Seis diáconos ordenados para la diócesis

Por Maureen Smith
JACKSON – El sábado 4 de junio el Obispo Joseph Kopacz ordernó a seis hombres como diacons permanentes en la Catedral de San Pedro. Los hombres pasaron los últimos cinco años en formación en Memphis durante los fines de semana estudiando y aprendiendo a administrar los sacramentos. Las clases fueron impartidas por profesores del Seminario St. Meinrad en Indiana.
Los nuevos diáconos, los cuales servirán en sus propias, parroquias son: Jeff Artigues y John McGinley, San José, Starkville; Richard Caldwell, Santa María, Vicksburg; Denzil Lobo, San Francisco, Madison; John McGregor, St. Jude, Pearl y Ted Schreck, Sagrado Corazón, Southaven.
El Padre Sam Messina, pastor de la Parroquia Santa María, Batesville, quién supervisó la formación de los seis candidatos, dijo que el ministerios de los diáconos  es el servicio y la palabra. “Ellos trabajan con la caridad, visitando los hospitales y las cárceles, ayudando en las despensas de alimentos y asistiendo en el altar”, dijo.
Los diáconos permanentes son ordenados y pueden administrar bautismos, matrimonios, oficiar en funerales y visitar hospitales. No pueden consagrar la Eucaristía pero si pueden predicar en la misa y en los servicios de Comunión. El Padre Messina dijo que los diáconos también pueden enseñar y preparar parejas para el matrimonio. Los candidatos pueden estar casados cuando son ordenados pero no pueden volver a casarse, incluso si enviudan. Las esposas de los ordenados juegan un importante papel en la preparación y en el ministerio de ellos. El Padre Messina dijo que las esposas tienen que tomar un año de clases y pueden asistir a más si quieren. Una de las condiciones es que un hombre soltero ordenado al diaconado permanente no puede casarse.
Los que entran en este programa debe estar plenamente consciente de que su compromiso es de por vida. El Padre Kevin Slattery, vicario general de la diócesis, dijo que la diócesis espera tener otra clase de formación para diáconos, pero están trabajando en los detalles. El límite de edad para ingresar es de 45 años.  Cualquier persona que se siente llamada a este ministerio debe hablar primero con su párroco.

