Where to in our 101st Year.

Happy birthday to the cathedral!

100 years is a milestone in anyone's life and even in the life of a public building.  So last week, we celebrated the centenary of Assumption Cathedral in Bangkok.  As I read some of the story behind its making, I could see that it was born out of the vision of one key figure - Fr Emile Colombet, the French missionary priest who was at the helm of the cathedral parish for 58 years from 1875.  I do not know much about him but the basic facts I do know tell me that he was an amazing man who surely left a legacy.

It is his legacy that is the real message of the centenary for me and that gives a clue on how to live out the 101st year and beyond.

His legacy to the Thai Church and beyond is encapsulated for me by four key words:   
Commitment
Faith
Simplicity
Vision

I try to put them into a catchy slogan but can't, and maybe that is being too flippant.  So better that I don't.  I then look at the words and see they are not doing words but being words.  They speak of the quality of the man and his integrity as a human being. 

As I say - It is not what we do but who we are that matters.  Who we are gives expression to what we do. 

I am amazed by such a man as P Colombet - at his length of time of service, at his achievements, at the mere context of his being so far away from home for so long at that time in history.  Beyond being amazed, he gives me a life to ponder and a way to inspire.  We truly are inheritors of a great faith that is meant to be lived, not enshrined.  Carpe diem!