October 2009

Collection: Saturday 5:30PM $3234; Sunday 8:30AM $325; 10:00AM $416; 11:00AM $323; 12:30PM$803; 8:00PM $533; Week Masses $514; Total $6,148- Thank you.

–All Saints is a beloved Catholic celebration. We honor today the countless men and women who enjoy the beatific vision of God in heaven and are called “The Blessed”. Their good example and prayers help us to persevere on our journey of faith. St. Augustine reflects that if they were able to overcome all sorts of trials and challenges, why shouldn’t we too? Do you remember in the Baltimore Catechism the question: Why were we created by God? And the simple answer was: “To love and serve Him in this life and enjoy him in the life to come”. The Beatitudes are the Magna Charta of the Saints. Let the thought of the saints in heaven comfort and reassure us; let their prayer of intercession help us. By the way it is also the fifth anniversary of my appointment by Cardinal Egan here at SFDS. The parish is in a better situation.

–Tomorrow is the feastday entitled “The commemoration of the Dead”. It is the day when we pray for All Souls. While Limbo is gone, the Purgatory is still very much in place. It is a state, a situation, a place where souls can purify themselves before being admitted into the presence of God. Pope Benedict makes a big reference to it in his Encyclical on Hope which I interpreted as being something like this. Right or wrong, our tolerant culture would find an unmerciful God very difficult to stomach and wants God to extend his forgiveness and salvation generously; loves to think that a merciful God will open the door of his heavenly kingdom to the poor exiled children of Eve. But treating evil too mercifully seems to be an insult to goodness and holiness and justice. Placing victims and perpetrators of unspeakable crimes in the same mansion of heaven seems to be an insult to anything we hold sacred. The Pope argues this is one more reason for an omnipotent and merciful God to find a way, a place, a mode whereby souls will undergo whatever  self-purification is deemed necessary to be made worthy of God’s forgiveness. Hopefully I am not making the pope saying things he didn’t mean. But that is the gist I took from it and it makes a lot of sense. –However, if you want to pray for your dead use the special envelopes at the back write their names on it, enclose an offering and we’ll place them by the tabernacle and remember them during November, especially at Mass. It is a good Catholic tradition. Last year I introduced an evening Mass but it didn’t really work out. It is not a day of obligation. It is only a devotional day.

– On Saturday December 5^th, there will be a fundraiser for the victims of the Filipino floods and natural disasters: hundreds of dead and thousands of homeless, combined with the celebration of the “Misa del Gallo” or “Simbang Gabi”.

–On Sat. Dec. 12^th will be the turn of our Spanish community to hold their Christmas Concert and Dinner from 6:30 to 11PM. The tickets ($10) are available now. It is a church fundraiser. For more information 212 860 0594/917 492 1352.

–We had our Census weekend last Sunday and the final toll was  650. It could have been better but for the rain and the late Yankees match which impacted the early Masses. I reckon that we have an average attendance fluctuating around the 500 mark. Our population is very diverse. There are a lot of young faces in our congregation, which is good. Much sincere humble devotion too.

–Here is a message from the Director of our website. Dear Father Victor: I am also sorry I did not make the council meeting, because I wanted to suggest that we add a parish council page to the website or get additional administrators, so we can add the long-promised biographical sketches of Fathers John and Matthew. I had a trial last week and wasn’t able to attend to much else. The site has gone over 50 hits several days in the last few weeks, and is now averaging over 30 hits a day. Sunday and Monday are the highest volume days. No day since July 10 has been below 10 hits.  Best, Phil

–Bethany Spirituality Center, Highland Mills, NY, offers the following: “Women’s Ways to God”, new monthly morning retreat program for women, directed by Sr. Rosemary Mangan, RJM, on Wednesdays, November 18 (“Finding God in My Choices”), and December 16 (“Finding God in Others”), 9:00am to 11:30am. Donation accepted. Please call (845) 460-3061 to register. Anyone who would like to stay for lunch and/or afternoon private time, please indicate when you call.