Catholic education keeps eye on eternal

Forming our future
By Jeannie Roberts
The significant role of catechists, teachers and staff in a Catholic school setting is to shape and mold children for eternity. Our walk, our talk and our sharing of our own faith in our daily lives, as well as our personal journey, all help a child to grow to love Jesus.
Our journeys are all different – some filled early with much sadness as well as much joy. Jesus walks with us daily as a teacher and guides us to be the light in the darkness, the joy in the sorrow, the calmness in the storm and the compassion and hope to the downtrodden.
Jesus lives in us and we live in him. Our mission is not only to educate with knowledge, but to fill the hearts of children with spiritual qualities that help them to grow as disciples of Jesus. As the 12 apostles were chosen, we teachers have also been chosen and we are answering the call to know, love and serve the Lord through the children we teach. Ephesians 4:11-12 says, “And he gave some as apostles, others as prophets, others as evangelists, others as pastors and teachers, to equip the holy ones for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ.”
At St. Elizabeth School we try to make our students aware of the poor and less fortunate. We minister to them throughout the year by collecting food and taking it weekly to church at our school Masses. Students sometimes help store, sack and pass out the food when the needy come to receive it. This ministry is organized by Michael and Jackie Jacob of our parish along with teacher Sue Craig.
Eternity involves more than feeding the bodies of the less fortunate. Students write letters to shut-ins, nursing home patients and the elderly of our parish, to let them know they are thought of and are being remembered in prayer. Throughout Lent, classes send a “footnote” to parishioners of their choice, relatives or friends. Small notes in the shape of a foot have a greeting on the front and a short note written by each student on the back.
Students also serve and lead the singing at our Masses, all while learning what their faith is about. Many non-Catholics are being exposed to the loving community of believers; some families sometimes even join the church when their children start attending the school. Evangelization is at its best when a parent tells you how their heart has been touched by their child’s praying and that the family desires to join the church.
Students are also encouraged daily to act the way Jesus would act in each and every situation. They have a morning devotional read on the intercom and then recite the school’s pledge, “Eagle Endeavors,” created by Jane Rutz and Georgette Sabbatini. The pledge is as follows:
E – Embrace the teachings of the Holy Bible;
A – Act generously to those in need;
G – Grow academically;
L – Love sincerely;
E – Entrust my family, my school and myself to God’s care;
S – Strive for kindness with every thought, word and action.
At the end of each month we take one of the “Eagle Endeavors” and the teachers vote on a class who has exemplified that chosen endeavor. The Advisory Council then treats the winning class. The prize may be a free dress day, pizza, ice cream party, picnic etc.
Students from first-sixth grades lead the Stations of the Cross each Friday during Lent, discuss Lenten practices and write on a cross in the rotunda what they will do for someone or what they might give up for Lent. All students participate.
As a student body, they gather weekly to pray for the needs of the parish, the sick and their own personal needs. We often say a decade of the rosary for the seriously ill and suffering parishioners. The sixth grade students will hold the hands of the younger children and walk them to their cars in the pickup lines.
We as teachers try to listen and respond to the problems our children may have in their worlds. Many children need a friend to help them through the struggles in their lives. We refer serious problems to the counseling program offered in the Delta through our diocese. Father Scott Thomas, our pastor, meets and talks to students about their problems, or he will talk to a class on how to treat fellow classmates if the need arises.
Some students have had experiences that we as adults have not had to face yet – be it the death of a sibling, parent, or grandparent – and just need a compassionate person to help them through a difficult journey in their life. Our teachers and school can be the calm in the storm. We will never know our influence on our students.
God has called us by name and we follow the call to know, love and serve Him through our role as teachers which covers more than grade level books and different teaching techniques. Our vocations touch the heart and soul of each and every child we teach. We thank God for calling us on this special journey to be light in the darkness, joy in the sorrow, calm in the storm, company to the lonely and compassion and hope to the downtrodden.
(Jeannie Roberts is the principal of Clarksdale St. Elizabeth School.)

