By Archbishop Thomas Wenski - The Archdiocese of Miami
Photographer: Via Facebook
Five men from the Archdiocese of Miami, in their last year of formation for the priesthood, were among a total of 13 from Florida dioceses who were ordained deacons April 25, 2020 at St. Vincent de Paul Regional Seminary in Boynton Beach.
Archbishop Thomas Wenski preached this homily April 25, 2020 at the ordination of 13 transitional deacons, five of them from the Archdiocese of Miami. Transitional deacons are in their last year of formation before being ordained to the priesthood. The ordination took place at St. Vincent de Paul Regional Seminary in Boynton Beach with only the seminarians present. The Mass was livestreamed — and can be viewed — on the seminary’s Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/SVdPSem/.
With the imposition of hands and the prayer of consecration, the Lord will pour out the Holy Spirit upon these acolytes and consecrate them deacons. To the families and friends of these soon-to-be deacons, we thank you for your support during their vocational journeys. And, while you witness this ordination from afar, please know that they do feel your presence today. Livestreaming this ordination ceremony is perhaps a 21st century expression of what the Apostles’ Creed describes as “the communion of saints.”
As transitional deacons preparing to be ordained to the order of presbyters, they will also freely embrace the celibate state as a sign and a motive of pastoral charity.
My brothers, you will be Deacons of the Church of God. As such, you are ordained to be a sign and instrument of Christ, who came “not to be served but to serve.”
If we can associate the words “Christian” and “ambition,” it should only be when “Christian ambition” describes the Christian’s passion to serve. For “service” is the highest calling of every Christian. Even the pope – who is the “highest” figure in the hierarchy of the Church – is rightly called: the Servus servorum Dei, the Servant of the Servants of God. Yourdiakonia or service is the threefold: service of the Word, service of the Eucharist, and service of the poor.
As deacons, ordained during the twin crisis of the coronavirus pandemic and a global economic disaster, you will exercise your pastoral ministry as a new and yet uncertain new “normal” emerges: one that will involve continued social distancing, self-isolation for the vulnerable, and possibly, until a vaccine becomes widely available, continued contagion that will sicken and kill, and also an increase in poverty and the ills associated with it.
Neither you nor I were prepared for this “new normal.” The pandemic is teaching us that we are not in charge of our lives as much as we sometimes pretend to be. We do not know as much as we sometimes think. Hopefully, this experience has made us humbler – and therefore more receptive to God’s grace. For only humility makes it possible for us to respond to God’s will as Mary did: “Fiat.” Be it done unto me as you will.
But, “in good times and in bad,” as deacons you will still have the duty of proclaiming the Gospel and helping the priests explain the Word of God. Today, I will entrust you with the Book of the Gospel with these words: Receive the Gospel of Christ, whose herald you have become. Remember, brothers, it is his Gospel, not yours; it is the Word of God, not our own! As heralds, you must always speak in his name and not your own.
Living in the world but not of the world, the Church has a unique service to render to the world – it is the diakonia of the truth, the service of the truth. As ministers of the Church, you must understand that it is the truth that judges events – not vice versa, as so often happens today in our current culture. By your faithful service to the Gospel in its integrity – without compromise, without accommodation, hesitation or fear – you must help the world to discover that Truth that has a human face, the Truth that is a person: Jesus Christ.
As deacons, you are the first co-workers of the priest in the celebration of the Eucharist. As co-workers of the priest, you also are servers of the Mysterium fidei, the great mystery of faith.
All Christ’s faithful can come to a fuller and deeper understanding of and participation in these “mysteries,” if your service at the altar helps to underscore the “sacredness” of this sacramental encounter with the Living Christ. At the altar, your language, your demeanor must in no way be profane or given to an informal familiarity – for in this Holy Sacrifice we meet our Lord and Redeemer.
Our communion with Christ in the Eucharist, for this reason, must lead us to seek communion with our brothers and sisters. These days, the faithful are enduring a painful and already too long fast because of the pandemic that has prevented their presence at Mass and their reception of Holy Communion. This seminary community has endured many of the discomfits imposed on much of the world because of this pandemic; but because of the unique circumstances of living already somewhat “socially distanced,” you are not only healthy but you have been privileged to enjoy full participation in the sacramental life of the Church. This should count for something! Nourished on the Eucharistic bread, we all must pay attention to the needs of others, noticing their pain and suffering, and thus be in the world as witnesses to hope.
As co-workers with the bishop and priests, you must be the living and working expression of the charity of the Church. To you, then, is entrusted in a special way the ministry of charity that is at the origin of the institution of the deacon.
As this beautiful ordination ceremony so richly makes clear, as deacons, you are born from the altar – from within the heart of the Eucharistic Sacrifice. You are born in prayer.
Prayer offers you an intimate relationship with God and will protect you from any possible “intimacy deficit” that could generate “a sense of emptiness, a perception of frustration or difficulty in managing loneliness, needs and affections.” And prayer – and only prayer – will sustain you and keep you faithful to your triple diakonia of Word, Eucharist and Charity.
For this reason, the Liturgy of the Hours is entrusted in a way to the ordained ministers of the Church. The Liturgy of the Hours belongs to you – no less than it belongs to the bishops and priests.
As deacons you can be instrumental in better acquainting the laity to the Liturgy of the Hours, even if by ZOOM. And your own efforts to pray daily the Liturgy of the Hours can help you grow in vigor, be strengthened in faithfulness and increase your ability to serve. And, since it is a prayer offered in the Spirit to the Father in the name of Christ for the Church and for the whole world, it is itself another form of diakonia.
Chè pèp Bondye a, lapriyè pou yo pou yo swiv egzamp Jezi, li menm ki Bon Gadyen. Menm jan li te fè, se pou yo fè tou.
Epi chè frè m, fè volonte Bondye a ak tout kè ou: ak anpil renmen epi nan kè kontan sèvi pèp la jan ou ta sèvi Granmèt la.
Hermanos, hagan la voluntad de Dios de corazón: sirvan a las personas con amor y alegría, como servirían al Señor.
