Archive of Fr. Thomas Rosica's Writing

Prior to June 2008

Reflections:

Toronto Sun columns and
other newspaper articles by Fr. Thomas Rosica, C.S.B.

Texts, lectures and Conferences:

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Links:

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New Ways to Proclaim the Good News
Interview With Father Thomas Rosica

By Karna Swanson

TORONTO, MAY 26, 2008 (Zenit.org) - The Church has a message to deliver, and the challenge of that task today is to do it in a "mediated" world, says one of the hosts of the 2008 International Catholic Media Convention.

Basilian Father Thomas Rosica, who is also the director of Salt and Light Catholic Media Foundation and Television Network, added that the Church needs to be "there on the scene, using all the means of modern social communications to proclaim the word of God and the message of the Church."

The three-day international Catholic Convention, to be held May 27-30 in Toronto, will be hosted by the Catholic Press Association of North America, the Catholic Academy for Communication Arts Professionals and the Association of Roman Catholic Communicators of Canada.

The carefully orchestrated American pilgrimage was replete with a White House royal welcome for his 81st birthday on Wednesday, a major lecture to Catholic university presidents and educators, a private and very moving meeting with victims of clergy sex abuse at the Vatican embassy in Washington, an address to leaders of many faith traditions, and a mega Mass at Washington Nationals Stadium.

Its theme is "Proclaim It From the Rooftops."

In this interview with ZENIT, Father Rosica comments on the future of Catholic media and their relationship with the secular press.

Q: Why the theme "Proclaim It From the Rooftops"?

Father Rosica: We have chosen as the theme of this year's Catholic Media Convention: "Proclaim It From the Rooftops," inspired by the Scriptures -- Matthew 10:27 -- and also by Pope John Paul II's apostolic letter "Rapid Development."

The reality is that the Church must now speak to a highly technological, "mediated" society. John Paul II said that the Church must be present in the new "Areopagai" of the world -- a world replete with so many competing philosophies, ideas and phenomena. The Church has to be there on the scene, using all the means of modern social communications to proclaim the word of God and the message of the Church.

Q: What new developments in Catholic journalism do you want to see highlighted at this conference? Outcomes?

Father Rosica: The 2008 Catholic Media Convention owes its existence to a collaboration that is rare in any part of the publishing world. In fact, collaboration has been a fact of life among Toronto Catholic media for years. Two unique aspects of the Toronto convention are how we can foster good collaboration among all entities of Catholic media and view our work as part of the New Evangelization.

Second is our concern for the future, especially how we can reach out to the next generation and involve young adults in the mission of communications. This week will be an intensive lesson for North American Catholic journalists in building bridges within and outside the Church as we learn to tell our stories, bear witness to the truth and proclaim our message from the rooftops.

Q: The Pope said in his message for this month's World Communications Day "that seeking and presenting the truth about humanity constitutes the highest vocation of social communication." Does this vision of the role of communications mark a fundamental difference between Catholic and secular journalists?

Father Rosica: Catholic communicators and journalists have a special obligation and mission not only to serve the Church, but to teach the world about seeking the truth and serving the truth.

The secular media misses the mark when the truth, goodness and the dignity of the human person is not part of the story. As John Paul II -- himself a media expert and master -- wrote in 2005, in his final '05 apostolic letter titled "The Rapid Development": "Communication both within the Church community and between the Church and the world at large requires openness and a new approach toward facing questions regarding the world of media.

"This communication must tend toward a constructive dialogue, so as to promote a correctly informed and discerning public opinion within the Christian community." Good journalists and communicators must be concerned with truth, goodness, beauty and hope, even in the most dire of circumstances.

Q: What can the Catholic media do to get the message of the Gospel more widely known?

Father Rosica: I have learned some powerful lessons in dealing with the media over the years, especially through the adventure of World Youth Day 2002 in Canada, the suffering and death of John Paul II, and my work with Salt and Light Television and our collaboration with the "secular" media.

It serves no purpose for Church officials, leaders and members to vilify those in the media, to stonewall and not respond to the constant phone calls of this reporter, that producer, some editor. That's the nature of the beast. They don't call it breaking news for nothing.

Nor does it serve any purpose for those in the "secular" media to ignore or marginalize the Church and religious issues, treating them as trivial matters that don't merit serious reflection. We have to learn from each other, and we have much good work to do together to serve the cause of truth and decency in a world that is becoming more devoid of value, virtue and meaning.

Many times in the Church, our stories are non-stories because key elements are missing. In more biblical language, how on earth do we move the light from under the bushel and onto the lamp stand so everyone in the house may see it? How do we learn the difference between old news and the new news with relevance -- a real story worth telling to the world?

High on the agendas of our 2008 convention is the theme of the so-called hostility of "secular" media to religion and the Church. Is the hostility real or perceived? What can be done to build bridges? The convention will help Church media workers to learn to tell our stories to the world cogently, boldly and courageously.

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On the Net:

Catholic Media Convention: www.catholicmediaconvention.org

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The Shadow of Peter Fell on America Last Week
Pope Brought Words of Hope and Healing

By Father Thomas Rosica, CSB

TORONTO, APRIL 23, 2008 (Zenit.org) - Last week Benedict XVI made his first visit as Pope to the United States of America, and many were concerned about the impact the German Pontiff would have on a rather beleaguered Church.

They asked if Benedict XVI would be able to "connect" with people as his predecessor Pope John Paul II had done. After all, Benedict XVI arrived in America at age 80 while John Paul II was a mere 59 when he visited for the first time in 1979.

Up until last week many people both within and outside the Church in North America simply didn't know Joseph Ratzinger, and some didn't want to know him. They knew only half-truths about a former Vatican watchdog who was often portrayed as a strict, scholarly bookworm who lacked the charisma and flair of his predecessor on the throne of Peter. Last week something changed significantly in peoples' perception of Benedict XVI.

The carefully orchestrated American pilgrimage was replete with a White House royal welcome for his 81st birthday on Wednesday, a major lecture to Catholic university presidents and educators, a private and very moving meeting with victims of clergy sex abuse at the Vatican embassy in Washington, an address to leaders of many faith traditions, and a mega Mass at Washington Nationals Stadium.

Moving over to the Big Apple for the final leg of the journey, the Pontiff gave a major address to the U.N. General Assembly only to be followed by another major address to the people behind the scenes at the United Nations: secretaries, janitors, interns and the support staff. (Not many political leaders acknowledge the little people who make the big organizations work!)

The German Pope also visited a Manhattan synagogue on the eve of the first day of Passover. He celebrated mass marking the third anniversary of his election as Pope on April 19 in what many consider the symbolic seat of Catholicism in the United States -- New York's St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

"New spring"

During that Mass he issued a rallying cry for the "new spring" in a Church that he said was so divided and wounded in many ways, especially by the clergy sex-abuse scandal. As our Salt and Light cameras covered the event, we saw many priests and religious men and women in tears during that Mass.

At the end of Mass celebrated on the Pope’s third anniversary of election, he spoke personal and unscripted words: "At this moment I can only thank you for your love of the Church and Our Lord, and for the love which you show to the poor Successor of St. Peter. I will try to do all that is possible to be a worthy successor of the great Apostle, who also was a man with faults and sins, but remained in the end the rock for the Church. And so I too, with all my spiritual poverty, can be for this time, in virtue of the Lord's grace, the Successor of Peter."

On Saturday evening the grandfatherly Benedict XVI stunned the world, and even himself, with a grand performance of humanity, compassion, conviction, sheer joy and very stirring words at the youth events at New York's seminary in Yonkers. Prior to entering the World Youth Day atmosphere outside, the Pope met with dozens of disabled children in the seminary chapel -- most of them in wheelchairs. The Pope walked slowly down the aisle, along which the children were lined up. He took each by the hands, or kissed a child on the head. Parents and caregivers nearby wept openly.

At the outdoor rally for nearly 30,000 young people, Benedict XVI made a rare reference to his upbringing in Nazi Germany. "My own years as a teenager were marred by a sinister regime that thought it had all the answers; its influence grew -- infiltrating schools and civic bodies, as well as politics and even religion -- before it was fully recognized for the monster it was," said the Pope, who deserted the German army near the end of World War II.

Throughout the week the Vatican took great care in articulating the Pope's immigration position, stating the need to protect family unity and the human rights of immigrants, but pointedly avoiding any specifics of the American immigration debate, such as the issue of whether to grant legal status to illegal immigrants. For sure, Benedict XVI’s words last week stirred the crosscurrents of the debate at the heart of a presidential election in the United States.

There is the Church

An ancient Latin expression, first used by St. Ambrose in the fourth century, came to my mind last week during several moments of the historic papal visit to the United States: "Ubi Petrus ibi ecclesia," which is translated, "Wherever Peter is, there is the Church."

Peter was in America last week, on the South Lawn of the White House, and at the Catholic University of America. Peter’s great smile and obvious serenity ignited a nation, a Church and a continent with hope in the midst of cynicism and despair, and while many would like to hasten death for a Church that is alive and young. Peter’s words addressed to representatives of more than 190 member nations of the United Nations spoke of human rights, dignity, dialogue and peace to a world at war in so many places. Peter’s eloquent silence, prayer and gestures at ground zero brought healing and peace to victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on a nation.

The New Testament's Acts of the Apostles tells us "that they even carried the sick out into the streets and laid them on cots and pallets, so that when Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on any one of them. Also the people from the cities in the vicinity of Jerusalem were coming together, bringing people who were sick or afflicted with unclean spirits, and they were all being healed."

Benedict XVI came to America last week to bring healing and hope. His words and simple gestures were desperately needed in a nation torn apart by terrorism and wars, and in a Church split by many divisions. Only time, reflection and prayer will reveal if the healing of U.S. Catholics, begun last week, will bear fruit for the Church in America.

One thing is certain, however: Last week the shadow of Peter fell on millions of people in America and far beyond. And many received hope and experienced healing from our many diseases. And one more thing happened last week: Joseph Ratzinger came into his own.

Though elected and installed as Pope three years ago, I think his Papacy really began in the minds and hearts of North Americans last week when "Peter was among us."

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Marking 5 Years Since Youth Day '02
Interview With Father Thomas Rosica

 TORONTO, JULY 28, 2007 (Zenit.org) - World Youth Day 2002 woke up the Church in Canada, said Basilian Father Thomas Rosica, national director of the event held in Toronto five years ago.

Speaking with ZENIT to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the 17th World Youth Day, Father Rosica commented about what effects the event brought to Canada and the Church.

Father Rosica is the director of the Toronto-based Salt and Light Media Foundation and Catholic Television Network, which he founded in 2003.

Q: World Youth Day 2002 in Toronto took place five years ago. What do you think has been the most profound effect the event had on the Church in Canada?

Father Rosica: World Youth Day 2002 was a tremendous catalyst allowing many great things to happen in and to Canada.

We may choose to speak of World Youth Day as something in the past -- that brightened the shadows, monotony and fatigue of our lives at one shining moment in history in 2002.

Against a world background of terror and fear, economic collapse and ecclesial scandals, World Youth Day presented an alternative vision of compelling beauty.

World Youth Day 2002 woke up the country and the Church in Canada.

The Catholic Church was alive and young during those glorious days of July 2002, and the Church continues to be alive and young today.

World Youth Day 2002 also shifted the plates of the earth in Canada in the area of media relations. Two sections of the Holy Father's talks remain engraved on my memory.

First, at the arrival ceremony in Toronto for John Paul II at the beginning of World Youth Day 2002, the Holy Father spoke these prophetic words to government officials and the people of Canada at Pearson International Airport on July 23, 2002:

"Canadians are heirs to an extraordinarily rich humanism, enriched even more by the blend of many different cultural elements. ...

"In a world of great social and ethical strains, and confusion about the very purpose of life, Canadians have an incomparable treasure to contribute -- on condition that they preserve what is deep and good and valid in their own heritage."

Then on Saturday evening, July 27, 2002, on the tarmac of a former military air base in Toronto, Downsview Park, John Paul II spoke these thought-provoking words to the crowd of more than 600,000 young people gathered at the great vigil of World Youth Day 2002:

"The question that arises is dramatic: On what foundations must we build the new historical era that is emerging from the great transformations of the 20th century?

"Is it enough to rely on the technological revolution now taking place, which seems to respond only to criteria of productivity and efficiency, without reference to the individual's spiritual dimension or to any universally shared ethical values?

"Is it right to be content with provisional answers to the ultimate questions, and to abandon life to the impulses of instinct, to short-lived sensations or passing fads?"

And what happened in our country over the past five years? One of the most serious crises of our times is the crisis of marriage and family life.

Canadians have to reflect carefully on the social consequences involved in the redefinition of marriage, examining all that is entailed if society no longer gives a privileged place and fundamental value to the lifelong union of a man and a woman in marriage.

As the keystone of society, the family is the most favorable environment in which to welcome children.

I will never forget the sight of John Paul II descending the stairs of the plane that brought him to Toronto, and ascending the stairs of the plane that would take him to Guatemala at the end of our World Youth Day in Toronto.

John Paul II taught us in the twilight of his pontificate that everyone must suffer, even the Vicar of Christ. Rather than hide his infirmities, as most public figures do, he let the whole world see what he went through.

In a youth-obsessed culture in which people are constantly urged to fight or deny the ravages of time, age, disease, he reminded us that aging and suffering are a natural part of being human.

Where the old and infirm are so easily put in nursing homes and often forgotten, the Pope was a timely and powerful reminder that our parents and grandparents, the sick, the handicapped and the dying have great value.

Our Canadian reality is truly based on a transcendent vision of life based on Christian revelation that has made us a free, democratic and caring society, recognized throughout the world as a champion of human rights and human dignity.

We will only continue to offer this treasure to humanity and history if we preserve what is deep and good and valid in our own heritage.

We must uphold the dignity of all human life, from its earliest moments to its final moments of natural death. And we must celebrate the dignity and sacredness of marriage between a man and a woman, as well as fostering and loving family life.

Q: You attribute the founding of Salt and Light Television to World Youth Day. Can you explain more about your network and how it was the direct result of that event?

Father Rosica: Canada needed this television medium more than we know. Starting up a television network anywhere is fraught with challenges, and in Canada this is compounded by the country's size, distances, languages and cultures.

But God was with us from the beginning of this great adventure, just as he was with us through the preparation and execution of World Youth Day 2002.

I learned most of what I am doing here at Salt and Light Television from John Paul II. He was a brilliant teacher and model of goodness and humanity, a wise communicator and a true "Pontifex Massmediaticus."

Salt and Light Television was born on the wings of World Youth Day 2002, drawn from Matthew 5:13-14 -- "You Are the Salt of the Earth and Light of the World" was the theme for World Youth Day 2002.


The Catholic television project is clearly a tribute to and a legacy of John Paul II, and World Youth Day 2002 was the wind beneath our wings.

There could be no better way to carry on the legacy of World Youth Day 2002 than through Canada's first national Catholic television network that bears the imprint and tradition of World Youth Days. The television network came about through the generosity of an Italian Canadian family that owns the largest private print and media company in the country, St. Joseph Media.

Its founder, Gaetano Gagliano, now 90 years old, was a disciple and friend of Blessed Giacomo Alberione. Gagliano views Salt and Light as the crown of his long career in the print, media and communications industry.

The Gaglianos provided the seed money of $15 million to get this project off the ground four years ago.

Initially available only in the Toronto area, the network is now carried by cable and satellite television services that cover Canada coast to coast.

Its programs -- in English, French, some Italian and, most recently, shows in Mandarin and Cantonese -- are available to nearly a half-million Canadian homes, primarily as a low-cost pay-cable channel.

A limited amount of Salt and Light programming also can be seen in the United States. U.S. residents can sample Salt and Light programming on our Web site, which offers promotional clips of all current shows as well as streaming video.

Salt and Light documentaries appear periodically on the Eternal Word Television Network. Salt and Light also has entered a programming exchange with Boston Catholic Television Network, which is available in various parts of the East Coast of the United States.

Recently has been announced the launch of H2O News, a new multilingual television service developed in cooperation with several Vatican agencies.

We are thrilled to have been invited by H20 to provide the English component of H2O, as well as assisting with the French and eventually the Chinese services. This will certainly help us to enhance our news dimension and thrust us on a global stage.

Q: Staffed by young people, most of whom participated in some way in World Youth Day, what do you think is the unique contribution Salt and Light offers television viewers?

Father Rosica: First and foremost one of the great contributions of Salt and Light Catholic Television Network is the unique manner in which young Catholics have assumed leadership roles in our evangelization efforts.

One clearly gets the impression that the Church is "alive and young" at Salt and Light.

Second is our commitment to offer Canadian society a message of hope, and an invitation to draw closer to Christ and the Church through our programming.

In many ways, Canada is a new mission territory, and the urgent pastoral needs for education in faith and spirituality, history and Church teachings are so vast and can never be fulfilled by one group or agency.

Everything we do at the Salt and Light Catholic Television Network revolves around the five pillars of the Salt and Light Television network: 1) prayer, devotion and meditation; 2) multilingual Catholic liturgy, Vatican events and ceremonies; 3) learning and faith development for all ages; 4) stories of Catholic action and social justice throughout Canada and around the globe; 5) stories of our Catholic communities, information and context.

Salt and Light Television network also works closely with the major television networks in Canada to assist in the background material and education about Catholic matters.

This was clearly evident in 2005 during the transition in the papacy. These efforts have built badly needed bridges with the secular media, and continue the legacy of World Youth Day 2002.

Q: Other than the network, have you seen tangible examples of young lives changed by World Youth Day? And what about the not-so-young you encounter?

Father Rosica: One of the most significant aspects and fruits of World Youth Days is that young people have rediscovered their bishops and priests, and bishops and priests have rediscovered their young people.

I recall John Paul II stating on several occasions that World Youth Days exists not only for the conversion of young people and the societies in which they live, but also for the conversion of their bishops and priests. There is much truth in these words.

Canada was particularly blessed to have many bishops who truly believe in World Youth Day as a powerful instrument of evangelization.

Through World Youth Days, John Paul II unleashed something totally new and unthinkable some 25 years ago!

We have felt the effects of World Youth Day 2002 throughout the vast Canadian landscape over the past five years, from the dynamic Youth Ministry Program in the Archdiocese of Vancouver, to the powerful Scriptural "Lectio Divina" evenings with the young people of Edmonton, Alberta.

Over these past five years the Cathedral of Kingston, Ontario, came alive with catechesis sessions for young people and many older ones as well!

There have been revitalized youth ministry programs in the Ontario Dioceses of St. Catharines, London, Toronto, and Cornwall.

We cannot help but be grateful to God, giving thanks for the renewed energies among the young people of the Archdiocese of Montreal, Quebec.

In Atlantic Canada there has been a veritable explosion of youth activities in Halifax, and World Youth Day inspired the birth of the John Paul II Media Center in Halifax, a creative media project led by young people.

In Quebec City, birthplace of the Church in North America, the seeds and winds of World Youth Day 2002 have empowered young people and the Quebec Church to prepare for the Eucharistic Congress in June 2008.

The energy of World Youth Day has swept across Canada through powerful, Gospel-rooted movements like Catholic Christian Outreach, now present on many university campuses of the country. National Evangelization Teams Ministries continues to flourish with the World Youth Day 2002 spirit.

The phenomenon of World Youth Day has become a powerful seedbed for vocations to the priesthood, consecrated life, marriage and lay ecclesial ministries.

Whether it is because those who have already sensed a call choose to attend World Youth Day out of their strong faith life, or because World Youth Day awakens young adults for the first time to the special call of God, World Youth Day can be a moment of life-changing discernment.

On June 29, as I sat in St. Peter's Basilica and watched the scene of Benedict XVI placing the pallium on the shoulders of five new Canadian archbishops, I quietly thanked God that each of these pastors and leaders had already taken to heart the gift of World Youth Day 2002 and have built so well on its foundation.

And many of the episcopal appointments in Canada over the past five years have manifested that being a bishop today in the Church means that one has a special mission to young people.

Q: Canada once had a thriving Catholic culture. Have you seen a return to the participation in the Church, sacraments, etc., in the years following World Youth Day?

Father Rosica: World Youth Days offer no panacea or quick fix to the problems and challenges of our times. Rather, they offer a new framework and new lenses through which we look at the Church and the world, and build our future.

One thing was clear after World Youth Day 2002: We realized that we have much work to do in reaching out to young adults across this vast land.

July 2002 was for us not an end or accomplishment of some fete; it was rather beginning of a new adventure of faith and hope for the entire Canadian Church.

At our World Youth Day 2002 in Canada, John Paul II issued a clarion call to commitment to the entire Church in Canada.

To his young friends he said: "Many and enticing are the voices that call out to you from all sides: many of these voices speak to you of a joy that can be had with money, success, and power. Mostly they propose a joy that comes with the superficial and fleeting pleasure of the senses."

The alternative call was Jesus' cry: "He calls you to be the salt and light of the world, to live in justice, to become instruments of love and peace." The choice was stark, self-denying, life-defining, and irrevocable.

It was between, "good and evil, between light and darkness, between life and death."

There were no shortcuts or compromises for John Paul II, only clarity. And that is what young people are seeking today, not quick answers but Gospel clarity.

It is incumbent on the Church to offer solid opportunities for youth and young adult ministry that contain solid content, vision, community and hope.

Many people have commented to me that World Youth Day 2002 taught them to wear biblical lenses in order to understand what July 2002 was all about for the Church in Canada.

On a very personal note, as I remember the great event of World Youth Day 2002, and allow it to take on its true dimensions -- one image seems to dominate: that of the rather violent and ferocious wind and storm that rocked Downsview Park on Sunday morning, July 28, 2002.

It was for me and for many the wind of Pentecost that we read about in the New Testament.

And yet, in the midst of the howling wind and violent storm, the nations of the earth -- at least 172 of them huddled together in that field -- understood one another as they gathered around the successor of Peter on that July morning five years ago.

This was the wind that had led the World Youth Day Cross from sea to sea to sea, across Canada "a mari usque ad mare." That summer and that particular morning of July 28, 2002, I believe that the Church in Canada was born again on the shores of Lake Ontario.

Canada is often described on the international scene as being one of the most politically correct or tolerant societies in the world.

Some take great pride in these words applied to our country. Others, including myself, do not necessarily see this description as something terribly positive.

