Father, and that we
should therefore treat one another with love, respect and
forgiveness. He lived out what he taught by caring for those he met;
by healing the sick - a sign of God's love at work; and by forgiving those who put him to death.
Jesus's actions alone would not have led him to a criminal's death
on the cross: but his teaching challenged the religious and moral
beliefs of his day. Jesus claimed to be the only way to reach God.
Above all, he pointed to his death as God's appointed means of
bringing us self-centred people back to God. Jesus also foretold
that he would be raised to life again three days after his death.
When three days after he had died on the cross his followers did
indeed meet him alive again, frightened and defeated men became
fearless and joyful messengers.
Their message of good news about Jesus is the direct reason why
this church exists. More important, it is the reason why all over
the world there are Christians who know what it means to meet the
living Jesus, and who believe that he alone has the key to human
life.