Homily for 31st Sunday of Ordinary Time

Homily for the
31st Sunday of Ordinary Time

Oct. 31, 2021
Eucharistic Prayer
St. Joseph Church , New Rochelle, N.Y.

“Do this in memory of me” (Words of Institution, E.P.).

How often have you heard that command of Jesus?  Yet have you ever asked what it is that Jesus is commanding us to do?

On the most basic level, he’s commanding us to re-enact what he did at the Last Supper, to take bread and wine, bless them, share them, and consume them—to carry out a ritual.

On a deeper level, he’s commanding us to understand what that ritual means.  What we’re doing is what he did:  changing bread into his body and wine into his blood, and consuming these altered substances that he’s given us, given for us, for the forgiveness of our sins.  It’s bread no longer, wine no longer, despite their outer appearance and taste, but himself—God’s love, God’s power, God’s forgiveness made flesh that we might share in that love, that power, that forgiveness, and be transformed ourselves from sinners alienated from God into friends of God, into saints.  As we prepare to celebrate All Hallows Eve, the eve of all the saints, we remember why God made us and how Jesus remakes us—to be saints.

“Do this in memory of me.”  What is our Lord Jesus doing that we must remember?  At the Last Supper he’s surrendering his life to his Father.  He’s committing himself to obeying his Father.  He told us that he’d come down from heaven to do the will of the one who sent him (John 6:38) and that his food was to do his Father’s will and to finish his work (John 4:34).  St. Paul affirms, “Thru one man’s obedience all people have been made right with God” (Rom 5:19).

Jesus doesn’t want to be arrested, tortured, and executed, nor does his Father want that.  What the Father wants is that Jesus reveal God’s love and forgiveness for the whole human race, and his compassion for the lowly, the suffering, and the oppressed.  That’s what got Jesus into trouble with the Jewish authorities.  Abp. Samuel Aquila of Denver expresses it this way in a recent newspaper column:  “His direct truthfulness was challenging, and to some it was so threatening that they plotted against Jesus and eventually killed him.”  Such insistence still gets many Christians into trouble and leads to exile, prison, or martyrdom, e.g. St. Oscar Romero and Blessed Stanley Rother, a missionary priest from Oklahoma killed by government militia in Guatemala because he catechized and educated the peasants.

If you and I are to do what Jesus has done, in memory of him, receiving the Eucharist isn’t enuf.  Obedience like his is required of us too.  We are required to seek the Father’s will in our own lives and do our best to carry it out—in our married lives, family lives, work lives, recreational lives; in our interactions with people on the street, on the highways, and on the World Wide Web.  The famous acronym WWJD—“What would Jesus do?”—can’t be just a slogan.  It must be lived.

In particular, what Jesus did at the Last Supper and on Good Friday was to give his body for us, pour out his blood for us.  He sacrificed his life for our salvation.  We heard in the Letter to the Hebrews, “He offered himself once for all when he offered himself” (7:27).  To do this in memory of him is to sacrifice ourselves for the sake of others:  spouses to sacrifice for each other, parents for their children, grown children for their aging parents, those with social advantages for those aren’t well off, like the sick, the unemployed, the hungry, the homeless, the refugee, the desperate pregnant woman and the single mother, those who need education.  The Church engages in such social works in imitation of Jesus—in memory of him.  The Church is us, not just Cardinal Dolan or the clergy or religious sisters.  It’s all of us.  All of us must offer ourselves as sacrifices to God, like Jesus.

Homily for Tuesday, Week 30 of Ordinary Time

Homily for Tuesday
30th Week of Ordinary Time

Oct. 26, 2021
Rom 8: 18-25
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Residence, New Rochelle

By coincidence, St. Paul speaks today of creation’s “eager expectation” of the “revelation of the children of God” (8:19), of creation’s redemption “from slavery to corruption” (8:21), 5 days before a U.N. summit meeting on climate change in Glasgow.  Paul makes the point that even the created world has been corrupted by human sinfulness.  For nature suffers death and decay just as human beings do.

The politicians and scientists in Glasgow aren’t likely to talk about sin except in terms of what we do to destroy or to preserve the environment.

The Earthly Paradise (Bruegel the Younger)

Paul, of course, wasn’t thinking about environmentalism.  He had a biblical outlook.  According to Genesis, sin destroyed creation’s harmony.  Jesus Christ has begun its restoration.  When humanity is set free from the bondage of death because of faith in the resurrection, when we rise in Christ, creation too will be fully restored.

We don’t know what the new world of the resurrection will be like, the new Jerusalem.  Do we imagine an amazing, peaceful natural world, Eden restored, Isaiah’s vision of the wild beasts at peace with oxen, lambs, and little children (11:6-9)?  But we live in hope of humanity’s being saved after the travails of our suffering, and our enjoying the fullness of life God planned for us.  And why not with other created realities too?

FMAs' GC24 Concludes

FMAs’ GC24 Concludes

Rector Major Tells Sisters, “You are called to be life for many.”

(ANS – Rome- October 25, 2021) – On Sunday, October 24, the Institute of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians concluded its 24th General Chapter at its Generalate. The chapter began on September 11. In 44 days of listening, prayer, dialog, and discernment, the 172 FMA chapter members elected the new Mother General, Mother Chiara Cazzuola, and the other members of the general council. They reflected together on how to be “communities that generate life in the heart of contemporary life.”

