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This morning, I offered a special mass at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral for Greek Orthodox Bishop Paul Yazigi and Syriac Orthodox Bishop John Ibrahim, who were recently kidnapped in Syria. Here is the audio of the opening remarks that I made. I would also like to share with you the audio clip of my homily.
I am sorry that I will not be in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral this Sunday to celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ – also known as Corpus Christi. (The solemnity is actually today, June 7 – the Thursday after Trinity Sunday. In the United States, we have moved the observance of the solemnity to the following Sunday, this year June 10.) I’ve got a good excuse, though, for my absence. You see, I am leading a group of pilgrims from the Archdiocese of New York to the 50th International Eucharistic Congress that is being held this week in Dublin, Ireland.
About fifty of us from the archdiocese are here to join with hundreds of thousands of Catholics from all over the world in for prayer, adoration, study, and celebration of the Eucharist.
While in Ireland, we will visit other sites as well, like the Shrine of Our Lady of Knock, and Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in the Archdiocese of Armagh, the Primatial See of Ireland. But the real purpose of our visit is to participate in the Eucharistic Congress and to be with the family of faith in our communal savoring of the Eucharist.
A Eucharistic Congress occurs every four years, and provides a wonderful occasion for the Church to ponder and deepen her belief in the mystery of our faith we call the Eucharistic. The last one was held in Quebec City, Canada in 2008., and the Holy Father has appointed Cardinal Marc Oullete, former Archbishop of Quebec and the current Prefect of the Congregation of Bishops as Papal Legate – that is, his official personal envoy – to this Eucharistic Congress.
So, hundreds of bishops, thousands of priests, deacons, sisters, brothers, and seminarians, and tens of thousands of faithful women, men, and children from all over the Church universal, are gathering in Dublin for what promises to be a very spiritually uplifting occasion.
Our faith, of course, is internal. “The kingdom of God is within you,” as Jesus Himself taught. The essence of our faith is an interior, sincere acceptance of Jesus Christ as our Lord and savior, and of all the truths He and His Church have revealed. The soul is the arena of faith.
Yet, our faith is also external, because our internal acceptance of Christ has profound exterior effects. An interior adhesion to Christ results in a conversion of heart which has significant social, communal effects.
Thus, as we internally profess our faith in the Eucharist, we are moved to manifest that externally. Think about it:
– we genuflect as we enter Church as a sign that we adore Jesus really and truly present in the tabernac
– we say out loud, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof” before approaching the altar, publicly indicating our sorrow for sin and desire to be cleansed, a desire that would result in sacramental confession when we are conscious of mortal sin;
– we bow before we receive our Lord at Holy Communion;
– we say Amen, meaning, yes, when the priest, deacon, or extraordinary minster proclaims “The Body of Christ,” “The Blood of Christ”;
– we dress modestly, appropriately, for the Eucharist, giving a public sign that this is an event more sublime than playing tennis or lounging at the pool;
– on occasion, we publicly express our interior faith in the Eucharist through processions, Eucharistic exposition, and forty hour devotions;
– and, every four years, the Church universal sponsors a Eucharistic Congress as a corporate, ecclesial act of faith on behalf of the entire Church.
We see so many signs of a revived appreciation for the Eucharist in the Church:
– enhanced participation in the liturgy;
– more opportunity for our sick and homebound to receive Holy Communion because of the generous apostolate of our Extraordinary ministers;
– the growing popularity of Eucharistic adoration (in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, we have Eucharistic adoration about 5 ½ hours every day – about 10 hours on First Friday);
– an increased awareness of the social demands inherent in the celebration of the Eucharist, acknowledging that the Eucharist has implications “beyond the walls” of our Church buildings;
– a heightened sensitivity to the necessity of a worthy reception of Holy Communion; and that our partaking of the Eucharist indicates a communion not only with our Lord but with His Church. Thus, we would not dare violate integrity by receiving the Eucharist if we are conscious of being separated from the unity of the Church by sin or dissent from clear Church teaching.
It was at the Eucharistic Congress in Philadelphia, 1976, that we first sang “You satisfy the hungry heart with gift of finest wheat.
You are very much on my mind and in my prayers at the Eucharistic Congress as I praise God for the gift and mystery of the Blessed Eucharist!
Let me share with you a copy of Edwin Cardinal O’Brien’s homily from St. Patrick’s Day Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Here is an excerpt:
It was Archbishop John Hughes, Irish born, who to the consternation of many laid the cornerstone for this Cathedral on August 15, 1859. The City and the Nation were at that time in a deep financial depression: bank closures and unemployment were rampant. And the site he chose to build was well north of the then bustling heart of New York. His whole plan was called Hughes’ Folly, so unrealistic were the finances as well as in the timing and the choice of this very location.