There is nothing politically correct about preaching and living the Gospel, about being salt and light in a culture that has lost the flavor of the Gospel and tried to extinguish the light of Christ.

In fact, the Gospel message is at times completely incorrect in the eyes and ways of the world! The Gospel of Jesus Christ is proclaimed with boldness and with courage -- and that is one of the great lessons of World Youth Day 2002.

A boldness that does not overpower, that is not rude, that does not bully, that is never disrespectful, that never shows off or flaunts gifts that one has received -- but where the Spirit has been so lavishly poured out upon us as individuals and as a faith community, the Church has an obligation to announce and to proclaim Jesus Christ boldly, unapologetically and unabashedly -- with great joy.

Earlier this month while visiting Rome, I spent several long moments in the crypt of St. Peter's Basilica, at the grave of John Paul II, the great dreamer and father of World Youth Days.

Every day I ask the Servant of God Pope John Paul II to pray for us and intercede for us, and especially for the young people who found in him a father, a grandfather, a teacher and a demanding friend who loved them.

May those same young people find in the Church in Canada a rock, a shelter, a harbor, a home, and a possible lifetime of service in the Church today -- a Church that is "alive and young," as Benedict XVI said at the inauguration of his Petrine Ministry in 2005.

Turning the Tide Against Euthanasia
Interview With Father Thomas Rosica

TORONTO, MAY 6, 2007 (Zenit.org) - One can know if a society is still Christian by the way it treats its most vulnerable citizens, according to the director of Salt and Light Catholic television network.

In this interview with ZENIT, Father Thomas Rosica commented on the Toronto-based network's newest documentary: "Turning the Tide: Dignity, Compassion and Euthanasia."

The documentary was released April 2, the second anniversary of the death of Pope John Paul II.

http://www.saltandlighttv.org/prog_special_ttt.html

Basilian Father Rosica was the national director of World Youth Day 2002 prior to founding Canada's first Catholic television network. He also lectures on sacred Scripture at the Faculty of Theology of the University of St. Michael's College in Toronto. Since July 2006 he is a member of the General Council of the Congregation of Priests of St. Basil.

Q: The name of your documentary is "Turning the Tide." How can we as a culture turn the tide away from the universal acceptance of euthanasia?

Father Rosica: We took the title of our documentary from the words of the great 19th-century American writer Harriet Beecher Stowe: "When ... everything goes against you … never give up … for that is just the place and time … that the tide will turn."

"Turning the Tide" looks at all aspects of the euthanasia and the assisted-suicide issue, from the point of view of those people who see themselves as most threatened if a law is passed allowing euthanasia.

When people today speak about a "good death," they usually refer to an attempt to control the end of one's life, even through physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia.

We have a responsibility to confront these actions -- especially if we are to understand our moral obligation as caregivers for incapacitated persons, and our civic obligation to protect those who lack the capacity to express their will but are still human, still living, and still deserving of equal protection under the law.

There can be no true peace unless life is defended and promoted.

The best way to know if we are still in any way a Christian society is to see how we treat our most vulnerable people, the ones with little or no claim on public attention, the ones without beauty or strength or intelligence.

Q: What has been the role of the mainstream media in promoting euthanasia and assisted suicide?

Father Rosica: The mainstream media has caused great confusion about the topic of euthanasia and has been extremely deceptive in its portrayal of human suffering and compassion.

Most people who think that euthanasia and assisted suicide should be legal are not thinking the whole issue through. They are thinking about personal autonomy and choice.

They think about what it would be like to suddenly become incapacitated, and consider such a life as undignified or worthless. Perhaps they consider severely disabled people as having no quality of life.

Our dignity and quality of life don't come from what we can or cannot do. Dignity and quality of life are not matters of efficiency, proficiency and productivity. They come from a deeper place -- from who we are and how we relate to each other.

Q: Many view euthanasia as compassionate, as death with dignity. What does the Church say with regard to compassion, dignity and death?

Father Rosica: This issue strikes to the very core of who we are and what we believe.

Even when not motivated by the refusal to be burdened with the life of someone who is suffering, euthanasia must be called false and misguided mercy. True compassion leads to sharing another's pain, not killing the person whose suffering we cannot bear.

What is wrong with abortion, euthanasia, embryo selection and embryonic research are not the motives of those who carry them out. So often, those motives are, on the surface, compassionate: to protect a child from being unwanted, to end pain and suffering, to help a child with a life-threatening disease.

But in all these cases, the terrible truth is that it is the strong who decide the fate of the weak; human beings therefore become instruments in the hands of other human beings.

Our society today has lost sight of the sacred nature of human life. As Catholic Christians we are deeply committed to the protection of life in its earliest moments to its final moments.

The Christian notion of a good death is not as a good end, but a good transition, that requires faith, proper acceptance and readiness.

"Turning the Tide" proposes that true compassion is the best way to handle human suffering.

Q: Do laws prohibiting euthanasia have a place in a free society? Is the right to die a human right?

Father Rosica: Currently in Canada, euthanasia is considered murder and the law provides for a maximum of 14 years in prison for cases of assisted suicide.

In June 2005, Francine Lalonde, a Bloc Québecois member of the Canadian House of Commons, introduced Bill C-407 that would change the Canadian criminal code and legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide in Canada.

The bill had some initial problems and was not passed, but Lalonde, re-elected in 2006, has promised to reintroduce her bill.

The notion that euthanasia and assisted suicide could be a reality for us in Canada should come as a wake-up call to all Canadians, not just because of the notion that all life is sacred from conception to natural death, but simply because of whom such a law would affect most, the most vulnerable.

This includes the chronically ill, who are a strain on the health care system; the elderly who have been abandoned and who have no one to speak on their behalf and who feel they may be a burden to others; and the disabled who have to fight every day to maintain their own integrity and dignity.

If we look at how the system has gone in the Netherlands, Belgium and in the state of Oregon in the United States, we can see that legalizing euthanasia and assisted suicide will not be the solution.

Consider the following statistics:

In 1984, in the Netherlands, euthanasia was declared legal when certain conditions were met.

Even though about 2,400 cases of euthanasia and assisted suicide are reported each year, the Dutch government conducted a study in 1991 that found that there were up to 12,000 cases that year.

Of these, about half the patients did not request or consent to being killed. One of the doctors explained that it would have been "rude" to discuss the matter with the patients, as they all "knew that their conditions were incurable."

Belgium legalized euthanasia in 2002. That year, 204 people were reported to have been killed. In 2006, 444 people were reported to have been killed. In 2005, the Belgian government acknowledged that approximately half of all euthanasia deaths are not reported.

In Oregon, physician-assisted suicide was legalized in 1997. In 1998, there were 16 reported assisted suicide deaths. In 2005, there were 36.

In view of what has happened in other countries, it is time to turn the tide before all Canadians have to start fighting for our lives.

Q: What can the world learn from the way Pope John Paul II lived his death?

Father Rosica: John Paul II showed us true dignity in the face of death.

Rather than hide his infirmities, as most public figures do, he let the whole world see what he went through in the final phase of his life.

Before the cameras, John Paul II taught that although science can ease discomfort, palliative care should not be used as a cloak to hide the fact of dying.

As the curtain was about to fall, nothing made him waver, even the debilitating sickness hidden under the glazed Parkinsonian mask, and ultimately his inability to speak and move.

Pope John Paul has become a living "argument" for the appeal to respect the most frail and vulnerable, who he upheld during his pontificate.

Who can say his life was not fruitful, when his body was able to climb snow-capped summits or vacation on Strawberry Island in Lake Simcoe in 2002, during World Youth Day in Canada?

Who didn't feel the paradoxical influence of his presence, when his voice was muted?

In our youth-obsessed culture, Pope John Paul II reminded us that aging and suffering are a natural part of being human.

Where the old and infirm are so easily put in homes and forgotten, the Pope was a powerful reminder that the sick, the handicapped and the dying have great value.

John Paul II taught us how to live, to suffer and to die. May he watch over us now and strengthen us as we turn the tide in our time.

É possível evangelizar com a televisão
Entrevista com o padre Thomas Rosica,
presidente e fundador do canal «Salt and Light»
ZENIT INTERNATIONAL NEWS SERVICE

TORONTO, quarta-feira, 1 de fevereiro de 2006 (Zenit.org)- Ainda que alguns não acreditem, é possível evangelizar com a televisão, assegura o sacerdote que coordenou a Jornada Mundial da Juventude no Canadá, em 2002.

Ao acabar a Jornada, o padre Thomas Rosica, religioso basiliano, foi nomeado presidente executivo e fundador do canal católico de televisão «Salt and Light» («Sal e luz»).

Nesta entrevista, o padre Rosica, que é também professor de Sagrada Escritura na Faculdade de Teologia da Universidade de Toronto, conta a Zenit os primeiros passos desta aventura.

--Como foi recebida a televisão «Salt and Light» no Canadá?

--Padre Rosica: O Canadá necessita deste meio mais do que parece. Iniciar uma cadeia televisiva em qualquer parte está carregado de desafios, mas no Canadá, também, há que contar com o tamanho do país, as distâncias, as línguas e as culturas.

O esforço foi compensado com incontáveis bênçãos e consolos. Em só três anos, «Salt and Light» conseguiu chegar a cem mil lares. E o número de subscrições continua aumentando.

--Como se chegou a criar a rede televisiva «Salt and Light»?

--Padre Rosica: A televisão «Salt and Light» nasceu na onda da Jornada Mundial da Juventude. Com freqüência comparei esta Jornada com uma bomba, de santa energia e criatividade, que lentamente está produzindo fruto em toda nossa terra.

Um dos frutos mais evidentes do acontecimento de 2002 é esta cadeia que foi possível graças à generosidade de uma família ítalo-canadense, proprietária da maior companhia editorial e de publicações do país, St. Joseph Communications. Seu fundador, Gaetano Gagliano, que tem agora 88 anos, foi discípulo e amigo do beato Giacomo Alberione.

O senhor Gagliano vê «Salt and Light» como o broche de ouro de uma longa carreira na indústria das publicações e na comunicação. Os Gagliano proporcionaram o capital para iniciar o projeto.

Frutos visíveis da Jornada Mundial da Juventude são também outros pequenos esforços no campo dos meios de comunicação, na Arquidiocese de Halifax, com o Instituto de Meios de Comunicação João Paulo II, e a nova produtora de filmes católicos da Arquidiocese de Quebec.

«Salt and Light» colabora estreitamente com ambas dioceses e seus valiosos arcebispos: Terrence Prendergast, S.J., em Halifax, e o cardeal Marc Ouellet, em Quebec, para reforçar seus programas e beneficiar-se das experiências e atividades de cada iniciativa.

Desde nosso início, em 2003, recebemos um firme apoio e impulso do Centro Televisivo Vaticano, de muitos departamentos da Santa Sé, da Conferência Episcopal canadense e de muitas dioceses do país.

Também colaboramos muito de perto com os serviços televisivos da Conferência Episcopal dos Estados Unidos, com Telepace e SAT 2000 na Itália, KTO na França, o Centro de Meios de Comunicação da Arquidiocese de Hong Kong, e numerosas redes de televisão católicas e produtoras católicas de todo o mundo enquanto preparávamos nossa programação para o Canadá.

--Alguns dizem que já existe o canal de televisão católico criado pela Madre Angélica, EWTN, sobretudo na América do Norte. Que é o específico da missão de «Salt and Light»?

--Padre Rosica: A madre Angélica e sua muito competente e admirável equipe fizeram algo grande por Deus e a Igreja dando-nos o canal EWTN.

Mas sabemos que as urgentes necessidades pastorais de educação na fé, na espiritualidade, história e ensinamento da Igreja são tão amplas que nunca podem ser satisfeitas por um só grupo ou agência.

Vemos nossos esforços em «Salt and Light» como complementares aos de EWTN, mas também estamos respondendo a necessidades específicas e a complexidades da Igreja canadense.

--Descreva um dia na programação de «Salt and Light».

--Padre Rosica: Tudo o que fazemos se move em torno a cinco pilares: oração, devoção e meditação; liturgia católica multilingüe, eventos vaticanos e cerimônias; ensinamentos e crescimento na fé para todas as idades; reportagens sobre ação católica e justiça social no Canadá e no mundo; reportagens sobre nossas comunidades católicas; informação e contexto.

Produzimos regularmente catorze programas em nosso centro de emissões em inglês, francês, italiano e começaremos em fevereiro de 2006 com um dialeto chinês, o cantonês.

Também oferecemos ocasionalmente programas em espanhol, polonês e alemão. Estas línguas respondem à diversidade cultural da Igreja no Canadá.

«Salt and Light» colabora também com as maiores cadeias televisivas do Canadá para ajudar em assuntos de educação católica e material de documentação. Isto se viu no ano passado, durante a transição do papado. Estes esforços permitem construir pontes muito necessárias com os meios seculares.

--Fale-nos de seu departamento de documentários.

--Padre Rosica: O departamento de documentários de «Salt and Light» está especializado em vidas de santos e outras reportagens católicas únicas.

Um de nossos primeiros documentários se fez na Colômbia, e informava dos jovens que em Bogotá e Medellín faziam as pequenas cruzes de madeira usadas na Jornada Mundial da Juventude, em Toronto.

Esta história de justiça social, «Aprende daquela Cruz», emocionou o mundo e conservou viva a memória da Jornada Mundial. Nosso documentário mais conhecido é «O amor é uma eleição», sobre a vida de Santa Gianna Beretta Molla.

Elegemos esta nova santa como patrona de nossa cadeia televisiva. Se havia algo que necessitávamos naquele momento era do modelo forte de feminilidade, maternidade, vida matrimonial, familiar, ética e profissional que representa Santa Gianna.

Seu marido Pietro e sua família são bons amigos meus e nos pediram para fazer um documentário de sua vida. O filme sobre Santa Gianna está disponível em inglês, francês, italiano, espanhol, e logo em polonês, português, árabe e cantonês.

Nosso mais recente documentário, premiado em setembro pelo «National Film Board Theater» em Toronto, titula-se «Viagem de luz: a busca de Deus na Terra Santa». Este filme de 47 minutos foi rodado em cenários de Israel e Palestina.

O documentário anima a peregrinar à Terra Santa e foi produzido com ajuda de Sua Beatitude Michel Sabbah, patriarca latino de Jerusalém, e segue a viagem de um grupo de jovens católicos pela terra de Jesus.

--Sabemos que João Paulo II teve um grande impacto em sua vida e trabalho. Como segue influindo sua vida e visão em «Salt and Light», e em sua própria vida?

--Padre Rosica: Aprendi muito do que agora faço em «Salt and Light» de João Paulo II. Foi um professor brilhante e modelo de bondade e de humanidade... um sábio comunicador e verdadeiro «pontífice mediático».

João Paulo II gostou muito que o projeto desta televisão católica canadense nascesse depois da Jornada Mundial da Juventude. Tive oportunidade de encontrá-lo em várias ocasiões em 2003 e 2004, e compartilhar com ele o crescimento da cadeia. Seus olhos brilharam!

Agora lhe pedimos que siga abençoando este audaz projeto de nova evangelização. Estou seguro de que Santa Gianna Beretta Molla e o Papa João Paulo II farão todo o possível por ajudar-nos a encarnar, dar profundidade e beleza às palavras, às histórias e às imagens da Igreja, mediante o instrumento da televisão católica no Canadá.

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Es posible evangelizar con la televisión
Entrevista con el padre Thomas Rosica,
presidente y fundador del canal «Salt and Light»
ZENIT INTERNATIONAL NEWS SERVICE

TORONTO, miércoles, 1 febrero 2006 (Zenit.org)- Aunque algunos no lo crean, es posible evangelizar con la televisión, asegura el sacerdote que coordinó a nivel nacional la Jornada Mundial de la Juventud en Canadá, en 2002.

Nada más acabar la Jornada, el padre Thomas Rosica, religioso basiliano, fue nombrado presidente ejecutivo y fundador del canal católico de televisión «Salt and Light» («Sal y luz»).

En esta entrevista el padre Rosica, quien es además profesor de Sagrada Escritura en la Facultad de Teología de la Universidad de Toronto, cuenta a Zenit los primeros pasos de esta aventura.

--¿Cómo ha sido recibida la televisión «Salt and Light» en Canadá?

--Padre Rosica: Canadá necesita este medio más de lo que parece. Iniciar una cadena televisiva, en cualquier parte, está cargado de desafíos pero en Canadá, además, hay que contar con el tamaño del país, las distancias, las lenguas y las culturas.

El esfuerzo ha sido compensado con incontables bendiciones y consuelos. En sólo tres años, «Salt and Light» ha logrado llegar a cien mil hogares. Y el número de suscriptores sigue aumentando.

--¿Cómo se llegó a crear la red televisiva «Salt and Light»?

--Padre Rosica: La televisión «Salt and Light» nació en la onda de la Jornada Mundial de la Juventud. A menudo he comparado esta Jornada con una bomba de efecto retardado, de santa energía y creatividad, que lentamente está produciendo fruto en toda nuestra tierra.

Uno de los frutos más evidentes del acontecimiento de 2002 es esta cadena que fue posible gracias a la generosidad de una familia italo-canadiense, propietaria de la más grande compañía editorial y de publicaciones del país, St. Joseph Communications. Su fundador, Gaetano Gagliano, que tiene ahora 88 años, fue discípulo y amigo del beato Giacomo Alberione.

El señor Gagliano ve «Salt and Light» como el broche de oro de una larga carrera en la industria de las publicaciones y la comunicación. Los Gagliano proporcionaron el capital para iniciar el proyecto.

Frutos visibles de la Jornada Mundial de la Juventud son también otros pequeños esfuerzos en el campo de los medios, en la Arquidiócesis de Halifax, con el Instituto de Medios de Comunicación Juan Pablo II, y la nueva productora de filmes católicos de la Arquidiócesis de Quebec.

«Salt and Light» colabora estrechamente con ambas diócesis y su valiosos arzobispos: Terrence Prendergast, S.J, en Halifax, y el cardenal Marc Ouellet, en Quebec, para reforzar sus programas y beneficiarse de las experiencias y actividades de cada iniciativa.

Desde nuestro inicio, en 2003, hemos recibido un firme apoyo e impulso del Centro Televisivo Vaticano, de muchos departamentos de la Santa Sede, de la Conferencia Episcopal canadiense y de muchas diócesis del país.

También hemos colaborado muy de cerca con los servicios televisivos de la Conferencia Episcopal de Estados Unidos, con Telepace y SAT 2000 en Italia, KTO en Francia, el Centro de Medios de Comunicación de la Arquidiócesis de Hong Kong, y numerosas redes de televisión católicas y productoras católicas de todo el mundo mientras preparábamos nuestra programación para Canadá.

--Algunos dicen que ya existe el canal de televisión católico creado por la Madre Angelica, EWTN, sobre todo en América del Norte. ¿Qué es lo específico de la misión de «Salt and Light»?

--Padre Rosica: La madre Angelica y su muy competente y admirable equipo han hecho algo grande por Dios y la Iglesia dándonos el canal EWTN.

Pero sabemos que las urgentes necesidades pastorales de educación en la fe y en la espiritualidad, historia y enseñanza de la Iglesia son tan amplias que nunca pueden ser satisfechas por un solo grupo o agencia.

Vemos nuestros esfuerzos en «Salt and Light» como complementarios de los de EWTN, pero también estamos respondiendo a necesidades específicas y a complejidades de la Iglesia canadiense.

--Describa un día en la programación de «Salt and Light».

--Padre Rosica: Todo lo que hacemos se mueve en torno a cinco pilares: oración, devoción y meditación; liturgia católica multilingüe, eventos vaticanos y ceremonias; enseñanza y crecimiento en la fe para todas las edades; reportajes sobre acción católica y justicia social en Canadá y el mundo; reportajes sobre nuestras comunidades católicas; información y contexto.

Producimos regularmente catorce programas en nuestro centro de emisiones en inglés, francés, italiano y empezaremos en febrero de 2006 con un dialecto chino, el cantonés.

También ofrecemos ocasionalmente programas en español, polaco y alemán. Estas lenguas responden a la diversidad cultural de la Iglesia en Canadá.

«Salt and Light» colabora también con las mayores cadenas televisivas de Canadá para ayudar en asuntos de educación católica y material de documentación. Esto se vio el invierno y primavera pasados, durante la transición del papado. Estos esfuerzos han permitido construir puentes muy necesarios con los medios seculares.

--Háblenos de su departamento de documentales

--Padre Rosica: El departamento de documentales de «Salt and Light» está especializado en vidas de santos y otros reportajes católicos únicos.

Uno de nuestros primeros documentales se hizo en Colombia, e informaba de los jóvenes que en Bogotá y Medellín hacían las pequeñas cruces de madera usadas en la Jornada Mundial de la Juventud, en Toronto.

Esta historia de justicia social, «Aprende de aquella Cruz», emocionó al mundo y conservó viva la memoria de la Jornada Mundial. Nuestro documental más conocido es «El amor es una elección», sobre la vida de santa Gianna Beretta Molla.

Elegimos a esta nueva santa como patrona de nuestra cadena televisiva. Si había algo que necesitábamos en aquel momento era el modelo fuerte de femineidad, maternidad, vida matrimonial, familiar, ética y profesional que representa santa Gianna.

Su marido Pietro y su familia son buenos amigos míos y nos pidieron hacer un documental de su vida. El filme sobre santa Gianna está disponible en inglés, francés, italiano, español, y pronto en polaco, portugués, árabe y cantonés.

Nuestro más reciente documental, premiado en septiembre por el «National Film Board Theater» en Toronto, se titula «Viaje de luz: la búsqueda de Dios en Tierra Santa». Esta película de 47 minutos fue rodada en escenarios de Israel y Palestina.

El documental anima a peregrinar a Tierra Santa y fue producido con ayuda de Su Beatitud Michel Sabbah, patriarca latino de Jerusalén, y sigue el viaje de un grupo de jóvenes católicos por la tierra de Jesús.

--Sabemos que Juan Pablo II tuvo un gran impacto en su vida y trabajo. ¿Cómo sigue influyendo su vida y visión en «Salt and Light», y en su propia vida?

--Padre Rosica: Aprendí mucho de lo que ahora hago en «Salt and Light» de Juan Pablo II. Fue un profesor brillante y modelo de bondad y de humanidad... un sabio comunicador y verdadero «pontífice mediático».

