Three Salesians Ordained

Three Salesians Ordained

Bishop Whalen Advises, “Remember, it’s always about Jesus.”

Julia St. Clair, coordinator of communications for the New Rochelle Province, contributed to this post.

Two Salesians of Don Bosco were ordained to the presbyterate and one to the diaconate on Saturday, June 26, at St. John Bosco Church in Port Chester, N.Y. They were Frs. Leonard Carlino and Steven DeMaio and Deacon Ky Nguyen. All three men belong to the Salesian province of St. Philip the Apostle, which covers the eastern U.S. and all of Canada.

L-R: Deacon Ky Nguyen, Fr. Lenny Carlino, Bp. Edmund Whalen, 

Bp. John Barres, Fr. Steve DeMaio, Deacon Craig Spence, Fr. Tim Zak

Auxiliary Bishop Edmund J. Whalen of New York presided and preached.  Also participating was Bishop John O. Barres of Rockville Centre, Fr. Lenny’s diocese of origin.  Another 46 priests concelebrated, mostly Salesians, and five deacons also vested for service at the altar or participation by their presence.

The church was about half-full, a couple of hundred people, with pews still marked off for social distancing.  Attending were the ordinands’ families and friends, members of the Salesian Family, and parishioners of St. John Bosco.

Many others tuned in via the live stream from St. John Bosco Church’s Facebook and YouTube.

“It’s absolutely beautiful that someone so young has decided to dedicate his life to God,” Joanna Garbatini, Fr. Steve’s cousin, proudly commented to Julia St. Clair of the Salesian Communications Office.

“I remember when I first met Deacon Ky, who was my small group leader on the Salesian Leadership Retreat, and Fr. Steve, who was my homeroom teacher when I was a freshman,” Anthony Del Debbio, Salesian High School ’19, shared with Miss St. Clair. “Fr. Steve was the one who got me into the Salesian community.” He then told a humorous story of an occurrence he encountered after Deacon Ky’s departure from Salesian High. “[Deacon Ky] oversaw chapel when I was an altar server. When he left, he left instructions for us on where everything was, steps 1-20—and we didn’t find them until we called him for help!”

“It’s really overwhelming because I had the grace of accompanying Fr. Steve for four years. I also know Fr. Lenny well since we studied together. It’s beautiful this day has come, and they will be wonderful priests,” Fr. Benny Di Bitonto, diocesan priest from Jerusalem, began explaining to Miss St. Clair. “We will miss them but celebrate the Mass every day. We are one and will always meet at the altar. There is no periphery; we are all at the center.”

The parish provided a buffet luncheon after Mass.

Both Fr. Lenny and Fr. Steve studied theology for four years at the Studium Theologicum Salesianum in Jerusalem, also known as the Ratisbonne Institute, an affiliate of the Salesian Pontifical University in Rome, and both were ordained deacons on June 14, 2020, at the Church of All Nations in Gethsemane, Jerusalem.

Fr. Leonard Joseph Carlino Jr. was born in 1991 at Stony Brook, N.Y. His parents are Leonard Carlino Sr. and Linda Carlino. All of them have made their home in Hauppauge, N.Y., and have been parishioners of St. Thomas More Church there.

Fr. Lenny was educated at Forest Brook Elementary School in Hauppauge and Hauppauge High School before entering the Salesians in August 2009. At Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J., he earned a B.A. in Catholic theology, followed by an M.A. in religious education from Fordham University in the Bronx. At the Ratisbonne he earned a Bachelor’s degree in sacred theology; his thesis was titled “Consecration and the Recapitulation of All Things in Christ.”

Fr. Lenny came to know of the Salesians through the presence of Salesian Cooperators at St. Thomas More Parish, which led to his participation in Salesian youth ministry retreats. He entered the novitiate in Rosemead, Calif., in 2013 and made his first profession of vows on August 16, 2014, at Haverstraw, N.Y., and his perpetual profession on August 17, 2019, also at Haverstraw. He completed two years of practical training at Archbishop Shaw High School in Marrero, La., teaching religion and assisting with band and choir (2015-2017). He has found his eleven years of Salesian life a beautiful “life of consecration in prayer, community, and mission. I’ve been blessed to meet Salesians from many different contexts, backgrounds, and countries. While we are all unique, we share this identity as sons of Don Bosco and followers of Christ as ministers of the Church to young people.”

As a newly ordained priest, Fr. Lenny is assigned to St. John Bosco Parish in Port Chester as parochial vicar and coordinator of youth ministry. There he hopes “to personalize and truly interiorize the priestly ministerial identity through practice of the ministry at St. John Bosco parish, especially among the young people of the village.”

All of the newly ordained men were extremely happy and grateful to have experienced such an amazing day. “It’s very good to be here,” Fr. Lenny told Miss St. Clair. “For me, witnessing the wonderful laypeople embrace their vocations helps me to live mine. While it’s been a long time coming, God is with you and that makes it all worth it.” For Fr. Lenny, the next step on his vocation journey is to “be at peace and have grace flow through ministry.”

Fr. Lenny gives Communion to his mom

Fr. Lenny celebrated a Mass of thanksgiving in his home parish of St. Thomas More on Sunday, June 27, receiving a warm welcome from pastor Fr. Antony Asir and hundreds of parishioners.

Fr. Steven Joseph DeMaio is the son of Steven and Theresa DeMaio of Ave Maria, Fla. He was born in Danbury, Conn., in 1985. His original hometown was Sherman, Conn., where the family belonged to Holy Trinity Parish.

