Welcoming the Lord

Most of us are aware that we cannot celebrate Mass without a priest.  While this no doubt makes our priests feel needed, it can have the unfortunate side effect of leading some of faithful to think that Mass is something that the priest “does” for the rest of the Church.  In reality, the Mass is something that we all do together.  The priest is here to preside over the Mass, but each of us also has an important role.

We are one.  Our Catholic faith does not allow the distinction of “us” versus “them.”  On Sunday we gather in one Lord, one faith, one Baptism.  Yet, we are many.  When we gather, it’s also to witness to the commonality of our faith, evident in the many parts that make up the one Body.

Whether we are Hispanic, Native American, African American, European, or Vietnamese, we stand side by side around the table of the Altar and sing our thanksgiving to God.  And while that song may sound different in our different cultures, this Eucharist, this thanksgiving, is the song of our hearts.  The late Joseph Cardinal Bernardin wrote that we leave Mass, “carrying the tune we have heard.”  A tune that resonates within all of us, because we share one heart.

Before we are anything else – any ethnicity, nationality or citizenship – we are the Body of Christ, sisters and brothers by our Baptism.   (CCC 1207)

Our faith teaches us that Christ dwells in every member of his body, that we can find him in the people who gather with us here every Sunday.  We are not strangers who have gathered – even if we’ve never met – we know each other, because each one of us carries Jesus in us.

What an awesome responsibility each of us has, bearing Christ as we do.  All of a sudden we begin to understand that our presence here is not just about “coming to Church,” or “going to Mass;” it’s about gathering and welcoming each other and recognizing that in offering hospitality to each other we are offering it to Christ himself.

Through the week, all of us are scattered throughout our community.  On Sunday, we reconnect with the other members of the Body.  Smiling and saying hello.  Sharing the stories of our lives and our concerns and expressing the love of Christ that binds us one to another.

This is not irreverent in church, because it’s the way we welcome the Lord in our midst.  Jesus said, “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them” (Mt 18:20).  His presence in each of us is one of the ways that he reveals himself to us at Mass.  Reverence requires that we recognize him and respond to him.

Gathering and offering hospitality to each other is an important way we prepare for the celebration of the Mass.

A Royal Priesthood

Most of us are aware that we cannot celebrate Mass without a priest.  While this no doubt makes our priests feel needed, it can have the unfortunate side effect of leading some of faithful to think that Mass is something that the priest “does” for the rest of the Church.  In reality, the Mass is something that we all do together.  The priest is here to preside over the Mass, but each of us also has an important role.

The first part of the Roman Missal, the big red book which contains the prayers we use at Mass, is called the “General Instruction.”  It says that “the celebration of the Eucharist is an action of the whole Church,” all of us.  It goes on to say that “this people nevertheless grows in holiness by its conscious, active, and fruitful participation” in the Mass.

The Second Vatican Council called everyone who gathers for Mass; be it priest, deacon or the lay faithful, to “full, conscious, and active participation.”  As a matter of fact, the world’s bishops said that this was to be the, “aim to be considered before all else,” in our celebration of the Mass.  The bishops were so concerned about this as they recognized that this kind of participation “is the primary and indispensable source from which [we] are to derive the true Christian spirit.”  It is by our taking part in the offering of the Mass that we are to become more and more like Christ.  It is our primary path to holiness.

The Council fathers insisted that our participation in Mass is both a right and a duty by reason of our baptism, because through baptism, to quote St. Peter, we have become “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people.”  We all share in the priesthood of Christ; you and I in the royal priesthood and Father in the ministerial priesthood, and it is Christ who offers his sacrifice to the His Father whenever we, all of us, celebrate the Mass.  The priest is the Presider of the Mass; but we are all the celebrants.    

Sometimes we may think that our presence or our participation doesn’t much matter.  But each one of us is important to the celebration of the liturgy.  We each have a job to do that no one else can do for us.  Only together can we offer God proper worship.

A New Bishop

By now you’ve heard that Pope Francis has assigned Bishop John Charles Wester, current Bishop of Salt Lake City, as the new Archbishop of Santa Fe.  But why did we need a new Archbishop?  What was wrong with the old one?

By Church Law, bishops must submit their resignation to the Holy See upon reaching their 75^th birthday.  Rome then works to identify a new bishop for the diocese.  This may take anywhere from a few months to a year, or more.  If the retiring bishop is healthy he may continue to serve, as has Archbishop Michael, until the new bishop is named.

Just like everyone else, clergy members eventually retire.  In most dioceses, deacons and priests retire at the age of 65 or 70, although they may continue to serve (usually in a smaller capacity) if they are healthy and they and their bishop decide it’s in the best interest of the Church.  Cardinals don’t retire per se, but after they reach 80 they can no longer take part in voting for a new pope. 

