Category: Pastor’s Corner

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PAX

My dear Family,

The following words from Job clearly state what I am feeling: “…the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away: as it hath pleased the Lord so is it done: blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21). There is sadness in parting and leaving my family; but there is also peace knowing that this is the will of God. I pray that you can also see the goodness and blessing of God in all this. We are all looking for true happiness, and at times we forget that we can only find it in the will of God, even if at the moment it might not feel like “happiness”, but we must have faith and trust “…that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to his purpose, are called to be saints” (Romans 8:28).

I want to take this time also to ask for your forgiveness if at any point I offended anyone with anything I did, said or did not do. Know that I tried to give my all out of love for God and the salvation of your souls. To the best of my knowledge, I always spoke the truth of the Gospel  to you, realizing that only the Truth would makes us true disciples of the Lord Jesus and truly set us free (John 8: 31-32). Always remember that at times the Truth will be painful to hear and hard to accept, just like the medicine we have to take for a physical illness is at times painful or bitter to the taste, but we know that it is for our physical well being.  The same is with the Truth, it can be painful to hear and bitter to swallow, but if we abandon ourselves completely to the will of God, this at times painful and bitter medicine, will bring us to Eternal Life.

You have taught me so much these past three years which God has blessed me with. I have been graced to meet in this faith community people of great Faith, Hope and Charity. The witness of so many of you has strengthened my priesthood and my commitment to continue to die daily to self that I may live completely for God and the salvation of souls. There are no words to express my gratitude for all that you have done for me. Your smiles, your words of encouragement, your love for me and above all your faith, all these truly humble me and encourage me to keep fighting the good fight. It is not an easy time to be a Catholic and it is less easy to be a priest, but you all have helped me and encouraged me to not lose hope to always remember that Christ is still King, and for this I am greatly thankful. I only hope that I was able to return the favor and gave you a little hope in the Church and the priesthood.

Even though I will not be here with you, know that I will always carry you in my heart and will always remember you in my prayers. I ask that you please pray for me; that you beg God for my sanctification. My deepest longing for you and for me is for us to become saints! So let us follow the council of St. Paul: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain.  And every one that striveth for the mastery, refraineth himself from all things: and they indeed that they may receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible one.”(1 Corinthians 9: 24-25). So let us run the race that will win for us the crown of Eternal Life without counting the cost. Always remember that we will receive much more than what we are asked to give. Always remember how BLESSED YOU ARE IN CHRIST!

In the love of Jesus, Mary and Joseph

Fr. José Haro

Dear Friends,

There once was a rich young man by the name of Alexis.  He lived in Rome during the fourth or fifth century and he lived at a time when it had just become legal to be a Catholic.  People could finally practice the Christian faith out in the open.   Both of Alexis’ parents were devout Catholics and his father was a senator.  Alexis’ parents taught him the faith and taught him to be especially charitable to the poor.  When Alexis was a teenager, he decided that he wanted to give up everything, give up his wealth and give up his place of privilege in Roman society.  He wanted to live a life of poverty and prayer, and he wanted to do this all for God, but his parents had other plans for him.  They had arranged for him to marry a rich young woman.  And because it was their will for him he went along with it.  He really listened to his parents.  Yet on his wedding day when he saw his bride for the first time, he had second thoughts, this woman was smart, loving, and beautiful, and she would be a great wife, but even so, he asked for her permission to leave her for God.  She gave him the permission.   So he left.

He made his way to Syria, where he lived the life of a beggar.  Any money he received he first shared with the many poor people around him using only what was left over for himself.  When he wasn’t begging he was praying in the various churches of the city.  After living this way for several years people began to recognize him for his extraordinary holiness.  People would come to him for advice and to ask for his prayers.  They called him the living saint.  And this made him very uncomfortable.  So after seventeen years in Syria he made his way back to Rome and to his parents’ house.  He came as a beggar to his own house where he’d grown up.  His parents didn’t recognize him and so he started living under the stairs leading up to the front door.  His parents allowed him to live there not knowing who he really was.  And there he stayed spending his time begging for food, praying in the churches of Rome, and teaching the homeless about God.  With his parents never realizing who he was, even though they passed him and looked at him every day as they went to and from their house.