Curtis Martin

–Theology on Tap-NYC for Young Adults in their 20s and 30s and early 40s:  Join young adults for a series of lectures at Metro 53 Bar and Restaurant, 307 East 53rd Street, between 2nd and 1st Avenues.  The event is from 7pm-8:30pm.  The final lecture of Fall 2009 is on November 16, 2009, by Curtis Martin, founder of FOCUS.  The topic for this night is “Made for More: Why Be Ordinary When You Can Be Great?”  For more details, visit www.totnyc.org In Christ, Mario

–Here’s a joke.The Baby’s Name. “I’ve decided on a name for the baby,” said the young mother. “I shall call her Euphrosyne.” Her husband did not care for the selection, but being a tactful fellow, he was far too wise to declare his objection. “Splendid,” he said cheerfully. “The first girl I ever loved was called Euphrosyne, and the name will revive pleasant memories.” There was a brief period of silence, then: “We’ll call her Elizabeth, after my mother,” said the young wife firmly. And there were smiles all over.

–I was visited this week by the architect and the company that is going to install the chair lift at the entrance of the church. It will consist of a chair that moves automatically up the steps. People on wheel chair will have to leave the wheel chair and sit on it. Anything more bulky would be unsightly. They took all measurements. Now it will be constructed. Then installed. Installation will take a couple of days. It should be in place by the end of November and certainly before Christmas. We’ll have to work out how to manage this new feature. There will be a key switch. I have seen chair lifts inside homes and my preoccupation is now that it be constructed well and sturdy for outside use.

–Dr. McNiff, the superintendent of Catholic Schools writes: Dear Principals, Pastors and Parents– As part of the state bailout of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, state lawmakers imposed the metropolitan commuter transportation mobility tax commonly known as the MTA Payroll Tax – on certain employers within the 12-county MTA region, including schools. Under this new law however, only public schools will be reimbursed by the state. The cost to religious and independent schools is approximately $6 million. Our Catholic Schools, no doubt, will find it enormously difficult if not impossible, to comply with this new tax without possibly cutting programs, or reducing expenses in other areas that would have a negative impact on the school (like turning down the thermostat) and/or by raising additional revenue that will further strain the ability of parents to send their children to our schools. The Archdiocese of New York already subsidizes our schools in the amount of $30 million per year and cannot take on this additional and unjust burden. Senator Jeff Klein and Assembly Member Mike Spano have introduced legislation to reimburse our schools as well. Dr. McNiff asks us to speak out now loudly/forcefully, especially because the first MTA payment is due on November 2. Telephone numbers of politicians can be found at www.nyscatholic.org

– The Synod on Africa has come to an end and 57 propositions have been sent to the Pope. They used to be secret but Pope Benedict asked that the list be published and so it was made public. Some very interesting stuff. I’ll give you some examples of it. A more collaborative style of decision-making in the church, including greater respect for the contributions of religious women and men, laity, women, and young people. New structures to foster decision-making authority by women in the church, including a recommendation that the Vatican create a study commission on women in the church within the Pontifical Council for the Family. Better formation for Africa’s laity, especially those involved in public life, to avoid the spectacle of prominent Catholics involved in corruption and bloodshed. Combating tribalism inside the church, including cases in which bishops’ conferences have been divided along ethnic lines, and priests have opposed bishops from outside the dominant tribal group. Ensuring that Catholic leaders do not take partisan positions in national or regional politics, so they can serve as an independent voice of conscience. Fidelity by African priests to celibacy and detachment from material goods. An end to “simony” by priests who make money from the sale of sacramentals  such as holy water and oils. We shall see how much of this gets implemented.

For the first time in 20 years, a priest of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis has been appointed a bishop. On Oct. 19, Archbishop Pietro Sambi, apostolic nuncio to the United States, announced that Pope Benedict XVI had chosen Father Paul D. Etienne, pastor of St. Paul Parish in Tell City, to become the new bishop of Cheyenne, Wyo. He will be ordained a bishop on Dec. 9 in Cheyenne. Here is how it went. Let’s listen to him. Well, it was bizarre. I don’t know what else to say. Archbishop Sambi called the office at the parish and it was my day off. I was up at the family farm with a chain saw, working in the woods. When he called, I was just getting out of my pickup truck. I was in my Carhart jeans and in my work boots, and had nothing to take notes with. I was just sitting there in my truck listening to him tell me that I’ve just been named bishop. And he had to say ‘Cheyenne’ four times before I could understand what he was saying. I still just can hardly believe it. It’s a very unusual experience. And I couldn’t tell anyone about it because it was not announced yet.

