Celibacy is not just a matter of not having sex. It is a way of admiring a person for their humanity, maybe even for their beauty.
To be a preacher requires two apparently contradictory qualities: confidence and humility.
We can identify with Frodo and Sam, setting off not knowing quite where they are going and what they are to do.
All the Abrahamic faiths are marked by violence.
One of our deepest needs is to be at home.
At the centre of Christianity is community; we are gathered by the Lord around the altar.
Christians can bring peace to multi-religious Europe because we are able to understand the role of faith in the lives of other believers better than atheists.
The unutterable violence of the Holocaust shook our confidence in the possibility of telling any story of faith at all.
Despite all the lunacy of the last century, all the absurdity of war and genocide, we believe that humans being are rational and are made to seek the truth.
The trouble is that after nine years as a Jack of all trades and Master of the Dominican Order, I have no expertise on anything except airports and exotic foods.
I believe that his death and resurrection transformed humanity's relationship with God.
Clearly a big challenge for Christianity is how to remain in contact with the millions of people who look for God but do not come to Church.
This evening I wish to suggest that we Christians should accompany people on their pilgrimages. Specifically we should travel with people as they search for the good, the true and the beautiful.
To be frank, I suspect that today there is little respect for Christianity as source of moral teaching about goodness.
What can the Church do? If she stands by her moral teaching, then she will be seen as standing in judgement over a vast percentage of Europeans.
Seeking the good is not primarily about rules and commandments.
Thinking that morality is all about commandments is a relatively new way of thinking, since the Reformation.
The next challenge for Christianity is to remind Europeans that we are called to seek the truth.
Our society has lost confidence in the power of reason, except perhaps scientific reason.
Claiming that you have got the truth wrapped up does breed violence and intolerance.
