Homily
Wednesday of the Week Between Ascension and Pentecost
St. Lawrence Catholic Center
19 May 2010
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St. Paul's farewell from Ephesus includes some final words to the presbyters. St. Paul predicts that the Church will be persecuted on all sides by savage wolves, and that it will take everything the priests have to keep the Church united in the true faith. Not only that, but perhaps the greatest enemy will be the priests themselves who stray from the truth, who preach the Gospel as a career for their own benefit, and who are unwilling to lay down their lives so that the true faith may be taught with integrity and love. Pope Benedict said as much during his recent travel to Portugal, that the greatest enemies of the Church may seem to be from outside the Church, but in reality, the greatest enemy of the Church is always on the inside, from those who have been consecrated but who eventually fall away and take the faith of others with them. During this year for priests, we pray for the special closeness of every priest to the Lord Jesus, and in these days leading to Pentecost, we pray for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, so that the charism of each priest can be strengthened and renewed, and he may be more generous in serving the unity of the flock.
Jesus in praying to the Father shows us clearly that it is not our mission to steal people out of the world, but to work for the redemption of the world by forming people who are truly able to live spiritual lives, being in the world but not of the world. It is the world redeemed by the love of Christ, and in a deeper relationship with God, that is the new Jerusalem for which we all hope. Let us not flee the world, but flee instead to Jesus Christ, who through the gift of the Spirit has given us all a share in His mission to redeem the world and to present it as a bride ready to receive her husband. Let us pray especially for the gifts of the Spirit that preserve and strengthen the unity of our Church! +m
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