Beyond the Silence - Carthusian Monks

BENEDICT XVI ENTRUSTS FAMILIES TO INFANT JESUS OF PRAGUE

VATICAN CITY, 26 SEP 2009 (VIS) - At 12.30 p.m. today the Pope arrived at the church of Our Lady Victorious in Prague, which was built by German Lutherans between 1611 and 1613 on a site once occupied by a chapel dedicated to the Blessed Trinity. Following the victory of the Counter Reformation in Bohemia, emperor Ferdinand II gave the building to the Order of Discalced Carmelites and it was consecrated to Our Lady Victorious.

The church houses the famous image of the Infant Jesus of Prague. The statuette, made of wax over a wooden frame, comes from a convent in southern Spain and was given to the Carmelites by princess Polyxena von Lobkowitz in 1628. The cult of the Infant Jesus spread during the Baroque period and is associated with the visions of St. Teresa of Avila, the great reformer of the Carmelite Order.

Benedict XVI was greeted by the rector as he arrived at the church, which was crowded with families and children. He adored the Blessed Sacrament in the chapel of the Infant Jesus then placed a golden crown on the statuette before moving on to the main altar to greet those present.

"The image of the Child Jesus calls to mind the mystery of the Incarnation, of the all-powerful God Who became man and Who lived for thirty years in the lowly family of Nazareth", he said. "My thoughts turn to your own families and to all families ... as we call upon the Child Jesus for the gift of unity and harmony. ... We think especially of young families who have to work so hard to offer their children security and a decent future. We pray for families in difficulty, struggling with illness and suffering, for those in crisis, divided or torn apart by strife or infidelity. We entrust them all to the Holy Infant of Prague, knowing how important their stability and harmony is for the true progress of society and for the future of humanity".

"In the Holy Infant of Prague we contemplate the beauty of childhood and the fondness that Jesus Christ has always shown for little ones. ... Yet how many children are neither loved, nor welcomed nor respected! How many of them suffer violence and every kind of exploitation by the unscrupulous! May children always be accorded the respect and attention that are due to them: they are the future and the hope of humanity!"

The Holy Father concluded by thanking all the children who had come to greet him and he asked them to pray for their parents, teachers, friends, and for him.

"Bishops receive advice from Pope on caring for priests"

Castel Gandolfo, Italy, Sep 21, 2009 / 10:43 am (CNA).- As he does every year, the Holy Father hosted a congress for all the bishops who were consecrated this past year. Noting that helping priests is an essential task for a bishop, Pope Benedict reminded the prelates to urge priests to seek "intimate and personal union with Christ."

Addressing the recently-consecrated bishops at Castel Gandolfo today, the Holy Father recalled the importance of "not forgetting that one of a bishop’s essential tasks is that of helping priests – by example and fraternal support – to follow their vocation faithfully and to work enthusiastically and lovingly in the Lord’s vineyard."

Priests, said the Pope, must "remain united to the Lord; this is the secret of the fruitfulness of their ministry." Increased workload, difficulties, and the new requirements of pastoral care "must never distract us from intimate and personal union with Christ. Our readiness and openness to people must never diminish or overshadow our readiness and openness towards the Lord."

"The time that priests and bishops consecrate to God in prayer is always time well spent," he emphasized. "This is because prayer is at the heart of pastoral work, it is the ‘lymph’ which gives it strength, it is a support in moments of uncertainty and discouragement, and an endless source of missionary fervor and of fraternal love towards everyone."

Focusing more closely on priestly life, Pope Benedict stated that, "At the heart of priestly life is the Eucharist." The Pontiff also pointed to a devout recitation of the Liturgy of the Hours as "one special way to prolong the mysterious sanctifying action of the Eucharist throughout the day." In addition, priests can participate in Eucharistic adoration, ‘lectio divina’ and the contemplative prayer of the Rosary, he said.

With the Church celebrating the Year for Priests, the Pope turned to its patron, St. Jean Vianney, who "showed us the importance of priests’ immersing themselves in the Eucharist and of educating the faithful in the Eucharistic presence and in communion."