Fr. Steve got his schooling at Sherman Middle School, Canterbury High School (New Milford, Conn.), and James Madison University (Harrisonburg, Va.); at JMU he earned a B.A. in business administration. At the Ratisbonne he earned a Bachelor’s degree in sacred theology; his thesis was titled “Created, Accompanied and Divinized in Trinitarian Friendship.”

After his college graduation, Fr. Steve met the Salesian Sisters in Lusaka, Zambia, while working for a Spanish NGO. That encounter induced him to join the Salesians in 2010. He entered the novitiate at Rosemead in 2011 and made his first profession of vows on August 21, 2012, at New Rochelle, N.Y. He made his perpetual profession on September 7, 2018, at Haverstraw, N.Y. He completed three years of practical training (2014-2017) at Salesian High School in New Rochelle, N.Y., teaching religion and serving as campus minister.

He speaks of his Salesian experience thus far as having “been one of healing and growth towards a deeper and more intimate relationship with God through my encounter with my Salesian brothers and the many people I have encountered on the way.”

Newly ordained, he will return to New Rochelle to assist in the province’s vocation office. He “hopes to be a dedicated and authentic Salesian priest wherever God sends me.”

Fr. Steve told Miss St. Clair that he’s “really grateful to be back in the province.” He continued, “I’m excited to work with vocations and youth and young adult ministry, accompany young people, and be a blessing.”

Fr. Steve celebrated a Mass of thanksgiving at St. Rose of Lima Church in Meriden, Conn., on Sunday, June 27.

Deacon Paul Ky Nguyen was born in 1986 at Dakmil, Vietnam. He is the son of Peter Minh Xuan Nguyen and Mary Hoang Dang. He got his early education in Vietnam, up to a B.A. in material science from the University of Natural Science in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam. He is currently a student at Immaculate Conception Seminary, attached to Seton Hall University, in South Orange, N.J.

Deacon Ky knew the Salesians early in life because his father is a Salesian past pupil. He entered the Salesians as a candidate in 2004 and made his novitiate in 2010-2011 in Ho Chi Minh City, professing first vows on August 14, 2011. After immigrating to the U.S. in 2016 to rejoin his family, he made his perpetual profession on August 17, 2019, at Haverstraw, N.Y.

Deacon Ky did his practical training in the Salesian boarding school at Bao Loc, Vietnam, teaching computer science and providing general assistance to the students, and at Salesian High School in New Rochelle as a campus minister (2017-2018). As a student of theology at Immaculate Conception Seminary, he resides in the Salesian community of Orange, N.J., and continues youth ministry activities there.

Concerning his Salesian life in two countries, he writes: “Being a professed Salesian for ten years has offered me chances to follow Christ in Don Bosco’s charism, i.e., to serve young people. There have been up-and-down moments on this journey. But in general, it has been a beautiful journey. Like Mary, who said ‘Yes’ to the call to become the Mother of God without understanding what it means, I am also called to continue to say ‘Yes’ to God with a complete trust in his wisdom and providence.”

Bp. Whalen presents the Book of the Gospels

to Deacon Ky.

When asked how he felt after the ordination Mass, Deacon Ky remarked, “Wow! I’m full of hope and know this is what God wants.” He added, “It’s a vocation and journey of faith because the Lord is by my side.”

This summer Deacon Ky will exercise his ministry at St. Rosalie and St. John Bosco parishes in Harvey, La., which are administered by the Salesians. In the fall he will continue his theological studies at Immaculate Conception Seminary. He says simply that he hopes to “continue to grow in faith, being closer to Jesus.”

Preaching without notes, Bp. Whalen began by noting the blessings that the ordinands’ parents gave to them after they responded, “Present,” to the call to step forward for ordination.  Their parents gave them the gift of God’s love, and through the ordained that love will flow on to God’s family, the Church.

The gospel reading (John 20:19-23), the bishop said, shows Jesus coming to his disciples, challenging them, and sending them to visit God’s people and breathe his life into them.

Then, citing the concluding words of the Eucharistic Prayer at every Mass, “Through him, with him, and in him,” Bp. Whalen challenged the ordinands to remember that their ministry is always about Jesus and his people.

He noted that this ordination is taking place between the memorial of St. Joseph Cafasso (June 23) and the solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul (June 29), and that June 29 will be the 70th ordination anniversary of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI.  He urged prayer that many more young men will come forward to answer God’s call and accept this gift of love from God, as “young, skinny” Joseph Ratzinger did and the three men are doing today.

The Bp. Whalen pointed to the priestly example of St. Joseph Cafasso, whose ministry focused on Jesus and on the condemned prisoners to whom he brought God’s love, “breathing on them the creative life of God.”  St. Joseph taught that same focus and attention to Don Bosco.  He also imitated Mary in his readiness to obey and readiness to suffer, because of poor health, in his ministry.

The bishop turned then to the example of Sts. Peter and Paul.  Like St. Peter, priests can bring Christ’s forgiveness to people only after they have accepted that forgiveness.  Like St. Paul, they are to be zealous (“not zealots”) in bringing the gift of God that has been “boiling up inside them” like hot water in a tea kettle.

Joseph Ratzinger has always remained a teacher attentive to individuals, even after being called in obedience out of his classroom to ministry as bishop, cardinal prefect, and Pope.  He kept his focus on Jesus through the sacraments of Eucharist and Reconciliation.

Finally, the bishop emphasized, all priestly ministry happens through the Eucharist, and the ordained have to start every day by experiencing that gift:  “through him, with him, and in him.” 

