On Pentecost Sunday, an often overlooked part of the liturgy is the Pentecost Sequence.  This prayer to the Holy Spirit is inserted into the Mass between the conclusion of the Second Reading and the Alleluia before the Gospel.  Since we rarely hear the Sequence at Mass, it can seem a little out of place.  But the Sequence for Pentecost is an extremely powerful prayer in which we invite the Holy Spirit to come and renew our hearts on this very important day in the liturgical year.  As I was reflecting on the Sequence, a few lines section caught my attention:

Heal our wounds, our strength renew;
On our dryness pour your dew;
            Wash the stains of guilt away:
Bend the stubborn heart and will;
Melt the frozen, warm the chill;
            Guide the steps that go astray.

This is a prayer we can offer first of all for ourselves.  If we are honest, we can all admit that we have wounds that need to be addressed in our lives.  We often feel dry when it comes to prayer or our participation at Mass.  We can all cling stubbornly to our will.  Calling upon the Holy Spirit to address those areas within us can be a very powerful prayer.  I never get tired of reminding people (and myself) that the same Holy Spirit that set the hearts of the Apostles of the early Church on fire, as well as saints throughout history, is available to us today.  He wants to melt our hearts, frozen in complacency and inactivity, and warm the chill of our lack of concern for the needs of those around us so that we can be those dedicated, missionary disciples He has equipped us to be through our Baptism and Confirmation.

After begging the Holy Spirit to renew our hearts, we pray for the rest of the Body of Christ to be awakened to the power of the Holy Spirit.  We pray for a New Pentecost, so badly needed in the Church and in the world.  We can and should be talking about all the legislative and cultural situations that need addressing, the rights of the vulnerable that are being overlooked, the structures in society that need so to be addressed.  But more importantly than all of that is to call upon the Holy Spirit to come to our aid, so that we can benefit from His powerful gifts which will be the most effective in bringing about conversion and change.  We need the Holy Spirit to point out how and what needs to be addressed, not simply relying on the spirit of the world, otherwise known as popular opinion.  Speaking of the Holy Spirit whom He would send, Jesus told His Apostles: “But when He comes, the Spirit of truth, He will guide you to all truth.” (John 16:13)  

As we look at the many difficult situations that face our Church, our nation, and our world, it can feel very overwhelming!  Before we give in to despair or discouragement, let us proclaim with confidence: “Come, Holy Spirit, come!”  In doing so, we are reminded of how the power of the Holy Spirit has worked throughout the history of the Church, a power that the Lord is eager to continue to send to us if we are but willing to receive it.

Father Alford

One of my favorite months of the year is May.  The grass is green, flowers are blooming, and the weather (generally) gets warmer, which, for me, means more opportunities for going fishing!  When I have been in parish assignments with schools, May was always a time to celebrate another school year coming to a close, capped off with graduations and other festivities.  May is a month when we also recognize our mothers on Mothers Day.  That day provides me an opportunity to be grateful for the gift of my mother, my grandmothers, and so many who have been very motherly to me as a priest.  Along those lines, the Church invites us to have a special awareness of our Blessed Mother during this month, which is dedicated to her in a special way.  For many years now, Mary has been such an important person in my life and I find myself expressing my gratitude to her and for her in a special way this month, especially when I pray the Rosary.  May is also a month when I think about the priesthood, since so many of the priests of our diocese (myself included) were ordained in the month of May.  In recognition of that, the priests of the diocese gather in early May each year for our Priests Jubilee during which we honor those celebrating significant anniversaries of their ordinations.

As I reflect on all of these aspects that make May a pretty remarkable month, these final two – Mary and the priesthood – come together in special way with the Marian title of Mary, Mother of Priests.  By virtue of their ordination, priests share in the life of Christ in a very unique way.  Because priests share this sacramental bond with Christ through Holy Orders, their relationship with Mary is likewise unique.  Mary certainly loves all of her children, but she has a special affection for those sons of hers who are continuing the life of her Son in priestly ministry.  I have felt this love from Mary in so many ways as a priest, and I know so many of my brother priests have also found in her that motherly care which is a source of great encouragement and strength.

