Fr. James Marra, SDB (1952-2016)

Fr. James Marra, SDB (1952-2016)

Fr. James Robert Marra, SDB, former director of advancement and treasurer of Don Bosco Prep in Ramsey, died unexpectedly on April 6 at Hackensack University Medical Center, Hackensack, N.J. He had collapsed the previous evening, but the proximate cause of death was not immediately known. Fr. Jim had been in declining health for several years, including several hospitalizations. He was 63.

Fr. Jim was born in Brooklyn on June 28, 1952, to the late Vincent Marra and Catherine Fay Marra. The family belonged to St. Michael’s Parish in Brooklyn, and there Jim was baptized and confirmed and attended the parish school.

Jim went on to St. Augustine High School and then Bishop Loughlin High School, both in Brooklyn. He started college at Hunter College in New York City in 1970 before deciding to pursue a priestly-religious vocation, which brought him to Don Bosco College in Newton, N.J., in September 1972. He was admitted to the novitiate at Ipswich, Mass., on August 31, 1973, and made his first profession at Newton on September 1, 1974.

Bro. Jim earned a B.A. in philosophy from Don Bosco College in 1977 and an M.Div. and M.A. in moral theology, summa cum laude, from the Pontifical College Josephinum in Worthington, Ohio, in 1983. He was ordained on May 21, 1983, in Columbus.

During his student years in Columbus, Bro. Jim ministered as a chaplain for the mentally ill at Columbus State Institute for one year and counseled seventh and eighth graders at St. Cecilia’s Elementary School for two years. During his deacon year he was assigned to St. Leo’s Parish, where he also counseled in the school and moderated the youth group.

Fr. Jim taught at Salesian Junior Seminary in Goshen (1977-1978), Don Bosco Prep in Ramsey (1978-1979), and Salesian High School in New Rochelle (1983-1984). Certified as an English teacher in New Jersey in 1979, he also taught math, history, and biology at various times. He was program director of Salesian summer camps in Newton, New Rochelle, and Elizabeth. He served as treasurer at Don Bosco Tech in Paterson (1984-1994), moderator of the Salesian provincial chapter (1994-1995), director designate of Salesian Missions in New Rochelle (1995-1996), director of Salesian Missions (1996-1998), and pastor of Corpus Christi Church in Port Chester (1998-2007) before his assignment to Don Bosco Prep in 2007.

Fr. Jim was admired for his combination of pastoral sensitivity and financial acumen.

His director, Fr. Jim Heuser of Don Bosco Prep, noted in Fr. Jim “a remarkable blend of the acumen of a good finance manager with the compassion of a good shepherd.  In both Paterson and Ramsey he obtained financial aid for many boys so that they could get a Salesian education.”

Fr. Heuser continued:  “Over the years, he showed an interest in promoting vocations, and indeed was instrumental in inviting and accompanying young men to become Salesians.  In these last years, he bore the darkness of pain and illness with remarkable faith and love.”

Former Rector Major of the Salesians Father Pascual Chavez, SDB, wrote:  “I have a wonderful memories of him and am very grateful to him for what he did for the Congregation in his Eastern U.S. Province.”

Jay Gambino, a parishioner of Corpus Christi in Port Chester who met Fr. Jim in 1975 as a day camper in New Rochelle, said: “I was always impressed with Fr. Jim’s pastoral and administrative gifts. His contagious piety and inviting approach made him loved by so many.” When Fr. Jim was Corpus Christi’s pastor, he called upon Mr. Gambino in 1999 to plan the parish’s 75th anniversary celebration the following year, and “I agreed and he was such an inspiration to me,” including the way he bore various illnesses that already affected him. “He carried this heavy and difficult cross as a humble son of Don Bosco and would never complain,” Mr. Gambino writes.

Employees of Salesian Missions are equally appreciative of Fr. Jim.  Missy Tai-Fatt recalls how Fr. Jim helped her one Christmas get to North Carolina to be with her dying brother, regards him as “a special man,” and remembers a long friendship.

Kenny Potter of Salesian Missions liked how Fr. Jim “always listened to what you had to say” and “was very understanding.”

Diane Barone of Salesian Missions has “one vivid memory of Fr. Jim. [It] was on his last day here at Salesian.  There was a line from his office all the way to the elevator of people wanting to say good-bye and thank you to him for everything he did for us.  He made coming into work fun. He was approachable and very easy to speak too.  I haven’t ever seen a priest who was so missed by the people he worked with.”

Another Salesian Missions employee, Brenda McClain, called Father Marra “truly a man of that helped the needy and the poor.  He showed love to everyone. He truly touched my life.”

Luis Ruiz, a former employee of Salesian Missions who remained in almost daily touch with Father Marra, called him his teacher, best friend, confessor, and “a saint among us.”