A Juan Pablo II le gustó mucho que el proyecto de esta televisión católica canadiense naciera después de la Jornada Mundial de la Juventud, y tuve la oportunidad de encontrarle en varias ocasiones en 2003 y 2004, y compartir con él el crecimiento de la cadena. ¡Le brillaban los ojos!

Ahora le pedimos que siga bendiciendo este audaz proyecto de nueva evangelización. Estoy seguro de que santa Gianna Beretta Molla y el Papa Juan Pablo II harán todo lo posible por ayudarnos a encarnar, dar profundidad y belleza a las palabras, a la historias y a las imágenes de la Iglesia, mediante el instrumento de la televisión católica en Canadá.

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Evangelizing Through TV in Canada
Interview With Father Thomas Rosica,
President of Salt and Light Catholic Media Foundation
ZENIT INTERNATIONAL NEWS SERVICE

TORONTO, JAN. 27, 2006 (Zenit.org)- Television is no longer forbidden territory for evangelization, says the priest who served as national director of World Youth Day 2002 in Canada.

Immediately after that World Youth Day, Basilian Father Thomas Rosica was appointed as president and chief executive officer of the Salt and Light Catholic Media Foundation and television network in Canada.

He also lectures on sacred Scripture at the Faculty of Theology of the University of St. Michael's College in Toronto.

Q: How is Salt and Light Television being received in Canada?

Father Rosica: Canada needed this medium more than we know. Starting up a television network anywhere is fraught with challenges, and in Canada this is compounded by the country's size, distances, languages and cultures.

The endeavor has been filled with countless blessings and consolations. In a little less than three years, Salt and Light Television is available in over 100,000 homes. And the number of subscribers is growing.

Q: How did the Salt and Light Television network come about?

Father Rosica: Salt and Light Television was born on the wings of World Youth Day 2002. I have often compared WYD 2002 to a time-released capsule of holy energy and creativity that is slowly bearing fruit across our land.

One of the most obvious fruits of the 2002 event is the television network that came about through the generosity of an Italian Canadian family that owns the largest private print and media company in the country, St. Joseph Communications. Its founder, Mr. Gaetano Gagliano, now 88 years old, was a disciple and friend of Blessed Giacomo Alberione.

Mr. Gagliano views Salt and Light as the crown of his long career in the print, media and communications industry. The Gaglianos provided the seed money to get this project off the ground.

Other visible fruits of the 2002 World Youth Day in Canada have been smaller media efforts in the Archdiocese of Halifax with the John Paul II Media Institute, and the new Catholic film productions in the Archdiocese of Quebec.

Salt and Light is working closely with both dioceses and their fine archbishops: Terrence Prendergast, S.J., in Halifax and Cardinal Marc Ouellet in Quebec City, to encourage their efforts and benefit from the skills and activities of each initiative.

From our very beginning in 2003, we have received unfailing support and encouragement from the Vatican Television Center, from many departments of the Holy See, from the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, and many individual Canadian dioceses.

We have also worked closely with the American bishops' conference television services, Telepace and SAT 2000 in Italy, KTO in France, the Archdiocese of Hong Kong Media Center, and numerous Catholic television networks and Catholic film production houses throughout the world as we prepared our programming for Canada.

Q: Some say that we already have EWTN available, especially in North America. What is unique and specific to the mission of Salt and Light Television?

Father Rosica: Mother Angelica and her very competent and admirable team have done something great for God and the Church by giving us EWTN.

Yet we know that the urgent pastoral needs for education in faith and spirituality, history and Church teachings are so vast and can never be fulfilled by one group or agency.

We view our efforts at Salt and Light as complementary to those of EWTN, but we are also responding to specific needs and complexities of the Canadian Church.

Q: Describe the 24-hour-a-day programming schedule of the Salt and Light Television Network.

Father Rosica: Everything we do revolves around the five pillars of the Salt and Light Television network: prayer, devotion and meditation; multilingual Catholic liturgy, Vatican events and ceremonies; learning and faith development for all ages; stories of Catholic action and social justice throughout Canada and around the globe; stories of our Catholic communities; information and context.

We are producing 14 regular programs in our Toronto broadcast center in English, French, Italian, and beginning in February, 2006, in the Chinese dialect of Cantonese.

We also have occasional programs in Spanish, Polish and German. These languages respond to the culturally diverse Church in Canada.

Salt and Light Television network also works closely with the major television networks in Canada to assist in the background material and education about Catholic matters. This was clearly evident last winter and spring during the transition in the papacy. These efforts have built badly needed bridges with the secular media.

Q: Tell us about your documentary division.

Father Rosica: The documentary division of Salt and Light specializes in the lives of the saints and other unique Catholic stories.

One of our first documentaries was made in Colombia, South America, and featured the young Colombians in Bogota and Medellin who made the small wooden crosses used at World Youth Day 2002 in Toronto.

This social justice story "Learn from that Cross" has touched people throughout the world and kept alive the memory of World Youth Day 2002. Our most well-known documentary is "Love is a Choice," the life of St. Gianna Beretta Molla.

We chose this new saint as the patron of our television network. If there was ever an age when we needed a strong role model of womanhood, motherhood, marriage, family, life ethics and professionalism, it is in St. Gianna.

St. Gianna's husband Pietro and her family are good friends of mine and they asked if we would make the official film documentary of her life. The film on St. Gianna is now available in English, French, Italian, Spanish, and soon in Polish, Portuguese, Arabic and Cantonese.

Our most recent documentary premiered in September at the National Film Board Theater in Toronto. Entitled "Journey of Light: The Search for God in the Holy Land," this 47-minute documentary was filmed on location in Israel and Palestine.

This documentary, which encourages pilgrimage to the Holy Land, was produced with the assistance of His Beatitude Michel Sabbah, Latin patriarch of Jerusalem, and follows the journey of a group of young Catholics to the Holy Land.

Q: We know that Pope John Paul II had a great influence on your life and work. How does his life and vision continue to impact Salt and Light Television and your own life?

Father Rosica: I learned most of what I am doing here at Salt and Light Television from Pope John Paul II. He was a brilliant teacher and model of goodness and humanity … a wise communicator and a true "Pontifex Massmediaticus."

Pope John Paul II was very happy that this Canadian Catholic television project came to life after World Youth Day 2002 and I had the opportunity of meeting with him on several occasions in 2003 and 2004 to share with him how the network was growing. His eyes lit up!

Now we pray to him and ask him to continue to bless this bold project of the New Evangelization. I am confident that St. Gianna Beretta Molla and Pope John Paul II will do all they can to help us give flesh, depth and beauty to the words, stories and images of the Church through the medium of Catholic television in Canada.

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È possibile evangelizzare attraverso la TV?
Intervista a padre Thomas Rosica, presidente di “Salt and Light”
ZENIT

TORONTO, martedì, 20 dicembre 2005 (ZENIT.org)- La televisione non è più uno strumento inaccessibile all’evangelizzazione, secondo padre Thomas Rosica, C.S.B, canadese, Direttore nazionale e responsabile della Giornata Mondiale della Gioventù 2002 che si è svolta in Canada.

Subito dopo la Giornata Mondiale della Gioventù del 2002, padre Rosica è stato nominato Presidente e amministratore delegato di “Salt and Light Catholic Media Foundation” e di “Television Network” in Canada.

Inoltre svolge delle lezioni sulle Sacre Scritture presso la Facoltà di Teologia dell’Università del St. Michael’s College di Toronto, ed è Master of Scholastics presso il Frassati House di Toronto.

P. Rosica, sono passati quasi tre anni da quando ha accettato questa missione di fondare e dirigere la Salt and Light Television, la prima rete televisiva cattolica del Canada. Qual è il successo che Salt and Light Television ha riscosso in Canada?

P. Rosica: Inizialmente, nel 2003, ero riluttante ad accettare questa missione. Ma ora non ho alcun rimpianto per aver intrapreso questo grande progetto di evangelizzazione e di educazione. Il Canada ha bisogno di questo mezzo più di quanto non si pensi! Avviare una rete televisiva è difficile ovunque e in Canada questa difficoltà è ulteriormente aggravata dalle dimensioni del Paese, dalle distanze, dalle diverse lingue e culture. L’impresa ha ricevuto abbondanti benedizioni e grazie. In meno di tre anni, Salt and Light Television è stata capace di entrare in più di 100.000 case in tutto il Paese. E il numero degli abbonamenti cresce di giorno in giorno.

Come è nata la rete televisiva Salt and Light Television?

P. Rosica: La Salt and Light Television è nata sulla scia della Gioranta Mondiale della Gioventù del 2002 (GMG 2002) che si è svolta in Canada. Spesso ho descritto la GMG 2002 come una capsula di energia santa e creatività, che rilascia con il tempo i suoi effetti, attraverso tutto il territorio nazionale.

Uno dei frutti più evidenti è rappresentato dalla rete televisiva che è nata grazia alla generosità di una famiglia italo-canadese che possiede la più grande società di stampa e di comunicazione del Paese: la “St. Joseph Communications” . Il suo fondatore, Gaetano Gagliano, 88 anni, è stato discepolo e amico del Beato Giacomo Alberione.

Il sig. Gagliano considera la Salt and Light come il coronamento della sua lunga carriera nell’industria della stampa e della comunicazione. La famiglia Gagliano, che ha fornito il capitale che ha reso possibile il decollo di questo progetto, è un meraviglioso esempio di autentica azione dei laici nella Chiesa dei nostri tempi.

Altri frutti visibili della GMG 2002 in Canada sono alcune realtà di minore dimensione come il John Paul II Media Institute nell’Arcidiocesi di Halifax e il new Catholic film productions nell’Arcidiocesi di Quebec. Salt and Light lavora a stretto contatto con entrambe le diocesi e i rispettivi Arcivescovi Terrence Prendergast, S.J. ad Halifax e il Cardinale Marc Ouellet della Città di Quebec, al fine di contribuire ai loro sforzi e di trarre i benefici derivanti dalle capacità e le attività di ciascuna iniziativa.

Sin dall’inizio del 2003 abbiamo ricevuto un sostegno immancabile da parte del Centro Televisivo Vaticano, di molti dipartimenti della Santa Sede, dalla Conferenza episcopale del Canada e da molte singole diocesi. Abbiamo anche lavorato a stretto contatto con il Servizio televisivo della Conferenza episcopale degli Stati Uniti, con Telepace e SAT2000 dell’Italia, con KTO francese, con il Centro per le comunicazioni dell’Arcidiocesi di Hong Kong, e con numerose reti televisive cattoliche e produzioni cinematrografiche cattoliche di tutto il mondo, nel corso della preparazione dei nostri programmi per il Canada.

Alcuni obiettano che esiste già EWTN, soprattutto per quanto riguarda il Nord America. Cosa contraddistingue in particolare la missione di Salt and Light Television?

P. Rosica: Madre Angelica e la sua ammirevole squadra altamente competente ha realizzato un qualcosa di grande per Dio e la Chiesa con EWTN. Tuttavia sappiamo che le urgenti necessità pastorali per l’educazione nella fede e nello spirito, nella storia e nella dottrina della Chiesa, sono talmente vaste che non potranno mai essere soddisfatte da un’unica organizzazione o agenzia. L’impegno di Salt and Light ci sembra complementare rispetto a quello di EWTN, nonché rispondente ad esigenze e complessità specifiche della Chiesa in Canada.

Alcuni dei nostri 30 collaboratori hanno lavorato con me nella GMG del 2002. Con loro sentiamo una speciale missione, da svolgere attraverso la Salt and Light Television, di raccontare la storia cattolica attraverso la prospettiva e gli occhi dei giovani. Questo è il cuore della nuova evangelizzazione: raccontare la storia antica in modo nuovo, fresco e dinamico. Per molti versi il Canada è un territorio di missione che richiede modi nuovi e dinamici per impegnare la gente nella fede.

Abbiamo avuto il privilegio, negli ultimi tre anni, di accogliere molti giovani provenienti da diversi Paesi, per collaborare per un periodo nei settori della cniematografia e della comunicazione. Giovani che ci sono stati indicati dalle Conferenze episcopali, dalle organizzazioni ecclesiastiche e dalle scuole di cinematografia del Canada e di altri Paesi. È stata un’esperienza che ci ha arricchito vicendevolmente e ci ha dato grandi benedizioni.

Ci vuole descrivere la programmazione delle 24 ore quotidiane della Salt and Light Television Network?

P. Rosica: Tutto ciò che facciamo ruota intorno ai cinque pilastri della rete televisiva Salt and Light: preghiera, devozione e meditazione; liturgia cattolica svolta in diverse lingue, cerimonie ed eventi del Vaticano; Educazione e approfondimento della fede per ogni età; esperienze di azione cattolica e solidarietà fatte in Canada e nel mondo; esperienze delle nostre comunità cattoliche; informazione e approfondimenti.

Stiamo producendo 14 programmi regolari nel nostro centro di Toronto, in inglese, francese e italiano, e a partire dal febbraio del prossimo anno anche nel dialetto cantonese per i cinesi. Abbiamo saltuariamente anche qualche programma in spagnolo, polacco e tedesco. Queste lingue corrispondono alle diversità culturali della Chiesa in Canada. Per la descrizione dei programmi si può vedere il nostro sito Internet su http://www.saltandlighttv.org/.

Salt and Light Television lavora anche a stretto contatto con le principali reti televisive del Canada per quanto riguarda il materiale di supporto e i contenuti sulle questioni cattoliche. Un’esigenza che si è resa particolarmente evidente nello scorso inverno, durante il periodo di transizione del Papato, e grazie alla quale sono stati instaurati legami assai necessari con i mezzi di comunicazione secolari.

Ci vuole parlare del vostro settore sui documentari che ha prodotto cose eccezionali?

P. Rosica: La sezione dei documentari di Salt and Light è specializzata nella vita dei santi e in altri racconti particolari del Cattolicesimo. Uno dei nostri primi documentari è stato girato in Colombia e Sud America sui giovani colombiani di Bogotá e Medellín che si sono impegnati a realizzare le piccole croci di legno utilizzate nella Giornata Mondiale della Gioventù del 2002 di Toronto. Questa storia di solidarietà intitolata “Learn from that Cross” (impara da quella croce) ha emozionato la gente di tutto il mondo, mantenendo viva la memoria della GMG 2002.

Il nostro documentario più noto è “Love is a Choice” (l’amore è una scelta) sulla vita di Santa Gianna Beretta Molla. Come è noto, abbiamo scelto questa nuova Santa come patrona della nostra rete televisiva. Noi viviamo in un’epoca in cui vi è un grande bisogno di avere un modello di donna, di madre, di matrimonio, di famiglia, di etica familiare e professionale, e tutto ciò si trova in Santa Gianna. Il marito della Santa, Pietro, e la sua famiglia, sono grandi amici miei e mi hanno chiesto se era possibile fare un documentario ufficiale sulla sua vita (la scorsa estate avevamo avuto il privilegio di accogliere la nipote di Santa Gianna Molla, Ortensia, tra i nostri stagisti). Il film su Santa Gianna è ora disponibile in inglese, francese, italiano, spagnolo e presto lo sarà anche in polacco, portoghese, arabo e cantonese.

Il nostro più recente documentario è stato premiato lo scorso settembre dal National Film Board Theater di Toronto. Dal titolo “Journey of Light: The Search for God in the Holy Land” (Viaggio di luce: la ricerca di Dio in Terra Santa), questo film di 47 minuti è stato girato in Israele e Palestina ed è un invito ad intraprendere il pellegrinaggio in Terra Santa. Esso è stato prodotto con la collaborazione di Sua Beatitudine Michel Sabbah, Patriarca latino di Gerusalemme, e documenta il viaggio di un gruppo di giovani cattolici in Terra Santa.

I nostri documentari sono disponibili nei formati VHS o DVD per il Nord America o per l’Europa al sito Internet https://saltandlighttv.org/shopping/index.php oppure chiamando lo 001-888-302-7181.

Sappiamo che il Papa Giovanni Paolo II ha avuto una grande influenza per lei, la sua vita e il suo lavoro. In che modo la vita e la visione di quel Papa continuano ad influenzare la sua vita e il lavoro della Salt and Light Television?

P. Rosica: Gran parte di ciò che faccio qui alla Salt and Light Television l’ho imparato dal Papa Giovanni Paolo II. Egli è stato un insegnante brillante e un modello di bontà e di umanità... un comunicatore saggio e un vero “Pontifex Massmediaticus”.

Non è un caso che l’ultimo documento di questo grande Papa riguardi il tema delle comunicazioni, poiché se mai nella Chiesa vi sia stato chi ha incarnato ed esemplificato la figura di un grande comunicatore, questo è stato Giovanni Paolo II. Nella Lettera apostolica “Il rapido sviluppo”, del 24 gennaio 2005, il Servo di Dio Giovanni Paolo II ci ha lasciato un testamento spirituale sulle comunicazioni.

Il Papa Giovanni Paolo II è stato molto felice di veder nascere questa televisione cattolica in Canada dopo la Giornata Mondiale della Gioventù del 2002, ed io ho avuto l’opportunità di incontrarlo in diverse occasioni tra il 2003 e il 2004 per condividere con lui gli sviluppi di questa rete televisiva. Ricordo che i suoi occhi si illuminavano!

Oggi preghiamo per lui e gli chiediamo di continuare a benedire questo progetto di nuova evangelizzazione. Sono sicuro che Santa Gianna Beretta Molla e il Papa Giovanni Paolo II faranno tutto ciò che è in loro potere per aiutarci a dare sostanza, profondità e bellezza alle parole, alle storie e alle immagini della Chiesa, attraverso lo strumento della televisione cattolica in Canada.

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Reflection for Friday July 22, 2005

St. Edith Stein and the White Rose Student Martyrs Under Nazism

Each World Youth Day offers blessed and saintly patrons- great heroes to the young people of the world who gather to celebrate their faith. Edith Stein, the Carmelite saint and co-patroness of Europe, is a very engaging figure for some of the 800,000 young people expected to attend World Youth Day next month in Germany.

The search for truth of Edith Stein – Sr. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross in religious life – could be a stimulus for young people who will go to Cologne, where she lived in the Carmelite Monastery in that city. Stein was Jewish, German, a seeker who lost her faith and found it. Her continuity of life when she entered the Cologne Carmel is also very interesting, as it was not a rejection of the intellectual life but, on the contrary, an entering more intensely into contemplation, which isn't inaction. In fact, her superiors asked her to continue with her intellectual work and she did so, in union with the Church and the needs of the world.

The Carmelite nun was torched to death in the Auschwitz concentration camp on August 9, 1942. She accepted her death in the concentration camp as communion with the cross of Christ, for her people and for peace in the world.

I might also suggest some models of holiness for the Cologne WYD 2005 in the persons of the White Rose Martyrs – a group of Orthodox, Protestant and Catholic students of Munich who, in 1942, fought to defend the dignity of man and religion in face of Nazism. The Munich youths– Hans Scholl and his sister Sophie, Christoph Probst, Alexander Schmorell, Willi Graf, Kurt Huber– had understood that Nazism represented a great threat and opposed it clearly in six leaflets they wrote.

While at the University of Munich, this group of medical students was secretly writing and distributing the series of pamphlets calling for the end of the war. They shared an intense aversion and opposition to the Nazi regime and clearly took positions against the deportation of Jews. By the spring of 1942 they realized that action was necessary. They bought a typewriter, a duplicating machine, and stationery, and got to work. The leaflets, which they circulated in German cities and universities, were signed with a 'white rose.'

Because of danger, the White Rose members worked in complete secrecy. They kept their own families oblivious to their actions so as not to endanger them. The pamphlets were printed under cover of darkness in a basement. Even simply obtaining reams of paper or large quantities of stamps required extreme caution.

The end came on February 18, 1943. Hans and Sophie Scholl went to the university with a suitcase full of the latest pamphlet authored by their professor, Kurt Huber. While lectures were in session and the halls empty, they quickly distributed stacks on window sills, in front of doors, on staircases. About to head home, they realized that a few sheets remained and threw them from the stairwell railings down into the university courtyard. This ultimately proved to be a foolish gesture that cost many lives. As the sheets fluttered onto the floor, the janitor appeared, noticed the two and arrested them on the spot. After a few moments, the Gestapo arrived and took them away. Four days later, after a perfunctory trial before the People' s Court in Munich, they were beheaded.

Theirs were acts of incredible conscience and courage. They were youths rich in faith, with a profound ecumenical vision. Although they lived at a different time, they are of enormous importance. Many of their young peers associated with the group and also lost their lives. Our society is poor in Christian models; and we need figures who are an example of faith, hope and charity. These martyrs are real models of faith who have something to say to all our young people.

Although they actually accomplished little (obviously they had no realistic chance of accomplishing very much from the outset), the White Rose students serve as an example that not all Germans blindly went along with Hitler. That they failed was perhaps preordained; that they dared to try is a testament to their humanity.

May St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross and her young friends from Munich intercede for us and for the young people of the world during the great gathering in Cologne in August.

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Reflection for Tuesday July 19, 2005

Angels invite us to put on the lenses and mind of Christ

Several of our viewers have written and asked me to comment on the widespread use of angels in our day. They are concerned that the angels of their childhood piety have been transformed into consumer products and advertising gimmicks. “Angelmania” seems to have trivialized our devotion to the angels.

During these days of summer, allow me to offer some brief reflections on God’s winged friends. If the angels teach us anything, they show us what it means to put on the mind of Christ. What a great privilege is theirs to stand constantly in God's presence, to feast their eyes on Jesus, to know his face and even more, his mind. They look upon the world and on each of us with the mind of Christ. To truly love someone is not only to adore their face and their external reality, but to enter their mind and heart. We have not only been given the spirit, the love and the strength of Christ. We also have been given His mind.

Our minds as well as our emotions are to be trained to see and to judge the events of our day. That is why we are invited by the Scriptures and by the Church to discern the signs of the times, and why the early church swept over the Roman Empire, not only by out-loving and out-living the pagan world but by out-thinking it as well. The pagan world, today as in the past, is always happy to tolerate a church that neglects the Christian mind. Even dictators have been undisturbed by Christians who confined their activities to prayer and worship.

When we think of how the Christian Gospel inspired and shaped the civilization we have inherited, how it taught generations to look at the human drama through the lens of Christ, and inspired not only the glories of art, music, poetry and architecture but also the thinkers and theologians who swayed our destinies, then we must have a different vision of our religious heritage.

