Ordination Homily: ‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them’
- June 20, 2009
These three men, Michael, Joseph and William, our brothers and friends, have answered a call to the Priesthood of Jesus Christ, and the first reading for this Mass of Ordination is about God's call to the young Jeremiah to serve as his prophet for the people of Israel. Jeremiah hears God calling him, but he answers that he is too young. God responds, "Say not ‘I am too young'! You shall go to whom I send you, and speak what I tell you. I place my words in your mouth."
See the humility of Jeremiah: he knows his limitations and realizes his total dependence on God. Because of that humility, God can use him and work through him for the people. Jeremiah knows that it is not his own word he will proclaim. Instead, he will proclaim God's word, a word that God will place in his mouth and on his tongue.
Prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah prepared the way for the fullness of God's word of love and salvation for us. God so loved the world that he sent his only Son, so that in Jesus Christ he could love and teach all peoples, and save them through Christ's death and rising.
Yet Jesus, the divine Son of God, is humble too: In our second reading, from the Letter to the Hebrews, we hear that Jesus Christ is our high priest, the mediator or "go-between" for God and all his human children. We are told that Jesus did not glorify himself in becoming high priest; rather, he was called and sent by his Father. "Son though he was," the reading says, "he learned obedience from what he suffered," becoming "the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him, declared by God high priest according to the order of Melchizedek."
Earlier in that same reading we hear that we human priests, like the priests of the Old Testament, need to be humble in regard to our call: we are "taken from among men and made their representatives before God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins." If we are humble, we will, the Letter says, be "able to deal patiently with the ignorant and the erring," because we ourselves are beset by weakness, and so for this reason must make sin offerings" for ourselves "as well as for the people." Finally, the Letter tells us, "No one takes this honor on himself, but only when called by God . . . "
At the Last Supper, on the night before he died on the Cross, Jesus Christ chose his apostles to become his first priests, the first men who would carry on his work as a prophet who teaches, a priest who offers sacrifice, and a shepherd who guides and protects. For twenty centuries Christ, our High Priest, has called men to assist and to share in the work of the bishops in the Catholic Church as successors of the apostles. This morning, through the Church, Jesus calls our brothers, William Thornton, Michael Quinn and Joseph Previtali, to be priests forever. Each man brings special gifts and experiences to this work, and each has answered the Lord's call at a particular time in his life that the Lord has chosen and willed.
However, no priest should confuse himself with the Messiah. We do not save anyone, for the very good reason that it has already been done, by an expert, and done perfectly. Jesus Christ, Lord, Messiah and Savior, calls us to let him give himself to others through us. Jesus lives on this altar table in the bread and wine; he lives in these words of his; he lives in us together as his Body, the Church. Priests proclaim, nourish, witness and defend this life, but the life comes from the High Priest himself.
Throughout her long history the Catholic Church, led by the Holy Spirit, has come to understand what this call to ordained, lifelong service in priesthood involves, and by this ancient rite of imposition of hands and anointing by the bishop, the Church consecrates and sets aside these men for this work. What "work," exactly? The bishops at the Second Vatican Council summarized the three-fold role of the priest in the Catholic Church: 1) As Christ the Priest, he will preside at Eucharist and the other sacraments, will become a man of prayer and a leader of prayer, and will witness to the mystery of the Cross in his own life and in the lives of those to whom he ministers; 2) As Christ the Prophet or Teacher, the priest will proclaim the Word as an apostle who "knows Christ" from personal experience and not just from hearsay, and he will prophesy or "tell-forth" God's will, as evangelist and missionary wherever he serves; 3) As Christ the Shepherd the priest will gather and serve the Christian community of believers, defend and spread the faith and the faithful, and lead them in service to the Church and to the world.
That is the "what" of priestly life and ministry. Does Jesus teach anywhere "how" a priest is to live and minister? Indeed he does, and pre-eminently so in our third reading, from St. Matthew's Gospel. Again, for a third time, the answer is "with humility." Jesus teaches us that the powerful authorities around us in this world are the very worst models of priestly service and leadership: "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and the great ones make their authority over them felt. But it shall not be so among you."
The leader in the kingdom, in the Church, shall be the servant of the rest; the one who would be first, shall be a slave of the rest. Why? Jesus is the reason: he says he "did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many." If the priest's leadership and service are strong, gentle and humble it reflects, and draws people to, Christ the High Priest. Pride, high-handedness and self-serving behavior do the opposite. Rulers, kings and potentates in our time ride around in long limousines with dark glass windows. The Pope rides around in a modified Jeep, standing up, so he and the people can see each other.
Michael, Joseph and William, you are becoming priests at a time when strong cultural forces urge us to forget God, and these forces affect young people and families especially hard. But do not be afraid: God will always be with you! With his help you will be able to walk in the ways that lead to the hearts of men, women and children, and to proclaim to them that the Good Shepherd has given his life for them and wants them to share in his mystery of love and salvation.
If you are to carry out this vital work, Jesus must always be the center of your life and you need to remain in intimate union with him through prayer, daily personal meditation, faithfulness to the Liturgy of the Hours, and especially the daily devout celebration of the Eucharist. In this way you will become and remain true apostles of the new evangelization, because you cannot give what you do not have in your heart and in your daily life.
Only three people in this Cathedral this morning are being ordained priests, but everyone here is involved, committed and obliged. All of us clergy, laity and religious, are charged by Jesus Christ to support Fathers Michael, Joseph and William with our prayers, our companionship and our caring. We are not bystanders or onlookers. We are the Church for whom they will become priests of the Risen Jesus Christ.
Following the good example of our late Holy Father, Pope John Paul II during his ordination of priests, I want to express my thanks and the thanks of the Church in the Archdiocese of San Francisco to the families and friends of these three ordinands, who have prayed for them and encouraged them; to the faculty and staff of St. Patrick's Seminary in Menlo Park and the North American College in Rome, who have looked after their formation; and to the priests and parish communities which have supported them with prayer and good example.
Joseph, William and Michael, you are being ordained priests in the midst of Eucharist, and Eucharist will always be the heart and center of your life and ministry. "Do this in memory of me." Does Jesus use those six words to refer only to the bread and wine of Eucharist? I don't believe so. Certainly they refer most centrally to that action at the Last Supper and on this altar. But the entire life and ministry of Jesus led to that moment in the Upper Room, and all the events of Good Friday and Easter Sunday are intimately connected with that supper. Do all in memory of him.
One last word: the Pharisees had a favorite complaint about Jesus - "This man welcomes sinners and eats with them." Actually, that is a very good description of a priest, a man who welcomes sinners and eats with them, feeds them and nourishes them, in Eucharist, in prayer, in teaching and example. May God's people always be able to say of each of you, "This man welcomes sinners and eats with them."
This homily was delivered by Archbishop George H. Niederauer at the June 20, 2009 priesthood ordination at St. Mary's Cathedral.
From June 26, 2009 issue of Catholic San Francisco.
