"New Signs of Vitality and Hope": For US Church, The Pope's Last Word

Six months since its start, eight years since the last go-round, the ad limina visit of the US bishops to Rome -- the first of B16's pontificate -- has reached its close.

This morning, the final group to make the pilgrimage -- the country's Eastern hierarchs, now teamed up as a region of their own -- provided the audience for the last of the five papal speeches directed to the American church, its focus on immigration and ecclesial unity, with an eye to the Year of Faith beginning in October on the 50th anniversary of the opening of Vatican II.

For purposes of context, the Pope's prior addresses to the bench dealt with the New Evangelization (Northeast regions, late November), religious freedom (Mid-Atlantic, mid-January), sexuality, marriage and family life (Midwest in February), and education and faith formation to the Western bishops earlier this month.

On a quick side-note, each of the visiting prelates from the 15 USCCB regions received the pectoral cross shown right as a gift from the pontiff during their respective meetings. It's literally a Benedictine cross -- a replica of a 14th century crucifix that hangs in the Benedictine mother-church at Sant'Anselmo.

The reigning pontiff's arms engraved on the back, no shortage of American prelates have been seen making use of the crosses since coming home, most prominently the conference president, Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, who donned it for the February Consistory at which he received the red hat.

And here, this morning's closing text....

* * *

Dear Brother Bishops,

I greet all of you with fraternal affection in the Lord. Our meeting today concludes the series of quinquennial visits of the Bishops of the United States of America ad limina Apostolorum. As you know, over these past six months I have wished to reflect with you and your Brother Bishops on a number of pressing spiritual and cultural challenges facing the Church in your country as it takes up the task of the new evangelization.

I am particularly pleased that this, our final meeting, takes place in the presence of the Bishops of the various Eastern Churches present in the United States, since you and your faithful embody in a unique way the ethnic, cultural and spiritual richness of the American Catholic community, past and present. Historically, the Church in America has struggled to recognize and incorporate this diversity, and has succeeded, not without difficulty, in forging a communion in Christ and in the apostolic faith which mirrors the catholicity which is an indefectible mark of the Church. In this communion, which finds its source and model in the mystery of the Triune God (cf. Lumen Gentium, 4), unity and diversity are constantly reconciled and enhanced, as a sign and sacrament of the ultimate vocation and destiny of the entire human family.

Throughout our meetings, you and your Brother Bishops have spoken insistently of the importance of preserving, fostering and advancing this gift of Catholic unity as an essential condition for the fulfillment of the Church’s mission in your country. In this concluding talk, I would like simply to touch on two specific points which have recurred in our discussions and which, with you, I consider crucial for the exercise of your ministry of guiding Christ’s flock forward amid the difficulties and opportunities of the present moment.

I would begin by praising your unremitting efforts, in the best traditions of the Church in America, to respond to the ongoing phenomenon of immigration in your country. The Catholic community in the United States continues, with great generosity, to welcome waves of new immigrants, to provide them with pastoral care and charitable assistance, and to support ways of regularizing their situation, especially with regard to the unification of families. A particular sign of this is the long-standing commitment of the American Bishops to immigration reform. This is clearly a difficult and complex issue from the civil and political, as well as the social and economic, but above all from the human point of view. It is thus of profound concern to the Church, since it involves ensuring the just treatment and the defense of the human dignity of immigrants.

In our day too, the Church in America is called to embrace, incorporate and cultivate the rich patrimony of faith and culture present in America’s many immigrant groups, including not only those of your own rites, but also the swelling numbers of Hispanic, Asian and African Catholics. The demanding pastoral task of fostering a communion of cultures within your local Churches must be considered of particular importance in the exercise of your ministry at the service of unity (cf. Directory for the Pastoral Ministry of Bishops, 63). This diaconia of communion entails more than simply respecting linguistic diversity, promoting sound traditions, and providing much-needed social programs and services. It also calls for a commitment to ongoing preaching, catechesis and pastoral activity aimed at inspiring in all the faithful a deeper sense of their communion in the apostolic faith and their responsibility for the Church’s mission in the United States. Nor can the significance of this challenge be underestimated: the immense promise and the vibrant energies of a new generation of Catholics are waiting to be tapped for the renewal of the Church’s life and the rebuilding of the fabric of American society.

This commitment to fostering Catholic unity is necessary not only for meeting the positive challenges of the new evangelization but also countering the forces of disgregation within the Church which increasingly represent a grave obstacle to her mission in the United States. I appreciate the efforts being made to encourage the faithful, individually and in the variety of ecclesial associations, to move forward together, speaking with one voice in addressing the urgent problems of the present moment. Here I would repeat the heartfelt plea that I made to America’s Catholics during my Pastoral Visit: "We can only move forward if we turn our gaze together to Christ" and thus embrace "that true spiritual renewal desired by the Council, a renewal which can only strengthen the Church in that holiness and unity indispensable for the effective proclamation of the Gospel in today’s world" (Homily in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, New York, 19 April 2008).

In our conversations, many of you have spoken of your concern to build ever stronger relationships of friendship, cooperation and trust with your priests. At the present time, too, I urge you to remain particularly close to the men and women in your local Churches who are committed to following Christ ever more perfectly by generously embracing the evangelical counsels. I wish to reaffirm my deep gratitude for the example of fidelity and self-sacrifice given by many consecrated women in your country, and to join them in praying that this moment of discernment will bear abundant spiritual fruit for the revitalization and strengthening of their communities in fidelity to Christ and the Church, as well as to their founding charisms. The urgent need in our own time for credible and attractive witnesses to the redemptive and transformative power of the Gospel makes it essential to recapture a sense of the sublime dignity and beauty of the consecrated life, to pray for religious vocations and to promote them actively, while strengthening existing channels for communication and cooperation, especially through the work of the Vicar or Delegate for Religious in each Diocese.