As you hopefully are aware, we have been asking the parish to pray three Hail Marys each day.  One of those Hail Marys is for the clergy of our parish.  I know I speak for all of us that those prayers for us are greatly appreciated.  For this month of May, though, could I ask you to please pray an additional Hail Mary for all of the priests of our diocese?  As you likely know, it is usually in May that we hear about priest assignment changes.  That can be a difficult time for a parish, but also for a priest.  So please keep those priests in your prayers in a special way, asking Mary to intercede for them during this time of transition.  At the end of this month, we will be ordaining two new priests for service in our diocese – Deacon Zach Samples and Deacon Paul Lesupati.  Please commend them to the prayers of Mary as they prepare to enter into this beautiful life of the priesthood.

Father Alford

St. Mark has been getting the royal treatment around here recently. Last week, Fr. Rankin wrote his saint article on St. Mark, and it covered two pages. As I celebrated Mass on St. Mark’s feast day on Monday of last week, I started thinking again about our Scriptures and how blessed we are to have the Word of God handed down to us from nearly 2000 years ago. I was intrigued by a line I read in my meditation book that morning. According to St. Clement of Alexandria, a bishop who lived from 150-211, Mark wrote his gospel down “at the insistence of the Christians of Rome.” What if the Christian community had never encouraged Mark to write down his account of the Gospel? Would God have found another way to communicate the truth that Mark has given us? I honestly don’t know. 

Our belief in the inspiration of the scriptures remains a great mystery of our faith. Typically, we write articles, books, or letters using our intellect and doing our best to communicate a message that needs to be passed on. So, if Mark (and all biblical authors) used their intellect and put a lot of effort into writing a short book about the life and teachings of Jesus, how can we say that God was actually the author of these books? Wouldn’t it make more sense for the Bible to be dropped out of the sky, straight from heaven? Some other religions believe that revelation occurred like this. Mormons traditionally believe that Joseph Smith discovered the Book of Mormon on golden plates buried in a hill, where the prophet Mormon had buried them around 300. Also, Muslims believe that the Quran was dictated to Muhammed verbatim in Arabic, and he repeated it to his scribes to write down. 

It is a common saying in the study of our faith that “grace perfects nature.” God does not nullify or cancel who we are as human beings when he shares his divine nature with us through the sacraments. With this in mind, it actually makes sense that God would want the biblical authors to use their natural gifts as part of the process of writing scripture. Biblical books and letters were always written by a human being, but the Holy Spirit guided the thoughts and words of the authors to be exactly as God wanted them to be. The word “inspired” comes from the Latin word spiritus, which literally means “spirit”! So when I hear that the early Christians urged Mark to write the Gospel down, I can see how much the Holy Spirit was involved in the whole process. First, God made mark with significant literary talents, provided him with a literate education, made him a companion of St. Paul, St. Peter, other apostles, and the early Christians, and maybe even a companion of Jesus himself. Then, as Mark sat at a desk with some kind of parchment or animal skin, the Holy Spirit guided him to the words to say in Greek, even as Mark worked really hard to craft such a beautiful Gospel. He may or may not have not known that he was writing an Inspired work of scripture. 

Because Mark wrote the Gospel using his human mind, the Church needs to undertake serious scholarly research to figure out what he intended to say throughout the Gospel. If you were to read any ancient writing (think of the Odyssey or Gilgamesh), you would most likely try to find some sort of guide through the text, such as a commentary or online lecture about the cultural significance of each book. The same is true for the Bible, which was written in Hebrew and Greek, and has been translated into other languages for us to read. 

Understanding the scriptures has always been a challenge for believers, and thankfully God gave us prophets, and later, bishops of the Church as the authority to teach the meaning of Sacred Scripture. I always take comfort in the fact that Saint Peter himself – the first pope – found the writings of St. Paul hard to understand! He wrote, “In [Paul’s letters] there are some things hard to understand that the ignorant and unstable distort to their own destruction, just as they do the other scriptures” (2 Peter 3:16). 

