Connecting people with God

THIS is a big, tremendous challenge to priests especially

when they—we, me included, of course—give homilies in the Mass which

is a very privileged occasion for us to preach in the name of Christ

as head of the Church.

  

            At this point, it may good to remit some relevant words

issued in 1997 by eight Vatican offices regarding “Questions regarding

collaboration of non-ordained faithful in priests’ sacred ministry.”

  

            “The homily,” they said, “during the celebration of the

Holy Eucharist, must be reserved to the sacred minister, priest or

deacon, to the exclusion of the non-ordained faithful, even if these

should have responsibilities as ‘pastoral assistants’ or catechists in

whatever type of community or group.

  

            “This exclusion is not based on the preaching ability of

sacred ministers nor their theological preparation, but on that

function which is reserved to them in virtue of having received the

Sacrament of Holy Orders.”

   

            Thus, we priests, have a tremendous duty to deliver the

homily in such a way that we connect people with God instead of just

with us. We may be able to connect with the people because of our

brilliant ideas, our oratorical and rhetorical skills, our gimmicks,

jokes, anecdotes, song-and-dance numbers, etc.—all of them having

their legitimate value. But the question to ask is whether we are

connecting people with God and not just with us, since that is what is

most important in delivering the homily.

  

            If we do not even know how we can say that we are

connecting people with God, then we have to admit we have a big

problem. Of course, it is not a problem so big that it cannot be

solved. Rather it is problem that is challenging us, priests, to do

our best to give due justice to this privilege of ours to preach in

the name and person of Christ.

  

            We have to use all the means, human, spiritual and

supernatural, to be able to preach in the name of Christ. Definitely

we need to study well the word of God, meditating on it continually so

that it can be an organic part, nay, the inspiring principle of all

our thoughts, words and deeds. A certain connaturality has to develop

between God’s word and our life.

  

            For this, the sciences of philosophy and theology are, of

course, indispensable. But we also need to avail of any science and

source of knowledge that would help us relate the word of God to the

different conditions of the people and the vice-versa. If there is

real faith, we can actually make use of anything to convey the word of

God to the people and connecting them with God.

  

            When delivering the homily, we must to see to that we are

not contented with the feel that the people are listening to us. That,

of course, is already a big success. What is more important is that we

have the gut feel that the people are listening to God.

   

            Somehow we have to develop the intuition that people are

listening to God instead of to us only. I suppose this can only happen

if we priests take our spiritual life seriously in the sense that we

really make the effort, with the grace of God, to identify ourselves

more and more with Christ, of whom we are his sacramental ministers.

  

            In this regard, we cannot overemphasize the need for

constant prayer and sacrifice, recourse to the sacraments, especially

the Eucharist and Confession, the continuing development of virtues

and the waging of a lifelong spiritual struggle against our

weaknesses, temptations and sins.

  

            There has to be the sensation that one is becoming more

and more like Christ. This is not some kind of presumption. It is

actually an obligation inherent to the fact that one is ordained to be

‘another Christ’ with the authority of Christ as head of the Church.