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June 20, 2010
On June 11, Pope Benedict XVI celebrated the close of the Year for Priests. Thousands of priests gathered in Rome to mark the end of the year. Redemptorists in the Baltimore Province had their own day of recollection and brotherhood to mark the occasion.
On June 10, several Redemptorists gathered at Mount St. Alphonsus Retreat House in Esopus, NY, for prayer, fellowship, recreation, and Mass. Before becoming a retreat house, Mount St. Alphonsus was the Redemptorist seminary, and the chapel was the site of numerous priestly ordinations.
Baltimore Provincial Patrick Woods presided at the closing Mass, and offered his reflections on the priesthood. You can read the entire homily here.
We are the men called to bring to our hungry world the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit.
We are the men called to preach the Word of God to a longing, confused society that has begun to reject the empty words of so many false prophets who made empty promises that cannot be delivered.
We are to bless and baptize by pouring living water on a thirsty world.
With those who are sick and afraid, we are to pour out the healing oil of Christ who sweated blood in Gethsemane.
We are to confirm in faith those who share the same human struggle to believe as do we.
We are to celebrate love, witness it, bless it, support it.
We are to lift those who bear the heavy burden of sin, who are on the edge of despair, who cannot see the face of the loving God or hear his voice.
Where there are those who have no voice, we are to speak for them.
When we are helpless to relieve the pain of the world, we pray and stand with the suffering.
Where there is death, we proclaim life.
My brothers, God’s people, all his people, so need the touch he can bring to his world through the priesthood he instituted 2,000 years ago.