Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Church

Dear Good People of Saint Mary,

A little over a year ago, I attended a lecture at Georgetown by one of our leading church theologians which has stayed with me. The occasion was the 50th anniversary of Unitatis redintegratio, Vatican II’s Decree on Ecumenism.
Her thesis basically spoke about a major shift which took place in the culture of the Church, something that had been a long time in coming but had finally become obvious: the life of the Church in the modern world demanded that the Church be involved in a dialogue. She said, quite simply, that the Church which had always operated (at least, for centuries) as a monologue—the Church speaking and everyone else just expected to listen—had come to terms with the fact that there were other voices that needed to be heard and a conversation was not only necessary, but holy.

The new principle of dialogue was named repeatedly for the first time in official documents of the Church as the way of growth in knowledge and wisdom, even the means by which we are edified by others and spread the Gospel.

There are lay people that need to be heard. There are non-Catholics that need to be heard. There are even non-Christian peoples who deserve to be heard. There are things to be learned and valued from all people who are made by God in his own image, even if their practice of faith or religion isn’t necessarily according to the authentic revelation that we hold as the central treasures of our faith.

For me one of the most stunning statements was made by Cardinal Walter Kasper in his reflections on Unitatis redintegratio, when he said that it isn’t possible to be truly “catholic” (the word means “universal”) if we follow a principle of operation in which find ourselves alone. “Universal” means that we must include all who are “other,” and find that fullness of God’s love not only in me, but also in you. That love of God is most perfectly known when it is found in us.

Made in the image of God and conformed to the person of Christ through the sacraments, we live a life that is trinitarian and perfectly united to the divine life of God. It is a love and life that is extended to all people, and we cannot experience it unless we are also in community, as God is in community.

Look at the way in which we celebrate the Mysteries of Christ in the Mass, the Liturgy of the Word is a conversation, the Liturgy of the Eucharist is a shared, mutual offering and receiving of us to God and God to us. The entire structure demands a We and a Thou: there can be no relationship in a monologue, but in a dialogue there is sharing and fulfillment.

I think this is the fault which lies at the heart of the thinking of so many today who claim to be “spiritual” but not “religious,” “believers” but not “belongers.” It is far too easy to isolate in individualism and selfishness; it is a far more difficult and demanding activity to make that commitment to a community of faith, in the context of others.

Even modern psychology shows the danger and resulting damage due to behavior that denies the most basic of human needs, to belong.

We can no longer pretend to own the same autonomy or personal infallibility when we must acknowledge the authority or preeminence of a tradition that has bound together a faithful community for centuries. Truth, once again, is something not be invented, but to be confronted with, something we receive, not something we make. It is given to shape us and we can’t create it any more than we can determine the reality of another person in our life. But openness to truth, like openness to others, is an often-unexpected and surprising opportunity to learn and grow. But the openness is vital.

Let us open ourselves to God, and one another, to discover the beauty and richness that is there.

May God bless you.

Dear Good People of Saint Mary,

This week I’ve been working at the annual National Workshop on Christian Unity in Albuquerque. It is a national gathering of ecumenical officers mainly from the Catholic, Lutheran, Episcopal and United Methodist churches who gather each year for seminars and prayer, promoting what we know to be Jesus’ desire (John 17) for full, visible communion among the baptized. Sometimes it seems like we are so far away from accomplishing our goals – sometimes, it seems like we are drifting farther away – but our gathering always provides encouragement and inspiration to keep after the prize.

I serve currently as the president of the Association of Catholic Ecumenical and Interreligious Officers for dioceses in the United States (www.cadeio.org).

One of the things we do during the Workshop is to gather for two evenings, one evening at a Catholic Mass and the other at a Protestant Eucharist. Of course, the point is that we can’t receive Communion together because we don’t share the same beliefs in sacraments and priesthood, and have adopted this two-night tradition to underline the pain of separation. Those of you in interchurch marriages know all too well what I’m talking about. But we find that it is too easy to become accustomed to division and avoid the situations where the tension is palpable. Yet, it is in the experience of the tension, the longing for unity, that we will pray and work more effectively toward solutions.

Ultimately, it is the work of the Holy Spirit and we will have to be ready to receive the gift of unity in his time, not ours.

In the meantime, we do everything we can together. You have seen examples of this in our community, when we gather to pray with our Christian brothers and sisters in Fredericksburg for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity each year (it is coming up in a few weeks after being snowed out in January!) and other prayer services, for example, on Wednesdays of Lent at noon. We also are actively involved in community ministries to the poor and homeless, those in need of food and assistance – all of them ecumenical in nature, shared among Christian churches. Every second Monday we have our own Taize prayer service to welcome those in interchurch families to come to our parish and pray in such a way that all may share fully and equally. We must always find ways to do everything we can – it is too easy to always focus on the things we can’t do, and not do the many things we can.

Regardless of what these activities may be, we must always be conscious of those among us who are seeking, or even just looking for a place to belong. When I first came to St. Mary we did a survey of all those who come to Mass about marriages and who comes to Mass. We discovered that it was quite possible that as many as 15% of those attending Mass on any given Sunday may not even be Catholic. For this reason we have to be people of hospitality, always extending a welcome to anyone who might be seeking a deeper life in Christ. We must never be a barrier to someone looking for God by something we might say, or how we might treat a guest.

I hear constantly from visitors and new parishioners how they have discovered a deep and abiding welcome at St. Mary, and I am grateful to all of you for being a good family to one another. Ultimately, we will know if we are faithful to our call as the body of Christ if we represent him to others – strangers or friends. Let us pray for unity.

We must work and pray actively so that Jesus’ broken body might be healed and reconciled. Even though we know it is his will that all of the baptized be one, he won’t do it without us. As we renewed our baptismal identity this Easter, let us commit to one another.

May God bless you.