Toward the Synod on the Family, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan

LORD, TO WHOM SHALL WE GO?

Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan

Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Monday, February 2, was the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, when we celebrate—not Groundhog Day!—but the bringing of the infant Jesus—forty days old—to the Temple by our Blessed Mother and Saint Joseph, to be consecrated to the Lord. It’s the fourth Joyful mystery of the rosary and, according to an older Catholic tradition, the end of the forty-day season of Christmas.

Feast of Consecrated Life

Since 1997, this feast has also been celebrated as the World Day for Consecrated Life, as Saint John Paul II explained when he instituted it: “The Virgin Mother who carries Jesus to the temple so that he can be offered to the Father expresses very well the figure of the Church who continues to offer her sons and daughters to the heavenly Father, associating them with the one oblation of Christ, cause and model of all consecration in the Church.”

This year, the World Day for Consecrated Life takes on added significance, as it falls within the Year of Consecrated Life declared by our Holy Father, Pope Francis, who himself lived consecrated life as a member of the Society of Jesus. This special year—begun on the First Sunday of Advent last November and continuing until next year’s Feast of the Presentation—invites all Catholics to give thanks to God for the gift of our religious brothers and sisters, and for all those consecrated to the Lord. We pray for them, for their holiness and happiness, and for the vibrancy of the charisms which they live. May they be blessed with many new vocations, for the Church sure needs consecrated life!

I have spoken often about the great blessing that religious sisters were to me and my family when I was growing up, and how essential they were in teaching me the faith and nurturing my priestly vocation. I give thanks today for all the consecrated men and women serving so beautifully in the Archdiocese of New York, the history of which is in great part a history of their heroic zeal. I thank them and salute them for their service to the Lord and their witness to their fellow disciples. I am also delighted that in our own archdiocese we have several communities which are growing both in numbers and confidence in the mission which the Lord has entrusted to them. May their number increase!

We need our consecrated men and women, for as Pope Francis writes, “the old saying will always be true: ‘Where there are religious, there is joy’. We are called to know and show that God is able to fill our hearts to the brim with happiness; that we need not seek our happiness elsewhere; that the authentic fraternity found in our communities increases our joy; and that our total self-giving in service to the Church, to families and young people, to the elderly and the poor, brings us life-long personal fulfillment.”

We join our prayers today to those of the Church universal, thanking God for the gift of consecrated life and for those who live it generously and faithfully!

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