Dear Brother Bishops, it is my hope that the Year of Faith which will open on 12 October this year, the fiftieth anniversary of the convening of the Second Vatican Council, will awaken a desire on the part of the entire Catholic community in America to reappropriate with joy and gratitude the priceless treasure of our faith. With the progressive weakening of traditional Christian values, and the threat of a season in which our fidelity to the Gospel may cost us dearly, the truth of Christ needs not only to be understood, articulated and defended, but to be proposed joyfully and confidently as the key to authentic human fulfillment and to the welfare of society as a whole.

Now, at the conclusion of these meetings, I willingly join all of you in thanking Almighty God for the signs of new vitality and hope with which he has blessed the Church in the United States of America. At the same time I ask him to confirm you and your Brother Bishops in your delicate mission of guiding the Catholic community in your country in the ways of unity, truth and charity as it faces the challenges of the future. In the words of the ancient prayer, let us ask the Lord to direct our hearts and those of our people, that the flock may never fail in obedience to its shepherds, nor the shepherds in the care of the flock (cf. Sacramentarium Veronense, Missa de natale Episcoporum). With great affection I commend you, and the clergy, religious and lay faithful entrusted to your pastoral care, to the loving intercession of Mary Immaculate, Patroness of the United States, and I cordially impart my Apostolic Blessing as a pledge of joy and peace in the Lord.

PHOTO: L'Osservatore Romano/Vatican photo

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"Now We Must Be Loyal Americans By Being Bold and Courageous Catholics"

HOMILY OF
THE MOST REVEREND WILLIAM E. LORI, DD, STD
SIXTEENTH ARCHBISHOP OF BALTIMORE

SOLEMN MASS OF INSTALLATION
CATHEDRAL OF MARY OUR QUEEN
BALTIMORE, MARYLAND
16 MAY 2012

I. Introduction

A. My thanks to the Cardinals who are with us today
and, in a special way, to the Papal Nuncio, Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò,
thank you for representing our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, and
please convey to him the sentiments of loving communion of all here today.
My greetings and thanks to the many Archbishops and Bishops who join us today, as well as the priests, deacons, religious, and laity of the Archdiocese of Baltimore, and honored guests from the Archdiocese of Washington, the Diocese of Bridgeport, my dear parents as well as family members and friends from Southern Indiana,
and many other places, together with interfaith and ecumenical representatives, and those who represent both State and local government, welcome one and all!

B. Doesn’t this seem like a good day to reflect on what a bishop does? One answer to that question was given by a third grader
at the Convent of the Sacred Heart School in Greenwich, Connecticut on the occasion of one of my visits.
Asked what a bishop does, she enthusiastically put her hand up and said, “He moves diagonally and protects the king!”
. . . So now you know!

C. Who a bishop is and what he is supposed to be was brought home to me
in this magnificent Cathedral of Mary Our Queen some seventeen years ago. It was here in this very sanctuary
that Cardinal Keeler and Cardinal Hickey presented me to Pope John Paul II for the first time as a newly ordained bishop.
There stood I before John Paul II, an ideal priest and a saintly bishop,
whose life spoke more eloquently even than his words about my vocation. And after I had been presented, I sat down and listened intently
as that magnificent Pontiff proceeded to describe
the unique heritage of this great Archdiocese of Baltimore.
This afternoon I want to express the common debt of gratitude we owe
to Cardinal Keeler who so loved and fostered the living heritage that is ours, and,
I want to join with you also in thanking Cardinal O’Brien, who, in challenging times, gave to this Archdiocese of Baltimore the care of a good and loving shepherd!

II. Paul in the Areopagus

A. We have just heard how St. Paul preached the Gospel in the Areopagus of Athens, the ultimate public square, in the height of the Roman Empire.
Paul did not hesitate to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ into that place
where ideas that mattered were discussed and debated.
By pointing to the altar to an unknown God Paul sought to make connections between the culture of the Athenians and the Gospel.
But never did it occur to St. Paul to present the Gospel
as mere ideas, as an alternative philosophy.
Rather, in that very public square St. Paul preached Christ crucified and risen as the source of life itself, of meaning, and of salvation.
His words were met with skepticism and even ridicule
yet among those who heard him, some came to be believe.

B. Few people in history went to more Areopagai than did Pope John Paul II
as he travelled the length and breadth of the globe proclaiming the Gospel of Christ, as indeed his successor, Pope Benedict, XVI, continues to do.
In so doing they are teaching me, they are teaching us all
how important it is not only to bring the Gospel into the public square
but indeed to defend the right to do so, not for ourselves and for all believers. Standing in this Cathedral, Blessed Pope John Paul II said:
“The challenge facing you, dear friends, is to increase people’s awareness
of the importance for society of religious freedom;
to defend that freedom against those
who would take religion out of the public domain
and establish secularism as America’s official faith.
And it is vitally necessary, for the very survival of the American experience,
to transmit to the next generation the precious legacy of religious freedom
and the convictions which sustain it.”