I was just an emotional wreck Saturday night during Mass at Tell City, my own parish but also my own native place, where my family and my friends are. I just really had a difficult time getting through the Eucharistic prayer and the rest of Mass. I’m sure the whole congregation was wondering, ‘What is wrong with him?’ And then I left from Mass to go out to tell Mom and Dad because I was leaving on Saturday night (to go to Wyoming). While I was there, we called the rest of my brothers and sisters. It was very emotional: lots of joy, but also the sorrow of knowing that there was going to be a greater separation now between us. I was filled up with emotion. And I still am. I still have a little emotion each day, kind of being a little overwhelmed with it all.

There’s a liturgical song called ‘Canticle of the Turning.’ It’s a song about Mary. And the refrain of it says, ‘The world is about to turn.’ That hymn was in my mind for the next two days after I got that phone call. That phrase sums it up. My world turned with that one phone call. I was telling the Diocese of Evansville seminarians when I gave them a retreat this summer, ‘Guys, our lives are not our own. Our lives belong to Christ. Our lives belong to the Church. And we have to keep praying for the freedom that we need to be who the Lord needs us to be, to go where the Lord needs us to go, and to say what the Lord longs for us to say on his behalf.’ And now, as I got this phone call and made this journey to Wyoming, it’s just all the more clear and evident that my life is not my own anymore. I will now have someone else keeping my calendar and telling me where to go. It is no longer my own. It’s more and more the Church’s. But the theological understanding of the bishop is that it’s the fullness of the priesthood. And that’s what all this emotion translates to for me. It’s almost like a physical pouring in of the grace and the fullness of that spirit of this office of bishop. I feel it in an almost physical way. That’s what this abiding sense of peace is all about [that I had] yesterday. It’s just the presence of the Spirit and the fullness of God’s presence saying, ‘I am with you. Do not be afraid. I’ll give you the words to speak.’ It’s a physical experience of what this fullness of the priesthood is going to be on that ordination day.

The weekend before … I kind of lost it in my homily. In the Gospel, Jesus told Peter when he asked, ‘Lord, what’s in it for us? We’ve been following you?’ And Jesus says, ‘You, know, Peter, there’s no one who’s left everything behind for my sake that will not receive a hundred-fold more: family, friends, possessions, lands, with persecutions, and eternal life in the age to come.’ And I can hear that now more with a sense of peace. This is a part of the playing field. There are many blessings. But the cross is right in the middle of everything that is about Jesus Christ. And to ignore that is to be unrealistic. That’s why Jesus was so freely open and speaking about [this] with his Apostles and any Christian that follows him. So leaving Tell City behind after just arriving there again is a part of the sorrow of this new turning of the world for me. But it doesn’t change the joy that is a part of the call either.

I think everything I’ve done in my life, plus the 17 years of priesthood, has upon God’s grace. It’s taught me how we have to be men of faith and men of hope to be good shepherds in the Church, whether that’s as priests or bishops. It’s a part of that reality, again, of the cross being in the midst of the ministry. Are we going to focus just on the cross? Are we going to focus just on the joys? Or are we going to focus on the reality of it all as a whole? I think that’s a part of what 17 years of priesthood has been teaching me. The Lord’s in the midst of it all. And we just have to be realistic and embrace the reality.

“Veritas in Caritate” (“Truth in Love”) from Ephesians 4:15 will be my motto. It’s just been something that’s been very much on my mind. I’ve been making notes in my own journal over the years. This reality of truth, any time the Scriptures speak of truth—it’s just one of those things that capture my mind and my heart and my preaching. It’s something that I spoke to the seminarians about a lot when I was vocations director and vice rector of Bishop Simon Bruté College Seminary in Indianapolis. We can’t beat people over the head with the truth. You have to present the truth with love. It was a no-brainer with me when this call came. I went immediately to that passage as my motto. And I think the fact that the pope’s recent encyclical was the inversion of that, “Love in Truth,” was another confirmation to me that this is what it is. I didn’t even think about it [that connection]. That’s just what it was going to be.

The next few weeks are going to be given to my people at home. We’re going to enjoy being together for whatever time we have together now. And that’s parishioners, family and friends. They will be my focus now until I move and begin my ministry here. I will continue to be a strong advocate for priests as well as recruiting seminarians. I want to do two other things. I want to spend time in each of the deaneries of the diocese to celebrate with the people. And then I want to spend a good amount of time in the diocese—an evening, an afternoon, a night, a morning—with my priests just so that we can be together and visit. They can share with me what it’s like to be a member of this Presbyterate, their hopes and dreams for the future. And after 12 months of listening, then we’ll bring everybody together in a planning process for the future.

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