Musings with Bishop McDermott
My dear family in Christ,
I just completed a wonderful 10-day journey around the state in celebration of National Catholic Schools Week. I was blessed to offer Mass and visit with students, faculty and staff at almost every Catholic school in Vermont. (You can check out my Facebook page or the schools’ websites for photos of the visits). I’ll complete the visits in the coming weeks with Mass at Rice Memorial High School and St. Michael-St. Monica School. It was a blessing to be able to be with these communities and I look forward to joining them again in the Spring.
I have to say that every school community was extremely gracious in allowing me to take time from their regular schedules to visit. Although, one first grader reminded me that the students had things to learn when he took my hand as I visited his classroom and said very gently, “you can go now.”
My homily for the school Masses focused on some bad news and some good news. The bad news is that none of us are saints yet. We all are likely to fail in our love of God and neighbor somewhere along the way. The good news is that God wants us to be saints and provides us all of the grace necessary to become the saints we are called to be through Jesus Christ. I noted that one of the most important things a Catholic school can teach is the call we all receive to holiness of life and to be saints. In other words, we are invited to be friends of God redeemed through Christ and guided by the Holy Spirit.
As I thought more about this bad news and good news, I realized the lesson of our call to holiness of life is not just a lesson to be learned at our Catholic schools but is a lesson that must be taught in our parishes, our religious education programs, our homeschooling endeavors and in our homes. It is incumbent upon all of us working with children and youth to remind them that they are called to be saints and to help them respond to God’s many gifts to fulfill this call. I think it is especially a responsibility of parents to share this good news with their children for it is in the home, the domestic church, that they first experience the love of God and where that love is most nourished.
So, for all of us as we enter into the month of February and perhaps look ahead to Lent, Easter and Spring, let’s recall the bad news that we are likely not saints at this point in our lives, and more importantly the good news that God wants us to be saints and helps us arrive at holiness of life. By living out our faith in the heart of the church, nourished in Word and Sacrament, may we all arrive in the halls of the heavenly banquets, saints of God most high.
God alone suffices!
+John J. McDermott