"Pope: Priests need True sense of Vatican II"

LONDON (UK Catholic Herald) - Pope Benedict XVI called for a young generation of priests who embrace a "correct" interpretation of the Second Vatican Council as he announced a "year for priests" on Monday.

Continuing the work of his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, in consolidating the work of the Council, the Pope explicitly supported Vatican II's reforms but insisted that they should not be exaggerated or understood as a complete rupture with the past. He also said that lay structures could not replace the ministry of the priesthood.

His comments coincided with the announcement of a year for priests beginning on June 19 and marking the 150th anniversary of St John Vianney, patron saint of the clergy. He told the Congregation for the Clergy that an indispensable struggle for moral perfection must dwell in every priestly heart. The Pope warned Church leaders against creating lay structures as solutions to a vocations crisis.

He said: "The centrality of Christ leads to a correct valuation of priestly ministry, without which there would be no Eucharist, no mission, not even the Church.

"It is necessary, then, to ensure that 'new structures' or pastoral organisations are not planned for a time in which it will be possible to 'do without' ordained ministry, on the basis of an erroneous interpretation of the promotion of the laity, because this would lay the foundations for a further dilution in priestly ministry, and any supposed 'solutions' would, in fact, dramatically coincide with the real causes of the problems currently affecting the ministry."

Pope Benedict stressed the sacramental nature of the ordained priesthood. "The missionary dimension of the priest arises from his sacramental configuration to Christ the head", he said, which requires "total adherence to what ecclesial tradition has identified as apostolica vivendi forma, which consists in participation... in that 'new way of life' which was inaugurated by the Lord Jesus and which the Apostles made their own."

Benedict XVI also underlined the importance of priestly formation and called for a younger generation of priests to be encouraged towards a "correct reading of the texts of the Vatican Council, interpreted in the light of all the Church's doctrinal inheritance".

He urged priests to be "present, identifiable and recognisable for their judgment of faith, personal virtues and attire - in the fields of culture and of charity which have always been at the heart of the Church's mission".

The Pope added that the priesthood is indispensable to the Church. Explaining the different dimensions essential to the mission of the priesthood, he named the ecclesial, communial, hierarchical and doctrinal aspects.

St John Vianney's relics will be brought to St Peter's Basilica by the Bishop Guy Bagnard of Belley-Ars to inaugurate the celebrations and the Pope will close the year by presiding over a "world meeting of priests" in St Peter's Square.

To mark the year for priests, which has "Faithfulness of Christ, Faithfulness of Priests" as its theme, the Congregation for Clergy will promote spiritual and pastoral exercises to highlight the role of the clergy in the modern world. Pope Benedict will also publish a collection of texts which deal with the aspects of the life and mission of priests in the modern world.

This year's Annuario Pontificio indicated a gradual increase in the number of vocations to the priesthood, although the number of vocations has been on a steady decline.

"Pope: missionary activity "intrinsic" to the life of the priest"

From AsiaNews

Benedict XVI has proclaimed a Year for Priests, which will begin next June 19. During the year, he will proclaim St. John M. Vianney "Patron of all priests of the world." A "Directory for Confessors and Spiritual Directors" will be published, as well as a collection of texts by Benedict XVI on the essential themes of priestly life and mission in the present era.

Vatican City (AsiaNews) - Benedict XVI has proclaimed a special Year for Priests, during which he will proclaim Saint John M. Vianney (the Curé of Ars) "Patron of all the priests of the world." The pope himself made the announcement today, to participants in the plenary meeting of the Congregation for the Clergy, received in audience.