Frs. Lenny & Steve give their 1st blessings

to the Bps. Whalen and Barres.

A third Salesian, Fr. Charles Craig Spence of Pass Christian, Miss., will be ordained on July 31 at St. John Bosco Church in Harvey, La., by New Orleans Archbishop Gregory Aymond.

More photos: https://link.shutterfly.com/RNubC5mYphb

https://www.facebook.com/SalesianSocietyInc/photos/pcb.4003046696461062/4003046476461084

Homily for 13th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Homily for the
13th Sunday of Ordinary Time

June 27, 2021
Wis 1: 13-15; 2: 23-24
Mark 5: 21-43
Holy Name of Jesus, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“God formed man to be imperishable; the image of his own nature he made him” (Wis 2: 23).

Jesus raises Jairus's daughter

(James Tissot)

The Book of Wisdom strongly emphasizes that death is not part of God’s plan for his creatures, that God wants humans, in particular, “to be imperishable.”  If we’re created in God’s own image, as Genesis affirms and our 1st reading restates, how could we not be destined to live forever?

Wisdom blames the Devil, whose envy and hatred for goodness brought death into the world.  If you hate God, you hate goodness, truth, and beauty, and you want to make all creatures as ugly, deceptive, and evil as you are.  That’s one of the themes in the Star Wars and Harry Potter stories.

The Devil succeeded in bringing death and all manner of evil into the world, in corrupting many a human heart by tricking us into worshipping wealth, pleasure, power, and our own egos rather than God.  “They who belong to his company experience death” (Wis 2:24) because they chase false gods; they worship themselves.

The whole Old Testament tells that story, and so does a great deal of ordinary history, the stories of cruel empires and egomaniac tyrants; of mobsters, slave traders, drug lords, people who sell out their country, and abortionists (purveyors of death, enemies of the innocent).

Into our deadly world stepped Jesus of Nazareth.  He came to restore the lively world created by God.  Our gospel reading this morning shows him at work thru 2 unexplainable healings, one more powerful than the other.  St. Mark, a master storyteller, cleverly weaves one healing into the narrative about the other, holding us in suspense by the interruption and then leading us to a climax.

The 1st healing involves a woman suffering terribly from uncontrollable hemorrhages, and impoverished by her search for a medical cure.  She’s without hope, desperate; so she risks sneaking up to Jesus in the crowd.  She’s unclean because of her bleeding, and she dare not come directly, openly, any more than a leper would.

"She had heard about Jesus" (Mark 5:27), but she doesn’t know Jesus well, obviously.  Lepers do come to him, and he welcomes every kind of social outcast who seeks him out.  He heals this woman too embarrassed to face him, hears her story, pronounces peace upon her.

That can be our story, too.  No matter what our unclean, sinful condition, our shame, our fear, our reputation—Jesus is waiting eagerly for us, to touch us with forgiveness.  As the woman “told him the whole truth” (5:33), we can bring our sins to Jesus, who sacramentally desires to tell us, “Your faith has saved you.  Go in peace and be cured of your affliction” (5:34).  Go to confession and be reconciled to God thru Jesus our Savior.

The story that was interrupted concerns the daughter of the synagog official, a mere child of 12.  She’s not sick, not dying.  She's dead, and everyone around her knows it.  Jesus doesn’t do CPR.  He just “takes her by the hand” and addresses her, “Little girl, I say to you, arise!” (5:41).

Which is what he desires to say to each of us, by name, on the Last Day.  He came to bring us back to life, the life we forfeited by our dalliance with the Devil, by our sins.  He came to raise us from our graves as he rose on Easter.

When we place our trust in him, we can sing, we will sing on Judgment Day, like the Psalmist:

“I will extol you, O Lord, for you drew me clear and did not let my enemies rejoice over me.  O Lord, you brought me up from the netherworld; you preserved me from among those going down into the pit.  O Lord, my God, forever will I give you thanks.” (Ps 30:2,4,13).

Homily for Friday, Week 12 of Ordinary Time

Homily for Friday
12th Week of Ordinary Time

June 25, 2021
Gen 17: 1, 9-10, 15-22
Ursulines, Willow Dr., New Rochelle, N.Y.

“When Abram was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to him and said: ‘I am God the Almighty.  Walk in my presence and be blameless’” (Gen 17: 1).

Abraham and his family on the move

(Jozsef Molnar)

Our passage from Genesis this morning seems long enuf with 11 verses.  It’s less than half of the 27 verses of the whole chapter, which seems to introduce us anew to Abram’s relationship with God and to God’s covenant with him.  According to the experts, this passage comes from the Priestly Source of Genesis, whereas earlier versions of the same material come from the Yahwist Source.

God begins by introducing himself to Abram as “God the Almighty,” El Shaddai.  He commands Abram to be a disciple, a companion even, to “walk in my presence,” and he commands him, as well, to “be blameless,” to be upright.  In the total context of Abram’s story, going back to his move from Ur of the Chaldees to Canaan in obedience to God, this new command or repeated command can mean simply that he should continue as he has been.

So much is left out of ch. 17 that today we skip over God’s changing Abram’s name to Abraham and his promise that Abraham, “father of a multitude,” will beget a multitude of descendants bound to him by a covenant.  God graciously states what he’ll do for Abraham:  “I will give to you and your descendants after you the land in which you are now staying, the whole land of Canaan, as a permanent possession; and I will be their God” (17:8).  That restates God’s earlier covenant promise (Gen 15).