C. When the bishops from this Mid-Atlantic region recently visited Pope Benedict XVI,
he too spoke forcefully about the need to defend religious liberty in the United States: “With her long tradition of respect for the right relationship between faith and reason, the Church,” he said, “has a critical role to play in countering cultural currents,
which . . . seek to promote notions of freedom detached from moral truth. . .”
He went on to say that “the legitimate separation of Church and State
cannot be taken to mean that the Church must be silent on certain issues,
nor that the State may choose not to engage or be engaged by
the voices of committed believers in determining the values
which will shape the future of the nation . . .”

D. We do not seek to defend religious liberty for partisan or political purposes, as some have suggested.
No, we do this because we are lovers of a human dignity
that was fashioned and imparted not by the government but by the Creator. We defend religious liberty because we are lovers of every human person, seeing in the face of every man and woman also the face of Christ,
who loved us to the very end and who calls on us to love and serve our neighbor with the same love he has bestowed on us.
We uphold religious liberty because we seek to continue serving those in need while contributing to the common good in accord with the Church’s social teaching and to do so with compassion and effectiveness through Catholic Charities,
the largest private provider of human services in the State of Maryland.
We do this because Archbishop John Carroll’s generation of believers and patriots bequeathed to us a precious legacy that has enabled the Church to worship in freedom, to bear witness to Christ publicly,
and to do massive and amazing works of pastoral love, education, and charity
in ways that are true to the faith that inspired them in the first place.
We defend religious liberty in fidelity to the wisdom of James Cardinal Gibbons
who withstood in the breach those who said it wasn’t possible
to be a practicing Catholic and a loyal American.
“...I belong to a country,” he said, “where the civil government holds over us
the aegis of its protection, without interfering with us
in the legitimate exercise of our sublime mission as ministers of the Gospel of Christ. Our country has liberty without license, and authority without despotism.”
Now we must be loyal Americans by being bold and courageous Catholics!

E. So, dear friends, let us be of good cheer.
Let us never imagine that the faith we profess with such personal conviction
is merely a private matter.
By its nature, the profession of faith is a public matter –
for the faith is meant to be spread far and wide and acted upon
in and through Church institutions and in the witness of individual believers.
Let us not shrink from entering the public square
to proclaim the Person of Christ, to teach the values that flow from reason and faith, to uphold our right to go about our daily work in accord with our teachings & values, to defend the sanctity of human life
from the moment of conception until natural death,
to defend the institution of marriage as between a man and a woman,
and to serve effectively those in great need with convictions borne of the moral law.

III. How We Go into the Public Square

A. But, dear friends, St. Paul did not carelessly enter the public square, the Areopagus. Not only did he first carefully study the culture & religious practices of the Athenians, he came filled with the love of God poured into his heart by the Holy Spirit.
He knew that the churches where he had preached and fostered the faith
needed to be both strong and vibrant, faithful and fruitful, truthful and loving. He knew that for his witness of faith to be believed
and for the church to flourish in times of peace as also in times of persecution, that its members must not only stand fast in the truth of the Gospel, but indeed to live the truth in love, to love in accord with the truth we have received.

B. Can there be any doubt how challenging this is?
The Church is endowed with the holiness of Christ
yet in need of constant renewal and purification
for those of us who are her members stand in need of God’s mercy and the mission of evangelization entrusted to us
requires the witness of a blameless conscience. On a day such as this, how hard we should pray
that in God’s grace, I will be a wise and holy bishop
who seeks to model my life and ministry on the Good Shepherd.
Pray that, as the Year of Faith announced by Pope Benedict XVI, unfolds,
I shall not only teach the faith but bear witness to it
in a manner that helps to heal the breach between faith and culture.
Pray that, in God’s grace, I might foster that unity of faith
which makes the Gospel credible, so that together,
we may always warmly invite those who have left the Church for whatever reason to return home in joy, in peace, and with hearts open to God’s love,
. . . and together may we continue to invite and welcome
those sincerely searching for the truth.

C. On a day such as this, how earnestly we should pray
for our auxiliary bishops, our priests, our deacons, who serve our parish communities, day in and day out, often bearing extraordinary burdens, for the sake of the Gospel. Dear brother priests, how happy I am that so many of you wrote to share with me your hopes, your dreams, your concerns for this local church you love so deeply.
I sense your ardent desire for an ever deeper sense of unity and solidarity,
as also your desire that the Church remain a strong and compassionate presence
in the City of Baltimore and all parts of the Archdiocese, including Western Maryland. You seek to marshal and shape all its God-given resources for the sake of the Gospel, and for the sake of those we serve or should be serving, including the blessing
of a growing presence of Spanish-speaking Catholics in our midst.
And because we all so greatly cherish the priesthood
to which you’d dedicated your lives,
let us never be content to think that God isn’t still raising up priestly vocations.
“To those of you who think that Christ may be inviting you
to follow him in the priesthood or the consecrated life, I make this personal appeal:
I ask you to open your hearts generously to him; do not delay your response.
the Lord will help you to know his will;
he will help you to follow your vocation courageously” (John Paul II, 26 I 1999).

D. On this installation day, how I wish to acknowledge and thank
women and men in consecrated life
who serve so generously, faithfully, and effectively in the Archdiocese of Baltimore.
With you, I think of the canonized and beatified religious who have served here,
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, St. John Neumann, Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos,
even as we give thanks for Mother Mary Lange whose Cause is underway
and we remember with gratitude and joy the previous visits of Blessed Mother Teresa.

