The Lone Star Catholic (Austin, Tex.), Vol. 49, No. 14, Ed. 1 Sunday, July 31, 1960 Page: 3 of 24
twenty four pages : ill. ; page 17 x 12 in. Scanned from physical pages.View a full description of this newspaper.
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
In close association and love
THE FAMILY AND THE PRIEST
REV. H. CAFFAREL
-
I
T happened many years ago at
\e
FIN
e
=4
C -
N
/N
fl
za-
Gospel topics
What’s mine is God’s
ALBERTA SCHUMACHER
men-
3
j
/
(
gards a humanity divided and
aced by catastrophe.
OUR SUNDAY VISITOR
July 31, 1960
\Ec“
5
■ --
1--
g .
2488k
f"A
AN —-—
(s. .8) A—6
Xi
. . 88 : 2.- 3 ■••• •
• < ■
/
.4
*4
^1/ o initiate and aid the growth
of esteem and mutual love, priests
must meditate on the grandeurs of
marriage and families must come to
know the nature of the priestly vo-
cation.
For the present let us consider
what place the Christian family
ought to give to the priest in their
thoughts, devotions, and prayer.
What does a family think of the
priest who comes to visit them?
■ There are homes in which the adults
have a polite and easy manner with
the priest which sometimes conceals
their real opinion of him.
There are other homes where
he is received with a true cordiality
— not very different, however, from
the end of the first family retreat
that I ever preached. For three days
I had preached to 15 families about
their vocation and their mission in
the Church. They had spoken to me
with marvelous trust and confidence.
Some revealed themselves as gener-
ous with the gift of God, with never
a thought of cheating His law; others
had confided their difficulties and
arguments. Before their courage and
humility I had a profound admira-
tion; I discovered the grandeur of
human love animated by the grace of
God. As they left, I knew my grati-
tude to them was certainly as deep
as theirs to me. With a smile, one of
them thanked me: “Now Marguerite
and I know what it means to be mar-
ried!” I replied, “And now I under-
stand the priest’s mission to fami-
lies.”
When the retreat ended, I passed
the night with the friend who had
invited me to preach. As I was clos-
ing the blinds in my room, I noticed
lights through the trees. It evoked
the memory of my retreatants; they
have returned to their homes, and
certainly this evening there is in
their homes a more ardent human
love and a greater love of God. It
was then that a spontaneous medita-
tion made me see clearly the affinity
which exists between marriage and
the priesthood, the bond between the
priest and the Christian family:
They are happy in their good homes.
. . . And it is this happiness, this
plentitude that Christ asks his priest
to sacrifice. A demanding calling!
. . . How is it that he who has re-
nounced love and paternity is pre-
cisely the person who has the power
to rekindle the flame of the family?
What is this paradox? . . . No, not a
paradox, but a mysterious corres-
pondence between Holy Orders and
Matrimony. If the priest abstains
from founding a family, this does
not mean he disdains love and a
family; it is not scorn but self-sacri-
fice. He is the lamb marked for sacri-
N5
M S
s0de D
28 \
-
, CT'1
T—,-p
K
—S
fice, so that God will bless the whole
flock. Thus the renunciation of one
explains the purity and the fervor
of love in the others. With these per-
ceptives, it is evident that priest and
family must understand and help
each other. Isn’t it only proper that
families have an ardent gratitude to
the priest? Don’t they know what
a sacrifice he has made so that their
own family life will be happier and
more intense? And they should pray
that the friendship of Christ may
transfigure the solitude of the
apostle.
The priest for his part will not
be jealous of the happiness of families
and of the human plentitude of their
lives; he will rejoice to see the fruit-
fulness of the divine blessings which
it is his vocation to solicit for them
from morning to night by the cele-
bration of the Mass and the recita-
tion of the Breviary.
At Mass, the union must be even
closer. When the priest presents the
host and chalice to the Lord at the
Offertory the people offer the priest
and pray for him: “Receive him,
Lord; it is the gift of the human
family, and just as in a moment the
host will become the living Christ
in his hands, we ask you that this
child of man and woman be in the
midst of us another Christ, sacrificed,
praying, pardoning, blessing.”
Why do the relations of priest
and 4he Christian family rarely reach
this level? Without doubt because
each more or less ignores the life
and the ideal of the other, as if the
two vocations were in two different
worlds.
AN excited nine-year-old boy
I know from a family of three boys
and four girls screamed: “Make
them stay out of my things!” The
grief connected with ownership can
begin even at the toy stage—the
watching, the guarding, the inevit-
able “poaching.” And with some it
lasts to the grave.