The Second Vatican Council promulgated a document on Divine Revelation entitled Dei Verbum, or the Word of God. There are several points in this document that I thought may be helpful to leave here for further reading. If you have read this far, thank you for bearing with me! I understand that not everyone is interested in some technicalities of how God’s Word is passed down to us, but I think it’s pretty cool. Here are parts of paragraphs 11 and 12 of Dei Verbum. 

Holy mother Church, relying on the belief of the Apostles, holds that the books of both the Old and New Testaments in their entirety, with all their parts, are sacred and canonical because written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. They have God as their author and have been handed on as such to the Church herself.

In composing the sacred books, God chose men, and while employed by Him, they made use of their powers and abilities, so that with Him acting in them and through them, they, as true authors, consigned to writing everything and only those things which He wanted.

Therefore, since everything asserted by the inspired authors or sacred writers must be held to be asserted by the Holy Spirit, it follows that the books of Scripture must be acknowledged as teaching solidly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings for the sake of salvation. Therefore “all Scripture is divinely inspired and has its use for teaching the truth and refuting error, for reformation of manners and discipline in right living, so that the man who belongs to God may be efficient and equipped for good work of every kind” (2 Tim. 3:16-17, Greek text).

However, since God speaks in Sacred Scripture through men in human fashion, the interpreter of Sacred Scripture, in order to see clearly what God wanted to communicate to us, should carefully investigate what meaning the sacred writers really intended, and what God wanted to manifest by means of their words.

To search out the intention of the sacred writers, attention should be given, among other things, to “literary forms.” For truth is set forth and expressed differently in texts which are variously historical, prophetic, poetic, or of other forms of discourse. The interpreter must investigate what meaning the sacred writer intended to express and actually expressed in particular circumstances by using contemporary literary forms in accordance with the situation of his own time and culture. For the correct understanding of what the sacred author wanted to assert, due attention must be paid to the customary and characteristic styles of feeling, speaking and narrating which prevailed at the time of the sacred writer, and to the patterns men normally employed at that period in their everyday dealings with one another.

But, since Holy Scripture must be read and interpreted in the sacred spirit in which it was written, no less serious attention must be given to the content and unity of the whole of Scripture if the meaning of the sacred texts is to be correctly worked out. The living tradition of the whole Church must be taken into account along with the harmony which exists between elements of the faith. It is the task of exegetes to work according to these rules toward a better understanding and explanation of the meaning of Sacred Scripture, so that through preparatory study the judgment of the Church may mature. For all of what has been said about the way of interpreting Scripture is subject finally to the judgment of the Church, which carries out the divine commission and ministry of guarding and interpreting the word of God.

So, to answer my initial question in the title, the answer is “both”! Both God and St. Mark are true authors of the Gospel of Mark. 

On April 30, 2000, Pope St. John Paul II celebrated Mass on the Second Sunday of Easter at St. Peter’s in Rome.  That in itself was not something altogether significant, given that the Pope lives at St. Peter’s and many papal liturgies are celebrated there.  But this Mass was unique.  Instead of celebrating Mass inside the basilica, he celebrated it outside, in the Plaza, something that is done only for extra special occasions so as to be able to accommodate large crowds.  The special occasion for this Mass was to celebrate the first canonization the New Millennium.  The saint canonized on that day was a fellow Pole, St. Maria Faustina Kowalska, known as the apostle of Divine Mercy.  On that day, the Holy Father officially decreed that the Second Sunday of Easter would be known throughout the Universal Church as Divine Mercy Sunday, per the request of Jesus Himself to St. Faustina as recorded in her Diary:

I desire that the first Sunday after Easter be the Feast of Mercy (Diary, 299)…I desire that the Feast of Mercy be a refuge and shelter for all souls, and especially for poor sinners. On that day the very depths of My tender mercy are open. I pour out a whole ocean of graces upon those souls who approach the fount of My mercy. The soul that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion shall obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishment. On that day all the divine floodgates through which grace flow are opened. Let no soul fear to draw near to Me, even though its sins be as scarlet.