Now the servants of that house were quite cruel to Alexis and though he could have ended all these sufferings just by telling his parents who he was, he chose to say nothing.  Alexis lived this way for 17 years.   It was a hard way of life.  And one morning the servants found him dead under the stairs.  But before burying him they went through his few possessions even going through the pockets of the jacket he was wearing.  And in one of his pockets they found a note.  The note explained to them who he was and how he had lived this life of penance and prayer from the day his wedding was supposed to take place until then, a total of thirty-four years.  Writing that he did it all for the love of God.  Praying and sacrificing for the people of God.

When Alexis’ mother came to look and to hold the dead body of her son she cried out, “My son, my Alexis, I have known you too late! You were there all the time and I never really saw you.” She was heartbroken.  This was a good and charitable woman but she had seen her son every day for seventeen years yet she didn’t really see him.  She had heard her son every day for seventeen years yet she didn’t really hear him.  She had invited her son into her home yet she didn’t really invite him in.   He got only as far as the space beneath the stairs.  It was a superficial relationship.  Alexis’ parents looked at their son every day for 17 years without ever seeing him.  And then it was too late.

On this Feast of Corpus Christi, Feast of the Body and Blood of Jesus, we are reminded that at the end of our life our soul will see at last our Lord who we have possessed all along in the Eucharist.  At that time will we say to our Lord using the same words as Alexis’ mom, “My Jesus, my Lord, I have known you too late!  You were there all the time and I never really saw you!”  After a lifetime of receiving the Eucharist did our soul really see who he or she was consuming?

In the middle ages people rarely received the Eucharist.  They might receive on a special occasion or a milestone event in their life like an anniversary, but it was very rare for to receive Holy Communion.   And if they were not receiving, the high point of the Mass for them were the two elevations.   The elevation of the Sacred Host and the elevation of the Chalice of Precious Blood.  Bells were rung to remind them of the importance of these two moments.  At those moments their eyes were focused intently at the Eucharist.  And in those moments they received Jesus into their soul through the sense of sight.  They were taking in the Divine through the sense of sight.  As poets will sometimes write, the eyes are the windows into the soul.   That’s why we take care to keep custody of our eyes, guarding them against the profane and the impure.  What we receive through the sense of sight really has an effect on our soul.  That can be for good or for bad.  But when we look at something that has true beauty, that true beauty has a way of lifting our soul to heaven.  And so we look at beauty, we look at the Eucharist.  Those people in the middle ages through the sense of sight were making a spiritual communion with Jesus.

Before ever tasting the Eucharist, we see the Eucharist and in faith we get a view of Heaven.   To look upon the Eucharist is to practice Heaven, because in Heaven for all eternity we will look intently on our Lord.  We won’t be golfing or playing cards in heaven, we’ll be adoring God.  That’s why adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is so good for us.  It’s practice for Heaven.  Even if it’s difficult for us sit there/kneel there, good things are still happening to our souls.

On this Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ we remind ourselves that we should occupy ourselves with simply looking at Him who is looking at us.  Keeping Him company, talking with Him, praying to Him, remembering what a privilege it is to be near Him and to receive Him into our very being.  Let us always look with love upon the One who has known us and loved us from before all time.

Let us be great Saints,

Rev. Christopher J. Ankley

A letter by St. Athanasius

 Light, radiance and grace are in the Trinity and from the Trinity

It will not be out of place to consider the ancient tradition, teaching and faith of the Catholic Church, which was revealed by the Lord, proclaimed by the apostles and guarded by the fathers. For upon this faith the Church is built, and if anyone were to lapse from it, he would no longer be a Christian either in fact or in name.

We acknowledge the Trinity, holy and perfect, to consist of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. In this Trinity there is no intrusion of any alien element or of anything from outside, nor is the Trinity a blend of creative and created being. It is a wholly creative and energizing reality, self-consistent and undivided in its active power, for the Father makes all things through the Word and in the Holy Spirit, and in this way the unity of the holy Trinity is preserved. Accordingly, in the Church, one God is preached, one God who is above all things and through all things and in all things. God is above all things as Father, for he is principle and source; he is through all things through the Word; and he is in all things in the Holy Spirit.

Writing to the Corinthians about spiritual matters, Paul traces all reality back to one God, the Father, saying: Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service but the same Lord; and there are varieties of working, but it is the same God who inspires them all in everyone.