How often do we hear: "I don't want to look at the world through any lens at all, especially angelic ones: I want to look at the facts and let them speak for themselves." This is the great heresy of our times: the myth of objectivity -the belief that the factors of life around us need no interpretation. Anyone who brings some prior conviction into play is accused of ignoring or distorting the facts. But there is no such thing as a purely objective judgment. We all bring some lens through which to see the facts. We all have our lenses. But my plea is for the lens, the mind and the heart of Christ. The angels have much to teach us- they offer us ways of looking at Christ and at the world.

To talk about angels today is not merely okay, it is also therapeutic. The important thing is not the terminology but the realization that there are such powers of numinous strength and majesty, that can break in on humans. These powers stir the deepest and most awesome responses within us; they can destroy or upbuild, illumine or darken. Those who do not recognize them, who persistently refuse to admit their existence, have little chance to avoid the destructive powers in the human psyche and in the universe; they are unlikely to open themselves to the angelic, and to the Christ who wants to live within all humans. There are dimensions of life far deeper and more mysterious than most of us usually admit. Those who have the courage to open themselves to these biblical angels may come to know divine love more deeply. They may be able to reach deep into life and know its meaning more fully.

So much of the resurgence of angels today and this angel mania is pure sentimentality--devoid of any authentic spirituality. But some of it is not. Some it betrays our deep human longing for God, for whom our hearts are restless until they rest in Him. Could angel mania not reveal our quest for spirituality, our burning need to probe the deeper questions of hope and faith? Perhaps the angels are speaking to us once again, and teaching us what it means to desire God's presence. They are, after all, in a good position to do that.

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Reflection for Friday July 15, 2005

Becoming the People of the Beatitudes:
the Meaning of World Youth Days (part 1)

World Youth Days are celebrations of Jesus Christ and the Catholic Faith. At the welcoming ceremony of World Youth Day 2002, Pope John Paul II said: “With your gaze set firmly on him [Jesus], you will discover the path of forgiveness and reconciliation in a world often laid waste by violence and terror.” The person of Jesus Christ must be at the heart of our efforts with young adults. In order to be authentic believers, we must have a deep, personal relationship with Jesus Christ. How is Christ at the heart of our efforts with young people? What is distinctive and unique about being Catholic?

The principal elements of World Youth Days — Christ, Sacred Scripture, catechesis, the sacraments (especially Reconciliation and Eucharist), piety, devotion, the World Youth Day Cross, the saints, together with the moments of pilgrimage, the Youth Festival, social service projects, vocations—must find a central place in our pastoral efforts with young people.

  • Pope John Paul’s biblical theme for WYD 2002 was most appropriate for our society and world that are often steeped in mediocrity and darkness. “You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:13-14). What biblical stories and images animate our pastoral ministry with young people?
     
  • During WYD 2002 in Toronto, over 100,000 young people celebrated the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Through this sacrament Christ lets us meet him and brings out the best in us. In our pastoral work with young people, do we present this sacrament as a privileged encounter with Christ who heals, forgives and liberates us?
     
  • The preparations for WYD 2002 and 2005 offered the Church in Canada profound moments to deepen our Christian piety and devotion. As well, the historic, 43,000-km pilgrimage of the WYD Cross and the magnificent presentation of the Stations of the Cross were a provocative, profound witness of the Christian story in the heart of a modern city. How have we continued this tradition in our parish communities and youth activities? Do we acknowledge the need for solid, biblically rooted Christian piety and devotion in the lives of young people today?
     
  • During his pontificate, John Paul II proclaimed 1,338 blesseds and 482 saints. Young adults need heroes and heroines today, and the Pope gave us outstanding models of holiness and humanity. Nine young blesseds and saints were patrons of WYD 2002; several more were patrons for WYD 2005. How often do we present them as the real role models for young people today?
     
  • Have we taken to heart Pope John Paul II’s invitation to young people to consider lives of consecrated service in the Church today? “think of the vast majority of dedicated and generous priests and religious whose only wish is to serve and do good! There are many priests, seminarians and consecrated persons here today; be close to them and support them! And if, in the depths of your hearts, you feel the same call to the priesthood or consecrated life, do not be afraid to follow Christ on the royal road of the cross! At difficult moments in the Church’s life, the pursuit of holiness becomes even more urgent.” 

How many people are no longer afraid because they saw in John Paul II one who was not afraid? How many young seminarians and religious have spoken their ‘yes’ because of him? How many young men and women have discovered meaning in John Paul II’s theology of the body and have entered into marriage with deep faith and conviction? How many ordinary people have done extraordinary things because of his influence, his teaching and his gestures?

Let us give thanks to God for Pope John Paul II who believed in young people. We are now shepherded by Pope Benedict XVI, someone who is deeply committed to bringing young people to Christ. On the morning after his election, Benedict XVI spoke at the end of a Mass: “I think in particular of young people. [...] With you, dear young people, future and hope of the Church and of humanity, I will continue to dialogue, listening to your expectations in an attempt to help you to encounter ever more profoundly the living Christ, who is eternally young.” In a homily a few days later, he said: “I say to you, dear young people: Do not be afraid of Christ! He takes nothing away, and he gives you everything. When we give ourselves to him, we receive a hundredfold in return. Yes, open, open wide the doors to Christ—and you will find true life.”

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Reflection for Tuesday July 12, 2005

The Church and Homosexuality

Last week’s reflection on the centrality, dignity and sacredness of marriage and the dignity of homosexual persons invited a host of responses from across the country.  I thank all of those people who took the time to write, call, and send e-mails of encouragement to us at Salt and Light Television.  Since we now have nearly 100,000 subscribers and viewers across Canada, the messages coming to us really do represent a wide spectrum of Canadian society and the Canadian Church.  Many of you asked that we state clearly what the Church teaches about homosexuality.

As you well know, all of human sexuality, including homosexuality, is the topic of so much discussion and study. It is really only in the last fifty-sixty years that the scientific and the medical communities have seen homosexuality not so much as a matter of choice for the great number of people, but they have seen it as an orientation, as part of who that person is, not as something that has necessarily been chosen.

In 1986, a document of the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith stated, "... it can be clearly seen that the phenomenon of homosexuality, as complex as it is, and with many consequences for society and ecclesiastical life, is a proper focus for the Church's pastoral care. It thus requires of her ministers attentive study, active concern, and honest, well-balanced counsel." That same document in paragraph 3 states, "... the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin” yet “the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder.”

In this 1986 document the Church also teaches clearly:  "It is deplorable that homosexual persons have been and are the object of violent malice in speech or in action. Such treatment deserves condemnation from the Church's pastors whenever it occurs. It reveals a kind of disregard for others, which endangers the most fundamental principles of a healthy society. The intrinsic dignity of each person must always be respected in action and in law." Further in the same document it states, "Today the Church provides a badly needed context for the care of a human person which she refuses to consider solely as heterosexual or homosexual, and insists that every person has a fundamental identity: a creature of God, and by grace, God's child and an heir to eternal life."

Our Catholic Catechism, published in 1994 states: "The number of men and women who have deep seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible.  They do not choose their homosexual condition. For most of them it is a trial.  They are to be accepted with respect, with compassion, with sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.  These people are called to fulfill God's will in their lives."

In its prayer and in its remembering, the Church goes back to the fifth chapter of Matthews Gospel. It remembers the high standards that Jesus gave us in the Beatitudes. Even though being so compassionate and understanding with our human weaknesses, Jesus preached those Beatitudes of singleness of heart, of seeking justice, of being merciful, and so on, that were the hallmarks of His real disciples.  Jesus looked out at those disciples, people like us, and said, "You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world." That is the dignity He saw in them and still looks for in us.

But Jesus also challenged his hearers and followers:  “You have heard it said, ‘You should not commit adultery…  But even to look at another with lust in your heart is a sin." And later, in discussing forgiveness and being asked, should we forgive even up to seven times, the Lord answered, "Seventy times seven times." You see, Jesus is also always challenging us as disciples to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church sets high standards for the situation of single and married persons, but also for the persons of a homosexual orientation. It states, "Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection."

The Catechism reminds those who are not married that fornication is sinful, or that adultery is sinful for those who are married, so it says that "homosexual acts cannot be approved."  It is a reminder that all of us, whatever the sexual orientation, are called to live chaste lives.  As disciples of the Lord, we must offer mutual support and encouragement and strive to live up to these standards.

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Reflection for Tuesday July 5, 2005

"Preserving what is deep, good and valid in our own heritage"

At the arrival ceremony in Toronto for the late Pope John Paul II at the beginning of World Youth Day 2002, the Holy Father spoke these powerful words to Government officials and the people of Canada at Pearson International Airport on July 23, 2002:

"Canadians are heirs to an extraordinarily rich humanism, enriched even more by the blend of many different cultural elements... In a world of great social and ethical strains, and confusion about the very purpose of life, Canadians have an incomparable treasure to contribute – on condition that they preserve what is deep, and good and valid in their own heritage."

The Parliament of Canada has voted to alter the definition it gives to marriage for the purposes of Canadian civil law. This decision could bring in its wake bitter and unpredictable demographic, social, cultural, and religious consequences.

The Vatican has called recent government measures in Spain and Canada legalizing same-sex marriage "new, violent attacks against the family." Spain's Parliament approved a bill June 30 to allow same-sex couples to marry and adopt children; Canada's Parliament approved legislation legalizing same-sex marriage two days earlier. The laws passed in Canada and Spain are expected to go into effect later this month. The Netherlands and Belgium passed similar laws allowing gay marriages in 2001 and 2003, respectively. Until now, only Spain allows for the adoption of children by married gay couples.

With Bill C-38 now proceeding to the Senate of Canada, and in view also of ongoing developments in the health-care crisis, Canadians continue to witness a dangerous deterioration of their communal values. This worrisome decline in shared concern and care for the common good is also evident in the continuing high rates of marriage breakdown, the annual number of abortions, and the declining number of births.

A plan of action is now before us. Our Canadian reality is truly based on a transcendent vision of life based on Christian revelation that has made us a free, democratic and caring society, recognized throughout the world as a champion of human rights and human dignity. We will only continue to offer this treasure to humanity and history if we preserve what is deep and good and valid in our own heritage. And one of the greatest gifts we have received is marriage.

You lay people are the ministers of the Sacrament of Marriage. You are its beneficiaries. Uphold the dignity of this important institution and sacrament. Support the Marriage Preparation Programs in your parish communities. Insist that in your parishes and dioceses, you have solid vocational programs for young adults and young people. It all begins there.

Use such opportunities and programs to give public witness, to speak about the sacredness and dignity of marriage, of family life, to future generations. Parishes, dioceses and countries that do not have creative pastoral strategies and vocational programs for young people leave the door open to tremendous moral confusion and misunderstanding, misinformation, emptiness.

As Christians, we must banish from our vocabulary, our hearts and our communities all existing tendencies of hating, reviling and destroying gay people- women and men with a homosexual orientation who, in most cases, have not chosen that orientation. For many homosexual persons, being gay is anything but being happy.

Gay people may be our sons and daughters, brothers or sisters, colleagues, neighbors, confreres, health care workers, clergy, and friends. They are also sons and daughters of God, created in God's image and likeness.

Over the past months I have heard from some gay women and men who have expressed their own frustration that the "same sex marriage legislation" was thrust upon them just as it was thrust upon heterosexual persons. Hateful language that labels all homosexual persons as "radical gay activists out to destroy society and family life" is not only erroneous, it is anti-Christian.

In some cases, the homosexual person grew up in very ordinary, loving family situations. Sexual orientation was not the result of external conditions. In other cases, the gay son or daughter, brother or sister, grew up in a divided family situation, accustomed to brokenness and rejection.

I have never met any gay people who hate the Sacrament or Institution of Marriage of a man and a woman, or despise the raising of children by a mother and father united in marriage. I have encountered gay men and women who bear the suffering of broken families and who grew up in hostile environments that did not nurture life.

Finally, let us not forget that other bonds of love and interdependency, of commitment and mutual responsibility exist in society. They may be good; they may even be recognized in law. They are not the same as marriage; they are something else. No extension of terminology for legal purposes will change the observable reality that only the committed union of a man and a woman carries, not only the bond of interdependency between the two adults, but the inherent capacity to bring forth children.

Men and women commit themselves to one another and to the children who are created through them and whom they nurture to adulthood. Let us pray that this nurturing be done in healthy, holy and happy ways.

Together as God's people, let us continue to help one another to bear the crosses that the Lord has given to us. Let us recommit ourselves to building up the human family, to strengthening and enshrining marriage, to blessing and nurturing children, and to making our homes, families and parish communities holy, welcoming places for women and men of every race, language, orientation and way of life.

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Reflection for Friday July 1, 2005

Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati

On July 4, the Church remembers Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati, whom Pope John Paul II called “the man of eight Beatitudes," at his Beatification Ceremony in St. Peter’s Square in 1990, and whom he has upheld on many occasions since then as a model of Christian living for young people.

Pier Giorgio was born in Turin, Italy on April 6, 1901. His mother, Adelaide Ametis, was a painter. His father Alfredo, an agnostic, was the founder and director of the liberal newspaper, "La Stampa", and was influential in Italian politics, holding positions as an Italian Senator and Italian Ambassador to Germany.

Pier Giorgio was educated by the Jesuits and developed the practice of daily Mass and Communion. His parents were not pleased at this; as bourgeois liberals, they feared that he might become a priest. In an era of strong anti-Catholicism, Pier Giorgio was deeply committed to the Church and had a great love for Mary. He never hesitated to share his deep spiritual life with his friends. An athlete, interested in cars, mountain climbing, amateur photography, he loved skiing and fencing.

At the age of 17, in 1918, he joined the St. Vincent de Paul Society and dedicated much of his spare time to serving the sick and the needy, caring for orphans, and assisting the demobilized servicemen returning from World War I. His charity did not simply involve giving something to others, but giving completely of himself. Pier Giorgio used to say often: "Christ comes to visit me daily in the Holy Eucharist. I return His visit by going to see Him in the poor."

He decided to become a mining engineer, studying at the Royal Polytechnic University of Turin, so he could "serve Christ better among the miners", as he told a friend. He was very popular at university and started a group of young women and men who would help each other to study and pray.

Just before receiving his university degree, he contracted poliomyelitis, which doctors later speculated he caught from the sick whom he tended. After six days of terrible suffering Pier Giorgio died at the age of 24 on July 4, 1925, neglected by his family even on his death bed. His last preoccupation was for the poor.

His funeral was a triumph. The streets of the city were lined with a multitude of mourners who were unknown to his family: clergy and students, and the poor and the needy whom he had served so unselfishly for seven years.

The stories of Pier Giorgio Frassati’s piety, faith, youthfulness, generosity and heroism abound. Many have been struck by his close relationship with the poor whom he loved. It was not simply a matter of giving something to the lonely, the poor, the sick - but rather, giving his whole self. He blended together in his life contemplation and social action in a remarkable way.

Thank you, Pier Giorgio, for giving flesh and blood to the Beatitudes. Thank you for being our inspiration for World Youth Day 2002. As young people look to your life and example, may they remember the words of Pope John Paul II spoken at Exhibition Place in Toronto, on July 25, 2002:

Lord Jesus Christ, proclaim once more your Beatitudes
in the presence of these young people,
gathered in Toronto for the World Youth Day.
Look upon them with love and listen to their young hearts,
ready to put their future on the line for you.
You have called them to be
the "salt of the earth and light of the world".
Continue to teach them the truth and beauty
of the vision that you proclaimed on the Mountain.
Make them men and women of the Beatitudes!
Let the light of your wisdom shine upon them,
so that in word and deed they may spread
in the world the light and salt of the Gospel.
Make their whole life a bright reflection of you,
who are the true light that came into this world
so that whoever believes in you will not die,
but will have eternal life (cf. Jn 3:16)!

May young people find in you, Pier Giorgio, what Jesus' Sermon on a Galilean hillside really meant.

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Reflection for Tuesday June 28, 2005

Peter and Paul: Foundations of the Church

On June 29, the church celebrates the feast of the two great apostles: Peter and Paul. According to tradition, the morning of June 29 of the year 64 A.D. Peter and Paul were taken from their common cell at Rome's Mamertino prison and separated. Artists through the ages have dwelt on their goodbye, often depicting the last embrace between the two friends. The Golden Legend records their parting words:

Paul to Peter: "Peace be with you, foundation stone of the churches and shepherd of the sheep and lambs of Christ!" And Peter to Paul: "Go in peace, preacher of virtuous living, mediator and leader of the salvation of the righteous!"

Peter was taken to Nero's Circus where he was crucified upside down, while Paul was taken east to the area now known as Tre Fontane. The name records the legend of the saint's beheading, when his severed head reportedly bounced three times, creating three fountains.

The connection between the two saints is also evident in their respective basilicas. Emperor Constantine built the first six Christian churches in Rome from 313 to 328, and among them were St. Peter's Basilica and St. Paul's "outside the walls." Five of the churches face east, as was common in orienting churches at the time. St. Paul's faces west, so that across the city, both basilicas watch over the sheep and lambs of their city.

I wonder if the two liked each other as friends! As ordinary men, Peter and Paul probably would have avoided each other. Peter was a fisherman from the Sea of Galilee and Paul a Greek-educated intellectual. But Jesus brought them together as a sign for his church in which the entire spectrum of humankind would find a new place to call home.

Peter’s journey was from the weakness of denial to the rock of fidelity. He gave us the ultimate witness of the cross. Paul’s pilgrimage was from the blindness of persecution to the fire of proclamation. He made the Word of God come alive for the nations.

Together they worked to build the church. Together they witnessed to Christ. Together they suffered the death of their Lord, death at murderous hands. Paul died by the sword and Peter was crucified upside down. They had a unity which transcended all differences. For Peter and Paul, insight into Jesus' true identity brought new demands and responsibilities. They taught us about the depths of Christian commitment.

Let me leave you with these words of the great German writer Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe on the feast of the two great pillars of our Church:

"Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness, concerning all acts of initiative (and creation). There is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too.

All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance which no man could have dreamed would come his way. Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now."

To be with Peter means to preserve the unity of the Christian church.
To speak with Paul is to proclaim the pure Word of God.
Their passion was to proclaim the Gospel of Christ.
Their commitment was to create a place for everyone in Christ’s church.
Their loyalty to Christ was valid to death. They were not afraid.
What do we perceive to be our responsibilities and commitments following upon our own declaration of faith in Jesus?

Peter and Paul are for us a strong foundation, they are pillars of our church. Let us pray for a small portion of their boldness, genius, power, courage and commitment in our own lives.

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Reflection for Friday June 24, 2005

"Stay with us, Lord" during this Year of the Eucharist

“Mane Nobiscum, Domine!” “Stay with us, Lord!” The theme of the Year of the Eucharist. This theme is drawn from the magnificent story of the Disciples of Emmaus in Luke’s Gospel. This story is at the heart of Luke’s resurrection chapter (24). In it we see Jesus as the successful evangelist, journeying with people through their sadness and disbelief, and leading them into an experience of God’s Word and God’s life at table. Through simple, yet profound questions, he stirs the hearts of his listeners to look beyond the surface and recognize God’s divine plan for humanity. Emmaus continues Jesus' journey, his pursuit of wayward disciples that was already prefigured by the parable of the shepherd who went in search of lost sheep until he found them and returned them to the fold (15:3-7).

When we meet the disciples on the road to Emmaus, it is evening, and the glow of that first Easter day has begun to fade. Resurrection at this point is nothing more than a rumor or a tale. Buried beneath their verbal exchange lies a deep yearning and holy hunger. Intimately intertwined with their skepticism is their hope, and their need for God to be alive, vibrant and present.

But the baggage of their doubt impedes the fervor of their faith. And so they fail to recognize Jesus. Without being aware of what they are really saying along the road, the two disciples profess many of the central elements of the creed of the Christian faith but they remain blind to the necessity of the Messianic suffering predicted in the Scriptures.

The stranger on the road to Emmaus takes the skepticism and curiosity of the disciples and weaves them into the fabric of the Scripture. Jesus challenges them to reinterpret the events of the past days in light of the Scriptures and they share a meal together. After breaking the bread with them, he disappears and finally their eyes are opened. This meeting of the “tradition” with the “encounter” of Jesus in the flesh kindled a fire in the hearts of those who traveled with him.

Finally in the intimacy of the breaking of the bread were their eyes opened and they recognized the Risen One in their midst. Understanding the resurrection implies a two-fold process of knowing the message of the Scriptures and experiencing the one about whom they all speak: Jesus the Lord, through the breaking and sharing of bread with the community of believers.

At Emmaus, the risen Christ performs the same basic actions that he performed at the multiplication of the loaves (9:16) and at the Last Supper. The many meals of Jesus, especially his last supper, can be said to be in the background of the evangelist's mind in describing this moment of recognition (cf. Lk 5:29; 7:36; 14:1,12,15,16; 22:14). With this experience of the Risen Jesus the Emmaus disciples believe.

The issue is how Luke uses the story to teach his readers in 80 A.D. They might have said to themselves that 50-60 years ago, people were so fortunate to have seen the Risen Lord with their very eyes. Nostalgia would cause people to say that having been there, back then, might make a difference in the way that they think and believe today!

But Luke says that even those who were there weren't able to recognize Jesus until the Scriptures were "opened" and the "eucharistic" meal was shared. The bottom line is this: a past generation is not more fortunate or blessed to have encountered the risen Jesus than is a generation that hasn't seen him! Faith in Jesus transcends all history, space and time. Christians of Luke's time and Christians of our time have the same essential elements necessary for recognizing the Lord: the Scriptures and the Eucharist.

May these reflections help us to deepen our love of the Eucharist and give us the courage to put into practice what we celebrate at each Eucharistic celebration.

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Reflection for Tusday June 21, 2005

"Being conquered by Christ"

Today I would like to address this message particularly to the priests, pastors and bishops who are among our regular, faithful viewers of Salt and Light Television. Many of you have contacted us or written us, telling us how helpful you find our programming, and these weekly reflections. This reflection is for you.

The church events which we have lived through during the month of April of this Year of the Eucharistic (2005) have been an unrepeatable grace in our Christian and priestly lives. Pope John Paul II has left us a priestly inheritance with his Holy Thursday letter to priests of 14 March 2005, which is a synthesis of his previous documents on priesthood. Pope Benedict XVI has called us to live this Year of the Eucharist rediscovering the friendship of Christ and making it the key of our priestly existence.