This is new:  for Abraham’s part, he, his household, and his descendants will signify their acceptance of God’s gift thru circumcision of the menfolk—a common enuf practice, actually, among some Middle Eastern tribes, but not in Babylon and Sumer, where Abraham came from.

Abraham prostrates himself before God (17:17), taking the posture of a vassal or a suppliant.  In fact, after he laughs to himself and thinks skeptically regarding having a son by Sarah, he voices his skepticism  with a suppliant’s plea concerning Ishmael, his son by Sarah’s slave girl.

Abraham’s story reveals to us once more God’s initiative in guiding our salvation.  He’s gracious in his promises to Abraham, and he’s gracious in his patience with Abraham’s skepticism.

Abraham, that man of faith so often held up to us, has doubts!  Like any of us, he falters, as do we sometimes, if not in faith, then in some other area of the spiritual life and the life of virtue.  God sticks by him, and he sticks by us, too.  In the long run, Abraham does walk in God’s presence and remain faithful.  He remains a model of faith for us.  God doesn’t find us “blameless” in his presence, but his grace thru Jesus Christ renders us blameless.

The covenant between God and Abraham was sealed in Abraham’s flesh and the flesh of all his male descendants, including our Lord Jesus.  God has given us who follow Jesus a new covenant sealed in flesh—in the body and blood of Jesus, given for us 1st on the cross, then in the Eucharist, so that we might ratify the covenant as often as we partake of the living flesh of our Savior.

80th Anniversary of Death of 4 Salesians in Auschwitz

80th Anniversary of Death 
of 4 Salesians in Auschwitz

(ANS – Rome – June 24, 2021) – June 27 will mark the 80th anniversary of the martyrdom of four of the twelve Salesians belonging to the Krakow Salesian Province who were arrested on the night of May 23, 1941 by the Gestapo. They are Fr. Jan Swierc, 64, pastor of St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish in Krakow; Fr. Ignacy Dobiasz, 61, parochial vicar; Fr. Franciszek Harazim, 56, professor of theology; Fr. Kazimierz Wojciechowski, 37, catechist.

Top: Frs. Swierc & Harazim;

Bottom: Frs. Wojciechowski & Dobiasz 

After a summary interrogation, although completely uninvolved with any form of political propaganda, they were accused of participating in clandestine organizations and, even more serious, of promoting the national culture – to the detriment of Nazi Germany - among young people (such as their parishioner Karol Wojtyla), exploiting the influence deriving from their priesthood. That was enough to deserve being tortured and sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp.

Deprived even of their names, they were forced to wear the bloody rags of those who, before them, had not survived the terrible penal company to which those accused of serious crimes were destined. Almost suffocated by the nauseating fumes of the burnt corpses that rose from the crematorium chimney, beaten and exhausted by the inhuman work, in a short time they fell by the hands of the SS guards.

Fr. Jan Swierc and Fr. Ignacy Dobiasz were the victims of that morning of June 27, 1941. In the afternoon, Fr. Franciszek Harazim and Fr. Kazimierz Wojciechowski suffered martyrdom, side by side.

“This sacrifice was a seed of life, a seed of victory…. Those pastors ... for the Christian life of every parishioner and especially for young parishioners ... paid not only with a good word, not only with the good example of their generous life, but also with the sacrifice and blood of martyrdom,” the then-archbishop of Krakow, Cardinal Karol Wojtyla, said of them in a homily on January 30, 1972.

The Positio super martyrio is currently being drafted for these and five other martyrs (Frs. Ignacy Antonowicz, Karol Golda, Ludwik Mroczek, Wlodzimierz Szembek, and Franciszek Miska).

Homily for 12th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Homily for the
12th Sunday of Ordinary Time

June 20, 2021
Job 38: 1, 8-11
Mark 4:35-41
Blessed Sacrament, New Rochelle, N.Y.
Holy Name of Jesus, New Rochelle

“The Lord addressed Job … and said: ‘Who shut within doors the sea…? … and said:  Thus far shall you come but no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stilled!” (Job 38: 1, 8, 11).

As usual in our Sunday readings, the 1st reading has been chosen as a prelude or partner to the gospel reading.  In this case, 4 verses from near the end of the Book of Job concerning God’s lordship over the seas are matched with the story of Jesus’ calming a storm on the Sea of Galilee—a wonder that “fills his disciples with great awe” and makes them ask, “Who is this” man with such power? (Mark 4:41).  St. Mark, of course, knows that his readers recognize Jesus as Lord; the apostles at the time were quite slow to figure that out.

Job rebuked by his friends (source unknown)

The Book of Job is a long reflection on the ways of God, particularly when human suffering is involved, more particularly when that suffering is totally undeserved.  The story, which is a very long parable, presents Job as a supremely upright man whom Satan afflicts terribly—with the death of his children, with physical pain, and with supposed friends who come to console him but, instead, blame him for what’s happened:  You must have offended God in some awful way for him to strike you in this way.

But Job, like the kids in the Family Circus cartoons, keeps telling them, “Not me!”  Unlike the kids, he insists that he has been faithful to the Lord God; he has not sinned.  He demands of God—speaking directly to him—that God show how he has done wrong, how he deserves what’s happened to him.

Eventually, God responds at some length; our passage today is a snippet of that.  God doesn’t convict Job of any sin; he doesn’t tell him why he’s being punished for no reason, or even that Satan has been the troublemaker all along.  Instead, God gives an answer that causes Job to bow down before him as creature before the Creator—an answer that we readers don’t find very satisfactory or consoling.