Even the gifts that the Spirit dispenses to individuals are given by the Father through the Word. For all that belongs to the Father belongs also to the Son, and so the graces given by the Son in the Spirit are true gifts of the Father. Similarly, when the Spirit dwells in us, the Word who bestows the Spirit is in us too, and the Father is present in the Word. This is the meaning of the text: My Father and I will come to him and make our home with him. For where the light is, there also is the radiance; and where the radiance is, there too are its power and its resplendent grace.

This is also Paul’s teaching in his second letter to the Corinthians: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. For grace and the gift of the Trinity are given by the Father through the Son in the Holy Spirit. Just as grace is given from the Father through the Son, so there could be no communication of the gift to us except in the Holy Spirit. But when we share in the Spirit, we possess the love of the Father, the grace of the Son and the fellowship of the Spirit himself.

Dear Friends,

Today is the Feast of Pentecost, a Feast that officially ends the season of Easter, a Feast that celebrates that day when the Holy Spirit descended, like tongues of fire, upon Mary, the Apostles, and all the other disciples gathered together in that upper room in Jerusalem 2 millennia ago.

So we might ask ourselves, what does this have to do with me?  What difference can the Holy Spirit really make in my life?  To answer this we sometimes have to see the difference in someone to understand; the difference the Holy Spirit makes, sometimes we have to meet someone animated by the Holy Spirit to be reminded of the difference that the Third person of the Trinity can make in our lives.

Now the person I have in mind is Immaculee Ilibegiza.  She’s an author and motivational speaker who radiates a combination of joy, freedom, and security.  She knows who she is.  She’s also a survivor of the Rwandan genocide.

In 1994, Immaculee was 24 years old and studying at a university in her home country of Rwanda when a time of intense and brutal fighting broke out.  Through a series of circumstances, as the fighting began, she was hidden away by a neighbor in a bathroom in his house.  The bathroom was 3 ft. by 4 ft.  She stayed locked inside that bathroom for the next 91 days.   In that bathroom with her were 6 other women.  During those 91 days over 1,000,000 people in Rwanda were slaughtered, including her family.  By the time the fighting was over and she emerged from the bathroom, she weighed barely  60 pounds.

hink that after having gone through all that she had gone through, after having seen friends turn against her family and horrifically murder them, that her demeanor would be one of a woman who is angry, resentful, and bitter.  But she’s not anything like that at all.

During those 91 days this young woman, in the midst of great disaster and personal loss, found God.  In her book, “Live to Tell” Immaculee writes how the faith she had been taught as a child suddenly came alive.  She writes how she began to talk incessantly with God, to argue with Him, to wrestle with Him trying to figure out what was happening all around her.  She was able to get a hold of a Bible from the man who was protecting them, and together with her rosary that kept her occupied for the next 3 months.  You can only imagine how well she got to know the Scriptures during that time.  And by her constant dialogue with God, her reading of Scripture, and her meditation on the mysteries of the rosary, she experienced some life-changing revelations.   

The greatest of those revelations was the experience of being God’s child.  She came to know, and not just in her head, she came to know in her heart that God was her Father and that she was His daughter, and that even in the midst of great distress He was there for her.  At one point as she was reading Scripture she blurted out to God, pointing to the Bible she said, “This says You have created me.  That means I am Your responsibility! You have to take care of me.”  This is the spirit of adoption that St. Paul talks about in our 2^nd reading today, a Spirit that enables us to know, to confidently know, to know within our heart that God is our Father and that we are His children.  Enabling us to cry out Abba, Father or more accurately Daddy, Father.  In those terrible and confining days Immaculee not only found God she found out who she was.  She found her identity.  She knew who she was and whose she was.  She discovered she was His daughter, and this one insight is the reason why she is now so free, forgiving, and joyful.

Many people wrestle their whole lives with things, things like insecurity, jealousy, envy, pride, not wanting to forgive.  We wrestle with these things for many reasons, but the root reason, I think, is because we are unsure of our identity; we don’t really know who we are or whose we are.  The Holy Spirit, the same Holy Spirit given in power to the Apostles on the day of Pentecost, enables us to know who we are, enable us to know that we are sons and daughters of the Heavenly King, and that no matter what may be going on in our life, even in the midst of difficult circumstances, like dealing with cancer wrestling with some sort of an addiction, or dealing with problems in our marriage, we are not on our own;  we are God’s responsibility, and He will give us, He will always give us the grace we need.  This is a simple yet profound fact of our faith and this makes all the difference in our lives.  This is the difference that Holy Spirit makes.  And that grace of the Holy Spirit may come to us in ways we don’t even expect or through people we don’t even know.