After Archbishop Sheehan retires, he will remain here in New Mexico after Bishop Wester is installed.  As “Archbishop Emeritus” he will be available to assist parishes that need a priest and help the new Archbishop as needed. 

Bishop John Wester will be the 12^th Archbishop of Santa Fe.  He will be formally installed at a Mass at the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi on June 4^th.  Archbishop Elect Wester was born and raised in San Francisco and was ordained to the priesthood in 1976.  The 64-year old bishop was named Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of San Francisco in 1998 and Bishop of Salt Lake City in 2007.

Many are curious what the difference is between an Archbishop and a Bishop.  Every corner of the earth is part of a diocese, most people know that.  What most don’t know is that several dioceses are grouped together and are overseen by one bishop.  That bishop is the “Metropolitan” of that group of dioceses and he is called an Archbishop.  The Metropolitan Archbishop of Santa Fe has then certain obligations not only to the Archdiocese of Santa Fe, but also the Dioceses of Gallup, Las Cruces, Phoenix, and Tucson: in effect all of New Mexico and Arizona.  Quite a job, indeed. 

Join us in praying for Archbishop Elect Wester and for our outgoing Archbishop, Michael Sheehan.  Let us thank Archbishop Sheehan for his 22 years of service to the people of the Archdiocese of Santa Fe and welcome Bishop Wester.  May God continue to bless both of them and our diocese.

Why Do We Gather

We begin with some basic questions for all of us:  Why are we here?  Why do we gather week after week for this liturgy we call Mass?

To celebrate the Sunday Eucharist some of the early followers of Christ risked their lives.  Even though there was great personal risk, the faithful were exhorted to gather.  One bishop in the early years of the faith wrote, “Let no one deprive the Church by staying away; if they do they deprive the Body of Christ of one of its members!”

Today, at least in the United States, there is no persecution of the Church.  But the statement of this third century bishop is still true: the community of believers suffers when we do not gather with it.

There are many reasons that we gather.  Some of us are here because it’s a habit.  Others come out of obligation.  Some come because their parents insist on it.  Others come to seek the Lord.  Some come because they are burdened with problems.  Others are here because they are grateful for God’s gifts.  And many of us are here for a combination of those reasons.

More basic to all of these reasons, however, is that we are here because God himself has called us here.  It was God who called us to share His own life through baptism.  It was God who called us to carry on the mission of Christ in the world today. 

And we come for Eucharist, which comes from the Greek word for thanksgiving.  We gather each week to give God thanks and praise.  Sometimes we may forget that.  It’s easy to focus on what we hope to get out of coming to church rather than on giving thanks for what God has already given us.

The most important thing we find when we gather is the presence of Christ himself.  Christ who is in each of us who has gathered.  Christ in the Word of God proclaimed.  Christ in the presider of the liturgy.  And Christ in the Holy Eucharist.

We come here to remember who we are.  Here we are reunited with one another and with He who is our head.  Those who say, “I don’t need to come to Mass to pray,” miss the point.  We’re here because God himself has asked us to be here, so that He can feed us and strengthen us to be Christ-bearers all week.

The Many Days of Easter

Most of us think of Easter as one day – a day when we eat lots of candy, visit relatives, and maybe even have an Easter egg hunt.  But, just like the Lenten Season lasts for 40+ days, the Church wants us to celebrate the Easter Season for 50 days!  

The Church reminds us that the whole Easter Season is like one glorious Sunday, during which we celebrate the thrill of knowing that Jesus’ resurrection has made it possible for us to share his life forever.  We celebrate the resurrection not by eating chocolate eggs every day, but by remembering that Christ died on the cross for us and rose again.  We must live our lives with that fact in the forefront of our minds.

The Resurrection teaches us that our death, like Jesus’ death, will not be the end.  Instead, it will be the step into a new life that will go on forever.  That’s the Easter message, and it’s such good news for all of us that it deserves a lifetime of celebration.

Let’s think about some of the days of Easter.

The first day of the Easter Season is, of course, Easter Sunday.  For us Christians, Easter is the high point of the Church’s calendar.  The date fluctuates from year to year:  last year Easter was celebrated on April 20th, and next year it falls almost a whole month earlier on March 27th.  Have you ever wondered why this most important feast moves from year to year?

Easter is always celebrated on the first Sunday following the first full moon after the first day of Spring or the “Vernal Equinox” on March 21st.  What does the cycle of the Moon have to do with Easter?  Our celebration of Easter is based on the celebration of the Passover, which is when Jesus was crucified.   Our Jewish fore-bearers kept track of time on a Lunar calendar:  Passover begins the day of the first full moon after the first day of Spring.  So, planning the Holy Day based on the cycle of the moon is part of who we are in our Judeo-Christian heritage.