The general chapter was lived an attitude of listening to the call of God, who prepares them to live the future with the young people of today. All of the work of GC 24 is now synthesized in the chapter document “With Mary, being a ‘presence’ that generates life.”

In the morning of the 24th, Mother General gave her concluding speech, in which she said among other things: “I feel the need to express my gratitude to the Lord for the abundance of grace to which we have been the recipients in this chapter time.... As a fruitful community enlightened by the presence of Mary, we have focused on three significant choices: to be in continuous formation, to walk in synodality, to network with a view to integral ecology. Three actions whose common thread is the quality of presence, that is, our ‘being there’ as a people and as a community in the heart of the contemporary world. Therefore, we are called to live life as a vocation and to rediscover the Salesian charism in all its apostolic, missionary dynamism.”

”GC 24,” she continued, “will be fruitful for the good of the whole Institute if we are effective mediations of communication and sharing of this profound experience that we have tasted and celebrated together. But now, it is time to go down from Cana to Capernaum, not alone, but with Jesus and Mary, to share life and mission together with the young people and the laity, to let God breathe in our existence, and courageously face the challenges that we will encounter. We entrust ourselves to Mary to help us to be women who know how to bring the new wine of hope to our history marked by so many sufferings and hardships, but blessed by the sweet Providence of the Father.”

At 11:00 a.m., Fr. Angel Fernandez Artime presided over GC24’s solemn concluding Eucharist. The introduction to Mass recalled, through symbols and choreography, the story of the wedding at Cana, an icon that had accompanied the chapter event since its preparation and which now continues to act as a guiding thread to the chapter document.

In his homily Don Bosco’s 10th Successor addressed the chapter members, saying: “You have lived an experience that is abundant in the Holy Spirit and grace, a personal enrichment of profound convictions which now becomes a commitment for all to share and witness. In fidelity to the Salesian charism, you are called to be life for many, a light in the mission among the poorest, a loving embrace of God for the most distant and those in need of humanity and closeness. The chapter begins now. We will continue to walk together collaborating with the creativity of the Holy Spirit in the Salesian educational mission.”

The Eucharist, Mother General’s concluding words, and the fulfilment of the tasks of the secretariat thus concluded the 24th General Chapter.

Pope Francis Addresses FMA General Chapter

Pope Francis to FMAs: “Do not forget the grace of your origins

“Mary Help of Christians will help you: You are her daughters!”

(ANS – Rome – October 25, 2021) – Pope Francis once again manifested his special attention to the Salesian Family through a surprise visit to the Generalate of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians in Rome on Friday, October 22. He went to meet the participants of the FMAs’ 24th General Chapter. The Holy Father exhorted the sisters to be on guard against spiritual worldliness, always to draw on the richness of their Salesian charism, to cultivate the family spirit, and to be generative communities at the service of the young and the poorest.

Thunderous applause from the chapter members welcomed the Pontiff as he entered the chapter hall. Newly-elected Mother General Chiara Cazzuola welcomed the Pope, thanking him for his presence and expressing the joy of feeling “at home” in his presence!

“We are almost at the end of our 24th General Chapter in which we reflected on the theme ‘Do whatever He tells you (Jn 2:5): Communities that generate life in the heart of contemporary life.’ It has been a very demanding process, and we are certain that the presence of Mary, our mother, teacher, and powerful intercessor, guides us, as she did in these 150 years of the history of the FMA Institute, and calls us to a regeneration in the Holy Spirit, who makes our educational communities generative of new life. As FMAs we feel the desire for a profound vocational renewal, to enhance the joy and beauty of God’s call. The encounter with you today, Holy Father, is for us, for our chapter, an invitation to have more vital strength, more enthusiasm, more evangelical courage in living the mandate that the Church entrusts to us.”

Subsequently, Pope Francis, with his simple and familiar style, appreciated the centrality of Mary in the chapter reflection and invited the sisters to do as she did. He reminded the chapter members, “Our Lady never retains anything for herself, but always points to Jesus.”

Then he lauded the service carried out by the FMAs throughout the world, especially in the current multicultural and multireligious social context of today, which is even more marked due to the pandemic.

Focusing on the objective of the chapter – to reawaken the original freshness of the vocational fruitfulness of the Institute – Pope Francis illustrated the challenges and the beauty of the consecrated life, without denying “the fragilities and struggles present in the communities,” but at the same time stressing the possibility of experiencing within them “a kairos, a favorable time to go to the charismatic roots.”

He recalled the dangers of “spiritual worldliness,” that subtle and pernicious attitude which, without creating obvious scandals, ends up closing horizons and taking away peace. He indicated as a way out the return and renewal of the charism, which, he continued, “is a living reality, not a stuffed relic.... It is creativity that gives fidelity to the charism. This is the way of the Church that the holy Popes of the [Vatican] Council and of the post-Council have shown us.”