E. On a day such as this how intensely we should pray
that the Lord, who willed to be born into a human family, will bless our families,
and give us the grace to renew family life in this Archdiocese and beyond.
Too often discussions about contemporary life-styles center only on adult feelings and overlook the needs of children and young people.
Let us be a church that honors our elders, sustains those in the prime of life,
but indeed a church that welcomes our young with enthusiasm and joy
and partners with parents in the task of educating and forming the next generation.
I thank our parents and educators who, at considerable sacrifice,
sustain the mission of our excellent schools in a time of great economic challenge, and who support our religious education programs, our youth programs,
as well as adult faith formation, marriage enrichment programs, and so much more. All these exist to sustain you in your beautiful but challenging vocation
as married men and women, as fathers and mothers of families
who are the bedrock of our society and at the same time the strength of our parishes.

F. How earnestly we must also pray for strong, active, and faithful lay leadership whether in our parishes, boards, offices, or agencies of the Archdiocese –
to those of you who, in a spirit of loving service, generously place your talents at the service of the Church’s life and mission – I sincerely thank you.
Here I think also of the Order of the Holy Sepulcher, the Order of Malta, the Knights of St. Peter Claver and the Knights of St. John,
and many other dedicated groups within the Church –
yet donning my cap as Supreme Chaplain, allow me to single out
the Knights of Columbus for its spirit of charity, unity, fraternity, and patriotism – which is a source of immense strength for the Church locally and universally.
Indeed, it was Cardinal Gibbons who ordained the visionary founder of the Knights to the priesthood, Father Michael J. McGivney, for whose canonization we daily pray.

G. St. Paul speaks of a variety of roles in the Church
but also of their orderly functioning for the health of the whole Body of Christ.
As we enter the public square to proclaim the Gospel, to evangelize the culture,
to defend human rights and dignity in accord with the Church’s social teaching,
may our local church be marked by a deep sense of inner solidarity and harmony,
by a unity that is born of truth and love forged by prayer, nurtured by the sacraments, and confirmed by keeping the commandments in the spirit of the Beatitudes.
By doing so, we prove ourselves to be worthy ecumenical and interfaith partners, both in our search for unity-in-truth and indeed in our service to the common good. By doing so, we also prove ourselves to be worthy partners in serving the needs of all together with government, the business sector, and community groups.

IV. Conclusion

A. In today’s Gospel, Jesus says to his followers,
“I have much more to tell you but you cannot bear it now.”
Looking out at you right about now, I’d say that just about sums our situation!
If God spares me, I’ll have fifteen years or so to tell you the rest of what I want to say! So I’ll leave you with this.
This installation takes place practically on the eve of the Ascension.
We can almost hear the Risen Lord telling us to gather with the Virgin Mother of God, to watch, wait, and pray for the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
For it was only with the coming of the Spirit
that the Apostles truly grasped the mystery of Christ and truth of the Gospel
and found the courage to proclaim the Gospel boldly to the ends of the earth.

B. What better way for us to begin this new chapter in the life of the Premier See
than to dedicate the days leading up to Pentecost
praying that the Holy Spirit might be poured forth upon us in ever greater measure? What better way for us to begin than by begging the Holy Spirit
to pour the love of God into our hearts so that we may be formed in Christ,
so that we may proclaim Christ by living the truth in love, by embracing love in truth. Through the prayers of Mary, our Queen,
may God bless us and keep us always in his love!

(Ed. Note: The above text appears in Lori's preferred outline form, the passages laid out in their original verse.)

PHOTO: Pool(1); Angelina Perna/Baltimore Sun(2-4)

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In Baltimore, The Loriole's Opening Day

Two hundred twenty-three years since the founding of the nation's oldest diocese and the appointment of a cousin of a signer of the Declaration of Independence as its first bishop, the American Catholic spotlight returns to Mother Baltimore today for the installation of John Carroll's 15th successor.

For a local church whose heads have historically loomed large on the national stage, Pope Benedict's March selection of Archbishop-elect William Lori for the Premier See has garnered even more prominence than usual.

In large part, the focus owes itself to the US bishops' high-profile push for religious liberty, which the 60 year-old prelate was tapped to oversee last fall. At the same time, the Baltimore nominee has found himself in the crosshairs of the moment's most attention-grabbing Stateside church story -- the Vatican mandate for a thorough reform of the umbrella-group representing the leadership of most of the nation's religious women -- after an April story in the British Catholic weekly The Tablet cited Lori as "the man who formally petitioned [Rome] to launch the current doctrinal investigation of the LCWR" during his term as chair of the USCCB's Committee on Doctrine.

In a response issued through the bishops' conference, the incoming archbishop said that he did not make that request, "nor would it have been appropriate for him to do so."

Regardless, the storyline of Maryland's long tradition at the vanguard of American religious freedom and the place of today's church in the public square is likely to dominate today's 2pm Eastern Installation Mass, expected to draw eight cardinals, 80 bishops, hundreds of priests and a crowd approaching 2,000 to the "New Cathedral" of Mary Our Queen. Among others, the rites will be livestreamed by EWTN and CatholicTV, along with Baltimore's WJZ and WBAL.

Keeping with longtime custom, the 16th archbishop will use the brass staff belonging to Carroll's second successor, the French Sulpician Ambrose Marechal, who took office in 1817. In yet another tradition that's become part of the day, meanwhile, the founder's pectoral cross was to be given to Lori by his predecessor, Cardinal Edwin O'Brien, at a lunchtime press conference prior to today's Mass. (Named Grand Master of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre last August and given the red hat at February's Consistory, while the Bronx native is now free to tackle the Rome-based position full time, the new cardinal will keep an American home in an apartment at Baltimore's Cathedral Rectory.)