(Diary, 699)

The message of Divine Mercy is extremely powerful as it reminds us of the depth of the Lord’s love for us, His children, and how He desires to free us from the burdens of our sins.  I recently heard a description of God’s mercy that has really impacted me.  The priest who shared it with me spoke about the experience of a child who has been injured, running to their mother or father in pain.  Seeing their child suffering, the parent has only one thing in mind – attending to the wound.  The parent is not trying to figure out what happened or why it happened, they just want to bring relief to their child.  This is like what happens when we run to the Lord for His mercy.  We run to Him in need, injured by our sins.  Seeing us suffering, the Lord goes right to the pain to heal us.  To strengthen this image, I recently came across these beautiful words of St. Faustina in her Diary:

When I see that the burden is beyond my strength, I do not consider or analyze it or probe into it, but I run like a child to the Heart of Jesus and say only one word to Him: “You can do all things.” And then I keep silent, because I know that Jesus Himself will intervene in the matter, and as for me, instead of tormenting myself, I use that time to love Him.

(Diary, 1033)

Think of this image the next time you go to confession, such as at our 2 PM Divine Mercy Service this Sunday.  Bring your sins before the Lord as an injured child before their loving Father.  Show Him your wounds by telling Him your sins and let Him do His work of healing.  Explanations of why and how these sins came about are rarely necessary.  The more we try to explain ourselves, the longer we delay His mercy from entering in to bring us His healing love!

Father Alford

Feast Day: April 25^th 

I would like to introduce you to a lion this week. No, it is not a wild lion – be not afraid! – but it is certainly not a tame one either – petting and photographing will not be to your advantage! – in fact it is a far more formidable beast than even the most powerful of the kings of the savannah! I speak, of course, of St. Mark the Evangelist and his Gospel. Within a hundred years of Jesus’ Resurrection, the Church had linked the Four Evangelists to the four creatures spoken of by the prophet Ezekiel which later reappear symbolically in the book of Revelation: the lion, the bull/ox, the man, and the eagle, all of them worshipping God.  St. Irenaeus was the Church Father who linked these with the authors of the Gospels, seeing in the lion an image for Mark, whose Gospel begins in a desert with the roaring of John the Baptist: “prepare the way of the Lord.”

How are we to approach a lion? How are we to approach the Gospel? How are we to approach Christ? On the one hand, if we come infear and hesitation, we will never get close enough to truly understand what, and Who, is there before us.  Consider the women at the end of Mark’s Gospel, who find the tomb empty and run away in wonder and fear. Only Mary, who takes back her courage and goes back to the tomb, has an encounter with the Risen Lord. Do our fears or trepidations keep us from engaging the Gospel in its entirety?  Do we allow ourselves to be challenged by it? Do we take back our own courage and come back, even if we don’t feel up to grasping or grappling with God right now?  Or, do we close God’s book, or never open it, or more subtly, just close our hearts and never open them to these potent words of God?  Will we let these pages capture us anew?

On the other hand, we can also approach these sacred words as we would a declawed tabby, to pet and prod and provoke into chasing a laser-pointer around the room.  We want to be delighted and comforted and so we turn to the story of Jesus looking for warmth and encouragement.  We pick out the bits that console us, and skim over the parts that ask us for something more.  We like to hear John speak of baptism, not so much of his call to repent and turn from sin.  We enjoy listening to Jesus’ words of forgiveness and compassion and healing, not as much His prediction of rejection, persecution, and crucifixion. 

The reality is that we are apt to be wildly disappointed whether we come to the Gospel of Mark hoping to avoid the ferocious lion, or to embrace only the kitten, for St. Mark’s Gospel is meant to both chase us, and comfort us.  In C.S. Lewis’ book series, “The Chronicles of Narnia”, Aslan, the Christ figure, is portrayed as a giant but gentle; strong but self-sacrificing, lion. We memorably meet Him with Lucy, Peter, Susan, and Edmund in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe but He also appears in a less-read book of that series, The Horse and His Boy. There a poor, abused, boy, and a royal, but lonely, girl, and two talking horses – all of them starting from the pagan faraway lands – find their paths come together as they begin an adventure that carries them through the desert back to Narnia. Only at the end of their journey do they finally meet Aslan, and discover that He had guided, and guarded, and chased them all the way to their true home.  

