Good Shepherd Sunday

In the Year for Priests, the Good Shepherd Sunday is a wonderful opportunity to pray for priestly vocations. Jesus, our Good Shepherd, says, “My sheep hear my voice; I know them and they follow me.” His words tell us what a vocation is: vocation is a call coming from Christ, an invitation for us to follow him. He calls whom he knows. We follow him when we hear his voice. Last Sunday, we saw how Jesus gave St. Peter this call. He said to him, “Follow me.”

We have seen last week that following Christ’s call is not easy for the road of discipleship is a path laden with thorns and crosses. The call which Christ extended to Peter would make him stretch out his arms to be led to where he would not like to go. The Acts of the Apostles today tell us that “the leading men of the city stirred up a persecution against Paul and Barnabbas and expelled them from their territory.” It seems that persecution is the lot of those who follow Jesus. That is why we oftentimes wonder: Why follow Jesus if such would only lead us to a way of suffering and trials? I think the answer is given by Jesus himself: “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. No one can take them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one can take them out of the Father’s hand.” The Apocalypse, which is the 2nd reading, shows us a vision of “a great multitude, which no one could count”…standing before the throne and the Lamb, wearing white robes washed in the blood of the Lamb. “These are the ones who have survived the time of great distress.” Indeed, Jesus is able to deliver what he promises: to those who hear his voice and follow him, he gives eternal life.

Once, I was invited to a Career Orientation which was sponsored by the high school I graduated from. I was made to sit amongst highly successful alumni of the school: Lawyers, Architects, Doctors, and the like. Each was given a chance to talk about their professions and this question was always asked by the students: “How much do you earn?” Believe it or not, I was asked the same question to which I replied: “My employer does not pay me much but I am here because the retirement benefits are great: He will give me eternal life.” The 2nd reading gives us a very beautiful explanation of what eternal life is: “They stand before God’s throne and worship him day and night. The one who sits on the throne will shelter them. They will not hunger or thirst anymore, nor will the sun or any heat strike them. For the Lamb…will shepherd them and lead them to springs of life giving water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

In fact this same reading reveals to us that the priesthood begins on earth what all of us will do in heaven for all eternity: “they worship him day and night.” Amongst the many labors of the priest, prayer takes primacy: In his message for today, the Holy Father says, “If the priest is a ‘man of God’, one who belongs to God and helps others to know and love him, he cannot fail to cultivate a deep intimacy with God, abiding in his love and making space to hear his Word. Prayer is the first form of witness which awakens vocations. Like the Apostle Andrew, who tells his brother that he has come to know the Master, so too anyone who wants to be a disciple and witness of Christ must have ‘seen’ him personally, come to know him, and learned to love him and to abide with him.” And this is the wonderful life of a priest: he is not just a disciple and a witness of Christ. He is the friend of Christ: one who ‘sees’ the Lord personally, knows him, loves him, and abides with him. No amount of money can buy that surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ Crucified. Already on earth, he enjoys intimacy with Christ. In heaven, while all other professions will cease, the priest will still continue to do what he has been doing here on earth: he will worship God day and night.

Fr. Trigilio vs. Fr. Pledger

Father Trigilio does it again! Amen Father!

'Hello, wake up and smell the coffee! There is a reason why the folk Mass crowd is getting older and fewer. Young and middle-aged faithful grew up under the pastoral leadership of Pope John Paul the Great. Latin was no longer a dead or secret language. Reverence is a key component to sacred liturgy. Pedestrian services cannot compete with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Whether ordinary form or extraordinary, both are equally valid and licit and both serve the spiritual needs of those who attend them. The 'look at your neighbor' theater-in-the-round modern monstrosities posing as churches are nothing more than banal self-serve ego worship. They emphasize the immanent while the authentic churches focus on the transcendent.'

I often tell my parishioners that church is the embassy of heaven. When they cross the threshold and enter the House of God, they are on foreign soil. They have passed from the earthly Babylon into the heavenly Jerusalem. This is why stained glass depicting lives of the saints adorns the real churches while clear plain glass allows the alternate worship sites to gawk and glare at the secular world. Gymnasiums are fine for sports but not for divine worship. Sacred liturgy is about God not about man. Religion is required by the cardinal virtue of Justice. We owe God proper adoration and praise. When we pat ourselves on the back, however, it is not religion but entertainment.

