Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:10] Speaker B: Welcome back to a new edition of our diocesan podcast, Big City Catholics, with Bishop Robert Brennan, the Diocesan Bishop of Brooklyn, serving in Brooklyn and Queens, and myself, Father Christopher Henyu. This week we're recording on site at St. Joan of Arc Parish, where Bishop is joining us for our Lenten pilgrimage. Today we'll begin in prayer. In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen. We ask our Blessed Mother's intercession always for us and upon our listeners and our intentions as we pray. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
[00:00:43] Speaker A: Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.
[00:00:47] Speaker B: Amen. In the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Amen. Bishop, welcome to St. John of Arc Parish. Welcome back.
[00:00:53] Speaker A: I'm glad to be back, actually. It's first time I visited since you were here. I was here last year with my senior Hoppy, as the school celebrated its 100th anniversary.
[00:01:02] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:01:02] Speaker A: And so that was with the whole community today. It was nice to visit with the children as they were coming in, to greet them as they were coming in. And we'll be together for the nine o' clock Mass.
[00:01:13] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah. No, it's, it's exciting. We had the chance to say, you know who Bishop Brennan is. Every time we go to Mass, we say we pray for Leo, our Pope, and Robert, our bishop. And Bishop goes, that's me.
That's clever. It's a good way for them to remember it, to make that connection. To make that connection.
[00:01:31] Speaker A: And what brings me here is that St. Joan of Arc is the station church for our annual Lenten pilgrimage, which they're well into the swing of things on the pilgrimage, people will be coming to St. Joan of Arco all day, praying, spending time before the Blessed Sacrament, coming to Mass or to the different devotions during the course of the day. I've gotten to a few of them and they're really getting great response. People are coming out sometimes in spite of difficult getting around.
[00:02:03] Speaker B: We've had some, some experiences of weather, but we'll get into that in a little bit. I mean, today here at the parish, it's a great honor for us to host. And on a Thursday generally, we have always an evening Mass in Spanish, so it's a very full day here in the parish. But we've thrown into the mix the Divine Mercy Chapel at the Angelus, even a moment of confession today as well before the evening Mass. So it's A great honor for us. I'm really glad to be able to.
[00:02:31] Speaker A: And that's really the hopes. There are different elements of the Lenten pilgrimage. The first consists of pilgrims who are going from church to church each day. There are some people who are making almost 40 churches. Yeah. And then it's also a day, I think, a blessing for the parish that hosts. And as I visited different churches, that's been the experience that is reported.
[00:02:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:55] Speaker A: Parishes themselves come out. They offer hospitality, but they're glad that they're one of the station churches. And this idea of station churches during Lent is really an awful lot old. Old tradition fell into a little bit of disuse, but it was revived in Rome a number of years ago.
[00:03:16] Speaker B: Really.
[00:03:16] Speaker A: By the American seminarians.
[00:03:18] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:03:18] Speaker A: American college. When you were studying. You.
[00:03:21] Speaker B: We did it.
[00:03:22] Speaker A: Part of it. So tell me about that.
[00:03:23] Speaker B: Yeah. A beautiful tradition. Lent was a very. It is a blessed time, but certainly a little more blessed in the city of Rome, where every day, a church that remains. Those churches, the first. First church, it always remains the same schedule, which is nice.
[00:03:38] Speaker A: Different experiences.
[00:03:40] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah. And I think, you know, to that point, you know, when a particular parish gets this opportunity, it raises the awareness in the parishioners as we're leading up to it, we're talking about it, we're telling them, hey, you too, can participate in it. And so we've shown our parishioners the great website that's promoting it and the app that's created for this pilgrimage so that hopefully, as more people get exposed to it, it'll continue to grow as well.
[00:04:06] Speaker A: So it's really got quite a following of people.
Last year, on the Wednesday of Holy Week, the last day of the pilgrimage, we were at St. Charles. And while I had seen different people at different times, seemed like everybody came for the clothes, and we were all gathered together. There was a photo. That's the reception.
When I saw everybody together who made the 40 days. Wow, this is pretty impressive.
