Friends
Alleluia! He is Risen. He is truly risen. Alleluia!
There are a lot of news stories about how there is a boom in people joining the Catholic Church this year. Five years ago, there were 70,000 people who joined the church in the US and, this year, that number has gone up to over 90,000. Part of that has to do with getting farther and farther away from fears of being in crowds that happened during Covid. I would think part of this has to do with those people I would call media clerics like Bishop Barron, Cardinal Dolan, and Fr. Mike Schmitz who are showing the world a compassionate, kind, and humorous side of priesthood instead of the insidious side so often portrayed in the media. It also helps having the first ever American Pope who speaks with a Chicago accent...though different than the accent I'm used to hearing on Saturday Night Live. However, I think we priests have also finally recognized how important it is to empower you all, the laity in the church, in the work of evangelization. I think about how priests were threatened by the prospect of Catholic radio and television because we couldn’t control what the lay people were going to say. Oftentimes, those same priests would brag about how they were good at empowering the laity until the laity asked to start some form of apologetical or catechetical media movement.
All the gospels say that Mary Magdalene was the first to see the empty tomb. Some list other women there but they are all in agreement that Mary Magdalene was there. What’s the significance of this person? Contrary to Dan Brown, it was not a wink toward some kind of romantic relationship between Jesus and her. Jesus loved her just like he loves all people who show faith in him. I think Jesus appears to Mary Magdalene specifically because she was NOT one of the twelve apostles. In other words, I think he wanted his first post-resurrection contact not to be with those he had ordained as leaders, but specifically among one who was, in a sense, the disciple of disciples, St. Mary Magdalene. He appeared to Mary because, unlike the Apostles who will have to get busy organizing churches and spreading the gospel far and wide, she can stay in one place and work behind the scenes building up the faith of a particular community. It’s why I’m not only not in favor of women’s ordination or widespread ordination of married men and not worried about declining numbers of priests. I feel like we are just now seeing priests recognize we can’t micromanage everything that happens in our parish and I’ve seen lay people feeling empowered to start catechetical and evangelical initiatives. I have seen lay people take on the responsibility of starting small group Bible studies. I’ve seen lay people reach out to invite people to Mass or confession with them. I’ve experienced lay people leading prayer over people for healing. When this happens and lay people feel like they have an important place in the church that isn’t dependent on the priest’s involvement nor in competition with the our responsibilities, we start to work together and our love for the church grows.
One week from today, I will stand at this ambo and read a letter from our Archbishop announcing the next step in our Journey in Faith. I will finally be able to tell you what parishes you will be working with as a pastorate and who will be the local leaders starting in July. I know this has been a very difficult process for some people and I wish I could say it’s about done but, the truth is that this is just beginning. Next we’ll have to figure out Mass times and roles for staff and how centralized to make the offices. Please keep two people in mind as all of this is going on. The first is Jesus. He is our hope and our strength. He wants to appear to us daily, hourly, to give us hope and lead us to the Father. Keep Jesus always in our heart.
But also think of Mary Magdalene. She may have started off scared and confused on that Easter morning but she ran to the apostles with the kind of joy that allowed Jesus to appear to her on the way. We may not have Mass in as many churches as we used to but that doesn’t stop us from telling everyone He is risen. Indeed, even as great as 90,000 new Catholics are this year, in the year 2000, 174,000 new Catholics joined the church in the United States. Almost twice as many! There’s too much work to do to sit around licking our wounds. Too many of our family have the left the church and too many people have no hope because they do not know Christ. He has arisen and has appeared to Mary Magdalene. Can you be like her and spread the gospel message to those most in need of hearing it?
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