Follow this link: The Black Biretta: Father Trigilio takes on 'U.S. Catholic'; Father Pfleger's church of the bizarre#links#links

Easter Vigil in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite

Exultet

Just want to share pictures of our Easter Vigil in the Extraordinary form of the Roman Rite at the Parish of the Lord of Divine Mercy, Sikatuna Village, Quezon City. Thanks to Jesus Felix Valenzuela, our Cantor, for the wonderful photographs

Interesting Liturgical Commentaries from Office for the Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff on Vatican Website

Easter Vigil Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite 2010

Easter Vigil Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite 2010

The Holy Father during Good Friday services 2010

The New Liturgical Movement brought to our attention the liturgical commentaries coming from the Office of the Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff on the Vatican Website. At last, something is said about the centrality of the Crucifix in the Liturgical Celebration and this on the Vatican website itself!

How I wish the liturgists in the Philippines would read this! I remember that once I was reprimanded by a liturgist about the Crucifix I placed on the altar. He said, "The Cross is not the center of the celebration." I asked, "Father, if the Cross is not the center of the celebration, then, what is the center of the celebration?" He gave a very strange answer, "The Celebration is the center of the Celebration!" I do not know what is it with these liturgists who are allergic to the Cross on the altar!

Follow this link: Interesting Liturgical Commentaries from Office for the Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff on Vatican Website

the Non-Singing (Catholic) Congregations

I stumbled upon this very sensible article on Catholic (non) singing which, I think, is worth our consideration. I really agree with what the author says about the real place of Music in Catholic Liturgy.

"The music is part of the liturgy, integral and native to it. The people are not making it. It is not generated by us. They can be part of it but it is not their primary responsibility. And when they sing, it is not to reinforce their perception of membership in a community. It is to more fully participate in sacred actions taking place in a liturgical manner. It comes from within the structure of the liturgy and is not imposed from without. It does not come from the people. It comes from the prayer in which the people are invited, but not required, to participate. You can issue all the proclamations you want to. You can yell and demand. But in the end, this Catholic sense of the role of the people's song will not change. Here is the controversial claim that I would like to make: there is nothing wrong with this. In fact, the people might be more correct here than their pundits who are always denouncing them. And if the people ever do relent and start singing like Bapitsts, the new ethos will gut the primary focus of the Roman Rite. The Catholic ritual is not people based or people centered. It is not given by the community as a gift each to other. It is a gift from God that we offer back to God, something we receive humbly as a blessing and an occasion of grace as we offer our lives back to God in sacrifice. "

"Think of observing a miracle even in a non-liturgical context. Is the impulse to sing as loudly as possible or is it to become quiet in its presence? If someone interrupts the scene with loud outbursts, we might wonder if they are fully aware of what is going on. Even in our times of mundane liturgy and plain talk on the altar, the embedded Catholic sense is still there to regard the liturgy as solemn, not something we make on our own but something to which we must submit. The driving impulse here is toward being quiet. Yes, we are free to sing the Gloria, the dialogues, the Sanctus, the Agnus, provided it is compatible with a prayerful comportment. But we all try not to push our voices above the volume of the activity around us. This is a humble impulse. Arrogance and sticking out is contrary to what we believe we should be doing. "

Follow this link: In Defense of Non-Singing Congregations

Divine Mercy Sunday

“No soul will be justified until it turns with confidence to my mercy, and that is why the first Sunday after Easter is to be the Feast of Mercy. On that day, priests are to tell everyone about my great and unfathomable mercy…Tell the confessor that the Image is to be on view in the Church…By means of this image I will be granting many graces to souls; so let every soul have access to it.” (Diary.570)

These words of the Lord to St. Faustina become especially significant today because the Mercy Sunday which we celebrate is in the middle of the Year for Priests. Indeed, the Lord has bestowed upon the priests that special task to proclaim his Mercy. And not only does He give the priests this task. He also bestows power to their words: “Tell my priests that hardened sinners will repent upon hearing their words, when they will speak about my unfathomable mercy, about the compassion I have for them in my Heart. To priests who will proclaim and extol my mercy, I will give wondrous power, and I will anoint their words and touch the hearts of those to whom they will speak.” (Diary 1521)