The whole story has been asking why innocent people suffer.  The only answer the biblical author can offer is that God’s wisdom in creating and ordering the universe is far vaster than our human wisdom and understanding of how the universe ought to function.  One Scripture scholar writes:  “The world is full of the mystery of [the Lord’s] wisdom; in spite of its paradoxes, it does not fall apart, it does not return to chaos.  Of this world men … are but a small part.  Job must accept the world as it is and from this accept God as He is.”[1]

In the face of all that seems to be wrong with the universe—floods and droughts, famine and storms, earthquakes and all kinds of “acts of God,” as our insurance policies mention—we have no explanation for why it’s so.  It’s beyond our human wisdom, unless we suppose that the created world is in rebellion against humanity in the same way that sinful humanity is in rebellion against God.  God, according to the Book of Genesis, made men and women lords of the created world in the Garden of Eden and required that they recognize him as their Lord.  They rebelled, and then created order became disorder.

This is not to mention the undeserved suffering that people choose to inflict upon others, the grossly sinful choices that we make.  God’s not responsible for our free choices to make war, to destroy the environment, to traffic in drugs or human beings, to despise and mistreat our brothers and sisters for any reason or no reason.

In the Book of Job, after Job humbles himself before God’s wisdom and might, he’s restored to his possessions and his health and is given new sons and daughters.

In the gospel, the terrified disciples in the boat with Jesus are saved when they cry out to him, “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re perishing?” (Mark 4:38).  Regardless of the physical condition of the universe—all its beauty and all its chaos like hurricanes and wildfires—and regardless of the evil that some people inflict on others or the blessings of health and liberty and family that some people enjoy:  regardless of all that, we’re all perishing.  Or, as some cynic has said, “No one gets out alive.”

On May 14, the New York Times carried a story on its front page about a sister, a Daughter of St. Paul whose name, ironically, is Sister Aletheia—the Greek word for “truth.”  Her message to everyone is, “You are going to die.”  Then what?  Suffering and death are part of life.  Remember death and consider where you want to end up.  If you die as an unrepentant sinner, you will indeed perish—eternally, in painful, hateful company with Satan.  If you die having called upon Jesus and placed your hope in him, then he who has crushed Satan and risen from the grave will save you—eternally in happiness beyond your wildest earthly experience.  The Lord who set the bounds of the oceans and stilled their waves will unbind our bodies from pain and from the grave and still everything that’s ever upset our hearts.  He will love us as only a father or mother can and let us love him and all of redeemed humanity more than we can ever love our BFF or spouse or anyone.

---

[1] John L. McKenzie, SJ, “Job,” in Dictionary of the Bible (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1965), p. 441.       

Formation Workshop for New Provincials

Formation Workshop for New Provincials 

(ANS – Rome – June 18, 2021) – On June 19 the latest workshop for recently appointed provincials will conclude. It’s the second that has taken place with the new general council, elected by the 28th General Chapter in the late winter of 2020, both of which have come after the Covid pandemic. Starting from June 6, seven provincials have been sharing their days with the Rector Major and his main collaborators, learning about the program and guidelines of the Congregation. Each of the seven also had the opportunity to present his own circumscription to the general council.

The vicar of the Rector Major, Fr. Stefano Martoglio, coordinated the course. The participants are:

• Fr. José Pastor Ramírez, provincial of the Antilles;
• Fr. Giovanni D'Andrea, provincial of Sicily;
• Fr. Sigfried Kettner, provincial of Austria;
• Fr. Leonardo Mancini, superior of Piedmont/Val d’Aosta;
• Fr. Melchor Trinidad, provincial of United States West (4th from the right in the photo;
• Fr. Mychajlo Czaban, superior of Ukraine vice province;
• Fr. Peter Timko, provincial of Slovakia.

Compared to the course organized last March for new provincials, this version has seen a small increase in participation. Despite the numerous travel difficulties of this period, seven provincials managed to reach Rome; there were only six last time. There has also been an increase in its geographical composition: no longer only provincials from EU countries, but also from the non-Schengen European area, and from North America.

The crux of the provincials’ group work continues to be the legal elements relevant to the exercise of government, the characteristics of animation, and the fundamental references for religious identity and discipline remain. Moreover, the individual sharing of the objectives and projects with the Rector Major and of the departmental councilors, favor the adoption of a broader perspective on the realities of the Congregation and nourish the climate of fraternity.

The decline of Covid-19 infections in Italy allows this session’s participants to enjoy some outings to a few places in Rome which have great importance, with due precautions. On the morning of June 18 the provincials visited and know about the Salesian Pontifical University, its large and modern library, and the Salesian research facilities based at the university: the  Salesian Historical Institute and the Salesian History Association. The afternoon had a spiritual flavor as they experienced a moment of pilgrimage, prayer, and meditation at the Catacombs of St. Callistus.

In light of this process of gradual return to normality, in September the formation and accompaniment courses offered by the Rector Major and his council to the provincials who have reached the mid-term of their mandate, will resume in Turin.

Homily for Thursday, 11th Week of Ordinary Time

Homily for Thursday
11th Week of Ordinary Time

June 17, 2021
2 Cor 11: 1-11
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Home, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“If only you would put up with a little foolishness from me!” (2 Cor 11: 1).

In several of his letters—Galatians is another example—Paul is compelled to defend his apostleship and the Gospel he preaches.  He has always had opponents of his message:  Jews who don’t believe in

Christ, pagans who find the Gospel cuts against their economic interests, and those he calls “false apostles” who insist that the Greeks must adopt the Law of Moses in order to become Christians.