As shown above, the ceremonies began last night with Vespers in the Basilica of the Assumption -- the nation's first cathedral, uniquely designed to symbolize in stone and light the fusion of the Catholic faith with the American experiment.

Following a prayer at Carroll's tomb in the crypt beneath the high altar, Lori preached the following homily, given here as prepared for delivery:

PHOTOS: Archdiocese of Baltimore(1); Sebastian Martorana/Baltimore Sun(2)

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Anglicanorum Digest

Four months since its establishment by Rome, the Stateside Ordinariate for Anglican groups entering Catholic communion is coming off a banner week, the first of many soon to come.

On Saturday, two top-tier American prelates each ordained a former Episcopal priest to the transitional diaconate, bringing the Chair of St Peter's officially on-deck group of priests-in-waiting to three. The once-and-future Fathers Jason Catania and David Ousley respectively lead the freshly received communities in Baltimore and Philadelphia, the latter of which completed its journey during Holy Week.

Another onetime Anglican priest, now Deacon Jon David Chalmers became the Ordinariate's first cleric during the Easter Octave in South Carolina, and will be ordained a Catholic priest on June 3rd. Last Tuesday, meanwhile, the circumscription that covers all entering Anglican groups in North America likewise incardinated its first priest -- Fr Eric Bergman, a married father of seven ordained for the diocese of Scranton in 2007 -- as well as completing the purchase of a church for his community, which had been sharing space with a local parish.

Beyond the trickle of founding clerics, some 60 candidates for orders have been cleared for the pipeline over the last several months, half of them said to be preparing for imminent ordination to diaconate and priesthood. Among them, late this month brings what'll likely be the largest single ordination rite as -- in the region long known as the cradle of American Anglo-Catholicism -- Bishop Kevin Vann of Fort Worth makes Catholic deacons of six former Anglican clerics.

Including the unprecedented priesting of a father and son together, the sextet will be ordained on June 30th, and one of the men has already been named the next pastor of the Ordinariate's "principal church" (effectively its cathedral), Houston's Our Lady of Walsingham parish, effective July 1.

Upon their approval for orders by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, all the candidates have taken part in a rapid-formation course, mostly conducted online from Houston's St Mary's Seminary and University of St Thomas.

Reflecting the rise of the Southern church and Texas' longtime status as the dominant venue of the Anglican communities which have journeyed to Rome on these shores, the Ordinariate is American Catholicism's first national entity to be based outside the traditional centers of ecclesial influence in the Northeast and upper Midwest.

* * *

A topic of keen interest given its historic nature -- and, in some quarters, the tensions it highlights between churches and over hot-button issues -- the recent developments from the domestic Ordinariate have been met with even more significant news from the overseas efforts to realize Anglicanorum coetibus, Pope Benedict's 2009 initiative enabling "corporate union" for Anglican groups seeking to enter the Catholic fold whilst maintaining elements of their spiritual, liturgical and juridical tradition.

Late last week, it was announced that a third Ordinariate will be launched on 15 June, this time for Australia, under the name of "Our Lady of the Southern Cross."

No numbers on those seeking to enter Down Under were immediately available. At least for the foreseeable future, the Aussie branch is likely to be the sole remaining Ordinariate to take its start.

In Britain, meanwhile, the first of the jurisdictions -- named for England's own Madonna of Walsingham -- has received two significant boosts from Rome within the last month, one directly from the pontiff.

Days after the English bishops were publicly prodded by their Nuncio, Archbishop Antonio Mennini, to "continue to be generous in your support" of the Anglican venture, word emerged earlier this month that Benedict himself would lead by example in making a personal donation of $250,000 to the UK Ordinariate.

Sixteen months since its founding, the English Ordinariate has yet to secure a principal church of its own, and has been fraught with enough other difficulties for the effort's head -- the former Anglican "flying bishop," Msgr Keith Newton -- to remind his members in a recent article "to not think that the journey will be easy or necessarily straightforward nor will practical matters always work out in the way one might expect." (Though the Ordinariates are equivalent to dioceses in canon law -- and their heads enjoy de iure membership and voting rights in their respective conferences of bishops -- Newton and his American counterpart, Msgr Jeffrey Steenson, are precluded from becoming bishops due to their marriages.)

By contrast, however, the launch of the Stateside entity -- an undertaking far more sprawling in scope and complex in its dynamics than its UK sibling -- has been perceived as such a success that persistent reports have floated the project's Rome-picked overseer, Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington, as a potentially strong contender to succeed California's own Cardinal William Levada as prefect of the CDF. (Wuerl is shown below presenting Steenson with his bull of appointment at the latter's February installation in Houston's Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart.)

Oversight of the global Anglicanorum project has lately become a top-tier task at the former "Holy Office," conspicuously alongside several other matters with intense relevance to the Stateside church, among them the ultimate handling of clergy sex-abuse cases and, now, the just-launched reform of the LCWR -- the umbrella group representing the leadership of most of the nation's women religious.

(On a related side-note, the most prominent evidence of the DC cardinal's still-rising stock in Rome came last October, when the Pope tapped Wuerl -- a theologian by training -- for the key role of Relator-General, or lead spokesman, at this fall's Synod of Bishops on what's become Benedict's signature pastoral priority, the New Evangelization. Of the three cardinals previously given the podium post by B16 at his four Synods since becoming Pope, two subsequently became heads of Vatican dicasteries, and the third -- Angelo Scola -- was transferred from Venice to the archbishopric of Milan, Europe's largest diocese.)

