Twenty-Four Years of Brothers and Sisters

[an old post, updated]

Today is my twenty-fourth anniversary of baptism. I don't think I had any idea what I was getting into that Saturday midday when I walked up out of the basement of Freeman Hall at Connecticut College, made my way out the Williams St. gate and went down to Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Quaker Hill. Perhaps it's part of the mercy of God that I had little idea. In any case, the Holy Spirit knew what he was doing and that's what matters.

As always, this anniversary reminds me to thank God and pray for all the people he has given me along the way, those who have been bearers of the graces God has willed in his generosity towards a lukewarm disciple like myself.

Our New Deacons And The Journey

Two of the brothers here at the friary are to be ordained deacon tomorrow morning. Each in his own way has had a long journey toward the sacred ministry, and I'm very happy for them both. Pray for them, in thanksgiving to God for their vocations and for their openness to the graces that will open up for them in the days and seasons to come.

The occasion reminds me even more strongly that it was five years ago today, on the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, that I was ordained deacon. It was at St. Peter's in Cambridge, Massachusetts, together with one other Capuchin and my Jesuit classmates through the laying on of hands of F.X. Irwin, retired auxiliary bishop of Boston. I have a few vivid memories of the day: How it was one of the only times I have ever worn a regular clerical outfit, since the dalmatics the Jesuits supplied for the ordination did not fit well over our Capuchin hoods. How when I prayed Midafternoon Prayer later in the day my spirit rejoiced at the first time I was praying the Liturgy of the Hours according to the promise of my ordination. How my provincial minister not long after the Mass informed me that I would be ordained priest on the Blessed Mother's birthday the following year.

That's five years in the clerical state, and what a journey it's turning out to be.

Reflecting on the whole business does a lot for me in appreciating grace. I didn't join the Order with any strong idea about being a priest; I just knew that I wanted to be a Franciscan. In fact, when I got into studies I found it hard to know how to even discern the question of whether or not to present myself as a candidate for Orders. Nevertheless, as I have prayed through the experience of priesthood these past few years, I have become convinced that it is a grace and vocation that God has been working in me for much longer than I ever knew.

This helps me to remember that our discernments and reflections on God's will for us are never complete, and that God's purposes in the greater economies of grace are larger than our own consciousness of what we call our spiritual life. Remembering this helps me to trust. All that is required is openness to what is at hand and faithfulness to the next step God reveals.

Discernment

The more years pass in my ongoing, bumbling attempt at Christianity, I realize that for me discernment means the adoption of my best guesses at God's perspective on things.

The iconic moment in this movement came when one of my professors helped me to know how to discern whether or not to present myself as a candidate for Holy Orders. I went back and forth on this question when I was in the formation program, mostly because I didn't know how to discern it. I didn't join the Order with the idea of becoming a priest; I only knew that I wanted to be a Franciscan. The discernment experience from the religious call didn't seem to apply to discerning the clerical call, and I was kind of at a loss.

Did I feel called to be a priest? Did I desire it? My professor turned my perspective around for me: 'The question isn't whether or not you feel called to be a priest, or whether you want it, but in what way is the priesthood of Jesus Christ trying to take shape in your life.'

It's not about what I want or how I feel--though the presence of attraction and giftedness on the natural level is an important confirmation--but about reading the signs of what God is up to in one's life.

The other night one of our guys asked me if I thought he was ready to be ordained deacon. I said no, and he was a little shocked. What human being is ready to approach the altar as servant of the sacred mysteries? Who of us even deserves the privilege of serving another human being? But I explained my point: the 'am I ready?' question is the wrong approach. The real question is to look at the graces and circumstances of life up to this point, and ask if the next step seems like where God is directing one's life. So, I said to this brother, has God not given you the graces you needed to survive many years of religious formation and theological education? Do you feel the desire to preach and serve that he has put into your heart?