He also emphasized the need to nurture communities interwoven with intergenerational, intercultural, sisterly, and cordial relationships. “For this you can draw on your family spirit, which characterized the first community at Mornese.” He noted the example of the “first Daughters of Mary Help of Christians” and the first Salesians working in the peripheries of the metropolises in Latin America. “When they arrived in Buenos Aires – this is the beauty of the first Salesians – they did not go to the middle-class neighborhoods, no, they went to look for frontiers…. What attracts a vocation? Holiness, zeal.”

Finally, inviting the sisters again to cultivate tenderness and closeness to young people, he spoke of the opportunity for renewal constituted by the 150th anniversary of the foundation of the Institute, and concluded: “Do not forget the grace of your origins, the humility and smallness of the beginnings which made God’s action clear in the lives and in the message of those who, filled with wonder, began this journey. Mary Help of Christians will guide you: you are her daughters!”

11 Young SDB Priests Meet for Quinquennium Workshop

11 Young SDB Priests Meet for Quinquennium Workshop

(ANS - Chicago - October 22, 2021) – Eleven Salesian priests participated in an ongoing formation event for their first 5 years (quinquennium) of priesthood from October 7 to 10. Fr. Joseph Nguyen, novice master and delegate for formation of the United States Western Province, and Fr. Dominic Tran, vi e provincial and delegate for formation of the Eastern United States and Canada Province, animated the group. The participants, ordained from months (since June) up to five years, reflected and shared experiences and their ministries, focusing on their life of prayer as Salesian priests.

Homily for Mission Sunday

Homily for the
30th Sunday of Ordinary Time
Mission Sunday

Oct. 24, 2021
Ps 126: 1-6
Mark 10: 46-52
St. Joseph Church, New Rochelle, N.Y.
Our Lady of the Assumption, Bronx
Holy Name of Jesus, New Rochelle                    

“Then they said among the nations, ‘The Lord has done great things for them’” (Ps 126: 2).

This weekend the Church around the world celebrates Mission Sunday.  This annual observance reminds us that the Church is fundamentally missionary.  The Church was created by our Lord Jesus to carry on his mission until the end of time, his mission of announcing God’s love to people everywhere.  Our Lord Jesus wants the whole world to exclaim, as the psalmist did, “The Lord has done great things for them.”

The prophet Jeremiah preached in the name of the Lord, “Shout with joy for Jacob, exult at the head of the nations; proclaim your praise and say:  The Lord has delivered his people” (31:7).  The psalmist sang of Israel’s deliverance from bondage, testifying of God’s work to the whole world.  St. Mark wrote about Jesus’ public ministry, passion, and resurrection so that generation after generation of believers would know that they might be saved by faith in Jesus, like the blind beggar who appealed to Jesus at Jericho (Mark 10:46-52).

The 2d Vatican Council reminded all Christians that the Church is missionary, charged to proclaim salvation thru Jesus Christ.  Pope Francis tells us all that we are to be missionary disciples.

In the gospel story today there are 2 kinds of disciples.  The 1st kind is the one who shouts out, “Jesus, son of David, have pity on me” (10:47).  He wants Jesus and everyone else to hear him.  He calls Jesus his “master” (10:51), and he follows Jesus on his way to Jerusalem, to his passion, death, and resurrection for the redemption of the world.  The 2d type of disciple is the type that tries to shush the blind man, “telling him to be silent” (10:48).  They don’t want any public disruption.

Missionary disciples not only follow Jesus and carry their crosses with him in hope of rising with him; but they also proclaim who Jesus is.  They want the world to know that he’s the son of David, the messiah, the Savior.  They are Jesus’ real disciples, those who have learned from him—which is what “disciple” means.

How are we to be missionary disciples?  How are we to say among the nations, “The Lord has done great things for” us?  Certainly we don’t have to wade into crowds like Bartimaeus and shout out, “Jesus is the son of David” and he saves us.  No, we don’t have to make a scene, as it were.

Neither can we be silent.  The Chinese government wants Christians to be silent and just follow the Communist Party rules.  There are elements in American society who want to shush us:  they’ll let us pray as we wish in church, but not bring our beliefs or our consciences into public practice, e.g., by proclaiming that unborn human beings have a right to life, that people of any race, nationality, or religion have God-given dignity, that homosexual activity is unnatural and immoral, that transgenderism is a lie, that people fleeing hunger, persecution, and violence deserve refuge, that making money doesn’t justify the destruction of the environment.

For parents, speaking up begins with evangelizing your children:  teaching them to pray and teaching them what we believe as Catholic Christians and how we are to act as disciples of Jesus.  If your children are in public school, pay attention to what they’re being taught in school.  In many places, our children are being indoctrinated to approve of LGBTQ policies, abortion rights, and sexual activity without responsibility or consequences.  Parents have the right to object and to insist that they, and not school boards or teachers, will teach their children what’s right and wrong.

Most of us can’t go out to the nations of the world as missionaries.  But some of us may be called by Jesus to do that.  For example, the Jesuits and the Franciscans, among others, offer opportunities for missionary experiences for one or two years on Indian reservations or in Appalachia as well as overseas.  The Salesians have a thriving lay missionary program that allows volunteers to serve in such places as Bolivia, Cambodia, South Sudan, Papua New Guinea, and Vietnam.

