Sacerdos in Aeternum

The Adoration Chapel in the upper Basilica.  I pray here or in the crypt chapel most days.

 

"No person of reason, no thinker, has ever performed miracles, not even among the saints. He does divine works whosoever surrenders to God. So don’t think about it any more. . . Do this for all your needs, do this. . . and you will see great continual silent miracles. I will take care of things, I promise this to you."  - Servant of God Dolindo Ruotolo, "The Surrender Novena"

I have assigned the Surrender Novena, in whole or in part, as a penance too many times to count.  The fundamental notion of the novena, as expressed in the quote above, is that God will provide for our every need if we surrender and allow him to care for us.  It is a simple idea, and it is profoundly true.  God takes care of us.  Yet, in spite of knowing that it is true, I am generally inclined to tell God how he might best care for me.  I regularly argue with him about what he gives to me, why he gives it, and how he gives it.  Though I have repeatedly proven myself an incompetent agent of self-sufficiency who usually ends up drowning in trouble when I try to do thing on my own and in my own way, I find hat I am still insistent that God do as I tell him.

This was the substance of a conversation between Jesus and I as I prayed in front of the Blessed Sacrament at the Basilica recently.  I was grousing about my frustrations with the city, my homesickness, and my desire to exercise priestly ministry.  He reminded me of several truths I conveniently forget.  First, I chose to come here.  The bishop did not force me.  He asked if I was willing.  I said yes.  I could have chosen otherwise.  Second, it is my firm conviction that the moment in which we find ourselves and the experiences of this moment are, even when they include suffering or evil, an expression of God's love and providence.  Where I find myself right now is Jesus loving me, even if I would rather he loved me in a more comfortable way.  Third, and following from the previous premise, it is my conviction that obedience to Christ means choosing for myself that which he chooses for me.  If this moment is an expression of his love, and he has chosen to love me thusly, obedience requires that I also choose to be loved in this moment and through these experiences.  I am where I am and I undergo what I undergo because he has loved me into this moment, and to try to escape or to resent this moment is to reject Christ's love.  It is a variety of faithlessness and to the extent that I persist in it willingly, a sin.  So it was that Jesus was able to ask me sternly, "Will you choose for yourself what I have chosen for you?"  As it turns out, sometimes to hang on the cross and die is less painful than to try to pull my hands and feet free of the nails that hold me there.  "Yes, Lord.  I surrender."  

Obedience is its own reward, and I did not surrender with the expectation that it would win me any particular favor.  I should know by now, however, that God is never outdone in generosity.  When I give my will to him, he gives me all that I desire in return.  To whit, beginning sometime last week I had a hankering for saltwater taffy.  This is not particularly unusual.  Since my surgery, I have regularly endured cravings for any variety of sugary foods.  This urge, however, was particularly intense.  I spent an hour on Amazon trying to find reasonably priced bulk bags of taffy before coming to my senses, turning out the lamp, and sleeping.  I woke up still craving taffy, but sleep had at least steeled my resolve sufficiently to reject the idea of mail order candy.  Imagine my surprise, then, when a day later, when I went into the dining room, I discovered that one of the resident priests had been out and about earlier in the day, and had bought taffy and left a portion for the community to share.  "Surrender to me," Jesus says, "And I will do everything for you."  He cares that I want candy.

The above example is, I suppose, a bit glib.  The cacoethes to founder on sugar and Christ's response is hardly a genuine example of God's providence.  I would agree with this contention were not for the fact that the taffy was just an amuse bouche for what he really had in mind.

For two months now I have been plagued with a kind of fear of becoming useless or unneeded.  Part of what I loved about parish life was the fact that I was needed.  There were things that no one else could do, and that if I did not do them, they would remain undone.  Without me, Masses would go unsaid, sins unforgiven, and the sick unanointed.  A great deal of my sense of identity was absorbed in what I did, what I accomplished, and how I helped.  Then, suddenly, I was not really needed.  Someone else would say Mass and forgive sins.  I would live in a parish already staffed by people assigned to those tasks.  After that, I would go to school where not only would I have no community of people to need me, but also I would have no authority to take care of them.  What is a priest who does not preach?  What is a priest who does not hear confessions?  What is a priest without his people?  These have been the substance of an ongoing conversation with Jesus for months, and they were top of mind when Jesus asked me to surrender and choose for myself what he had already chosen for me.  Such was my resolution as I headed to dinner that night.

