Hello and welcome!

Last Thursday, I was very happy to celebrate Mass with our Catholic school principals and leadership here at the Pastoral Center.

We were very pleased that Kathy Mears brought them together for this gathering where I was able to have a Eucharist with them and meet them. Their role in Catholic schools is essential, and we are very anxious to have them fully involved in furthering the Catholic identity and educational excellence that must be characteristic of Catholic schools.

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Thursday afternoon, we had our monthly meeting of the Presbyteral Council. As I told the priests, the work of the Council is very important. I know that sometimes it may be tedious to get all kinds of information and reports, but they are very helpful so they can make recommendations for the governance of the archdiocese, having been well informed about the issues we face.

I urged the priests to make sure that the communications between the vicariates and the Presbyteral Council are very strong, so that the Presbyteral Council really is a sounding board for the entire presbyterate; so that the issues that are important to the priests will be brought before the Council and that the recommendations that the Council makes to the archbishop will be dealt with at the level of the vicariates. No important decision is made in the archdiocese without taking the pulse of the priests, as it were, and the way that we do that is through the Presbyteral Council.

We are very grateful for the priests who give of their time to be a part of the Council. I know that priests are plagued with meetings and obligations, but I am happy when they take their responsibility seriously, knowing that being part of the Presbyteral Council is also a commitment to be very active at the vicariate level as well.

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That evening, I went to Temple Emanuel in Newton for a gathering sponsored by the temple, the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee, to mark the 50^th anniversary of Nostra Aetate. 

It was a lovely event, and our hosts could not have been more gracious, kind and enthusiastic.

We are very pleased that the entire Sloane family was able to be present including Barbara, who has not been going out much lately. So, I was very honored that they would be there.

The evening began with remarks by Robert Trestan, the director of ADL New England, and Robert Leikind, the director of AJC Boston, followed by a short introduction by Rabbi Wes Gardenswartz.

I gave the keynote and, afterwards, there was a panel during which we took questions that have been submitted.

One of the subjects raised was that, at some of the high schools in Newton, there have been instances of anti-Semitic graffiti. Sadly enough, this indicates that some of our young people don’t realize how evil anti-Semitism is and how dangerous it can be. Indeed, just the following day was the basketball game between Catholic Memorial and Newton North High School in which an anti-Semitic chant was made.

I was grateful that the school administration reacted strongly to this incident and made the fans apologize to the Newton North prinicpal. The school has subsequently taken several other additional steps. All of this just indicates the need for a more aggressive education around these issues.

It is disturbing that young people in our society would be caught up in this anti-Semitism that many of us had hoped was ceding into the past. The Holocaust was such a shameful episode in our history, and what allowed the Holocaust to take place were the prejudices of the people against the Jews. This incident is just a stark reminder that we have much more work to do in this area.

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Saturday, I went to Regina Cleri to attend the wake of Father Gerry Brennan, a beloved priest of the archdiocese. Many of his relatives and priest friends gathered for the wake service.

Father Gerry lived at Regina Cleri for many years since his retirement. He was a wonderful presence and he will be sorely missed.

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Sunday, I was invited by Bishop McManus to go to St. John’s Parish in Worcester to celebrate the Novena of Grace.

St. John’s was the first parish established outside of Boston. So, it is in a way, the mother church of the Dioceses of Springfield and Worcester, because the Worcester Diocese was formed out of Springfield.

The church was built just a couple of years after the parish was formed. So, the church itself is very old. It reminds one of the traditional New England Protestant church with a colonial façade and a full balcony that goes around three sides of the church.

For over 100 years, they have observed this novena, which I was previously unfamiliar with, but I was fascinated by the story of how it came about.

The origins of the novena are in the 1600s, during the time that the Jesuits were evangelizing Japan. St. Francis Xavier was, of course, the greatest missionary in the history of the Church after St. Paul. As I told the people, I always visit the Church of the Gesù in Rome and pray at the tomb of St. Ignatius. There, they also have the reliquary with the arm of St. Francis Xavier. I pointed out the image they have in the church of St. Francis Xavier with his arm raised, and I told them that that is the very arm that is in the reliquary. With that arm, St. Francis Xavier baptized 300,000 people in Africa, China, India and Japan.

A few years after Francis Xavier’s very successful missionary work in Japan, a terrible persecution arose during which the Japanese shoguns identified Christians by making Christian symbols that they called fumi-e. They put these medallions on the ground and everyone in the village would have to stomp on these images of Christ and the Blessed Mother. If anyone refused, they knew they were Christian and they would torture them mercilessly.

Well, one of the Portuguese Jesuits apostatized; his name was Father Ferreira. (Shūsaku Endō wrote a very famous novel based on the story of this Jesuit called Silence.) When the news of this apostasy came out, Jesuits from all over the world made a vow that they would go to Japan as missionaries and become martyrs. One of these priests, while he was still in Italy, had a vision of St. Francis Xavier who asked him to initiate this Novena of Grace in which people pray to be able to die in grace. That priest went to Japan and ultimately died a martyr there.

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On Monday, I went to Washington to attend two days of meetings of the board of The Catholic University of America and, during my time there I was invited to two special events.

On Monday evening I went to a celebration at the nunciature for the anniversary of Pope Francis’s election.

With Little Sisters of the Poor and Bruderhof members

And, on Tuesday evening, I went to a gathering of Irish people at the White House.

With Vatican Ambassador Kevin O’Malley and Jim Brett

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Wednesday, I was back in Boston for the board meeting of St. John’s Seminary.

Among the projects we discussed was a very fine video presentation explaining seminary life that I think will be very a helpful tool for our vocation directors.

Also at this meeting we were happy to welcome our new board member, Dr. Francesco Cesareo, president of Assumption College. We are very grateful for the commitment of all those who serve on the board and have done so much to advance the mission of the seminary.

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Thursday, of course, was St. Patrick’s Day and I am always delighted to be able to preside at the St. Patrick’s Day Mass at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross.

As always, it was a very grand event, with bagpipes, the blessing of the shamrocks and readings and prayers in Irish.

We are so grateful to Msgr. Moroney who delivered an inspiring homily and are also grateful for the presence of the many seminarians who were there with him.

This year is the 100^th anniversary of the Easter Revolution and so we prayed for the people of Ireland in a special way. Many of the patriots of the revolution were very devout Catholics and the Church was very instrumental in helping the fledgling Republic.

We also prayed in a special way for State Trooper Thomas Clardy, a father of six who lost his life in the line of duty on Wednesday.

Afterwards, there was a lovely reception in the Cathedral Hall with Irish music, step dancing and Irish soda bread for all!

Until next week,

Cardinal Seán