[00:04:31] Speaker B: That's why. That's really beautiful. Very beautiful.
[00:04:34] Speaker A: And Lent is a special time. This is a time we have those tools of prayer, fasting, works of mercy, and the three of them. It's so important that the three of them go together.
[00:04:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:44] Speaker A: You know, we don't take any one thing on its own because it's more than just aesthetical practices. So, you know, fasting or abstaining. So we abstain from meat on Friday. People may make certain sacrifices, and those are a lot of very, very important things. But the practice of fasting needs to lead us to deeper prayer, to a greater reliance on the presence of God in our lives and on asking for his help and mercy, realizing it's not the stuff that we fill ourselves with that sustains us, but God is the one who sustains us. And that sense of abstaining self denial and of prayer has to lead to a certain almski. To charity.
[00:05:32] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:33] Speaker A: So, you know, it's one thing to give up coffee during Lent or that morning cup of coffee, but it's nothing to take maybe that couple of dollars and boy, it's getting to be a lot more than a couple of dollars if you're getting it on the boat. And to put it maybe toward some charity. That's right. Remember when I was kids, we had those cards, we put the quarters in the car, the mic box, you know, and then.
[00:05:56] Speaker B: Same thing.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: Charity without prayer is empty. It's kind of empty, yeah. Charity without some form of self denial is kind of just throwing away the XX change.
[00:06:08] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:06:09] Speaker A: Whereas the three of them go together in a very beautiful way during Lent. And hopefully doing this with the pilgrimage will raise the consciousness of what we're doing and why we're doing it.
[00:06:20] Speaker B: Sure, sure. And that's the point, you know, for men and women to come out to their parish church or local church or maybe even a church across the whole diocese. It's an act of sacrifice. It's a beautiful act of prayer, and it's a charity of their time, the sacrifices that they make, and it's bringing them into the presence of the Lord. So it does exactly what you're expecting.
[00:06:44] Speaker A: You know, from your experience at the CO Cathedral of St Joseph and the televised daily Mass, there are also many people who join us in prayer who are homebound and some of them very much alone. And even in those situations, people can have that sense of pilgrimage, of joining with us. Many people join us by downloading that app or going on the website or even just trying to follow along with Currents or the daily Mass in a special way during Lent. But with those tools, the app and the website, you can see where. Where people are, where people gathering today.
And then there was special prayers set aside for each day so that we're at least connected, all of us in the same place in the heart of God.
[00:07:33] Speaker B: You know, it's a season of transformation. It's a season of a. As you might call it, a transfiguration. As we come to the second Sunday of Lent. And the readings, they're just so striking. Every year you come on these, the daily Mass readings and our Sunday readings,
[00:07:48] Speaker A: like the first Sunday is always the temptation of the wood. We heard that last week. And the second Sunday is always the
[00:07:54] Speaker B: transfiguration of the wood.
[00:07:55] Speaker A: As you were listening to the Gospel of Matthew. So we're hearing Matthew's account. Yes, the transfiguration of the wood. And we see how Jesus brings Peter, James and John up the mountain where he's transfigured with brilliant light. The sight of Moses and the prophet and Elijah, the voice from heaven. What's that all about? Is it just a display? No, it's a little more than that. Right. It's an encouragement.
[00:08:21] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:21] Speaker A: Peter, James and John were about the other disciples. They were making their way to Jerusalem, to the cross. Life is getting tough. Life is getting tough. And when life is getting tough, what do we need?
Need a moment.
[00:08:32] Speaker B: That's when we need it most. Yeah. It's a great reminder to us as we come across the second week as an encouragement, as you say. You know, it's an encouragement for us as well to see this, the account and to know that it's a presence there for us and a reminder for us. Bishop. It gets tough and we have our own daily struggles, our own. Many people are suffering in sicknesses and illnesses, but we're also struggling. We're all in this together. When every time it seems to snow on a Sunday, a nightmare of parish priest. Oh, my goodness gracious. But we are surviving through it this time a little better.
