Wednesday, December 27, 2017

Simbang Gabi 7: The Priest and the Church of the Poor

SIMBANG GABI 2017
YEAR OF THE CLERGY AND CONSECRATED PEOPLE
DECEMBER 22, 2017

Jesus, I trust in you!

Elizabeth called Mary blessed because she believed that everything told to her by the Lord would be fulfilled. Mary’s response was a song that the Holy Spirit inspired her to sing. In this song, she acknowledged the greatness of the Lord who looked upon her with great kindness. Elizabeth’s praise is the first of so many people who would call her blessed simply because the Almighty has done great things for her.

However, Mary’s song goes beyond thanking God for favors she personally received from him. She recognized how God is now moving in order to bring about the renewal of the entire created world. She sings of God’s mercy inverting the established worldly order: the proud being scattered in their conceit; the mighty being cast down from their throne and the lowly being lifted up; the hungry being filled with good things and the rich being sent away empty…This inversion of the world order is the breaking in of the Kingdom of God in the world. Wherever the gospel is preached to the poor, wherever the brokenhearted are healed, wherever the oppressed and the prisoners are freed, the Kingdom of God is found. The Kingdom of God is the gathering of people around Christ so that they may share in his Divine life. In this gathering of believers, Christ’s law of charity, justice and mercy is lived out.

The priest plays an important role in establishing on earth the Kingdom of God. “Priests exercise the function of Christ as Pastor and Head in proportion of their share in authority. In the name of the bishop, they gather the family of God as a brotherhood endowed with the spirit of unity and lead it in Christ through the Spirit to God the Father. For the exercise of this ministry, a spiritual power is given them, a power whose purpose is to build up.” (Presbyterorum Ordinis, 6.) The work of the priest is to gather and build up the family of God. He builds the kingdom of Christ by treating everybody with great kindness and by acting towards people according to the demands of Christian doctrine and life: “Be urgent in season and out of season, convince (manghikayat), rebuke (magsaway), and exhort (magpayo), be unfailing in patience and in teaching.” (2 Tim 4:2) His work is to educate people to reach Christian maturity: “Christians must be trained so as not to live only for themselves. Rather, according to the demands of the new law of charity, every man as he has received grace, ought to minister it one to another, and in this way all should carry out their duties in a Christian way in the service of their fellow men.” (PO, 6.)

“Although priests owe service to everybody the poor and the weaker ones have been committed to their care in a special way. It was with these that the Lord himself associated, and the preaching of the Gospel to them is given as a sign of his messianic mission.” (PO, 6.) The Magnificat is fulfilled not through an armed struggle or a class war. It is fulfilled in the exercise of charity, of mercy, and of justice. The inversion of the world order takes place through conversion – the conversion of the Church so that it may be a church for the poor. Pope Francis said: “I want a Church which is poor and for the poor.” (Evangelii Gaudium, 198.) The priest not only leads the community in works of charity for the poor. He must also allow the poor to be evangelizers themselves.  “We need to let ourselves be evangelized by (the poor). The new evangelization is an invitation to acknowledge the saving power at work in their lives and to put them at the center of the Church’s pilgrim way. We are called to find Christ in them, to lend our voices to their causes, but also to be their friends, to listen to them, to speak for them, and to embrace the mysterious wisdom which God wishes to share with us through them.” (EG, 198.)


O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!

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