It's important for me to continue to apply this model to myself in these days. I have a lot of doubts about my capacity to fulfill my obedience of obtaining the doctorate. Can I finally unlearn certain bad study habits I fell into as a child? Is my vocation mature enough to be able to spend so much time alone with just the great doctors and my dictionaries? Can I live my religious life well enough here in a formation house, and still be able to give good example to the brothers in formation on a number of levels?

Such questions are important in the sense that they come up in the process of discernment, but I need to keep in mind that they are not the heart of discernment for me. My discernment question is simply this: has God not been pointing me in the direction of this project in many ways and for a long time? When I was a teenager, did He not first begin to call me to Himself through an intoxicating mix of mathematics and Platonic mysticism, inspiring a sort of wonder that I sometimes perceive again as I read the medievals now? Did God not give me the desire to complete the STL degree back when I was in my diaconate year, arranging many other things to make sure it got done? Did God not give me the inspiration, when I was a parish priest, to spend the occasional day off in the library of St. Joseph's Seminary reading Bonaventure's commentary on the Sentences? Who does that?

Again, I think that is the sort of thing that discernment means for me; the attempt to adopt God's perspective and to make our best guess at where God is pointing us. Like all good spiritual practice, it relieves us of the tyranny of ourselves and our feelings.

Four Years a Cleric

Today I am four years in the clerical state of life; on this feast of Our Lady of the Rosary four years ago, another friar, a bunch of Jesuits and I were ordained deacons at St. Peter's in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Having my religious life compounded by diaconate and the priesthood that followed eleven months later (on Our Lady's birthday) has retained a kind of adventitious character for me. It still seems new somehow, even after four years. I think it's at least partly because I didn't come to the Franciscan life having thought much about priesthood. My desire and interest was to be a friar. I remember going for an interview with my home diocese in between my time with the OFM and before I entered the Capuchins. Thinking myself a good candidate to be a secular seminarian--relatively young, having the ideal academic background, etc.--I was shocked when the vocation director said that my sense of priestly vocation didn't seem well formed. He was quite right. I hadn't really thought about it. As it turned out later, I didn't really know how to think about it either.

In the course of my formation with the Capuchins, however, the question came up eventually. Should I declare myself a candidate for Orders or remain a lay friar? I wasn't sure, but my real problem was that I didn't know how to discern the question. I had come to the Franciscan religious life because it was what I wanted to do as an individual Christian; I had decided, to the best of my discernment, that this was the best way for me to live out my baptism. Priesthood didn't seem to me to be the same sort of question. It wasn't something I should present myself for just because I might desire it. It was more of a public property than that.

I thank God that I had a wise director at the time, who advised me to examine my own experience of myself as a public minister. How did I experience myself at the moments I was called upon to preach? To lead public prayer? This practice confirmed for me the words of one of my most important teachers at the former Weston Jesuit School of Theology, who said, "The question isn't whether or not you think you want to be a priest; the question is whether the priesthood of Jesus Christ is struggling to born in you in this particular way."

Based on all of that, but not without some trepidation, I was able to consent to declaring myself a candidate for ordination to the diaconate and thence to the priesthood. I am now convinced that this life of religious priesthood is where God was aiming me all along, even though I didn't know it. But I didn't need to know it, and that's part of the point. God only inspired me and gave me the desire to take the next step at each moment along the way. This experience has helped me to remember a salutary spiritual truth that I have kept in mind ever since: Just because God leads us somewhere, or we have the grace to put good discernment into practice in leading our Christian lives, it doesn't mean that we know the whole story at any given moment. God's plans for us are bigger than we know.

Y Con Tu Espiritu

Before I came here to my first assignment, my Sunday Eucharist was in Spanish for several years. In the parish where I served as deacon I used to do the childrens' liturgy of the Word during the Spanish Mass, and in the parish where I lived during studies I had the ministry of monitor--the one who reads the pious (and sometimes awful) introductions to the Mass and the readings of the day. I was also entrusted with the solemn demand that everyone turn off their mobile devices at the beginning of Mass: favor de apagar los beeperes y celulares. 'Beeperes;' that still cracks me up. In most places I've lived in the Order--with the exception of the year of novitiate--the Spanish Mass was the most vibrant celebration. I also appreciated the language practice, so the choice was clear.

