A few months ago, I wrote about our entering into the third year of our National Eucharistic Revival, a year focused on mission.  We have reflected on our diocesan / parish mission statement as articulated in our 2017 Fourth Diocesan Synod, and the four pillars of discipleship and stewardship: hospitality, prayer, formation, and service.

As we begin this new calendar year and prepare to shift back into Ordinary Time for a couple of months before Lent, I would like to draw our attention to an initiative that the National Eucharistic Revival team is promoting called Walk with One.

The premise of the initiative is rather simple.  It recognizes that the spreading of the Good News, which we call evangelization, typically takes place in one-on-one encounters, encounters that can happen anywhere or at any time.  While we should always be prepared to give a witness to our faith (cf. 1 Peter 3:15), we can also be intentional in our efforts to share the Gospel message.  This is what the Walk with One initiative invites us to do, to identify just one person with whom we desire to walk toward a deeper relationship with Jesus and His Church.

In last week’s bulletin article, I shared the story of praying for my grandmother, and how this weekend, we would be inviting you to consider the name of somebody whom the Lord has put on your heart to accompany.  I realize this might initially sound intimidating, but at this point, all we are asking for is prayer.  Most of us are not comfortable inviting somebody to come back to Mass or confession, so this time of prayer has two aims.  Obviously, we are praying for the Lord to prepare the hearts of those with whom we desire to journey.  But we are also praying for ourselves, that we might have the courage and the conviction to approach them and offer a more explicit invitation to them at some point in the future.  That invitation may not be just to come to Mass.  It might be inviting them to go to confession with you.  It might be more basic, like inviting them to join you for coffee or a meal so that they can share their story.  The how is not so important at this point, but our focus is on the who.

As we begin this time of prayer for these individuals, let me caution against a mindset that we can sometimes fall into.  We can be tempted to see others as “projects” to work on.  Once we get them back to Mass, then our work will have been done.  No, we want to see these individuals as people, companions on our journey of faith.  We need to love them and be genuinely interested in them.  Even if the person does not immediately accept our explicit invitation, we will not cease to be involved in their lives.  We want to love them where we find them, hoping that the Lord will move them to a different place, using us as His instruments in bringing about that progress.  Regardless of the outcome we hope for, when we sincerely seek to accompany a brother or sister in the Lord, witnessing to our love of the faith, God is glorified, and nothing will have been wasted.  God is far more patient and committed to this than we are, and that can be extremely comforting.

As soon as the Lord places an individual on your heart to walk with, first of all from a distance, begin to pray for them each and every day.  It could be as simple as adding a fourth Hail Mary to the three Hail Mary’s I’ve encouraged us to say each day for our parish, the clergy of the parish, and ourselves.  We might consider spending time in Eucharistic Adoration, offering that time up for them.  We might look for a novena to pray for them.  It does not need to be complicated, just that we do something each day.  Let us also make sure to thank God every day for the good He has planned for us and for them through this commitment to prayer, and whatever concrete actions the Lord may invite us to take in the future.

Father Alford     

Feast Day: December 29^th 

What is Jesus doing when He claims to have fulfilled Psalm 110 in Himself? St. Peter interprets it for us in his first sermon on Pentecost (and thereby underlines how critical it was to Jesus’ mission and identity). Hang on as we get a full taste of his understanding, and passion, having just received the Holy Spirit!: 

Brothers, I may say to you with confidence about the patriarch David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on his throne, he foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption. This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing. For David did not ascend into the heavens, but he himself says,

“‘The Lord said to my Lord,
“Sit at my right hand,
until I make your enemies your footstool.”’

Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.” Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. [Acts 2:29-38]

Jesus, Peter tells us, by claiming psalm 110 for his own, is claiming two extraordinary things: that He is the Christ, the Messiah, the anointed heir and son of David – yes, a lord, a rival to the Roman rulers – but also that He is son and equal of YHWH, God incarnate – yes, the Lord, not just a rival of the high priestly class, but the only one who fully interprets (and actually inspired) the scriptures. Rightly so then, when Jesus claims to fulfil this passage, both Pilate and Caiaphas know He is throwing the gauntlet before them. 

And Jesus is not only claiming those extraordinary identities by citing this passage, but is turning the whole thing on its head at the same time! It had always been read as a promise that one day a new David would successfully conquer all of Israel’s enemies. What if instead it was always a promise of a King and Kingdom that instead embraces Israel’s enemies? What if the carpenter’s son was in fact the true High Priest? What if the Roman occupation was not contrary to God’s Kingdom but the way in which God’s Kingdom will be carried to the world? What if death itself were the means to Eternal Life, and the descendent of David were in fact His Creator? What if this son of David were the Lord that David served?

And so we take another leap forward, one century, and another, and another. A cantankerous Church Father, the great scholar Jerome, found his way to another quiet cave near the village of Bethlehem and began to translate the Old and New Testaments into Latin. He came to the critical passage of Psalm 110, verse 1 and replaces the Hebrew “adonai” and Greek “kyrios” with the Latin word “Dominus.” And so, “The Lord says to my lord” becomes the splendid Latin line, “Dixit Dominus Domino meo.” Such were the words cited by Ambrose or Augustine in their preaching and teaching on the radical transformation of death that comes with Jesus’ Resurrection (Ambrose’s Exameron) and His equality with the Eternal Father (Augustine’s Tractate 99).

But first, just a few decades before all three of those great Fathers of the Church, we have a saint who depicts even more clearly the fulfillment and authentic Christian interpretation of this age-old prophecy. We are far from Bethlehem, beyond even Cairo, probably near modern Tunisia or Libya and we are watching eight men, Christians, refuse to uphold Diocletian’s divinity and offer incense in his honor. They are part of the Roman empire and Roman culture; their names obviously Latin: Dominic, Victor, Primian, Lybosus, Saturninus, Crescentius, Secundus and Honoratus, but they will not budge to their emperor’s demand. 

Their Lord, not Caesar, has conquered death and sanctified death. Their Lord, not Caesar, has both divinity, and authority. Their Lord, not Caesar, reigns eternally and death cannot cut them off from Him. And the first was named “Dominic”, the first St. Dominic in the history of the Church, and we know nothing about him except His name, “Dominicus”, “of the Lord.” Yet with that name, he carries in himself a radical claim: that The Lord and his lord are the same person, the God-man Jesus Christ.

– Fr. Dominic is just glad to have been introduced to another name-sake and intercessor this week. (AND, another feast day that ought to be adequately celebrated!)