The one thing all of us can do is pray for missionaries and the people to whom they bring the Good News of Jesus.  I commend to you, particularly, the 5 Salesian lay missioners who were commissioned and sent out as missionary disciples this summer:  Hannah Mercado from California, Grace Mosher from Connecticut, and Olivia Wyles from Ohio, who’ve gone to care for orphan girls in Bolivia; John Funk from California, who’s gone to Sierra Leone; and Theresa Hoang from Virginia, who’s gone to South Sudan.

May God bless you and enable you at all times to call upon Jesus as your master, to have active faith in him so that he will save you.

Homily for Thursday, Week 29 of Ordinary Time

Homily for Thursday
Week 29 of Ordinary Time

Oct. 21, 2021
Rom 6: 19-23                                                 
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Residence, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“Present your bodies as slaves to righteousness for sanctification” (Rom 6: 19).

Paul reminds those who will read his letter at Rome that, in their weak human nature, they were once slaves to all kinds of lawlessness—meaning wrongdoing against God’s laws.  That’s true of all of us in one way or another.

When Paul refers to “parts of your bodies as slaves to impurity,” he means not only their physical bodies and sins of impurity, but also their mental and emotional capacities and other sins that degrade them, e.g., arrogance, greed, drunkenness, gluttony, lies—anything that enslaves them (or us).

“What profit did you get then from the things of which you are now ashamed?” he asks (6:21).  He reminds us that such attitudes and behaviors end in death.  Our bodies pay the penalty of sin, and there’s always the danger of eternal death.

Eternal life, on the other hand, comes from “becoming slaves of God” (6:22).  So the Roman Christians and we have surrendered our bodies and all their capacities to God’s righteousness, i.e., to living as people who’ve been sanctified by the grace of Christ and who walk with him.

When we surrender to God, we offer him our bodies with their infirmities; our minds with their focus on humility, patience, purity, and temperance; our hearts with their focus on our Lord Jesus and on kindly treatment of the people around us.  In that righteousness we find not slavery but freedom.

Former Child Soldiers Wear Don Bosco's Uniform

Former Child Soldiers Wear
Don Bosco’s Uniform

(ANS – Cali, Colombia – October 20, 2021) – Colombia’s guerrilla warfare began in 1952 and has caused over 300,000 deaths, while at the same time fueling the growth of powerful drug cartels. At the Don Bosco Center in Cali, however, young people who have known nothing but guerrillas and guerrilla warfare are welcomed and accompanied on their path toward rehabilitation.

Upon their arrival at the Salesian house in Cali, the young ex-guerrillas are given the uniform and tools that correspond to the profession they have chosen to learn. This is because they always wore uniforms when they belonged to one of the armed groups which are still blocking the peace process in Colombia. Already from the age of 7-8, they were torn from their families and enrolled in the various guerrilla factions: forced to shoot, to throw bombs, to become servants of “officers” or, worse still, sexual slaves.

The Salesians have been running a specific facility to accommodate these young people for about 20 years now. Youngsters who arrive are those who have been practically deprived of their own identity and self-esteem and have lost their trust in others.

At the Salesian center, however, together with the clothes for the workshops and schoolbooks, they also receive the recognition of their personal identity and pass from slavery to freedom. Educators insist on their future, to free their memory and give them back their soul. How to restore the faith lost during the years spent in the bush without making them feel guilty? How to bring them closer to God without denying the trauma left by the crimes, when they had to trample their conscience in order not to go mad? The decisive challenge is: to forgive what has been done to them, and to forgive themselves. It is something that can be done  through the experience of loving-kindness, the one that Don Bosco always wanted to transmit to young people.

The young people of Cali find a team of professionals who help them to establish a plan of studies and to choose a profession. Five Salesians are very concretely involved in supporting 30 teenagers. The workshops serve as the cornerstone of youth development – for learning safety regulations, for handling machines and products, and for learning concrete skills for their future. The specializations offered are paths to their career as electrician, industrial mechanic, automobile repair technician, cook, tailor, beautician, welder, computer operator, accountant, librarian, commercial secretary, etc., And all of these are accompanied also by their inner search for their personal qualities and the integral development of each individual.

For security reasons, the lives of these young people are lived almost exclusively within the center. Their names have not been deleted from the lists held by the guerrilla leaders, who are always ready to absorb them into service or to take revenge. Young people leave only accompanied by their educators and according to a program compatible with the processes developed internally.

It is necessary to have them to re-adapt, to get used to free relations again, to sharing meals and free time, and gradually to regain the sense and the rules of coexistence.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, they had to give up even small and limited movements into the city. But they made themselves useful by converting part of their activities to the production of masks: a way to rehabilitate themselves as citizens.

Turin's New Mayor Thanks Salesians for Imprint on His Life

Turin’s New Mayor Thanks the Salesians for their Imprint on His Life

Photo: Stefano Lo Russo’s Facebook Profile

(ANS – Turin – October 20, 2021) - “I dedicate this victory to a person who for me was a teacher, a father, a guide: Fr. Aldo Rabino. I wish he were here, but I’m sure he’s watching us from up there.” These were the first words of the new mayor of Turin, Stefano Lo Russo, 46, elected to lead the Piedmontese capital after the elections to local bodies on Sunday and Monday. Turin’s First Citizen, a geologist, wanted to claim and present to the citizenry his Salesian formation, which played a decisive role in his life and his political career.

