Archdiocesan Financial Report

The Pastoral Center of the Archdiocese of Boston, located in Braintree, MA

The Archdiocese of Boston has just released its Financial Report for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2008. The report is available here on the archdiocesan website.

Plan B for Notre Dame Commencement

UPDATE: Rocco has more on this story. The University of Notre Dame has announced its resolution of the problem created when intended Laetare Medal recipient Mary Ann Glendon declined the honor and the invitation to ND's commencement in light of the university's plan to award an honorary degree to Barack Obama. (For previous ConcordPastor posts)

Swine Flu: and this little piggy went to church...

Image: Scientific American

The Committee on Divine Worship of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops has released some guidelines for worship in light of concern about swine flu.

Locally, the Archdiocese of Boston has contacted pastors, drawing particular attention to numbers 7, 8 and 9 in the USCCB document.

Careful attention to hygiene and common sense are the watchwords of the day - as they should be every day!

Despite its name, this strain of swine flu isn't spreading from direct contact with pigs or pork, but rather it is being transmitted among humans.

(For more on the science of this flu, see this Scientific American post.)

-ConcordPastor

Word for the Weekend: Good Shepherd Sunday

Image: St. John Icon Studio

The Fourth Sunday of Easter is sometimes called "Good Shepherd Sunday" because the gospel on this day always offers us an image of the Lord as shepherd.

Here are this Sunday's texts and background material on them and here are hints for helping children prepare to hear the Word this weekend.

This Sunday's first lesson gives us Christ as "the stone rejected by the builders" while the second lesson speaks of the intimacy God shares with us his own, his children.

The beautiful icon above is a striking image of the gospel's presentation of Christ the Shepherd who lays down his life for us, his flock - on the Cross.

-ConcordPastor

St. Catherine of Siena: "O, Divine Madman!"

St. Catherine of Siena by Janet McKenzie

Today is the feast of St. Catherine of Siena. Her spirituality is distinguished by her abandoning herself to Christ as his loving bride. She would sometimes begin her prayers, "O Divine Madman!" She wrote of God as pazzo d'amore, ebro d'amore " - crazed with love, drunk with love for us.

Here's a gem from her writings...

And I shall clothe myself in your eternal will,
and by this light I shall come to know
that you, eternal Trinity,
are table
and food
and waiter for us.

You, eternal Father,
are the table
that offers us as food
the Lamb, your only-begotten Son.

He is the most exquisite of foods for us,
both in his teaching,
which nourishes us in your will,
and in the sacrament
that we receive in holy communion,
which feeds and strengthens us
while we are pilgrim travelers in this life.

And the Holy Spirit
is indeed a waiter for us,
for the Spirit serves us this teaching
by enlightening our mind’s eye with it
and inspiring us to follow it.
And the Spirit serves us charity for our neighbors
and hunger to have as our food.

- Catherine of Siena

Popping the question: Married Catholic priests?

H/T to Michael Paulson at his blog, Articles of Faith, for a summary of and link to an editorial in America offering a "modest proposal" for the Church to take a good, long look at the possibility of married priests.

Silence and fervent prayer for vocations are no longer adequate responses to the priest shortage in the United States... For making do within the limits set by present demographic trends presents a double threat to Catholic life: Catholic communities will become only infrequent eucharistic communities, or eucharistic communities will be severed from the pastoral care and public witness of priests.

(Read the complete editorial)

-ConcordPastor

Sit up and be counted!

Are you on Twitter? I know many of my readers and FaceBook friends are.

Fr. Bob Reed over at Catholic TV is encouraging Twitter folks to "sit up and be counted"!

Click on the link below to see what it's all about and become a follower!

www.CatholicsCount.com

-ConcordPastor

In praise of a foolish shepherd

Image source

H/T to David Gibson at dotCommonweal for the link to this op-ed essay by John Berwick in the New York Times.

Berwick draws an interesting comparison between what some see as papal missteps and the foolishness of the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep to search for the one who is lost.

The article looks at the pope's much reported words on Muslims, AIDS and condoms and the recent gesture towards four excommunicated bishops.

Perhaps we should be less worried about the pope’s bloopers than the arbiters of political correctness would have us be. In his classic Praise of Folly, Erasmus concluded: “All men are fools, even the pious ones. Christ himself, though he was the wisdom of the Father, took on the foolishness of humanity in order to redeem sinners. Nor did he choose to redeem them in any other way but through the folly of the cross and through ignorant, sottish disciples.

There’s no accounting for folly, except to recognize that it’s perhaps the most endearing and creative human quality. And in the long run, it can be a lot more productive than prudent diplomacy.

Interesting reading!

-ConcordPastor

Prayer for a spring morning

God to enfold me,
God to surround me,
God in my speaking,
God in my thinking,
God in my sleeping,
God in my waking,
God in my watching,
God in my hoping,
God in my life,
God in my lips,
God in my soul,
God in my heart.







- Celtic Prayer
- Image by Kittiej

A loss for Notre Dame: Mary Ann Glendon declines

Photo of Mary Ann Glendon by Tanit Sakakini

Those who have followed the story and my posts on Notre Dame's invitation to Barack Obama to speak and receive an honorary degree at their commencement in May, Rocco's report this morning will be of interest: Mary Ann Glendon has now declined to accept the University's esteemed Laetare Medal and will not attend the graduation exercises.
ObamaND2009
-ConcordPastor

Monday Morning Offering - 44

Image: George Mendoza

Good morning, good God!

