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Homilies | Wednesday, April 03, 2019

He strived to be both scholar and saint

At funeral for Msgr. Martin Cassidy, 88, at Assumption Church

Archbishop Thomas Wenski preached this homily at the funeral Mass for Msgr. Martin Cassidy, which was celebrated April 3, 2019, at Assumption Church in Lauderdale-By-The-Sea. 

I remember when I came to Assumption Rectory shortly after I returned to Miami after becoming your archbishop. I had come to speak to Msgr. Cassidy about his retirement. I came with Father (Richard) Vigoa who then was my priest secretary. I told him to wait for me in the car and to keep the motor running.

Of course, some years before my visit, he had submitted his letter of resignation when he had turned 75 but Archbishop (John C.) Favalora told him he could stay nunc pro tunc – which is Latin meaning “for the time being.” Now I was telling him it was time. Despite my trepidation, he received me warmly. We talked about his previous assignments. He had served the Church here in South Florida in a number of parishes. He was pastor at St. Catherine’s in Sebring, St. Kieran’s in Miami, St. Francis of Assisi in Riviera Beach, St. Gregory’s in Plantation and finally here in Lauderdale-By-The Sea at Assumption, where he built this beautiful church. In fact, shortly after the church was finished, he gifted me with the stained-glass windows of the old church, which I installed in Divine Mercy Haitian Mission in Fort Lauderdale and in St. Joseph Haitian Mission in Pompano, two churches along with Notre Dame d’Haiti in Miami that I shepherded as Father Wenski.

In any case, the conversation was cordial. He understood, for he was always a man of the Church. I told him that retirement offered him the opportunity to be as “occupied” as he wished to be without being “preoccupied” with the demands of administration. And God gave him some years to enjoy “retirement.”

We express our condolences to his family who have traveled here from Ireland – and we are grateful to the Cassidy family who was so generous to the Church: He was one of 11 siblings, two of whom were also priests and a sister who was a nun. A cousin of his was an Archbishop in Ireland. God spared him from that cross. This Cassidy family knew something about being “missionary disciples” – long before Pope Francis made this the key concept of his Apostolic Exhortation, Evangeliae Gaudium, the Joy of the Gospel.

The Church in Florida owes a deep debt of gratitude to Msgr. Cassidy and the hundreds of priest missionaries from the “Auld Sod” who labored so faithfully and so effectively in the Sunshine State. Ireland has been called the land of saints and scholars. Through zealous pastoral work and through his keen knowledge of Irish history and literature – often on display in his preaching – Msgr. Cassidy strove to be both: saint and scholar.

The Paschal Candle stands beside the coffin at every Mass of Christian burial — just as it stands by the font at baptisms. Five grains of incense represent the five wounds of Christ. Those five grains in the form of a cross are framed by the Greek letters, Alpha and Omega, symbolizing Christ — our beginning and our end. When the candle is lit after the blessing of the new fire on Holy Saturday evening, the priest prays — as Monsignor prayed the many times he celebrated the Easter Vigil: “May the light of Christ, rising in glory, dispel the darkness of our hearts and minds.” The words of St. Paul then comfort us: “If we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also rise with him.”

Every person’s life is lived under the sign of the Cross. Experience shows, especially when that experience is interpreted in the light of the wisdom that age gives, experience shows that life’s difficulties, by God’s grace, contribute to peoples’ growth and the forging of their character. From adversity comes a light that can brighten even the years of old age, for as St. John Chrysostom said: “Tribulations not only do not destroy hope, they are its foundation.”

And even as the infirmities of age took their toll, Monsignor still gave us a witness to hope, a witness of priestly integrity and the joy that comes from walking through this life as a “missionary disciple” and a friend of Jesus.

Of course, God uses imperfect instruments to work his will so that we know that it is He who saves, and not we. Yet, like Martin Cassidy, every priest here is privileged to serve God and his people in this awesome vocation of the holy priesthood. And even though we carry this treasure in the “earthen vessels” of our frail humanity and sinfulness, it is a holy priesthood because as “other Christs” we share in our Lord’s own high priesthood in our ministry of Word and Sacrament.

For Msgr. Cassidy so much of his daily life was centered in the Eucharist. This is true for all of us priests. In the Eucharist, Monsignor proclaimed Christ’s promises; he accepted and believed the words of Jesus — that eternal life is the gift that the Eucharist brings.

Jesus said: “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” The Christ whom he adored hidden in the host may he now contemplate face to face. A priest for 59 years! He goes home to the Lord at the age of 88.

Eternal Rest grant unto him, O Lord; may his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. 

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