Mayor Lo Russo, hitherto a fulltime professor at the Polytechnic of Turin, and who has been the member of the city council since 2006, ascended in the academic world starting with technical school education. His family had modest resources and chose that path for him so that he could circumvent the costly regular academic school system and begin qualifying toward a job.

It was precisely then, when young Stefano was about to take his diploma at the Salesian technical school, that the intervention of Salesian Fr. Rabino introduced him to the world of volunteering. He involved him in Operation Mato Grosso in Latin America.

Then, a few years later, Fr. Rabino asked him, “Why don’t you get involved in politics?” Not surprisingly, in the blog in which he introduces himself, Lo Russo states, “The passion for politics and commitment to my community was undoubtedly born in those years.”

The bond with Fr. Rabino, who passed away in 2015 and whom Lo Russo defined as his spiritual guide, was also sealed thanks to the national sport, soccer, as both were ardent lovers of the sport. It certainly went beyond “faith in a sports team” as well. The new mayor is as much a Juventus fan as was his Salesian formator, who in fact was the chaplain of that soccer team for over 40 years and had been also passionate about Torino Calcio.

Thus, in the city of Don Bosco, the First Citizen is indeed a fruit of Salesian education.

Homily for Tuesday, Week 29 of Ordinary Time

Homily for Tuesday
Week 29 of Ordinary Time

Oct. 19, 2018
Rom 5: 12, 15, 17-21
Ps 40
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Residence, New Rochelle, N.Y.

In his letter to the Romans, St. Paul has been discussing our justification by Christ.  Justification means our being made just or righteous or sanctified in God’s eyes.  That’s the redemption that Christ won for us.

In today’s passage, Paul points to Adam’s transgression thru which sin entered the world, afflicting not only Adam but the entire human race, afflicting us all with the penalty of death.

Adam’s sin was disobedience, obviously.  But according to Genesis, it was also a rebellion, an ambitious attempt to overthrow God.  For the Devil told Eve, and she must have repeated the lie to Adam, that if they ate the forbidden fruit they would become like gods (Gen 3:5).

Paul contrasts that choice which led to humanity’s condemnation with “the gracious gift of the one man Jesus Christ,” “the gift of justification” (Rom 5:15,17).  The obedience of Christ counteracted Adam’s disobedience.  The humility of Christ undid the consequences of Adam’s ambition.  “Thru one righteous act acquittal and life came to all” (5:18).

Jesus Christ offers us life.  Believing in him, following him, and obeying his law of love for God and our brothers and sisters cleanses us of our sins.  “Grace overflows all the more” (5:20), so that, as Psalm 40 says, we may “exult and be glad” (v. 17).  That’s what we do whenever we celebrate the Eucharist, thru which we our Lord Jesus joins us to his own humble, obedient sacrifice to the Father, and with Jesus we exclaim, “To do your will, O my God, is my delight” (40:9).

Pilgrimage in Footsteps of Karol Wojtyla the Worker

Pilgrimage in the Footsteps 
of Karol Wojtyla the Worker

(ANS – Krakow, Poland – October 15, 2021) - The 17th Pilgrimage in the Footsteps of Karol Wojtyla the Worker took place on October 9, attended by the faithful from the Salesian parish of St. Stanislaus Kostka in the Dębniki district of Krakow, and other pilgrims. During World War II, young Karol Wojtyla went from Dębniki to the Solvay factory where he worked (1940-1944): first in the Zakrzowek stone quarry, and then as a worker at the water filtration plant. The pilgrims, starting from the Salesian parish church, retraced several roads to Zakrzowek. Then, once they reached the John Paul II Center, they participated in Mass, presided over by Fr. Marek Dąbek, SDB, provincial coordinator of altar servers. At the end of the celebration, Fr. Andrzej Krol, SDB, provincial delegate for youth ministry, presented scholarships to 30 young people from the province, as a sign of appreciation for their commitment to spiritual and intellectual development.

Photos: https://sdb.org.pl/2021/10/10/pielgrzymka-sladami-karola-wojtyly-robotnika/

Homily for 29th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Homily for the
29th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Oct. 17, 2021
Mark 10: 35-43
St. Joseph’s Church, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“James and John … came to Jesus and said to him, ‘Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you’” (Mark 10: 35).

Two of Jesus’ 3 favorite apostles (the 3d is Simon Peter), the 2 he’d nicknamed “sons of thunder” (Mark 3:17), come to him and make an incredibly bold demand; we could call it thunderous:  “We want you to do whatever we ask.”  Would you ever think of addressing your boss, your best friend, or even your favorite aunt like that?  And they have the nerve to address Jesus as “Teacher.”  What have they learned from him?  Zilch!  Niente!  Nada!

Just verses before this passage, he’d been telling his disciples that they’ll have to give up families and lands and wealth.  In 4 verses skipped over between last Sunday’s gospel and today’s, he predicted for the 3d time his own passion, death, and resurrection.  That’s not the kind of glory James and John are thinking of.

Jesus displays patience with them as incredible as their boldness.  Instead of telling them how foolish or blockheaded they are, he tells them they don’t understand what they’re asking for.

