Since we are travellers and pilgrims in the world, let us ever ponder on the end of the road, that is of our life, for the end of our roadway is our home (St Columban, 8th sermon).
GospelMark 9:30-37(English Standard Version Anglicised: India)
Jesus and his disciples went on from there and passed through
Galilee. And he did not want anyone to know,for he
was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “The
Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill
him. And when he is killed, after three days he will rise.”But they did not understand the saying, and
were afraid to ask him.
And they came to Capernaum. And when
he was in the house he asked them, “What were you discussing on the way?”But they
kept silent, for on the way they had argued with one another about who was
the greatest.And
he sat down and called the twelve. And he said to them, “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.”And he took a child and put him in the midst
of them, and taking him in his arms, he said to them,“Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me,
and whoever receives me, receives not me but him who sent me.”
Bishop Perry is an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Chicago.
In most parts of the world since March 2020 people have not been able to take part in Mass in church on Sunday or on weekdays. Parish priests have been celebrating Mass in empty churches. Funeral Masses here in Ireland were open only to the immediate families of the deceased during the strict lockdown periods. As I write this, churches in the Republic of Ireland may now be filled to 50 per cent of their capacity. More recently, under 'less restrictive' regulations, fifty persons were allowed to attend religious services, no matter how large or small the building was.
Many have become used to online Masses. These have been a great comfort to people. But have we come to see this as a normal way of participating in the Holy Sacrifice?
Families have been communicating by Zoom, Facebook and the like, and these have been truly a blessing in the situation we have all been going through. But this is not the same as meeting in person.
In the video above Bishop Perry is talking about Sunday Mass in the context of the family. A number of times he says husbands and fathers or husband and father emphasising that in God's plan a man is meant to be a husband before he becomes a father. The same holds for a woman. She is meant to be a wife before she becomes a mother. Marriage is the primary vocation of a couple. They are first called by God to be spouses. As spouses they are then, in most cases, called to be parents. The Church honours St Joseph above all as the Husband of Mary. It was as such that in a very real sense he fulfilled the role of being a father to Jesus, Son of God and Son of Mary.
Bishop Perry speaks of the importance of the husband/father leading the family by taking part in Sunday Mass. Though I have memories of my mother taking me to Mass when I was a young child, my abiding memories are of my father taking me to Sunday Mass and seeing him attend Mass every weekday morning before preparing my mother's breakfast and then going off to work.
We want to be Christ's witnesses here. Words of Archbishop Youhanna Boutros Moshe of Mosul. He belongs to the Syrian Catholic Church, one of the Eastern churches in full communion with Rome.
Mass had been celebrated in Qaraqosh without break since the early days of Christianity until ISIS drove out its Christians - the majority in the town - in 2014. ISIS gave Christians three coptions: pay a tax, convert to Islam or be executed.
When churches were closed because of the pandemic none of us were faced with those choices.
Pope Francis visited Qaraqosh this year on 7 March. Here is
part of his address to the people there in the Church of the Immaculate
Conception.
Our gathering here
today shows that terrorism and death never have the last word. The last word
belongs to God and to his Son, the conqueror of sin and death. Even amid the
ravages of terrorism and war, we can see, with the eyes of faith, the triumph
of life over death. You have before you the example of your fathers and mothers
in faith, who worshipped and praised God in this place. They persevered with
unwavering hope along their earthly journey, trusting in God who never
disappoints and who constantly sustains us by his grace.
As we slowly return to a form of normality, maybe we can reflect on what it means to us to take part in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, particularly in Sunday Mass, whether we attend it on Saturday evening or on Sunday itself. We have before us the example of our fathers and mothers in faith. In the words of Bishop Perry, Sunday is the day when husbands and fathers can lead their families to the Lord.
Visit of Pope Francis to Iraq, 5-8 March 2021
Traditional Latin Mass (TLM)
Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 9-19-2021 if necessary).
But the Pharisees hearing that he
had silenced the Sadducees, came together:And one of them, a doctor of the law, asking him, tempting him:Master, which is the greatest commandment in the law? (Matthew 22:34-36).
Authentic Beauty
Authentic beauty, however, unlocks the yearning of the human heart, the profound desire to know, to love, to go towards the Other, to reach for the Beyond.
I gave my back to
those who strike,and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard;I hid not my facefrom disgrace and spitting.(Isaiah 50:6. First Reading).