It was too hot yesterday for an April day
and plenty warm enough to remind me, Lord,
that your heat draws forth life
from the earth and the branch
and that without your warmth
trees will not blossom,
the summer will not come,
the ground will not offer itself
as a bed for geraniums and tomatoes...

As if over night, Lord,
your warm touch budded flowering trees and teased
my longing for those too-short weeks
when branches are laced with blossoms:
a coming of unexpected beauty,
bare limbs suddenly overdressed
in unplanned delicacy,
finery to take one's breath away...

As wintered earth waking,
watered by spring rains:
make of my soul an orchard of flowering trees;
seed my heart with flowers wild and rare;
make of my life a bed for harvests rooted,
ripe and running over with your sweet juice,
your spirit in my veins...


Take my winter-wearied self,
and warm me to your grace:
draw forth from me what none,
least I,
might think could ever spring
from these deadened limbs,
this sluggish heart,
this spent spirit...





Work your miracle of spring
within me, Lord,
and bring out in me
the beauty, the strength you always see,
the glory I fail to find,
the self you made me to be...

For this I offer you the ground of my being,
the garden of my mind and the soil of my heart...

Let me bask in the warmth of those around me, Lord,
and let my shade be for them a place of peace
and shelter from their storms...

Bring forth what you will from the fields of my days, Lord:
warm me to your presence
and let your face shine upon me...

Amen.

-ConcordPastor

Holocaust Remembrance Prayer

Photo by Sonja L. Cohen for About.com

On Sunday night (April 26), the town of Concord held its 29th Annual Holocaust Remembrance Observance. (See an earlier post on this.) I was asked to offer the prayer at the end of the evening. I wrote this as a kind of litany, inviting all to join in on the refrain:

We must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because God made the world in all its wonder
and made humankind in his own divine image:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember...

Because God loved his chosen ones
and pitched his tent among them:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because God made a covenant with his people
and promised to be their God forever:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because God gave the law and prophets
as a sign of love and care for his own:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because God is ever faithful, even in the face of our infidelities:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because we are the descendants of Cain and Abel:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because we fail to be our sisters' and our brothers' keepers:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because national pride can blind us to justice:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because we know how to hide from the truth:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because our selective memory
can keep us from knowing and naming our own faults and sins:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because we find it hard to face the horrors of human history:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because there are those who deny the truth:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because our children must know the story of this nightmare:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because our children must never live this nightmare:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because we desire the freedom of those who will come after us:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because God commands that we shall not kill:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because the Lord is our God and the Lord is one:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because we are to love the Lord our God
with all our heart, all our soul and all our might,
and love our neighbor as our self:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Whether we sit at home, or walk along the way;
when we lie down to sleep and when we rise up:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

Because all our hope is in the Lord our God:
we must never forget what we came this night to remember…

We must never forget what we came this night to remember!

Amen.

-ConcordPastor

Homily for the Third Sunday of Easter

Appearance While the Apostles were at Table by Duccio di Buoninsegna

Homily for the Third Sunday of Easter
Acts 3:13-15, 17-19
1 John 2:1-5a
Luke 24:35-48

The scriptures are silent about so many things concerning Jesus.
We don’t know if he was short or tall, barrel-chested or wiry.
We have no clue as to the color of his eyes or hair.
Was his voice a deep bass or a gentle tenor?
We don’t know.
And yet, St. Luke takes time out to tell us what Jesus had to eat
when he appeared to the apostles in the story we just heard:
a piece of baked fish!

Actually, the detail that’s important here is not so much what Jesus ate
but the simple fact that he did eat something.

The stories of Jesus appearing to his friends after he rose from the dead
are intent on our knowing that Jesus rose, not as a spirit,
a ghost, some kind of holy hologram,
but that he rose in his body.

So it is that Jesus invites the doubting Thomas and the others
to see and touch the wounds the nails made in his hands,
to put their own hands to the wound in his side
where the centurion’s lance had pierced him.

One more detail of evidence of Jesus’ bodily resurrection
is that he eats real food
as he does here in taking the piece of baked fish.

This effort on Luke’s part may seem rather primitive
until we ask ourselves how we imagine the risen Jesus…

We know that the Spirit of the risen Christ lives within and among us,
moving sometimes as a gentle breeze
and sometimes as a strong wind.

But does the risen Jesus not have a more palpable presence among us?
Is the risen Jesus not among us in the flesh and bone
of our brothers and sisters gathered here as the Body of Christ?
Does the risen Jesus not enter my life and yours
in the person, the voice and the face
of everyone whose path crosses our own, every day of the week?
Does the risen Jesus not ask us, through the cry of the poor,
if we have something for him to eat?

It would be much easier to live a Christian life
if the risen Jesus were merely some ghost of his former self,
but he is not that.

He has hands and feet, arms and legs;
he is short and tall and of every imaginable build;
his face is male and female;
his voice is loud and soft, encouraging and demanding,
commanding, compelling and consoling.

He lives in those we love and he lives in those we don’t love.
He lives in the young and in the old and in those not yet born.

Today in this church he has hundreds of faces,
each one different and each the same because he wears them all.

Who knows how many times in the past week
did the risen Christ appear to you and me
and ask, in some way, for something to eat, something to drink,
for some gesture on our part to show that we recognize him,
that like the first disciples, we too are witnesses of his resurrection.

In a few moments we will offer bread and wine in thanksgiving
and invoke the Spirit of God on our gifts,
praying that they become the body and blood of Christ.
And we believe that in the sacrifice of this altar
we will share in supper of Jesus, risen among us.

Pray with me that our faith in the presence of Christ in this sacrament
will open our eyes and ears and hands and arms and hearts
to his presence among us in one another,
in every place we go, in everyone who asks of us,
“Have you anything for me to eat?”

