Reflecting on the Papal Visit -12

The entrance procession at St. Patrick Cathedral, NYC: photo by Chang W. Lee/The New York Times

On Saturday, the pope celebrated Mass at St. Patrick Cathedral in New York City for priests, religious and seminarians. Again, the message was positive, uplifting and supportive. One thing I especially appreciated was the sense in the homily that the pope and those of us "on the front lines" are in the same ministry, facing the same difficulties, in need of the same hope:

We are called to proclaim the message of hope and to embody it in a world where self-centeredness, greed, violence, and cynicism so often seem to choke the fragile growth of grace in people’s hearts...

Perhaps we have lost sight of this: in a society where the Church seems legalistic and “institutional” to many people, our most urgent challenge is to communicate the joy born of faith and the experience of God’s love...

The pope used the cathedral itself as a reference point for his homiletic reflections:

(Let us look at) the stained glass windows, which flood the interior with mystic light. From the outside, those windows are dark, heavy, even dreary. But once one enters the church, they suddenly come alive; reflecting the light passing through them, they reveal all their splendor...

It is only from the inside, from the experience of faith and ecclesial life, that we see the Church as she truly is: flooded with grace, resplendent in beauty, adorned by the manifold gifts of the Spirit. It follows that we, who live the life of grace within the Church’s communion, are called to draw all people into this mystery of light.

This is no easy task in a world which can tend to look at the Church, like those stained glass windows, “from the outside”: a world which deeply senses a need for spirituality, yet finds it difficult to “enter into” the mystery of the Church. Even for those of us within, the light of faith can be dimmed by routine, and the splendor of the Church obscured by the sins and weaknesses of her members. It can be dimmed too, by the obstacles encountered in a society which sometimes seems to have forgotten God and to resent even the most elementary demands of Christian morality. You, who have devoted your lives to bearing witness to the love of Christ and the building up of his Body, know from your daily contact with the world around us how tempting it is at times to give way to frustration, disappointment and even pessimism about the future. In a word, it is not always easy to see the light of the Spirit all about us, the splendor of the Risen Lord illuminating our lives and instilling renewed hope in his victory over the world...

Ah, yes! The frustration, disappointment and even pessimism about the future: I know them well - as do many of my readers in all walks of the Christian life. Benedict went on:

For all of us, I think, one of the great disappointments which followed the Second Vatican Council, with its call for a greater engagement in the Church’s mission to the world, has been the experience of division between different groups, different generations, different members of the same religious family. We can only move forward if we turn our gaze together to Christ! In the light of faith, we will then discover the wisdom and strength needed to open ourselves to points of view which may not necessarily conform to our own ideas or assumptions.

It is easy to allow differences and divisions among us to preoccupy us to the point that we come near forgetting the heart and focus of our mission: proclaiming Christ and him crucified...

And, yet again the pope took the occasion to speak to the pain of the sexual abuse crisis in the Church:

Here, within the context of our need for the perspective given by faith, and for unity and cooperation in the work of building up the Church, I would like say a word about the sexual abuse that has caused so much suffering. I have already had occasion to speak of this, and of the resulting damage to the community of the faithful. Here I simply wish to assure you, dear priests and religious, of my spiritual closeness as you strive to respond with Christian hope to the continuing challenges that this situation presents. I join you in praying that this will be a time of purification for each and every particular Church and religious community, and a time for healing...

And near the end of the homily, a call for those in ministry to be the first in modeling humility and the spirit of reconciliation:

If we are to be true forces of unity, let us be the first to seek inner reconciliation through penance. Let us forgive the wrongs we have suffered and put aside all anger and contention. Let us be the first to demonstrate the humility and purity of heart which are required to approach the splendor of God’s truth. In fidelity to the deposit of faith entrusted to the Apostles, let us be joyful witnesses of the transforming power of the Gospel!

Again, this message comes in eminently accessible language and imagery. I urge you to read the full text, available over Whispers in the Loggia.

-ConcordPastor