Readings(Jerusalem Bible: Australia,
England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)
GospelMark 8:27-35(English Standard Version Anglicised: India)
Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea
Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?”And they
told him, “John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others, one
of the prophets.”And
he asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Christ.”And he strictly charged them to tell no one
about him.
And he began to teach them that the
Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and
the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise
again.And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and
began to rebuke him.But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and
said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are not
setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”
And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to
them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take
up his cross and follow me.For whoever
would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses
his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it.
On 28 August 2001 my Columban confrere and friend Fr Rufus Halley, was ambushed while on his motorcycle from Balabagan to nearby Malabang, his parish in Lanao del Sur, Philippines, and murdered. This was in the the Prelature of Marawi, sometimes called the Prelature of St Mary's in Marawi, in a predominantly Muslim are of Mindanao, the southern island that is larger than Ireland.
After spending ten years or so in a rural parish near Manila he felt called by God to go to the Prelature of Marawi around 1980 where he learned Cebuano, the language of the Christians there, and Maranao, the language of the Muslims. He became fluent in both, as was in Tagalog, now the basis of the national language, Filipino.
Father Rufus chose to live in a situation where for centuries there had been tension and, at times, violence. Ten years before he went to Marawi there had been civil war in the area.
At the heart of his life each day was the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and an hour's adoration before the Blessed Sacrament. Both Christians and Muslims saw him as a man of God. He was deeply influenced by the spirituality of Blessed Charles de Foucauld, a French priest who spent most of his priestly life living among Muslims in the Sahara, spending much time in adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and welcoming the Muslims who knocked on his door looking for help.
Father Rufus was an active member of the Jesus Caritas Fraternity of Priests, an international movement inspired by the spirituality of Blessed Charles. (Many of the members in Ireland will be on retreat together in Star of the Sea Centre, Mullaghmore, County Sligo, from 12 to 15 September after a gap of more than two years due to the pandemic. Prayers appreciated!) Blessed Charles was murdered in the Sahara in 1916.
He was very aware of the possible danger he lived with daily but was deeply respected and loved by those who knew him, Christian and Muslim. On one occasion he was invited to mediate between two warring Maranao clans, a truly extraordinary situation. With God's help he succeeded.
This heroic priest, who came from a wealthy background in County Waterford, Ireland, chose to live very frugally. In a letter to his father he explained, My needs are few and one of the things I feel called to do is to make my life a little simpler. This vision, if that's what you'd call it, comes from trying to be a follower of a poor man, and also, from the poverty on a grand scale which I've seen in the Philippines.
St George Maronite Cathedral and Mohammad Al-Amin Mosque, side by side in Beirut
Pope Benedict XVI visited Lebanon from 14-16 September 2012. Lebanon is a country that has seen much conflict down the centuries. Roughly 60 percent of the people are Muslims and 40 percent Christians. In his homily on the last day of his visit, which used the readings of today's Mass some of his words might have been about Father Rufus: Following Jesus means taking up one’s cross and
walking in his footsteps, along a difficult path which leads not to earthly
power or glory but, if necessary, to self-abandonment, to losing one’s life for
Christ and the Gospel in order to save it. We are assured that this is the way
to the resurrection, to true and definitive life with God.
Choosing to walk in the footsteps of Jesus Christ,
who made himself the Servant of all, requires drawing ever closer to him,
attentively listening to his word and drawing from it the inspiration for all
that we do.
Prayer of Abandonment of Blessed Charles de Foucauld
Introduced and read by Bishop Fintan Monahan of Killaloe, Ireland
Traditional Latin Mass (TLM)
Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost
The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 9-12-2021 if necessary).
Authentic beauty, however, unlocks the yearning of the human heart, the profound desire to know, to love, to go towards the Other, to reach for the Beyond.
Laudate
Dominum
Music
by Mozart
Sung
by soprano Patricia Janečková
The JanáčekChamber
Orchestrs, directed by Jakub Černohorský
This is Mozart's setting of Psalm 116 in the Latin. Most modern translations number it as Psalm 117.
Psalm 116 [117]
Laudate
Dominum, omnes gentes; laudate eum, omnes populi. Quoniam confirmata est super
nos misericordia eius, et veritas Domini manet in æternum. [Amen, Amen].