The first eight days following Easter are called the “Octave of Easter.”  The octave begins with Easter Sunday and concludes with the end of the Second Sunday of Easter.  These eight days are all considered “solemnities” – the highest of feast days.

The fortieth day of the Easter Season celebrates Jesus’ ascension.  He told the crowds and His disciples that He would return to the one who sent Him, and so He does.  But Jesus also tells His followers that even though He is leaving them, He will not leave them alone.  He promises to send the Holy Spirit, which He does on the 50th and last day of Easter - Pentecost.

There are many days of Easter and the Church is here to celebrate them all.  We invite you to take an active part in celebrating this Easter Season.  Just as we take time to solemnly reflect on the Passion of Christ during Lent, we are called to celebrate Christ’s resurrection throughout the Easter Season by keeping it in the forefront of our minds and attending Mass every week.

Shalom

Over the past year we’ve hosted three Healing Services.  These services brought our community together to strive for a deeper sense of spiritual awareness and to pray for the healing of memories, family-life, and grief.

There are so many areas of our lives where we need healing.  We are surrounded by an aggressive culture and live in a violent world.  Daily we are bombarded with images of brutality in our cities and in countries around the globe.  As we see these images we become accustomed to the violence they portray and can begin to accept it as normal.

The reality is that on any given day the media presents us with more violence than our grandparents might have witnessed in their entire lives.  While we see the result of this cruelty in the news, much of it is “make believe” in television shows; but as any psychologist can tell you, the mind knows no difference between what is real and what is vividly imagined. 

Daily, we see images of mass murders in Africa; reflections of violent crime portrayed on television and first-person shooter video games; websites devoted to glorifying the actions of murderers and psychopaths; and more.  Our society, and especially our children, come to understand that we handle our problems through violent acts instead of dialogue and conversation. 

Jesus told His disciples, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.” He goes on to tell them that He doesn’t give peace as the world gives it.  We understand peace to be the absence of conflict.  But the peace that Jesus refers to is the Jewish concept of “Shalom” (Shă - lōm).  Most of us understand Shalom means “peace,” but that’s only a small part of the meaning.  Shalom means completeness, wholeness, health, peace, welfare, safety, soundness, tranquility, prosperity, perfectness, fullness, rest, and harmony.  In short, Shalom means perfect and full peace living in right relationship with each other and with God.  This is the kind of peace Jesus gives: this is the kind of peace that we’re missing in our world today.

We will gather on Sunday, April 19^th at 5:30 PM to explore the inner peace and global peace that Shalom calls us to.  Through music, prayer and reflections we will look to rid ourselves of those things that serve to distract and prevent us from true peace.  

Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday is a wake-up call.  It hits us squarely between the eyes, forcing us to face our own mortality and sinfulness. 

On Wednesday we will hear Scripture readings that are urgent and vivid.  The Prophet Joel tells us that God wants us to return to Him with our whole hearts and to acknowledge our sinfulness with fasting and weeping and mourning.  In the Gospel reading Jesus reminds us that our fasting, our prayers and our almsgiving are important ways to atone for our sinfulness, but we must do so in such a way that only God sees what we’re doing.   Jesus criticizes pious self displays, not pious actions.

We have black ashes rubbed into our foreheads, ashes from the Palms that we so excitedly waved last year on Palm Sunday.  We recite a Litany of Penitence that takes our breath away, or should.  It’s a tough day, but take heart!  This is one religious day that won’t fall into the clutches of retailers.  There aren’t any Hallmark cards celebrating sin and death; no shop windows are decked out with sackcloth and ashes.

On Ash Wednesday we come to church to kneel, to pray, and to ask God’s forgiveness, surrounded by other sinners.  Human sin is universal; we all do it, not only Christians.  But our church tradition sets aside Ash Wednesday as a particular day to address sin and death.  We are ALL sinners, no better and no worse than our brothers and sisters. This is not a day to compete ("my sins are worse than yours are"), but to a day to confess.

Most of us don’t spend much time thinking about death.  But death is the great equalizer. In death there are no CEO’s, no janitors; no rich, no poor. All of us are in the hands of the loving God—that's it. The trinkets of honor and position of this world are but dust and ashes.  When we remember, to dust we shall return, we remember that we are made for more than trinkets or honor.  We are made for life with God - now and forever.

Ash Wednesday is the gateway to Lent.  We have forty precious days to open ourselves up to God, to examine ourselves in the presence of the one who created us, knows us, and loves us.  We have forty days to face ourselves and learn not to be afraid of our sinfulness.  We are dust, but with God’s grace we can learn to live this life more fully, embracing our sinfulness, allowing God to transform us.

Ash Wednesday gives us the opportunity to gather in prayer, not so much to inform God of our needs – but to express our dependence upon Him.