-ConcordPastor

The ecclesial side of Gilbert and Sullivan

H/T to AP for this church history take on the "Modern Major General" from Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirantes of Penzance.

It might remind you of something I posted a while back - another version of the same song.

Post-Resurrection Menu: Word for Third Easter

Image: FoodPhotoBlog

Ready to hear the Word this weekend?

Check out the menu here.

And as long as we're talking about baked fish, take a look at what Bishop Conlon of the Diocese of Steubenville is recommending for his people.

-ConcordPastor

Oh, why is that doggy in the window?

Photo: Boston.com

I drove into Boston for a meeting yesterday and it was a glorious day to be on the road and riding around Jamaica Pond! I passed a car with two dogs in the back seat crowding each other to get their faces out the window into the rush of April breeze warmed just right by the sun. They were certainly enjoying having their faces in the wind!

So, I rolled down all the windows in my car (well, the three that work!) and let that same rush brush my face: the dogs knew what they were doing!

Why do dogs like to hang their heads out of car windows?

And here's a little Vivaldi for the first weekend of real Spring weather in New England for 2009!

-ConcordPastor

Running on God's Time

Photo: New Wineskins

A friend writes the blog New Wineskins under the name of Ultraguy (always linked on the sidebar here). Take some time to read Ultraguy's piece, Running on God's Time. It's his post-Boston Marathon reflection on the race.

You don't need to be a marathoner to appreciate the spiritual wisdom in these words:

What happened yesterday can’t fade because the serenity is unrelated to the race or to the performance or even to how I felt running it. Instead, the sense was in the race itself… and in me. My race became an opportunity for calm and joy because, for only the second time ever, I released the event to God to do with as He saw fit. The race became a kind of offering, a prayer, a release of self.

I hope you'll make the time to take a look...

–ConcordPastor

Word for the Weekend - April 26

Image by Cerezo

Time to look over the scriptures for this coming weekend's liturgy for the Third Sunday of Easter.

You will find the texts and background material on them here and if you are helping children prepare to hear the Word, take a look here.

The gospel this week again finds the disciples gathered in the upper room, just after the return of the two who met the risen Jesus on the road to Emmaus.

As in other accounts, the emphasis here is on the physicality of the risen Lord - that's the point of having Jesus ask for something to eat and for the disciples to offer him a piece of baked fish. The point here is that ghosts and spirits don't eat! The Risen One invites those present to touch him (as we read in last week's gospel, too) and he eats with his friends, as he does in other post-Resurrection stories.

-ConcordPastor

A holy kiss

Image: Catholic Herald

I preached last night at the Saint Anthony Novena at St. Anthony Parish in Fitchburg. The parish is 101 years old and parishioners have prayed this novena to their patron saint for 101 years!

The service was standard novena fare with prayers, hymns, scripture and homily, two litanies (one to St. Anthony and one to the Sacred Heart) and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. About 100 people were in attendance and the response in prayer and song was beautifully strong.

The service ended with an invitation to come forward to venerate a relic of St. Anthony in a reliquary. The photo above gives a good image of what this looks like for those who may be too young to remember this from their youth.

I held the reliquary and offered it to each person who came forward to kiss it, wiping the small glass case with a napkin each time it was kissed.

As I watched the people kiss the relic, I thought of how I kiss the altar at the beginning and end of every Mass I celebrate. With a frequency that surprises me, as I kiss the altar at Mass I often think of the altars I've kissed in the parishes I've served in over the past 36 years. That's a lot of kissing!

I wondered about what was in the minds and hearts of the men and women who came forward last night to venerate the relic of Anthony. Mostly I wondered about the intimacy of this gesture: a kiss... Many people kiss the Cross as an act of veneration on Good Friday. In some churches, people kiss the feet of a statue of the Lord or his Blessed Mother or a particular saint. But kissing, such a warm, human gesture of affection, does not play a large role in our liturgy. Although we offer a "kiss" of peace to others at Mass, it's likely that most worshippers only truly kiss a family member or two and let a handshake or maybe a hug suffice for others. (And no, I'm not suggesting that we start kissing strangers, left and right!)

Honoring a relic of St. Anthony was certainly the reason for the procession to the altar step last night, but to honor Anthony with a kiss - that was beautiful!

-ConcordPastor

Welcome to the table of the Lord!

Photo by DB

On Sunday morning we made room at the Lord's Table for 11 of our young brothers and sisters to receive Communion for the first time. Our parish was pleased to welcome these children to begin sharing in the Lord's sacrifice offered to us at the altar the Eucharist. A celebration such as this is a joy and a grace for the whole parish as well as for the children and their families. Between now and Pentecost we will have five more of these liturgies - a wonderful way to keep alive the Easter spirit through this season of seven weeks.

-ConcordPastor

Monday Morning Offering - 43

Image: George Mendoza

Good morning, good God!

Yesterday was a great day, Lord!

Yes, all the usual Sunday doings,
but among the Easter lilies
we welcomed children to the Eucharist
for the first time -
a moment of grace for the parish,
for the children and for their families....

Many visitors in the assembly and some, I'll guess,
have not come recently or often to your table, Lord...

I hope, I pray, I trust that this home-coming
might have been a moment of special grace
sparking in the hearts of the strayed
a taste for prayer, a thirst for you,
a desire to come again...

Was it the Easter season or the weather,
the scriptures, the children's faces,
or the grace of the song we lifted to your name
that opened my eyes, my ears, my mind,
my heart to you and your presence?