Sitting with one of my fellow students, the conversation, unprompted by me, somehow arrived at a place where he described a family friend who had, with his wife, founded a megachurch somewhere in the outskirts of Washington, D.C.  He commented that this man seemed, in conversation, to assume that his work as a protestant pastor and Patrick's life as a priest were substantially the same.  Poignantly, Patrick noted, "He doesn't realize that while pastoring is something he does, a priest is what I am.  Even if I am lying in my bed crippled and unable to move, I continue to minister as a priest by virtue of my ordination.  Priesthood is not what we do.  It is what we are."  Patrick said nothing new.  I was not unaware of the facts he articulated.  But I needed to hear them again.  I am a priest.  Though I might prefer to be a priest with people for whom to care, having them is hardly constitutive of my priesthood.  I went to bed that night encouraged by this reminder of the truth of Holy Orders.  I offer the sacrifice of Christ on the altar and by my own manner of living.  When I offer the Holy Mass, my desire and my longing for a parish become part of what is offered on the altar.  They become part of the sacrifice of myself that priesthood demands.  If this is how Jesus wishes that I offer my sacrifice right now, who am I to disagree?  If this is how I might best serve his people at this moment, then this is how I must serve them.  To learn the law is my ministry.    

But, the ache for the hands-on, down and dirty, spitting in the Devil's eye work of the Gospel remains . . .

And so it was one of the greatest joys of my life when yesterday, for the first time in weeks, I pronounced those sweet, sweet words of mercy, "I absolve you of your sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."  I have finally received permission from the Archdiocese of Washington D.C. to hear confessions.  As a result, I swiftly volunteered to assist with confessions at the National Shrine yesterday.  I sat for two hour in the confessional and forgave the sins of a dozen penitents, one of whom had been away from the sacrament for more than thirty years.  This morning, I concelebrated Mass at the same church and assisted in the distribution of Holy Communion for the first time in several weeks.  While returning to the sacristy, the coordinator for visiting priests thanked me profusely and begged that I would help with upcoming holy days and confessions during Advent and Lent.  I could not help but grin at the prospect.    After I had finished removing my Mass vestments, I went back to the confessional and absolved another two dozen sinners.  And I felt useful.  And I felt happy.  And I felt like a priest.  I surrendered to Jesus, and he has done everything for me.  He will not be outdone in generosity.

I am a student, and I will be a student for quite a while to come.  After that I will be a pastor again.  Between here and eternity, there will be assignments that I cannot even begin to predict right now.  Eventually I will either retire or die.  There will be more occasions when I feel useless, and I will wish that I could offer my life in the ways I prefer.  I will argue with Jesus again about what he choses for me, and when, and why.  And in all of it, I will be a priest forever.  Priest is not what I do.  It is what I am.

Poverty

 

This is the residence chapel where I celebrated Mass today.
 It is very odd to do so without a congregation.
  It is very odd not to preach on Sunday morning.

Jesus said to him, “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” Matthew 19:21

A little more than five years ago, I completed the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius.  These are completed, most typically, over the course of a thirty day silent retreat, though they can also be completed in other ways.  For most of those who approach the exercises with sincerity and dedication, the experience once is one wherein the retreatant discovers God's love with new depth and conviction.  These were certainly the outcomes for me.  Among the unexpected graces of the retreat, however, was a deepened awareness of God's desire that I should live in poverty.  This call has manifested itself in acute ways over the last several months.

Poverty is, at its heart, not so much a physical as a spiritual reality.  Though not unrelated, material possessions or the lack thereof do not define poverty.  Poverty, rather, is an expression of dependence.  he who is poor has nothing upon which to rely except the goodness and benignity of a provident and loving Eternal Father.  One experiences poverty when he arrives at a point where he cannot take care of himself and must allow another to do so for him.  For this reason, material poverty can be an aid in achieving the genuine poverty to which the Christian disciple is called, but the two are not synonymous.  I might have nothing, but continue to try to take care of myself.  By contrast, I might have all the riches of the earth and  live a life of utter dependence.  Dependence is the key.  To a certain extent, dependence is a synonym to poverty.

This notion makes sense when we consider the fundamental identity with which we approach God.  We are God's beloved children.  While we may like to think we are his beloved, adult children, we deceive ourselves.  We are God's infant children.  The hallmark of infancy is dependence.  Babies cannot take care of themselves. Left unattended, they will certainly die.  We are the same.  We have nothing to recommend that we are capable of self-reliance.  We need someone to take care of us.  To the extent to which we lean into and embrace this reality is the extent to which we experience poverty.  