I mention all of this because of a telling experience I had this morning. At our little, intimate early Mass (6:45 am in the small chapel) there was someone among us who was clearly more accustomed to Mass in Spanish. It wasn't words that gave it away, but gesture: the waving of the arms back at the priest at the 'also with yous,' the insistence on hand-holding at the Our Father, etc.

I was really struck by how foreign such behavior had become to me in less than three years in a parish of German- and Irish-American history (and sensibility) and with Mass only in English (although there is a little Latin mixed in when I do it, though in the vox secreta.) Gestures of prayer that were an ordinary part of my life for many years--though I may not have participated in them myself--had now become foreign to me.

It just goes to show how much we are formed by where and with whom we choose to pray, or where the Holy Spirit puts us.

Our Lady of the Rosary

Today's memorial is special to me because I was ordained deacon on this day three years ago. So a little bit later this morning I'll be embarking on my fourth year of the clerical state.

I remember learning the rosary as a catechumen. I had bought one at good old St. Jude's on Campbell Ave. in West Haven, Connecticut--how little I could have imagined then that only five years later, after many twists and turns, I would be living the hermit life in a little apartment around the corner! I had received a little tri-fold pamphlet of instructions with the rest of my catechetical materials. I remember how, for each of the fifteen mysteries (this was before the Luminous Mysteries) there was a little picture with one of the virtues listed under it. Each of these virtues had the label, "fruit of the mystery."

I guessed that it meant that by meditating on the various mysteries, one could obtain the various virtues. For example, meditation on the Visitation was associated with charity, the carrying of the Cross with patience, the Resurrection with faith, etc. I remember being intrigued but perplexed, and I wondered how this was supposed to work. What was the mechanism by which meditation on the mysteries was supposed to produce virtues?

Praying the rosary over the years, and reflecting on the meaning and purpose of discursive meditation, I think I have come to understand. Too often we treat the mysteries of faith, or the events of the lives of Our Lord and Our Lady as if we were merely spectators. They become beautiful and miraculous spectacles which we admire and love for their sublimity. Not that there is anything wrong with this in itself, but we are called to a much deeper place than this. Meditation on the mysteries of the rosary is meant to help us understand ourselves and our own deepest identity; we are to step into the mysteries with our minds, hearts, and lives. Perhaps better, we are meant to allow the mysteries to step into us.

After all, this is why the Eternal Word borrowed human flesh from the virgin motherhood of Mary and became man, so that our humanity--by being joined to the humanity of Christ through baptism and Holy Communion--might have the opportunity to be caught up into the joy, delight, and communion of the Life of the Blessed Trinity. Thus we bear virtuous fruit when we fulfill our vocation as Christ-ians, as those who are formed into the human members of the humanity of Christ.

This is what we pray for in the prayer that concludes the rosary, when we ask that we who meditate on these mysteries might "imitate what they contain, and obtain what they promise."

What Can a Deacon Bless?

Our brand new transitional deacon, ordained this past Saturday, wrote me an email asking clarification about those things to which he could now impart blessings. Most ordinary blessings are open to deacons, but some blessings--especially those that deal with the public cult and veneration of the Church--are not.

So I went through my trusty De Benedictionibus, an impulse buy for 41 euro when we were in Rome two summers ago, and made a list of those things a deacon can bless:

Water (i.e. "make" holy water), rosaries, holy pictures and statues destined for private veneration, medals, and personal religious articles in general. Families, couples, children, women before or after giving birth, old folks, sick folks, catechists, catechetical meetings, parish meetings, pilgrims, travelers, new homes, new schools and universities, new libraries, new hospitals, offices and shops, vehicles, technical equipment and tools, animals, fields and flocks, first fruits, and tables and meals.


Certain blessings, however, require a member of the priestly order. They include:

The blessing of a cathedra, ambo, tabernacle, of fonts and baptisteries, images of the Lord and the saints for public veneration, new church doors, bells, and organs, cemeteries, seminaries, and missionaries.