Fr. John Nazzaro, Fr. Jim’s classmate all the way through seminary, wrote:  “Jimmy was my best friend, my brother….  We did our whole formation together. His example of compassion and love for everyone, especially the underdog kids, made him the Salesian we loved.”

Fr. Abe Feliciano met Fr. Jim when he was a student at Don Bosco Tech in Paterson.  He mourns the passing of his one of his “spiritual fathers”:  “The Word of God took on a deeper meaning today as one of my spiritual fathers went to Heaven: RIP Fr. Jim Marra, SDB. John 3:16 was my scriptural motto for ordination to the priesthood. It first took flesh in my life when Fr. Jimmy came in search of this once-wayward son of God to bring him back home to the Father. He showed me the loving face of Jesus that called and carried me back to the path of eternal life.”

Fr. Roy Shelly writes from California that Fr. Jim “was the personification of generous hospitality.”

Dobie Moser, executive director of Catholic Charities in Cleveland and a Salesian Cooperator, calls “his life and faith a shining witness of the spirit and charism of Don Bosco.”

Fr. Jim is survived by his mother, Catherine, of Brooklyn, his brothers Frank of Brooklyn and Vincent of Sayreville, his sister Louise of Staten Island, and several nephews and nieces.  He was predeceased by his twin brother Michael.

Fr. Jim will be waked in the chapel of Don Bosco Prep on Sunday, April 10.

      Reception of the Body St. John’s Hall                               1: 30 p.m.

      Wake                         Mary Help of Christians Chapel 2:00-5:00 p.m.

                                                                                    7:00-9:00 p.m.

      Rosary                       "                       "                            5:00 p.m.

      Prayer Service             "                       "                           7:30 p.m.

The Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated in the school’s gymnasium on Monday the 11th at 10:00 a.m.  A luncheon will follow in the school cafeteria.

Fr. Jim will be buried in the Salesian Cemetery, Craigville Road, Goshen, N.Y., on Monday at 1:30 p.m.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in Fr. Jim’s memory to Don Bosco Prep for student assistance.

Don Bosco Prep is located at 492 North Franklin Turnpike, Ramsey, NJ 07446.

Homily for 2d Sunday of Easter

Homily for the
2d Sunday of Easter
April 18, 2004
John 20: 19-31
Nativity, Brandon, Fla.
St. Clement, Plant City, Fla.

Troop 40's intended camping trip this weekend was cancelled, leaving me without a Mass assignment or a homily to complete (I had started outlining one based on the Collect). So here's one a dozen years old, on the gospel reading.

“Jesus said to them, ‘Peace be with you.  As the Father has sent me, so I send you” (Jn 2: 21).

The Church concludes its 8-day-long celebration of the day of the Lord’s resurrection on this 8th day or octave day of Easter.  For another 6 weeks—until Pentecost—we’ll continue to celebrate, but in a slightly lower key than in these 8 days.

Today we hear how Jesus appeared to his disciples on the same day that he rose from the grave, following their discovery that the tomb was empty, following his appearance to Mary Magdalene near the tomb (Jn 20:11-18), and, according to St. Paul (1 Cor 15:5), following also an appearance to Peter that isn’t otherwise attested.  We hear, further, how Jesus appeared again a week later, which would coincide with today, and so convinced doubting Thomas that he was truly risen, that he is truly our Lord and our God (20:28).

Thomas acknowledges Jesus as Lord and God

That Jesus is our Lord and our God is awesome, literally.  That a man could be raised from the dead and live immortal is awesome.  The power of God is the only explanation for such a fact.  Our faith affirms the fact, on the testimony of Peter, Thomas, and the rest of the apostles; for we are those to whom St. John writes, “Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed” (20:29).

Our faith, tho, can ask why.  Why has Jesus, our Lord and our God, been raised from the grave?  Why has he returned to his cowardly, faithless disciples?

In 2 words:  for us.  St. John quotes Jesus earlier in the gospel proclaiming that he came in order that we might have life, and have it in abundance (10:10).  And so the 1st words he speaks to his not so reliable friends are, “Peace be with you” (20:19,21).  While this was a conventional Jewish greeting—shalom—it takes on a new meaning for Christians hearing it from their risen Lord:  you are now at peace, in harmony, reconciled with God.  What Adam did, what you have done personally by your sins, has been undone, atoned for, forgiven.  The world is made new and made whole again.

The octave day of Easter has come to be designated Divine Mercy Sunday.  God’s mercy toward us sinners is indeed offered to us in Christ’s bestowal of peace.  Jesus makes possible the endless renewal of that peace be giving to his disciples—to the nascent Church—the commission to go forth in his name:  “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”  He sends them with the Holy Spirit—this is John’s version of Pentecost, quite different from Luke’s in timing and external display, but the same in effect.  And thru that Holy Spirit they are to carry on Jesus’ own mission of reconciliation and mercy, forgiving sins—and also “retaining sins” (20:23), i.e., not forgiving them.  To the Church Jesus is giving his own power of spiritual healing and forgiveness, a power exercised by admission to Baptism and to Penance; as well as the duty to deny these sacraments of mercy to people who aren’t truly repentant, aren’t willing to commit their lives to following Jesus in the power of God’s Holy Spirit.

