By Father Bill Hoffman

“The people are hungering for God, for a sense and taste of the holy…and you priests are the ones who can give it to them. You have been ordained and empowered to do this, but you cannot give what you yourselves do not have. We are praying for you to be holy priests.” Words of Mother Teresa of Calcutta to some 6,000 priests and deacons, and to 80 bishops attending the Oct. 5-9 Worldwide Retreat for Priests in Rome. The theme of the retreat was: A Call To Holiness.

Mother Teresa was not the only one to make that plea, but she did so with an intensity that made everyone take her words to heart. She spoke about Mary and how devotion to her would help a priest find her Son, Jesus, and take Him along in his daily tasks.

Devotion to Mary

Cardinal Leo Suenens from Belgium, referring to devotion to Mary, said that he once asked the renowned theologian, Father Karl Rahner, why Marian devotion seemed to be on the wane in the world. Rahner replied that the modern world is preoccupied with its “-isms”: materialism, marxism, capitalism, hedonism, humanism, etc., and that an “-ism” does not need a mother.

Father Salvador Carrillo, from Colombia, used a simple parallel when he urged prayer and devotion to the eucharistic presence of Jesus. He said that when we are in the air, we are dry; when in water, wet; when in ice, frozen; when in the presence of God, we grow in likeness to Him, in holiness. One must be immersed in the Word of God in order to preach the Word of God. Only by being in the presence of God can one convey a sense of the presence of God.

The chaplain of the papal household, the Franciscan priest, Raniero Cantalamessa, challenged us to a renewed commitment to purity, whether as married or as celibate men. He reminded us of St. Paul’s teaching that even if we are freed from the Jewish law, we are not free in this regard, for we now belong to Christ. Married sexuality as well as celibacy are ways of glorifying God. If we really want to live purely, we have to “fall in love with God once again: and if we want to remain faithful, we have to stay away from sources of sin, such as TV and pornographic movies and magazines.

Be Eucharistic

He continued: virtue does not have to be ashamed in the presence of vice, but just the opposite. The Holy Spirit calls us today to bear witness to the original innocence in which we were created. Only through Him can this be done.

On another occasion, he spoke about the call all Christians, especially priests, have to be Eucharist, that is to share their personalities and their obedient service with others. As Jesus said of Himself, “I have come not to do my will, but that of the Father,” so we, too, would live that sacrifice – something done to honor God but for the benefit of others.

One thought he left with us which impressed me was this: when people decide to break with sin or to be more generous, Satan is going to be especially active to thwart them. That is when they are most in need of the presence and help of the priest. It is the humble, Spirit-filled priest who is capable of guiding others along the path to holiness, and so he is the one feared by Satan.

Father Thomas Forrest, C.Ss.R., from New York, the one who first had the idea of an international retreat sponsored by the International Office of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, gave a powerful talk on sin, and how “sin” is the one word the world seems determined to avoid. Euphemisms abound: alternate life-styles, doing your own thing, freedom. We need to preach Jesus crucified for our SINS. It is a false compassion not to speak about sin, not just social and structural sins, but also personal sin. Our essential message has to be that God wants all of us to live sinless lives, and we can do that through the power of the Holy Spirit, through union with Jesus and His holy Church.

Laughter

Bishop Uribe Jaramillo, of Rionegro, Colombia, who has been ordaining some 40 priests each year and whose retreats are attended by some 500 priests each year, spoke of the need we all have for inner healing. Sins not only offend, they also wound and these wounds need healing, going back to the time of our conception.

For a change of pace, we had Bishop Valerian D’Souza from India. He had the audience roaring with laughter at his wit and his bubbly personality. He told us not to take ourselves too seriously. God takes us seriously, and we have to take Him seriously.

The last speaker at the retreat was Pope John Paul. His words were along the same theme: the spiritual health of the Church depends greatly on the holiness of her ministers, and the means of growth in holiness are the same as they always have been: prayer, adoration, Scripture and the sacraments (especially confession).

Our days got underway at 9 a.m. and ended about 7 p.m. The music ministry group, the core of which was from the Emmanuel Community in Paris, was great. Most of the songs had verses in French, English, Italian, Spanish and German. These plus Portuguese and Japanese were available for instantaneous translations over the headphones. The singing was very enthusiastic. Three of the five days included an hour of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament exposed on the high altar in St. Peter’s. Priests took turns hearing each other’s confessions – mine was heard by an Ugandan.

Different Apostolates

The Masses usually lasted two hours and it took almost 30 minutes for 60 deacons to distribute Holy Communion.

For us, the mix of ages and nationalities was a tremendous experience. Each priest or deacon had something going on in his ministry about which he was excited, or at least I was thrilled to hear about:

American Franciscans at work for some thirty years on a scholarly Catholic translation of the Bible into Japanese; the Ghanan’s project of reworking the Life in the Spirit seminars so as to include more about the sacraments and Mary for the African cultures; the Indian from Aswan State who had to spend six days traveling to Bombay for the flight to Rome; the American Jesuits working in Nepal, laying the groundwork for evangelization – (It is still prohibited in Nepal to try to convert anyone to the Church. The Catholics there usually become so while they are working in India. Recently Nepal established diplomatic relations with the Holy See and it seems that things might soon be different there.); the Tanzanian, whose parish has some 30 “out stations,” where four languages are spoken and he can preach in only three of them, but just get along a little bit in the fourth; the Nicaraguans, who spoke of increasing pressure form the Marxist government against the Church, censoring parish bulletins, radio programs, and deleting parts of papal speeches given in other parts of the world – plus the orchestration of ‘safe’ contacts for fact-finding groups from the U.S. and elsewhere; the Nigerian, who just stood there, looking around, and commented: “I’ve never seen so many white priests in my whole life!”; the priests from Uganda who were encouraging each other to be strong and brave, since some of them were almost certain to face persecution and death as they returned to their country torn by tribal strife; the Maltese who spoke about his government’s attempt to take over Catholic schools in that country, and yet how vocations to the priesthood are high; the one from Borneo, who was the first priest from his particular tribe; the American working on St. Croix, the Virgin Islands, having such success with the charismatic renewal that he has taken some of his parishioners (the population is black) to Ghana for charismatic seminars and retreats.

Personal Holiness

There was a huge prayer letter (2 feet by 3 feet) from Japan, saying that for the success of the retreat, they were offering up 134,910 rosaries and 5,760 days of fasting! Another from California said much the same thing.

No one I spoke with could think of when 6,000 priests had even been gathered together, anywhere, for anything. But there we were, 6,000 priests and deacons and 80 bishops from 101 countries, in Vatican City, hearing the call to personal holiness and to a renewed love of God, the Church and the Pope. Several around me, and I along with them, had to wipe tears from our eyes as we felt the Holy Spirit moving us to repentance, conversion and renewed commitments to God and His Church.

Those present at the retreat from Atlanta along with Father Hoffman were Fathers Brent Bohan, Jorge Cristancho, Edward Danneker, John Fallon, Henry Gracz, Terence Kane, Richard Morrow, Alberto Rodriguez, OP and Richard Wise. Also present were Deacon Jorge Gonzalez and Deacon candidate Walker King.