Jesus is rather insistent on our poverty.  Or at least, he is rather insistent on my poverty.  He is disinclined to tolerate for long any source of security beyond himself.  This is not to say that he wants we to live a life scurrying from one danger to the next like a mouse in a house full of cats.  It is, rather, that he wants me to trust absolutely that in all circumstances he will give me everything I need and more.  Herein, I think, resides an explanation of the fact that I find myself writing while sitting at a desk in q city that I do not love. having celebrated Sunday Mass without people I do love, wondering where to tow a vehicle that has inexplicably stopped working, and wishing that I did not have to rely on providence to get by.  

I have been, for a long time now, growing rich.  My house was comfortable.  I was surrounded by my own things.  I made most decisions for myself.  I largely determined my own schedule.  I recreated in ways that I chose, in places where I was comfortable, and with people with whom I was familiar and had relationships.  I could escape to the ranch at will.  I could hide in one of my two rectories and avoid seeing people for days at a time.  My ministry, though fulfilling, presented few new challenges.  I knew how to handle most situations.  I was generally happy, comfortable, and content.  Though Jesus was near, and I spoke with him regularly, I had arrived in a place in life where it seemed as though I could do it alone.  There was little I needed from Jesus.  There was little I asked him to do for me.  So he put me in a place where I need him.  I was rich, so he made me poor.

I say all of this, not by way of complaint or lament.  It is, mostly, I suppose, just thinking aloud.  Jesus wants me.  He has always wanted me.  But he wants me on his terms, not my own.  I do not get to decide what our relationship is going to look like.  I do not get to decide when I need his help and when I do not.  Either I am dependent on him, and I live that way now and in eternity, or I depend on myself, and I live that way, now and in eternity.  

It is not easy or comfortable to be poor.  In fact, to some extent, the only natural reaction to poverty of the material or spiritual sort, is to attempt to escape it.  That is, I think, perhaps the point.  The only way out is for Jesus to get me out.  And, once I have escaped the poverty of school, traffic, crime, and east-coast nincompoopery, if I am willing, he will choose a new way for me to be poor - a new parish, a new ministry, a new bishop - any of these will be sufficient to ensure that I cannot do it alone.  It will guarantee that I remain God's infant child, always dependent on the one who has always taken care of me, and who always will.  

Of Washington D.C. and Its Surrounding Environs

 

As Dorothy said to Toto, "I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore."  Nor, to be certain, have I been in Kansas for some time now.  

I made the drive to Washington, D.C. over the course of three days, stopping first in Madison, WI, just shy of half-way, and spending the second night in Pittsburgh, PA.  That left me with about a four hour drive to the metro the next day.  I planned it thus so as to ensure that I would arrive with plenty of daylight and ample time to move into my room and unpack.

As regards my room, I was pleasantly surprised to find it much larger than I anticipated.  About five days before leaving South Dakota, I received word that a room had been reserved for my at Curley Hall, which is the housing for the priest teaching faculty on campus.  Though the building is old (more on that presently), it is far more spacious than the dorm style room I had been planning to occupy at Theological College.  I have a large sitting room/office, a decent bedroom, and a small private bath.  These are clearly rooms academics.  The place is filled with bookshelves, and the small collection I brought with me makes but a pitiful dent in the available space.  Though three years of study is likely to fill much more it, this room was obviously originally meant for a man of letters who would spend years here as a teacher, researcher, and writer.

My room is in the "annex" - a building behind the main building.  They are both old sick buildings, and are among the oldest on campus.  Little has been done by way of updating the facility.  there is no central air, though I have an effective window unit.  Because of the itinerant nature of this building's residents, the rooms are all furnished in haphazard fashion with furniture and wall hangings reflective of the decades of through which the room has been occupied.  There must have been a priest who resided here at length during the 70s judging by the art.  The bed is hard, paint is peeling, and I had to scrub mold off one of the walls (D.C.is built on a swamp, after all).  But, I am not terribly particular about that sort of thing.  I was instructed by other student-priests to take any furniture I would like from any other room in the building.  It is all community property, and when I finish, I will leave it for someone else to use as they see fit.  Apparently last year one of the residents used a sawzall to, for whatever reason, cut all of his bookshelves in half.

