John McDade’s Nicholas Lash Memorial Lecture was a wonderful opening of what could perhaps be a series. It was the most fitting tribute to a great Catholic theologian in many ways. Nicolas Lash dedicated his life to making the ethos of the Second Vatican Council effective in the life of the church. What he achieved, and this is what John’s lecture outlined for us, is an intellectual and theological resourcing of lay spirituality.

This is a perfect timing for engaging with it. John McDade sensitively articulated directions and needs so that we could live in a ‘balanced church’, where the hierarchical, organisational and spiritual elements are in a dynamic and constructive harmony. For me, two of John’s ‘Lashian’ emphases keep echoing from the night. First, that the life experience of every single Christian is an important theological locus, in which particularity the Church, with her ‘Catholica’, also subsists. Secondly, that the prophetic dimension or mystical element of religion is the charisma of every baptised Christian. In other words, lay people, living in the world – all of us – have a special vocation and responsibility in making the Church genuinely Christ like for everyone, a paradigm shift Pope Francis has initiated.

John McDade has given us a framework for what we might call a ‘synodal theology’. What we heard that evening was Catholic theology at its best. I would like to add that John McDade does theology in style. He coloured the night by cracking really smart jokes. ‘Who is there?’ Saint Peter asks at the gate of heaven. A distant voice comes in answer, ‘It is I’. ‘Oh, not again a Scottish grammar teacher!’, Peter exclaims.

Well, those of us attending the night, as an appreciation of John McDade’s unsurpassable eloquence and style, perhaps, could add something else, a well-deserved compliment. This is when the Scottish Belle Letters rhetoric tradition and contemporary Catholic theology merge beautifully. This is a proper ‘synodal theology’: a huge thank you to both the speaker and the organisers.

Dr Joseph Gabor
Research Associate at MBI