[00:09:07] Speaker A: Yes, it is a tougher storm. Yeah, it was a lot. I came down in a short time. But the fortunate thing is it's warming up pretty quickly after. Remember the last one?
[00:09:18] Speaker B: We were below freezing for weeks.
[00:09:20] Speaker A: So long.
[00:09:21] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:09:22] Speaker A: And obviously that impacted some of our Lenten practices, the pilgrimage itself getting around.
But we always rise above it. This is one of those storms that comes around every couple of years. Go through the cycles. It's just the way the storm travels up the coast, the path the storm takes.
[00:09:41] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:09:41] Speaker A: That's all that's to it. But we get through it and we keep moving on and things are back in full swing around here. Kids are all excited. They had a couple of extra days to do.
[00:09:51] Speaker B: They did. They did. Yeah. A full snow day and then a remote day.
[00:09:56] Speaker A: The other interruption, you might say, to our Lenten practice is when I were both down in Palm beach for a couple of days in Florida, not for vacation, but one of our own. Bishop Manuel de Jesus Rodriguez, the former pastor of Our lady of Sorrows in Corona, is now the official Bishop of Palm Beach. He replaces Bishop Gerald Barbarito, now the Bishop Emeritus, who himself is a Brooklyn priest sent to Palm Beach. And what a beautiful experience to be with him as he was ordained to see the welcome that he received from the people of Palm beach. Really already made a wonderful impact and is received with great love and hospitality. And he's hitting the ground running.
[00:10:42] Speaker B: Yeah. I was speaking with his priest secretary and this was before the three hour ordination. Right. Bishop Manuel said to him, where are we going tomorrow? We. Well, what's our first thing tomorrow? So he brings with him certainly a lot of energy and excitement. And one other thing that was quite beautiful was having the chance to speak with Bishop Barbarito. And, you know, even though you're in Palm beach, he hasn't lost his Brooklyn connection. You know, he says he watches current news every day. He likes to keep in touch, reading, you know, the tablet. He does.
[00:11:12] Speaker A: And he comes to visit. His sister lives up here in the North. She's actually in New Jersey. So he comes up for a couple of days after Christmas, couple of days in the summer. Actually. I have the privilege of him staying with me. He's always, for me, a great source of encouragement. We talk about the transfiguration and encouragement of the Lord. We give encouragement to one another. And Bishop Barbarito is like an elder brother who was a source of encouragement to me. Good counsel.
[00:11:41] Speaker B: That's great.
[00:11:42] Speaker A: So, yes, hopefully we'll see a little more of him now that he has a little bit of time.
[00:11:47] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:11:48] Speaker A: Come and visit. When he comes up to Brooklyn, he walks everywhere. He walks across the Brooklyn Bridge. He goes all over Manhattan museums. He goes, visits different cemeteries.
Members of his family are buried. Still goes to some of his favorite haunts. He tells me about his favorite pizzeria, which is in Prospect Park, Windsor Terrace area.
He's never lost those Brooklyn roots.
[00:12:11] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:12:11] Speaker A: But then again, when you're in Palm beach, it's still kind of connected.
[00:12:15] Speaker B: I noticed that. I noticed that he always goes Palm
[00:12:19] Speaker A: beach, the sixth borough of New York City.
[00:12:21] Speaker B: It makes a lot of sense.
[00:12:22] Speaker A: Other people, oh my gosh.
[00:12:24] Speaker B: Yeah. Everyone you talk to, it was like, you know, they. They saw the light or something and they. Or they saw the sun.
Now, it was a beautiful, beautiful celebration indeed. And it's great to have that Brooklyn connection. And you had a great role as a.
[00:12:40] Speaker A: It was an honor to be a co. Consecrator. And the tradition of the church is that there's one bishop who is the ordaining bishop. A number of Bishops join, but that we have two other bishops, our co consecrators. It's connected to that idea of the apostolic succession. And it really was a very powerful experience to just to be at an Episcopal ordination. Because here you're seeing that continuation of the apostolic succession. You're seeing that continuation of, of God taking care of his church from generation to generation.