One way or another

Reflections on Life
By Father Jerome LeDoux, S.V.D.
If you don’t spend time pondering what it means to be a saint and what one must do to become a saint, you had better hop to it, because you will not get to heaven unless you become a saint. What is not holy cannot abide God’s presence. So, if you die short of sainthood, something drastic has to happen between you and God before you are ushered permanently into the all-holy presence of God in heaven.
You may not believe in purgatory, but that is irrelevant. Whether you believe in purgatory or not, if you are not holy enough when you die, God will somehow cleanse you – purge you – so that you are sanctified, holy and fit to enter into God’s heaven and remain there in rapture forever. The alternative is unacceptable, quite unthinkable and in every way and by all means to be avoided, for the alternative is to be without God forever, and forever is infinitely beyond a quadrillion years.
Those who try to evade that uncomfortable conundrum are consigned to do as one inconsolable man did for his close friend who had died. Fearing that the soul of his friend might be lost because his friend, though a good man, had serious faults, he finally wrote an epitaph and put it on his friend’s grave in bold letters: “Too bad for heaven, too good for hell; where he went I cannot tell.” I dare say, innumerable people, both known and unknown to us, fit that description in uncanny fashion.
Since we must all become saints if we are to be with God forever, what are the makings of a saint? Perhaps we can begin with a pivotal pearl of wisdom shared in James 3:2, “If anyone does not fall short in speech, he is a perfect man, able to bridle his whole body also.” None of us have any illusions about just how difficult it is to master our thoughts and the resulting words that spill out through our lips. The wellspring of discipline and control of our lives resides in our thoughts and words, being never judgmental, always forgiving, ever inclusive, supportive and loving.
Must a saint do spectacular things? A few, such as Joan of Arc, do. However, by far most saints live ordinary lives highlighted by laser focus on the transforming grace of God. That leads us to puzzle over the difference between Thérèse of Lisieux and her fellow nuns. All of them did the same, daily things together, but with results as markedly different as humdrum, everyday nuns and the sanctified life of Thérèse.
A good example is Thérèse’s comment on being ecstatic, “I prefer the monotony of obscure sacrifice to all ecstasies. To pick up a pin for love can convert a soul.” So that laser focus on the good intention, on God’s mercy and grace made all the difference.
“I mean to try to find a lift by which I may be raised unto God, for I am too tiny to climb the steep stairway of perfection. Your arms, then, O Jesus, are the lift that must raise me up even unto Heaven. To get there I need not grow; on the contrary, I must remain little, I must become still less.”
Inspired by and driven by the Holy Spirit, Thérèse of Lisieux reveals in her autobiography, “Story of a Soul,” a spirituality manual that is at once a primer, a primary textbook, an undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate textbook. The proof of the relevance and truth of “her little way” of childlike trust in and love of God lies in the fact that the work was inhaled hurriedly by nuns around the world.
On Oct. 20, 1898, Mother Agnes of Jesus and Mother Marie de Gonzague, published an exceptionally long, 476-page obituary to be sent to all the Carmels in France. The 2,000 surplus copies were sold off at 4 francs each.
To everyone’s surprise, a second 4,000-copy edition was required six months later, and soon a third. In explosive fashion, by 1956 there were 40 editions, let alone translations that began in 1901. More than 50 translations were listed, with figures always being exceeded and uncontrollable as the pirate editions multiplied.
From 1969, a team continued the critical edition of 266 known letters, 54 poems (1979), 8 plays (1985), 21 prayers (1988) and the Final Conversations (1971).
Already begun during her life, conversions and cures exploded with her memoirs.
The whole work was gathered into one volume –Completed Works – running to 1,600 pages of Bible paper. The collection was presented to John Paul II and then Cardinal Ratzinger on Feb. 18, 1993. Numerous tomes written by brilliant theologians fall short of the simple biography, “Story of a Soul.” Thérèse’s work and her life moved Pope John Paul II on Oct. 19, 1997, to declare her the 33rd. Doctor of the Church, the youngest and, at the time, only the third woman.
As I pen these words, I am smiling constantly as I think of this great heroine.   –
“God is love, and all who abide in love abide in God and God in them.”   (1 John 4:16)
(Father Jerome LeDoux, SVD, lives at Sacred Heart Residence in Pass Christian. He has written “Reflections on Life “since 1969.)