Perhaps it was all those things - and more,
more than I can know or count -
that opened my soul to your walking among us
and with us and with me
through a day of grace...

So I offer you this Monday morning, Lord,
the moments when your Spirit opens me
to your life around me, within me,
above, before, behind and below me...

I know there is not a moment of any day or night
when you are not by my side, Lord:
you are always there, without fail...

But I often fail to see, to hear, to sense you,
to feel your touch upon my shoulder gently guiding
or purposefully pushing me to reclaim the path
you have marked out for my steps...

I offer you my desire to be open,
to recognize, to know the moments of grace
that come my way every day, every night...

I offer you my need to trust that you are with me,
especially when I fear you have left me...

I offer you my hope to find you in some special way
every day of my life,
to discover your presence and your peace
settling in around me and within me
in ways that only you would know I need...

I offer you my hunger
for the warmth of your embrace,
the light of your wisdom,
the peace of your grace...

And I offer you my prayer that in some way
my life will be a moment of grace
for all whose lives and paths meet mine this day...

I offer you my heart, Lord,
a cup yearning to be filled to overflowing
with the gifts you have in store for me
this Monday morning and in the week ahead...

Amen.

-ConcordPastor

Homily for the Second Sunday of Easter: April 19

Above is another addition to my collection of variations on Caravaggio's Doubting Thomas. Photograph by Andy Moxon.

Homily for the Second Sunday of Easter
Acts 4:32-35
1 John 5:1-6
John 20:19-31

On the map of human experience,
doubt is a place somewhere between belief and disbelief.

Doubt lives in a heart unable or unwilling
to accept something proposed as true, real,
something to be believed --
as when “Doubting Thomas” told the other apostles,
“I will not believe” what you have told me.

If the opposite of doubt is trust, belief,
and a certain confidence that binds the believer to commitment,
then doubt is that holdout between belief and disbelief
that gives way to uncertainty and mistrust,
to an isolation detaching the doubter from the bonds believing offers.

It’s important to distinguish here between doubt and inquiry,
between doubt and seeking understanding,
between doubt and the pursuit of truth.

It’s one thing to seek to understand one’s faith better and more deeply:
to ask questions, to probe and to test.
It’s another thing to reject what one has come to know and believe
or worse, to be suspect of proposed truth
simply for the sake of being suspect.

It’s one thing to doubt the word
of those who have lied in the name of truth.
It’s another thing to reject the truth proclaimed to be the Word of God.

It would not be an exaggeration
to suggest that we live in a culture of doubt
and that this culture of doubt lives in the Church.

Doubt is the mentor of those convinced
that the individual, not the community, is the arbiter of truth.

I’m old enough to remember a time
when Christians considered doubt a vice
and young enough to see that now, for at least some,
doubt has become a virtue.

Probing study and questioning
have the potential for deepening our roots in faith.

But doubt, left untended, can breed a cynicism that erodes faith,
disables hope, sours trust, and unhinges fidelity
to commitments born of promises made.

The corrective for doubt is not a system of provable conclusions
satisfying the intellect of the scientific mind.
Doubt is overcome, rather,
through a giving over of one’s self in trust and hope
to what the community and the ages hold to be true,
much as loneliness is healed not by any license or guarantee of bliss
but rather a mutual giving of selves, in trust,
to an unknown future -- for better or for worse.

In our own time, a cloud of uneasy doubt shadows many Catholics.

It shades our prayer and sacramental practice, our conversations,
our trust in clergy, our financial support of the Church
and our Catholic identity.

Under this cloud of doubt, many have walked away
from the prayer and life and work of the Church.

The journey from doubt and disbelief to faith
follows the path of self-giving.

The Church needs to expose its vulnerability
and invite those who doubt and those who have left
to touch the Church again as Christ invited Thomas
to probe his wounds.

And those in doubt, those who have left,
need to reach again in trust and touch the life of the Church,
the life which was once theirs and which still promises peace.

Thomas made his way from doubt to faith by staying with the apostles
even after he refused to believe that Jesus had risen.
It was in the company of other believers
that Thomas met the risen Christ
whose divine mercy and peace drew the doubter to truth and faith.
In the prayer and work of the Church the risen Jesus
continues to come to meet us,
to invite us to touch him,
to draw us out of our doubt to faith.

Whether we come in doubt of faith this morning,
we join, here, the company of believers.

Approaching this altar,
and taking the bread and cup of the Eucharist,
let us all say, with Thomas, the doubter,
“My Lord and my God!”

-ConcordPastor

The Regulars are out! The Regulars are coming!

Just after midnight tonight I'll hear a fife and drum corps marching down Main Street to the green in Monument Square, where I live.

Only in Concord, Massachusetts might a parade pass by your home at midnight!

But it's Patriots Day weekend and tonight is the Patriots Ball, an affair that ends with the revelers marching from the armory to First Parish Church (across the street from my church and rectory) where the folks greet "Dr. Samuel Prescott" who arrives to announce that the Regulars (the British) are on the move.

Some claim the cry of the night was, "The Regulars are out!" while others favor, "The Regulars are coming!" But it seems none of the well-informed on this matter credit the good doctor with shouting the more familiar, "The British are coming!"

Michael Ryan tells the story here - not without its romantic element - and it's one worth reading if you want to get the story behind the story.

A fife and drum corps is hardly the stuff of a lullaby, but once they've marched away tonight I hope I'll be fast asleep and ready to rise early for Mass in the morning.

-ConcordPastor

On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five...

Image source

The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere

Listen my children and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.