Seventeen Years of Brothers and Sisters

Tomorrow is my anniversary of baptism; I will be seventeen years old. By Providence I have a liturgical day free of obligation for public Mass, so I intend to get up early and offer a Mass for those whom the Lord has given me along the way:

First, for my first priest, Fr. Larry, and for the friars and parishioners of St. Mary's in New Haven, whose reverence and piety first attracted me to prayer.

Second, for Deacon Ron, who baptized me, and for his family; for Fr. Leo Sutula, requeiscat in pace, who gave me my first Holy Communion and who also heard my first confession; for Bishop Dan Reilly, who confirmed me; for Fr. Dan, OFM, who invested me in the Franciscan habit; for Fr. Michael, OFM Cap., who received my profession of both temporary and perpetual vows; for Bishop Francis X. Irwin, who ordained me deacon; and for Cardinal Sean O'Malley, OFM Cap. who ordained me priest.

Third, for my spiritual directors, from whom I have profited so much: Fr. Charles, Sr. Joyce, Fr. Confer, Mr. Zepf, Sr. Vivienne, Sr. Pat, priests of the Discalced Carmelites and Oblates of the Virgin Mary whose names I have forgotten, and Fr. Karl.

Fourth, for my formation directors: Vincent and Fr. Aubrey, Fr. Andrew and Br. Richard, Fr. Bill and Fr. Raphael, Br. John and Ken, Fr. Marty, Fr. Tom, and Fr. Jack.

Fifth, for my classmates in religious life: Phil, Hank, Brian, Mike, Ken, John, Steve, Robert, Sam, Tom, James, Arlen, Justin, Drew, Jim, Bart, Louis, and Marvin.

Sixth, for the teachers who have been so encouraging to me: Fr. Dominic and Br. Bill of the OFM, Carlos ('the real teacher'), Antonio, ('el Loco'), Khaled, Sr. Meg, Cathy, Fr. John of the Sulpicians, and Frs. John, Randy, Peter, Dan, and Stanley of the Society of Jesus.

This is going to be one long memento for the living!

In The Homiletic Bind

This is "mission appeal" weekend for us, when a priest from a far away place comes and preaches and appeals for prayers and financial support. Because of this, I did not prepare to preach this weekend, as Fr. Visitor would be preaching at all the Masses.

Unfortunately, Fr. Visitor missed his flight this morning, and will not arrive until later on in the evening. This leaves me in a bind for the vigil Mass tonight. Since the day I was ordained deacon, I have not presumed to give a liturgical homily without preparing ahead of time, and I don't intend to start now.

However, I am obligated to offer a homily. (see c. 767 in your Code of Canon Law) So what am I going to do, seeing as I don't want to (1) preach without being prepared or (2) deny the people the homily to which they have a right on Sundays, and thereby (3) commit a mortal sin?

Well, here's my solution: Thanks to my favorite homily helper, the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, (of which I only have the Mark volume so far) the people are going to get a little bit of Augustine's homily on the gospel.

Grateful

Yesterday I finally got to my "home" parish to offer a Mass of Thanksgiving. Not that it was my home for very long; I was only a parishioner of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Quaker Hill, Connecticut for three short semesters when I was in college. Nevertheless, because I received the sacraments of initiation there, it will be always be home in a certain sense.

As I drove up to the church, I looked at the sidewalk and remembered how it was the last walk I took as an unbaptized seeker. The permanent deacon who baptized me assisted with the Mass, and among those present were his wife and my godfather, who is a captain in the Coast Guard and a professor at their academy. It was almost overwhelming to pronounce the Lord's words of consecration at the same altar from which I received my first Holy Communion.

So today, with two funerals on deck and trying to recover from a being absent from my regular ministry for a day, I am trying to remember to be grateful for my vocation. Gratitude saves us from so much misery.

One For The Canonists

The other day someone pointed out article 9, paragraph 3 of Summorum pontificum to me, which gives clerics in major orders (i.e. bishops, presbyters, and deacons) permission to pray the Liturgy of the Hours according to the Roman Breviary of 1962.