Soon to turn 76 -- a year past the retirement age -- Benedict made Levada, then the archbishop of San Francisco, his pontificate's first major personnel-pick as his successor at CDF seven years ago this week. In a late April homily at the 50th anniversary of the ordination of his closest friend and San Fran successor, Archbishop George Niederauer, the usually guarded cardinal-prefect pointedly noted that both he and the jubilarian "are soon to finish the official ministries in which we are now."

On the bright side for the English Ordinariate, the UK group will ordain over 20 priests this year, 18 of whom are set to become deacons at a Pentecost Eve Mass in London's Westminster Cathedral. The men will be ordained by Bishop Alan Hopes, an auxiliary of the capital who had been a Church of England priest.

Numbering some 40 groups across Britain, the Walsingham community ordained 60 clerics in its first year of existence.

Back to the States, meanwhile, an extensive briefing on the concept behind the Ordinariate project and the first steps of its American branch was given by Steenson last weekend at a Massachusetts church....


Currently spending a good chunk of time on the road to visit his communities atop finals duties as a professor at St Thomas, River City readers might be interested to know that Steenson will be in town Sunday to celebrate the 9am Anglican Use Mass for the local Ordinariate group, which is temporarily based at Holy Cross, Mount Airy.

Sure, it's already a busy day 'round these parts with the traditional slate of First Masses starting at 3 o'clock. If the Pope's emphases have suddenly become less than paramount among this crowd, though, well, the place just wouldn't be Philadelphia anymore.

PHOTOS: Principal Church of Our Lady of Walsingham(1); Donna Ryckaert /North Texas Catholic(2)

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Thanks, Moms

Before all else on this Mother's Day, the liturgical blessing for all the Moms among us....

Loving God, as a mother gives life and nourishment to her children, so you watch over your Church.

Bless these women, that they may be strengthened as Christian mothers. Let the example of their faith and love shine forth.

Grant that we, their sons and daughters, may honor them always with a spirit of profound respect.

Grant this through Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Whether yours is motherhood in the literal sense or -- as is the case for many here -- bringing a mother’s gifts to others through your lives and work, Lord knows there's no greater blessing in this life than a mother's love... and today and always, no words could ever say enough thanks for all you do, give and are.

Moms of every stripe, may you know every good thing forever... and on this Sunday, here’s hoping you’re able to take it easy for a change.

* * *

This Mother's Day likewise brings the debut of a new text in the Stateside church -- the Blessing of a Child in the Womb.

Approved by the US bishops last November, its recognitio from Rome fittingly granted on Annunciation Day, the text was published last week in English and Spanish with an eye to this Sunday's liturgies.

Lest anyone hasn't yet seen -- and could perhaps use -- it, here, the relevant ritual text in its group form:

God, author of all life,
bless, we pray, these unborn children; give them constant protection
and grant them a healthy birth
that is the sign of our rebirth one day into the eternal rejoicing of heaven.

Lord, who have brought to these women the wondrous joy of motherhood,
grant them comfort in all anxiety
and make them determined
to lead their children along the ways of salvation.

[For the fathers: Lord of the ages,
who have singled out these men
to know the grace and pride of fatherhood, grant them courage in this new responsibility, and make them examples of justice and truth for
these children.]

[For the family: Lord, endow these families
with sincere and enduring love
as they prepare to welcome these children into
their midst.]

Lord, you have put into the hearts of all men and women of good will
a great awe and wonder at the gift of new life;
fill this (parish) community
with faithfulness to the teachings of the Gospel and new resolve to share
in the spiritual formation of these children in Christ our Savior,
who lives and reigns for ever and ever.

R. Amen.

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At "The Heart of Our Nation and Church," The President Talks "The Law of the Gift"

Ladies and gentlemen, SuperTim.

Returning to the alma mater where he earned his doctorate in the history of the American church under the venerable John Tracy Ellis, this Saturday saw the Cardinal-President give the Commencement Address at the Catholic University of America as the institute chartered by the US bishops with the approval of Pope Leo XIII closes out its 125th anniversary.

Alongside the speech on the East Steps of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Cardinal Timothy Dolan received the university's President's Medal, CUA's highest award, given for "extraordinary service to the church, nation and" Catholic U.

In its milestone year, the university graduated some 1,500 students at today's ceremonies.

And here, with the usual mix of topics, the Dolan fulltext, adapted according to delivery:

PHOTO: Ed Pfueller/Catholic University of America

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At Ad Limina's Close, A Meeting of Giants

Apologies for the watermark, but here's your Shot of the Day -- Bishop-elect Gregory Parkes of Pensacola-Tallahassee, all 6-foot-8 of him, towering over the 5'4" B16 at the start of this morning's ad limina audience for the bishops of Florida (Vatican photo-gallery).

With the Sunshine State's papal group-chat, the 14 Latin-church regions of the American bench have now all been received on their seven-yearly pilgrimage, the first of this pontificate. Next week brings the visit's close with the first-ever joint report of Region XV, the recently created arm bringing together the Eastern-church hierarchs based on these shores; previously, the Eastern prelates were part of the geographic group where they were based.

The first priest of Orlando ever to be named a bishop on his March appointment, 48 year-old Parkes will be ordained on June 5th.

By the looks of it, the rite might just be the first of its kind to require a ladder.

