“Our seminary is not closing!”  This was the opening statement that Bishop Timothy Senior, the rector of St. Charles Borromeo Seminary, made as he addressed the priests of our archdiocese at a recent clergy conference.  I want you to hear this statement because I’m afraid that there are those who think the seminary is, indeed, closing.  There are currently 165 seminarians from 15 (arch)dioceses and five religious communities at our seminary preparing for the priesthood; 75 of them are preparing to become priests for our archdiocese.  So, it’s clear that […]

“Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God” (Mt. 22: 21).  When some of the religious leaders try to trap Jesus with a question about whether or not to pay the Roman taxes, Jesus reminds his listeners that everything belongs to God; after all, he is the creator of the universe and gives us all that we have.  We read in the Bible that, after God had created the heavens and the earth, he planted a garden and placed man there to […]

“Go, make disciples of all nations…teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Mt 28:19).  After Jesus overcame death by his Resurrection, he did not just return to heaven to sit at the right of the Father.  Before ascending to the Father, he commissioned those who had come to believe in him to make disciples, that is, others who would come to believe in the one, true God and his son, Jesus, who came to save us.  That is the ongoing mission of the Church; we are the […]

“The mission of Christ the redeemer, which is entrusted to the Church, is still very far from completion.  As the second millennium after Christ’s coming draws to an end, an overall view of the human race shows that this mission is still only beginning and that we must commit ourselves wholeheartedly to its service.  It is the Spirit who impels us to proclaim the great works of God: ‘For if I preach the Gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting.  For necessity is laid upon me.  Woe to me […]