When I was living in London in 2003, I picked up a book in a local church that detailed all London area masses.

On Sundays, when my familied friends were busy with their nearest and dearest, I’d pick a church, go to mass, and afterwards explore a new part of the city.

I got around.

When I mentioned my Sunday excursions to an Italian friend, they pointed me in the direction of the church they went to on Ogle Street. The priest, they said, preached to a packed audience, and his sermons were worth noting.

[Were I ever allowed to be a priest, I’d make sure my sermons were relevant and practical.]

I haven’t thought of Ogle Street or my Sunday mass hunts in years. I can’t remember the priest’s name, but a quick search tells me it was the St Charles Borromeo Church. Borromeo was once Archbishop of Milan, so perhaps this was the Italian connection.

You might have heard of him for this morsel of wisdom:

Do not give yourself to others so completely that you have nothing left for yourself.

But back to how Ogle Street came to mind after all these years.

I’m cleaning out. I’m paring down. I’m readying myself for the inevitable final departure, although I hope the fortune teller was right and that I have a while to go yet.

I came across a box of memory sticks, one with a whopping 256MB of space. On it was a copy of one of those sermons which were printed in the Ogle Street Parish newsletter each week. The save date on the file was 17 March 2003:

“Age quod agis” – that’s Latin! Translated into English it simply means “DO WHAT YOU ARE DOING”.

This is the most fundamental advice you can receive if you want to be a person of sanity. This is the most fundamental advice you can receive if you want to be a person of sanctity.

It is what St. Benedict told the Benedictines, St. Ignatius the Jesuits, and Buddha the Buddhists.

“Age quod agis” means keeping our mind and attention only on what we are actually doing, so that we are not distracted, fragmented, divided, schizo, split: doing one thing but actually thinking about another.

For example: you are now reading this Newsletter. But are you? Does it have your complete attention? Or are you also thinking about something else, or someone else, and planning your next move?

Of course, if you are reading this newsletter during Mass, put it down immediately. “Age quod agis” not only means “do what you are doing”, it also means “do the right thing at the right time”.

But why is this advice so vital and fundamental for our sanity and our sanctity? Why?

Because giving our full attention to what we are doing silences our crazy ego, which feeds on the illusion that I am the centre of the universe. This illusion fills my mind with thousands of thoughts, plans, schemes, and self-centred projects. In religious language, such thoughts are called pride.

Those who give free rein to such thoughts end up in a world of pure fantasy. The only way out of this unreality is to give our full attention to what we are doing.

When we make a cup of tea, we make a cup of tea. When we close a door, we close a door. We give tea making and door closing our full attention. There is no room for fantasising.

If you think this is easy, try it! You will discover how mentally active we all are. The human mind is like a huge swaying tree, filled with screaming monkeys, somersaulting from branch to branch.

To give our full attention to what we are actually doing is a great grace. In religious language it is called “the sacrament of the present moment” because God is present only in the present.

Perhaps the most difficult thing of all is to give our full attention and be fully present to someone we are talking with. Very few people are able to do this, because our mind is rarely still and focused.

To be totally present, spouse to spouse, parents to children, friend to friend, doctor to patient, priest to penitent, is not easy. Only those who act from the still centre of their being are able to relate thus.

That is why, when we do meet someone who gives us their undivided attention, we are aware of it. We know that something very special, something beautiful is happening. And that person is different.

By giving our full attention to a person, or to some activity, we cut off an enormous amount of useless reflection, thoughts, poses, ploys, schemes, distractions, machinations, intrigues, all centred on ME!

When we refuse to think of anything except what we are doing now, or the person we are with now, even on the mobile, then we are developing the habit of being present to the present, the only reality.

Far better to be present to your job as barman serving in the King and Queen that to be at Mass in Ogle Street thinking about being in the King and Queen and what you are going to drink at that bar!

So today, AGE QUOD AGIS – DO WHAT YOU ARE DOING.

Benedict, Ignatius, and Buddha will applaud your sanity and your sanctity.

There is merit in cleaning out. I recycled four bags of paper, emptied 10 box files, and started on one cabinet.

I also found this sermon and spent a while reminiscing about my days in London. I don’t miss living there in the slightest, but I’m grateful to have had the experience and to have made the friends I made while I was there.

Happy St Patrick’s Day to you all, wherever you are, however you’re celebrating.