For in-depth reports from the days, the Mother of All Episcopal Blogs -- St Petersburg Bishop Bob Lynch's For His Friends -- has been running daily dispatches.

PHOTOS: L'Osservatore Romano

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From the President's Desk

(SVILUPPO --6.30pm ET: During the SiriusXM broadcast noted below, Dolan -- who's been blogging since 2009 -- launched a Twitter feed... he can be found @CardinalDolan.)

Anyone who's watched Tim Dolan long enough has likely come to figure out that, while maintaining a perception of omnipresence, the cardinal-chief of the Stateside bench usually tends to make his public interventions in highly concentrated bursts.

Along those lines, before tackling the issues in a live, two-hour national "town hall" meeting tonight on SiriusXM Radio -- where the Gotham church has its own outlet, headlined by Dolan's weekly radio show -- the new red hat talked church and secular policy in a sit-down with MSNBC:



On a related note, almost three months since B16 "put the red hat on the Empire State Building" (or the still-rising 1 World Trade), Dolan's Homecoming Tour -- with its closed streets and giddy throngs, perhaps the closest thing to a Papal Visit American Catholicism will experience for quite some time -- reached its close on Sunday in his native St Louis as the city's 2,700-seat Cathedral-Basilica overflowed, much like it did on Assumption Day 2001 for his ordination as a bishop.

The Mass was the new cardinal's second Midwestern stop in a week, following a swing through his prior charge in Milwaukee, where the event dominated local news for days and the congregation began queueing up before dawn for a seat in the 2,000-seat basilica dedicated to Our Lady Help of Christians atop the Beer City's Holy Hill.

Adding a dose of memories to the usual mix of stand-up and Scripture, here, Dolan's preach from his hometown pulpit:


PHOTO: Reuters

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In Ireland, Under a Predator's Shadow, The Primate Falls

While the American Catholic conversation continues to be flooded with politically-driven commentary over the Vatican’s mandate for a reboot of LCWR and the US bishops’ ongoing fight for religious liberty, the most significant story going in the English-speaking church these days -- and quite possibly, well beyond -- comes instead from Ireland, where the country’s chief prelate is facing a fresh round of enraged calls to resign amid assertions that he failed to protect children during a 1970s canonical investigation into the Isle’s most infamous predator priest.

A BBC documentary last week reported that, as a priest-notary during a 1974 church probe, the present-day Cardinal Seán Brady was given information on five victims of Brendan Smyth -- the Norbertine priest whose staggering trail of abuse would effectively launch the ongoing two-decade torrent of revelations that have illustrated an equally prolific history of covering up allegations on the part of the country's seniormost churchmen and their aides.

According to an interview with the victim who provided the names and addresses of other Smyth targets to Brady, no follow-up was made to four of the five children (boys and girls alike) listed by the man, Brendan Boland, who was 14 when he testified in Brady's presence.

The TV report said that those listed by Boland or others known by the group would continue to be abused by Smyth into the late 1980s.

For the cardinal-primate of All Ireland -- by tradition, the successor of St Patrick himself -- the disclosure has made for the lowest point of a stunning fall. On his 2007 elevation to the College, Brady was hailed by prelates, press and public alike for his humility, "patent sincerity," "honesty in cleaning up the clerical child sex abuse scandals" and a widely-appreciated role in advancing the Isle's famously fraught peace process. Such is the radioactive specter Smyth continues to hold in the Irish psyche, however, that to be painted as even an unwitting enabler of the notorious pedophile increasingly seems a blow from which the low-key cardinal will prove unable to recover.

To be sure, the effect is not unique to leaders of a beleaguered, battered Irish church. In 1994, when the Republic's attorney general was found to have blocked a request from Northern Ireland for Smyth's extradition there to face a criminal proceeding, public anger erupted with an intensity that forced the collapse of the government.

Never laicized, the Norbertine "monster" (right, being taken to court) died in prison three years later, shortly after being sentenced to 12 years for pleading guilty to the abuse of 20 boys and girls.

A combination of charges from the North and Republic, the indictment stretched for an additional 71 counts.

Smyth also abused American children during assignments in Rhode Island and North Dakota in the 1960s. After the case erupted three decades later, his abbot admitted in a televised interview that neither US bishop where he was sent was warned about the cleric's "propensity to molest."

In an extensive response to the documentary's claims, the 72 year-old cardinal said last week that he "was shocked, appalled and outraged when I first discovered in the mid 1990’s that Brendan Smyth had gone on to abuse others."

Brady voiced his frustration about media coverage that gave "the impression that I was the only person who knew of the allegations against Brendan Smyth at that time and that because of the office I hold in the church today I somehow had the power to stop Brendan Smyth in 1975. I had absolutely no authority over Brendan Smyth.... The only people who had authority within the church to stop Brendan Smyth from having contact with children were his Abbot... and his Religious Superiors in the Norbertine Order.

"I feel betrayed that those who had the authority in the church to stop Brendan Smyth failed to act on the evidence I gave them," he added. "However, I also accept that I was part of an unhelpful culture of deference and silence in society, and the church, which thankfully is now a thing of the past."

After Irish media honed in on Boland's request for a public apology, Brady complied yesterday before a camera from the state broadcaster RTE during a previously planned pilgrimage to Lough Derg -- historically, a site of spiritual refuge "for anyone in trouble."