The rest of the 12 apostles are just as blockheaded.  They’re as ambitious and self-centered as James and John, and “they became indignant at James and John” (10:41) for trying to seize power, as it were.

Patiently Jesus tries again to teach all of them what real authority is, real greatness, real leadership.

But 1st he responds directly to the sons of thunder:  the places they seek are already reserved for others.  Whom can Jesus mean?  If we remember when Jesus will come into his kingdom, we come to a startling answer.  In Mark’s Gospel, he’s recognized as Son of God by the centurion at Calvary (15:39).  In John’s Gospel, he comes into his glory on the cross (ch. 17).  In short, it’s at his crucifixion—implying also his resurrection—that Jesus comes “into his glory” (10:37).

When Jesus was crucified, who had the places at his left and right?  It wasn’t any of the 12, who’d scattered like scared rabbits when he was arrested.  You know the answer:  crucified on either side of him (you can see their images in stained glass over there on either side of the Sacred Heart)—it’s recorded in all 4 gospels—were 2 thieves (or bandits or revolutionaries or criminals, depending on the translation you’re reading).

Which means what?  The 2 outlaws who died alongside Jesus represent us.  Jesus achieves glory from his Father by coming among us sinners who’ve broken God’s laws, sharing our mortality, and offering us divine pardon and eternal life.  “The Son of Man … came to give his life as a ransom for many” (10:45).

“For many” in this text, as in Jesus’ words at the Last Supper which we repeat at every Mass, has several meanings.  1) “many” represents a larger whole—everyone; 2) “many” means many nations, many peoples, and not only the Jews; 3) “many” indicates that some people will reject the pardon God offers, and Jesus will effectively ransom many but not all.

But the point here is Jesus’ offering his life as a ransom for sinners.  He’s predicted his passion, death, and resurrection 3 times.  This is “the cup” that he’ll drink, “the baptism with which [he’ll be] baptized” (10:38).  He tells James and John that they will indeed drink his cup (10:39), the cup of suffering for the glory of God, as witnesses to God’s love for humanity.  James, in fact, is destined for martyrdom—a word that means “witness”—under King Herod Agrippa (Acts 12:2) around 44 A.D.  According to a pious tradition, John was spared execution at Rome by a miracle and then sent into exile on the island of Patmos off the coast of Turkey.

All along Jesus has made it perfectly clear that everyone who follows him must drink his cup and receive his baptism.  When we’re baptized, aren’t we baptized into his death and resurrection?  St. Paul tells us we are (Rom 6:3-4).  At every Mass, don’t we take up the cup of Christ’s blood and consume his body given for us, for the forgiveness of our sins and the redemption of the world?

Indeed, we do.  Therefore, like him we offer to God the Father our lives:  sometimes in suffering, suffering life’s evils, afflictions, and heartbreaks, eventually suffering the evil of death, surrendering our lives to God as Jesus did; and sometimes the suffering of being servants, as Jesus emphasizes today:  “whoever wishes to be great among you will be your servant” (10:43).  An alternate translation is “slave.”

Serving others instead of ourselves is usually hard.  But we have numerous occasions to be servants in our families, among our neighbors and acquaintances, in our parish’s ministries to the poor, at work.  Whatever we do, work is always an opportunity to benefit other people.

We prayed in the Collect that we might conform our will to God’s.  Jesus shows us how.

Homily for Memorial of St. Callistus I

Homily for the Memorial of
St. Callistus I

Collect
Oct. 14, 2021
Rom 3: 21-30                                                
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Home, New Rochelle, N.Y.

The Collect for St. Callistus notes his devout attention “to Christ’s faithful departed” and “his witness to the faith,” and it alludes to “the slavery of corruption.”

Callistus was, in fact, a slave, and early in his career he was charged with some kind of financial irregularity—“corruption,” if you will.  Our only historical source for his life is the highly suspect writing of his ecclesiastical and theological opponent, who eventually became the martyr St. Hippolytus.  So we don’t really know the details that got Callistus into legal trouble.

But eventually he was freed from both his condition as a slave and the taint of corruption, became a deacon and advisor to Pope Zephyrinus, and was charged with care of one of the Christian cemeteries outside Rome’s walls—the one on the Via Appia that now bears his name.  Thus he’s the patron saint of cemetery workers.  Those cemeteries—the famous catacombs—have long since been disused and the bodies removed, but they remain places of veneration and tourism, as you know.  Since 1930 the Salesians have been proud caretakers and tour guides of the catacombs of St. Callistus.

As for Callistus himself, he succeeded Zephyrinus as Pope in 219, and he bore witness to the faith possibly by martyrdom around 222—it’s uncertain—but certainly by his orthodox teaching, his equal treatment of all classes of people within the Church, and especially by his merciful treatment of repentant sinners—which was the main point of contention between him and Hippolytus, as well as the great African theologian Tertullian.

Stressing God’s mercy puts into practice Paul’s theoretical teaching that “the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law” (Rom 3:21).  All human beings are sinners “deprived of the glory of God” (3:23), even the “righteous” like Hippolytus, Tertullian, and the critics of Pope Francis, and all of us “are justified freely by God’s grace thru redemption in Christ Jesus” (3:24) when we put our faith in him.

