OUR PRIESTLY MISSION TO THE POOR

ST CHARLES BORROMEO, BISHOP

Phil 2:1-4; Ps 131; Lk 14:12-14

Our Ministry to the Poor

We have established in our Sunday reflection that love consecrates the priest to God. We have also seen that the perfection of the priesthood is found in Jesus Christ alone because of his love for the Father. Since love makes two persons become one, the Son is one with the Father through his love for the Father, both in time and eternity. But we are talking about his sacred humanity through which he shares our common nature. Jesus Christ is our high priest because he took our nature and became like us in all things except sin. If he did not assume our nature, he would not be a priest for us, for a priest is taken from among the people and appointed to mediate between the people and God. He can represent us because he is acquainted with our condition. He knows our weakness and he experienced our suffering in his sacred humanity. He can give us holy things because he is one with the Father in his divinity and knows the will of the Father. He is our Sacerdos, the Giver of holy things, for he reveals the will of the Father to us. In this sense, he is our bread from heaven. Our vocation to the priesthood is, therefore, a vocation to Jesus Christ. It is a vocation to become like him. Our goal is to become what he was in his sacred humanity.

On the one hand, we follow the leading of the Holy Spirit in seeking knowledge of Jesus Christ, greater love for him, and more dedication to his service. In other words, we desire each day to obey his precept of charity, which is to love God with all our minds, with all our hearts, and with all our strength. For the perfection of our priestly role, we have to become like our brothers and sisters in their condition of life. This is the second part of the precept of charity: you must love your neighbour as yourself. Hence, St. Paul urges the Philippians to let their love come to perfection by being of one accord. “If our life in Christ means anything to you, if love can persuade at all, or the Spirit that we have in common, or any tenderness and sympathy, then be united in your convictions and united in your love, with a common purpose and a common mind.” In this advice, Paul moves from our vocation to the priesthood of Jesus Christ as individuals to its mystical perfection in the Church. The Church of Christ, just like the Israel of old, has the vocation to priesthood she shares with her head and bridegroom. Notice that Paul locates the centre and perfection of this vocation in the Holy Spirit we have received, who is called Love of the Father and the Son. We will never fulfil our vocation to the priesthood if we fail to develop an interior or spiritual life.

The Church's vocation and mission will be fulfilled when each of us answers the vocation of God to become like Jesus Christ or a priest to the other. The love the Spirit pours into our hearts each day helps us to identify with the weakness, suffering, and death of our brothers and sisters. If we have received the bread of heaven, which is the holy will of God the Father, we would have come to understand that our brothers and sisters are our mission; we are to give them what we have received. “Always consider the other person to be better than yourself, so that nobody thinks of his own interests first but everybody thinks of the other people’s interest instead.” Our Lord taught the same lesson to the Pharisees who hosted him. “When you give a lunch or a dinner, do not ask your friends, brothers, relations or rich neighbours, for fear they repay your courtesy by inviting you in return.” This is the mind of the priest of God, to offer the people bread from heaven, which they cannot pay back, because what is offered to them is from the Father, and not from us.

This attitude that the Psalmist captures as humility describes the person of St. Charles Borromeo. He was born in 1538 in a castle on the shores of Lake Maggiore in northern Italy, to a powerful family. He was a nephew to Pope Pius IV, who made him a cardinal in 1559. He was ordained a priest in 1563 and later consecrated the bishop of Milan. He helped reform the Church through the teaching of Catechism, new liturgical books, and a personal life of poverty. He cared for and fed over 3,000 poor people during the famine at his expense. He set an example for his clergy by caring for the sick during a plague. Many worldly clergy and religious opposed his reformation work and tried to kill him several times. Charles died on 3 November 1584.

Let us pray: preserve in the midst of your people, we ask, O Lord, the spirit with which you filled the Bishop Saint Charles Borromeo, that your Church may be constantly renewed and, by conforming herself to the likeness of Christ, may show his face to the world.