He said to his friend, "If the British march
By land or sea from the town to-night,
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch
Of the North Church tower as a signal light --
One if by land, and two if by sea;
And I on the opposite shore will be,
Ready to ride and spread the alarm
Through every Middlesex village and farm,
For the country folk to be up and to arm."

Then he said "Good-night!" and with muffled oar
Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore,
Just as the moon rose over the bay,
Where swinging wide at her moorings lay
The Somerset, British man-of-war;
A phantom ship, with each mast and spar
Across the moon like a prison bar,
And a huge black hulk, that was magnified
By its own reflection in the tide.

Meanwhile, his friend through alley and street
Wanders and watches, with eager ears,
Till in the silence around him he hears
The muster of men at the barrack door,
The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet,
And the measured tread of the grenadiers,
Marching down to their boats on the shore.

Then he climbed the tower of the Old North Church,
By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread,
To the belfry chamber overhead,
And startled the pigeons from their perch
On the sombre rafters, that round him made
Masses and moving shapes of shade --
By the trembling ladder, steep and tall,
To the highest window in the wall,
Where he paused to listen and look down
A moment on the roofs of the town
And the moonlight flowing over all.

Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead,
In their night encampment on the hill,
Wrapped in silence so deep and still
That he could hear, like a sentinel's tread,
The watchful night-wind, as it went
Creeping along from tent to tent,
And seeming to whisper, "All is well!"
A moment only he feels the spell
Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread
Of the lonely belfry and the dead;
For suddenly all his thoughts are bent
On a shadowy something far away,
Where the river widens to meet the bay --
A line of black that bends and floats
On the rising tide like a bridge of boats.

Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride,
Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride
On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere.
Now he patted his horse's side,
Now he gazed at the landscape far and near,
Then, impetuous, stamped the earth,
And turned and tightened his saddle girth;
But mostly he watched with eager search
The belfry tower of the Old North Church,
As it rose above the graves on the hill,
Lonely and spectral and sombre and still.
And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height
A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!
He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns,
But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight
A second lamp in the belfry burns.

A hurry of hoofs in a village street,
A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark,
And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark
Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet;
That was all! And yet, through the gloom and the light,
The fate of a nation was riding that night;
And the spark struck out by that steed, in his flight,
Kindled the land into flame with its heat.
He has left the village and mounted the steep,
And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep,
Is the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides;
And under the alders that skirt its edge,
Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge,
Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides.

It was twelve by the village clock
When he crossed the bridge into Medford town.
He heard the crowing of the cock,
And the barking of the farmer's dog,
And felt the damp of the river fog,
That rises after the sun goes down.

It was one by the village clock,
When he galloped into Lexington.
He saw the gilded weathercock
Swim in the moonlight as he passed,
And the meeting-house windows, black and bare,
Gaze at him with a spectral glare,
As if they already stood aghast
At the bloody work they would look upon.

It was two by the village clock,
When he came to the bridge in Concord town.
He heard the bleating of the flock,
And the twitter of birds among the trees,
And felt the breath of the morning breeze
Blowing over the meadow brown.
And one was safe and asleep in his bed
Who at the bridge would be first to fall,
Who that day would be lying dead,
Pierced by a British musket ball.

You know the rest. In the books you have read
How the British Regulars fired and fled --
How the farmers gave them ball for ball,
From behind each fence and farmyard wall,
Chasing the redcoats down the lane,
Then crossing the fields to emerge again
Under the trees at the turn of the road,
And only pausing to fire and load.

So through the night rode Paul Revere;
And so through the night went his cry of alarm
To every Middlesex village and farm --
A cry of defiance, and not of fear,
A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,
And a word that shall echo for evermore!
For, borne on the night-wind of the Past,
Through all our history, to the last,
In the hour of darkness and peril and need,
The people will waken and listen to hear
The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed,
And the midnight message of Paul Revere.

- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

A poem for this first warm day of the year

Image: Cedar Nursery


Field Guide

No one I ask knows the name of the flower
we pulled the car to the side of the road to pick
and that I point to dangling purple from my lapel.

I am passing through the needle of spring
in North Carolina, as ignorant of the flowers of the south
as the woman at the barbecue stand who laughs
and the man who gives me a look as he pumps the gas

and everyone else I ask on the way to the airport
to return to where this purple madness is not seen
blazing against the sober pines and rioting along the roadside.

On the plane, the stewardess is afraid she cannot answer
my question, now insistent with the fear that I will leave
the province of this flower without its sound in my ear.

Then, as if he were giving me the time of day, a passenger
looks up from his magazine and says wisteria.

- by Billy Collins in Questions about Angels

Jesus doesn't barge in on us

I hope you took the time to read New York's new Archbishop Timothy Dolan's homily from the Vespers liturgy at St. Patrick's Cathedral a couple of days ago. If you did, you'll recall these lines:

One of my favorite illustrations of Jesus is the familiar one of Him standing outside the door of a simple home, gently knocking. In second grade at Holy Infant School in Ballwin, Missouri, my teacher, Sister Mary Bosco Daly, who this evening, fresh from Ireland, just read our scripture passage from St. Peter, asked us to look closely at that picture and see if we noticed anything strange. “Yes,” Carolyn Carey finally raised her hand and blurted out, “there is no door knob!”


“Right,” observed Sister Bosco, “because Jesus cannot open up and barge in on His own. He patiently waits for us to open the door of our hearts and invite Him in to stay with us.”
...

Because that’s the ultimate question, in the end the only one that really counts: will we open up in faith, hope, and love to the God who gently knocks on the door to our being, asking Him in to live with us? Or will fear, self- absorption, and darkness keep us locked up in ourselves?