That last group are Paul’s foes in this passage.  Against them, Paul reminds the Corinthians that his preaching among them has been entirely selfless:  giving them over to Christ as to a spouse, not taking any salary or fee from them, as the Church’s ministers are entitled to do.  Therefore he merits their trust when he asserts that “the truth of Christ” is in him (11:10).

That truth—the truth of the Gospel—is at stake when self-appointed apostles, whom he sneeringly calls “superapostles” (11:5), come “preaching another Jesus than the one we preached” (11:4).

Variations on the Gospel have always been a problem for the Church, from Paul’s time thru medieval heresies and the Protestant Reformation up till today.  Today dissenters from Vatican II preach a different Gospel.  So do nominally Catholic folks who approve of abortion, homosexuality, and women’s ordination.

Paul fears that “as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning,” the “thoughts [of his Corinthian friends] may be corrupted from a sincere and pure commitment to Christ” (11:3).  Last week Bp. Robert Barron forcefully reminded hundreds of Catholic journalist and communicators—as you can read in Catholic media online or in print—that our primary duty is to preach Jesus Christ risen from the dead.  So Paul did.  Christ’s resurrection is what validates his teaching and the teaching of his living spouse, the Church.

Homily for Tuesday, 11th Week of Ordinary Time

Homily for Tuesday
11th Week of Ordinary Time

June 15, 2021
2 Cor 8: 1-9
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Home, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“In a severe test of affliction, the abundance of their joy and their profound poverty overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part” (2 Cor 8: 2).

Paul’s writing from Macedonia, where he’d founded churches in Philippi, Thessalonica, and Beroea (we don’t have a letter to the Beroeans), and he’s informing his friends in Corinth, in the province of Achaia, of the generous collection that the Macedonians have been taking up “in the service of the holy ones,” i.e., for the church in Jerusalem.  This collection is mentioned in several places in Paul’s letters, and the Corinthians also were contributing.  Paul’s appealing to them to match the generosity of the Macedonians, who are making their gift from a position of “affliction” and “profound poverty”—a condition the Corinthians don’t share.

We don’t know what afflictions the Macedonians were experiencing—whether it was some form of persecution, a natural disaster like the earthquake that struck Philippi while Paul and Silas were in jail there (Acts16:19-39), economic hardship, or something else.  Nevertheless, they’re displaying “a wealth of generosity” (8:2).  The Corinthians ought to “complete this gracious act also” (8:6).

I’m sure no one ventures to take up a collection among you, brothers.  I’m sure, however, that as a community you’re generous in responding to various needs of your province, of your schools, of people in want in one form or another.

Our generosity can extend beyond material goods.  You remember the scene in the Acts of the Apostles when a lame man accosts Peter and John as they’re going into the Temple.  Peter responds, “Silver and gold I have not; but what I have I’ll give you.”  And he heals the man in Jesus’ name. (Acts 3:1-8)  We have Jesus to share with people:  his love, his friendship, his virtues.  We can give Jesus to each other, to our staff, to our families, to alumni that we’ve kept in touch with, to the doctors and nurses we see, perhaps more often than we’d like to.  This was always the most gracious act within our power, and it still is.

Homily for 11th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Homily for the
11th Sunday of Ordinary Time

June 13, 2021
2 Cor 5: 6-10
Holy Name of Jesus, New Rochelle, N.Y.
St. Theresa, Bronx

“We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord” (2 Cor 5: 6).

We returned to Ordinary Time, the “green season,” on May 24, but because of Trinity Sunday and the solemnity of Corpus Christi on the following Sundays, today is the 1st Sunday in which we actually return to one of the “ordered” Sundays, the numbered Sundays, that give this liturgical season its name, Ordinary Time.

When we left off Ordinary Time before Ash Wednesday, we were reading from St. Paul’s 1st Letter to the Corinthians.  Now we’ll have several weeks of reading from 2d Corinthians.

Paul preaching before King Agrippa (Nikolai Bodarevsky)

In today’s passage, 5 verses, Paul speaks of a certain tension in Christian life.  On this earth, in our physical bodies, we’re not completely at home.  Our true home, he says, is with Christ.  To live in this world separated from Christ—“away from the Lord” is how he puts it, not meaning a separation from grace or from God’s love but a physical separation—requires that we be “courageous.”  He uses that word twice (5:6,8).  That’s because “we walk by faith, not be sight” (5:7).  We don’t see our Lord Jesus, risen from the dead.  We don’t feel his presence.  We can’t probe the wounds in his hands and side as St. Thomas did.  He’s present to us only by faith.

So we need courage to follow him, to worship him, to obey his teachings—all in the midst of a world that is unbelieving (as much of our society and our culture, is unbelieving and even hostile, like the pagan world of 1st-century Corinth).

Paul is certainly speaking for himself when he writes, “We would rather leave the body and go home to the Lord” (5:8).  Christ died to redeem us from sin and from death.  As soon as we can leave those realities behind and join him in the life of the resurrection, our destiny will be achieved; we’ll enjoy eternal happiness.  God created us for this; the Son of God took on a body of flesh and blood for this—to unite himself to us and bring us into eternal life in a transfigured body like his own risen body.

So, Paul continues, as long as we’re here on earth, in this present body, subject to temptation and to harassment by unbelievers—not to mention to physical pains and sufferings and the loss of people we love—as long as that’s our present condition, Paul affirms, “we aspire to please him, whether we are at home or away” (5:9).  That is, when we come to our heavenly home, we’ll live always pleasing him; while we’re away from our heavenly homeland, the destination of our pilgrimage here below, we strive to please him by living virtuously:  honestly, devoutly, chastely, generously, patiently, forgiving, respecting others.

