On our parish website I recommend people take a few moments to watch a brief video message explaining the Holy Father’s Prayer Intention for the month. In the month of August Pope Francis has called on political leaders to be at the service of the poor, the unemployed and the common good. The Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network released its most recent message on July 30, 2024. In that message Pope Francis stated that today politics does not have a good reputation: corruption, scandals, distant from people’s day-to-day lives. He asks if we can move ahead toward universal fraternity without good politics. His answer is that we cannot do so.

I was at Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas for a conference in July 2021. One of the things to which I look forward on such an occasion is meeting other people attending the conference as they are often from all over the country. I was not disappointed in this regard. While I was there I met a priest from the Diocese of Tulsa and the Bishop of Little Rock, Arkansas. With both of them I had a conversation about the recently beatified Blessed Stanley Rother who had been a priest from Oklahoma and volunteered to be a missionary in Guatemala. Blessed Stanley was murdered because he did not want to abandon the indigenous people in his parish. His parishioners were being tortured and murdered by soldiers and paramilitary squads. When Stanley spoke out against this, he learned that he had been put on a list of people to be tortured and murdered. He was killed on July 28, 1981.

Last week I presented part of a statement by the Most Reverend Borys Gudziak, Archbishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Philadelphia and the Chairman, Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development of the U. S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Let me continue where I left off last week.

Shortly after the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024, Wilton Cardinal Gregory, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Washington, issued the following statement: “I ask our people of the Archdiocese of Washington and everyone of good will to keep former President Trump and all those killed or injured in last evening’s violence in our prayers. May those who work for the security of our country be strengthened in their duties. Let our nation be a land of peace.”

The National Eucharistic Congress that will begin this week in Indianapolis will be the tenth National Eucharistic Congress held in the United States. Let me give you a brief history of the previous nine National Eucharistic Congresses.

Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati was born on April 6, 1901 (which was Holy Saturday that year) to Alfredo Frassati, an agnostic who owned the noted liberal newspaper La Stampa) and Adélaide Ametis, a noted painter. His only sister was his sister Luciana Gawronska. As a young man he was nicknamed the “Terror” because of his fondness for practical jokes. He was an average student in school, but he was known among his peers for his intelligence (and even more so for his devotion. He was dedicated to works of social action that would unite people together in fellowship as a way to combat inequalities. He was opposed to fascism and did not support the regime of Benito Mussolini. He was once arrested while protesting alongside the 1921 Young Catholic Workers Congress.

Ten days ago—on June 20, 2024—we observed World Refugee Day, which serves as a reminder of the millions of individuals and families forcibly displaced from their homes and the importance of durable protection mechanisms, such as the U. S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP). On that day the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) joined with those around the world in honoring refugees and the communities that welcome them. Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Migration underscored the importance of refugee protection for the Catholic Church:

“A modern-day apostle of the Holy Spirit.” This is what Pope Saint John XXIII called Blessed Elena Guerra when he beatified her in 1959. On April 13, 2024, Pope Francis officially approved the miracle needed for her canonization during an audience with Cardinal Marcello Semeraro. Pope Francis also announced that he will convene a Consistory of Cardinals to deliberate the canonization of Blessed Elena Guerra, as well as Blesseds Carlo Acutis, Giuseppe Allamano, and Marie-Léonie Paradis.

Pope Francis preached a very memorable homily on Pentecost Sunday in 2020. In that homily he pointed out that the Holy Spirit brought about unity among Christ’s followers in the early Church despite the diversity of backgrounds and ethnicities that were present even at that time. Pope Francis continued by saying that today we also have our differences, such as opinions, choices, or sensibilities. But when we yield to the temptation to defend fiercely our own ideas as being good for everyone, the Holy Father said that becomes a “faith created in our own image,” “not what the Spirit wants.”

On May 26, 2024, about 50,000 children and adults gathered in St. Peter’s Square for a Mass that concluded the first World Children’s Day. Pope Francis established this world day as a “movement of boys and girls who want to build a world of peace, where we are all brothers and sisters, a world that has a future because we want to take care of the environment around us.”