International deacons gather in Rome, share reflections on ministry, challenges

By Cindy Wooden
ROME (CNS) – Thousands of permanent deacons and their wives began their Year of Mercy celebration by cutting straight to the heart of what it means to be a deacon, how the ministry impacts their families and the challenge of explaining their vocation to others, including bishops and priests.
The pilgrims divided into language groups and hundreds of English-, German- and Portuguese-speaking deacons and their families gathered May 27 at Rome’s Basilica of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva.
Whether alone or with their wives, dressed in clerical collars or T-shirts because of the afternoon heat, they began sharing experiences of formation, homiletics training and ministry assignments even before the formal program began.
The Jubilee of Deacons concluded May 29 with a Mass celebrated by Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square.
In the informal conversations and the sharing afterward, the women were active participants. Many of them had accompanied their husbands to formation classes, and all of them are directly impacted by their husbands’ ministries.
Deacon James Keating, director of theological formation at the Institute for Priestly Formation in Omaha, Nebraska, said deacons are born in families, most of them fall in love and start families before discerning a vocation to the diaconate, and they often are called upon to minister to other families.
Deacon Keating insisted that a deacon who has had proper formation in prayer, theology and the sacraments “will become a better husband,” his wife “will actually fall more in love” because he will be converted to a closer relationship with Jesus and a greater availability to others.
However, he said, that availability is not so much about time and activity, as it is about “being” a deacon. It’s about “relationships, not ministries,” Deacon Keating insisted.
Kimberly Norman, whose husband, James, is a deacon at Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica in Chicago, said Deacon Keating was right. Speaking of her husband, she said: “Yes, he is a better man. Yes, he is a better husband.” The preparation and ministry “has strengthened our marriage.”
Deacon Norman said his wife has changed, too, and is a particularly good example and reminder to him to make more time for prayer.
The jubilee for deacons began just two weeks after Pope Francis told members of the International Union of Superiors General that he thought it was a good idea to establish a commission to study the role of New Testament deaconesses and the possibility of women serving as deacons today.
The Normans said that was a great idea. “I’m very hopeful,” Kimberly Norman said. Deacon Norman agreed, saying, “Clearly, women have had leadership in the church, but it’s not recognized by ordination.”
Deacon Anthony Gooley of the Archdiocese of Brisbane, Australia, and a lecturer in theology at the Broken Bay Institute, told the crowd that deacons were instituted in the early Christian community to minister to people whose particular needs were not being met by the disciples.
They have the same mission today to reach unserved or underserved populations, he said. In fact, their potential contribution to the new evangelization “is limited only by imagination and by the will of those who engage in placements and pastoral planning in the dioceses.”
“Too often a deacon is left to work out the details of his own pastoral ministry,” Deacon Gooley said, and arrangements are made with “a handshake deal with the parish priest.”
His remarks led to a ripple of agreement around the basilica.
Deacon Greg Kandra of the Diocese of Brooklyn, New York, a popular blogger and multimedia editor for the Catholic Near East Welfare Association, focused on the ministry of deacons in the workplace. Many of the almost 45,000 permanent deacons in the world continue to work in secular jobs in to support their families even after ordination.
But a deacon is a deacon no matter where he is, Deacon Kandra said. He is called by the church to be on the “front line,” wherever he is.
“The deacon is called to be a witness to compassion,” helping those who are hungry or poor, whether materially or spiritually. “They might work in the cubicle next to yours,” he said.
As a witness to the dignity of work, Deacon Kandra said, the deacon is called to stand up for just wages and decent working conditions, but also to improve the workplace environment by “quieting gossip,” listening to grievances, speaking up for those without a voice.
“Some of the most important missionary activity in the world today may begin in unlikely places, not in a jungle or desert of some far-off country, but around the water cooler, or on a bus, or over coffee in the company cafeteria,” he said.
“What began on the altar on Sunday,” Deacon Kandra said, “continues in the world and in the workplace on Monday.”

Deacons’ wives offer gift of novena prayers

By Andrew Morgan
The wives of the deacons both in the Diocese of Memphis and Jackson played a special role in their formation and ordination. Many of them attended all but a handful of the classes with their husbands during the five-year formation. At the ordination Mass, the wives carried their husband’s vestments in the procession and presented them to the priests or deacons at the time of vesting.
Another example of their commitment to the ministry was the unusual gift they gave their husbands – the gift of prayer. The wives and a volunteer organized and prayed a novena starting on May 13, for the men in the Memphis diocese, and then a second time beginning May 26 for the men in Jackson. The volunteer was praying for the unmarried candidates.
The novena was composed by Sarah D’Addabbo, wife of Mike D’Addabbo of the Diocese of Memphis. D’Addabbo felt called to write a small prayer as part of her spiritual preparation for her husband’s ordination. She collaborated with Shona Moore, wife of Philip Moore,  also from Memphis.
The pair started gathering writings and ideas. D’Addabbo found  some lines written by Father John McKenna, CSSR, that became her inspiration for the prayer. when she obtained his permission to use his writings, Father McKenna said he was honored his words would be used for a novena.
D’Addabbo shared the prayer with family and friends who wanted to pray it as well, and they adjusted it to make it fit their relationship with the men they know.
Dawn McGinley, John McGinley’s wife, was closely involved with her husband through his formation. “I was blessed to be able to attend all but three of the formation classes with my husband. It helped us grow together as a couple and see our faith in a new way, she noted. “It was a great privilege to watch each of these men grow spiritually and personally. Each one has a wonderful gift that will benefit our diocese, the parishes and the people they will serve.”
She had this to say when asked why they chose to say a novena for their husbands. “Novenas are beautiful prayers that require a special discipline to pray every day. I personally have felt that God is asking me to pray for my husband and his vocation in the diaconate,” she said.
“I feel it is a way I can share in his ministry. I may not even know who he is helping or what they need but when he gets called to serve, I can pray. We, as a couple, personally know the power of intercessory prayer. We have experienced the power of prayer and God’s response to that prayer through many trials in our life. It is a great gift,” McKinley added.
(Andrew Morgan is a rising sophomore at The Catholic University of America and a graduate of Madison St. Joseph School.)