Between instructors and students, twenty priests live here.  As per priestly custom, we are all on a first name basis, titles being unnecessary among peers.  Many of these men are my classroom instructors.  I find it odd not to use some sort of title when addressing them.  I find it odd to converse with them as brother priests in the dining room and then as professors in the classroom.  

Meals are served here in the building three times per day, and our classroom is about a two-minute walk from the front door.  The National Shrine is just across the street from us.  There are three chapels, all outfitted to say mass privately or in small groups.  A community Mass and Evening Prayer is offered each day.  I sense the younger priests are disinclined to join the old guys, their liturgical tastes tending toward greater formality and adherence to the liturgical norms outlined in the various liturgical books.  That said, there is, at least so far, a strong spirit de corps in the house.  Everyone is eager to help those of us just arrive to acclimate to our new surroundings.  Perhaps most encouraging of all, however, is that I have experienced none of the hubris common the Catholic Church on the East Coast among the men here.  I find that kind of pretension utterly repugnant.  At least among the students in this house, everyone is just trying to get their degree and go home.  It is a sentiment with which I resonate deeply.  All in all, among the available options, this is an ideal living situation.

Catholic University, or at least the School of Canon law situated therein, is notorious for poor communication, and has been my experience from the day I applied for study.  Emails are generally unanswered, phone messages unreturned, and notification of important events often arrive after the event has already passed.  Apparently there was an online student orientation on August 20.  I learned about it on August 25.  This is a source of profound frustration to me.  Similarly frustrating is the university's infatuations with technology.  I have a new file on my phone entitled "Bullshit I Had to Download for CUA."  There is an app for using the printers.  There is an app to access the gym.  There is an app for email.  There is an app to guarantee that's actually me using the other apps.  Beyond these, the classes now distribute all materials online.  Seldom does an instructor provide a printed copy of the readings, the syllabus, or other course documents.  I can print these myself, using the printing app, and then walking to a computer lab and somewhere on campus to collect them.  Similarly, there is no bookstore.  They are all ordered online.   These are, I suppose, cost-saving measures.  I have often wondered if I would keep pace with technology, having been more or less raised with it.  I find, however, that I tend toward becoming a luddite.

This part of the city, I am frequently told, is very safe.  The regular presence of police helicopters and the sound of gunfire two nights seem to mitigate against these assurances.  In spite of these concessions, I find that I do not feel unsafe, especially during the daylight hours, and given that I am her to study, there seems little reason for me to be out after dark.  Even if I were, however, out and about, most of the violent crime is directed toward people who had it coming.  Basic precautions (avoid walking alone after dark, stay where there is light, don't make ostentatious displays of valuable things like computers, jewelry, or cash, travel by taxi or uber when alone) are sufficient to avoid trouble.

Parking is a problem in most of the city.  So, shopping, at least for me, means a trip to the suburbs where there is a bit more room for sprawling lots.  The suburbs are also, generally, safer.  I found a Target within a reasonable drive of the university.  There is a Safeway within walking distance of there.  By taking advantage of these two, vendors in advance, I suspect I will survive Election Day and Inauguration Day.

I do not have classes on Fridays, and with Labor Day, I will have no classes on Monday.  I hope that affords me some time to see some of the more typical destinations for visitors to the city.  Maybe Arlington or the Smithsonian Zoo.  And, I need to track down a fly shop.  I know there has to be one.  They will provide me with what I need to know in order to escape and at least pretend that I am not surrounded by the unwashed masses.  

I found, at the Shrine, an altar to Our Lady of Perpetual Help.  She was a great comfort to me.  I suspect I will go see her often.  She reminds me of home, and she helps remind me why I am here. 

I have lots of deeper things to write about.  I am still trying to formulate them in my mind.  For now, I am here.  I am safe. And, I am finding myself sliding relatively naturally and serenely back into academic life, if not city life.  Pray for me.  I'll do the same for you.         

The Great Multitude

I saw a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and tribes, and peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne, and in sight of the Lamb (Revelation 7:9).  

 

First it was one voice.  “O salutaris, Hostia.”  Then more voices joined.  “Quae caeli pandis ostium.”  And then, the multitude cried out, “Bella premunt hostilia da robur fer auxilium.”  The final note of the Amen faded, and a hush, heavy like wet snow filled the arena.  And the multitude knelt in rapt adoration of Jesus present there on the altar.  Shining like the sun under the glare of the spotlight in the darkness, he tugged at the hearts of the youth around me.  They were being inexorably drawn, like iron to a magnet, into him, into his love, into his mercy, into his healing.  