But this raises some questions about obligation. What about Prime? If someone is praying with the breviary of Bl. John XXIII, is he obligated to recite it, seeing as it doesn't exist in the current rite and is thus absent from the current Canon Law?

And what about the "little hours," Terce, Sext, and None in the usus antiquior and Mid-Morning, Midday, and Mid-Afternoon Prayer in (the American English translation of) the Breviary of Paul VI? According to the current understanding, clerics outside of choir only have to pray one of these three at some time between Morning and Evening Prayer. Was this a relaxation of the reform or was it in effect before? Is a cleric using the 1962 breviary obligated to all three, or not?

Just wondering as I take a morning off to strain out the gnat and swallow the camel.

Diagnosis

This past weekend one of the retired priests was going to his "help out" (That's what you call it when religious priests without a parochial assignment assist at a parish with weekend Masses) and was curious to hear the promised "guest preacher." Unfortunately the guest preacher turned out to be a diocesan official who announced that the pastor--who had already disappeared--was under investigation for using the parish funds to support his gambling habit.

So we have in our area another depressing story of the clergy getting caught while up to no good. How does this happen? How do we priests--who (presumably) teach and preach high ideals day after day--fall into these double lives and get caught in such sinful crimes?

Do we need a reform of the clergy, as has happened at our moments in our Church's history? What's wrong with the Catholic priesthood, with all of its spiritual malaise and reports of low morale?

If, in my very personal and arrogant opinion, I were to hazard a diagnosis of what's wrong with the clergy, I would point to three things right away:

1. We don't say our prayers. Each of us, when we were ordained deacon (or subdeacon if it was before August 1972) promised to observe the Liturgy of the Hours faithfully on behalf of the Church and the world. It has not been my general impression that we take this promise very seriously.

2. We have allowed ourselves to absorb the bourgeois values of the North American upper middle class.

3. We have permitted the culture of the clergy to absorb the values and attitudes of certain decadent subcultures from the surrounding society.

But, as I say, these are only IMAO, "In my arrogant opinion."

Debut

My first day as a deacon was really something. Fortunately for me, the experienced permanent deacon was there for all the Masses, coaching me and sharing the deacon duties with me in genuine spirit of ministerial hospitality. Here's how it went:

Mass #1: Early morning Mass in English, without music. My first bumbling attempt at setting up the altar.

Mass #2: Principal Mass in English, with the choir. My first proclamation of the Gospel, which I forgot to kiss when it was done. Coffee time afterwards with the English-speaking folks.

Mass #3: Principal Mass in Spanish, with the baptism of four babies. My first dismissal of the assembly. Then we were given Latino lunch.

Mass #4: Mass with the Sudanese community for the celebration of the feast of Daniel Comboni, the first bishop of Khartoum. The Mass was partly in English, with all of the sung parts and responses in Arabic. It was very beautiful, actually. After this Mass we were given Sudanese supper, and I gave my first meal blessing.

What a day! But I'm very grateful.

Sunday

Yesterday I was up north at the parish where I spend the weekends. I served at a couple of Masses and helped with a blessing of animals, in preparation for the feast of Francis this week.

As, praised be Jesus Christ and thanks to your prayers, I am to be ordained to the diaconate on saturday, I realized that yesterday was my last Sunday as a layman. Though I'm very happy about the ordination, I felt a little grief too.

I figure that, apart from the occasional blizzard or traveling misadventure, I've been going to the Sunday Eucharist for the past eight hundred Sundays or so. And I've participated in a lot of ways: Both before and during my religious life I've been a quiet member of the assembly. I've served as a reader, a cantor, and an acolyte. I've been monitor at Masses in Spanish. I've even been Master of Ceremony once in a while.

There's been a great variety and choice in my place in the Sunday assembly, but this is about to change. In accepting a hierarchical office and a particular place in the Eucharistic assembly, I realize that from here on in Sundays will be something new.

Every spiritual choice closes the doors to other options. But new doors open as well. To hold them all up in reverence and thoughtfulness, that's discernment.