These reflections are a result of more than 40 years of ministry as a Roman Catholic priest. Most of these years I spent in the Diocese of Charlotte which covers Western North Carolina. Now I am retired, and live in Medellín, Colombia where I continue to serve as a priest in the Archdiocese of Medellín.
Responsorial Psalm (Psalm 90)
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain wisdom of heart.
Return, O LORD! How long? Have pity on your servants!
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
Fill us at daybreak with your kindness, that we may shout for joy and gladness all our days.
And may the gracious care of the LORD our God be ours; prosper the work of our hands for us! Prosper the work of our hands!
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/090422.cfm
How important is wisdom—not only to “number our days aright” but to remember that God has been our refuge from one generation to the next!
For as I see it, God has exhibited us Apostles as the last of all, like people sentenced to death, since we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels and men alike. We are fools on Christ’s account, but you are wise in Christ; we are weak, but you are strong; you are held in honor, but we in disrepute. To this very hour we go hungry and thirsty, we are poorly clad and roughly treated, we wander about homeless and we toil, working with our own hands. When ridiculed, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we respond gently. We have become like the world’s rubbish, the scum of all, to this very moment. (1 Cor 4:6b-15)
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/090322.cfm
With all the difficulties of his ministry, Paul would not have changed places with anyone. Saint Gregory (540-605) promoted a renewal of pastoral ministry in the church.
Thus should one regard us: as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. It does not concern me in the least that I be judged by you or any human tribunal; the one who judges me is the Lord. (1 Cor 4:1-5)
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/090222.cfm
Long ago, in a parish far, far away, I was being attacked for my HIV/AIDS ministry and my outreach to LGBT Catholics and their parents. I made reference to this particular passage of scripture:
“As a pastor and a priest, I will not turn my back on those who are living with HIV/AIDS. As a pastor and a priest, I will not turn my back on our gay brothers and sisters and their families. One day I will have to stand before our Lord and give an accounting of my priestly ministry. He is the one to judge me—not you. And what is the measure he will use? . . . "as often as you did it for one of these least ones, you did it to me."
Brothers and sisters: For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in the eyes of God. So let no one boast about human beings, for everything belongs to you, Paul or Apollos or Cephas, or the world or life or death, or the present or the future: all belong to you, and you to Christ, and Christ to God. (1 Cor 3:18-23)
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/090122.cfm
Paul’s words about ministry remind us that ministry is directed in service to the community, the community to Christ, and Christ to God. Or, as Pope Francis says, “shepherds should smell of the sheep.”
What is Apollos, after all, and what is Paul? Ministers through whom you became believers, just as the Lord assigned each one. I planted, Apollos watered, but God caused the growth. Therefore, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who causes the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive wages in proportion to his labor. For we are God’s co-workers; you are God’s field, God’s building. (1 Cor 3:1-9)
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/083122.cfm
My friend, Msgr Tony Kovacic (1920-2015), never spoke English very well, and, in addition, had a speech impediment. We were stationed together for a while in a parish when he commented: “Some people, they like you. Some people, they like me. Isn’t God good, they can like one of us?”