That is why I like to contem-
plate our stewardship of the things
of God—the tranquil use of grass
and ground, of bud and bloom, of
tree and sky . . . and especially of
“loves,” meaning the people we
treasure because they are God’s and
only given to us for our happy
having if we consent to a certain
amount of generous sharing. Posses-
siveness is the enemy of all happi-
ness.
In the sandal prints of Saint
Francis, the happy man roves the
earth living and loving, but claim-
ing nothing as his very own, his
heart never screaming silently the
equivalent of the shrill cry of the
child—“I want what’s mine to be
mine; make them stay out of my
things.” Rather, there is the calm
aceptance—what’s mine is God’s.
n j
, ="......
' ; 11
U
' -
t I gh,(
d.--..............
_______________1 11
-—- — n i
-It 6
■ ■ x _____
(*uh597
5 4 Fg
e f9
S}g
7
family in his prayers and his Mass.
Because he knows that these
families practice a Christian hos-
pitality, the priest will not hesitate
to send people to them — a catechu-
men who must be helped in his prep-
aration for baptism, a lost person
who will only find equilibrium in a
healthy family, an engaged couple
who seek counsel. Often the success
of his actions is precarious when
they are not supported and com-
pleted by the devotions of a family.
He fears for the new convert, the
isolated young family, the vocation
menaced by a hostile environment.
To esteem, welcome, and aid the
priest is good. But it is not every-
thing. The families must also pray
for them, and most of all, for the
parish clergy. Isn’t it logical to of-
fer this help to those Who have con-
secrated their hearts and time to
you? Why is it that the faithful too
often are estranged from their
clergy, prompter to criticize them
than to serve? And when a priest
fails they are indignant. First of all
they should ask themselves what
their part of the responsibility should
Do they help him and protect
him by their prayers? Do they ig-
nore the fact that every leader is a
man especially marked by the
enemy?
Still rarer are those who pray
for their bishop, in spite of the in-
vitation to do so in the Memento of
the Mass. They speak of him as a
functionary, an administrator, yet
he has received the plenitude of the
priesthood; almost everyone seems to
ignore the fact that he is the spiritual
head, the father of the diocesan
church, the authentic successor of the
apostles, responsible for them be-
fore the Father.
To be prayed for too is the Holy
Father, the priest in whose face
Catholics can contemplate “the so-
licitude of all the churches.” Jesus
Christ, on the mountain top, wept
over the city: “How often would I
have gathered my children together,
as a hen gathers her young under
her wings. ...” A similar sorrow
tears the heart of the Pope as he re-
the manner in which any good friend
of the family is welcomed. Leaving
them, he often experiences an un-
easiness. They have called upon his
human gifts and not his superna-
tural gifts. It is to his person, and
not to the ministry of the Lord that
they are attached. They do not have
a true understanding of his priest-
hood.
By contrast, when he reads con-
fidence and respect in the direct gaze
of the children, he knows that the
parents have a profound compre-
hension of the priesthood and that
they have inculcated it in their sons
and daughters. In a farmer’s home,
the head of the family before the
meal asks one of his three sons to ex-
press a welcome to the envoy of the
Lord; in another home the priest is
invited to bless the table and to lead
the evening prayer; as the priest
departs from a professor’s home,
parents and children kneel for his
blessing. If he has a closer associa-
tion with these families the priest
will see that they follow with atten-
tive sympathy the effects of the
clergy to establish the reign of Christ
in the parish as well as in the mis-
sion lands, that they never miss an
occasion to take the children to see
a missionary depart or to be present
at the profoundly instructive cere-
mony of an ordination, usually ig-
nored by so many Christians.
If he reads their hearts, he will
discover that the fathers and
mothers ardently wish that Christ
come under their roof to recruit His
apostles. It is a humble desire, with
a certain resignation, for they well
know that it is the choice of Christ
and not that of the parents. But they
also know that it is their task to
create a climate where vocations can
appear and flourish. Perhaps one
day they will have the happiness of
receiving the first blessing from a
newly ordained son. Then, kneeling
before him, they will render homage
to that higher paternity which has
just invested the fruit of their love.
When the priest leaves such a
family to return to his apostolic task,
he feels himself stronger; he knows
that the retreat he is going to preach'
is sanctioned by them, he knows that
the dangerously ill mother of whom
he had spoken will be prayed for by
them. They are associated in his
ministry and he in return adopts the
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Matching Search Results
View seven places within this issue that match your search.Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Francis, Dale. The Lone Star Catholic (Austin, Tex.), Vol. 49, No. 14, Ed. 1 Sunday, July 31, 1960, newspaper, July 31, 1960; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1528577/m1/3/?q=Lamar+University: accessed May 31, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting St. Edward’s University.