Certainly it’s merciful of God to give people a chance to repent, a chance to respond to the Gospel thru the Church’s preaching and to commit ourselves to Christ and to Christ-like behavior by being baptized.  In Evangelical Christians terms, this is accepting Jesus as our personal Lord and Savior.

Early in her history Holy Mother Church realized that a lot of people don’t make a once-and-for-all commitment to Christ, an irrevocable self-giving.  That’s one reason why the Church so highly regards martyrdom, which obviously is a total self-offering to God in Jesus’ name.  “No one has greater love,” Jesus himself said, “than to lay down his life for his friends” (Jn 15:13)—for our friend Jesus, in the case of Christian martyrs.

But in the face of arrest and the confiscation of one’s home, lands, and wealth, of torture and death, many Christians chickened out before the Roman courts and burned incense before the pagan gods.  In the Nazi death camps some Catholics were beaten to death or shot for refusing to trample upon a crucifix or a rosary.  How many of their fellow inmates did stomp on a sign of their faith to avoid a beating?

Blessed Joseph Kowalski, SDB, in his Auschwitz prisoner's ID
He was executed on July 4, 1942, for refusing to trample on his rosary.

Last week’s Our Sunday Visitor had a story about a 19-year-old Russian soldier named Yevgent Rodionov—Orthodox, not Catholic—who was captured by Chechan rebels in 1996.  The Chechans are Moslem, and some are as fanatical as Hamas and Al Quaeda.  These noticed the cross the young private was wearing and demanded he take it off and renounce his faith.  He refused.  They beheaded him.  Now he’s widely, if unofficially, venerated in Russia as a saint.  How many of his comrades would have done the same?  How many of us would have said, “Yes,” like 17-year-old Cassie Bernall, an Evangelical Christian, when one of the Columbine killers pointed a gun at her in the school library and asked her whether she believed in God?  She said yes, and he shot her.

Of course many Christians’ faithfulness falters not when they’re threatened but when they’re tempted:  a ruler or a soldier to murderous behavior, a spouse to adultery, a CEO to larceny, an inner-city youth to pushing drugs, a distraught young woman to abortion.

And so the Church understood by the end of the 3d century, after considerable debate and soul-searching, that even baptized Christians, people who’ve eaten of Christ’s body and drunk his blood, are capable of serious failure, of mortal sin.  And in her exercise of the Lord’s mercy—of carrying out Christ’s commission to bring peace to humanity, the Church developed a ritual of public penance.  This was a severe ritual for major sins like murder, adultery, and apostasy, and it was offered only once after Baptism.  If Baptism was one’s 1st chance at God’s mercy, public penance was the 2d and last.  Christianity was perhaps the 1st edition of 3 strikes and you’re out.

Public penance meant confessing one’s failure in public before the bishop and being given 5, 7, 10, or more years of hard penance—e.g., fasting on bread and water 3 times a week, making a long and dangerous pilgrimage; in the worst cases, a lifetime of penance, with reconciliation and holy communion available only on one’s deathbed.  Until the requisite time was fulfilled, the penitent was treated like a catechumen and had to leave the liturgy after the homily; he was cut off from praying with the faithful and from the Eucharist.  Well, naturally, that wasn’t very inviting.  People postponed Baptism till late in life, risking a sudden and unprovided death, rather than risk serious sin after Baptism, and its consequences.

Thomas Cahill’s book How the Irish Saved Civilization (Doubleday, 1995) recounts how the Irish preserved the learning of the ancient world and of Christianity in their monasteries during the so-called Dark Ages, then returned that learning to Continental Europe.  I doubt that it’s part of Cahill’s story, but the Irish monks also saved Christian penance.  Apparently out of the monks’ practice of spiritual direction, including the confession of their faults, a practice of private confession and forgiveness developed—and, as you might expect, it proved wildly popular outside the monasteries, too, in contrast with the ritual of public penance.  And so it seems our familiar sacrament of Reconciliation evolved.  The main point of it, of course, is that it exercises the compassion, the mercy, the forgiveness of Christ for us weak and sinful believers—continuing his mission from the Father to restore us to divine peace.

Blessed are those who believe Jesus our Lord is risen, who know his mercy, and who “have life in his name” (20:31).

Homily for Easter Sunday

Homily for
Easter Sunday
March 27, 2016
Acts 10: 34, 37-43
St. Vincent’s Hospital, Harrison, N.Y.