Memphis deacons share bond with Jackson families

MEMPHIS – Twenty-two men were ordained into the permanent diaconate for the Diocese of Memphis on Saturday, May 21, by Bishop J. Terry Steib. In a Mass celebrated at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, visiting clergy and diocesan deacons joined with hundreds of parishioners in the ordination ceremony. The men ordained from the Diocese of Jackson went through their formation program in Memphis with these men, traveling to Tennessee for classes. Instructors from St. Meinrad Abbey in Indiana would fly to Memphis to offer the classes.
The two classes of deacons became quite close. The candidates from Jackson attended the Memphis ordination. The newly ordained deacons from Memphis then turned around to attend the ordination of deacons in Jackson.

Diocese already blessed with trio of active deacons

By Andrew Morgan
The six men ordained to the diaconate Saturday, June 4, are not the first deacons to serve in the Diocese of Jackson. This diocese was one of the first in the nation to ordain deacons. There are currently three permanent deacons serving here.
Monday, May 23, Deacon Henry Babin celebrated his 40th anniversary of ordination. He was ordained for the Archdiocese of New Orleans, but later served in Houma-Thibodaux until his relocation to Mississippi in 1992, where he has remained since. He is currently serving at Olive Branch Queen of Peace Parish.
Prior to his ordination, Babin worked as a school administrator in Houma, and in the DeSoto County school system as a counselor. Deacon Babin felt called to the priesthood in his youth and entered seminary in the 10th grade, but soon felt this was not the path for him. When the office of permanent deacon was restored during Vatican II, he knew that was the right ministry for him. He was ordained into the second class of permanent deacons for New Orleans after a two year formation process consisting of biweekly meetings and lessons.
Deacon Babin’s primary responsibilities have included pastoral counseling, baptism and marriage preparation, RCIA instruction, preaching, conducting wake and funeral services, performing Communion services and visiting the sick. Additionally, he has preached for diocesan mission appeals, and on the national level he has served as the executive director for the National Diaconate Institute for Continuing Education (NDICE), an organization he joined in 1979.
“The most pleasing part of serving the church,” he explained, “is making people feel that they are the church. I enjoy all the ministries I am involved in, but I love meeting people and making them feel welcome the most.”
He offered this advice to those discerning the diaconate and the newly ordained: “My advice to everyone is to be yourself. Realize that you are not a mini-priest and remember that you are in a servant ministry. Sometimes you have to say ‘no,’ and be aware of spreading yourselves too thin and treat all as equals.”
Deacon Theodore Klingen was born and raised in St. Louis, Mo. He ministers at Oxford St. John Parish.
After receiving both a bachelor and master degrees from St. Louis University, he served in the Air force, eventually earning a Ph.D. in chemistry from Florida State University. In 1964, he came to the University of Mississippi as a professor of chemistry and remained on the faculty until 2012. He was ordained as a deacon at St. John in July of 1982 by Bishop William Houck.
In addition to his duties of performing marriages, funerals and preaching at Sunday Masses, he has worked also on marriage and baptism preparation, assisted with more than 40 annulment cases and instructed RCIA classes. Currently he works as a chaplain for Baptist Hospital, North Mississippi, the Oxford Police Department and the local Council of the Knights of Columbus. He has been married since Sept. 1958 to Maura Downey Klingen. They have a daughter and a son.
Deacon Klingen said the most rewarding thing about his 34 years of service as a deacon is realizing the difference one can really make in a person’s life, a realization which is especially true in annulment cases.
Brother Senan Gallagher, ST, a New York City native, has been a brother for the Missionary Servants of the Most Holy Trinity for 60 years. For 16 of those he has ministered as a deacon. He is currently stationed at Canton Holy Child Parish and he helps at Batesville St.  Mary Parish and at Sardis St. John the Baptist Mission.
The witness of the Marist brothers and sisters at his childhood school cultivated his call to religious life. He felt specifically called to the diaconate as part of his desire to work in parishes with people, leading to his formation and ordination in New Orleans and later assignments in Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi. Brother Senan said he is especially grateful for having been assigned to the South. He regards it as a blessing, because he gets to serve with so many dedicated lay people.
He thanks God for his vocation, as well as the vocations of the men just ordained. An even greater blessing he said is the restoration of the permanent diaconate itself. He looked forward to seeing the candidates, many of whom he knows through Cursillo retreats. Brother Senan also described the diaconate as “two for the price of one” since wives take part in formation and are an important part of ministry. “Not only ought we all be grateful for new, dedicated deacons, but also for the couple dynamic between husband and wife. The blessings abound.”
(Andrew Morgan is a rising sophomore at The Catholic University of America and a graduate of Madison St. Joseph School.)

