For His Friends

22,000 Catholic youth gathered in Kansas City this week-end for the bi-annual nationwide convention. The gathering of our most committed and devoted young people places them in contact with wonderful presenters who are able to connect with them, gives them time to experience good liturgy, and spend time in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament  which an amazing number of the participants utilize. On Saturday all 22,000 processed through the streets of Kansas City in an Eucharistic procession which gave the locals of whatever and no religious persuasion something to think about. Our own Father Len Plazewski was there along with a good representation from the diocesan youth. One might have though that tough economic times would have cut into the number of participants this year, but no – this was one of the largest.

Youth ministry is a challenge for our beloved Church. There are so many things competing for young people’s time and attention today from sports involving far more youth than in my day to a whole menu of after school options. Parishes still try hard to have good programs for the young people but getting them to come is a real challenge. Everyone points to the success of Protestant outreach to young people and I must admit that it is one of the few comparison points for which I am often jealous. One of the bright lights these past two years has been the three ECHO program members from the University of Notre Dame’s post-graduate program in religious education and youth ministry working in four of our parishes. Their presence and good work has injected some life into our times moribund-like youth ministry programs.

I believe that today’s young Catholic can have a thirst for the faith and it is incumbent upon myself and our pastoral leadership to meet these needs. At the same time, I do  not think it a wise strategy to offer programs where adult leadership assumes the mantle of acting like we were still young but rather we need to help our young prepare for an adult faith which awaits them. We have some extraordinarily generous young people who edify and sometimes humble me by their commitment to the Church, its teaching and values, and the responsibility of the baptized to share the faith with others boldly and fearlessly. I also see in the new interest in vocations to the priesthood and religious life the seeds of a renewal we badly need. It is our job as adult Catholics to provide the fertile soil in which these seeds can settle, germinate and blossom. The Church is looking for good gardeners in the soil of the faith of our young. Do you think you might be able to help?

+RNL

Fridays I try to reserve for myself but today is not going to be one of  those days, th0ugh I do hope I can get to my first RAYS game tonight. Some general responses to comments which many of you have taken the time to share with me over the past weeks and months. It is impossible for me to respond to all of them but some response seems apropos. I do not consider this a blog, as you know, where comments are posted. I read them, take them seriously, sometimes respond to them generically without publishing them specifically.

First, thanks to all who read this blog. The number of people visiting each day is on a steady increase and I know that many check it out intermittently. We can tell where the readers are from (general location) and how long they remain on the blog site (the longer time usually means someone comes intermittently and thus takes more time to read its contents). I do  not consider it my duty to blog every day although sometimes it may appear that way.

I was pleasantly surprised at the response level of support in favor of the position of restraint which I tried to take on the Notre Dame graduation issue. Thank you for that and thanks also to those who respectfully disagreed. From the beginning all I hoped for was a civilized discussion/debate.

One reader mentioned the loss of THE FLORIDA CATHOLIC and asked what we were planning as a vehicle for delivering “news” of the diocese, especially clergy assignments, etc. We hope our web page will be the major manner of communicating to all who can access it through the electronic media.

That so many of you loved the ordination of Father Melchior brought a return of tears of gratitude and happiness. Also, the blog on the virtue of hope seems to have struck a responsive chord in a number of readers.

So let me end with some good news for a change. The vocations to the priesthood picture brightens considerably this year as we have accepted about eight  into the seminary to join the twenty-four we currently have. For the first time since 1988 we have more than thirty seminarians and this year will be the third best year for the number of seminarians since 1984. Thirty-nine is the highest number in the forty year history of the diocese (1983-84). I attribute that grace to several factors: God’s blessings and favor, a good vocation director who works the job hard, and the quality of our present seminarians who attract those discerning a vocation. It also helps that only Father Carl Melchior left the seminary this Spring (understand that properly now!) while for the first time in my memory, all others are remaining in formation for next year. Finally, your prayers help a lot. The media this morning is filled with a story of a priest who felt he needed to leave the Church of his ordination. Not enough attention is paid to those who choose to remain and serve. Soon, if it is God’s will, there may be more of them.

+RNL

Last night’s news from the White House contained one stunning appointment, the new Ambassador of the United States to the Holy See. The president’s choice is Miguel Diaz and I am personally delighted since I have known Ambassador-designate Diaz personally and admired his theological and intellectual work. Normally, I would be clueless about these appointments but this man served on the faculty of our regional seminary as a professor of theology following receiving his doctorate degree from Notre Dame. Miguel Diaz is proud of his Cuban heritage and history and also of his Church. The bishops of Florida were sad to see him leave when for economic and professional reasons first Barry University in Miami andf then St. John’s in Collegeville, Minnesota offered him positions he could not turn down. At the time he was also serving as academic dean at our seminary. A number of priests of this diocese ordained in the last thirteen years would probably remember Diaz and, I would think, with respect and gratitude for his work at St. Vincent de Paul Seminary. Of this I am certain, this is a man who would not sell out either his Catholic faith or his love of his country.

The appointment will be “batted around” in some circles prior to his confirmation hearings precisely because he is a working Catholic theologian. Those who are skeptical of the president’s every move will likely see something sinister in this appointment and the media may have a little more interest than they normally would. All I know is this, the Miguel Diaz I know and remember is an outstanding husband, father, and teacher and a wonderful representative of our Catholic faith. On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States of America and the Holy See and the joint appointment of ambassadors by the late President Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II, our country will for the first time be represented by someone who can not easily be called a “political operative” but a son of immigrants who loved the Church enough to make it his life up to this moment. There will soon be a new coin in those fountains in St. Peter’s Square.