“We are witnesses [that] … this man God raised on the third day.  Everyone who believes in him will receive forgiveness of sins thru his name” (Acts 10: 39, 40, 43).

Why are you here this morning?  Are you looking for the Easter bunny?  hunting for eggs?  Are you celebrating spring’s arrival, celebrating the lilies and daffodils and forsythia and magnolias?

You’re in the wrong place!  You want Stop ’n’ Shop or the mall or a park.

We’re here because Jesus Christ rose from the dead on the 3d day after his crucifixion.  We’re here because he commissioned his apostles to go thruout the whole world to continue his mission of extending God’s pardon, God’s mercy, to sinners “thru his name.”

The 1st reading this morning comes from the Acts of the Apostles, which is the 1st book in the NT after the 4 gospels (and one of the easiest books in the Bible to read—hint!).  We read from Acts thruout the Easter season, hearing the Church’s 1st preaching of the resurrection of Jesus and the “forgiveness of sins thru his name.”

One sample of that preaching is our 1st reading, and it’s from a very significant chapter of Acts.  St. Peter is addressing a Roman centurion named Cornelius and his household, addressing Gentiles—pagans! Romans! the hated occupiers of Judea—offering even to them the salvation won for us by the cross and resurrection of Jesus.  Until this point, the apostles and all the 1st followers of Jesus have been Jews, and they believe that Jesus fulfilled all the prophecies of the Jewish Scriptures (the OT) for the benefit only of the Jews.  Too bad about everyone else!

Cornelius the Centurion

Chapel of the Centurion at Fort Monroe, Va.

But God sent Peter a vision, a revelation, commanding him to broaden his outlook, to go also to the pagans with the Gospel of Jesus (10:9-16).

So Peter does that, starting by reminding Cornelius and the others of what they must already have known, of all Jesus’ good deeds all over Judea and Galilee and in Jerusalem.  Everyone had either seen and heard Jesus, or at least had heard of what he was preaching and the healings he was performing.  And surely everyone knew—especially an officer in the Roman army like Cornelius—that the Jewish and Roman authorities had executed him.

What not everyone knew, and certainly not many believed, was that 3 days after that execution, Jesus rose from the dead and—as we heard in the gospel reading (John 20:1-9)—his tomb was empty when his followers went to complete his burial rites, which they couldn’t complete on Friday evening because of the Sabbath.  Few knew that “God granted that he be visible … to us, the witnesses chosen by God in advance, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead” (Acts 10:40-41).  The Jewish leaders had put out a story that the disciples had stolen his body—a story spread by the very guards who explained that they were sleeping while it happened (Matt 28:11-15).

But the disciples themselves were slow to believe he was truly alive.  After all, who’d ever heard such a fantastic story before?  Next Sunday we’ll hear the gospel of “doubting Thomas” (John 20:19-29).  The apostles and other disciples believed because, as Peter says, they really had seen and spoken with Jesus, had eaten with him, had touched his very flesh and its wounds.

By the time Peter preached the resurrection to Cornelius, he and the other apostles had already experienced harassment, arrest, and flogging on account of their preaching.  2 chapters later, King Herod will execute the apostle James and try to execute Peter too—who will make a miraculous escape from jail.  The apostles are men so thoroughly convinced that Jesus is alive that they no longer fear persecution or death.  They are thoroughly convinced that Jesus has truly been “anointed with the Holy Spirit and power” by God (Act 10:38) and has been “appointed by God as judge of the living and the dead” (10:42), as we profess every Sunday in our creed—or today in our baptismal promises.

Peter gives witness to the resurrection of Jesus and to what that means:  “everyone who believes in him will receive forgiveness of sins thru his name,” and on the day of judgment Jesus will award eternal life to those he has forgiven, and allow those who have rejected his pardon to go their own way—which is not the way to eternal life.

The Church continues the mission of the apostles, the mission to testify to the resurrection and to God’s mercy—mercy offered to everyone, Jew and Gentile, man and woman, rich and poor—offered but never imposed.

That’s why we’re here this morning:  to rejoice that Jesus is risen, to rejoice that he forgives our sins, to rejoice that his Holy Spirit empowers us to live a new life—no more “malice and wickedness” but, instead, “sincerity and truth” (1 Cor 5:8).

All of us who are followers of Jesus now are his witnesses—by living holy lives, by practicing kindness toward one another and patience with one another, and by our joy, the joy that comes from believing that Jesus is alive and from being in a relationship with him.

“Christ indeed from death is risen, our new life obtaining.  Have mercy, victor King, ever reigning!  Alleluia!” (Sequence)

Homily for Good Friday

Homily for Good Friday

March 25, 2016
John 18-19
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Home, New Rochelle

Who are you?  If you had been in Jerusalem in April 30 A.D., what part would you have played?