Office of deacon restored by Vatican II

By Msgr Michael Flannery
The diaconate developed gradually in the early church. We have its foundation in the Acts of the Apostles: 6:1-6. Stephen was one of the first deacons chosen for the ministry of service to widows. We are all called to a ministry of service, but this is especially so for a deacon.
The Didache, an ancient manuscript, mentions that deacons assisted with administration in the church and speaks of them as being men of integrity. Ignatius of Antioch speaks of the fully developed order of bishop, priest and deacon. The pre-Nicene period was the golden era of the diaconate. We find deacons running dioceses as administrators and attending councils of the church. Deacons became very powerful and even assigned priests to parishes.
A deacon comes directly under a bishop. As in the Acts of the Apostles, when the diaconate was first set up, it came under the apostles and it was a way for the apostles to ensure that the social ministry was carried out giving the apostles time to peach the word of God.
The developing role of the priest as celebrant of the Eucharist hinted at the diaconate decline. The Council of Nicea stated: “Let deacons remain in their proper place, knowing that they are ministers of the bishop and less than presbyters.”
Pope Leo the Great named deacons as ambassadors. There began a growing friction between the deacons and the priests over liturgical roles. Eventually, it was reduced to a stepping stone on the way to the priesthood. By the 10th century deacons were a temporary and ceremonial order of the hierarchy in the west. An order from the Council of Trent to restore the diaconate was never implemented. .
The movement for the restoration of the diaconate began in Freidburg, Germany in 1951. During Vatican II, a petition was sent to the council fathers for the restoration of the diaconate in July 1959. Central America, South America, Thailand and Eastern Europe favored it. Africa, the United States, Spain, Italy and Portugal opposed it, but the petition passed.
Deacons would be ordinary minsters of Baptism and Holy Communion and preside over some liturgical services. Strangely enough there are very few permanent deacons in Central America, South America, Thailand and Eastern Europe. World-wide, there are 39,564 active permanent deacons and there are more than 15,000 active permanent deacons in the U.S. One third of all the permanent deacons in the world are in the U.S. Yet initially, the American bishops did not favor it.
In our theology, the church is a priestly community. It is the sacrament of Christ’s presence in the world. Christ is the Eternal Priest and all priestly functions come from Christ. There is the priesthood of the laity and the priesthood of the ordained ministry. Priesthood and diaconal service are both hierarchical participations in the priesthood that have been transmitted through the bishops. The episcopacy is the fullness of the hierarchical priesthood and the priest and deacon are sharers in that fullness of power. Deacons and priests are assembled around the bishop and support him in his work.
The bishop is the successor of the apostles, the priest performs sacerdotal functions and the deacon diaconal functions. Deacons are not substitutes for the shortage of priests, but in their own right play a vital and a specific role in the church’s apostolate.
Deacons are not less than priests. They have a vital role to play in the apostolate. The Constitution on The Church states: “Deacons have a threefold ministry of word, liturgy and charity.”
1) The ministry of the Word: In the rite of ordination of a deacon, the bishop places the Book of the Gospels into the hands of the deacon and says: “Receive the Gospel of Christ, whose herald you are. Believe what you read, teach what you believe and practice what you teach.” The deacon is authorized to preside over the Liturgy of the Word and over public prayers of the people.
2) In the ministry of liturgy: A deacon is authorized by the church to administer baptism solemnly, to distribute Holy Communion, to preside over marriages, to bring Viaticum to the dying, to read sacred scriptures to the faithful, to administer sacramentals and to officiate at funerals.
3) Ministry of charity: The Constitution on the Church states: “They are ordained not unto priesthood but ordained unto ministry, their diaconal service is far reaching.” It includes not only ministry to the poor, but ministry of the temporalities of the church.
(Msgr. Michael Flannery, a retired priest of the Diocese of Jackson, is the former Judicial Vicar and currently assists in the Tribunal.)