The love between the Father and the Son is so monumentally strong that we name it the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is love personified.  And because of our Baptism that monumental love dwells in us, so that along with Jesus we can call God our Father.  May the Holy Spirit remain ever present within us, keeping us in a state of grace, revealing ever more our true dignity as sons and daughters of God the Father.

May the prayer of “Come Holy Spirit” be always on our lips.

Peace and all good,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

From a sermon by Saint Augustine

No one has ever ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven

Today our Lord Jesus Christ ascended into heaven; let our hearts ascend with him. Listen to the words of the Apostle: If you have risen with Christ, set your hearts on the things that are above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God; seek the things that are above, not the things that are on earth. For just as he remained with us even after his ascension, so we too are already in heaven with him, even though what is promised us has not yet been fulfilled in our bodies.

Christ is now exalted above the heavens, but he still suffers on earth all the pain that we, the members of his body, have to bear. He showed this when he cried out from above: Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? And when he said: I was hungry and you gave me food.

Why do we on earth not strive to find rest with him in heaven even now, through the faith, hope and love that unites us to him? While in heaven he is also with us; and we while on earth are with him. He is here with us by his divinity, his power and his love. We cannot be in heaven, as he is on earth, by divinity, but in him, we can be there by love.

He did not leave heaven when he came down to us; nor did he withdraw from us when he went up again into heaven. The fact that he was in heaven even while he was on earth is borne out by his own statement: No one has ever ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven.

These words are explained by our oneness with Christ, for he is our head and we are his body. No one ascended into heaven except Christ because we also are Christ: he is the Son of Man by his union with us, and we by our union with him are the sons of God. So the Apostle says: Just as the human body, which has many members, is a unity, because all the different members make one body, so is it also with Christ. He too has many members, but one body.

Out of compassion for us he descended from heaven, and although he ascended alone, we also ascend, because we are in him by grace. Thus, no one but Christ descended and no one but Christ ascended; not because there is no distinction between the head and the body, but because the body as a unity cannot be separated from the head.

Dear Friends,

On this Sixth Sunday of Easter the Gospel reading is taken from the farewell discourses.  In the hours of the night before he was taken captive, Jesus talked at length to his friends.  He confided to them what was most important.  Every word here is weighty.  It’s all so dense with significance that we need a great deal of time to grasp the meaning of his words.  People have been meditating on them, and drawing strength from them, for almost two thousand years now.    And one saying here has always struck peoples notice: “We will come to him and make our dwelling with him.” 

God does not live in Heaven alone, in that world of his, “up above,” away from earth.  He also dwells within our midst, in his Word, within our Souls, and most especially in the Holy Eucharist.  And He makes himself a Divine Prisoner of our tabernacle.   I want to share with you a story about a Saint and his great love of the Eucharist.  This saint’s name is Tarcisius and he lived in third century Rome when it was very dangerous to be a Christian.  Mass was celebrated in secret usually in houses or the catacombs where the dead were buried.  Tarcisius was an altar boy and he assisted at Mass whenever possible.  Following Mass one day the Bishop gave him an important task.  He asked Tarcisius to bring Holy Communion to a group of condemned Christians who were awaiting their execution.  The Bishop thought that the guards at the prison would not suspect a twelve year old boy, would not suspect that he was there to bring Communion to the condemned.

Tarcisius accepted his assignment.   The Bishop carefully wrapped the Blessed Sacrament within a fancy decorative cloth.  He gave it to Tarcisius who gently but securely carried it under his coat next to his heart.  So off he went.  No one suspected a thing until he met a group of his friends.  Friends, who though not Christians, were ones he often played with in the streets.  These young boys saw Tarcisius and asked him to join in their games.  Tarcisius quickly declined, saying he was on an important errand.  The boys saw that he was carrying something under his coat and they became curious asking, “What are you hiding under your coat?”  “We want to see” they excitedly yelled.  Tarcisius had learned to have a great respect and love for our Lord present in the Eucharist.  So he refused to show them saying it wasn’t for them and that they wouldn’t understand.  But these boys were very determined to see what he carried.  So they asked and pleaded many times.  Each time Tarcisius emphatically said no.

