Eucharistic Adoration for an increase in Priestly Vocations

We know that through the liturgical seasons and celebrations of the Church, we are able to renew in time the timeless mysteries of God. The “eternal now” of God’s mercy and love needs to be celebrated by us in individual seasons and feasts because we could never begin to grasp all of these mysteries at one time. In a non-liturgical sense, a similar observation could be made about the roles of service that God calls members of the Church to embrace. Here in our Archdiocese, for instance, we celebrate days of reflection on the Consecrated life, on the Diaconate and on the various forms of the apostolates that enrich our local Church. This week, we reflect in a particular way upon prayer for an increase of priestly vocations within our Archdiocese, especially prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. In doing so, we are not introducing a novelty or a matter of personal preference or style, we are merely obeying the command of our Lord: “Ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest” (Matthew 9:38).

Placing our needs in context
It is interesting to note that earlier in the passage just quoted from the Gospel of Saint Matthew, we read: “At the sight of the crowds, his heart was moved with pity for them because they were troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few’” (Matthew 9:36-37). Those sentiments sound familiar, don’t they? In our self-centered age, we are always tempted to think that no other time ever saw the challenges we face in our own time. In our proud age, we are tempted to think that we should also be able to surmount those challenges using our own power! Therefore, we can be tempted to think that our concern over a need for more priests is a phenomenon of our age only. We can also be tempted to think that a program of ours should be able to solve our problems. If that fails, we are tempted to surrender and say that we must come up with some alternative to our problem on our own.

The Synod of Bishops held in 1990 examined the question of priestly vocations in a particular way. While acknowledging the challenge of our time, the Synod Fathers did not hesitate to state with great confidence: “The synod, with complete trust in the promise of Christ who has said: ‘Lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age’ (Mt. 28:20), and aware of the constant activity of the Holy Spirit in the Church, firmly believes that there will never be a complete lack of sacred ministers in the Church. … Even though in a number of regions there is a scarcity of clergy, the action of the Father, who raises up vocations, will nonetheless always be at work in the Church.”

Jesus Himself has looked upon the people of His time, and ours, with pity and concern. He has acknowledged their, and our, need for shepherds. He has acknowledged that the number of shepherds are insufficient for the needs of the people. He has also presented us with a solution. It is this solution that we are focusing on in a special way this week.

Prayer before the Blessed Sacrament
When we are missing someone and we think of what the company of that person was like or the things we enjoyed with and through that individual, we sometimes look to a physical or mental image of that person with longing. We can find ourselves conjuring up an image of that person in our mind as we recall what we enjoyed with and through this individual we long for. This is a very beautiful aspect of the human person.

In the Blessed Sacrament, we find not an image or a reminder but Jesus Himself. The Church teaches us that in “the most Holy Eucharist are contained truly, really, and substantially, the Body and Blood together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently the whole Christ” (Council of Trent, Session 13, Canon1). Therefore, what more perfect place to “ask the master of the harvest to send laborers into his harvest” than in the presence of that very same Master? It is also most appropriate that we pray for priestly vocations in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament because of the intimate union between the Priesthood, the Sacrifice of the Mass and the Most Blessed Sacrament. Just as the Church is the image of the communion of Persons within the most Blessed Trinity, this communion is evoked, according to God’s plan, by the Eucharist, the “sacrament of unity.” This Sacrament, which Saint Thomas Aquinas says we rightly call “Blessed” because it contains the author of all the sacraments, Jesus Himself, is not present in the world without the priest. Therefore, the nourishing of the entire Body of Christ depends upon the priest, who acts in the Person of Christ Himself when bringing Jesus down upon the Altar during Mass. When reflecting upon this reality, we pray with serenity even in the midst of our supplication. According to His own promise, the same Lord who promised to be with His Church will never abandon her.

Action of the entire community
Having seen the place of the priest and the Eucharist as central to the life of Christ’s Church, we will not find it difficult to understand that the work of praying for priestly vocations is a work of the entire Christian community. “Obedient to Christ’s command, the Church first of all makes a humble profession of faith: In praying for vocations, conscious of her urgent need of them for her very life and mission, she acknowledges that they are a gift of God and, as such, must be asked for by a ceaseless and trusting prayer of petition. This prayer, the pivot of all pastoral work for vocations, is required not only of individuals but of entire ecclesial communities” (Pastores Dabo Vobis, 2).

I am so pleased to be making this appeal for prayer before the Blessed Sacrament for priestly vocations at this particular time in the life of the Archdiocese. We are approaching the culmination of the Bicentennial celebration of our founding as a diocese and we are preparing for the first Pastoral Visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the United States. We have just celebrated the feast of Saint John Neumann, fourth bishop of Philadelphia and we are looking toward the celebration of the feast of Saint Katharine Drexel in March. These events are intimately associated with the central place of the Blessed Sacrament in the life of the Church.

Saint John Neumann will always be intimately associated with the Forty Hours Devotion, that great expression of the faith of the Church in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, which he introduced into the United States. Saint Katharine Drexel was so conscious of the Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist that, when she founded her Religious Congregation to work with Native and African Americans, she called it the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament. Our Holy Father continues to encourage adoration of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. He spoke these beautiful words in a Message to Dutch Youth: “Go to the encounter with Him in the Blessed Sacrament, go to adore Him in the churches, kneeling before the Tabernacle: Jesus will fill you with His love and will reveal to you the thoughts of His Heart. If you listen to Him, you will feel ever more deeply the joy of belonging to His Mystical Body, the Church, which is the family of His disciples held close by the bond of unity and love.”

I have just written to the priests of the Archdiocese asking them once again, especially during this time of intense spiritual renewal as we culminate our Bicentennial celebration, to encourage adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in our churches. We must remember that Jesus is present in the tabernacles of our churches, even when the Blessed Sacrament is not exposed upon the Altar. This is why our Catholic piety gives us that beautiful expression of faith which refers to “making a visit” to the Blessed Sacrament. We are truly visiting a Person, Jesus Himself, present in the tabernacles of our churches. This is why I pray that as many of our parish churches as possible will remain open during the day and offer exposition of the Blessed Sacrament when this can be arranged, so that our people may visit our Eucharistic Lord. You know the famous story of the elderly parishioner of Saint John Vianney, whom the saint often found praying before the Blessed Sacrament. When the Cure of Ars asked the man what form his prayer took, the man answered: “I look at Him and He looks at me.”

We have already spoken about the command of Jesus that we make supplication to Him, especially for priestly vocations. We have spoken of how this is so appropriately done in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, in the tabernacle or exposed in the monstrance. Let us not forget, as we come before the Blessed Sacrament, also to make reparation to Him for all our own sins, the sins of the whole world and those sins which have caused particular scandal to the Christian people and offense to the Heart of Jesus. Reparation has long been an integral part of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. Once again I ask you to join me not only as I fulfill my obligation to provide priests for our faithful people but also as we all together approach Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament with a genuine desire to heal the wounds caused by the sins which pierced His Sacred Heart as He looked out from the Cross down through the ages of time.
January 17, 2008