The Church is at her best, faithful to her mission, when she invites people to open the door and ask Jesus in. That’s precisely the invitation this Archdiocese of New York extends; that’s the proposal the Church makes to the world...

Dolan references here the painting The Light of the World by William Holman Hunt (above). H/T to Mollie Wilson O'Reilly over at dotCommonweal for the graphic. (Click on the image above for a larger version)

-ConcordPastor

A day at a time...

Image: BHRSB

I enjoyed a wonderful dinner last night in the home of a family in my parish. Just delightful in every way! After the children went to bed, the mom and dad and I chatted some about raising children in these days, in the culture that's ours. I believe these two parents are doing a great job but I certainly don't envy them the hard work this entails.

Back home at the end of the evening, I crashed in my recliner and mused a bit on something that crosses my mind more and more: there are some things in life, some experiences that will never be mine - except to enjoy them as I meet them in the lives of others: like having and raising children. No, I'm not pining at this age to be a parent! I'm just the coming to terms with some realities.

An Easter letter from an ordination classmate included this, "I realize that at my age my yesterdays outnumber my tomorrows..." That's a sobering thought and it puts just about everything in a clear perspective.

So, sitting in my recliner last night I was very aware of my becoming the older person I am and will be for the rest of my life. It was something like trying on a new coat and discovering that it fits, and fits rather well... Don't hear that as a statement of defeat, much less a sign of anything being wrong or an omen of bad news: it isn't! It's just an awareness of my age and the changes that growing older inevitably occasions.

I'm rather at peace with this and I find peace in it...

-ConcordPastor

Never again: What you do matters

Image: WSHERC

Earlier this year I posted a number of times on the damage done to Jewish-Catholic relations by the lifting of the excommunication of four "bishops" in the Archbishop Lefebvre-founded schismatic group known as Society of St. Pius X.

In one of those posts I recommended that concerned Catholics could take a constructive step forward on this issue by making sure to attend and participate in local Holocaust Memorial Observances in their communities this spring.

The official date for Yom Hashoah 2009 is April 21, while the memorial week runs from April 19-26. The theme for this year's observance is: Never Again: What You Do Matters.

On February 26, I posted:

I received a phone call this week from the folks in Concord who are planning the town's annual Holocaust remembrance this spring. This will be the 29th annual Holocaust Remembrance in Concord. As has happened a number of times in my 15 years here, the call came to invite me to give an invocation at the event on April 26th. I readily accepted, grateful that the news stories of the past several weeks had not ruptured what are solid ties between people of different faiths in my community.

Then I began to think back to such services in years past... There are usually about 75, maybe 100 people in attendance, Jews and gentiles. Why not more people? I can't say that my parish has been heavily represented in those present. And that leads me to ask you, my readers, "Have you attended such services in the past?" (Many communities have such a remembrance service every spring.)

There's been a lot of noise made over the pope's lifting the excommunications and Williamson's denial of the Holocaust but making noise (or posting comments on blogs) is easy.

What a witness it would give, what telling testimony to our outrage over Williamson we would offer if we made every effort to attend the local Holocaust memorial observance in our communities this spring.

Our Jewish neighbors have never met Richard Williamson but they know us: we are the face of the Catholic Church in our communities.

Shoah: we must never forget...

In Concord, Massachusetts, the town observance will take place on April 26 at the Town House at 7:30 p.m.

When is your community's observance?

Will you be there?

Remember: What we do matters...

-ConcordPastor

From the Church on Fifth Avenue

Photo: Reuters

Rocco has the full text of the homily given by Archbishop Timothy Dolan today at the Mass at which he was installed as the Archbishop of New York. If his homily at Vespers last night led you to think that this man is a great preacher, then today's offering will confirm you in your observation.

The only problem in linking you to this text is that if I borrow some of it for my own preaching you'll know just where it came from!

From the homily:

For three weeks in July, 1992, I was on pilgrimage in Israel. I had a wonderful Franciscan guide who made sure I saw all the sacred places in the Holy Land. The day before I departed, he asked, “Is there anything left you want to see?”

“Yes,” I replied, “I would like to walk the road to Emmaus.”

“That we cannot do,” he told me, “You see, no one really knows where that village of Emmaus actually was, so there is no more road to Emmaus.”

Sensing my disappointment, he remarked, “Maybe that’s part of God’s providence, because we can now make every journey we undertake a walk down the Road to Emmaus.”

My new friends of this great archdiocese, would you join your new pastor on an “adventure in fidelity,” as we turn the Staten Island Expressway, Fifth Avenue, Madison Avenue, Broadway, the FDR, the Major Deegan, and the New York State Thruway into the Road to Emmaus, as we witness a real “miracle on 34th street” and turn that into the road to Emmaus?

For, dare to believe, that:
From Staten Island to Sullivan County
From the Bowery, to the Bronx, to Newburgh,
From White Plains to Poughkeepsie…

He is walking right alongside us...

(for the complete text)

-ConcordPastor

Doubting Thomas: Second Sunday of Easter

Doubting Thomas by Caravaggio (click on image for larger version)



Contemporary rendering of Doubting Thomas, based on Caravaggio, found at The Crossroads Initiative



Another contemporary rendering of Caravaggio: Still Doubting by John Granville Gregory

If you haven't yet done your scripture homework in preparation for Mass this weekend, I hope these three renderings of the Doubting Thomas might pique your interest and lead you to those texts which, complete with background materials, can be found here.

Got kids? Here's some material to introduce them to this Sunday's scriptures before the getting to church.

And here's one more!