Nevertheless, the dauntless Archbishop, with prophetic vision and typically Irish determination—what others might call stubbornness, insisted on the need, to erect quote “a Cathedral in the City of New York that may be worthy of our increasing numbers, intelligence and wealth as a religious community, and as a public architectural monument to the present and prospective greatness of this metropolis of the American continent.” This block on 5th Avenue between 50th and 51st St. – Hughes’ Folly?
With the interlude of the Civil War, it was not until 1879, twenty years later, that America’s first Cardinal, John Cardinal McCloskey, finally dedicated this, America’s Cathedral. And what a symbolic triumph it was for all Catholics of New York, largely immigrants, highly suspect and openly rejected by the New York elite of the day. For the Irish of New York it was especially meaningful. Transplanted from a small spot in the north Atlantic where they were forced to smuggle bread and wine and priests into hidden forests for hushed celebrations of the Eucharist on “Mass rocks”, they now had complete freedom to build their churches openly. They were now proud Americans and loyal Catholics. In complete obedience to Church teaching, they brought children into this world many of whom would become priests, nuns and brothers saturating our country’s urban centers and building the vast empire of Catholic educational and charitable institutions
You can read his whole homily here. An audio clip of the homily is available online, click here to listen.
Here is a copy of my homily from Pro-Life Sunday, Sunday, October 3, 2010, at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. An audio clip of the homily is available online here.
AMDG JMJ
27/OT/C/3/X/10
(Pro-Life)
“For the vision, still has its time,
presses on to fulfillment, and will not disappoint;
if it delays, wait for it
it will surely come, it will not be late.”
The vision . . . God’s holy Word this Sunday morning, from the Prophet Habakkuk.
The vision . . . what is this vision?
From the beginning, our creator had this vision: to share His life with us, His creatures, life now, life forever.
The vision of the sacredness of life, life now, life forever.
A reign of life, not destruction
A kingdom of life, not extinction
A culture of life, not death.
This vision our creator planted in the depth of every human person, as part of our normative law: that life is sacred; that, once God breathes it into us, it lasts forever; that to take innocent life is so inimical to a righteous society that its protection is mandated in the very middle of the ten commandments; that the more innocent and fragile the more it begs protection; that, indeed, to protect life is the most noble of vocations.
This vision, while enshrined in every great religious creed, whether Jewish, Catholic, Islamic, evangelical, Hindu, Buddhist . . . the list goes on . . . , is at its core not denominational or confessional at all, but human, basic, fundamental, rational, natural law, so much so that it was at the core of the enlightened founding fathers who fashioned on these shores a new “promised land” acknowledging from day one that human beings are endowed with certain basic inalienable rights, and that the first of these is . . . guess what? . . . life.
The sacredness of life, life now, life forever.
The vision is threatened, dulled, eclipsed . . . Habakkuk uses vocabulary such as “violence . . . ruin . . . misery . . . destruction . . . strife . . . discord.”
We today add words such as “war . . . terrorism . . . abortion . . . euthanasia . . . trafficking . . . experimentation on living organisms . . .” and are at times tempted to shout out with the prophet, “How long, O Lord? I cry for help, but you do not listen!”
And the one who implanted that vision within His creatures soothes,
“For the vision, still has its time,
presses on to fulfillment, and will not disappoint;
if it delays, wait for it
it will surely come, it will not be late.”
This is the vision that inspired a Francis (whose feast we celebrate tomorrow) to genuflect before a pregnant woman; a Peter Claver to climb onto slave ships to pour clean water in to the parched throats of African captives; a Bartholomew de las Casas to challenge a system that abused and violated native rights; a Teresa of Calcutta to bathe maggots from the face of a dying beggar in a gutter; a Marine sergeant to jump on a live grenade in a foxhole to preserve the lives of his platoon; a Gianna Molla to carry the baby in her womb all the way to birth even though she knew it would mean her own death . . .
This is the vision that inspires today’s premier civil rights cause, the pro-life movement, renewing our nation, world, culture, and Church.
We may legitimately ask, with Habakkuk, “when . . . how long . . . how much longer will the distortion of death seem to trump the vision of life? . . .” but we never ask if . . . for, fellow dreamers, we hold this truth to be self-evident.
“For the vision, still has its time,
presses on to fulfillment, and will not disappoint;
if it delays, wait for it
it will surely come, it will not be late.”