Bishop to priests: God makes big demands, provides love

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Catholicism is a faith of extremes, where God makes tough demands while always offering his unconditional love, a U.S. bishop told priests taking part in their jubilee for the Year of Mercy.
When preaching or communicating church teaching, some priests might emphasize the high ideals needed for holiness, whereas others might underline God’s loving, inclusive embrace of even his wayward children, Auxiliary Bishop Robert E. Barron of Los Angeles told Catholic News Service June 2.
But these two poles are not mutually exclusive, he said.
“We are not an ‘either-or’ religion, we’re the great ‘both-and’ religion” in which nothing can get in the way of divine mercy – “it moves into the arena of sin, it can never be trumped,” he said.
Bishop Barron was one of seven priests chosen to offer a catechesis on mercy during the Jubilee for Priests and Seminarians in Rome June 1-3. He presented his talk to English-language speakers at the Basilica of St. Andrea della Valle June 1.
He said he centered his talk on the Samaritan woman at the well in t John’s Gospel as a way to present four dimensions of mercy:
– “God’s mercy is relentless. It crosses all boundaries and borders. It can never be stressed enough,” he said.
– “God’s mercy is divinizing. It’s more than just patting us on the head or healing our wounds, it’s drawing us into the very life of the Trinity.”
– “Divine mercy is demanding, he said. “It affects a change in us, calls us to conversion.”
– “It inspires those who receive it to share the good news, embarking on mission,” he said.
Jesus “makes this very strong moral demand” on the woman and “calls her out” for living with a man who is not her husband, the bishop said.
But Jesus has also “won her over” with his pleasant approach and appealing offer of grace, he continued. And yet “that grace is not cheap, that grace is a demanding grace.”
This was the message he sought to tell the priests in his catechesis: “that it’s the great ‘both-and’ logic of Catholicism that ought to govern us here, and we shouldn’t fall into the trap of the zero-sum game.”
The “genius of the church,” he said, is that it includes all these facets and allows for a “great symphony of voices” in which some who preach the Gospel really emphasize “the inviting, inclusive side–others, that embody this demanding side.”
“Both should be part of the same chorus. The danger is reducing the symphony to a monotony,” he said.
He said a lot of what Pope Francis says reminds him of his spiritual mentor, the late Cardinal Francis E. George of Chicago.
He said the cardinal once told seminarians at Mundelein Seminary, where Bishop Barron taught for more than 20 years, that he greatly admired them for their devotion to the truth.
“But then he said, ‘Remember, you can’t just drop the truth on people then walk away. You have to give them the truth and then be willing to walk with them to help them implement it.’”
“I think that’s precisely (Pope Francis’) message. He’s not softening the truth, but he’s saying you don’t just drop it on people, you walk with them,” he said.
Contributing to this story was Robert Duncan.
(Editors note: A video to go with this story can be found at https://youtu.be/DCzvPZjG3oY)