These young men would not let him pass.   They began to threaten him with harm if he didn’t show them.  Again Tarcisius refused.  Eventually it came to violence with the group of boys beating Tarcisius repeatedly until he was unconscious and mortally injured.  A passer-by, an adult Christian, who recognized Tarcisius, chased the boys off.  He brought the injured boy back to the Bishop who anointed him and looking under the young boy’s coat, the Bishop found the Holy Eucharist just as he had sent it safe and unharmed still within the fancy cloth.  Tarcisius died soon after.

St. Tarcisius showed a great love and devotion to our Lord present in the Holy Eucharist.  He showed a great attentiveness and protection.  What is our response to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament?   In that situation or any situation do we show the same attentiveness and devotion and love?

Last Fall I was in Boston visiting my friend Fr. Joe.  And on the trip home I sat next to a woman who half way through the flight asked if I was a priest.  I don’t know what gave me away, probably the collar.  We had a pleasant conversation.  She told me that she had been born, raised, confirmed, and married in the Catholic Church.  But in her thirties she just kind of drifted away from the faith.  She wasn’t upset or mad about anything she was bored and she just drifted away.  She drifted away, unknowingly leaving behind the greatest gift, the gift of the Eucharist.  I think the Church failed her.  We didn’t do a good job of educating her and witnessing to her our great love of the Mass and of the Eucharist, the source of our spiritual life and the height of our spiritual life. She didn’t learn that each Mass allows us to be mystically present at the Last Supper.  And as the Apostles are fed with the Lord’s body and Blood so are we.  So that’s our job now, that’s the job of all Catholics (you reading this letter), to teach those around us and to joyfully witness to our great love of the Eucharist and the Mass.  This fall I’m going to be adding classes for the parents of those making their First Reconciliation and First Communion.  I want them too, to grow in knowledge and love of the Eucharist.  They are, after all, the first teachers of the faith to their children.

Our Lord says to us in the Gospel today, “I will come back to you.”  And he keeps his promise he comes back to us at every Mass and he stays with us as a divine prisoner of the Tabernacle.  So as the Christmas hymn says, Come, let us adore him!  Always!

Let us be great Saints,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

Dear Friends,

In today’s Gospel Jesus says, “I give you a new commandment: love one another.  As I have loved you, so you also should love one another.”  Jesus says, as I have loved you, God never ceases to love us, we are the work of His hands and made in his image.  God will hate our sin but he’ll never hate us.  Even when we’ve turned away from Him, His love still presses upon us trying to find a weak spot in the hard shell of our self love and through this weak spot he can enter and turn us back to him.

At every moment we have God’s complete attention, His undivided love.  Right now God is thinking of you, looking directly at you, loving you.  God loves us with a terrific and infinite love and he’s always aware of our present problems; he cares tremendously about what happens to us.  And out of the burdens we carry today, burdens imposed upon us by the ignorance or malice of others or by our own foolishness, out of these burdens God is going to bring good to us.  It’s the certainty of this truth, of God’s love for us; that has to be the foundation of our life.

St. Catherine of Siena was very certain of God’s love; it was the foundation of her life.  St. Catherine, born in the 14^th century, was the youngest of 25 children in the Benincasa family.  She was a mystic and a brilliant author and because of the brilliance of her writings she’s a Doctor of the Catholic Church. St. Catherine like all the Saints had a deep and abiding love of the Eucharist.  Many chapters in her book, “The Dialogue” are devoted to the mystery of the Eucharist.  She writes that there are four qualities, or attitudes of the heart, that we have to have in order to strengthen and deepen our reception of our Lord in the Eucharist.  These four qualities are faith, love, desire, and conversion.

First is faith, a living faith firmly believes in the Trinity’s personal love for each of us.  “God cares for each of us as if she alone existed, and for all of us as if we are but one.”  Jesus within the Eucharist wants to be intimately united with us so that we can share in his divine life.

Second, is love and our faith leads us to love.  When we realize how much we are truly loved by God, the only adequate response is to love in return.  And the best way we can express a free, self-giving love for God is to love our neighbor.  The Eucharist is the self-giving love of the Savior and fruitful reception of Holy Communion deepens our love for God and neighbor.

