ACCW Homily
San Francisco Archbishop George H. Niederauer delivered the following homily at Holy Names Church in San Francisco Oct. 10 at a gathering of the Archdiocesan Conference of Catholic Women.
It is a privilege and a delight to celebrate this Eucharist with you during this special Year of the Priest. As priests of Jesus Christ your sons make Eucharist possible for the Catholic faithful here in the Archdiocese of San Francisco day by day, and, by your witness of faith and your loving support and encouragement of them you are a vital part of each of those celebrations of the Mass in our local Church. I thank you for the gifts you have given and are giving to the Church, the People of God.
When I was a little boy, with no real hint or awareness of my vocation to Priesthood, I heard my own mother say these words, half to herself, whenever she dropped or spilled something: “Oh well, accidents happen even to the priest’s mother!” Now my mother’s maiden name was Sullivan, and she spent lots of summers at her Irish grandmother’s farm, so as I grew older I supposed that this was a saying she had picked up from my great-grandmother. As I grew still older, I noticed the wisdom of the saying as it applied not only to the mothers of priests, but also to us priests ourselves.
What is the particular wisdom of that saying? The gift of a call to priesthood is extraordinary and priceless; the one who receives that gift is an ordinary mortal like the rest of us, from a family of ordinary mortals. Jesus called ordinary fishermen, and one tax collector, as his first priests, and they set the world of the first century on fire with faith, by the power of the Holy Spirit. They remained ordinary men, but with God’s grace they became extraordinary apostles and saints.
In 1789 George Washington became this country’s first president, and in the same year Father John Carroll became the country’s first bishop. His diocese covered all thirteen states, with 25,000 Catholics, and he had fewer than twenty priests to minister alongside him. We have a letter he wrote in which he described his clergy as “a medley of clerical characters.” That phrase is a good-humored and realistic description of most of us priests from the first Twelve until right here and now.
In our first reading this morning we hear about those first twelve priests, gathered together in the upper room, with Mary, the mother of Jesus, before the first Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit empowers them to begin the life and work of the Church. All the saving action accomplished by the Church since then, and being accomplished now, is the fruit of the Spirit’s gifts of light and power and life.
In our gospel reading we hear again the story of the wedding at Cana in Galilee, where, according to St. John, Jesus worked his first sign (or miracle). He did so for the family of a young married couple during their wedding celebration. The families were clearly friends of Mary and Jesus, and Mary apparently had something to do with the arrangements for the celebration, because she notices that the wine has run low and she tells the servers to do what Jesus says.
Mary has made this need of the family her own need as well, and she turns to her son. Not only does Mary give us the example to turn to Jesus in our need, she also gives us the most important spiritual advice. It is the only advice Mary gives in all four gospels: she says to the waiters: “Do whatever he tells you.” We should not hear the words of Jesus to his mother as some kind “brush off,” because that is not the way Mary heard it. Having told her son of the situation, she confidently tells the waiters to do whatever he tells them. She knows he will tell them something, and the need will be met. Mary had faith in her son. So must we.
Faith has brought us this far, as the words of the hymn say, and faith will bring home. Mary’s advice—“Do whatever he tells you”—is so important because the story of the wedding at Cana is not about what Jesus did once and never again. Rather it is a story about what Jesus is always doing in our lives, if we let him. Jesus is always making the vital difference in our lives if we listen to what he tells us and let his word shed light on the choices and responses we make in our lives.
Dr. William Barclay, the Presbyterian scripture commentator, tells a wonderful story to illustrate this presence and action of Christ in our lives. He tells about a British laboring man, an alcoholic, who drank away his wages in the pub with his buddies from work. The man’s wife and children had very little to eat, and most of the furnishings of their home had gone to the pawnshop. One day the man attended a Christian temperance rally, saw the light, and turned his life around. His family was delighted by his conversion, but his friends at work were not pleased, because they had lost their drinking companion. So the other workers teased the man unmercifully about his “getting religion.” One day one of the asked, with a sneer, “Do you really think Jesus Christ turned water into wine?” The man answered, “I don’t know about that, but if you come round to my house, I’ll show you how he turned beer into furniture!”
Your priest sons, in what they say and do, are letting Christ make differences in people’s lives like the difference he made in that British laborer’s life. The media have had a field day these past years, implicating all priests in the sins of some. Those sins were horrendous, and the Church has rightly put in place the strongest programs possible to help heal victims and to prevent such abuses in the future. Nevertheless, in this Year of the Priest we need to affirm, support, encourage and thank the many faithful priests who serve our Church.
It’s easy to envy the special privilege given to that nameless bride and groom at Cana, who had Jesus and Mary in their home as their wedding guests, and for whom Jesus worked the first of his signs. Still, your privilege and mine is greater. At this Mass today, Jesus invites us into his house, his Church, and he does not change water into wine; instead, he changes bread and wine into his own Body and Blood, given on the Cross for us, and now shared with us food for our journey in faith. At every Mass your sons celebrate, Christ works this sign and gives these priceless gifts. In each action of their priestly ministry, he is present with his powerful, saving love. Let us give thanks to God for calling your sons, and all priests, to serve in this ministry, and let us pray for the graces they constantly need to remain faithful and fruitful in priestly service.