* * *

Secretary to his Northern bishop at the time of the Smyth investigation, the Cavan-born Brady went on to become rector of Rome’s Irish College and, in 1996, primate of All Ireland on his ascent as archbishop of Armagh -- the seat traced to Patrick, who made the town's primitive church his hub on the island. In the post, the primate likewise serves as chairman of the unified conference of bishops from the North and the Republic.

Brady's tie to the Smyth case encited controversy when his role as a canonical notary first emerged in early 2010, without the fresh aspect of the additional victims he learned about. The mere disclosure that, in recording their experiences, the future cardinal swore the teenage victims to secrecy -- a standard procedure to maintain the integrity of canonical proceedings -- made for enough grist in the court of public opinion to foster perceptions that he abetted a cover-up.

At the time, the cardinal said he would "reflect carefully" on his position, but asked if a "new beginning" for the church would "allow for wounded healers, those who have made mistakes in their past to have a part in shaping the future?"

In the wake of the initial imbroglio, Brady said openly that he had requested "episcopal assistance" from Rome -- a statement widely interpreted as a request for a coadjutor who would succeed him.

To date, an appointment of the sort remains pending, but some reports over recent days say the move could be expedited to allow for an "exit strategy."

In a marked change from 2010, however, Pope Benedict's choice of a designated successor to the primate would now be advised upon by a veteran close collaborator of the pontiff's: Archbishop Charles Brown, the New York native and longtime CDF aide who was tapped as Nuncio to Dublin last November, then ordained by Benedict himself on Epiphany Day (below) -- these days, a relatively rarity-- as an unmistakable signal of the Pope's closeness and trust.

Educated at Oxford and Notre Dame but without a day's experience in diplomacy before being sent to the posting on Navan Road, the savvy, urbane theologian was dispatched in large part to end a decades-long tradition of Italian appointees who were routinely sidelined and dominated by the Irish bishops. (As one Curialist recently put it, under Brown's predecessors the most significant business at the Dublin Nunciature "was that the pasta arrived from Italy.")

Likely to oversee a significant upcoming consolidation of the 26 Irish dioceses -- which, between them, comprise some 4 million Catholics (yet are served by rapidly plummeting, aging contingents of priests) -- it was telling that, as opposed to Brady or the capital's widely-regarded Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, Brown took the celebrant's duties for a nationally-televised Mass on Sunday in preparation for next month's International Eucharistic Congress in Dublin.

In a seeming reference to the divisions born of the abuse scandals writ large and the Brady controversy's return to the headlines, Brown pointedly said in his homily that "the unity of the church does not come cheap. All of us need to pray for that unity and at times also to suffer for it."

As the new Nuncio delivered his message from the RTE studios, after a parish Mass elsewhere in the city, Martin backed a full state inquiry into the Smyth case, a call that -- reflecting the apparent tenuousness of his position -- the cardinal subsequently echoed.

A new civil investigation would follow four prior government probes on the history of abuse and its mishandling in Catholic dioceses and institutions, each of which have released damning findings on venues ranging from the residential schools run by religious orders to the Dublin church and the rural diocese of Cloyne, where Bishop John Magee -- once the private secretary to three Popes -- was first stripped of his powers by Rome before resigning in disgrace, and whose treatment of cases led to a historic repudiation of the Vatican by the Isle's Taoiseach (Prime Minister) in the country's Parliament.

Late last year, the coalition government announced the closing of its embassy to the Holy See and the appointment of a non-resident ambassador. While economic reasons were officially cited as the reason for the move, the decision was widely interpreted as a snub to the Pope. (The Holy See had been the first state to recognize Ireland on its independence, and the papal Nuncio to Dublin serves to this day as Dean of the Diplomatic Corps accredited to the Republic.)

On the eve of a Eucharistic Congress that the Dublin prelate and the Vatican alike envisioned as a jump-start toward the renewal of an Irish church whose challenges make its Stateside daughter seem fairly problem-free by comparison, the latest Brady fiasco has all the makings of a considerable embarrassment.

Reflecting an unusually broad spectrum of ecclesial agreement, public prodding for the cardinal's resignation has ranged from sources as varied as Divine Word Fr Vincent Twomey -- a retired moral theology don in Ireland's national seminary at Maynooth and onetime pupil of Professor Joseph Ratzinger (who, last year, awarded his student the highest papal honor a religious can receive), and the editor of the influential London-based Tablet, Catherine Pepinster, who said in a Thursday tweet that the Irish church's "agony" would be "far worse if Cardinal Brady fails to quit over latest abuse scandal."

"Time to go," Pepinster said.

Further roiling the scene has been a reported Vatican "silencing" of at least five prominent Irish priests over their respective commentaries on hot-button issues affecting the church's life.

While the sanctions imposed by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith apparently vary in their degree, in the broad sense, anything the men intend to say publicly on questions pertaining to church teaching or discipline on homosexuality, priestly celibacy, the ordination of women and other unspecified sensitive matters must be approved by Rome before being made public.

In the wake of the move, one of the clerics -- Passionist Fr Brian D'Arcy, a widely-cited media commentator -- sought to shift the focus to the scandals, saying that "to be silent about issues and about the protection of children, I can't do that."

"Any system depends on the integrity of the person carrying out the system," D'Arcy said. "And if the person carrying out the system is afraid to talk about 'that, or that, or question why about that,' then the secrecy veil comes in again, and children will not be protected."

Most of the priests under scrutiny are affiliated with an independent association of Irish clergy that's attracted a high profile over recent months. This week, the group is hosting a conference on the future of the Isle's church which, according to reports, drew some 1,000 attendees to its opening day in a Dublin hotel.

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