The speech to the Vatican dicastery for the clergy was also an opportunity, for Benedict XVI, for some statements about priests, beginning with the statement that missionary activity is "intrinsic" to priestly life, for which "there is an essential apostolic mandate: 'Go out into the whole world and preach the Gospel to all creation' (Mk. 16:15)." This distinguishes "ontologically" the mission of the priest from that of the lay Christian, in that for the priest the missionary dimension "arises from his sacramental configuration to Christ the Head." Because of this, on the one hand, there is a "necessary, even indispensable tension toward moral perfection, which must inhabit every authentically priestly heart," and on the other hand the necessity of the ministerial priesthood, without which there would not be the Eucharist, nor even the mission or the Church itself. "In this sense," the pope added, "it is necessary to be careful that new pastoral structures or organizations are not designed in view of a time when one will have to 'do without' the ordained ministry, departing from an erroneous interpretation of the proper promotion of the laity, because in this case the presuppositions would be put in place for a further dilution of the ministerial priesthood and the eventual presumed 'solutions' would dramatically coincide with the real causes of the contemporary problems connected to the ministry."

The mission of the priest "is carried out 'in the Church'. This dimension of ecclesiality, communion, hierarchy and doctrine is absolutely indispensable to any authentic mission, and alone guarantees its spiritual efficacy. The four aspects mentioned must always be recognized as being intimately correlated: mission is 'ecclesial' because no one proclaims or conveys himself, but within and through his own humanity every priest must be well aware of convening an Other, God himself, to the world. God is the only treasure that men ultimately want to find in a priest. Mission means 'communion' because it takes place in a unity and communion that only secondarily has significant aspects of social visibility. Moreover, these derive essentially from that divine intimacy in which the priest is called to be an expert, in order to be able to lead, with humility and trust, the souls entrusted to him to the same encounter with the Lord. Finally, the dimensions of 'hierarchy' and 'doctrine' suggest a reiteration of the importance of ecclesial discipline (a term related to 'disciple') and initial, permanent doctrinal formation, and not only theological.

The pope emphasized this last point both in order to stress the necessity of the permanent formation of the priest, and, in this regard, to reaffirm that the necessary interpretation of Vatican Council II must be made within the Church's tradition, and not as a "novelty" detached from it. "Mission," he said, in fact, "has its roots in a special way in good formation, developed in communion with the uninterrupted ecclesial tradition, without ruptures or temptations of discontinuity. In this sense, it is important to foster among priests, especially in the young generations, a correct reception of the texts of the Ecumenical Council Vatican II, interpreted in the light of the entire doctrinal heritage of the Church."

It appears equally urgent "to recover that awareness which drives priests to be present, identifiable, and recognizable for their judgment in faith, their personal virtues, and even their dress, in the areas of culture and charity, always at the heart of the Church's mission."

The pope, finally, will take part, at the closing of the Year for Priests - which begins next June 19 - in a "World Encounter of Priests" in St. Peter's Square, on June 19, 2010. During the Year for Priests, a "Directory for Confessors and Spiritual Directors" will also be published, together with a collection of texts by Benedict XVI on essential topics of priestly life and mission in the present era.

"Pope Cautions Against Dilution of Priestly Ministry"

Encourages Solid Doctrinal Education Among Clergy

From Zenit

VATICAN CITY, MARCH 16, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI is affirming the importance of the ministerial priesthood in the Church, and is calling for greater attention to the education of clergy.

The Pope said this today during an audience with participants of the Congregation for Clergy's plenary assembly, a Vatican communiqué reported. In this meeting, he also announced his intention to convoke a Year for Priests, beginning June 19, on the occasion of 150th anniversary of the death of the Curé of Ars.

The Pontiff cautioned his audience against confusing the baptismal and ministerial priesthood, stating that the two are distinguished on an ontological level, rather than by a variance in degrees. The second dimension, he said, "arises from [the priest's] sacramental configuration to Christ the Head."

This configuration, he noted, "brings with it, as a consequence, a cordial and total adherence to what ecclesial tradition has identified as 'apostolica vivendi forma,' which consists in participation in that 'new way of life' that was inaugurated by the Lord Jesus and which the Apostles made their own."

The Holy Father urged the bishops to ensure that "the 'new structures' or pastoral organizations are not planned for a time in which it will be possible to 'do without' ordained ministry, on the basis of an erroneous interpretation of the promotion of the laity, because this would lay the foundations for a further dilution in priestly ministry, and any supposed 'solutions' would, in fact, dramatically coincide with the real causes of the problems currently affecting the ministry."