Pope Francis has recognized the second miracle needed for the canonization of the church’s first millennial saint: Blessed Carlo Acutis. On May 23, 2024, Pope Francis met with Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, prefect of the Dicastery for Saints’ Causes. During the course of their meeting, Pope Francis signed decrees advancing the sainthood causes of Blessed Carlo Acutis and several other individuals. The same day the Vatican announced that the Holy Father had signed the decrees and that he would convene a set a date for the canonization of Blessed Carlo and Blesseds Giuseppe Allamano, Marie-Léonie Paradis, Elena Guerra, and eight Franciscan friars and three Maronite laymen who were martyred in Damascus, Syria in 1860. Blessed Marie-Léonie Paradis was a Canadian religious sister who was stationed in New York and Indiana from 1862-74.

During the interim phase of the Universal Synod—after it ended its first session in October 2023 and before the Universal Synod meets again in October 2024—the Archdiocese of Washington held five listening sessions in Lent with five specific communities: Young Deaf Catholics, Young Black Catholics at Howard University’s Sister Thea Bowman Catholic Campus Ministry Center, the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council, and the Archdiocesan Priest Council. Three themes arose across the five listening sessions: 1) Evangelization and Welcome; 2) Leadership Development; and 3) Social Justice and Inclusion. Within each of these themes there are areas of convergence, matters for consideration, and proposals.

During the interim phase of the Universal Synod—after it ended its first session In October 2023 and before the Universal Synod meets again in October 2024—the Archdiocese of Washington held five listening sessions in Lent with five specific communities: Young Deaf Catholics, Young Black Catholics at Howard University’s Sr. Thea Bowman Catholic Campus Ministry Center, the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council, and the Archdiocesan Priest Council.

During the interim phase of the Universal Synod when it ended its first session In October 2023 and before the Universal Synod meets again in October 2024, the Archdiocese of Washington held five listening sessions in Lent with five specific communities: Young Deaf Catholics, Young Black Catholics at Howard University’s Sr. Thea Bowman Catholic Campus Ministry Center, the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council, and the Archdiocesan Priest Council. Three themes arose across the five listening sessions: 1) Evangelization and Welcome; 2) Leadership and Leadership Development, and 3) Social Justice and Inclusion. Within each of these themes there are areas of convergence, matters for consideration, and proposals.

During the interim phase of the Universal Synod, after it ended its first session In October 2023 and before the Universal Synod meets again in October 2024, the Archdiocese of Washington held five listening sessions in Lent with five specific communities: Young Deaf Catholics, Young Black Catholics at Howard University’s Sr. Thea Bowman Catholic Campus Ministry Center, the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council, and the Archdiocesan Priest Council. Three themes arose across the five listening sessions: 1) Evangelization and Welcome; 2) Leadership and Leadership Development, and 3) Social Justice and Inclusion. Within each of these themes there are areas of convergence, matters for consideration, and proposals.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Committee on Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations (CCLV) released The Class of 2024: Survey of Ordinands to the Priesthood in anticipation of the World Day of Prayer for Vocations. The survey mentions that Pope Francis thanked “mothers and fathers who do not think of themselves or follow fleeting fads of the moment, but shape their lives through relationships marked by love and graciousness, openness to the gift of life and commitment to their children and their growth in maturity.

Cardinal Gregory was in Rome recently for a Papal Foundation Board Meeting and to receive the Rector’s Award at the annual Rector’s Dinner at the Pontifical North American College where a number of Washington seminarians study for the priesthood. While in Rome, Cardinal Gregory gave an interview to Vatican News where he spoke about human dignity, particularly Dignitas infinita, the recently released Vatican Declaration on human dignity. I want to highlight some points he made on that occasion.

In 1224—eight hundred years ago—St. Francis of Assisi received the stigmata after he had withdrawn to the hills of La Verna (located in the Apennine mountains in central Tuscany) to pray and do penance. Earlier this month Pope Francis joined a group of Italian Franciscan Friars from La Verna and Tuscany to celebrate the 800th anniversary of the “gift of the stigmata” (as Pope Francis put it). On this occasion, Pope Francis made a number of statements on which we should reflect. Let me include several of these statements here:

Our Easter Season is only beginning, with 50 days between Easter Sunday and Pentecost, the day commemorating the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and Mary. There are many beautiful chapters in our Catholic faith between the beginning and the end of the Easter season—and this Sunday, April 7, Divine Mercy Sunday, marks one of them.

The Lord has risen as he said, Alleluia!