SJS at Saint Patrick's

Here's a quick snapshot from the front steps of the New York Cathedral as Father O'Connor led a short pilgrimage to New York City today.  

Why Some People Don't Go to Church...

Here is my talk to the First Friday Club of Worcester, delivered after Mass this morning at the DCU Center in Worcester.

Perhaps the most often asked question I get these days is “Why have so many people stopped going to Church?” And its probably because it is so true, as those of us who remember the days when most Sunday or Holy Days Masses were filled, upstairs and down and confession lines stretched to the back of the Church. While nowadays it seems that a new Church closes every few months and the Church in some parts of New England seems to resemble a going out of business sale.

One way to answer this question is with denial. But putting your head in the sand never gets you anything but a lot of sand in your hair and in your eyes. For the dismal percentage of Catholics who attend Mass each Sunday, go to confession at least once a month, or observe the Church’s moral tenets is undeniable.

So, why don’t people go to Church and what are the effective pastoral responses? In this very brief talk, let me suggest three reasons: lack of belief, selfishness and fickleness, and three antidotes. as well.

1. Sometimes people just don’t believe.
For some people, the good news is just too good to be true. That Jesus died for me, that my sins can really be forgiven, and that God wants me to love him like he loved me. It’s all too much to believe!

It’s hard for us to believe, just as when you’re lost, it’s hard to picture the road home. And when I have burdened God with all my sins and all my betrayals, it’s hard to imagine that he is really in the mood to forgive me.  It’s easier to think myself as lost and just to stay that way.

But the most effective antidote to this lack of belief, is a Priest who believes, with humility, gentleness and care. I think of a great Worcester Priest, now retired, who is ever the champion of the Church: who in his writings, his teachings and his life he has always been a faithful son of the Church. But never with arrogance or condescension. Always with kindness, patience and humility…and always with unswerving belief. That’s the kind of Priest that brings them back to the Church.

2. The second thing that keeps people from God is that they’re selfish.

In this they’re just the opposite of who God is. They’re in it for themselves. I don’t go to Mass because I’m too tired to get up on Sunday morning...it’s my day and I deserve to sleep in. They don’t go to confession because my sins are no one’s business but my own, and they don’t feed the poor because it's my money and my life and it's no one else’s business. It’s all about me.

But the antidote to selfishness, is the Priest who is selfless, who loves unto death, and who gives himself for his people without any thought of return. You know a priest like that, whose schedule would kill a man half his age, but who tirelessly and patiently goes about doing what must be done, because it is the right thing to do. The kind of man who demonstrates by his life that mercy begets mercy and compassion merits the mercy of God. That’s the kind of Priest that brings them back to the Church.

3. The final thing that keeps folks from God is fickleness.
One minute we’re faithful, the next we’re faithless; one minute we love Christ with our whole heart and soul, and the next we’re concerned with nothing so much as selfish pleasure and grabbing for all the gusto we can get.

But the antidote to fickleness is the Priest who is faithful. Who by his life teaches that God is not yes and no, on and off, hot and cold. But that God is the incessant yes to love, a faithful and perduring love, the Alpha and Omega, who was and who is and who ever will be. And who calls us to be the same.

I think of a priest I know who has become the mister fixit of one of a diocese not so far from here. Whenever there’s a big problem he’s the one the Bishop sends in. And its not because he’s the best administrator or even the most brilliant teacher or the most pious member of the presbyterate. It’s because he’s faithful, steady and solid as a rock. That’s the kind of Priest that brings them back to the Church.

...

And that’s why I am so grateful to Bishop McManus for making me a Seminary Rector in these last chapters of my Priesthood, and it's why I so love this wonderful work! Because what we need more than anything else is Priests: Priests who believe, Unselfish Priests, and Priests who are faithful to Christ and to his Church and to his Holy People.

And back in that Holy House to which I will return in just a little while, we have one hundred and thirty eight young men who are trying to become such a Priest, for you and your grandchildren and for children yet unborn. Pray for these good men that the Risen Christ might form them after his own heart in goodness, faithfulness and love.

Thank you.

Lessons from Yesterday for Today

Here is my Rector's Conference from last evening on Anti-Catholic Bigotry: Lessons from Yesterday for Today.


   

Deacons-elect Take Oath of Fidelity

This was my homily at Holy Hour and Evening Prayer, where many of our Deacons-elect recited the Nicene Creed and took the Oath of Fidelity to the Church. It is followed by some pictures from the Oath.

In just a few moments, our brothers, before being ordained to the Sacred Order of Deacon, will take an Oath of Fidelity to the Church and to her teachings; and despite its length, this oath is simple in its content: I believe. I profess. I will obey.