He also admonished them to cultivate a "truly paternal" relationship with the priests, and to concern themselves with "their permanent education, above all in the doctrinal area."

The Pope stressed the importance of the ministry, without which "there would be no Eucharist, no mission, not even the Church" and he recalled that the mission of the priest "has its roots in a special way in a good formation, carried out in communion with unbroken ecclesial Tradition, without pausing or being tempted by discontinuity."

"In this regard," he continued, "it is important to encourage priests, especially the young generations, to correctly read the texts of the Second Vatican Council, interpreted in the light of all the Church's doctrinal inheritance."

Visibility

The Pontiff spoke about the urgent need for priests to be "present, identifiable and recognizable -- for their judgment of faith, personal virtues and attire -- in the fields of culture and of charity which have always been at the heart of the Church's mission."

He said the mission of the priest concerns the Church, communion, hierarchy and doctrine, and added that these aspects should not be separated.

He explained: "The mission is ecclesial because no one announces or brings themselves, but rather in and through his own humanity, every priest should be very conscious of bringing Another, God himself, to the world. God is the only treasure that, definitively, mankind wishes to find in a priest."

The Holy Father said the mission concerns communion "because it takes place in a unity and communion which only at a secondary level possess important aspects of social visibility. These, moreover, are derived essentially from that divine intimacy of which the priest is called to be an expert, so that he can bring, with confidence and humility, the souls entrusted to him to the same meeting with the Lord."

He said that "the 'hierarchical' and 'doctrinal' dimensions emphasize the importance of ecclesiastical discipline -- a term related to that of 'disciple' -- and of doctrinal -- not just theological, initial and permanent -- formation."

The Pope concluded by urging those present to discover the centrality of Jesus Christ who gives meaning and value to the ministerial priesthood.

He added, "As Church and as priests we announce Jesus of Nazareth, Lord and Christ, crucified and risen, Sovereign of time and history, in the joyful certainty that this truth coincides with the deepest hopes of the human heart."

"Spanish bishop: Lack of radical dedication amongst religious explains vocations crisis"

From Catholic News Agency

Madrid, Feb 2, 2009 / 10:18 pm (CNA).- In a pastoral letter published to mark the World Day of Consecrated Life on February 2, Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, Bishop Demetrio Fernandez of Tarazona, Spain, said the lack of radical commitment in consecrated life is one of the main causes of the vocations crisis.

“Christians are already consecrated through baptism, but the consecrated life is a new title of consecration that brings baptism to its fullness,” the bishop said. “Consecrated life is a prophetic cry in today’s world (and always), which reminds us what the definitive values of the Kingdom are, those that Christ lived out in the beatitudes and those that He invites others to live out when He calls someone to follow Him more closely.”

“We live in times of crisis in the consecrated life as well,” Bishop Fernandez underscored. “Secularization, that is, living as if God did not exist, adapting oneself to the opinions and ways of the world, has also filtered into the consecrated lifestyle.”

“It seems like a contradiction, but unfortunately this is the way it is. A consecrated life in which one is not willing to live a radical commitment to Jesus Christ, with a fanatical love like that of St. Paul, is a life that is not very attractive or exciting to the young people of today. This is one of the reasons for the lack of vocations,” the bishop stressed.

Bishop Fernandez acknowledged that the “issue of the scarcity or lack of vocations among young people is very complex and cannot be reduced to a single cause, but the institutes of consecrated life that live coherently ‘having lost everything for Jesus Christ’ are getting vocations.”

“On the other hand,” he added, “the institutes that have adapted to this world do not have vocations and are slowly dying out.”

“The World Day of Consecrated Life is an occasion to pray to the Lord for those who have consecrated their lives totally to the Lord, that they may be faithful to the first love that led them to leave everything for Jesus Christ,” Bishop Fernandez stated.

