Opening Mass of the 2025 Spirit of the Arts Festival
Thursday of Week 16 of Ordinary Time

Homily

Most Rev Timothy Costelloe SDB
Archbishop of Perth

Thursday 24 July, 2025
St Mary's Cathedral, Perth

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In the very earliest days of the story of Christianity, when the memory of the resurrection of Jesus was still a living thing in the lives of many of those first Christians, Saint Paul wrote a letter to one of the small Christian communities which had sprung up in a place called Corinth. It was a city which was part of the Roman Empire and was a place in which people from all over the world and coming from every race, nation and religion lived together, sometimes in harmony and sometimes not.

One of the great challenges the early Christians faced was the fact that many of the other religions at that time were based on the belief that God, or the gods, only gave gifts to people who had done things that the gods wanted. If you were rich, it was because the gods were happy with you; if you were poor, it was because the gods were angry with you. If you were talented in any way, it was because you were a favourite of one of the gods, and your talents were a sign of the gods’ special liking for you. This idea, apart from suggesting that the gods liked some people and disliked others, which was the very opposite of the Christian understanding of God, was inclined to make people rather proud of their gifts, which is not necessarily always a bad thing, but also very boastful about their gifts and very dismissive of and condescending towards those who did not have those gifts – and this is always a bad thing. It was into this kind of situation that Saint Paul offered the following advice, in the form of a question: What do you have that you did not receive?  And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not? (1 Cor 4:7).

This is true of all the good things which are a part of our lives; they are all generous gifts to us from a loving God, who gives them freely, rather than as a reward for good behaviour. It is certainly true of two of the most important gifts we have been given: the gift of life and the gift of faith.

Sometimes, when I am speaking to young people preparing for their Confirmation, I remind them of this and I also point out that to have been given the gift of life, first of all, and then the gift of faith, is a precious thing which none of us have done anything to deserve. Life, of course, is given to us all, but this is not true of faith. It is a gift given to some – and for that reason it is important that we ask ourselves why? Why does God give some the gift of faith – why has God given me the gift of faith – when others have not been given this gift? Am I better than everyone else, or deserve this special gift because I have earned it?  Could it be that God likes me more than other people and for that reason I have been given this gift because I am one of God’s favourites? 

None of these explanations make much sense.  God does not have favourites.  God does not like some people more than others.  God created each of us in love and God continues to sustain us in love.  The only way, then, to explain why we have been given the gift of faith, or indeed any of the gifts we have, is because God, for His own mysterious reasons, has decided that He wants to come into the lives of other people through us.  God lets us, in all kinds of ways, into the secret of His love so that we can then share that secret with others – by what we say, of course, but also and more importantly by what we do.

If this is true of the gift of life, and the gift of faith, it is also true of all the other gifts we have been given, including what the Church will call in one of its formal prayers the gifts of inventive skill and creative vision, the gifts which the Spirit pours out on artists, craftsmen and musicians. It is these gifts which we are celebrating today, it is these gifts for which we are thanking God today, and it is these gifts which will be on display over the course of the Spirit of the Arts Festival. They are gifts which, as we share them with others, become an invitation to everyone to experience, and reflect on, the creativity, and generosity and beauty of God. Our special gifts and talents, then, are given to us so that, as we use them and share them with others, everyone is able to look beyond the gifts themselves to the one who gives those gifts – to the Lord. Just as Jesus does in the gospel today, we too then can also say, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me.

Because of this presence of God’s Spirit, each one of us, in his or her own unique way, is a living sign and expression of the creativity and boundless goodness of God.  While we certainly want to thank all those people who make the Spirit of the Arts Festival possible, and while we must thank all those who are willing to use their gifts to entertain, delight and amaze others, most of all we want to thank God without whom there is no life, no joy, no creativity, and no hope.  Among all the many gifts and talents each one of us has been given, today and throughout the festival we want to be conscious of the most basic and beautiful gift of all - the gift of life - and the gift of faith which helps us to remember where our life comes from, how precious it is, and how wonderful it is to share it with others.

May the God of life bless the Spirit of the Arts festival this year and lead us all into a deeper sense of gratitude for all that God does for us for, after all, what do we have that we did not receive and why then would we boast as though our talents and abilities are of our own making rather than precious gifts coming from the hand of our loving God?