+RNL

I was going to allow the Notre Dame graduation of last Sunday pass without further comment but when I read the attached speech of Justice John Noonan of the US Court of Appeals given during the commencement ceremony, I found it too good not to share with my readers.

First, a few words about Judge Noonan. In the mid ’60’s of the last century, he was chosen along with others by Pope Paul VI to serve on a papal commission to review Church teaching on the subject of c0ntraception. Why was a young law professor from Massachusetts chosen for such a task by the Holy Father. Because as a college and law student, John Noonan became this country’s foremost expert on natural law, a foundational element of the Church’s teaching on all of human sexuality.

Secondly, he was a past recipient of the Laetare Medal given by the University of Notre Dame to an outstanding Cath0lic lay person. When Professor  Mary Ann Glendon of Harvard Law School chose not to accept this year’s Laetare Medal, the University’s President, Father John Jenkins, C.S.C. asked Judge Noonan to speak at the ceremony in her place.

Ponder his words carefully – they make a lot more sense than 90% of the rhetoric in the last few weeks. You may view video of or read the text of his remarks by clicking here.

+RNL

While Notre Dame’s annual commencement exercises are underway in South Bend this afternoon, the first of six Catholic High School graduations was taking place at the same time. For the first time in my fourteen years here as bishop, I will not be attending any of the graduations this year. It is a one year hiatus for a reason I will explain momentarily. But for this moment I wish to congratulate the departing seniors for reaching this important moment in their young lives and to assure them of my prayers and good wishes as they advance further in either education or work. Many have sacrificed to allow these young women and men to reach this moment of accomplishment and I wish to thank the parents, teachers, administrators and staff of the six Catholic secondary schools for their very significant role in allowing these, our sisters and brothers, to receive their diplomas. I have written a letter to the presidents and/or principals of St. Petersburg Catholic, Clearwater Central Catholic, Tampa Catholic, Bishop McLaughlin and the Academy of the Holy Names extending both regrets for my absence and best wishes to the Class of 2009.

I am making a very brief trip out-of-the country this week to attend the installation of the next Archbishop of Westminster (London, England), Archbishop Vincent Nichols. The new archbishop and I worked very closely when we both served as General Secretaries of our respective episcopal conferences and became sufficiently close that he attended my episcopal ordination here in St. Petersburg, I attended his in Westminster Cathedral as auxiliary-bishop of that diocese, and he favored the priests of this diocese with his presence and spiritual leadership at one of our past October convocations for priestly renewal. He was later transferred to the Archdiocese of Birmingham as archbishop before being named to the historic and extremely important see of Westminster a few weeks ago. He is to be installed at noon this Thursday. Consequently, once I decided I would go for forty-eight hours, I realized I would miss three of the six graduations and felt it better to absent myself from them all this year. I will be back next year, I am certain. Apologies to anyone, and there number is not likely to be legion, who miss me and wish I had been there.

+RNL

I have four hours between connecting planes and am sitting in the gate area of Cleveland’s Hopkins Airport. I have several other thoughts that have been ruminating through my head since leaving South Bend and the campus of Notre Dame this morning. They are my personal reflections.

Only the seniors were on campus this week-end, preparing for their graduation week-end which starts tomorrow (Friday) and ends with the commencement ceremonies on Sunday afternoon. They were seen by this observer to be doing what one would expect people who have spent four years in once place to do – tossing the accumulated “junk” of their college years and preparing to load the rest into Mom and Dad’s car on Sunday or Monday. But late last night I witnessed something beautiful and touching. At about 1130pm I walked down the short walk from where I was staying to the Grotto. There were about fifty students there, mostly kneeling and praying. At the far right side (where the mother and her young child can be seen in the picture which follows) there was a young couple holding hands and with their other hand holding rosaries. I saw them cross themselves and then they stood up. The young man got down on his knees and took the young woman’s hand. Out came a ring and a request followed by tears and a hug. How cool was that? After praying together to the mother of the redeemer. How cool was that?

Proud parents and their children are beginning to arrive for the week-end. They are greeted at the entrance to the campus by “floats” displaying horrid pictures of aborted children which so far seem only to have stirred the emotions of some women employees on campus who have recently miscarried. The three-ring circus is soon to begin and of this much I am sure – a lot of pro-life graduates of the class of 2009 are going to take a long time to heal and think well of the so-called “pro-life movement.” Precisely as I had predicted in my first blog entry, the contentious voices of the movement  have “shot themselves in the foot” once again and the cause of saving the unborn is again set back.

Sixty to eighty graduates who are pro-life and wounded by the presence of the President at their graduation have asked the university for several things: permission to miss the ceremony, permission to have a Mass at 1130am on Sunday, and permission for two hours of Eucharistic adoration from 2-4pm on Sunday during the ceremonies. I hurt that these few young women and men must choose to absent themselves but I admire the dignified, prayerful manner in which they seek to make their pro-life statement. Kudos also to Campus Ministry at ND which is assisting this group in meeting all its needs.

There has been a lot of demagoguery on this situation in the Church as well and in certain sectors of even the Diocese of St. Petersburg. I have always felt and continue to feel that the best pro-life lessons are taught by advocates who with a certain passion and commitment speak of life without raising their voices, their fists, their placards and pictures. Reason will ultimately carry this battle, not emotions. And while it is a very emotional issue for many, it is also very emotional for those who have had abortions, sought forgiveness and have to live with the sad consequences of their actions.

We are people of hope and I try hard to be a witness to hope. I hope the graduates of Notre Dame’s Class of 2009 will leave this campus as signs of hope for the Church and for the nation and find it in their hearts to forgive those who have chosen to try and spoil their week-end. Just as these beautiful tulips will in a few days wither and die, so will this moment pass and this great university will continue as a beacon of faith and hope as an incoming class is planted on this holy ground.

+RNL