Franciscan at Home

In this year of the priest, these articles will be dedicated to catechetical saints who were priests. Since the year has been placed under the patronage of St. John Vianney, we will begin with him.

If one wants to understand the Curé of Ars (the pastor of Ars), one must understand the French Revolution. Often it is described as a fight to overthrow the corrupt and decadent reign of the French monarchy, and as far as it goes this was true. However, with that must be coupled the knowledge that the revolutionaries did the best they could to destroy the Catholic Church. Thousands of priests and religious were exiled, or executed. Others were imprisoned on ships, and other spent their days hiding from the so-called revolutionaries to avoid capture and imprisonment.1 The Vianney family was one of the devout families who hid these fugitives. These things continued after the so-called Reign of Terror officially ended. The thirteen year-old John Mary Vianney received his First Communion secretly in the house of a neighbor, with hay bales blocking the light from the windows to prevent discovery.

The Curé is famous for his ministry in the confessional. He heard confessions for up to 18 hours a day. 20,000 pilgrims a year came to see him in Ars. St. John Vianney also lived a deeply Eucharistic life. He often said, ‘Our Lord is hidden there, waiting for us to come and visit Him, and make our request to Him. See how good He is!’

He was also a priest who took his catechetical ministry very seriously. The Revolution had caused much religious ignorance and indifference; as a result many lived immoral lives and the Curé sought to rectify this.

Juan cuenta la historia de esta forma:

Hubo una boda en Canaán. María asistió como invitada. También estuvo presente Jesús, su Hijo. También estaban sus primeros discípulos. María se dio cuenta que se estaba acabando el vino, lo cual era una vergüenza tremenda para los anfitriones de la boda. Al ir con su Hijo, María le dijo con sencillez: ‘No tienen vino’.

Imagina a Jesús que la queda mirando profundamente, diciéndole con un pequeño suspiro: ‘¿Qué tengo yo contigo, mujer? Todavía no ha llegado mi hora.’ Lo mejor estaba por suceder. La respuesta de María. No dijo nada.

Ella encontró a los que servían el vino. Señaló a su Hijo. Dijo: ‘Hagan lo que Él les diga.’

‘Los catequistas… son los embajadores de Cristo, como si fuera Dios exhortando por sus bocas. Tienen el honor de colaborar en la difusión del Evangelio en virtud del poder divino. Su oficio no se deriva de los hombres sino de Dios por Jesucristo.

‘Esta conciencia de la misión divina del maestro cristiano debe de ser la ley de su actitud moral, la primera regla de sus pensamientos y conversaciones, la base de toda su actividad. Debe de suscitar en él los sentimientos de su deber y dignidad, además de contrarrestar el tedio de la rutina diaria. En la vida de San Pablo, generó dos sentimientos, dos pasiones se podría decir: una nobleza sin orgullo y una devoción sin reservas.’ [i]

Este cuadro de Caravaggio narra el relato histórica de lo que le sucedió a San Pablo antes de que fuera bautizado, mientras todavía le llamaban Saúl. Se narra esta historia tres veces en el Nuevo Testamento (Hechos 9:1-9; 22:5-16; 26:12-18) con variantes en el detalle y énfasis. Principalmente, ésta es una de las representaciones más poderosas de las características esenciales de la conversión cristiana.

Una forma en que se puede empezar a utilizar este cuadro, para adultos o niños, sería por medio de una lectura en voz alta, lentamente, siguiendo el drama del encuentro de Saúl con Cristo, señalando paso a paso cómo se describe la conversión en el cuadro.

Se propone la versión más completa de la historia en la tabla que sigue, tomado de Hechos 26. El texto de las Sagradas Escrituras se encuentra en la columna de lado izquierdo, y un comentario sobre el cuadro en la columna del lado derecho.

As we prepare for the Beatification of Cardinal John Henry Newman, Professor Norris helps us to understand Newman’s vision of education for mission.

In the month of October 1850 an announcement was made which shook the whole of England: the Catholic Hierarchy was to be restored in the land. After its banishment two hundred years previously it was now being set up again. ‘It is difficult to realise the fury caused. Protest meetings were held all over England, the Pope and Cardinal Wiseman were burned in effigy.... The agitation showed the strength of English Protestantism’[i]. The net effect of the agitation was that the Bishops were effectively silenced. Convinced that the church was not only the hierarchy but all the People of God, Newman wrote to a friend, ‘I dare say it may be advisable for our Bishops to do nothing ‑ but for that reason, if for no other, the laity should stir’[ii]. The hour of the laity had struck.