Then Paul sounds an almost ominous note:  “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ” (5:10).  We profess every Sunday, “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.”  He’ll take a place on his judicial bench (at least figuratively) and weigh our lives:  our words, our deeds, our omissions, “my thoughts and my words, what I have done and what I have failed to do,” as we sometimes confess at the beginning of Mass.  Again, it takes courage to keep Christ before our minds and our hearts, day in and day out and to try to cling to him when we’re irritated or stressed or tired or tempted by the 7 capital sins (pride, lust, anger, envy, gluttony, sloth, and greed).

Paul concludes this little passage by assuring us that each of us will “receive recompense, according to what he did in the body, whether good or evil” (5:10).  We’ll get our just desserts, so to speak.  Actually, since we’re sinners, we won’t get what we deserve; rather, by Christ’s grace, if we’ve striven to stay close to him, we’ll get far more than we deserve:  an eternal reward, an eternal home, with him.

Therefore, brothers and sisters, be of good courage always.  Continue to walk by faith.

Homily for Memorial of the Salesian Polish Martyrs

Homily for the Memorial of the
Salesian Martyrs of Poland

June 12, 2021
2 Cor 5: 14-21
Provincial House, New Rochelle, N.Y.

The Salesian ordo (liturgical calendar) allows an option for today's celebration: either Immaculate Heart of Mary or the 5 young martyrs of the Poznan Salesian oratory.

“The love of Christ impels us” (2 Cor 5: 14).

Paul’s “us” possibly means himself and Timothy, in whose name, too, this letter was written.  Christ’s love is the driving force in their apostolic ministry.  “Us” could also mean all of the Christian community at Corinth, all for whom Christ died, all who are called to live for him.

It was that living for Christ, that being impelled or driven by Christ, that made the difference in the lives of Francis Kesy, Chester Jozwiak, Edward Kazmierski, Edward Klinik, and Jarogniew Wojciechowski.  (I tried and failed to find an English equivalent for “Jarogniew,” as well as trying and probably failing to pronounce these names correctly.)

As you know, these 5 youths were leaders in the Salesian oratory at Poznan, one of Poland’s largest and oldest cities.  The youngsters of the oratory engaged in all the usual Salesian activities, religious, cultural, recreational, including singing in their parish choir, and summer camp activities that included singing in other parish churches.

Germany invaded Poland and launched WWII on Sept. 1, 1939.  Within a few months, if not weeks, the oratory and numerous other religious and civic activities were shut down.  But our 5 blesseds continued to lead activities secretly in the woods, the fields, and gardens.  They knew they were in danger from that even tho they weren’t directly challenging the Nazi authorities.  But the love of Christ impelled them.

For the Gestapo, an indirect challenge, even suspicion, was sufficient cause to arrest Polish civilians.  So in September 1940, Francis, the 2 Edwards, Chester, and Jarogniew were arrested separately.  At that time they were 19, 20, 21, 21, and 17 years old, respectively—3 of them not even legally adults.  They were jailed, interrogated, tortured, and moved to different prisons.  Sometimes 2 of them would be together; at other times they were totally separated from each other tho not from other prisoners.  A constant concern was how their friends were faring, as well as how their families, especially younger siblings, were holding up at home.

“In Christ, the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come” (5:17).  For St. Paul, the old things were the Law and rabbinic traditions.  For the Corinthians, they were the pagan gods and their pagan ways of life.  In Poland, the Nazis announced a new world order, the 1,000-year reich (empire).  For our oratorians, Christ’s new order, already 1,900 years old, remained the guiding rule.  But their old things had passed away:  the freedom and joy of the oratory and their family lives, the oratory’s public worship and service to the community.  In prison, there was a new order:  sharing faith and prayer in very limited circumstances, encouraging and cheering up each other when possible, and other prisoners too, and their families when they were able to smuggle out some correspondence.

So they lived for 23 months, shuttled around, eventually no longer harassed or tortured, ever hopeful of eventual release, always aware that they might face death.  They remained faithful to the prayers they’d learned at the oratory:  morning and evening, Rosary, novenas to Don Bosco and MHC, and the Church’s cycle of feasts.

“We are ambassadors for Christ” (5:20).  Paul and Timothy preached publicly and reminded the Christian community that they too represented Christ in their daily lives.  Our 5 young men necessarily had to do that in secret even before their arrests, and of course once they were imprisoned—altho they made no attempt to hide who they were within the confinement of their cells.

The end came rather suddenly:  they were shipped back to Poznan and summarily tried for treason—against the Reich, not Poland—and condemned.  By then their ages ranged from 19 to 23.  They were transported to Dresden in Germany for execution.  As you may read in the Divine Office, they were joyful about that, consoled by the opportunity for the sacraments and by their date being set for the 24th of August (1942).  Having lived for Christ, been tortured like him and jailed for him, they died heroically for him.  Their final ambassadorship for Christ cam in the secrecy of the prison yard by guillotine.  To the end, they counted on Christ to “redeem their lives from destruction, to crown them with kindness and compassion” (Ps 103:4).

The yard of the prison in Dresden where the executions were carried out.

In 1999 St. John Paul II beatified Francis, Chester, the 2 Edwards, and Jarogniew with 103 other Polish martyrs sacrificed by the Third Reich.  All 108 are commemorated on June 12.