 

This was the third day of a week-long trip.  Sixty people (mostly teens with a handful of chaperones), and hundreds of miles guaranteed a bus rank with the smell of traveling adolescents roused too early from slumber.  The days had been long and the nights short.  We walked five miles and more daily.  Lines for bathrooms, vendors, food, and impact sessions were long, and the wait regularly consumed the lion’s share of what free time was available.  The breakout sessions were excellent, but the cool, darkened lecture halls lulled most of our group to restless sleep.  That night, at the stadium, the talks focused on forgiveness and healing.  As the final presenter concluded, we briefly considered leaving.  Could the kids take another hour?  We had to stay.  After all, we had come to see Jesus, not the speakers.  And so it was, that I found myself surrounded by young people aching for the infinite.

 

Into the silence, a deep bass note sounded, as though from the drone of a bagpipe.  Then a second, and a third, and a fourth.  “Let all mortal flesh keep silence’” they intoned.  “And with fear and trembling stand.”  Suddenly, the bass droning was no longer coming from the direction of the altar.  It was rising to Heaven all around me.  The boys were singing!  Not murmurs or whispers, but full-throated, they begged the Almighty, “Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, Lord Most High!”  Then, silence again, broken only by the quiet sounds of gentle tears.

 

“What happened last night?” I asked them later.  “I don’t know.  I was just that I suddenly knew I wasn’t alone,” one boy told me.  Another said, “I felt like Jesus picked me up and carried me.”  A girl told me, “I don’t know what happened.  It just felt different.”  Another said, “I heard him say my name.”  Over and over they told me they had discovered that Jesus knew them, loved them, was with them, cared about them, and would help them.  

 

The National Eucharistic Congress was a resounding success.  I have so often begged Jesus in my own prayer, “Please, do something.”  He did something, alright.  Something big, something real, something amazing.  These kids confessed their sins honestly and completely.  They spoke openly and vulnerably to Jesus.  They allowed themselves to feel the aching they all experience for the “Something more” that life this side of eternity cannot give them.  By the time we arrived at the closing Mass, the message they were hearing was, “Go!”  And I think they will.  Back to Martin, and to Wall, and to Lemmon, and to Rapid City, and Spearfish, and Bison.  And they will know that everywhere that a red sanctuary light is burning, there Jesus is waiting for them in the tabernacle.  They are different now.  They have tasted heaven.  They are marked by his love, and now they know it.  They have fulfilled what St. John the Evangelist foresaw so long ago:

 

They cried with a loud voice, saying: Salvation to our God, who sitteth upon the throne, and to the Lamb. . . and they fell down before the throne upon their faces, and adored God, Saying: Amen. Benediction, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, honour, and power, and strength to our God for ever and ever. . . . They shall no more hunger nor thirst, neither shall the sun fall on them, nor any heat. For the Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, shall rule them (Revelation 7:10-17).

 

Stay Tuned

It was fourteen years ago that I published the first post to this blog. It was, at that time, meant to help memorialize and process the many first experiences of priesthood and to include others in that process. It served that purpose well for five years, and then it became more difficult. I was assigned to a small town. Too many people would be familiar with the details I disclosed to write honestly. And I was busy, getting busier. Now, at the end of fifteen years of priesthood, without a parochial assignment, in possession of a sharp tongue and a dim wit, I find myself headed to our nations capital in August to commence the study of canon law. I am not so much intimidated by the thought of returning to school, but I am repulsed by the thought of life in a metropolis after my bucolic existence in Bennett County.

I fear that I will be arrested for hate speech, and I am likely to be cancelled for my inability to keep my antediluvian opinions to myself. I find people behaving badly in public both repugnant and enrapturing. I doubt I’ll be able to refrain from recording the crazies on the metro and the truly deranged blatherskites who blockage from the steps of the capitol. I am certain I will need and outlet, or perhaps more appropriately, an audience to let the madness out of my head.

And, I need something to help fill the hole left by my hiatus from parish life. I hope to write more now. And I hope people will read. It will help me stay grounded and connected. It will help me remember what it is to be a parish priest in Western South Dakota.

So, if you enjoy blistering rebukes of East Coast pretension, deliberate hick exhibitionism, delightful displays of Great Plains folksy commentary, and the pining of a priest who is homesick before leaving, check back often. I suspect, at least in the short term, I’ll have much to say.

Stay tuned…