I believe and profess and obey not what man has taught, but what God has revealed through his Risen Son and through our Holy Mother, the Church.

Believing in God is a simple thing. A child kneeling beside his bed posits the same trust in his Father in Heaven as he does in his mother and father on earth…in their wisdom, their care for him and their ability to save him. And yet, as our beloved Pope emeritus reminds us, this fundamental affirmation of belief “simple in its essence, opens onto the infinite world of relationship with the Lord and with his mystery.”

The faith which is professed by these, our brothers, is the Apostolic Faith which we have received from the Lord Jesus himself. It is, as the hymn reminds us, “the faith of our fathers, living still.”

It is the faith which each one of you, God willing, will someday profess by the same oath and creed as you prepare to be ordained.

A faith which demands care and fidelity, an adhesion to what has been handed down in its entirety. An obedience to the Bishops, as authentic doctors and teachers of the faith, which fosters communion and unity.

So help you deacons-elect, so help us all, and God's Holy Gospels on which you will place your hands.

Heaven on Earth: Fra Angelico at the Gardner Museum

There is a wonderful exhibit of four reliquaries (painted for use in the sacristy of Santa Maria Novella in Florence) at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum on the Fenway.  

I encourage you to see these reliquaries and to reflect on the mysteries of the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary which they depict in such stunning detail.  

Here are a few of my random reflections on the four reliquaries, their liturgical and devotional use and how the other pieces in the exhibit help us to understand these unparalleled works of art!



  

The Easter Vigil

Here is my homily, followed by some pictures, from tonight's Easter Vigil.  

CHRIST IS RISEN!  

ALLELUIA!

A great silence lay heavy upon the earth, as in the darkness of a tomb, thick with death, with ancient sin and crippling despair.  It seemed that all was lost, that Satan’s empty show and fear and pain and loss has won the day.

A great silence lay upon the earth, as they walked in the darkness to his tomb with vials of oil to anoint a dead body on that awful, awful night.

As in his bed, and old man lay, afraid of death and afraid to be alone.  Abandoned by his family and with no friends, his only companion was the pain and the gasping fear of the death which was sure to come.  

As in his house, a young man drank and sniffed a line of selfishness.  I’m lucky to have a good job, he snorted, and I can buy all the friends I need, endowed with a good mind and better looks and the confidence that, given the right opportunities, the world could be his oyster. 

As on a street that lady walked, three husbands in and having lost her kids again.  Her heart filled with an aching longing for something she had never found.  Each time she caught a glimpse, but it never really played through.  And now she’s lost, literally wandering the streets with tears of desperation.

Each one, in fear and sin and desperation, walk in the darkness to the tomb to anoint a dead body on that awful, awful night.

But then it happened! A stone is moved, and in its place, a shining angel sings: “He has been raised!” “My hope, is risen!” “The Prince of life, who died, now reigns immortal.” As the angel’s voice, shatters the dark silence of every corner of our world, with the awesome glory of his holy light.

To the old man afraid to die, afraid of the rotting, painful sentence of malignant death, the angel’s voice commands: exult! For Christ has paid the price of ancient sin, destroyed the prison-bars of death for you, and rose victorious from the tomb. On your death bed, I say to you: exult! For death has no more power over you, and the first born of many brothers has promised that you will never really die.

And you, young man, bound down by your own selfishness, thriving in the darkness of your narcissism, forging chains of Satan’s empty show. You who hide in all the dark places of this world, protecting your heart and hiding your true self, making believe and never really facing the truth. An angel calls to you: Rejoice! For the chains of your brokenness are smashed, as this pillar of fire banishes the darkness of sin. Come out of your hiding, as his glory floods this holy Church, arrayed with the lightning of his glory!

And you, dear woman, disappointed by life, alone and afraid, sick to your stomach with desperation. I say, shake with joy! For the trumpet sounds, the dead are raised and he who is the way, our shepherd and our priest, will lead us home. And all who are caught up in their brilliant minds, in their own self-satisfying desires, all who are so frightened to follow should stop, and hear the angel’s voice on this night which restores lost innocence, drives out hatred and leads the sinner home.

O truly blessed of all nights, when, the Morning Star that burns undimmed redeems us all, and Angels sing the Triumph of our Mighty King!

Evening Mass of the Lord's Supper

O God, who have called us to participate
in this most sacred Supper,
in which your Only Begotten Son,
when about to hand himself over to death,
entrusted to the Church a sacrifice new for all eternity, 
the banquet of his love,
grant, we pray,
that we may draw from so great a mystery,
the fullness of charity and of life.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, 
one God, for ever and ever. 

The Faculty serve Holy Thursday dinner to the seminarians.