The Crucifixion, by Andrea Mantegna, 1457

Judas betrayed Jesus to his enemies.  He did it for what he loved most in life: money.  St. John portrays Judas as a materialist, one of those people who “knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.”  He sold out his friend because he thought it was to his own advantage.

Peter, on the other hand, was not a calculator.  He was quick and emotional, impetuous rather than reflective.  He said or did the 1st thing that came into his head:  defending Jesus out of earnest love in Jesus’ presence; denying Jesus out of fear in Jesus’ absence.  Peter was good-hearted but weak.

Annas and Caiaphas and the other Jewish leaders were concerned about their people, concerned lest the Romans impose a still harsher rule.  They were concerned for the purity of the faith.  But their religious and national zeal led them to an “ends justifies the means” policy.  They decided that Jesus was a threat to the whole nation and they had to get rid of him at any cost.  Their motto may have been “Do whatever it takes.”  To them Jesus’ innocence was irrelevant.  So they corrupted their worthy goals of religious and national freedom.

“Another disciple,” an anonymous one, followed Jesus into the high priest’s courtyard.  This man ran a certain risk to be near Jesus.  Whatever he did was so quiet and self-effacing that we don’t even know his name, only that it was important for him to “follow Jesus closely” and to help others, like Peter.  If this was the beloved disciple, as is often supposed, this was his 1st step being close enuf to Jesus to the end to lend him moral support.

Pilate was a man of the world, an ambitious man, a politician.   He saw clearly enuf what was right but was unwilling to risk doing it.  He was personally opposed to killing an innocent man but unwilling to impose his belief on others, tho the decision and the responsibility were clearly his.

St. John is vague about the crowd that gathers before Pilate’s court.  Were they just the priests and scribes who had long opposed to Jesus?  Or were they some of the general population of Jerusalem?  Or were some of them pilgrims who’d come to the city for the feast?  Whatever their identity, we get the impression that they were a mindless rabble, a mob; they were carried along by the opinion of the moment, by a few catchy slogans.  Did they really know Jesus?  Did they know what they were shouting about?

The soldiers who executed Jesus couldn’t have cared less about him or the 2 criminals.  Executions and such unpleasant business were just part of their job.  They were only following orders.  Would it have made any difference to them if they had realized that Jesus was an innocent man falsely accused and falsely condemned?

Three or four woman and one man, all disciples, stood by Jesus to the end, silent and powerless, but reliable and faithful.  They didn’t care what people thought.  Their presence was Jesus’ only support in his dying hours.

Finally, two more disciples appeared, Joseph and Nicodemus.  Both men had already struggled with their fear of being identified as Jesus’ friends, for they were prominent men and could have lost reputation, influence, or more.  But they came forward with a certain boldness to do a last service for Jesus, no longer caring about popular opinion.  They were practical disciples who saw something needed to be done in Jesus’ name, and they did it.

Some of these varied characters are similar, some very different.  We see in them courage and cowardice, ignorance and loyalty, avarice and service, generosity and corruption.  Those qualities, motives, and attitudes determine how closely we follow Jesus, whether we stand with him, whether we do what’s right or even care what’s right.  The vital question is not what part we might have played in Jerusalem in April of 30 A.D., but what part we play now.

Homily for Holy Thursday

Homily for

Holy Thursday

March 24, 2016

Preface

Provincial House, New Rochelle

“He is the true and eternal Priest, who instituted the pattern of an everlasting sacrifice and was the first to offer himself as the saving Victim” (Preface).

The Last Supper (Tintoretto)

We’ve heard many times that today we celebrate the institution of 3 mysteries:  the Eucharist, the Christian priesthood, and the commandment of love.  The Preface of the Mass touches on all 3.

Christ “is the true and eternal Priest.”  Under the Old Law, Aaron and his male descendants were priests and offered sacrifices of various kinds every day on behalf of the people.  Those sacrifices were limited in that they were for the benefit only of the Jews—whether they were thanksgivings, atonement, worship, or intercessory sacrifices.  They were limited in time, needing to be repeated over and over, daily and seasonally.  Jesus Christ, who was not descended from Aaron, not in the legal sense anyway—he may have had Aaronic blood thru Mary, whose kin included Elizabeth, wife of Zechariah (cf. Luke 2:5)—is called the true priest, however.  He is the true priest because, as our reading of Ps 110 says, God his Father designated him as priest of the New Law (v. 4); because he offers a sacrifice that avails for the entire human race and not just for one part of it; because his priestly worship is so perfect, whether it be considered as adoration or thanksgiving or atonement or intercession that it need not be, and cannot be, repeated.