The exhortations of John Paul II and Benedict XVI stand as a prolongation of the invitation of Christ himself "stay in my love … you are my friends" Our priestly "existence" is called to be: a grateful existence, giving, saving, memorable, consecrated, held out to Christ, Eucharistic at the school of Mary.

John Paul II in the encyclical "Ecclesiae de Eucharistia" and the Apostolic Exhortation "Mane Nobiscum Domine" lays out for us certain lines of "Eucharistic spirituality" for all vocations. In re-reading these texts we feel profoundly touched, especially if we have had this experience before the Tabernacle. Christ continues to speak today, from heart to heart.

Our Christian and priestly spirituality is relational or of friendship, it is a giving in union with the charity of the Good Shepherd, it is transforming so that it makes us a clear sign of Jesus himself, it is Marian in that it approaches the school of Mary, it is of ecclesial communion, it is ministerial or of service, it is missionary. … It is nearly always an attitude of thanksgiving "Eucharistic," of one who feels loved by the Lord and as a consequence, wants to love all and wants to be loved by all.

The consequence of a relational life on our part is very logical, that as all the faithful, we are called to be: "souls enamored of him, ready to wait patiently to hear his voice and, as it were, to sense the beating of his heart" ("Mane Nobiscum Domine," n. 18). If we do not experience this intimacy with Christ, priestly identity or existence vanishes and does not find sense in life anymore: "Jesus in the tabernacle wants you to be at his side, so that he can fill your hearts with the experience of his friendship, which alone gives meaning and fulfillment to your lives".

The Petrine ministry has been experienced in our hearts as never before in the month of April of this year, with two Popes who have invited us to a life centered on Christ in the Most Holy Eucharist, through experience, eating that "same bread" which in which we are "one body" (1 Corinthians 10:17).

When we have meditated this year on the question of Christ to Peter "do you love me?" to communicate to him the primacy of shepherding, we have felt more than ever, we who are personally called, like shepherds of the same flock. It is as if our response has been like that of Peter "you know that I love you." In fact, if we live in communion with him who "who is the head of universal charity" that is to live also in communion with Peter and his successors.

Pope Benedict XVI, during his inauguration Mass in St. Peter's Square made an appeal to everybody, remembering however at the same time "the work of the shepherd, as fisher of men." After having repeated the appeal of John Paul II, made at the inauguration of his pontificate ("open wide the doors to Christ"), he added "whoever lets Christ enter will not loose anything, nothing that will render life free, beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors of life opened wide. Only in this friendship is the great potential of the human conditioned opened up. Only in this friendship do we experience what is good and free" (Benedict XVI, Homily 24 April 2005).

In truth there is nothing more beautiful than to be conquered by Christ. Living faithfully in communion with the Petrine charism and ministry, rediscovering this reality of our pastoral vocation as sources of the paschal joy of Christ in us and others "There is nothing more beautiful than to know Him and to speak to others of our friendship with Him. The task of the shepherd, the task of the fisher of men, can often seem wearisome. But it is beautiful and wonderful, because it is truly a service to joy, to God's joy which longs to break into the world".

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Reflection for Saturday June 18, 2005

Ad multos annos, Cardinal Ambrozic!

I would like to extend our best wishes to Cardinal Aloysius Ambrozic, Archbishop of Toronto who recently celebrated 50 years of Priestly Ordination on June 4, 2005.  Cardinal Ambrozic, a renowned Scripture scholar, was named Auxiliary Bishop of Toronto in 1976 and then became Archbishop, succeeding Gerald Emmett Cardinal Carter.  Ambrozic, along with 22 others, was made Cardinal in February, 1998 by Pope John Paul II.

Cardinals are chosen by the Holy Father to serve as his principal assistants and advisers in the central administration of church affairs.  Collectively, they form the College of Cardinals.  The word cardinal is derived from two early Latin terms, cardo and cardinis.  For the past three hundred years, the English translation has rendered these two words as “hinge,” to signify that important device that serves as a juncture for two opposing forces and that affords harmony as a result.  As a hinge permits a door to hang easily upon a framed portal, so too the cardinals, it was believed, facilitated an easy relationship between the theological and governmental roles of the hierarchy of the Church.

The cardinals’ color red symbolizes the blood shed by martyrs and witnesses for the faith.  Giving public, clear witness to the faith lies at the heart of each Cardinal’s mission.

In 1492 Lorenzo the Magnificent wrote to his youngest son, Giovanni dei Medici, a cardinal deacon at thirteen and later Leo X (1513-1521):  “In your person we behold the greatest dignity ever granted by God to our family, and its value is the greatest by reason of your age...  Never fail to remind yourself that it is not your merits, nor your prudence, nor your conduct, that has made you what you are; it is God himself who has made you a cardinal, you should show that you realize this by living a holy, exemplary and honorable life... ."

The role of the College of Cardinals, especially under the leadership of Pope John Paul II, and now under Benedict XVI remains a pivotal one in the Church of the third millennium century.

To mark the momentous occcasion of fifty years of priestly ministry in the Church, Pope Benedict XVI wrote to Cardinal Ambrozic last week.  I would like to share with you excerpts of that letter:

“To our Venerable Brother, Aloysius Matthew Cardinal Ambrozic, Archbishop of Toronto, As priest and Bishop, you have spent fifty uninterrupted years, zealously and carefully working for the spiritual wellbeing of this one community.

…We congratulate you, together with the beloved Church of Toronto, which has known for many years your strong and learned leadership in the ways of the Gospel of the Lord.  We rejoice fervently in the Lord for your apostolic dedication for that Church, your proven fidelity toward the Magisterium, your right doctrine of the faith, together with your sure spirit of governance.

…from the depths of our heart, we impart our Apostolic Blessing, extended with this letter to you and to the flock of Toronto.  We will remember you kindly, then, on the most joyful day of June, gathered together with your auxiliary bishops, helpers in the priesthood and faithful, in festive honouring of the first days of your priesthood.”

What do we wish for you today, Your Eminence?  And what do we wish for the Church of Toronto as you continue your Episcopal ministry amoung us?  Health, happiness, peace, deep fulfillment and abiding joy. You have given us an example of faithful service and daily sacrifice. You have shown us the meaning of unwavering fidelity to Christ and the Church.

With this vast Archdiocese of Toronto and the Church in Canada, we rejoice and celebrate the fact that Pope John Paul II has given us a good shepherd, a teacher, and a faithful witness, in the person of Aloysius Matthew Ambrozic, the Cardinal Archbishop of Toronto.

Happy Golden Anniversary of Priesthood!

Ad multos annos, Your Eminence!

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Reflection for Friday June 10, 2005

The Cardiac Arrest of the Sacred Heart of Jesus

June has always been the month devoted to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, clearly one of the most popular and significant devotions within the Church.  This devotion’s decline in our time is all the more striking because of its pre-eminence in the first half of the 20th century, when so many Catholic families had a picture of Jesus and his Sacred Heart displayed in their homes, and when Thursday night holy hours and first Fridays proliferated in parishes.

Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus has suffered cardiac arrest in recent decades. It has been dismissed as superstitious in its apparent guarantee of salvation to those who practice it, as masochistic in its emphasis on making reparation for Jesus’ own suffering.

Like many forms of heart disease, such atrophy could have been prevented through a healthy diet—in this case, Scripture and tradition. The heart, what the late, great Jesuit theologian, Fr. Karl Rahner, has called a  “primordial word”, is a powerful metaphor in the Bible.  It signifies the wellspring of life, the totality of one’s being.

The prophet Ezekiel, for instance, records God’s promise to change Israel’s “heart of stone” into a “heart of flesh,” while John’s Gospel gives the heart its most profound scriptural expression: Jesus’ heart is the source of living water, of rest for the Beloved Disciple, of the church and its sacraments, of doubting Thomas’s faith.

Jesus revealed His Sacred Heart to Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, a Visitandine nun, in seventeenth century France.  From 1673 to 1675 at the Visitation convent of Paray-le-Monial, Margaret Mary received a series of four revelations from Christ about his heart. He showed Himself in a way that she could understand - with a human heart aflame with love. He told her that He would be present in a special way to those devoted to His Sacred Heart and that His presence would lead to peace in families, the conversion of sinners, blessings in abundance and perseverance when death was near.

This new devotion offered a tender, compassionate spirituality that helped to renew the church and counter Jansenism’s severity and sectarianism.  Devotion to the Sacred Heart helps us experience Christ's presence in our hearts, in our homes and in the Eucharist. It inspires us to love our family members, to be compassionate and forgiving toward others and to reach out to those who are poor. In other words, this devotion helps us to be better disciples.

The deepest meaning of the devotion, however, might be glimpsed in a poet who does not even mention it: Dante Alighieri. At the dark bottom of Dante’s Inferno, Satan is frozen in ice up to his chest, crying tears and drooling bloody foam, his six wings bellowing cold wind upward. Wedged into the inverted apex of the underworld, he is locked in his own resentment, impotent and utterly alone.  Hell, the Inferno makes clear, is not fire, but ice: cold, crabbed isolation. Paradise is pure communion, illuminated and warmed by the love that moves the sun and the other stars. .

In today’s love-starving world, how we need to follow the example of Jesus Christ in His unspeakable love for us.  If there is one adjective that describes the modern world, it is loveless. This world is a selfish world, so preoccupied with the present and immediate that it gives almost no thought to eternity and the everlasting joys that await those who have served God faithfully here on earth.

That is why God puts into our lives so many occasions for loving people who obviously do not love us, or giving ourselves to people who have never given themselves to us. How desperately we need, especially in today’s world, to learn that God became man in order to suffer and die out of love for us on the Cross.

That is what devotion to the Sacred Heart is all about. It is the practice of selfless love toward selfish people. It is giving ourselves to persons that do not give themselves to us. In all of our lives, God has placed selfish persons who may be physically close to us, but spiritually are strangers and even enemies. That is why God places unkind, unjust, even cruel people into our lives. By loving them, we show something of the kind of love that God expects of His followers.  The price of reaching heaven is the practice of selfless love here on earth.

Seventy-two times a minute. 4,320 times an hour. 103,680 times a day. Almost 38 million times a year. Over 2.6 billion times in the course of an average life. Fist-sized, the human heart beats powerfully and durably. It must be sturdy enough to contract and send fresh blood throughout the entire body, elastic enough to collect spent, deoxygenated blood. Too much hardness or softness of heart, and one dies.  Only a healthy heart—strong and supple—can give and receive lifeblood.  May the Sacred Heart of Jesus heal our coronary infirmities.

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Reflection for Wednesday June 8, 2005

Benedict's Vision of Church

Every pope is responsible for defending and proclaiming the entire deposit of church teaching, but within that vast body of material, every pope also has particular passions that he tends to emphasize.

As a theologian and cardinal, Joseph Ratzinger, returned often to the question "Is the church really going to get smaller?" over the years. It is a question that is troubling to some sectors of the Church today. In an interview published in 1997 in a book entitled "Salt of the Earth" (Ignatius Press), he explained it this way: "Maybe we are facing a new and different kind of epoch in the church's history, where Christianity will again be characterized more by the mustard seed, where it will exist in small, seemingly insignificant groups that nonetheless live an intense struggle against evil and bring good into the world - that let God in."

From its first days, the church struggled with sects and schisms and later with the Reformation, and in modern times it is torn by scores of local interests, sex scandals, and dissent on contraception and the role of women in the church. The question is whether those hard truths - on sexuality, on the proper celebration of Mass, on standards for receiving communion - will scare off Catholics who disagree.

There are those who argue that the best way for the church to spread its message is to embrace the largest number of people and to work with them where they are. And at the opposite end are those who would argue that actually the same message is much more credible when it's propounded by a smaller group of individuals who live it more intensely.

Of more interest to Pope Benedict is that the church is also bombarded by a secular culture that he believes offers no fixed values. And the eternal question for the church remains: What do Catholics need to do and believe, in order truly to belong?

Pope Benedict's own record on the idea of a smaller church is layered. But Benedict does not seem to speak happily about the prospect of a smaller church. "Most people admit that at the present stage of things in Europe the number of baptized Christians is simply dwindling," he said in a 2002 book of interviews, "God and the World" (Ignatius Press). "We simply have to face up to it." In that book, in fact, he strongly opposes the idea of being a "closed club."

"I have nothing against it, then, if people who all year long never visit a church go there at least on Christmas Night or New Year's Eve or on special occasions, because this is another way of belonging to the blessing of the sacred, to the light," he said.

For Pope Benedict, fundamentally a man of Europe, the issue of a smaller church seems mostly to be defined by the losses in the developed world, since growth in the third world has pushed church membership to more than one billion.

And his approach to re-evangelize Europe, some think, is likely to differ from that of Pope John Paul II and his stadium rallies. Many experts expect a greater focus on small groups, based on the model of his namesake, St. Benedict, who inspired the monastic order that spread Christianity and Western culture in Europe in the Dark Ages.

Given Ratzinger's oft-invoked image of Catholicism as a "creative minority" reduced in size but fortified by stronger fidelity, many expected the initial days of the new Pontificate to be a "night of the long knives," a purge of dissident voices and a reassertion of order and discipline. To date, that has not materialized. Both critics and supporters of Benedict alike say that it is unlikely that he would plan to prune back the church intentionally - or that he could.

Benedict’s Christian concept of Church is 'leaven' and that's a very strong, biblical ideal: small, faithful groups tend to revive the whole community. Cardinal Ratzinger once wrote, the West will tire of secularism and spiritual loneliness. "And they will discover the little community of believers as something quite new. …As a hope that is there for them, as the answer they have always been looking for."

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Reflection for Thursday June 2, 2005

Pope John Paul II: Santo Subito!

On Friday, May 13, Pope Benedict XVI announced the he will dispense with the five-year waiting period, established by Canon Law, to open John Paul II's cause of beatification. During his meeting with priests of the Diocese of Rome, held in the Basilica of St. John Lateran, the Pope read the following announcement in Latin: "The Supreme Pontiff, Benedict XVI, has dispensed with the period of five years of waiting, after the death of the Servant of God, John Paul II, Supreme Pontiff." The rescript, as it is known in canonical terms, was requested of the Pope by Cardinal Camillo Ruini, vicar for the Diocese of Rome, the diocese in which John Paul II lived for nearly 27 years.

Benedict XVI chose the feast of the Virgin of Fatima, May 13, as the date to make this important announcement. John Paul II had a special devotion to Our Lady of Fatima who he believed, as he acknowledged in his testament, intervened to save his life on May 13, 1981, when he was the target of an assassination attempt. An immense, prolonged applause resounded in the Lateran cathedral, interrupting the Holy Father's words. The Pope smiled with evident emotion and stood and to join his brother bishops and priests in the long ovation.

Normally, candidates for sainthood, or the halfway stage of beatification, must be dead for at least five years before the long process of investigating and approving the person's cause can start. But Cardinal Saraiva Martins, head of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, said that the pope had the power to waive the rule if he deemed it fit. And Benedict did indeed do that.

With this announcement, 42 days after the death of John Paul II, Benedict XVI responded to the cry that took over St. Peter's square April 8, the day of his predecessor's funeral: "Santo subito!", "Sainthood now!" It was Pope John Paul himself, who dispensed with two years of the five-year waiting period for Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, whom he beatified in October 2003. For his part, Benedict XVI dispensed of the entire waiting period in the case of his predecessor.

A week after Wojtyla's death, on April 2, 2005, dozens of cardinals reportedly signed a petition to be given to his successor, asking him to accelerate sainthood procedures John Paul. They were impressed by the outpouring of grief that accompanied his final hours and the scores of placards saying 'Santo Subito!' which were held aloft during the funeral. They were also aware that dozens of miracles attributed to him are piling up in the Vatican.

A miracle is the seal with which God guarantees that a person is with God and that God is with that person, in communion. For this reason, a miracle realized in life is not valid for the process of canonization; it must be realized after death.

Bishop Renato Boccardo, who was in charge of organizing Pope John Paul's trips, said that looking at the individuals recognized by the church between 1978 and 2005 "opens a window into the secret life of John Paul II." The 20th century produced more martyrs than any other century in history with Nazi, communist and other totalitarian regimes persecuting the church.

"He lived with the saints. They were his friends and traveling companions, some of a lifetime and some whom he met along the way." "Each day, every day, everywhere in the world, he prayed a litany of Polish saints. He had a little white card with the litany printed on it, but he had added in his own writing the Polish saints he had proclaimed," said Bishop Boccardo, who is now Secretary General of Vatican City.

By presiding personally over beatification ceremonies at home and abroad, Pope John Paul made sainthood truly universal, instead of being centered on the Mediterranean. With Karol Wojtyla, holiness became universal and he reminded us that to be a saint is to do ordinary things extraordinarily well. Pope John Paul II was a living Gospel and a model of holiness.. May he continue to intercede for us and bless us from the window of the Father’s House.

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Reflection for Tuesday May 31, 2005

Beatitifications, Canonizations and Benedict XVI

When Mother Marianne Cope of Molokai was beatified on Saturday, May 14 in St. Peter's Basilica, Pope Benedict XVI did not celebrate the beatification Mass. The Portuguese Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, prefect of the Congregation for Saints' Causes was asked by the Holy Father to preside over the evening Mass at the Altar of the Cathedra in St. Peter’s Basilica.

Mother Marianne was a member of the Sisters of St. Francis, who have their motherhouse in Syracuse, N.Y. Mother Marianne left the motherhouse 122 years ago to go to Hawaii to care for the victims of leprosy, which today is called Hansen's disease.

Pope Benedict had decided that the prefect of the Congregation for Saints' Causes would preside over beatifications in the future, while the pope would preside at canonizations. Since at least 1989, Vatican officials have been discussing changes in the sainthood process, particularly the need to underline the difference between beatification and canonization.

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger once told 30 Giorni, an Italian magazine, "The distinction between beatification and canonization is a completely reasonable instrument for differentiating between figures who can be examples in a specific environment and those who have a message to transmit to the entire church." "However," he said, "I have the impression that today this distinction is not easily recognized from the outside."

For many, beatifications have become almost meaningless. Cardinal Saraiva Martins had said in 2003 that choosing who presides over the ceremony "is not a theological problem, but a pastoral one and must be considered in that light."

The idea of a cardinal, rather than the pope, presiding over a beatification is not something completely new, but a return to a centuries-long practice, which was in use until 1971. For years, Vatican officials and theologians have been discussing the possibility of returning to the pre-1971 practice in order to clarify the fact that a beatification is different from the declaration of sainthood. Pope Paul VI made the change when he decided to preside personally over the 1971 Mass for the beatification of Maximilian Kolbe, the Polish Franciscan martyred in a concentration camp. For that ceremony, Polish Cardinal Karol Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul, concelebrated. Since then, Archbishop Marini said, "we have been losing the sense of the distinction between beatification and canonization."

The most obvious differences between a beatification and canonization are the level of papal authority involved and the extent to which the person may be honored with public Masses and prayers. The difference is seen, somewhat subtly, at the ceremonies: At a beatification, the bishop of the diocese where the person died asks the pope to declare the candidate blessed; at a canonization, the head of the congregation for saints asks in the name of the universal church that the pope proclaim the candidate a saint. The difference was clear when the pope did only canonizations.

When someone is beatified, the pope allows members of the person's religious order and Catholics in the place the person lived to celebrate the newly beatified person's feast day Mass and hold other public acts of veneration. Canonization, on the other hand, is an official papal declaration that the person – now recognized as a saint – is to be venerated throughout the Catholic Church.

Pope Benedict has a pastoral understanding that most Catholics do not realize the difference between beatification and canonization when the ceremonies are equally elaborate. Our new pope is prepared to end the duplication which produced no good, but only created confusion. A new emphasis on the distinction would calm the mania on the part of organizations and religious orders to have their founders beatified and canonized.

I have often heard the question about 'excessive' number of saints and blesseds proclaimed (in the last 26 years, and Pope John Paul II was certainly aware of such critiques and concerns. Pope John Paul beatified 1338 women and men, and canonized 482 Saints compared to the combined total of 302 saints proclaimed by all his predecessors between 1594 and 1978.

But let us remember that it is not the pope who makes saints or, even less, the congregation of Saints – which some refer to as a 'saint factory.' The formal recognition that a person is a saint is not the fruit of propaganda or good organization, but the result over time of many faithful looking to these individuals as friends in heaven, asking for their help and trying to imitate how they lived.

Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI agreed on the need for saints and on the fact that God continues to call and raise up saints among the faithful. The church recognizes saints, the pope proclaims them, but God makes saints by spreading his grace and individuals become saints by welcoming his grace.

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Reflection for Thursday May 26, 2005

"We Cannot Live Without Sunday"

As the church prepares to celebrate the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ on Sunday, May 29, I would like to share with you the story of a group of martyrs in the early Church who give us some profound insights into the gift of the Eucharist, and the importance of our Sunday gatherings. These heroic witnesses, known as the “Martyrs of Abitene” martyred in 303, were Christians who lived in Abitene, a city of the Roman province called "Africa Proconsularis," today's Tunis. They were victims of Emperor Diocletian's persecution, initiated after years of relative calm.

The martyrs' message is the theme of the 24th Italian National Eucharistic Congress, that is being held in Bari, Italy this week. Pope Benedict XVI will preside at the closing mass of the Congress on Sunday, May 29.

The emperor Diocletian ordered that "the sacred texts and holy testaments of the Lord and the divine Scriptures be found, so that they could be burnt; the Lord's basilicas were to be pulled down; and the celebration of sacred rites and holy reunions of the Lord were to be prohibited" (Acts of the Martyrs, I). Disobeying the emperor's orders, a group of 49 Christians of Abitene (among them Senator Dativus, the priest Saturninus, the virgin Victoria, and the reader Emeritus) gathered weekly in one of their homes to celebrate Sunday Mass. Taken by surprise during one of the meetings in Octavius Felix's home, they were arrested and taken to Carthage to Proconsul Anulinus to be interrogated.

When the Proconsul asked them if they kept the Scriptures in their homes, the martyrs answered courageously that "they kept them in their hearts," revealing that they did not wish to separate faith from life. During their torture and torment, the martyrs uttered exclamations such as: "I implore you, Christ, hear me," "I thank you, O God," "I implore you, Christ, have mercy" were exclamations. Along with their prayers they offered their lives and asked that their executioners be forgiven.