But what kind of laity? From the time he joined the Catholic communion five years previously in 1845 he was increasingly aware of the inadequate preparation of the lay people for the mission now falling to them. In particular, they needed education and formation for the task ahead. At the end of Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics in England, delivered in 1850 in reply to the attack on the Bishops (G. K. Chesterton described it as having been practically preached to a raging mob), he described the kind of laity he wanted for the times now upon Catholics in England. It is worth quoting this purple passage,

‘Your strength lies in your God and your conscience; therefore it lies not in your number. It lies not in your number any more than in intrigue, or combination or worldly wisdom. What I desiderate in Catholics is the gift of bringing out what their religion is. I want an intelligent, well‑instructed laity; I am not denying you are such already: but I mean to be severe, and, as some would say, exorbitant in my demands, I wish you to enlarge your knowledge, to cultivate your reason, to get an insight into the relation of truth to truth,....to understand how faith and reason stand to each other, what are the bases and principles of Catholicism. In all times the laity have been the measure of the Catholic spirit; they saved the Irish Church three centuries ago, and they betrayed the Church in England’[iii].

There was in Father McGivney a balance between the human and divine. His ability to mourn with those in sorrow and rejoice with those in need of joy and encouragement typified his priestly disposition. Every one of us, cleric or lay, married or single, need to achieve such a balance, an integration, in our own lives. www.fathermcgivney.org

Fr. Michael McGivney is probably not familiar to most readers, unless they are connected to the Knights of Columbus. The Knights are known for their work for the poor, for Catholic education, and for the disabled.

I attended a conference sponsored by a non-religious organization who work with and for people with severe disabilities. One session, focused on independent living for people with developmental disabilities and the life of one individual was highlighted. It was noted that part of the success achieved by this man in living independently stemmed in part from the invitation of his neighbor to attend a meeting of the Knights of Columbus. He joined the organization, worked very hard in the projects sponsored by them, and eventually became a member of the Catholic Church. I was surprised that a state run organization would highlight the religious life of a client, but I was not surprised that the Knights played a role in the man’s support group.

Dear Co-worker of Christ, Father,

You have said ‘yes’ to Jesus and He has taken you at your word.

The Word of God became Jesus, the poor one. And so there is this terrible emptiness you experience. God cannot fill what is full – He can fill only emptiness – deep poverty – and your ‘yes’ is the beginning of being or becoming empty. It is not how much we really have to give – but how empty we are – so that we can receive fully in our life and let Him live His life in us.

In you today He wants to relive His complete submission to His Father – allow Him to do so. It does not matter what you feel but what He feels in you. Take away your eyes from yourself and rejoice that you have nothing – that you are nothing – that you can do nothing. Give Jesus a big smile each time your nothingness frightens you. This is the poverty of Jesus. You and I must let Him live in us and through us in the world.

‘The Catholic Church, which elevated this man in sacred orders, who was ‘wonderful in his pastoral zeal, in his devotion to prayer and in the ardour of his penance’ to the honours of the saints of heaven, now, one hundred years after his death, offers him with maternal joy to all the clergy as an outstanding model of priestly asceticism, of piety, especially in the form of devotion to the Eucharist, and, finally, of pastoral zeal.’ Sacerdotii Nostri Primordia 10 St. Jean Marie Vianney was born in Dardilly, near Lyons, on 8 May 1786, the son of Mathieu Vianney and Marie Béluze, poor peasants with a strong faith. He was not a Religious but an example of the life of a diocesan priest lived in the desire and pursuit of holiness. However, as John XXIII points out in SNP 11, his life reveals a holiness lived in accordance with the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience. Pope Pius XII had said that these counsels are not binding on the secular clergy, yet it is true that they are signs of holiness, and become a foundation for the life of all priests for they are founded on virtue which is universal, which is of course consecrated to be lived with radicalism in religious life, but which contain a call to all Christians, and not least to priests.

The Lord continues to send priests to serve in his Church. The latest figures from the Vatican Yearbook show a slight increase in 2009 over the 2008 figures worldwide for candidates to the priesthood, and the whole period from 2000 onwards is also one of stability, with a slight increase in numbers. Globally, also, the percentage of the world population who are Catholic continues to rise (it now stands at 17.4%). We can praise God for this, not because we are interested in numbers for their own sake, but because each number represents a person, precious to the Father.

What, then, is a priest? The answer was given to us existentially by St Maximilian Kolbe. When this friar martyr of Auschwitz was asked why he wished to take the place of a Polish father and husband, Francis Gajowniczek, in the punishment bunkers where camp inmates were starved to death, Maximilian Kolbe gave only one reason: ‘I am a Catholic priest’. Pope Paul VI called this an ‘incomparable’ response. The response came, he said, ‘from a heart trained to give itself’. And is not a Catholic priest, Pope Paul asks, a ‘second Christ’, who is the redeeming Victim of mankind? ‘What a glory it is for us priests, and what a lesson…to find such a splendid exemplification of our consecration and of our mission!’ Maximilian Kolbe provides us with an outstanding manifestation of the very heart of Catholic priesthood.