Just a reminder for you all – there will be deaconate ordinations tomorrow at 10:30 at Sacred Heart Cathedral. Normally, I would consider the Cathedral a no-fly zone for people who have genuine regard for the Liturgy. However, Dr. Scott Caton will be ordained to the transitional deaconate at this Mass. He is definitely worthy of your prayers, as are the seven other men who will be ordained to the permanent deaconate. Your prayers are one of the sources of much-needed grace and strength for our ordained ministers.
If you can make it to the Cathedral for this special day, I would strongly urge you to do so. Show your support for ordained ministry. I find it extremely ironic that the diocese pitches the “we want vocations” shpeal so often, but the Master of Ceremonies is a nun, vested in alb. Only in Rochester do we have a Mistress of Ceremonies in lieu of a Master of Ceremonies, who is typically a monsignor. What message does this send to the young men in the diocese? “We want vocations, but it’s nothing special to be a priest – anyone can play the part.”
You can have the nicest posters, the most reverent priests, the most intimate conversations with discerners and seminarians, but without the proper liturgical and sacramental formation, vocations die. And when vocations die, so do parishes and schools. When the Mass is corrupted, so too are the minds of those young men who are called to ordained ministry in the deaconate or the priesthood. We have seen this in so many instances in Rochester – I can state with certainty that Jim Callan had a vocation to the priesthood, but look at how he was warped! That was not his doing, but the doing of a lacklustre administration in his formation years. There is a glimmer of hope in every heretic’s heart, and that glimmer is the Call they received from God. If only human politicking did not obscure God’s plans so easily.
So come to the ordination, tomorrow, Saturday, at 10:30 AM at Sacred Heart Cathedral. Show your bishop that you support our ordained ministers. Be there for Dr. Caton on this blessed day, and give him your prayerful support. And in the long-term, do all that you can to let the young men in your parish know that the priesthood is something so transcendent that it cannot be restricted to “sacramental ministering” and parish administration. To be a priest is to love the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and through this piercing and all-consuming love come the sacraments of the Church, and through them, the singular grace which only can be attained through them. Without the priesthood, there are no sacraments and no Church.
Pray for vocations. Support our young men, our seminarians, our discerners, our Becket Hall residents, and even your own sons. Put your sons into the altar serving program at your parish, because there is no surer fountain of vocational awareness than being in the sanctuary of Our God, aiding the priest who makes God incarnate again and again, each and every day reenacting that bloody sacrifice of Calvary. To serve at the altar of the Lord is to kneel shoulder to shoulder with the choirs of haven, the hosts of angels, and the saints who have gone before us in Faith. Show your sons that a vocation to ordained life is a manly, noble thing, not something to be toyed with for political gain. Pray for our priests, and pray for our deacons, and pray for our religious. May God bless them in their ministry, and may He bless Dr. Caton and his fellow soon-to-be-deacons in their zeal for God’s Church.
Tags: Liturgy, Married Priests From Rochester NY, Orthodoxy at Work, Vocations
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I can't make it, but great post Gen. really well said.
Our 2 year old is playing church now – it's pretty funny. The lamp is the cross and he says, "mommy, will you please go die on the cross."
When he starts doing that in Latin, that's when I'll be impressed. lol jk
It is with great pain that, as a deacon, I have stopped going to the diaconal ordinations. The last time I went was after the renovation but before the new organ. The complete lack of kneeling during Mass, the singing of Halle Halle Loo OO Yuh to the beating of bogos and congas, the sanctuary being referred to as "the space" (come on, how about, at least "worship space"), are all too much. Now, the Presbyterianization is complete with a central organ in the space. A somewhat liberal priest from our area said disparagingly of the cathedral, "the organ is the tabernacle." At the last ordination, standing with the deacons in the transept, I could only see the choir in the Space and the pulpit. I could not see the altar or the bishop's chair. I agree with everything you said but I just can't stand coming back from an ordination upset.
I just got back from it – I have a series of posts lined up. Oh, it kindled the fires inside of me, sir, it kindled the fires.