Jesus is the eternal Priest because his priestly service doesn’t end with death.  What began with his earthly ministry continues forever where he reigns in the heavenly court, ever atoning for the sins of mankind, ever interceding with his Father for the graces we need, ever bringing our prayerful thanks and praise to the Father on our behalf, ever uniting humanity to the Blessed Trinity.

Truly Christ is the only priest of the New Law—the true and eternal one.  He does call and privilege men to share in his priesthood, to make his “everlasting sacrifice” always present among us, “to make this offering as his memorial” (Preface).  We celebrate that priestly institution today, simultaneous with the institution of the Eucharist.  But it is always Christ’s priesthood that men exercise, and nothing apart from him.  It is always Christ who consecrates, who pardons, who anoints with the Holy Spirit, who speaks the divine Word thru his time-bound ministers.

He “was the first to offer himself as the saving Victim.”  The 1st reading, from the Exodus story of Passover, shows Christ foreshadowed in the lambs sacrificed so that the Hebrews might be spared, the lambs whose blood marked the Hebrew households for salvation.  But Christ, unlike the lambs, freely offered himself for this role, freely offered the sacrifice of his body and blood on the cross.  Indeed, his sacrifice began well before Calvary, began with the Son’s humbling himself by “taking on the condition of a slave” (Phil 2:7), taking on our human flesh in his incarnation and living among us for more than 30 years.

The blood of the paschal lambs on the door posts and lintels of the Hebrews’ homes marked them to be spared by the angel of death.  The blood of Christ the paschal Lamb, flowing from the wounds of his passion, marks believers for salvation from the more terrible angel of death who would claim not only our bodies but our souls as well.  “As we drink his Blood that was poured out for us, we are washed clean” (Preface), purged of our sins, restored to a healthy relationship with Jesus’ Father.

A window of the provincial house chapel

(formerly in the novitiate at Newton, N.J.)

In Christ’s sacraments “we are washed clean” because they flow from his sacrificed blood:  from his side “blood and water flowed out” (John 19:34).  He washes not our feet but our whole selves, and “whoever has bathed” in him “is clean all over” (John 13:10).  In this washing and in this sacrifice of his body and blood, Christ has “instituted the pattern of an everlasting sacrifice.”  The self-sacrifice of Christ, his “loving of his own to the end” (John 13:1)—which may be translated in either a temporal sense, “till the end of his earthly life,” or in a sense of degree, “to the utmost, as much as can be imagined—Christ has also instituted the pattern of love, of service that his priests are to follow—not only those men consecrated as ministers of the altar, but also all who share in his priesthood more broadly, his priestly people, who share in this sacrifice, who join Jesus in worshiping his Father.

We give thanks tonite for the true and eternal priesthood of Jesus, who makes the saving sacrifice of his own body and blood present to us in the Eucharistic mystery; who continues to save mankind by washing away our sins and incorporating us into his own divine life.

Pastoral Assignments for 2016-2017: Round 1

Pastoral Assignments for 2016-2017: Round 1
Province reaches into bottom of barrel, pulls out blogger

This afternoon Vice Provincial Fr. Tim Zak published a letter to the province announcing the first assignments for the pastoral year that will begin on July 1.  The list includes 3 new directors, 2 directors appointed for 2d terms of office, and 1 director named for a 3d term.  Directors serve a 3-year term.  The effective date for all the appointments is July 1.

Fr. Mike Mendl in a Scout cap

Heading the list of the new directors--I guess because he's senior in age--is your humble blogger (he thought that his age had put him safely past any danger of such an appointment).  He's been appointed director of the little SDB community in Champaign, Ill.; there will be just 2 other confreres, which limits the damage he can do!  We keep hearing how stretched the province is for personnel--so here you go!

One of the 2 other confreres is the pastor of Holy Cross Church, and the other is part of the campus ministry team at the University of Illinois. Four Salesian sisters are also on the campus ministry team, so there's a pretty strong Salesian presence in Champaign, all good people to be with.

Fr. Mike has spent 25 of the last 30 years in New Rochelle, primarily doing editorial and communications work, and a little teaching and Boy Scout ministry.  Since 2004 he's also been vice director of the provincial house community.  He'll replace Fr. Joe Santa Bibiana as director in Champaign; Fr. Santa just celebrated his 50th anniversary of ordination and got nice coverage in the local and diocesan newspapers.

The 2d new director is Fr. James "Jay" Horan, named to head up another small SDB community, that of East Boston.  Three SDBs there direct the Salesian Boys & Girls Club and assist in weekend parish ministry.  Fr. John Nazzaro will step aside after 9 years as director in Eastie.

Fr. Jay Horan meeting with students

Fr. Jay has many years of teaching and campus ministry experience in the province's high schools, and has been almost a "lifer" as vice director.  He's been at the B&G Club in Eastie for the current year.