"Vocation week is time to pray, ponder one’s call"

From Intermountain Catholic
by Priscilla Cabral

Photo at left: Father Colin F. Bircumshaw , Director of Vocations and Most Rev. John C. Wester, bishop of the Diocese of Salt Lake City kneel before the Blessed Sacrament while its being exposed for Evening of Prayer with Benediction at the Cathedral of the Madeleine Jan. 11. Evening Prayer with Benediction was part of the National Vocation Awareness week, which has been observed since 1976, when the National Conference of Catholic Bishops established it. IC photo by Priscilla Cabral

SALT LAKE CITY — National Vocation Awareness Week is Jan. 11 – 17, 2009, starting on the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. During this period, Catholics are called to pray especially for an increase in vocations to religious life and the priesthood, and to ponder the call to follow Jesus received at their baptisms.

“We are called and formed to be one with Christ in his passion and resurrection,” said the Most Rev. John C. Wester, bishop of the Diocese of Salt Lake City during Evening Prayer with Benediction, part of National Vocation Awareness Week, at the Cathedral of the Madeleine Jan. 11.

Baptism, he said, calls us to practice the mystery of vulnerability and kindness exemplified when God all-powerful, who created everything, became one of us.

This call is hard to answer especially when images everywhere tell us violence and power should be our ideals.

Celebrities and the arms they carry are a good example that in our culture “violence and power get bigger with each generation,” said Bishop Wester.

Humphrey Bogart carried a small gun, then Clint Eastwood came along with a rifle, Sylvester Stallone followed him with a canon, and finally Arnold Schwarzenegger came out with a tank or a bazooka, he said.

“We are conditioned to be powerful… but we are called to a different role, that of a servant,” he said echoing the words of the evening’s reading:

Thus says the Lord: Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one with whom I am pleased, upon whom I have put my spirit; he shall bring forth justice to the nations, not crying out, not shouting, not making his voice heard in the street. A bruised reed he shall not break, and a smoldering wick he shall not quench, until he establishes justice on earth; the coastlands will wait for his teaching. (Isaiah 42:1-4)

As servants, we are called to put somebody else first, to bring hope, love, peace, and courage to others, and to recognize we are vulnerable and fragile.

“When we know we are weak… Christ can work with us and use us,” said Bishop Wester.

Evening of Prayer with Benediction was organized by the Office of Vocations and the Office of Liturgy in an effort to bring the community together to pray for vocations before the Blessed Sacrament.

The evening started with dim lighting in the Cathedral to emphasize the presence of the Paschal Candle. Each assembly member lit the candle he or she was holding as the Paschal Candle passed by under the guard of the Knights of Columbus.

“We ask the Lord to kindle within us the flame of faith,” said Bishop Wester during the homily.

After the Benediction, Bishop Wester gave thanks to Father Colin F. Bircumshaw, Director of Vocations, and Father Javier Virgen, associate director of Vocations and vicar for Hispanic Affairs, for assisting him at the altar, and to the choir for their uplifting music. Then, he gave special thanks to the Knights of Columbus for the stipend they collect for the seminarians of the diocese.

“I know sometimes it is a sacrifice to your members to come forward with that,” he said.

The bishop also invited the assembly to gather again in prayer.

“There is a certain power of prayer when we work together.”

The Tarheel Apostle - Fr. Thomas Frederick Price, MM

The following video is primarily of a teleplay produced and aired by NBC on national television some time in the 1940's (we're not sure of the exact date). It shows some vignettes from the life of Fr. Thomas Frederick Price, MM, during his years as a priest in North Carolina prior to founding the Maryknoll Mission Society and leaving for China. To this I have added some information about the life of this truly heroic and virtuous priest.

Below are links to several sources of information about Fr. Price and his cause for canonization:

Cause for Sainthood for Father Thomas Frederick Price Group on Facebook

Roman Catholic Diocese of Raleigh

Maryknoll Mission Society

Testimonies concerning the reputation of Fr. Price,
as well as credible reports of favors or healings
received through prayer for his intercession
should be reported to:

Fr. Michael Walsh, MM,
Vice-Postulator of the Cause
of Fr. Price at
mwalsh@maryknoll.og

"From Rome and about seminarians"

From The Catholic Review
by Archbishop O'Brien
(emphases mine)

This week finds me away from Baltimore and enjoying, absorbing the spiritual grandeur of Rome, the world’s Eternal City.