Among the testimonies, is that of Emeritus, who affirmed fearlessly that he received Christians for the celebration. The Proconsul asked him: "Why have you received Christians in your home, transgressing the imperial dispositions?" Emeritus answered: "Sine dominico non possumus" ("We cannot live without Sunday").

"The term 'dominicum' has a triple meaning. It indicates the Lord's day, but also refers to what constitutes its content -- his resurrection and presence in the Eucharistic event." The motive of martyrdom must not be sought in the sole observance of a 'precept,'" as "in that period the Church had not yet established in a formal way the Sunday precept. Deep down was the conviction that Sunday Mass is a constitutive element of one's Christian identity and that there is no Christian life without Sunday and without the Eucharist.

In the commentary that the writer of the Acts of the Martyrs made to the question posed by the Proconsul to martyr Felice: 'I am not asking you if you are a Christian, but if you have taken part in the assembly or if you have a book of the Scriptures, the commentator wrote these provocative words:

"O foolish and ridiculous question of the judge!. As if a Christian could be without the Sunday Eucharist, or the Sunday Eucharist could be celebrated without there being a Christian! Don't you know, Satan, that it is the Sunday Eucharist which makes the Christian and the Christian that makes the Sunday Eucharist, so that one cannot subsist without the other, and vice versa?"

The commentary on the martyrs concluded with these sobering thoughts: "When you hear someone say 'Christian,' know that there is an assembly that celebrates the Lord; and when you hear someone say 'assembly,' know that a Christian is there.”

The message left by the martyrs of Abitene: "We cannot live without Sunday" is highly appropriate for us on the day when we celebrate our deepest identity as Christians: members of the Body of Christ who have been given an extraordinary gift in the bread and wine of the Eucharist. Strengthened and encouraged by the example of the Martyrs of Abitene, let us pray that we become what we receive in this great Sacrament and on this great feast.

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Reflection for Monday May 23, 2005

God the Communicator: A New Perspective on the Holy Trinity

There is a profound mystery that the Feast of the Holy Trinity recalls: both the unspeakable reality of God and the manner in which this mystery has been given to us. This is the only day of the year when we are called to ponder a teaching of the Church rather than a teaching of Jesus. Though the mystery of one God in three persons is the core belief of Christianity, so many of us struggle to explain this central teaching. Monotheistic Christians do somersaults trying to explain why such a belief doesn't make them polytheists.

Within our Christian communities, the doctrine of the Trinity is called many things these days besides amazing or awesome. Some people call it archaic, obsolete or patriarchal. Others, believing that ancient confessional statements and doctrines no longer serve us, have totally abandoned Trinitarian language for something far less complicated.

Others still have chosen a favorite member of the Trinity and have put all of their theological eggs into one basket. Some, concerned that the Trinity expressed as Father, Son and Holy Spirit portrays the Godhead as overly male, have worked to change the language. Some people have opted to ignore the Father-Son relationship and speak only of the functions of the three: Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier or Sustainer. Others are enraged that we could even tinker with the ancient language of faith.

The doctrine of the Trinity was originally formulated to give words to our faith. Just as the early Christians who lived in a hostile world needed to put some definitive language to what they believed Christ had revealed to them, so to do we need a common language and common confession in a world that is increasingly hostile to Christianity.

The Trinity holds us accountable, and keeps us from the temptation of worshipping a one-dimension deity. The full view of God found in the Trinity lifts up a God who is more than a Creator who made the world at one shining moment in history, and then left it to run its course. We do not worship and adore a process, but a provider who continues to create and move among us.

We cannot explain the whole thing because it remains very mysterious. But we must explain each and every day, in faithful and articulate language, what God has done among us, what God is doing now and what God promises will be accomplished. Mysteries explained cease to be mysteries. The doctrine of the Trinity challenges our secret desires to know God fully and eliminate all mystery. This was the great sin in the garden at the beginning of biblical history that caused the fall from grace. I often think that the desire to dispel all mystery still burns deep within us.

God is communication between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Trinity celebrates the peace and unity of the divine persons in whom that circular dance of love continues, always in relationship with others. The Trinity, three Persons in one God, mystifies the human mind. God delights in us human beings fashioned by his own hand. As we celebrate this mysterious feast of the Holy Trinity, let us be thankful for the manifold ways that God’s abundant love has been poured out upon us, making our families and parishes communities reflecting God’s own communitarian life.

Though we may struggle in understanding the Holy Trinity, we nevertheless take it into our very hands each time that we mark ourselves with the sign of the cross. Words once spoken over us at baptism become the words with which we bless ourselves in the name of the Trinity. Herein lies the meaning of this unique, one God in three Persons.

Glory to you, Holy Trinity,
equally great to the end of the ages.
We adore you, we praise you, we give you thanks
because you were pleased to reveal the depth of your Mystery
to the humble, to little ones.

Grant that we may walk in faith and joyful hope
until the day when it will be ours to live
in the fullness of your love and to contemplate forever
what we now believe here below:
God who is Father, Son and Spirit! Amen.

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Reflection for Thursday May 19, 2005

Signs of Pentecost

Let us reflect for a moment on the great gift of the Holy Spirit that we received on Pentecost Sunday. As we celebrate the outpouring of Christ’s Spirit upon each of us, we discover that the Holy Spirit makes the Christian experience truly Catholic and universal, open to all human experience.

To be Catholic is to be universal and open to the world. Not only to Canada or North America or a certain familiar part of the world or segment of society but it must be open to all, open to every single person. The mind of Christ is not intended to be a selective mentality for a few but the perspective from which the whole world will be renewed and redeemed. An insight like this, the universal scope of salvation did not however come easily and without much straining.

In fact, the whole of the New Testament can be understood precisely as the emergence of the Catholic, the universal, in Christian life. Christianity, had it not moved from where it was particular and small would have just been a small modification of the Jewish experience, a subset of Jewish piety that was still focused in and around Jerusalem and the restoration of a literal kingdom of Israel.

The first two generations of Christians discovered that Christianity couldn’t be just that. Because they had received the Holy Spirit, which is the universal principle, the Holy Spirit opened their eyes to the universal import of the Christian truth and it does so through their encountering non-Jews who received the Holy Spirit just as we have.

We are not the principle evangelizers, it is the Holy Spirit who is the greatest evangelizer, who needs transparent instruments, who have emptied themselves of their agendas and opened themselves to God's work. The Holy Spirit makes us transcend all of the tribal and narcissistic impulses of our times for the sake of enfolding every human person into the reality of Christ. The Holy Spirit is universal: always thinking beyond our boundaries, the horizons of our imaginations. We become an evangelizing, Spirit-filled Church when we allow the Spirit to fill us with holiness, joy and peace. When we are, caught up in the Spirit, when the Spirit dwells within us, the Spirit gives us creativity and imagination.

Can we imagine a world where forgiveness is not only possible but becomes a way of life that leads to liberation and justice? Or are we so caught up with the hopelessness of our times that we forgot the art of dreaming and of imagining?Empowered by the Spirit the community can dare to dream dreams, to hope great things, to see visions, and to witness in word and deed to the power of the Spirit, whose fruits are seen by the traces of justice in the world.

What is the deepest and surest assurance and intimation that the Spirit is present in this in-between time of the first fruits, inspiring hope of a harvest yet to come? It is joy. If there is joy present you can bet that the Holy Spirit has something to do with this deep and authentic joy. St. Augustine who was the most musically passionate of the Fathers of the Church memorably evokes the experience of joy in the presence of the Spirit with these words.

"Whenever people must labor hard they begin with songs whose words express their joy. But when joy brims over and words are not enough they abandon even this coherence and give themselves to the sheer sound of singing. What is this jubilation? What is this exultant song? It is the melody that means our hearts are bursting with feelings that cannot express themselves. And to whom does this jubilation most surely belong? Truly to God who is unutterable, if words will not come and may not remain silent what else can you do but let the melody soar? This is the song of the Holy Spirit.”

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Reflection for Tuesday May 17, 2005

Benedict XVI's Solid Foundation

At his installation in the Basilica of St. John Lateran on Saturday, May 7, Pope Benedict XVI delivered his first homily from the ‘cathedra’ of the bishop of Rome. In a tour de force homily, he presented to his own diocese and to the world the pillars upon which the former head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has built his agenda for his pontificate.

Benedict affirmed that the task of the bishop of Rome is that of "presiding in doctrine and presiding in love": this latter expression is taken from St. Ignatius of Antioch. This love, he explained, is that of Christ, who makes himself really present in the Eucharist, from which the Church "is continually born anew."

As for doctrine, he said that the pope "must not proclaim his own ideas, but rather constantly bind himself and the Church to obedience to God's Word, in the face of every attempt to adapt it or water it down, and every form of opportunism."

Benedict XVI recalled two duties of this "obedience to God's word" that he now considers essential. The first is that "from high up on this Chair the Bishop of Rome is constantly bound to repeat: 'Dominus Iesus' – Jesus is Lord," before the "so-called gods in the heavens and on the earth."

His other duty is that of preaching "the inviolability of the human being and of human life from the moment of conception until natural death," in the face of "all efforts apparently intended for the benefit of the human person, and in the face of erroneous interpretations of freedom."

The Eucharist, "Dominus Jesus," the defense of life: these are the three pillars of his pontificate. The third pillar coincides with the great conflict of faith, culture, and civilization that is taking place between the Christian and the secular vision of life and man.

In the Pope’s judgment, the inviolability of unborn human life is not only a commandment of the Christian faith; it is a natural law written deep within every man and woman and valid in all places.

Such ideas can also be found in one of Benedict’s most influential teachers, the German theologian Romano Guardini (1885-1968). Ratzinger has said on a number of places that he was formed in his school, as well as in the school of Möhler, Newman, Scheeben, Rosmini, de Lubac, and von Balthasar. In 1947, Romano Guardini wrote a very important text while Germany was legislating on abortion. Guardini’s arguments are more relevant than ever. And they are essentially philosophical arguments, which intentionally "refrain from focusing upon more strictly Christian points of view."

It is astounding for its clarity of vision, its ability to deal with complex themes such as the dignity of man and the ways in which life must be protected, and for its tranquil lucidity and clearness, foreign to much public debate today. It is astonishing because it defends its position without ever making recourse to religious arguments.

Guardini opposed the modern "conception of man as the sole owner and proprietor of his own existence" with "the previously lively sense of the fundamental inviolability of human life."

Guardini considers as central the role of Nazism, which was responsible for establishing the elimination of the disabled, who would be followed by the incurably ill and the aged, those who were no longer "useful" to society, but constituted a burden, a detriment: "If one begins to consider such a detriment a sufficient reason to violate human life, one cannot convincingly uphold any limitation."

The defense of life in Guardini coincides with his defense of humanity from barbarism, which had just been experienced during Hitler's dictatorship, and his lucid reasoning warns against repeating the same errors, because "wrongful actions, even if they appear to be useful, lead to ruin in the end." Guardini refutes those who maintain that abortion, the selection of embryos, and their being used for research purposes are free individual decisions, and not the coercion of the state, as at the time of Nazism. The substance, he maintains, is the same, and so is the danger of barbarism.

Upon Guardini’s solid foundation for life, Cardinal Ratzinger and now Pope Benedict XVI has built a solid foundation to proclaim the Gospel of Life to a world that longs to hear it and give it flesh.

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Reflection for Tuesday May 10, 2005

Forging Bonds of Friendship with the Media

This past Sunday, Feast of the Ascension of the Lord, was also World Communications Day. Pope Benedict XVI dedicated his address, delivered from the window of his study before praying the Regina Caeli, to the World Communications Day. His predecessor, Pope John Paul II, had chosen this year's theme: "The Media at the Service of Understanding Among Peoples."

In his written message for World Communications Day, released on January 24 of this year, the late Pope John Paul II underlined the power of the pen, saying words can "bring people together or divide them," "forge bonds of friendship" or "provoke hostility."

John Paul II wrote: “For many, the media are the chief means of information and education, of guidance and inspiration in their behavior as individuals, families, and within society at large." Accurate knowledge promotes understanding, dispels prejudice, and awakens a desire to learn more.”

John Paul II continued: "Instead of building unity and understanding, the media can be used to demonize other social, ethnic and religious groups, fomenting fear and hatred. Those responsible for the style and content of what is communicated have a grave duty to ensure that this does not happen.”

"Indeed, the media have enormous potential for promoting peace and building bridges between peoples, breaking the fatal cycle of violence, reprisal and fresh violence that is so widespread today."

To achieve these objective, the Bishop of Rome concludes by offering an ethical principle for communication: "The human person and the human community are the end and measure of the use of the media of social communication."

In Sunday’s Angelus message, Benedict XVI appealed to communicators to help bring down walls of hostility, and to overcome prejudices and contempt for individuals and nations.

"Communicators have the opportunity to promote a true culture of life by distancing themselves from today's conspiracy against life and conveying the truth about the value and dignity of very human person."

Addressing thousands of pilgrims gathered in St. Peter's Square, the Pope said: “These important instruments of communication can favor reciprocal knowledge and dialogue or, on the contrary, fuel prejudice and contempt among individuals and peoples; they can contribute to spread peace or to foment violence.

For this reason, people must always be reminded of their responsibilities; it is necessary that all do what corresponds to them to ensure objectivity, respect for human dignity and attention to the common good in all forms of communication. In this way a contribution is made to bring down the walls of hostility that still divide humanity and to consolidate bonds of friendship and love which are signs of the kingdom of God in history.”

Benedict also said: "In the present age of the image, the media effectively constitute extraordinary resources to promote the solidarity and understanding of the human family." As proof of this, he mentioned the worldwide coverage of John Paul II's death and burial.

Benedict XVI decided to grant one of his first audiences as Pope to journalists, on April 23, to thank them for their service and to continue the "fruitful dialogue" his predecessor had between the media and the Church during his 26-year pontificate.

What a hopeful and encouraging message to all of us at the Salt and Light Television Network in Canada.

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Reflection for Tuesday April 18, 2005

For the past three weeks we have been inundated with words, stories, images, profoundly moving ceremonies coming to us from Rome. We have learned once again in the retreating and passing of Pope John Paul II how vast a person he was among us and on the world stage. Our memories of what he was like before his "retreat" or "departure" have now become suffused with the profound weight of post-mortem insight.

The genius of Pope John Paul II was his ability to bring out people's virtues, their desire for goodness and truth - sometimes deeply buried. The goodness and inspiration released in people by that first and then subsequent papal visits turned out to be a powerful virtue. It was by reviving such goodness, hidden in people's hearts, that the Pope led Poles out of communist slavery. In the same manner, he helped end dictatorships in Chile, Argentina, Nicaragua and the Philippines. He also strongly opposed the wars in Iraq and the Falklands, among others, and spoke out against political repression in Cuba and elsewhere.

John Paul II consistently resisted the temptation to politicize the ultimate questions. They are protected by transcendence. But everything else that remained he did bring into politics. He didn't help bring about the fall of the Iron Curtain by celebrating liberalism or by putting forward an ideology to compete with communism. All he did was point out how reprehensible it was to deny people their freedom. His words and his actions were also thought-provoking for those who weren't religious.

The forces he partially unleashed against authoritarian regimes were only side-effects of the way the man who began life as Karol Wojtyla viewed humanity. Man, endowed with inalienable dignity; man, deserving of love because God loves him: that is the vision at the centre of John Paul II's teaching and at the centre of his global mission. Through broken and bent at the end of his earthly pilgrimage, John Paul II entered history standing tall, as a giant.

John Paul II has continued to teach throughout his death. He was a bestseller in life and also in his death. This has certainly been an extraordinary time of evangelization, catechesis and education for the universal Church.

During these days we have experienced a global Advent as we awaited the successor of John Paul II. The Holy Spirit, the Consoler was mightily active among us, guiding the Cardinals and the entire Church through this time of sorrow and gratitude, of Sede Vacante or Interregnum, of longing and waiting. God has provided us with a new Chief shepherd in the person of German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger who has taken the name of Pope Benedict XVI.

The conclave was not only about a group of seniors robed in red gathered together under Michelangelo's masterpieces. It was also about us. We had a role to play through our fervent prayers, our hopes, our longings, and our renewed promises to be good, generous disciples of the Master.

What would John Paul II say to us today? He would tell us forcefully that the past twenty seven years were not about John Paul, nor about Karol Wojtyla, not even about “Lolek”, his nickname as a young man. The years of the Pontificate of John Paul II were about Christ, the Redeemer of the Human Family. In his homily for the closing of the Great Jubilee, on January 6, 2001, Pope John Paul II said: "We need to 'set out' anew from Christ with the zeal of Pentecost, with renewed enthusiasm. To set out from him above all in a daily commitment to holiness, with an attitude of prayer and listening to his word. To set out from him in order to testify to his love."

He continued:
"Set out from Christ, you who have found mercy.
Set out from Christ, you who have forgiven and been forgiven.
Set out from Christ, you who have known pain and suffering.
Set out from Christ, you who are tempted by tepidity:
the year of grace is endless.
Set out from Christ, Church of the new millennium.
Sing as you go!"

And as we sing and continue the journey, let us welcome Pope Benedict XVI as our Shepherd, as Vicar of Christ, Successor to Peter, Servant of the Servants of God, Bishop of Rome. and Let us continue to learn from Pope John Paul II's steadfastness and courage, his greatness and humanity. May we learn from him how to build bridges and open doors for the people of our time.

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Reflection for Thursday March 31, 2005

Preaching and living the Gospel of Life

This year, Good Friday marked the 10th anniversary of the encyclical “Evangelium Vitae”, one of John Paul II's most important contributions to peace, happiness, and human rights. "Evangelium Vitae," warned of an encroaching "culture of death." The papal document issues a clarion call to respect life – the answer to one of the great injustices of our society.

The Terry Schiavo case in the United States illustrates Pope John Paul's concerns that human persons would be valued more for their utility and 'quality of life' than for their inherent worth." In fact, the Pope wrote in No. 64 of the encyclical: "Here we are faced with one of the more alarming symptoms of the 'culture of death,' which is advancing above all in prosperous societies, marked by an attitude of excessive preoccupation with efficiency and which sees the growing number of elderly and disabled people as intolerable and too burdensome."

Our society today has lost sight of the sacred nature of human life. As Catholics we must be deeply committed to the protection of life in its earliest moments all the way to life in its final moments. Life is equally vulnerable as one approaches death. Mrs. Schiavo has had her feeding tube removed and is currently dehydrating and starving to death as legal battles and protests rage around her. Bishop Elio Sgreccia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, said this action, was 'an illicit and grave act not only on the fact that food has been taken away from her, but also on the decision that tries to legitimize such a thing.'"

The Terri Schiavo case is a tragic example of the moral and legal confusions that govern how we care for those who cannot speak for themselves, especially those whose lives might seem less than fully human. And so we have a responsibility to confront what has happened and why – especially if we are to understand our moral obligation as caregivers for incapacitated persons, and our civic obligation to protect those who lack the capacity to express their will but are still human, still living, and still deserving of equal protection under the law.

Terri’s life is not worth living, people say; see, she is dependent on others even for food and water; let nature take its course. But what is natural about starving to death? And what is so wrong with being dependent on others? Babies are dependent on others for food and water; so are many elderly people. Are they less worthwhile? The Christian conscience answers that human beings were created interdependent; only our fallen nature believes we can make it alone.

What is wrong with abortion, euthanasia, embryo selection, and embryonic research is not the motives of those who carry them out. So often, those motives are, on the surface, compassionate: to protect a child from being unwanted, to end pain and suffering, to help a child with a life-threatening disease. But in all these cases, the terrible truth is that it is the strong who decide the fate of the weak; human beings therefore become instruments in the hands of other human beings.

We also have another profound example of “Evangelium Vitae” in the person of Pope John Paul II, who is in this striking period of his earthly life a paradoxical image of happiness. Who can say that his life was not fruitful, when his body was able to climb snow-capped summits or vacation on Strawberry Island in Lake Simcoe? Who doesn't feel the paradoxical influence of his presence, when his voice is muted? Has Pope John Paul II not become a living 'argument' for that appeal to respect of the most frail and vulnerable, which he has launched during his pontificate? Who doesn't dream, deep down, of such a fulfilled and dedicated life? For in the final act of this great Pontificate, we are now experiencing the full meaning of Evangelium Vitae, the Gospel of Life.

My friends, without the Resurrection, Jesus would have remained an unknown victim – trampled on, and forgotten; and human society would be none the wiser. But God raised Jesus up, demonstrated His power over death, and gave those who witnessed it the knowledge that the bloodied victim abandoned on Golgotha was, after all, His beloved son. That knowledge has changed the world. That is why Christian society is distinguished by its overwhelming concern for the helpless victim: the very least of us is worth God suffering and dying for. Our Easter faith does not answer the thousand and one questions that our life poses. But it turns those questions around that one, magnificent fact: we are all worth it. All of us. If God died for all of us, it is not ours to decide who is fit to live. The best way to know if we are still in any way a Christian society is to see how we treat our most vulnerable people, the ones with little or no claim on public attention, the ones without beauty or strength or intelligence.

May we all continue to live and preach that Gospel of life by our words and by our actions – as we value more and more life unborn, life unfulfilled, and life usurped in our own journeys towards life unending in the company of our Risen Lord Jesus Christ.

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Father Thomas Rosica on Mel Gibson's "The Passion"

National Director of World Youth Day 2002 Weighs in on Film

TORONTO, FEB. 6, 2004 (Zenit.org) - A priest who oversaw World Youth Day 2002 and its Way of the Cross through the streets of Toronto says he was overwhelmed by Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ."

Father Rosica is a trained Scripture scholar and represented the Canadian bishops' conference for nearly 10 years on the National Christian-Jewish Consultation. He shared his views about "The Passion" with ZENIT.

Q: You have lived, studied and taught in the Holy Land at the École Biblique and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. You headed up World Youth Day 2002 in Canada, which had as its centerpiece the historic Way of the Cross through the center of a modern city. You certainly did not watch Gibson's movie as an outsider. What do you think of it?

Father Rosica: My first reaction was overwhelming. Having followed the extensive debate about the movie for the past year, I was interested in seeing it, but never expected the invitation to be so personal.

