Dear Friends,

Each year, Good Shepherd Sunday provides me an opportunity to reflect on the awesome mystery of the sacred Priesthood to which I am blessed to have been called and in which grace I daily struggle to be a shepherd after the Heart of Christ. An extraordinary grace and a tremendous burden intimately intertwined into the vocation to be the person God created me to be. Honestly, however, whether parent or priest, married or single, if we are genuinely seeking to live our lives within the mystery of our faith in Jesus Christ, we could all refer to our lives as such: An extraordinary grace and a tremendous burden intimately intertwined into God’s calling me to be the person God created me to be.

And while each vocation is important; nevertheless, when we define every vocation as equally important without making the unique distinctions that belong to the responsibilities of each, we ultimately reduce the significance of and dissuade the aspiration toward any vocation. On this Sunday, Mother Church provides us the opportunity to reflect on the unique vocation of the ministerial priesthood and our personal role in praying for our priests and bishops and encouraging those who are courageously discerning a vocation to the priesthood. Pope Benedict XVI in his homily at the Mass of the Lord’s Supper in 2006, offered a beautiful and sincere reflection that I personally find both consoling and challenging, especially in this period of history. He depicts the priest as the one, together with all the faithful, on whom much love is bestowed in the Self-gift of God Himself; at the same time, the priest is the one to whom Jesus entrusts His own ministry of mercy and love and through whom He announces and shares it. He writes:

“Having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.” (Jn 13: 1) God loves His creature, man; He even loves him in his fall and does not leave him to himself. He loves him to the end. He is impelled with His love to the very end, to the extreme: He came down from His divine glory. He cast aside the raiment of His divine glory and put on the garb of a slave. He came down to the extreme lowliness of our fall. He kneels before us and carries out for us the service of a slave: He washes our dirty feet so that we might be admitted to God's banquet and be made worthy to take our place at His table - something that on our own we neither could nor would ever be able to do. God is not a remote God, too distant or too great to be bothered with our trifles. Since God is great, He can also be concerned with small things. Since He is great, the soul of man, the same man, created through eternal love, is not a small thing but great, and worthy of God’s love. God’s holiness is not merely an incandescent power before which we are obliged to withdraw, terrified. It is a power of love and, therefore, a purifying and healing power. God descends and becomes a slave; He washes our feet so that we may come to His table. In this, the entire mystery of Jesus Christ is expressed. In this, what redemption means becomes visible. The basin in which He washes us is His love, ready to face death. Only love has that purifying power which washes the grime from us and elevates us to God's heights. The basin that purifies us is God himself, who gives Himself to us without reserve - to the very depths of His suffering and His death. He is ceaselessly this “love” that cleanses us; in the sacraments of purification - Baptism and the Sacrament of Penance - He is continually on His knees at our feet and carries out for us the service of a slave, the service of purification, making us capable of God. His love is inexhaustible; it truly goes to the very end."

Pray for me, as I struggle to live my vocation today. I certainly did not run away from nor give up a wife and family to be a social worker, but to bring the Body of Christ to the people of God. I am deeply troubled that we do not consider essential the Eucharist and the sacraments as the healing remedies for the health and well-being of our souls, in particular, and the world in general. I pray that we, like the disciples at the first Easter, burst out of our self-imposed imprisonment “for fear of the whatever it may be …” and be filled with the Holy Spirit having a renewed Pentecost of witness set afire by our faith, hope and love given to us as the gift of the Risen Lord. During this week, please pray for me, Msgr. Leighton, Msgr. Cribben, Fathers McLaughlin, Fr. Chambers, Fr. Farsaci and all priests that we may daily cooperate with the grace given to us at ordination as we seek to be good shepherds after the Heart of Jesus! Despite our sinfulness, failures and limitations, we have been consecrated by God for service to you. Also, I ask that you pray for the young men at St. Charles Seminary and the young men in our midst who may be discerning a vocation to the priesthood, encourage them, at least, to consider such discernment which may lead them to the great adventure of living a life fulfilled and meaningful.

Be of good cheer, and blessed week!

Msgr. Grous