Now I had a laugh. I'm feeling my age. You know, often with bishops you hear the analogy of St. Paul speaking to St. Timothy, the letter of St. Paul to Timothy. And Paul the elder bishop is giving a little bit of encouragement and advice to the younger bishop Timothy. I always saw myself as Timothy. So I said, you know, I'm the young guy. And Bishop Manuel called me the Paul,
[00:13:46] Speaker B: like, oh my goodness, I'm the old guy. You're the mentor.
Yes, that's right, that's right. You had a beautiful, beautiful reflection homily during the vespers on that, on Monday evening. And I was just so, so impressed to see the amount of people that came out and that were present and the diversity that was.
[00:14:04] Speaker A: You know, it's a rich and lively church. And again you see the great things God is doing all of us.
[00:14:10] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:14:10] Speaker A: We see it here in Brookline, Queens. And I know Bishop Ra will see it in his new home. Last thing for us to talk about today is this time of Lent is also a very important time for those who are preparing for the Easter sacraments. And it's a time of intense preparation, like a 40 day retreat, so that they come renewed and really spiritually open to the grace of the sacraments of baptism, confirmation and Eucharist. Traditionally, the first Sunday of Lent is the rite of election.
[00:14:46] Speaker B: Traditionally that's when blizzards don't hit and unfortunately because of the snow, we had
[00:14:52] Speaker A: to call off the gathering.
The custom is that the bishop gathers with all the elect and that goes back again to the ancient church, that it was the bishop who did the rights of initiation at the Easter vigil, the whole church. That's a little impossible.
And so over the years now, Bishop gathers with all the people on that first Sunday month for the right of election.
And this is where we declare those who've been preparing electricity, chosen ones who indeed are going to be baptized at Easter and their names are enrolled in the book of involving. So what we did this year is there is the possibility that the bishop can delegate as the pastors or the local priests to do so. That's what we're doing.
So each parish is going to have some of them had it Sunday because they would have gathered for ascending earlier in the morning. So instead they did the rite of luncheon. Some will do it sometime during the week or perhaps this coming Sunday so that they will be declared elect in their own parish. Another custom, though connected to the order of Christian initiation of adults is the neophyte. So the bishop gathers with the newly baptized on Sunday after Easter or one of those early Sundays in the season of Easter. And so we have that coming up. So I'm disappointed that I couldn't be with those who are preparing for the sacraments, but I'm looking forward to as many of them as possible joining us. For the neophytes, that's beautiful.
[00:16:31] Speaker B: And certainly we as Catholics, as you say, sort of as the older brothers in the faith, certainly maintain our prayer.
[00:16:37] Speaker A: That's right. We have a responsibility and obligation to be people who are encouraged. But you know what? We can always be inspired.
[00:16:44] Speaker B: We are.
[00:16:44] Speaker A: You know, it's something Catholic faith is something. I don't know that I would go so far as to say we take it for granted. Granted. But it's something that's so much a part of us that when we think about somebody who sat down deliberately said, you know what? I really do believe this, and I want to be a Catholic. Yeah, that's inspiring to all of us.
[00:17:02] Speaker B: It certainly is.
[00:17:02] Speaker A: The faith that we have.
[00:17:03] Speaker B: It certainly is. Well, Bishop, if perhaps on that note, for prayer for all those who are moving through this season of conversion and transformation and those preparing for the sacraments, we can keep them all in our close prayers and offer a closing prayer.
[00:17:18] Speaker A: So we pray for those who are preparing for the sacrament, and we pray for all of us on this spiritual journey of Lent and often use the prayer of St Francis before the crucifix during these days of Lent. In the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit.
[00:17:33] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:17:34] Speaker A: Almost high and glorious God, enlighten the darkness of my heart. Give me bright faith, certain hope, perfect love and deep humility. O Lord, give me sense and discernment in order to carry out your true and holy will. Amen.
[00:17:51] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:17:52] Speaker A: God bless you, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
[00:17:56] Speaker B: Amen. Thank you, Bishop, and thanks to all who continue to join us each and every week, a blessed Lent to you and your families. And we remain united in prayer until next week.
[00:18:06] Speaker A: God bless Sam.