St. Callistus realized that Baptism doesn’t render us immediately perfect; we’re still liable to sin, even the grave sins that horrified Hippolytus and Tertullian.  So he held that divine grace may still restore someone to righteousness thru faith in Christ.  There is our hope—for ourselves and for the many people for whom we pray.

Homily for Jubilees of Christian Brothers

Homily for Jubilee Mass
for the Christian Brothers

Oct. 12, 2021
1 Cor 1: 22-31
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Home, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“Christ Jesus [is] our wisdom, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption” (1 Cor 1: 30).

Our religious life serves 2 purposes within the community of the disciples of Jesus, i.e., the Church.

The 1st purpose concerns our own holiness as followers of Christ.  We’ve found in him the power that overcomes weakness and the wisdom that enlightens our ignorance.  By ourselves we’re too weak to defeat sin.  Christ forgives us and makes us holy (righteous and sanctified).  By ourselves we don’t know how to please God and how to discern truth and goodness.  Christ teaches us thru the Gospel and thru his living body, the Church.  By our union with Christ, our singular focus on Christ within our religious calling, we are made holy.  We don’t make ourselves holy; or in the old lingo, we don’t consecrate ourselves to God.  Rather, we’re foolish and weak.  Christ, our wisdom and power, consecrates us to God—makes us holy and pleasing for the service of God.

The 2d purpose of our religious life is our public witness.  Our individual lives and our community life as brothers tells the entire Church and the entire world that Christ is wisdom, Christ is strength, Christ is light, Christ is truth, Christ is life.  The world certainly hesitate to believe all that, and sometimes Christians themselves forget it.  So both need the steady, fervent witness of religious.

What a glory it is for us, then, to see and hold precious our brothers who have answered Christi’s call to personal holiness within the family of Edmund Rice and who have borne faithful witness for so many years.  May God continue to bless them, and thru them all the rest of us!

(St. Catherine's Monastery, Sinai)

Homily for 28th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Homily for the
28th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Oct. 10, 2021
Mark 10: 17-30
St. Joseph’s Church, New Rochelle, N.Y.     

“Jesus … said to his disciples, ‘How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!’” (Mark 10: 23).

Christ and the Rich Young Man (Heinrich Hofmann)

A wealthy man has come to Jesus, asking what he “must do to inherit eternal life” (10:17).  He’s basically a good man, observing the 10 commandments.  But Jesus tells him that in spite of his observance, something is still missing in his relationship with God.

Note that he’s asked Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life.  It’s the wrong question; it starts with an erroneous premise.  At your job, you earn your paycheck by showing up at the assigned time and doing your assigned responsibilities.  But no one can do anything to earn an inheritance.  One’s given an inheritance, usually by virtue of a family connection.  Similarly, no one can do anything to deserve eternal life.  It’s a gift from God to his sons and daughters who have been brought into his family by their relationship with Jesus Christ.  That’s why our Collect this morning prayed that God’s grace “at all times go before us and follow after” and help us “carry out good works.”

So Jesus tells this man he needs a closer relationship with him.  That closer relationship must begin by getting rid of everything he has been depending on and by having consideration for his neighbor:  “Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven.  Then come, follow me” (10:21).

“Thou shalt give money to those in need” isn’t among the 10 commandments.  Those commands are the bare minimum of our faithfulness to God.  Jesus commands us to go further.  He commands us, for instance in several of his parables, to help those in need.

In our gospel reading 2 weeks ago, Jesus told us to do away with whatever holds us back from God’s kingdom:  “If your hand or your foot or your eye is an occasion of sin to you, cut it off, pluck it out,” lest it keep you from entering the kingdom (Mark 9:43-48).  He wasn’t ordering us to do bodily mutilation but to focus ourselves wholeheartedly on God.

Now he gives a similar instruction to this rich man:  give your money and your property away and come along with me.  Those who are actually following Jesus—the apostles—are “amazed at his words” (10:24).  As we have followed Jesus’ apostles thru the gospels, we’ve seen their concern about the advantages they expect to come from following Jesus.  They think his kingdom will bring them wealth and power, like earthly kingdoms.

But Jesus keeps telling them it’s not so.  Rather, wealth is an impediment.  “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”  Someone who’s rich, or someone who has political authority, relies upon himself.  What can I do to inherit the kingdom?  You can’t do.  You can’t buy your way in.  You can’t command your way in.  You have to empty yourself.  As Jesus tells us, we have to deny ourselves, take up a cross, and follow him (Mark 8:34).

We know instinctively that people who pursue wealth at all costs, or who pursue power at all costs—denying the rights and dignity of others, perhaps by cheating, by trafficking in drugs or human beings, by killing (including abortion; Pope Francis recently reminded us again that abortion is murder)—such people are not being good and are not on the road to God’s kingdom with Jesus.

But there are other obstacles to our traveling along with Jesus.  How many of us are rigid and stubborn in our opinions and won’t tolerate anyone who disagrees with us?  How many of us love to inflate our importance by gossiping about others and passing along some scandal or other?  How many of us are proud and arrogant and look down upon others for some reason and pass judgment upon them?  How many of us are addicted to some un-Christian behavior like pornography or contraception or the abuse of alcohol?  How many of us get into showing off fancy clothes or electronic gadgets or other consumer goods?   How many of us are so angry at someone that we refuse to forgive or even to pray for that person?