Third on St. Catherine’s list is desire.  She wrote that our human actions are finite, but our desires can be infinite.  We can desire the infinite; we can and should desire God Himself, because He desires us.  If we don’t expect much from Holy Communion we won’t receive much.  Desire determines the spiritual fruitfulness of Holy Communion.  The more we desire the more fruitful.   Desire for God will direct all of our actions toward giving him glory and honor, not only at Mass but during every moment of our day.  We always pray to the Holy Spirit for an ardent desire of God.

Fourth on the list, is conversion and as we grow in faith, love, and desire the Holy Spirit more clearly reveals to us our shortcomings.  We see how much more we need to change.  Conversion is a process of growth, we patiently move forward, step by step.  We turn away from our old ways of living and begin thinking and acting like the Person we receive in Holy Communion.

I once read that after receiving Communion the Eucharistic bread remains in our stomach for up to fifteen minutes.  During that short period of time after receiving Communion we contain within ourselves the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of our Lord.   We are walking Tabernacles.    In the short period of time after having  all received the Eucharist, we all have the real presence of Jesus within us and we can in a very real way see how we’re all each other’s brother and sister and how we all make up the One Body of Christ.   This helps us to follow the new commandment that Jesus gave us:  Love one another.  In loving one another we love Jesus.

May we like St. Catherine see the Blessed Sacrament with the Eyes of Faith, receive the Blessed Sacrament with the Hands of Love, and Taste the Blessed Sacrament with a Holy Desire.

May we be great Saints,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

Dear Friends,

Cardinal Dolan of New York once related a story from a time when he was part of a study group on tour in the Holy Land.  One day while hiking, the group encountered two shepherds enjoying conversation and a smoke.  And while these two shepherds had been talking their two grazing flocks had become completely mixed together.  Through their guide, the group asked how the hundreds of sheep would sort themselves out and follow the correct shepherd.  Eager to impress these tourists and hoping for a gratuity, the two men stood at a distance from one another, yelled something incomprehensible, and began walking in opposite directions.  Immediately, the sheep fell in line behind the proper shepherd.  And then the two shepherds began to show off, they exchanged clothing and once again stood apart and shouted.  So familiar were the shepherds’ voices to the sheep that these animals ignoring the disguised outward appearance again followed their own shepherd.

“My sheep hear my voice,” says Jesus in today’s Gospel, “I know them, and they follow me.”  A few verses earlier in John’s Gospel, Jesus states that sheep follow the shepherd “because they recognize his voice,” whereas “they do not recognize the voice of strangers.”  The focus of today’s liturgy is hard to miss:  in addition to the Gospel, the opening prayer, the responsorial psalm, the second reading from Revelation, and the prayer after Communion all speak to us of the Good Shepherd.

It’s interesting to note that Judaism and Christianity are the only two major World religions that describe God as a Shepherd.  A shepherd is one who walks closely among his sheep.  He’s so close he smells like his sheep.  He’s covered in their grime.  He knows them well; he knows them individually and can tell when something is just not right.  He knows when they’re sick and need attention.  He knows when they’re tired/distressed and need rest.  He knows when they’re hungry and need food.  He tirelessly searches for the straying and lost.  He protects them from predators. And finally he knows when his sheep are just too exhausted and need to be carried.  This is our Lord this is our Good Shepherd.

As Cardinal Dolan experienced, sheep are very good at knowing the voice of their shepherd and following it.  Now I’ve had this experience myself.  Today is the perfect day to talk about Buck, the “wonder lamb.”  When I was a kid Grandpa Ankley gave to my brother Matt and me a newborn lamb.  I remember the night he gave it to us, he brought it right into the kitchen and set it free.  Matt and I, with great excitement, chased it all over the house, we chased it until it peed under the kitchen table.  Mom was not smiling.  Buck went to the barn.  Buck was very young and needed to be bottle fed, which we did.  He attached to us quickly, he knew our voices.  He followed us everywhere, when we walked, when we ran, and even when we rode our bikes, Buck followed closely behind.  Everywhere that Chris went that lamb was sure to follow.  Now sometimes in his ovine exuberance he would race ahead of us.  In those moments he’d lose sight of us and become disoriented and frightened.  He’d begin to baa loudly.  But all we’d have to do is call out to him, call him by name, and he’d come running with his tail wagging behind him.  He knew the voice of his shepherd.