O
praise the LORD, all you nations;acclaim
him, all you peoples!
For his merciful love has prevailed over us; and the LORD’s
faithfulness endures forever. [Amen, Amen].
At the very first meeting of the Legion of Mary an altar just like that in the photo, except for the words 'Legio Mariae' and the Vexillum, the standard of the Legion, was used. Every meeting since then, at whatever level, has such an altar, with the Vexillum included.
The Legion of Mary held its first meeting on the evening of 7 September 1921 in Myra House, St Nicholas of Myra Parish, Francis Street, Dublin, under the name of the Association of Our Lady of Mercy that became the Legion of Mary in 1925. Present at that first meeting were Fr Michael Toher, Frank Duff, a 32-year-old civil servant, and a group of women, all young except for 64-year-old Mrs Elizabeth Kirwan, a widowed New Zealander and a nurse. She was appointed president of the group.
The website of the Legion of Mary states: The
object of the Legion of Mary is the glory of God through the holiness of its
members developed by prayer and active co-operation in Mary’s and the Church’s
work. The unit of the Legion of Mary is called a praesidium, which holds a
weekly meeting, where prayer is intermingled with reports and discussion.
Persons who wish to join the Legion must apply for membership in a Praesidium.
The Legion sees as its priority the spiritual and social welfare of each
individual. The members participate in the life of the parish through
visitation of families, the sick, both in their homes and in hospitals and
through collaboration in every apostolic and missionary undertaking sponsored
by the parish. Every legionary is required to carry out a weekly apostolic work
in the spirit of faith and in union with Mary.
The Legion of Mary has an estimated ten million or more members worldwide between active and auxiliary (praying) Legionaries. Its headquarters are in Dublin and it is supported entirely by its members through the 'secret bag' collection at every meeting. The Legion has no employees. From the beginning it has been 'classless', with members from every social background. To emphasise that Legionaries are living out their baptism, which makes us sons and daughters of God the Father and brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ and of one another, members address each other as 'Brother' and 'Sister' at meetings, though not outside of that.
The formation of members is based on the 'master and apprentice' system, with new legionaries working with an experienced member. Legionaries work in pairs and each gives a report of work done at the weekly meeting. Adult members are required to do two hours of apostolic work each week. (Junior members do one hour.) I know many who do much more. If one of a pair doesn't turn up the work cannot be done. So personal accountability is central to the whole system.
I joined the Legion of Mary when I was 13 and in First Year in secondary school. Our praesidium met in the school, though not during school hours. One of the things that impressed me was that meetings began and ended on time. There are no open-ended meetings. A praesidium meeting may not last longer than 90 minutes nor shorter than an hour.
The process for the canonisation of three Legionaries, Frank Duff, Edel Quinn and Alfie Lambe, is well on its way. The Legion website notes: [Frank Duff's] profound insights into the role of the Blessed Virgin in the plan of
Redemption, as also into the role of the lay faithful in the mission of the
Church, are reflected in the Legion Handbook which is almost entirely his
composition.
Edel Quinn went from Ireland as an envoy of the Legion of Mary to East Africa at the age of 29 and suffering from tubercolosis. She did heroic work there until her death in 1944. The Legion website notes: Edel died in
Nairobi on May 12, 1944. In 1957 the Archbishop of Nairobi initiated the
process for her Beatification and many witnesses were examined, monoly in
Africa and Ireland. Their evidence, published by the Holy See, points not only
to outstanding holiness but to holiness in its most attractive form. The words
love, joy, peace appear in almost every testimony. The Vicar General of
Mauritius was speaking for many when he said 'I want to lay special emphasis on
her constant joy; she was always smiling; she never complained; she was always
at people’s disposal, never stinting her time'.
Alfie
Lambe went to South America in 1952, aged only 21, as a Legion of Mary envoy.
Like Edel Quinn, he was in poor health. Yet Frank Duff saw his potential as a
lay missionary as he had seen that in Edel Quinn, overcoming opposition in both
cases when sending these two young people on difficult missions.
