Unity and the Priesthood

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On the occasion of Fr. José Del Toro's first mass

By Fr. Ted Baenziger

I feel that today's homily, following so closely upon that of Bishop Ramirez last night, should be different, not in substance so much, since we continue to celebrate the joy of a new member of the priesthood, a minister of Christ ordained in our midst to serve the Church (that is all of us, but especially in the context of Basilian life, a special gift of God to this family of Christians through Jose Jaime). Not in substance then, but in point of view.

I would like to speak here, not of the readings Fr. Del Toro chose for last night's mass, but rather of the Church that chose them for today, since these are the readings of the day, the second Saturday after Easter, and see if we cannot gain something from the voice of God through these scripture passages.

Let us pretend that the first reading talks directly to us today about divisions in the people of God, the followers of Jesus Christ, divisions that came about quite naturally in the time of Peter, but which threatened the early church, and thus threaten our unity even today. I would call this threat "Diversity", that popular idea today that differences in opinion or practice, or way of life are a Good Thing, and should be fostered. This popular point of view says the individual is a law unto himself and that everybody should rejoice in differences and that there is no common good except to allow everyone to be totally free, free to starve, free to suffer, free to kill and maim, free to be indifferent, free to lie and cheat, in short: free to sin.

The Church in Jerusalem had at least two kinds of Christians: the converts from the Jews like Peter and the other disciples, from the heart of Palestine, as it is known to the Romans; and then those other, Greek-speaking converts (also Jewish, but not accepted by the home-town crowd), people that included Samaritains and other foreigners from Egypt, all those from out of town at Pentecost that came from the far-flung diaspora of Jews around the Mediterranean. So many differences! Summed up in a language dispute, it seems.

They formed a part of this new community but felt second-class, looked down upon by others. They were resented in turn by the others as being different. Such is the case for any minority, but when it comes to the Body of Christ, the Church, it quickly became a serious problem because of the complaints (unequal treatment, downright injustice when it came to the widows who could not defend themselves).

The elegant solution of the Apostles bears a lesson for us all. It is very important to see what they did not do. They did not try to make everyone the same, same clothes, same food, same language, nor did they simply state that there is no problem about mixing really different peoples in the same group, just leaving things to get worse. Neither as a third way did they try to make new laws to limit the influence or expand it for any one group, making walls and barriers, placing burdens or favoring suspicions about motives: their insight was to see, through the action of the Holy Spirit, that the only solution possible came through service, and so they created the diaconate, which means service, a ministry to the needs of each in the context of the many. They were also driven to recognize that as Apostles they could not do everything: they needed help. This first division of labor in the Church gave us a hierarchy, in order to preserve UNITY: One Church, many forms of service; One Body, many members, each with a place, a dignity, a service to render. As Paul tells us later, the eye, the ear and the foot do not insult each other because they are different since they are part of the same body: they cooperate. Unity is not sameness, but it is not autonomous everybody for himself diversity either. Unity is co-operation, not through a profit motive, a quid pro-quo of mutual back-scratching and back-stabbing, but a joining together in the Spirit of God. A common good in Christ-Jesus.

Our first lesson then, in the context of Jose-Jaime's ordination, is that he has been placed in a position of service to the unity of the Church. The laying on of hands comes from the earliest Church choosing laborers to serve God in a different way, setting them apart; for the anointing that took place in the Mass last night the bishop chose the hands because Jose's task is to use those hands for God's work: to bring about the Eucharist, to feed the flock, to bless us, to comfort and heal us through the sacrament of Reconciliation. (Chrism as universal, baptism, but individual, confirmation, and particular: priest, bishop, king). We are one in the spirit, but not the same in calling to vocation.

From the Gospel passage, we have another vision of the Church that reveals its unity and the perilous nature of the journey we share. It comes down to a little boat that the stormy waves are tossing about, in danger of sinking, and everyone is rightly panicking. Out of nowhere, it seems, the Lord Jesus appears and the danger passes. The Church has always been compared to that boat, piloted by Peter, calling it the Bark (wooden, creaky, leaking, hard to handle, a working vessel for fishing as it was), the Bark of Peter.