Today Good Shepherd Sunday is also known as World day of Prayer for Vocations.  The Church gives us this day to remind us that the Good Shepherd is constantly calling out to us, constantly calling us each by name.  In fact the word vocation comes from the Latin word vocare which means to call.  Each of us was created out of a unique Divine love.  Our Lord loves us each in a unique one of a kind way.  If he were to stop thinking of us and to stop beholding us with His Divine gaze, even if only for a nanosecond, we would cease to exist.  And so with great love, at all times, our Lord sweetly calls out to us.

Now our good shepherd calls us not only to the big things of holiness and vocation, but he also calls us to follow him in the little everyday things we do.  Now sometimes we listen like those sheep in the Middle East, and we follow but sometimes we ignore and let the noise of the world interfere.  Today I think, it’s maybe a little more difficult to hear that divine voice with all the noise of our modern culture.  So we need to set aside time every day for silence.  We need a bit of silence every day; no TV, no radio, no headphones, no whatever noise making distracting device we may own.

In that regular and repeated silence we pray. We pray in order to hear that voice of our Shepherd.  In the Old Testament we read of the prophet Elijah and he heard the voice of the Lord but he only heard the voice in a tiny whispering sound.  Elijah didn’t hear our Lord’s voice in earthquakes, or winds, or fire.  He didn’t and couldn’t hear our Lord’s voice in the noise of the world.  He only heard it in the silence.  This Church is the perfect place for silence, the perfect place to know, to learn, and to listen for the voice of our Shepherd.

The last line of our second reading was this, “For the Lamb who is in the center of the throne will shepherd us and lead us to springs of life-giving water, and He will wipe away every tear from our eyes.”  Our Lord does not love us because we’re so good, He loves us because He’s so good.  And He’s not attracted to our gifts, virtues, and talents, but rather, He’s attracted to our weakness, brokenness, and sin.  And He loves us and calls us, not because we deserve it, but because we need it.

If ever we stray may we quickly recognize His voice and come quickly back to Him.

May we be great Saints,

Fr. Christopher Ankley

From a sermon by Saint Bernadine of Siena

The faithful foster-father and guardian

There is a general rule concerning all special graces granted to any human being. Whenever the di-vine favor chooses someone to receive a special grace, or to accept a lofty vocation, God adorns the person chosen with all the gifts of the Spirit needed to fulfil the task at hand.

This general rule is especially verified in the case of Saint Joseph, the foster-father of our Lord and the husband of the Queen of our world, enthroned above the angels. He was chosen by the eternal Father as the trustworthy guardian and protector of his greatest treasures, namely, his divine Son and Mary, Joseph’s wife. He carried out this vocation with complete fidelity until at last God called him, saying: “Good and faithful servant enter into the joy of your Lord”.
What then is Joseph’s position in the whole Church of Christ? Is he not a man chosen and set apart? Through him and, yes, under him, Christ was fittingly and honorably introduced into the world. Holy Church in its entirety is indebted to the Virgin Mother because through her it was judged worthy to receive Christ. But after her we undoubtedly owe special gratitude and reverence to Saint Joseph.
In him the Old Testament finds its fitting close. He brought the noble line of patriarchs and prophets to its promised fulfilment. What the divine goodness had offered as a promise to them, he held in his arms.

Obviously, Christ does not now deny to Joseph that intimacy, reverence and very high honor which he gave him on earth, as a son to his father. Rather we must say that in heaven Christ completes and perfects all that he gave at Nazareth.

Now we can see how the last summoning words of the Lord appropriately apply to Saint Joseph: “Enter into the joy of your Lord”. In fact, although the joy of eternal happiness enters into the soul of a man, the Lord preferred to say to Joseph: “Enter into joy”. His intention was that the words should have a hidden spiritual meaning for us. They convey not only that this holy man possesses an inward joy, but also that it surrounds him and engulfs him like an infinite abyss.

Remember us, Saint Joseph, and plead for us to your foster-child. Ask your most holy bride, the Virgin Mary, to look kindly upon us, since she is the mother of him who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns eternally. Amen.

