Christ missioned his twelve disciples and asked them to pray that the Lord of the harvest send labourers into his harvest. These are the days of the month of June, the month of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
I would like to use this piece of scripture to help us understand the challenges a priest faces in these days, as a spiritual father of his flock.
Some of you might still remember Monsignor Ambrose Pick, God rest his soul, sitting calmly on the porch of the rectory at St. Hedwig’s, reading a newspaper. Monsignor Pick was known as a gentle giant, a man whose presence would calm the nerves, and many people recall him very fondly. Much has changed in the life of priests since Monsignor Pick’s times. For one, for many priests, being a pastor of a parish is but one of the multiple duties that they have. To use a local example: Fr. John Burchat, the pastor of St. Lawrence’s, wears many hats – he not only shepherds three churches, but is also dean of the Barry’s Bay deanery, and fulfills many diocesan responsibilities. When I arrived among you in Barry’s Bay in September of 2018, I made you aware of the multiple tasks that I too carry: pastor of St. Hedwig’s parish, and instructor at Our Lady Seat of Wisdom College; provincial councillor for Assumption Province, which means several meetings a year; ongoing formation director for the Oblates of Assumption Province, which entails organizing our annual priestly retreat, and Study Days. On top of this, a couple of years ago I was elected to the Council of Priests for the Diocese of Pembroke, and now serve as the secretary of this council. Again, more meetings, more responsibilities, more work. Perhaps some of you think that when a priest is away, he must either be on vacation, or sleeping in the rectory. This is not the case for many priests. If you are able to work, the work just keeps coming: “the harvest is plentiful,” as the Lord says in the Gospel. With this in mind, please don’t be surprised when you see Fr. Jerry Gauvreau, our part-time associate pastor, active in the parish, and assisting with the sacraments. I am very grateful for his help, and for the help of Brother Grzegorz, my Oblate confrere. With all these challenges, we continue to pray for vocations, asking that the Lord “send labourers into his harvest.”
One task of the priest is to proclaim the Good News, as Our Lord charged his apostles in the Gospel. To proclaim the Gospel means, that, at times, we leave the church building, and bring the faith to the public square. Last Sunday, on the feast of Corpus Christi, we had a beautiful procession through town, with the Blessed Sacrament, liturgical ministers, altar servers, girls who received First Holy Communion, our cantors, and many people. In the words of Pope Francis, “The procession with the Blessed Sacrament – a hallmark of the feast of Corpus Domini…reminds us that we are called to go out and bring Jesus to others” (Pope Francis, homily, June 6, 2021). In the time that I’ve been here, in the past five years, this would have been at least the third Corpus Christi procession into town. We have ushers keeping us on the sidewalk and making sure that we don’t block traffic, and are respectful of pedestrians. In the bigger cities they actually have permits to close streets, so that the procession can walk unimpeded (Ottawa and Mississauga, for example). I bring up last Sunday’s procession because someone passed on some false accusations to the police, and said that we were going into town to have a protest, a demonstration. I had to clear up these false accusations with the authorities. The Corpus Christi procession is a religious tradition that is hundreds of years old, and is deeply rooted in Church practice. As I said, at times, to proclaim the Good News of the Gospel, we leave the church building, and bring our faith into the public square.
The first reading ends with the sentence, “These are the words that you shall speak to the children of Israel.” Where there are children, there are fathers. I mentioned spiritual fathers, and now I’d also like to mention our dads, our fathers. We pray for our living fathers, and remember in prayer those who have already died, so that they may be made heirs of the Kingdom of God. This we do through the intercession of Blessed Michael McGivney, the founder of the Knights of Columbus. His relics will be available for veneration after Mass. We pray the Lord of the harvest to send labourers into his harvest. We also ask Mary, the Mother of Priests, to guide and form her priests. As Archbishop Norberto Ribera, the Archbishop and Primate of Mexico, wrote, “Every priest knows that Mary, because she is a mother, is the eminent formator of the priesthood, since she is the one who knows how to shape the priestly heart; the Virgin, therefore, knows and wants to protect priests from dangers, exhaustion, and discouragement.”
https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cclergy/documents/rc_con_cclergy_doc_19071997_conri_en.html
So, Mother Mary will help the priest face the many challenges of our day. She will mold his heart, so it becomes more like the Heart of Christ. We ask Mary’s intercession, so that the Lord may send many labourers into his plentiful harvest.
(Fr. Paweł Ratajczak, OMI, June 18, 2023)