Doubting Thomas by Ben Steele

At the top of this post you saw 3 renderings of "Doubting Thomas," including Caravaggio and his imitators. The image here by Ben Steele takes us in another direction... or does it?

Steele's site is worth a visit for his take on art and how we view it. I'd apologize to fans of Kinkade but that would be disingenuous on my part: the visual pun in Steele's piece and in the simple title is too sweet to pass up!

For some insightful commentary on all of this, check out Anneke Majors post at A Motley Vision.

For yet another addition to this collection of variations on the Caravaggio piece, see here.

(Yes, this is largely a rerun of material from two posts from a year ago but I enjoyed putting it together then and thought new readers might enjoy taking a look.)

-ConcordPastor

Someone's knocking at the door!

Photo by Reuters

I've not yet posted anything on the appointment of Timothy Dolan as the Archbishop of New York although the Catholic blogosphere has set apart a good deal of space for this very news.

Tonight, in a symbolic ceremony, Archbishop Dolan knocked on the doors of St. Patrick Cathedral in Manhattan, seeking to be admitted as the new bishop of the Archdiocese of New York.

Here, from the New York Times, is the text of his masterful homily at the Vespers service which began his ministry in his new assignment. These are the words of a man who knows how to preach to people!

Thank you, everybody, for opening the door and letting me in when I knocked! It sure is good to be at home with all of you!

As I look out with heartfelt affection and appreciation at you good people who just opened the door and let me in, I embrace eminent cardinals -- especially my esteemed predecessor, Cardinal Edward Egan -- brother bishops, Archbishop Sambi and Archbishop Migliore, brother priests, deacons, and seminarians, women and men consecrated religious, representatives of every vicariate in this expansive archdiocese, parish leaders, respected civic and ecumenical partners, dear Mom, family, loyal friends from St. Louis, D.C., Kansas City, Baltimore, Milwaukee, Rome, Ireland, Australia -- brothers and sisters all:

Thanks for opening the door wide enough even for me to get in.

Thanks for welcoming me so warmly as your new pastor!

Thanks for already making me feel at home!

Thanks for letting me into your lives!

I am so glad you are here! And it sure beats sitting at home doing our last-minute tax returns, doesn’t it?

You realize the statement we are making this evening. As I begin my apostolic ministry as your new shepherd, there is nothing more effective, more appropriate, more powerful that we can do than pray, pray as the Church. Pope Benedict XVI repeatedly exhorts us that every project, every initiative, should begin with adoration -- praising the God without whom we can do nothing, with whom everything is possible, humbly placing our dreams, fears, hopes, and trust in His omnipotent hands. That we do this evening.

A special word of greeting to our Jewish friends, now concluding Passover, and, un abrazo especial a nuestra querida comunidad Latina por ser obsequio y promesa para esta arquidiócesis.

Thanks, most of all, everyone, for opening the doors of your hearts to the Lord Jesus Christ!

He it is, of course, who stands at the portal of every soul and gently knocks. Life’s most pivotal question then becomes whether we will open the door of our existence and let Him in, to receive incomparable light, love, mercy, and friendship, or whether we will remain closed-up in darkness, self-absorption, sin, and isolation.

So did St. Peter in God’s Word this evening prayer exhort us to “Come to the Lord!”

So did St. Peter’s successor, John Paul the Great, inspire the world when he challenged us, at his first Mass as Pope, to “open wide the doors to Christ.”

So did Pope Benedict XVI, in his inaugural Mass, invite us to “open-up in friendship with Jesus.”

One of my favorite illustrations of Jesus is the familiar one of Him standing outside the door of a simple home, gently knocking. In second grade at Holy Infant School in Ballwin, Missouri, my teacher, Sister Mary Bosco Daly, who this evening, fresh from Ireland, just read our scripture passage from St. Peter, asked us to look closely at that picture and see if we noticed anything strange. “Yes,” Carolyn Carey finally raised her hand and blurted out, “there is no door knob!”

“Right,” observed Sister Bosco, “because Jesus cannot open up and barge in on His own. He patiently waits for us to open the door of our hearts and invite Him in to stay with us.”

That lesson alone, Mom, was worth all the sacrifices you and Dad made to send us five kids to Catholic school.

Because that’s the ultimate question, in the end the only one that really counts: will we open up in faith, hope, and love to the God who gently knocks on the door to our being, asking Him in to live with us? Or will fear, self- absorption, and darkness keep us locked up in ourselves?

The Church is at her best, faithful to her mission, when she invites people to open the door and ask Jesus in. That’s precisely the invitation this Archdiocese of New York extends; that’s the proposal the Church makes to the world. As Bernini explained the massive colonnade surrounding St. Peter’s Square, “Those are the arms of Mother Church reaching out to embrace all people!”

This is the “theology of invitation” articulated by the servant of God, John Paul II.

God invites us . . . never coerces . . . God invites us to believe in Him, trust Him, accept Him. God invites us to let Him be the Lord of our life; and when we do, our lives are never the same; our lives will last forever!

Jesus, His son, is the invitation incarnate, as He invites us to a life of meaning, purpose, life to the fullest, life never-ending. To allow Him in is genuine freedom, the start of an adventure in fidelity. Living in the true liberty of Christ is not easy. It requires fidelity and heroic virtue. In our celebration days ago of Holy Week and Easter, we reverently recalled God’s liberation of the people of Israel from bondage in Egypt -- which our Jewish neighbors are now celebrating as Passover concludes -- and remembered how, during the Exodus, God gave us the gift of the Ten Commandments, lest this newly freed people would lapse back to the habits of slaves. When the Church proclaims the moral truth about the dignity of the human person, she helps us all live free.