Dear Friends,
St. Vincent de Paul lived in 17th c Paris France. And sometimes in the afternoon he liked to take a walk to clear his head. On one particular afternoon a crying woman ran up to him. She was inconsolable. In between the outbursts of tears and sobbing he was able to piece together what had happened. Her husband, that morning, had jumped form a bridge into the river. He had taken his own life. The woman was broken with grief. She feared the worst for her husband’s soul. But in a moment of Heavenly grace, St. Vincent de Paul was given a bit of knowledge of what had happened that morning on the bridge. He said, “Madam, do not be afraid, in that time and distance from the railing of the bridge to the water’s surface your husband repented, he is saved.” Go and pray for him!
On this Divine Mercy Sunday we are reminded that our Lord is always reaching out to us. Even in that millionth of a second between life and death, he still reaches out to us. In that short span of time, in that millionth of a second this is what the conversation may have sounded like:
Jesus speaking with a despairing soul:
Jesus: O soul steeped in darkness, do not despair. All is not yet lost. Come and confide in your God, who is love and mercy.
-But the soul, deaf even to this appeal, wraps itself in darkness.
Jesus calls out again: My child, listen to the voice of your merciful Father.
-In the soul arises this reply: “For me there is no mercy,” and it falls into greater darkness, a despair which is a foretaste of hell and makes it unable to draw near to God.
Jesus calls to the soul a third time, but the soul remains deaf and blind, hardened and despairing. Then the mercy of God begins to exert itself, and without any co-operation from the soul, God grants it final grace. If this too is spurned, God will leave the soul in this self-chosen disposi-tion for eternity. This grace emerges from the Merciful Heart of Jesus and gives the soul a special light by means of which the soul begins to understand God’s effort; but conversion depends on its own will. The soul knows that this, for him, is final grace and, should it show even a flicker of good will, the Mercy of God will accomplish the rest.
My omnipotent mercy is active here. Happy the soul that takes advantage of this grace.
Jesus: What joy fills My Heart when you return to me. Because you are weak, I take you in My arms and carry you to the home of My Fa-ther.
Soul: (as if awaking, asks fearfully): Is it possible that there yet is mercy for me?
Jesus: There is, My child. You have a special claim on My mercy. Let it act in your poor soul; let the rays of grace enter your soul; they bring with them light, warmth, and life.
Soul: But fear fills me at the thought of my sins, and this terrible fear moves me to doubt Your goodness.
Jesus: My child, all your sins have not wounded My Heart as painfully as your present lack of trust does – that after so many efforts of My love and mercy, you should still doubt My goodness.
Soul: O Lord, save me Yourself, for I perish. Be my Savior, O Lord, I am unable to say anything more; my pitiful heart is torn asunder; but You, O Lord…
Jesus does not let the soul finish but, raising it from the ground from the depths of its misery; he leads it into the recesses of His Heart where all its sins disappear instantly, consumed by the flames of love.
Jesus: Here, soul, are all the treasures of My Heart. Take everything you need from it.
Soul: O Lord, I am inundated with Your grace. I sense that a new life has entered into me and, above all, I feel Your love in my heart. That is enough for me. O Lord, I will glorify the omnipotence of Your mercy for all eternity. Encouraged by Your goodness, I will confide to You all the sorrows of my heart.
Jesus: Tell me all, My child, hide nothing from Me, because My loving Heart, the Heart of your Best Friend, is listening to you.
Soul: O Lord, now I see all my ingratitude and Your goodness. You were pursuing me with Your grace, while I was frustrating Your benevo-lence, I see that I deserve the depths of hell for spurning Your graces, Jesus (interrupting): Do not be absorbed in your misery – you are still too weak to speak of it – but, rather, gaze on My Heart filled with goodness, and be imbued with My sentiments. Strive for meekness and hu-mility; be merciful to others, as I am to you; and, when you feel your strength failing, if you come to the fountain of mercy to fortify your soul, you will not grow weary on your journey.
Soul: Now I understand Your mercy, which protects me, and like a brilliant star, leads me into the home of my Father, protecting me from the horrors of hell that I have deserved, not once, but a thousand times. O Lord, eternity will hardly suffice for me to give due praise to Your unfa-thomable mercy and Your compassion for me. (From the Diary of St. Faustina)
Give thanks to the Lord for He is good, His Mercy endures forever.
Let us be great Saints,
Fr. Christopher J. Ankley