Fr. Mike Pace is the 3d new director, taking the responsibility for the province's formation house in Orange, N.J.  For the Toronto native, this will be his 1st assignment outside Canada (except for his participation in the 27th General Chapter as the province's delegate and his experience leading pilgrimages to Italy).  He's currently pastor of St. Benedict's Church in Etobicoke, a Toronto suburb, and vice director of the SDB community, and has also served in Salesian settings in Montreal.  He's been on the provincial council since last July.

Fr. Mike Pace (by Fr. Puntino)

The Orange community is no little one, with 7 SDB staff members this year (including 3 serving Our Lady of the Valley Church) and 12 young SDBs in formation.  The community also includes 4 priests serving in detached assignments (nursing homes and parishes in N.J. and Pennsylvania).

Fr. Pace will replace Fr. Dominic Tran.

It appears that all 3 of our new directors are getting the vice ripped out of them--certainly out of their job descriptions!

Fr. Tom Provenzano, pastor of St. John Bosco Church in Chicago, has been named to a 2d term as director of the SDB community serving the parish.

Fr. John Serio, president of Salesian HS in New Rochelle, has been named to a 2d term as director fo the local SDB community (which is distinct from that of the provincial house).

Fr. Jim Heuser, president of Don Bosco Prep in Ramsey, N.J., has appointed to a 3d term as director of the SDB community there.  The school is just undertaking a major building project.

Homily for Palm Sunday

Homily for
Palm Sunday
March 20, 2016
Is 50: 4-7
Ursulines, Willow Dr., New Rochelle

“The Lord God has given me a well-trained tongue, that I might know how to speak to the weary a word that will rouse them” (Is 50: 4).

The 1st reading for Palm Sunday’s Eucharistic liturgy is always the same; only the passion account changes from year to year.  This 1st reading is one of the so-called Servant Songs from the 2d part of the book of the prophet Isaiah.  There are 4 of those songs, and we’ll hear the other 3 on Monday, Tuesday, and Friday of this week, plus today’s song repeated—and lengthened by 2 verses—on Wednesday.

Obviously the Church considers these 4 great poems to be significant during this particular week, this week we call “holy.”  Obviously the Church links the Servant Songs to Jesus the Messiah, particularly to his passion and his work of redemption.  As you know, that’s a link going back to the earliest days of the apostles’ reflections on their experience, if not to Jesus himself, who asked the 2 disciples on the way to Emmaus, “Didn’t the Messiah have to suffer, and so enter his glory?” (Luke 24:26).  As we read the preaching of the apostles in Acts, and the story of the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts 8:26-40), we find the connection stressed over and over.

Jesus Crowned with Thorns

medieval fresco in lower church

St. Bavo's Cathedral, Ghent, Belgium

The song that we heard a few minutes ago begins with a reference to the Servant of YHWH’s preaching and reminds us of how Jesus announced his mission in the synagog at Nazareth (Luke 4:16-21), quoting a different passage from Isaiah:  “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the lowly, to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners, to announce a year of favor from the Lord” (61:1-2).

But today’s song quickly turns somber, speaking of the Servant’s faithfulness in the face of torture, and of his total confidence in God’s faithfulness.

Reading that passage, we think 1st of all, like the early Church, of Jesus’ faithfulness and his trust in his Father, right up to the commendation of his spirit to his Father (Luke 23:46).  But I couldn’t help thinking also of the faithfulness of the Body of Christ, his Church, under persecution, under beatings and disgrace before men (cf. Is 50:6-7).  Christians in China defy the local government that attacks their church buildings.  Christians in Latin America are assassinated for defending the rights of the poor.  Christians in our country risk fines and imprisonment and loss of their livelihood for asserting conscience (as they did also in the ’60s).  Christians in Syria, Iraq, Pakistan, Nigeria, and elsewhere face every day the danger of physical assault, the burning of their churches, the confiscation of their goods, oppressive taxation, arrest, beheading or a bullet to the head—or risk perilous exile rather than deny Jesus.  Even now, Salesian Fr. Tom Uzhunnalil has been missing since March 4 when he was taken away by the terrorists who butchered 16 people at the Missionaries of Charity home in Aden.  Our fellow Christians say things like, “They may destroy our churches and seize our homes and our goods, but they can’t take away our faith in Jesus.”

“I have not turned back; I have set my face like flint, knowing that I shall not be put to shame” (Is 50:5,7), indeed.  The Suffering Servant still suffers, is still faithful to the Lord God.

Our persecuted fellow believers don’t despair of God’s help.  But they are mightily discouraged by the seeming indifference of the Christian West, or the formerly Christian West that pays loads of lip service to human rights—to “reproductive rights” and gay rights and the right to vote, but not so much to religious rights.  They plead for us to hear their cries, see their suffering, feel their pain—and do something to rescue them, to allow them to continue to live in their ancestral homes and practice their ancestral faith.