But notice what does not happen. Jesus is there and then he seems to be gone. They expect Him to get in and take over, but he doesn't. Why would John tell us this story if it didn't have any meaning for the early Church reading it, or for us today as we hear it? I believe the meaning is clear: we are in this thing called Christianity together. The times are rocky, dangerous and fearsome. Although we can only glimpse Him in the dimness, and not clearly, Jesus Christ is with us, our true leader who has the power to save us all, together. But He chooses to do it through the arms and hands of those in the boat, because we are called each of us to do something about keeping us afloat, not to panic, jumping out, screaming, nor sitting in the bottom weeping our fate. God's plan is that we work together to get to shore, but doing it in the enlightened faith of those who know GOD-IS-WITH-US, Emmanuel.

Father Del Toro's ordination and this first Mass, then, have something to do with all of us, since we are in this adventure together. Jose has a difficult task which I will get to in a moment, but his acceptance of that task is a sign to each of us that we also have God's work to do in the Church: there is no insignificant passenger in this ship of Christ's. We each have a role to play in the storm as in the calm times.

So what makes Jose-Jaime's task so difficult? In part, what he is to do seems impossible: we expect a priest to be truly holy, a man of prayer, a tireless worker for God's people, the chief do-it-all in the local parish or school, the leader who symbolizes Christ in our midst. Of course this role is properly that of the bishop, the chief shepherd of the local church, but the priest is his representative at any one time, for the Mass, in Baptism, Confession, the other sacraments, and even to confirm in certain cases. How can anyone bear such a burden of expectation in the real world? It seems to be like asking the pilot of our local boat to do all the work, hold the rudder, set the sails, keep the log, prepare the food, while the rest of us sit there and watch, receiving all the benefits without having to make any decisions or actions of our own. Let's make no mistake: the priest is just as weak a person as any one of us, and the Lord knows that he chose not the smartest, not the holiest and certainly not the most courageous leaders to act for him in the Apostles, and that there have always been mediocre and even bad priests from the beginning of the Church.

Jose will be a good priest if we are good with him. I mean, he cannot be God's servant unless we also are at God's service: a community of love and support that he can work in and through. He cannot be a good priest without an awful lot of prayer: his own and, dare I to say more importantly, our prayer for and with him.

For this reason I would like to close with a reflection on Jose's mother, and our own mothers. We each of us have one mother uniquely our own, and Jose-Jaime's is, like my own, very proud today to have a son a priest. She must, as my mother did, pray for her son as she always has, and, knowing him better that anyone else, prod, push, cajole and, sometimes nag, this boy of hers, now a chosen man of God. She must also love him unconditionally, as a mother, forgiving his faults, spoiling him sometimes, caring for him and loving him without limit. That's what mothers do, for their daughters, for their sons.

But Jose-Jaime has another mother, the one given to all of us when Jesus said to the beloved disciple, that is me, and you my beloved brothers and sisters, and to Jose: "there is your Mother". We are to take her in, care for her, and she is to be our best link to the holiness Jesus paid for with his blood: she will spoil us with her love, but that is good, because she did the same to Jesus.

But even there, we have not finished, because we each are children of God in his Church our Mother. This Church that takes us in our sinfulness and directs us to pray, to live out our responsibilities, that accepts us entirely in love, but always demands excellence, that calls us to sanctity, leads us to Christ. And this Body of Christ, the Church, is not male or female, but unity: it is God's unity that brings each of us individuals to share a common divine life of not Greek, not Jew, not male nor female, but Child of God and member of Christ.

An ordination is not about the priest but about us all. We lean on Father Jose, he leans on us, we build up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ by our daily lives of service: remember what Jesus told us: "Love one another as I have loved you." And, in another place: "I am with you always, even to the end of time."

Lord Jesus, bless Father Jose-Jaime, bless his family, the Basilians, bless all of our work in your service, bring us ever closer to you, direct your Church and send it many many more laborers.
Ainsi soit-il. Amen. Amen.