“Who are you?” [Shasta, the boy] said, scarcely above a whisper. “One who has waited long for you to speak,” said the Thing. Its voice was not loud, but very large and deep. “Are you—are you a giant?” asked Shasta. “You might call me a giant,” said the Large Voice. “But I am not like the creatures you call giants.” “I can’t see you at all,” said Shasta, after staring very hard. Then (for an even more terrible idea had come into his head) he said, almost in a scream, “You’re not—not something dead, are you? Oh please—please do go away. What harm have I ever done you? Oh, I am the unluckiest person in the whole world!” Once more he felt the warm breath of the Thing on his hand and face. “There,” it said, “that is not the breath of a ghost. Tell me your sorrows.” 

Shasta was a little reassured by the breath: so he told how he had never known his real father or mother and had been brought up sternly by the fisherman. And then he told the story of his escape and how they were chased by lions and forced to swim for their lives; and of all their dangers in Tashbaan and about his night among the tombs and how the beasts howled at him out of the desert. And he told about the heat and thirst of their desert journey and how they were almost at their goal when another lion chased them and wounded Aravis. And also, how very long it was since he had had anything to eat. “I do not call you unfortunate,” said the Large Voice. “Don’t you think it was bad luck to meet so many lions?” said Shasta. 

“There was only one lion,” said the Voice. “What on earth do you mean? I’ve just told you there were at least two the first night, and—” “There was only one: but he was swift of foot.” “How do you know?” “I was the lion.” And as Shasta gaped with open mouth and said nothing, the Voice continued. “I was the lion who forced you to join with Aravis. I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the dead. I was the lion who drove the jackals from you while you slept. I was the lion who gave the Horses the new strength of fear for the last mile so that you should reach King Lune in time. And I was the lion you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near death, so that it came to shore where a man sat, wakeful at midnight, to receive you.” 

“Then it was you who wounded Aravis?” “It was I.” “But what for?” “Child,” said the Voice, “I am telling you your story, not hers. I tell no one any story but his own.” “Who are you?” asked Shasta. “Myself,” said the Voice, very deep and low so that the earth shook: and again “Myself,” loud and clear and gay: and then the third time “Myself,” whispered so softly you could hardly hear it, and yet it seemed to come from all round you as if the leaves rustled with it. Shasta was no longer afraid that the Voice belonged to something that would eat him, nor that it was the voice of a ghost. But a new and different sort of trembling came over him. Yet he felt glad too. The mist was turning from black to gray and from gray to white. This must have begun to happen some time ago, but while he had been talking to the Thing he had not been noticing anything else. Now, the whiteness around him became a shining whiteness; his eyes began to blink. Somewhere ahead he could hear birds singing. He knew the night was over at last. He could see the mane and ears and head of his horse quite easily now. A golden light fell on them from the left. He thought it was the sun. He turned and saw, pacing beside him, taller than the horse, a Lion. The horse did not seem to be afraid of it or else could not see it. It was from the Lion that the light came. No one ever saw anything more terrible or beautiful.

I think we discover a similar truth every time we truly encounter Our Lord, including when we find Him in the pages of Scripture.  Yes, He sometimes challenges and sometimes comforts; He sometimes roars and sometimes reassures, but all those times, and all the in between times, He is there, close, helping, prodding, healing, forgiving, and loving us home. 

– Fr. Dominic Rankin has actually encountered more lions than deserts.  He has only seen three deserts (the Chihuahuan and Great Basin in the USA, the Negev/Judean in Israel), but has seen multiple lions both in zoos and on the Serengeti. He has encountered St. Mark’s Gospel many more times than that and plans to maintain this ratio of lion-engagement going forward.