Homily for Solemnity of Corpus Christi

Homily for the 

Solemnity of Corpus Christi

June 6, 2021
Mark 14: 12-16, 22-26
Ex 24: 3-8
Blessed Sacrament, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“This is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed for many” (Mark 14: 24).

Jesus and his apostles celebrate the Passover meal in the guest room of a friend, a place that has become known to Christian tradition as the upper room and also as the cenacle (which means dining room).  It’s Jesus’ Last Supper.

St. Mark says right off that it’s “the Feast of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover lamb” (14:12).  Jesus will take some of that unleavened bread and consecrate it as his body, the body that he’s about to sacrifice on the cross.  He’ll take a cup of Passover wine and consecrate it as his blood, to be shed on Calvary “for many,” that is, for many peoples and not only for his own Jewish people, as a sign of the new covenant that he is establishing.  Jesus becomes the new Passover lamb sacrificed to save God’s people, “the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”

There was already a covenant between God and the Jewish people, the one established thru Moses.  We heard in the 1st reading how it was ratified with a sacrifice of “young bulls as peace offerings to the Lord” (Ex 24:5).  At Mt. Sinai God agrees to protect the Hebrews and to lead them into the Promised Land; they agree to be his people, to worship him alone, and to obey his commandments.  They seal the agreement by sharing in the blood of the sacrifice:  blood splashed upon the altar, representing God, and blood “sprinkled on the people” as Moses proclaims, “This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words of his” (24:8).

In the most holy Eucharist which Jesus gave us at the Last Supper, we share in his sacrifice.  We literally eat his body and blood and so become parties to his new covenant.  This sacrament, this Blessed Sacrament (your parish feast!), is truly the sacrament of Christ’s body and blood—not merely a symbol, not merely a commemoration, but a present reality that touches us with salvation:  this is his blood of the covenant shed for many, even for us in New Rochelle in 2021.

That, of course, is why it’s so important for us to come to Mass on Sundays and celebrate the Eucharist as a Catholic community.  Here we renew our covenant with our Lord Jesus by partaking of his sacrificed body and blood.  Without that, we have no spiritual life.  Without that, we separate ourselves from his people.  Without that, we can’t hope to enter the Promised Land, to feast with our Lord Jesus “in the kingdom of God” (Mark 14:25).

But when we share in the Lord’s body and blood at the Eucharistic sacrifice, we commune with the Lamb of God who saves us from the angel of death that passed over the land of Egypt in Moses’ time and still lurks, demonically, looking for more people to slay and drag into eternal death.  We commune with the Lamb who takes away our sins, protects us with his grace, and leads us to eternal life.

Homily for Friday, Week 9 of Ordinary Time

Homily for Friday
9th Week in Ordinary Time

June 4, 2021
Mark 12: 35-37
Provincial House, New Rochelle, N.Y.

“How do the scribes claim that the Christ is the son of David?” (Mark 12:35).

The gospel readings this week have placed Jesus in contentious dialog with the religious leaders.  Only yesterday’s interaction with an unnamed scribe could be considered friendly.

Today he’s addressing a crowd, a friendly crowd it seems, in the temple.  But the subject is still the scribes, the theologians of the day.  Jesus takes up one of their teachings, a teaching generally accepted:  the Messiah will be descended from King David, will be a son of David.  In fact, on his way up to Jerusalem, Jesus answered to blind Bartimaeus’s appeal to him as the Son of David.

It’s not the title as such that Jesus takes apart in his question today, “How can the Christ be David’s son?”  He uses Ps 110, which we’re all familiar with, to pose a conundrum that he doesn’t resolve directly.  The scribes and everyone in his audience understood that David was the composer of the Psalms (that was their understanding, even if scholars today would refine that opinion considerably), and they all agreed that the Psalms were divinely inspired.  Further, they interpreted Ps 110 as referring to the Messiah.

Given all that, Jesus asks how David, speaking in this psalm, can refer to the Messiah as his lord:  “The Lord God said to my lord,” i.e., to the Messiah, who is thus David’s lord as well as everyone else’s.  How can the Messiah be both David’s son and his lord, his ruler?  Sons are subject to their fathers, not the other way around.

The issue isn’t Jesus’ genealogy—no one disputes his physical descent from the house of David.  The issue is the meaning of his status as David’s son, as Messiah.  He’s not the Christ whom the scribes and the people and his own disciples are expecting.  We saw what they were expecting when Jesus entered Jerusalem.  All this teaching, all these dialogs are taking place in Jesus’ last week, after Palm Sunday.

What will be the relationship between David’s son and the Lord God?  King David, speaking in the psalm, submits to “my lord,” to the Messiah, because the Messiah is God’s agent for inaugurating the kingdom of God, not a new kingdom of David.  The expectations of the scribes, and everyone else, aren’t in sync with Jesus’ role as Messiah, lord not of an earthly kingdom but one in which all human beings submit to God’s rule, until all earthy powers and demonic ones as well are placed under the Messiah’s feet, and he in turn gives all over to the Lord God.

So Jesus is inviting people to reconsider their expectations of the son of David.  How often we have to reconsider our expectations!  Those of us of a certain age remember when there was talk in the province of creating a New England Province and maybe a Southern Province because we had so many Salesians.  Our expectations about new vocations and the perseverance of old vocations weren’t realistic, we can see now.  What should we expect from the realities of today as regards our ministry, as regards the life of the Church?  Actually, we ask those sorts of questions repeatedly when we’re asked to describe, then evaluate a present situation, and then choose some action steps to address it.

All aimed, as Don Bosco used to say, at the glory of God and the salvation of souls.  Or at bringing humanity under the lordship of Christ.