Those obstacles aren’t monetary.  But they are attitudes that we possess that we must dispossess ourselves of, must give away, if we want to remain with Jesus.

          We know from our experience that it’s really hard to change those kinds of attitudes in ourselves.  That doesn’t mean we have to be discouraged by our faults or our sins.  “For human beings it is impossible, but not for God,” Jesus says today (10:27).  “All things are possible for God” (10:27), including our conversion from selfish, stubborn, proud, judgmental, and addictive attitudes.  “Go, sell what you have,” get rid of what holds you back from Jesus, and walk with him.

Homily for Feast of Dedication of St. Patrick's Cathedral

Homily for the Feast of the Anniversary
of the Dedication of St. Patrick’s Cathedral

Oct. 5, 2021
John 4: 19-24
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Home, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“The hour is coming, and is now here, when true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth” (John 4: 21).

We celebrate today the anniversary of the dedication of our cathedral, which took place on this date in 1910.  Altho Abp. John Hughes had laid the cornerstone 52 years earlier, in 1858, and the cathedral was opened for public worship in 1879 under Card. John McCloskey, replacing Old St. Patrick’s on Mulberry St., its solemn consecration was carried out only after Abp. John Farley had finished paying off its debt.  The total cost of construction was $4 million.  I have no idea what that would equal today.

St. Patrick’s is the spiritual home of our bishop and of the entire people of God in the archdiocese.  The building—the cathedral in midtown Manhattan—is a symbol.  What we celebrate is really our Lord Jesus, who calls us together to be his holy people, united with him and in him around the altar where his high priest, our bishop, presides and celebrates the Eucharist; and at the chair, the cathedra, where the bishop teaches us, nourishing us with the Word of God; and at the font where he washes new members of God’s family clean of their sins at the Easter Vigil.  The Spirit of God is at work in all these sacred mysteries, revealing to us the truths of God’s love and the truths of how we are to carry that love into our own lives.

Since we can’t all fit into the cathedral, and the archbishop can’t be everywhere in the diocese at once—obviously—he ordains presbyters and deacons to assist in his ministry of teaching, sanctifying, and guiding the flock of Jesus Christ, which goes on in our parish churches, religious houses, and other places of worship.  But the parish par excellence, the home church for all of us, is the cathedral.  So we celebrate the building, the cathedral, and what it represents —Jesus our good shepherd, the earthly shepherd whom he chooses for us, and ourselves as his people—on its birthday, the anniversary of the day when it was solemnly consecrated for the worship of the Father in Spirit and in truth.

Sr. Chiara Cazzuola Elected New Mother General of FMAs

Sr. Chiara Cazzuola Elected New Mother General of FMAs

(ANS – Rome – October 5, 2021) – The Daughters of Mary Help of Christians gathered in Rome to participate in the FMAs’ 25th General Chapter have elected Sr. Chiara Cazzuola, currently vicar general, as Mother General of the Institute. Mother Cazzuola succeeds Mother Yvonne Reungoat, who led the Institute since 2008. Fr. Angel Fernandez Artime, Rector Major of the Salesians, was present for the occasion and congratulated the new Mother General.

Sister Chiara was born in Campiglia Marittima, province of Livorno, Italy, in 1955. She joined the FMAs of the Tuscany Province. She lived the first years of her formation in Castelgandolfo, not far from Rome, and there, on August 5, 1975, she made her first profession.

She graduated in literature and was a teacher for several years and, subsequently, principal of secondary schools. For several years, she was the local and provincial delegate for the Salesian youth sports clubs and was seasoned as provincial coordinator of youth ministry. She has been a community animator/superior and then a provincial councilor as well. With the unification of the three FMA provinces of Emilia, Liguria, and Tuscany, she entered the provincial council as councilor for formation and offered an effective contribution, favoring paths of communion and spirituality, in simplicity, in respect for people, and with depth.

In 2007 she was appointed provincial of her native Emilia-Liguria-Tuscany Province, based in La Spezia. GC22 (2008) elected her as visiting councilor, and Sister Cazzuola gave her availability by stating: “In a spirit of abandonment to the will of God and trusting in the help of the Lord, I say ‘yes.’”

Over the next six years she visited several provinces in the Americas and Europe and gained a rich experience of Salesianity and interculturality. To each of her sisters, she gave attention and dedication, optimism with a smile, demonstrating the ability to grasp the seeds of life and hope in each person and in daily events. She remains a transparent and enthusiastic person about her vocation as an FMA, and has in her heart a great passion for young people. She is known always to express the capacity for frank, serene, and collaborative relationships.

Mother Yvonne Reungoat chose her as moderator for the 23rd General Chapter (2014) and in that chapter she was elected vicar general, thus sharing, up close, the responsibility of its animation and governance with the superior general. To Mother's question after the vote: “Do you accept?”, Sister Chiara replied with great emotion: “I trust the Lord and I entrust myself to Mary Help of Christians. This is why I say YES!”

She also serves as moderator in the current General Chapter 24. A warm applause welcomed her official proclamation as Mother General and the 10th Successor of St. Mary Domenica Mazzarello.