Sisters, I know that, like Pope Francis, you’re mindful of our beleaguered and persecuted sisters and brothers.  Continue to pray for them and, when possible, advocate for them, the 21st century’s suffering servants of YHWH.

Homily for Solemnity of St. Joseph

Homily for the Solemnity
of St. Joseph
March 19, 2016
Collect
Provincial House, New Rochelle

“Grant, Almighty God, that by St. Joseph’s intercession your Church may constantly watch over the unfolding of the mysteries of human salvation whose beginnings you entrusted to his faithful care” (Collect).

St. Joseph, patron of the Universal Church

Auriesville, N.Y.

St. Joseph didn’t have a direct role in “the mysteries of human salvation,” he had an essential indirect role as the protector and guardian of Jesus, and as the one who linked Jesus to the house of David, to whom God promised an everlasting dynasty (2 Sam 7:16).

The “beginnings” of “the mysteries of salvation” were entrusted to Joseph’s “faithful care.”  One commentator notes that “beginnings” here translates primordia, a word that “suggests hidden principles of growth, like seeds.”[1]  Jesus’ identity and mission were indeed hidden and developed slowly—hidden in Mary’s womb, hidden from Herod’s plot, hidden in the humble village of Nazareth—all under Joseph’s “faithful care,” until the seed of that identity and mission was ripe for the harvest in Jesus’ ministry.  The mysteries of our salvation unfolded ever so slowly, matured gradually, as Joseph (with Mary) taught Jesus his Jewish faith and heritage, fostered in him a life of prayer and charity, trained him in human virtues and life skills.  Not least, of course, was Joseph’s “faithful care” in taking Mary into his home as the angel had directed him (Matt 1:24), his promptness in fleeing with his family into Egypt (Matt 2:14), and on their return his prudence in settling in Nazareth, beyond the reach of Herod’s tyrannical son Archelaus (2:22-23).

Joseph saw the “beginnings” of “the mysteries of human salvation.”  He didn’t live to see Jesus’ public ministry or the culmination of the mysteries in Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection.  He didn’t see the fulfillment of what the angel promised him, that Jesus would save the world (Matt 1:21).  He died having helped nurture the seed of all that but not seeing its fruit; without fully understanding the role he played in “the unfolding of the mysteries.”  He “watched over” God’s Son without knowing what the Son would do in his maturity.  Joseph faithfully, obediently, and quietly played his own part and left all else to God.

So Joseph models the Church, for which our Collect asks him to intercede.  The Church now has the role, in God’s Providence, of “watching over the unfolding of the mysteries of human salvation.”  These “mysteries” are both the unfathomable plan of God (cf. Eph 3:8) for each of us and all of us—how God’s grace will touch and guide our lives—and the more particular “mysteries” entrusted to the Church’s “faithful care”:  the sacraments and the rest of the sacred liturgy by which Christ acts in the Church to effect our salvation.

The “beginnings” of “the mysteries of our salvation” were entrusted to St. Joseph in the person of Jesus.  The mysteries continue to “unfold” in the living body of Jesus, his Church, mysteriously and wondrously extending Jesus’ person over the ages thru our Baptism, thru the Eucharist, thru the preaching of the Word, thru the testimony of holy, grace-filled lives.  All this mysterious unfolding we entrust to St. Joseph’s continued guidance and protection, to his “faithful care,” knowing that he bears the same love for all of God’s children that he lavished upon God’s Only-begotten Son.

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        [1] Anthony Esolen, The Beauty of the Word:  A Running Commentary on the Roman Missal (NY: Magnificat, 2012), p. 367.

Discernment Weekend for Potential Lay Missioners

Discernment Weekend for Potential Lay Missioners

Over the March 11-13 weekend, 6 Salesian Lay Missioner candidates from as many U.S. states (Colorado, Georgia, Massachusetts, Missouri, New Jersey, and Ohio) visited Salesian Missions and the provincial house in New Rochelle as part of the process of discerning whether they might become SLMs later this year. Their weekend included presentations on Don Bosco and the Salesians, how to discern, the Salesian oratory criteria, and the Salesian Lay Missioner program itself. A panel of returned SLMs discussed mission with them. They visited 4 Salesian works in New Rochelle (the mission office, the provincial house, Salesian HS, and the "oratory" at Blessed Sacrament Parish) and took part in prayer and meals at each site.

A second discernment weekend for additional SLM candidates is planned in May. Those who are accepted into the SLM program will undertake three weeks of orientation in late July and August and be commissioned at the end of a retreat.

Pictured above are 5 of the candidates; the 6th had to leave on Sunday morning before your humble blogger/photographer returned from a weekend with Boy Scouts. At the left in the photo is Adam Rudin, director of the SLM program, and at the right Fr. Mark Hyde, SDB, director of Salesian Missions.