Alfie (Alphonsus) was born on the feast of the Birthday of St John the Baptist in Tullamore, Ireland, during the International Eucharistic Congress in Dublin. He acquired the nickname El Corderito, 'The Little Lamb', in Latin America. The Legion website tells us: For almost six
years he worked ceaselessly in promoting the Legion of Mary in Columbia,
Argentina, Ecuador, Uruguay and Brazil. After a short but grave illness he died
in Buenos Aires on the feast of St. Agnes, 21st January 1959 . . . He is buried in the vault of the Irish Christian Brothers, in
the Recoleta Cemetery, Buenos Aires.
I see two examples of what I call the 'thoughtfulness' of God and of his Blessed Mother here. Every year on the feast of St Agnes of Rome the pope blesses two lambs whose wool will later be used in making palliums, the special stole that metropolitan archbishops wear. This tradition is because of the similarity between the name Agnes and the Latin for lamb: agnus, used in so many references to Jesus as the Lamb of God. So the death of El Corderito on the feast of St Agnes has a fittingness about it.
The other example of the 'thoughtfulness' of God and of his Blessed Mother that I see is that Alfie is buried in the vault of the Irish Christian Brothers in Buenos Aires. Alfie had spent some time in the novitiate of the Brothers in Dublin but had to leave because of his poor health, something that initially broke his heart.
A prayer that is central to Legionaries is Mary's
own prayer, the Magnificat (Luke 1:46-55). This is prayed as part of the Catena (chain) in the middle of every Legion meeting and prayed by Legionaries every day. The singers here are German-born siblings living in Ecuador, one of the countries where Alfie Lambe worked.
The prayer of gratitude of every Legionary of Mary today is expressed in Mary's prayer: My soul glorifies the Lord.
Centennial of the Legion of Mary
Bishop Fintan Monahan of Killaloe, Ireland speaks about this moment in the history of the Legion of Mary.
[I came across this video after posting on my blog about the centenial.]
GospelMark 7:31-37(English Standard Version Anglicised: India)
Then Jesus returned from the region of Tyre and went through
Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis.And they brought to him a man who was
deaf and had a speech impediment, and they begged him to lay his hand
on him.And taking him aside from the crowd privately, he
put his fingers into his ears, and after spitting touched his tongue.And looking up to heaven, he
sighed and said to him, “Ephphatha”, that is, “Be opened.”And his ears were opened, his tongue was
released, and he spoke plainly.And Jesus charged them to tell no one.
But the more he charged them, the more zealously they proclaimed it.And they were astonished beyond
measure, saying, “He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and
the mute speak.
In the Second Reading today
St James asks in his blunt way, For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into
your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in,and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine
clothing and say, “You sit here in a good place”, while you say to the
poor man, “You stand over there”, or, “Sit down at my feet”,have you not then made distinctions among
yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?
In 1982 I
spent three months working in a hospital in a city in the the US Midwest. I
noticed that a particular nurse always wore a pro-life badge, for which I
admired her. But in the three months I was there as chaplain to patients and
staff on the floor we both worked on she never spoke to me except at a weekly
staff meeting. I was curious rather than hurt by this and before I finished I
asked her if we could meet. I told her what I had noticed and expressed my
admiration for her quiet pro-life stand. She was quite taken aback, as she had
never been conscious of ignoring me. It turned out that she had once had a bad
experience with a priest and had 'tuned out' on all priests. We had a very good conversation and ended up hugging each other.
The nurse had been making distinctions but was far
from being a judge with evil thoughts. We can be such, by
deliberately shutting out another person or group of persons from our life. But
very often we are unaware of others or of their needs.
Fr Joseph Coyle
(28 February 1937 - 18 December 1991)
One group of persons that is largely ignored in the
Church, is the Deaf. (Those who are profoundly deaf refer to themselves as a
group as 'The Deaf', with an upper-case 'D'.) One of my late Columban
colleagues, Fr Joseph Coyle from the city of Derry in Northern Ireland, worked
for many years in what is now the Diocese of Kabankalan, in the southern part
of the province of Negros Occidental, Philippines. Early in his time in remote parishes he
became aware of the needs of persons who had lost limbs. He helped many to get
artificial limbs.
But later he noticed that there were persons who
were more or less totally isolated, even from their own families - persons who
were profoundly deaf from birth or from early childhood. They did not even have
a common language with their parents or siblings. Their deafness was
experienced as an affliction by themselves and their families. They all felt a
sense of powerlessness.
In English the word 'dumb' has come to mean
'stupid' because of the perception in the past that those who used to be
described as 'deaf and dumb' were stupid.