One of my principal colleagues at Salt & Light and I were invited by the sound production company of the film to a private showing. I was very surprised to learn that the soundtrack is being produced for the movie by a sound company located several blocks from our Salt & Light Television headquarters in downtown Toronto.

I rarely leave a theater or a film screening with a strong desire to pray and be silent. That is what I felt this morning as I returned to our offices. "The Passion" is a deeply moving presentation of the final hours of Jesus' life on earth. It is by no means a film for children.

I recommend that all those in pastoral ministry, teachers and students of Scripture, and adult Christians view this film at some point. If Gibson's desire was to allow people to draw closer to Christ through this film, he has accomplished his goal.

If Gibson wished people to experience a conversion of heart to the nonviolent message of the cross, he has accomplished that as well.

Q: What stood out for you in the movie?

Father Rosica: The film has been produced with stunning cinematography, excellent acting, fidelity to the Scriptures, attentiveness to the theological meaning of the passion and death of Christ, and extraordinary artistic and religious sensitivity.

The powerful play of light and darkness across Pilate's tortured face is far more revealing than any of the words uttered. It is as though Caravaggio himself served as the artistic and lighting director of this film.

Every single scene is richly created in order to invite the viewer deeper and deeper into the mystery. I really feel that this movie is a masterpiece of religious art of the most powerful genre. As the movie progresses, those who were simply bystanders are drawn into the heart of the story.

Among many extraordinary details, I found Gibson's use of flashback masterful. As a teacher of the Passion narratives, I am always struck by the poignant scenes of the trial, and Peter's role in these Gospel accounts.

In this movie, the haunting flashback to Christ and Peter produces a special effect. The camera captures the face of Christ in profile, while Peter gazes upon us. Christ's excruciating suffering is punctuated by flashbacks to his washing the feet of his apostles in loving service. There are so many subtle ways in which the bystanders in this movie become the protagonists in an instant.

One of my great mentors and professors was the late Father Raymond Brown, S.S., who taught me the "Death of the Messiah" at the Biblicum in Rome. Brown demonstrated that, while there are some differences among the Passion accounts, they are in substantial agreement overall.

It is important to remember that Mel Gibson's film is not a documentary but a work of creative imagination. He incorporates elements from the four Passion narratives of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, but remains faithful to the fundamental structure common to all four Gospel accounts.

Gibson has done nothing to remove the brutality from the Passion story. In fact he has no intention to sugarcoat the Passion story with pietism or a false spirituality. The viewer is forced to look at the raw facts and events, and witness the suffering of a just man.

The more brutal the scenes become, the more powerful are the flashback moments of Jesus teaching on the Mount of the Beatitudes, Jesus identifying himself as the Good Shepherd, Jesus offering his life in the bread and wine of the last supper.

One scene, in particular, was very moving. As Jesus falls on the Way of the Cross, there is a flashback to his falling on a Jerusalem street as a child, and his mother running out of the house to pick him up. The interplay of Mary and Jesus in this film is moving, and reaches its apex in the scene of the Pietà.

The Mother of the Lord is inviting each of us to share her grief and behold her Son. It is what we tried to do on the Way of the Cross in the heart of the city during World Youth Day 2002 in Toronto. This scene was an incredibly powerful moment for us as well. In fact, those who discouraged us from such a public presentation of the Stations of Cross during World Youth Day 2002 were not from outside the Church!

After that magnificent presentation on Toronto's University Avenue in July, 2002, among the thousands of letters and messages we received were those from people of other faiths who simply said: "If only we could do something like this for our own young people and teach them about the core of our faith."

Q: To what do you attribute all the opposition to Gibson's film?

Father Rosica: Ignorance, an obsession with being politically correct, a poor understanding of true interfaith relations, and an unwillingness to come to grips with the cold facts and ambiguous nature of Jesus' trial and execution.

I must also admit that Christians and Jews who fail to deal with the Scriptures in a mature way, and simply promote a false irenicism and ignorance of history, do not help to build bridges and repair the real damage of anti-Semitism which is alive once again in the world.

The old adage that "those who don't know speak, and those who know don't speak" can certainly be applied to all the ink spilled over this film. I have heard heated debates among people who have no idea what the film is about.

Q: As one who has been deeply involved in Jewish-Christian dialogue for many years, do you think that the film is anti-Semitic or anti-Jewish?

Father Rosica: No, it is not at all anti-Semitic nor anti-Jewish. The film neither exaggerates nor downplays the role of Jewish authorities and legal proceedings in the condemnation of Jesus.

Without a doubt the figure of Caiaphas, the Jewish high priest is a villain. But it is very important to realize that Caiaphas in the Scriptures represented the regime of the time and not the Jewish people.

The film should serve as a springboard into deepening our knowledge of the Scriptures, our love of Jesus Christ, our understanding of the historic reconciliation of Christians and Jews, especially since Vatican II and under the pontificate of Pope John Paul II, and an analysis of the true causes of anti-Semitism, and its reappearance in the world today.

It think it is very unfortunate that many voices within the Church, not to speak of those from outside the Church, have already condemned the film before even seeing it on the grounds that it is anti-Semitic or anti-Jewish. If the movie does anything, it compels even the most distant and dispassionate viewer to deepen his or her understanding of the story of the Jesus' passion and death.

Jews and Romans of that time were involved in the condemnation, trial and execution of Jesus. That is a fact of history. Anyone who tries to rewrite history or rewrite the Gospel stories of Jesus' suffering and death is unfaithful to history and very dishonest in applying lessons of the past to contemporary situations.

Isn't the real issue arising from this film that many political and even religious authorities throughout history have persecuted individuals with revolutionary ideas?

The Gospel passion narratives recount how the sins of all these people at the time of Jesus conspired to bring about the passion and death of Christ, and thereby suggest the fundamental truth that we are all to blame. Their sins and our sins bring Christ to the cross, and he bears them willingly.

And we must learn from what happened to Jesus and ask ourselves not only about the identity of those who tried, condemned and killed him long ago, but also what killed Jesus -- and what vicious circles of violence, brutality and hatred continue to crucify him today in his brothers and sisters of the human family.

I read somewhere that Maia Morgenstern, the Jewish actress who masterfully plays the part of Mary, said that "The Passion" opposes oppression and violence. "It is about letting people speak openly about what they think and believe. It denounces the madness of violence and cruelty, which if unchecked can spread like a disease."

Q: What were your sentiments as you left the screening room of "The Passion"? You saw it on the eve of Christmas...

Father Rosica: At the end of such a provocative movie, and on the eve of the birth of the Prince of Peace, I am left with some questions.

In Gibson's "Passion," the "great high priest" is Jesus, the Child of Bethlehem who becomes the "Ecce Homo" of Jerusalem, not at all one distant from us and our condition, but one who sympathizes with us and suffers with us, for he has experienced our weakness and pain, even our temptations.

I must ask myself if am I a priestly person like he was? Do I live for others and spend my life for others? Is the world any less violent, hostile and brutal, and any more patient, kind and just, because of me? Do I stand on the side of truth? Or am I afraid to reveal my faith in Jesus and my fidelity to the Gospel?

"The Passion" compels me to reflect on the cost of discipleship.

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Introduction to the Toronto Sun’s
Commemorative Booklet on Pope John Paul II
Published Saturday April 9, 2005

Pope John Paul II was the head of the world's largest international organization of individual human beings. No world leaders have ever had such an impact as he did. I believe that he was the first real world leader we have ever known. The entire world lived his death like no other person’s passing. It was a global Calvary, a global dying and a global death. This week the world gathered in St. Peter’s Square to acknowledge a great witness to truth and to hope. People of every race, culture, faith and way of life were drawn to this man and his message. What does this outpouring of emotion and love tell us?

It is simply telling us about what John Paul II has done over nearly twenty-seven years at the helm of the Church. During his Pontificate, the eyes of the world were fixed on this Polish actor, philosopher, politician, theologian, pastor, prophet, mystic, and poet. This world leader of a billion Roman Catholics was the first pontiff of the media, satellite and Internet age. He had a commanding presence on center stage. He was a teacher of extraordinary intelligence, talent and humanity. The Pope often said, "In the designs of Providence, there are no mere coincidences." Maybe the reason this man became Pope is that he bore messages the world needed to hear over the past twenty-seven years.

What were those messages? John Paul II taught us about the radiant splendor of Jesus Christ as the unique Lord and Saviour of all. He impressed upon us the dignity and sacredness of human life, from the earliest moments to the final moments. Life is an extraordinary adventure, a God-given gift to be cherished, treasured, and protected. He helped us to realize that the Church is thriving where the full Gospel is preached in clarity, charity, piety, devotion -- in its full integrity. He told his beloved young people that there is every reason for the truth of the Cross to be called the Good News.

How many times did the Pope remind us that the family is the privileged place for the humanization of the person and of society, and that the future of the world and of the Church passes through it?

John Paul II issued to us a clarion call to commitment. To young people he said: "Many and enticing are the voices that call out to you from all sides: many of these voices speak to you of a joy that can be had with money, success, and power. Mostly they propose a joy that comes with the superficial and fleeting pleasure of the senses." The alternative call was Jesus' siren song. "He calls you to be the salt and light of the world, to live in justice, to become instruments of love and peace." How many ordinary people have done extraordinary things because of his influence, his teaching and his gestures!

In a world that prides itself on building walls and amassing arms for protection, he taught us how to build bridges and make peace. How many Jews throughout the world see in this man an instrument of reconciliation, hope and shalom! How many people from the major religions on earth find in him a model of prayer and holiness! How many world leaders find in him an example of leadership, humility and goodness! That is why they all gathered this week to bid him farewell.

One of the most profound lessons he taught us in the twilight of his Pontificate was that everyone must suffer, even the Vicar of Christ. Rather than hide his infirmities, as most public figures do, he let the whole world see what he went through. What grace, what dignity, what solidarity with the sick and suffering, what hope for each of us!

John Paul II will survive in the memories of millions who loved him. But even for those who did not love him, the legacy of this first world leader will remain a challenge. At the beginning of the third millennium, we have economic globalization. But this requires what has been called moral globalization. Whether or not we share John Paul II's motivating beliefs, we can acknowledge that his was the most impressive attempt so far made by any single human being to spell out what moral globalization might mean, starting with a lived practice of universal solidarity, charity, hope and above all, joy.

John Paul the actor gave the world a command performance on a world stage. He touched us deeply and changed the world and the Church. The Polish Pope began his historic Pontificate with the words that would become the refrain of his global ministry: "Do not be afraid! Open wide the doors to Christ!" Now Christ has flung open the doors of heaven to him. John Paul II will continue watching over the world from heaven.

Once again the Toronto Sun has helped to tell the world the story of greatness and goodness that still inhabit our earth through the life and death of Pope John Paul II. The Sun’s coverage of World Youth Day 2002 was outstanding, and its coverage of the Pontificate of Pope John Paul II, especially its final moments, is deeply appreciated by Catholics, Christians, and people of good will- who were all so loved and cherished by Pope John Paul II -- the young boy from Wadowice who would become a priest of Krakow, the Bishop of Rome, a giant and a hero for our time, and a witness to truth, hope and peace for the ages.

Fr. Thomas Rosica, C.S.B.,
C.E.O., Salt and Light Catholic Media Foundation
Former National Director and C.E.O., World Youth Day 2002

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Toronto Sun
Sunday April 3, 2005

Opening Doors to Hearts
Pope John Paul II [1920-2005]

The past week has been filled with memories of the past 26 years of the Pontificate of Pope John Paul II. Somehow the theme of “opening doors” and “crossing thresholds” won’t leave me nor will some extraordinary moments in St. Peter’s Square.

How well I remember that warm night of October 16, 1978. I was a nineteen-year-old university student when the Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church elected Cardinal Karol Wojtyla as the 264th Successor to the Apostle Peter. Something new was happening on the world scene and I can still see that radiant smile and hear that booming voice filling St. Peter’s Square. They called to Rome a man from a distant country, a youthful athlete who took the world and the Church by storm.

On that first night in 1978, Pope John Paul II stood on the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica and opened his arms, his heart and his mind to the world. His refrain would become: “Do not be afraid! Open wide the doors to Christ!”

Who can forget the powerful images of the Holy Father’s visit to Canada in 1984? And again in 1987? From Vancouver to Newfoundland, from the First Nations longhouse in Midland to the origins of the Church in Quebec, the Holy Father criss-crossed this vast country from sea to sea to sea… fulfilling remarkably his role of "Successor of Peter" but even more as "Successor of Paul", taking the Church off the banks of the Tiber River in Rome and bringing it to the farthest corners of the earth.

There are few places on this planet that have not been touched by Pope John Paul II. He opened the doors to millions of human hearts, bringing to women and men of every race, nation and culture, a message of hope; a message telling us that human dignity is rooted in the fact that each human being is created in the image and likeness of God.

John Paul II enjoyed an incredible popularity with young Catholics. At the World Youth Day in Rome in 2000, he called the young people of the world his "joy and his crown". How can we ever forget the touching scenes of World Youth Day 2002 in Toronto, when this old man, bent with old age and infirmity, haltingly descended the stairs of a plane at Pearson Airport and united people of all races, languages and ways of life?

He truly made us discover our youthfulness, generosity and joy as he invited us to become salt and light in a world, a society and a culture that is often devoid of the flavour of the Gospel and the light of Christ. It is said that joy is the perfume that is left behind when God has passed by. I have no doubt in my mind that God visited us through World Youth Day 2002.

It's not remarkable that the Pope saw his youthful friends as a metaphor of renewal and hope; what's remarkable is that the young people have also seen and understood themselves that way as well. Very few leaders have ever had such an impact on young people as this leader has had. He opened the doors of his heart to young people and they opened wide the doors of their lives to him. The young people of the Generation of John Paul II love him.

There was one more scene in St. Peter’s Square that took place this past Friday evening. As tens of thousands of people gathered and kept vigil into the night, their eyes fixed on several windows on the third floor of the Apostolic Palace, Archbishop Angelo Comastri, the Vicar General of Vatican City led the throng in praying the Mysteries of Light of the Rosary.

The cameras that panned the crowds revealed people of every colour, race, age… it was truly a universal scene. They were John Paul II’s people. As he began the ancient prayers, Archbishop Comastri spoke to the crowd: “Throughout his life, John Paul II opened countless doors to human hearts across the face of the earth. He invited us to open the doors of our hearts to Christ and his Good news.” Archbishop Comastri concluded by saying: “Now it is Christ who will open wide his doors to the Pope.” What a grand welcome it must have been!

The Pope's last recorded words were given to us yesterday as he lay dying. Having heard the voices of 50,000 young people singing in St. Peter's Square on Friday evening, his secretary told John Paul II that thousands of young people were singing and praying in the square. He uttered these final words: "I sought you out and now you have come to me... I thank you." What fitting words to describe the centerpiece of his Papacy: young people.

John Paul II has left his mark not only on Catholics and Christians, but on this world. He will be remembered as one of the great figures of the 20th century, who helped us cross the threshold into the new millennium. May we learn from his steadfastness and courage, his greatness and humanity. May we learn from him how to build bridges and open doors for the people of our time.

Fr. Thomas Rosica, C.S.B.,
C.E.O., Salt and Light Catholic Television Network Former National Director and C.E.O., World Youth Day 2002

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Homily of Fr. Thomas Rosica, C.S.B.
Memorial Mass for Pope John Paul II
Cardinal Flahiff Basilian Centre
Friday evening, April 15, 2005

Your Grace, Archbishop Ventura,
Bishop Durocher,
Brother Priests,
Dear Friends,

Welcome to this spontaneous celebration of thanksgiving and Easter hope. So many of you worked closely with us on World Youth Day 2002 and the Papal Visit to Canada three years ago. You represent the levels of Government, the corps of volunteers, the young people who were the stars of July 2002. The memories of that blessed event, the friendships born, the new collaboration forged, are part of the legacy of Pope John Paul II to us, to the Church and to Canada. It is a legacy that lies not behind us, but ahead of us.

It is an honour to have with us Archbishop Luigi Ventura, the Holy Father's Representative in Canada. In you, Eccellenza, we have the living link with the See of Peter, with the person of the Pope, with the hopes, dreams, feelings and aspirations of Catholics throughout the entire world during these sad, but hopeful days. Thank you.

For the past two weeks we have been inundated with words, stories, images, profoundly moving ceremonies coming to us from Rome. We have learned once again in the retreating and passing of Pope John Paul II how vast a person he was among us and on the world stage. Our memories of what he was like before his "retreat" or "departure" have now become become suffused with the profound weight of post-mortem insight.

Even in death, Pope John Paul II has turned us outward toward people to whom we are not physically related, identifying these people as our spiritual mothers, fathers, sisters or brothers. Just as his Lord and Master did in his dying on a cross in Jerusalem, John Paul II in his dying in Rome, broke down the barriers between people and created a new family by the power that flows from Jesus' death for humanity.

This has been an extraordinary time of evangelization, catechesis and education for the universal Church. John Paul II was a bestseller in life and also in death. L'Osservatore Romano got it right last week with the huge title on its Wednesday daily edition - a day normally set aside to cover the Pope's weekly General Audience. The title read: "Che Udienza!" [What an audience!] as over 600,000 people passed silently that day through the Vatican Basilica to pray before the body of John Paul II.

I wish to share with you three brief moments and images of John Paul II which have marked me deeply. They offer us some insights into the Pope's life, his great humanity and his legacy. [Explain three scenes that reveal the man.]

The first is from mass with him at Castelgandolfo in August 4, 2000. "Why are they crying?.... because of you…" In the presence of such goodness and holiness, sometimes our only response is one of tears. And they are a gift, especially when they come to cynics and the theological elite.

The second moment was on a Sunday in June, 2001. It was Father’s Day. I was in Rome with our senior team of World Youth Day 2002. The baptism of Maria Cristina, the granddaughter of Jerzy Kluger, the Pope's Jewish friend in the Papal Apartment. In the midst of such daunting responsibilities, he never lost the common touch and the gift of friendship. Jerzy told us at the end of the ceremony: "Lolek was Lolek." Humanity and friendship are saving graces, even under the most difficult burdens and crosses.

The third is the Pope's "retreat" on our Basilian Strawberry Island for that memorable week in July, 2002. The Stations of the Cross on Friday morning, on the golf cart with the head of the RCMP detail, and the Pope's private secretary. Response of the RCMP Commander: "This morning I, a Protestant, prayed for one hour with a Saint." Those who pray are the best invitation to prayer.

Ten years ago, John Paul II gave us a very important encyclical letter entitled: Evangelium Vitae – The Gospel of Life. He spent the next ten years giving that Encyclical flesh and blood in his own body. He showed us what the sacredness of human life meant right up until the final moments on April 2 – two weeks ago. To this Botox generation of false, eternal youth, John Paul II's unwillingness to hide his age carried a countercultural twist. The contrast between John Paul II's physical vigor at the start of his pontificate and his state at journey’s end was certainly notable. His struggle with the physical effects of aging was also a valuable lesson to a society that finds it hard to accept growing older, and a culture that sees no redemption in suffering.

The pope brought suffering back into the realm of the expected in human life. In this context, he was not an academic but merely a human being on a public stage. Everyone could see that his spirituality gave him an inner strength-- a spirituality with which one can also overcome fear, even the fear of death. What an incredible lesson for the world! If this is not the Gospel of Life, I don’t know what is!

During these days we are experiencing a global advent as we await the successor of John Paul II. Though so many people used the expression of "feeling orphaned" at John Paul II's death, our faith tells us that the Holy Spirit, the Consoler is mightily active among us, guiding the Cardinals and the entire Church in this time of sorrow and gratitude, of Sede Vacante or Interregnum, of longing and waiting. God will provide for us another shepherd to lead the Church on her pilgrim way. There is much work to be done and many questions still unanswered.

The conclave is not only about a group of seniors robed in red, gathered together under Michelangelo's magnificent ceiling. It is also about us. We have an important role to play through our fervent prayers, our hopes, our longings, and our renewed promises to be good, generous disciples of the Master.

What would the Pope say to us tonight in Toronto? He would tell us forcefully that the past twenty seven years were not about Lolek, nor about Karol Wojtyla nor even about John Paul II. They were about Christ, the Redeemer of the Human Family and the unique Savior of the world. In his Testament, John Paul II did not list issues and problems to be solved by Cardinals in Conclave or Bishops in Dioceses, but he indicated a vision and a direction- “Duc in altum”… “set out into the deep… fearlessly and courageously.”

In his homily for the closing of the Great Jubilee, on January 6, 2001, he said: "We need to 'set out' anew from Christ with the zeal of Pentecost, with renewed enthusiasm. To set out from him above all in a daily commitment to holiness, with an attitude of prayer and listening to his word. To set out from him in order to testify to his love…" (n. 8). He continued:

"Set out from Christ, you who have found mercy.
Set out from Christ, you who have forgiven and been forgiven.
Set out from Christ, you who have known pain and suffering.
Set out from Christ, you who are tempted by tepidity:
the year of grace is endless.
Set out from Christ, Church of the new millennium.
Sing as you go! Canta et ambula!"

As we sing and continue the journey, may we learn from John Paul's steadfastness and courage, his greatness and humanity. Though broken and bent at the end of his earthly pilgrimage, John Paul II crossed the threshold of history, standing tall, as a giant.

May we learn from him how to cross thresholds, open doors and build bridges to the people of our time. May we have a small portion of the fidelity of Peter and the boldness of Paul that were so mightily present in John Paul II.

Hail and Farewell, O Great One! Christ has thrown wide open the doors to welcome you to the Father’s House. Remember us and bless us from your window in heaven!

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Lecture given on Monday April 4, 2005

John Paul II's Master Class to his 'dear young friends'

This lecture was given on Monday evening, April 4, 2005 in the Chapel of the Newman Centre at the University of Toronto during a prayer service for Pope John Paul II. The service was attended by several hundred university students and members of the University of Toronto Catholic Community.

Dear Friends,

It is an honour for me to be here this evening and tell you a story about one of my great heroes, mentors and friends. I know he is also a hero for many of you gathered together in this beautiful chapel that Pope John Paul II knew about. I spoke to him on several occasions about the Newman Centre Catholic Mission at the University of Toronto. Had his health permitted in July 2002, he would have visited here during World Youth Day 2002 to admire the chapel and pray before these magnificent stained glass windows. Now is not the time to begin the analysis and critique of the Pontificate — that will come and must come once we have laid him to rest in the very place where his predecessor John XXIII rested until the Good Pope's beatification in the glow of the Jubilee Year.