Sadly, we have usually tragically said no to God’s invitation, most dramatically at the event we somberly recalled five days ago, Good Friday.

But we have a God who will not take no for an answer, as Easter demonstrates definitively.

And now Christ stands at the door and knocks, and the Church nudges us to open up and invite Him in!

But, you know all this, because this venerable Church of New York has been doing it for 201 years!

My brother priests, you are the ones who “open the door to the sacred” through Word and Sacraments. You do it so faithfully and so generously! I am so proud to call you “brothers”; I am so awestruck to be the elder brother of a presbyterate known for its zeal and devotion. I thank you, brother priests, for continuing to be agents of the divine invitation, and to you I pledge my life and love!

Consecrated women, vowed religious sisters, brothers, priests, for centuries you have opened the door to Christ identified with the sick, the immigrant, the troubled, the forgotten, and to millions of our children in our splendid schools, and who have loyally prayed without ceasing with and for the Church, this archdiocese owes you so very much. Please, keep opening the door to Jesus;

Our deacons, their loyal spouses, our devoted lay pastoral collaborators, please keep showing by your lives of service and joy that letting this Jesus in the door is a choice one never regrets;

Dear people of God, faithful Catholics of this archdiocese, you indeed are the “living stones” spoken of by Peter this evening, who give a smile, a voice, an embrace, a heart to the mystical body of Christ we call the Church, as you love faithfully in marriage, obey the “law of the gift” by caring for your children, who take the identity of Baptism, Eucharist, and Confirmation so seriously, and who never fail to open up to the Jesus who stands and knocks at the doors of your homes, parishes, schools, offices, farms, factories, and professions. Thank you for your vocations, for sensing the universal call to holiness.

Realistically, though, we must confess that there’s so much lurking there to keep us from “opening the door” to Jesus!

There’s sin, fear, and sadness to keep us closed-up inside, evident in so many problems and worries: the scandal of clergy sexual abuse and caring for those hurt; the challenges of strengthening our parishes, schools, and charitable outreach; the threats to marriage, family, to the unborn baby and fragile human life at all stages; the need for vocations. The list is long and haunting.

There’s so much inside me, I don’t mind admitting, that was scared to open the door completely to Him, as I kept the chain-on, opened up just a crack, and heard Him invite me to serve Him and His Church as Archbishop of New York! I inwardly replied to Him:

“Go away, Lord! I’m not your man! My Spanish is lousy and my English not much better!”

“I’m still angry at New York for taking Favre and Sabbathia from us in Wisconsin!”

“The Yankees and Mets over the Cardinals and Brewers? Forget it!”

“Following the likes of Hughes, Hayes, Spellman, Cooke, O’Connor, and Egan! Sounds like McNamara’s band, and I’m not up to being part of it!”

Trepidation; unworthiness; anxiety; leave me to the beloved brats, beers, and cool summer lake breezes of Milwaukee where I’m secure and at home . . .

Yet He had his sandal in the door and would not let me shut Him out, as I heard the whisper of the One who says,

“Timothy, be not afraid!”

“My grace is sufficient…”

“Never do I invite one to a task without giving him/her the strength to do it!”

“I am with you all days.”

“Open up and let me in. . . ”

I recalled the words John Paul II spoke down the street at the United Nations: “We must not be afraid of the future. It is no accident that we are here. Every human person has been created in the image and likeness of the One who is the origin of all that is. We have within us the capacity for wisdom and heroic virtue. With these gifts, and with the help of God’s grace, we can build . . . a civilization worthy of the human person, a true culture of freedom, a culture of life. “

And this evening, when you opened those bronze doors to my knock, and I beheld a Church, an archdiocese, that has been opening the doors to Christ for 201 years, am I ever glad I listened to Him and took the chain off!

“Give thanks to the Lord for He is good! For His mercy endures forever.”

A bishop's fidelity in the furor

Image: ABC News

I've posted several times on the issue of (my alma mater) Notre Dame's decision to honor Barack Obama and invite him to be the principal speaker at this year's commencement. Bishop John D'Arcy, whose diocese is home to the Fighting Irish, stated several weeks ago that he would not go to the graduation which would have been his 25th as bishop of Fort Wayne-South Bend.

In the meantime, the uproar has been loud in Catholic circles and many protests are planned. CNS reports that D'Arcy issued another statement on Good Friday:

"I urge all Catholics and others of good will to stay away from unseemly and unhelpful demonstrations against our nation's president or Notre Dame or (Holy Cross) Father John I. Jenkins," president of the university, he said in the April 10 statement. "The Notre Dame community is well-equipped to supervise and support discussions and prayer within their own campus."

"I had a positive meeting this week with Father Jenkins, and I expect further dialogue will continue," Bishop D'Arcy continued.

"These are days of prayer and hope when we should turn to the risen Christ for light and wisdom," he said. "Let us all work toward a peaceful graduation experience for the class of 2009 at our beloved Notre Dame."

(see CNS for the complete report)

The Anchoress (Elizabeth Scalia) has a piece at PajamasMedia titled, "See How These Christians Shove One Another":

At Easter we reacquaint ourselves with wonder, humility, and supernaturalism; perhaps some political introspection would serve us well, too. Have we Christians, meaning well, made idols of our ideologies and put our heads above God’s? Are we so engaged in “process” that — by our manner and actions — we repel rather than attract those who, but for us, might be Christ’s?
...

It's a good companion to the D'Arcy statement and has implications for people of faith regarding any number of issues in the news today.

There's a wisdom in Bishop D'Arcy's words and actions that deserves our attention.

-ConcordPastor