Fr Joe Coyle then focused his ministry on the Deaf.
In the late 1980s he set up a residence in Bacolod City, Welcome Home, for
out-of-town students so that they could attend schools with special education
programmes for the Deaf. That particular need is now being met more and more in
public schools in other cities and towns.
One of the services of Welcome Home Foundation, Inc. today
is to send catechists to local public schools where there are profoundly deaf
students. Some of these catechists are themselves profoundly deaf. Welcome Home
also strongly encourages parents of profoundly deaf children to learn Sign
Language and holds classes for them.
While based
in Bacolod City from 2002 until 2017 I regularly celebrated Mass in Welcome
Home, using my limited Sign Language and with the help of interpreters, some of
them profoundly deaf. When I left the Philippines in 2017 the Deaf participated
in one of the Masses in San Sebastian Cathedral on the last Sunday of the
month. (I’m not sure what the situation is during the Covid-19 pandemic). The current chaplain to Welcome Home and the Deaf in Bacolod is Fr Art Arnaiz CICM who has been involved with the Deaf since his seminary days and is fluent in Filipino Sign Language.
But I know that there have been times when
parishioners and priests in various places have complained that signing
interpreters were a 'distraction'. In some instances the Deaf have been made
clearly unwelcome at Mass. Maybe some of those who made them feel such are
already in 'St James territory' (Second Reading).
I do not know the source of the sorrow of the old
man in Van Gogh's painting above, which expresses very painful isolation. But
isolation is what many profoundly deaf persons feel, especially if they are
seen as 'dumb' in the modern sense. And what must deaf persons feel if some
don't even want to welcome them at the celebration of Holy Mass, our most
important act of worship as Catholic Christians to our loving Father?
As in so many of the healing stories in the Gospel,
we see Jesus giving his full attention to the person in need. We see him
engaging physically with that person, using his very spittle in the act of
enabling the man to hear and to speak clearly.
Again, as in so many of the healing stories, Jesus
is bringing someone back into the circle. The man's deafness and speech
impediment, the latter a direct result of the former, isolated him to a large
degree from his own family and community. Now he was fully part of them again.
'E.T. phone home' scene
I remember seeing the movie E.T. the
Extra-Terrestial with a young friend, Glenn, who is profoundly, though
not totally deaf, due to Usher's Syndrome, which also affects his sight. At the
time he was about the same age as Elliott, the boy in the clip above. I watched
the movie through Glenn's eyes, with a deeper appreciation of what is involved
when a profoundly deaf person and a hearing person are trying to communicate.
It can be very hard work, but rewarding.
Nearly thirty years ago I saw something
very beautiful at the Home of Joy in Tayuman, Tondo, Manila, a home for
children run by the Missionaries of Charity. I was looking for a particular
girl who was profoundly deaf. I'll call her Maria. I found her playing with a
group of other girls, all of them using Sign Language. But only Maria was deaf.
Without being aware of it, she had invited her friends into her world of
silence - and they, without being aware of it, had invited her into their world
of sound. All were equal.
A very important detail in the
gospel is that not only did the deaf man's friends bring him to Jesus but they
begged him to lay his hand on him.
Many churches in the western world
have what is called a 'loop system' whereby those who are hard of hearing and
use hearing aids can participate fully in Mass and other services. Being hard
of hearing is something that very often comes with growing old, and I am
experiencing that myself now - I've been using hearing aids for nearly four years now - but it is a very different reality from profound deafness, especially if that
deafness has been there since birth or early childhood.
The soul of a
profoundly deaf person yearns for the living God just as much as the soul of a
hearing person. But do we, the majority who are hearing, really allow/enable
the Deaf to participate fully in the Holy
Mass?
When
Signing is Singing
St
Mary's School for Deaf Girls' Choir, Dublin
Teacher
/ Conductor: Shirley Higgins
Traditional Latin Mass (TLM)
Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost
The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 9-5-2021 if necessary).
Epistle: Galatians 5:25-26; 6:1-10. Gospel: Luke 7:11-16.
Behold a dead man was carried out, the only son of his mother; and she was a widow (Luke 7:12).
Authentic Beauty
Authentic beauty, however, unlocks the yearning of the human heart, the profound desire to know, to love, to go towards the Other, to reach for the Beyond.
Complaining
Pharisee
