Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:10] Speaker B: Hello and welcome to this week's special edition of Big City Catholics. My friends, we're back in Holy Week and I hope it's a time of great blessing for you and all your loved ones. Earlier this week we celebrated the Prism Mass and very pleased to share with you the homily I gave on that day. Please know that as this podcast releases on Good Friday, we're in the midst of these most sacred of days. Know that you're in my prayers. Know that I ask God's blessing upon you. May these days be different for you and your loved ones. May they be days of great grace and hope. God bless you and prayers this coming Easter.
Early in January, a delegation from the Diocese of Brooklyn participated in the Sikh 25 conference hosted by the Fellowship of Catholic University Students Focus In a particular presentation on the wages of sin, a woman named Heather Keim, who works with Ascension Press, spoke about a particular moment of desperation and powerlessness that she felt at the sudden medical emergency involving her young son. She spoke about how, after she tried unsuccessfully to address the situation herself, the medics arrived with the remedy. Of course, when it comes to the human condition and the wages of sin, God comes with the remedy, the gift of Himself. The refrain throughout her talk was, where we go in our desperation matters. Now I'll say this, her talk in itself was absolutely amazing. She did a wonderful job. But I do have to admit that my mind wandered a little bit and I started to think, believe it or not, about the reading that we heard, the first reading that we heard in the Mass this evening. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me. He sent me to bring glad tidings to the lowly, to heal the brokenhearted, proclaim liberty to captives and release to prisoners, to announce a year of favor from the Lord and a day of vindication by our God to comfort those who mourn, to place on those who mourn in Zion the diadem instead of ashes, to give them the oil of gladness in place of mourning, a glorious mantle in place of a listless spirit. Now I can only speak for myself, but whenever I hear this passage and the corresponding Gospel where Jesus reads the same, pointing to its fulfillment in Himself, I immediately hear it with the ears and think of myself as sharing in this ministry of Christ. That's not incorrect. Indeed, the context, when we hear it generally is a call, an invitation, a challenge to go forth. Christ invites us into his ministry, he anoints us and he sends us forth as his witnesses. We are indeed anointed all of us, through baptism and confirmation, and set apart for witness, for service, for ministry. Moreover, in a few moments, we priests will renew our priestly promise, being resolved to be faithful stewards of the mysteries of God in the Holy Eucharist and the other liturgical rites, resolving to discharge faithfully the sacred order of teaching, following Christ the head, the shepherd, and not seeking any gain, but only moved by zeal for souls. That's no small thing. I thank God every day for that gift of the opportunity to serve as a priest and as a bishop. We all give thanks for being called into that ministry. Yet before all else, Jesus addresses this passage to people who are lonely, lowly, imprisoned, to those with heavy burdens and listless spirits. Friends, he's speaking to me. He's speaking to us, and he brings good news. I, and the lowly one in need of good news. I am imprisoned by my own limits and sin. It's I who bear a listless spirit. We've all experienced mourning in our lives, and we've all had our hearts broken. I need a savior. Contrary to popular belief, I cannot save myself. We all know people who have walked down disastrous paths, seeking relief or escape or the illusion of freedom or control. We've seen the wreckage and the havoc caused upon so many individuals and families.
You often help to pick up the pieces in terms of some of those disastrous decisions made by people you serve. More likely, for many of us, we can be tempted to seek meaning in our work or our projects, or, on the contrary, to withdraw to our rooms, to do the minimum by just getting by. The modern good, the modern virtue, is to be able to say, I can manage on my own. I got this. I'll deal with it. Truth is, we need a savior. And even better, we need we know him personally. I think of the late servant of God, Cardinal Van Tuan as he was taken away on a prison ship from Saigon. And from all that he loved, all that had meaning for him, he asked himself the question, do I love God or do I love the things of God? And it was by asking that question that over the years and years that he was imprisoned, that he kept his focus and resisted despair. Brother priests, friends, all before all else, today we give ourselves over to Jesus Christ, who brings us glad tidings, liberty, a glorious mantle in place of a listless spirit. We recognize tonight our need and God's great gift. We need a Savior, and he has come extending the hand of friendship as we ask the Lord's blessing on these oils. We will pray that we who are outwardly anointed may be inwardly transformed and come to share eternal salvation. Friends, I'm always overwhelmed by the enthusiastic presence of so many at this Mass. It is always, always so heartening. And this evening is no exception. We actually started a little early. Not because we wanted to beat the clock, we wanted to try to beat the rain. It was just about to rain on top of us and then of course, once we started moving, the cloud passed over and it would have been fine. Thanks to all of you who are here and to all who join by way of Net tv. Thanks for your love and your prayers for your priests, for sharing this love and the joy of the Gospel. I want to thank so many who serve in all the different capacities in our parishes and our movements in diocesan and related ministries, as well as to all those who support those works. May I take this opportunity to thank all those who took part in the various celebrations of the Eucharistic revival last year and all those who who just walked any part of this Lenten pilgrimage and all of the station churches that hosted us along the way. Thank you. Thanks to all of the religious sisters and brothers, the legacy that we have inherited from the religious congregation serving here for the generations in Brooklyn and Queens and provided by the many different congregations who are represented and who are serving so zealously here today. The depths of the contemplation and apostolic service that is provided by all of you never escapes me. We are blessed by you, sisters and brothers. Thank you so much. I think of our deacons and I thank them. Our deacons were ordained for service. I thank your families for the sacrifices they make as you offer this service and I thank you for the generous gifts of yourselves. I look forward to celebrating with you on the feast of Saint Ephraim. Two of the deacons for this Mass have given particular assistance to me and to the priests of the Diocese of Brooklyn and will be retiring from full time employment. Deacon Jaime and Deacon Julio. We thank you very, very much to our priests and our bishops. Thank you so very much. The generous resolution you made on the day of your ordination and that you renew here today to be united with the Lord Jesus more closely conformed to Him. That resolution inspires me each and every day and brings hope, comfort and love to God's holy people. I can never thank you enough. Thank you so much. Let's pray for those who are ill and those who are suffering. Let's give thanks for those who have gone home to the Lord after dedicating faithful service to Him. Congratulations to all those who celebrate special jubilee anniversaries this year. Boy, do we have a number of them. You'll see their names listed in the back of the book. But you know what? Here's one we don't get to celebrate very often. Dominic Cottrone. Father Dominic Cottrone, we are so proud of your 70 years of service as a diocesan priest.
I welcome all the priests who incarnated in the last year and the ordination class from last year. And I'm looking forward to using the Chrism that will have blessed this afternoon to ordain seven men for the diocesan service in June. We welcome all of them.
Thanks to all those who are involved in the work of vocations, the formation of seminarians, the various ministries of service to our priests. God bless you one and all this evening. And as we stand at the threshold to the sacred Triduum, we should glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. In him is our salvation, life and resurrection. Through him we are saved and set free.
[00:11:39] Speaker A: Thanks for joining us on this special edition of our diocesan podcast, Big City Catholics. We hope that you have a blessed rest of your holy Triduum. And join us again next week as we broadcast Bishop Brennan's Easter homily to the faithful of the diocese.