Tonight I begin by sharing with you a story from last summer. On a warm weekend in August 2004 as I worked in our new Toronto studios of Salt and Light Catholic Television Network in Canada, (a project inspired by John Paul II), two screens in our master control room were carrying very contrasting, human dramas played out on two world stages. One television network was airing scenes of the Olympic Games from Athens — featuring and exalting the human body in its youthfulness, agility, and beauty. Another monitor carried scenes of quite a different theater unfolding at a famous Catholic shrine tucked away in the Pyrenees in southern France — featuring not sportsmanship and physique as in Athens, but diminishment, suffering, disfigurement and pain that are so much a part of the pilgrimage centre at Lourdes. And the key actor in this moment of pathos was an 84-year-old Pontiff, slumped over on his kneeler as he prayed before the image of the Blessed Mother who appeared in Lourdes more than 150 years earlier.

Two contrasting theatrical dramas on that August weekend: Athens and its glorious medalists come and go with the passage of time. Lourdes and its exceptional pilgrim will remain engraved on the memories and hearts of pilgrims and viewers throughout the world who, seeing those images, realized that John Paul II was beginning the final dramatic act of a brilliant 27-year Pontificate. He was an actor who knew the power of gesture and symbol, and allowed himself to be a kind of spectacle to the world.

Now that the struggle is over, the curtain fallen, the race won, the heavenly victory his... Why, of all things, did the young people of the world respond so positively to this elderly Pontiff who, in the final years, represented the opposite of the cult of the body and the myth of eternal youth; the falsehood of rampant freedom without commitment; of love and sexuality without responsibility. He did not present them the hollow façade and quick sound bytes of self-serving politicians; wealthy sports heroes and empty Hollywood personalities of our day. And they loved him for that.

The press nicknamed him "Pontifex Mediaticus", "God's athlete", and later "God's astronaut" because he traveled a distance equivalent to more than three times that between the earth and the moon on over 100 international trips or pastoral visits as he called them. He fulfilled remarkably his role of "Successor of Peter" during the past twenty-seven years. But even more than that, he was the "Successor of Paul", talking the Church off the banks of the Tiber River in Rome and bringing it to the farthest corners of the earth.

Over the past twenty-seven years, the eyes of the world were fixed on this Polish actor, philosopher, politician, theologian, pastor, prophet, mystic, and poet. This world leader of a billion Roman Catholics was the first pontiff of the media, satellite and Internet age. He had a commanding presence on center stage.

How could we forget the extraordinary privilege that we Canadians had in hosting him on his last vacation in 2002 when Lake Simcoe north of Toronto was called "Holy Sea" and the headlines read "Pope loves Strawberry Island Retreat", "John Paul II's love boat meets handicapped children at Huronia Regional Centre" or "Pope loves Sisters' Morrow Park in Toronto." Through all of these moments, John Paul II lowered many of the Vatican's curtains of privacy and revealed to us secrets never before realized — that Pontiffs are human and need to play and even have lunch with young people now and then on islands in Canadian lakes?

Imagine the impact that such images had on young people! I know what they did to me! In fact, in the six times I have visited with the Pope after World Youth Day 2002, with a glimmer in his eye and a little smile, he would ask me about Strawberry Island!

What kept him going and inspired him for the long haul? Besides his mystical faith in Christ, his love of the Church, and his unwavering hope, it was young people. During a packed press conference at the National Trade Centre in Exhibition Place during World Youth Day 2002, one of the journalists from an American network asked me publicly: "So what medication is the Pope taking to stay alive?" Vatican officials told me to avoid such questions but I took the microphone and a sudden rippled hush came over the hall. I responded: "There are two prescribed drugs: one is young people and the other is Strawberry Island." The room roared with laughter, and the Pope's Press Secretary leaned over to me and simply said: "Bravo. That's exactly it!"

Inaugurating his Papal ministry on October 22, 1978, he told young people, "You are the hope of the Church and of the world. You are my hope." John Paul II always loved them, and believed in ministry and presence to youth. He knew deep within that without a love for and presence to young people, the Church would have no future.

He wrote: "Whenever I meet young people in my travels throughout the world, I wait first of all to hear what they want to tell me about themselves, about their society, about their Church. And I always point out: What am I going to say to you is not as important as what you are going to say to me. You will not necessarily say it to me in words; you will say it to me by your presence, by your song, perhaps by your dancing, by your skits, and finally by your enthusiasm." A lesson that some of us in Church leadership and ministry should take to heart quickly if we would like to make the Gospel relevant to future generations.

"No one invented the World Youth Days. It was the young people themselves who created them", John Paul II wrote in his 1994 book, Crossing The Threshold of Hope. In actual fact, he first sought them out; they then discovered him.

John Paul II enjoyed an incredible popularity with young Catholics. At the World Youth Day in Rome in 2000, he called the young people of the world his "joy and his crown". In July 2002 in Toronto, he showed us the same. Young people today are experiencing an extreme crisis of fatherhood. I am convinced that they flocked to him because in many cases he was the father they never had and the grandfather who had been so painfully absent in their lives.

During the 17th World Youth Day's concluding mass at Downsview Park in Toronto on Sunday, July 28, 2002, the Pope spoke deeply personal and touching words to the assembled crowd of over 850,000 people, "You are young and the Pope is old and a bit tired. But he still fully identifies with your hopes and aspirations. Although I have lived through much darkness, under harsh totalitarian regimes, I have seen enough evidence to be unshakably convinced that no difficulty, no fear is so great that it can completely suffocate the hope that springs eternal in the hearts of the young. Do not let that hope die! Stake your lives on it! We are not the sum of our weaknesses and failures; we are the sum of the Father's love for us and our real capacity to become the image of his son."

We can only imagine the Pope's frustration and sadness on Palm Sunday, 2005 when he was unable to descend to St. Peter's Square to preside at the magnificent Palm Sunday liturgy (the 20th anniversary of World Youth Days) — with most of the 50,000+ people present being young people. Instead, he sent the crowd a message: "I become more and more aware how providential and prophetic it is that this day, Palm Sunday and the Passion of the Lord, has become your day. This feast contains a special grace, that of joy united to the Cross which epitomizes the Christian mystery."

No world leaders have ever had such an impact on young people as this leader has had. What will be the enduring messages and legacy of John Paul II on the young people who consider themselves to be part of "John Paul II Generation?" The Pope, himself, often said, "In the designs of Providence, there are no mere coincidences." Maybe the reason this man became Pope is that he bore messages the world and especially young people needed to hear over the past 27 years.

First was the message and centrality of the radiant splendor of Jesus Christ as the unique Lord and Saviour of all. In order to be authentic believers, we must have a deep, personal relationship with Jesus. Christianity, Catholicism, the Sacraments are not courses, things, ideas, passing fancies, symbols — they are a person and his name is Jesus. Theology alone, trendy pastoral programs and new age, politically correct jargon will not save us. Jesus will.

Second was Human Dignity. In speaking of John Paul II several years ago, President George W. Bush, one of the Pope's admirers, said: "A young seminarian, Karol Wojtyla, saw the swastika flag flying over the ramparts of Wawel Castle. ...He shared the suffering of his people and was put into forced labor. From this priest's experience and faith came a vision: that every person must be treated with dignity, because every person is known and loved by God." John Paul II has impressed upon the new generation the dignity and sacredness of human life, from the earliest moments to the final moments. Life is an extraordinary adventure, a God-given gift to be cherished, treasured, and protected. Is it any surprise that so many hundreds of thousands of young people consider themselves to be explicitly pro-life, while their parents are so whimsical and non-committal to the issues of life and death? In John Paul II's "Culture of Life" we must make room for the stranger and the homeless. We must comfort and care for the sick and dying. We must look after the aged and the abandoned. We must welcome the immigrant. We must defend innocent children waiting to be born.

Third, John Paul II helped us to realize that the Church is dying in politically correct places where the Gospel is preached as merely a lifestyle option in a global supermarket of spiritualities without the obligation of belonging to the Church. The Church is thriving where the full Gospel is preached in clarity, charity, piety, devotion — - in its full integrity. John Paul II told young people that there is every reason for the truth of the Cross to be called the Good News. Young people took these words to heart and have carried the Cross around the world for the past twenty years. Not just the two beams of wood but the message of the Cross and its saving power. In Canada we are unlikely to forget the powerful images of the World Youth Day Cross on its historic, 16-month, 43,000 km pilgrimage from sea to sea to sea. The Pope entrusted this Cross to young people. They have carried it triumphantly across the face of the earth almost like an Olympic torch.

Fourth, John Paul II taught us that the adventure of orthodoxy — the challenge of fidelity and integrity, authenticity and solidarity — is what attracts young people today. Young people don't want to live on the surface. In a world that constantly panders to the young, a challenging Church, which combines the truth with charity and pastoral care, is a very attractive proposition. How many times did John Paul II speak to young people reminding them that the family is the privileged place for the humanization of the person and of society, and that the future of the world and of the Church passes through it?

Fifth, John Paul II issued a clarion call to commitment. To his young friends he said: "Many and enticing are the voices that call out to you from all sides: many of these voices speak to you of a joy that can be had with money, success, and power. Mostly they propose a joy that comes with the superficial and fleeting pleasure of the senses." The alternative call was Jesus' siren song. "He calls you to be the salt and light of the world, to live in justice, to become instruments of love and peace." The choice was stark, self-denying, life-defining, irrevocable. It was between, "good and evil, between light and darkness, between life and death." There were no shortcuts or compromises for John Paul II, only clarity. And that is what the young are seeking today, not quick answers but Gospel clarity.

How many people are not afraid anymore because they saw a Pope who was not afraid. How many young seminarians and religious have spoken their "yes" because of him! How many young couples have made permanent commitments in marriage because of his profound theology of the body! How many ordinary people have done extraordinary things because of his influence, his teaching and his gestures!

Sixth point. He reminded us that the heroes the world offers to young people today are terribly flawed. They leave us so empty. The world today, and especially young people, have the increasing need of the fascinating lives of the saints. During his Pontificate, Pope John Paul II has certainly helped us to rediscover these heroes and heroines in our tradition — in fact, he has beatified 1338 women and men, and canonized 482 Saints.

The world today needs voices of justice, compassion and hope resounding from the palaces of governments like Rideau Hall, [the Vaniers] and from clinics like the one in Mesero [Saint Gianna Beretta Molla]. We long to catch glimpses of men and women of conviction and truth — people who live in the small towns and parishes like the Sacristan in St. Radegund [Franz Jägerstätter]. Even from the hell holes like the concentration camps in Brandenburg/Havel and Auschiwtz [St. Edith Stein], we are able to find brilliant examples of extraordinary light in the midst of so much darkness.

Our world today rejoices in the holy men and women who labor in the Kaligats and Nirmal Hridays [Blessed Mother Teresa]. The world, and particularly young people need the sterling examples of women and men who enter cloisters, not to be shut off from the world, but rather to embrace the world with love, prayer and a true missionary spirit [Thérèse of Lisieux].

We need to hear Edith Stein's words each day on this campus: "Do not accept anything as truth if it lacks love; and do not accept as love anything which lacks truth."

Our world today badly needs Church leaders [Oscar Romero] who will stand up, speak out and be counted — and we need to hear the crystal clear message of young, committed Catholic Christians, who, like the mountain climber from Pollone [Pier Giorgio Frassati], risk everything to give flesh and blood to the Beatitudes.

Our world rejoices in the poor, humble porter of Montreal [Brother André Bessette], and all those like him who graciously offer hospitality and kindness to the multitudes, without ever counting the cost.

Tonight, we are surrounded by such a cloud of witnesses who are the friends of Pope John Paul II — He gave these people to us to hold us in his loving embrace. I spent hours in here praying to these people when I was here. I entrusted the World Youth Day to their care and protection. They didn't let me down. When you look at those windows, think of Pope John Paul II. One day his window might be here in this chapel.

Finally, one of the most profound lessons he taught us in the twilight of his Pontificate was that everyone must suffer, even the Vicar of Christ. Rather than hide his infirmities, as most public figures do, he let the whole world see what he went through. The passing of this Pope did not take place in private, but before television cameras and the whole world. In the final act of his life, the athlete was immobilized, the distinctive, booming voice silenced, and the hand that produced voluminous encyclicals no longer able to write. Yet nothing made John Paul waver, even the debilitating sickness hidden under the glazed Parkinsonian mask, and ultimately his inability to speak and move. In a youth-obsessed culture in which people are constantly urged to fight or deny the ravages of time, age, disease, he reminded us that aging and suffering are a natural part of being human. Where the old and infirm are so easily put in nursing homes and often forgotten, the Pope was a timely and powerful reminder that our parents and grandparents, the sick, the handicapped and the dying have great value. Many young people have confided in me over the past few years that they were "deprived" of their grandparents in their families and witnessed in the public diminishment and suffering of John Paul II the real meaning of aging and suffering. I have heard over and over again from young people these past years: "I feel as if he were my grandfather."

Against the backdrop of a Culture of Death, where life is so cheap and sanctioned euthanasia is on our doorsteps, John Paul II's dying gave new meaning and urgency to the Gospel of Life in all of its agonizing beauty.

I received this letter two hours ago one of several hundred that have been sent to me since the news of the Holy Father's suffering and dying last week. It is from a young man named Tom from London, Ontario. He was part of the welcoming delegation at Pearson International Airport on July 23, 2002.

"I just want to take a minute and say thank you for every thing you have done for me by taking me to the airport on that unforgettable Tuesday in July, 2002. ...For me these last few days have been an internal battle as to how I feel about this whole thing. I feel sad that such a man with such great sprits has died, sad that the church has lost one of it shepherds, and sad that the only Holy Father I have known in my life time has now passed away. Yet at the same time I can't help but feel excited and happy for both the church and for him. John Paul II was a man of great youthful spirits, he preached of hope, love, and world peace. But most of all he preached to and for the youth of our world. He was not blind to the fact that the youth were people, and he was not blind to the fact that the youth of today would one day lead our Church. He gave us a voice and he gave us a say.

...Being in that airport hanger watching the Pope take those steps off the plain is an image I will forever hold and cherish in my heart. That day the Pope did not take those steps so that we could see how old he is, he didn't take those steps so that we could see how frail he is and feel sorry for him, he took those steeps so that he could show the youth that he was there for them, he took them because he was a youth at heart and was always and will always be a youth at heart. I was then blessed with the opportunity to great the Holy Father, to look into his eyes and see his love and compassion. That day I saw the Pope in a new light. He was no longer this old frail man who led the church, I now saw him as this young vibrant sole who loved to lead his people, his fellow youth, his brothers and sisters. So I thank you Fr. Tom for granting me the greatest gift of my life. ... My prayer is that this person, this new leader, is one that loves the youth just as his predecessor Pope John Paul II did."

Nearly twenty-seven years ago, John Paul II began his historic Pontificate with the words that would become the refrain of his ministry: "Do not be afraid! Open wide the doors to Christ!" Those words did not fall on deaf ears for many young Catholics throughout the world. The very battle hymn that they made their own was: "John Paul II, we love you!" He responded back to them: "John Paul II, he loves you."

On Saturday morning last week, as he lay dying in his bedroom in the Apostolic Palace, over 100,000 people were gathered below in St. Peter's Square. Dr. Navarro-Valls told me that more than half of the people were young people. They sang. They prayed. They wept. They had kept two nights of vigil in that blessed place that was home to so many... who of us can ever forget the opening ceremonies of World Youth Day 2000 when the Pope welcomed 750,000 young people to Rome — to his home in that very place. Upstairs on the third floor, Archbishop Stanislas Dziwisz held the Pope's hand and they were able to hear the singing in the square. He told the Holy Father — "Listen, they have come in great numbers. They are here for you. Forcing himself to speak, the Pope uttered slowly: "Vi ho cercato. Ora sono venuti da me. Vi ringazio." "I have looked for you and now you have come to me. I thank you." These were the Pope's last recorded words on earth the day that he died, April 2, 2005. What fitting words to describe the centerpiece of his Papacy: young people.

John Paul the actor gave the world a command performance on a world stage. To his 'dear young friends', it was truly a Master Class in the drama of Gospel living and dying. He has touched us deeply and changed the world and the Church.

Tonight I say to you:

Your Holiness, Santo Padre, Dear Friend and Dreamer,
"Thank you" and "Pray for us."

In the words of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet [Act III scene 2]:
"...when he shall die, Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night,
And pay no worship to the garish sun.

And in the words of Horatio, Hamlet's friend:
"Good night, sweet prince,
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!"

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Sunday July 27, 2003: WYD Anniversary Reflection.

"We have been happy together
  in the light we have shared..."

World Youth Day 2002, an Extraordinary Event in Canadian History WYD Director Father Thomas Rosica Reflects on the First Anniversary TORONTO, JULY 27, 2003 (Zenit.org). For the first anniversary of World Youth Day 2002, the event's national director, Basilian Father Thomas Rosica, penned this reflection. Father Rosica is now chief executive officer of Salt and Light Television Network.

As I remember vividly the great event of World Youth Day 2002, and allow it to take on its true and authentic dimensions – one image seems to dominate: that of the rather violent and ferocious wind and storm that rocked Downsview Park on Sunday morning, July 28, 2002. It was frightening storm that blew in from the west – a storm that nearly prevented the papal helicopter from taking off from Morrow Park.

A storm that ripped off part of the roof of the largest stage ever constructed in North America. A storm that soaked the hundreds of thousands (+850,000) of young people encamped on a former military base and runway. A storm that drenched over 600 bishops and cardinals and even soaked the Pope as we brought him out on stage. As the four young people led the Pope out into the full view of the crowd – the winds were at gale force – it was the only moment during the entire event that I was somewhat terrified. Bishops had to hang on to their air borne mitres. Everything on stage was set to flight – books, music, altar cloths, chairs. Surrounded by the police chiefs of what seemed to be all of Canada, I uttered some silent prayers, begging God to let us get through this last, final challenge and obstacle.

For me and for many this was the wind of Pentecost that we hear about in the Acts of Apostles, Chapter 2. And yet, in the midst of this violent storm, the nations of the earth – at least 172 of them huddled together in that field – understood one another as they gathered around Peter on that July morning. This was the wind that had led the WYD Cross from sea to sea to sea, across Canada – '"a mari usque ad mare". And now on the shores of Lake Ontario, I believe that the Church was born again in Canada. More than anything – it was the wind and the trees that served as privileged witnesses of those young pilgrims who graced our land and our church last summer.

The trees of University Avenue extended their branches in a loving, protective embrace over half a million people on that unforgettable Friday night, July 26, 2002, as Jesus and his friends made their final walk up this majestic boulevard in the incredibly moving Via Crucis, watched by over one billion people around the world. One of the amazing things that happened last summer was that the media of the world – over 4000 of them – came to Toronto and Canada and climbed our trees to peer down onto this incredible story unfolding before them.

The image that remains engraved in my mind from all of that frenetic activity is the story of Zaccheus. The media climbed high in the trees and watched. And as Jesus and his hundreds of thousands of young disciples passed – one by one the skeptical and the curious climbed down from the branches and become part of the great pilgrimage. Many accredited journalists to the event were criticized by their more skeptical colleagues: "You went overboard, you crossed over, you lost professional objectivity – you became part of the story." They came to see the Pope – they ended up meeting Jesus. They wept – they were moved, they made new friends.

Previous theories of a young faithless, godless generation were dashed and new ones were formulated. In journalism, one may call this a loss of objectivity. In our business of the Church, we call it evangelization, transformation and conversion. They simply wanted to touch what they had heard and seen with their own eyes. And they did.

We may choose to speak of WYD as something in the past – that brightened the shadows and monotony of our lives at one shining moment in history in 2002. Against a world background of terror and fear, economic collapse and ecclesial scandals, World Youth Day presented an alternative vision of compelling beauty. Some have called those golden days of July 2002 a "Camelot" moment. That is one way to consider the WYD – fading memories of an extraordinary moment in Canadian history.

There is, however, another way: the Gospel way. The Gospel story is not about "Camelot" but about "Magnificat," constantly inviting Christians to take up Mary's hymn of praise and thanksgiving at the ways that Almighty God breaks through human history here and now. This way is not only nourished by memories, however good and beautiful they may be. The resurrection of Jesus is not a memory of a distant, past event, but it is Good News that continues to be fulfilled today – here and now. The Christian story is neither folklore nor nostalgia – a trip down triumphal church lane.

Had the disciples ever chosen this path, the Gospel message would now be in the British Museum under glass, and not alive and well and pulsating through the veins of millions of Christians throughout the world. The souvenirs of WYD 2002 are slowly leaving us – taking up their rightful past in the realm of memory and history. Those memories must die just as the grain of wheat must die in order to bear fruit.

What remains is the extraordinary encounter between Jesus and his young friends – between the young pilgrims and that beloved old man in white who journeyed from the banks of the Tiber to the shores of Lake Ontario for a meeting – an encounter – a kairos moment last summer. We are slowly beginning to understand the jumbled emotions which ebb and flow from that time and those places and why, when they have vanished, we shall value the whole World Youth Day experience so intensely and cherish the shadows of lightness that it cast upon Toronto, Ontario and all of Canada at a moment when we needed to be buoyed up and encouraged to "set out into the deep."

I pray that the mighty wind of Pentecost continue to blow furiously throughout the Church in Canada and especially in this great Archdiocese of Toronto – and with that wind a roaring blaze sent by God's restless Spirit. May that wind now blow from sea to sea to sea – bringing to full life a church that was reborn on July 28, 2002 at Downsview Park in the heart of Toronto. May the tongues of fire that we experienced in no small measure last July gently alight once again on our heads, and give us the courage to constantly make room in our Church for young people who are Christ's guarantee of endless joy and youthfulness.

During the Angelus prayer at Downsview Lands on Sunday, July 28, 2002, the Holy Father summed up beautifully the sentiments of millions of people who were touched in some way by World Youth Day 2002: "As we prepare to return home, I say, in the words of Saint Augustine: "We have been happy together in the light we have shared. We have really enjoyed being together. We have really rejoiced. But as we leave one another, let us not leave Him."

Could we desire anything more than these thoughts and words as our own Magnificat hymn of praise, thanksgiving, and promise of action one year later?

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