The Gospel today tells us that it has been the intention of Christ that his priests would be powerful proclaimers of his mercy. On the evening of his Resurrection, the Lord Jesus appeared to his apostles and bestowed upon them two gifts. The first would be the gift of his peace: “Peace be with you,” he said to them. The second would be the power to forgive sins: “He breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. Whatever sins you forgive are forgiven. Whatever sins you do not forgive are not forgiven.’” By these words, priests have become proclaimers of Christ’s “great and unfathomable mercy.” But not only that, the Lord Jesus gives wondrous power to the words of the priests: “To priests who will proclaim my mercy, I will give wondrous power, and I will anoint their words…” When the priest declares the absolution at the confessional, his words are truly anointed words…his words of absolution are truly anointed by the Holy Spirit whom Christ bestowed on his apostles on that blessed evening. In this way, Christ has made his priests even greater than the prophets of the Old Testament. For the ancient prophets, while proclaiming that God is a merciful God, slow to anger, rich in kindness, whose forgiveness is unto the thousandth generation, cannot declare absolution. “Only God can forgive sins.” But on that night of the resurrection, Christ bestows upon the apostles that power which only God can exercise: the power to forgive sins. “Whatever sins you forgive, they are forgiven…” Thus, St. John Chrysostom said: “Let us treat with reverence those to whose hands the work of the Spirit has been entrusted. For great is the dignity of the priesthood. Whose sins you shall forgive, He says, they are forgiven; and because of this, Paul says: Obey your prelates and be subjects to them (Heb. xii, 7), and hold them in great reverence.” The greatness of the dignity of the priesthood lies in the fact that he exercises the power which exclusively belongs to God: the forgiveness of sins.

Thus, the priest sits at the confessional as judge. As Pontius Pilate sat at the judgment seat, “at a place called Lithostrotos, but in Hebrew called Gabbatha” (Jn. 19:13) in order to sentence Jesus to death, so the priest sits at the confessional in order to free a penitent from his sins. Thus, it is important to confess everything to the priest for he cannot absolve what he does not know. And remember Jesus said: “Whatever sins you do not forgive, they are not forgiven.”

On this Mercy Sunday, let us truly mean what we say: “Jesus, I trust in you.” I know that oftentimes, we find difficulty believing in the priest’s absolution. The priest’s personal sinfulness oftentimes is the hindrance to his credibility as instrument of Divine Absolution. We may find reason to doubt a priest’s credibility but never should we doubt the authority of our Lord’s words: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whatever sins you forgive, they are forgiven.” Let us receive the absolution from the priest. “Lord, it may be difficult to believe in this absolution bestowed by a sinner but you anointed the words of this sinner priest. And so, I say, ‘Jesus, I trust in you!’”

On the authority and dignity of the Priesthood

Pope Benedict XVI, Good Friday

"Let us do all things that we may have the Spirit of God within us. And let us treat with reverence those to whose hands the work of the Spirit has been entrusted. For great is the dignity of the priesthood. For whose sins you shall forgive, He says, they are forgiven; and because of this Paul says: Obey your prelates, and be subject them (Heb. xiii, 7), and hold them in great reverence. For you have but the care of what concerns yourself; and if you look well after that you will not be held accountable for what others do. But the priest, even should he order his own life in a fitting manner, yet does not scrupulously have due care for both your life and the lives of those about him, shall go with the wicked into the everlasting fire; and so he oftentimes while not failing in his own conduct will perish because of yours, if he has not done all that belonged to him to do.

Knowing then the greatness of their danger, treat them with much consideration, for as Paul goes on to say: They watch for your souls; and not simply this, but as having to render an account of them. Because of this you must treat them with honour. And should you join with others to insult them, then neither will your own affairs prosper. For as long as the helmsman is in good heart, those on board are safe. But if he is grieved by their abuse and by their hostile behavior, he can neither keep a good watch, nor perform his task properly, and unwillingly involves them in many disasters. And so likewise the priest. If he is held in honour by you, he will be able to take care of what relates to yourselves. But if you throw them into despondency, weakening their hands, and making them easily overcome, you expose both them and yourselves to the waves, however courageous they may be."

St. John Chrysostom, Bishop and Doctor