Over the past eight years, I have served as chair of the Board of Governors of the Pontifical North American College in Rome, a privilege I will relinquish this November when my term expires.

“The College” is owned and supported by the bishops of our country who, since 1859 (with a brief interruption during World War II), have been sending candidates for the priesthood to be formed sub umbra Petri (beneath the shadow of Peter). In fact, the present seminary building, completed in 1959, stands on the Janiculum Hill overlooking St. Peter’s Basilica.

The original site of the seminary in the center of Rome dates back to 1599 when the building served as a Visitation Convent. Now called the Casa Santa Maria, it houses the graduate programs of the College, with some 75 priests studying for further degrees in the theological sciences.

Each year, as well, some 76 American priests, relative veterans in priestly service, spend 12 weeks under the auspices of the College’s Institute for Continuing Theological Education. As they brush up on their theology, they also experience the age-old secrets of Rome from within.

I am drawn to the “NAC” this particular week to help celebrate the annual Rector’s Dinner, a major fundraiser and a rare opportunity for Italian Catholics and some American pilgrims to sample a modern seminary community. Our seminarians host the event – direct traffic, transform the refectory into a banquet hall, wait tables, and provide some fine entertainment for many on hand whose sorry stereotypical image of a seminary and its seminarians would tend to resemble that of a 19th century monastery.

What our visitors see, however, is a large house of happy and healthy young men with a deep love for Christ and his Church and a strong desire upon ordination to return home as parish priests. These days, gratefully, our numbers are strong, with 180 seminarians and newly ordained priests representing 82 dioceses across the U.S.

In recent years I have noticed a trend or two at the College that might say something about the state of vocations in North America. There has been a decided shift in population from the Northeastern and Western dioceses to those of the Midwest. Archdioceses such as Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and San Francisco have not been sending seminarians in recent years, but there is a virtual roll call of dioceses from farm and ranch states such as Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, the Dakotas, and Texas. I suspect this reflects the vocation situation in various parts of our Land, and one might ask why such heavily populated Archdioceses are not attracting vocations in proportion to the smaller, close-to-the-earth dioceses.

Another impressive and, indeed, inspiring hallmark of today’s seminarians, in Rome and in our own distinguished St. Mary’s Seminary in Roland Park and Mount St. Mary’s in Emmitsburg, is a return to a Eucharistic-centered spirituality. At NAC, all are “on deck” at 6:15 a.m. for morning prayer and 6:30 a.m. community Mass before walking a typical 25 minutes to classes across town. Come evening, one would have to be impressed by the numbers in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament during the voluntary holy hour of exposition.

Many seminarians volunteer the fact that they discovered their vocation through devotion to the Blessed Sacrament in parishes where Eucharistic adoration was regularly scheduled with special prayers for vocations.

Nationally, I am told that there are dioceses such as Wichita, where an abundance of priestly vocations can be traced to diocesan-wide Eucharistic adoration. Nor do I think it a coincidence that the three parishes in our Archdiocese with the most success at present in “growing” seminarians for Baltimore all offer parishioners opportunities for Eucharistic adoration outside of Mass:

St. Louis, Clarksville – 4 seminarians

St. John, Westminster – 3 seminarians, 2 applying

St. Peter the Apostle, Libertytown – 2 seminarians, 1 applying

These three parishes provide half of our homegrown seminarians. They have taken seriously the Lord’s solution for great harvests, but too few laborers: “Pray the harvest-master to send laborers into his harvest.”

We are blessed, indeed, to have many deacons, religious, and laypeople working the harvest. But without the priest, there is no Eucharist. Without the Eucharist, there is no Church.

How fitting, how necessary, to turn to the Eucharist in our prayer for priests.


Apr 2, 2008