Ad Limina (Final Part 5)

Well, today started off with a real treat for Bishop Greg and myself. Word had reached us through the week that a group of students from Austin O’Brien Catholic School in Edmonton would be in Rome for a couple of days. We learned that they had arranged to celebrate Mass with Fr. Michael Schumacher in one of the chapels in the crypt area below St. Peter’s Basilica. We wanted very much to see them, so we went over to the Basilica first thing and met up with them as they were finishing their celebration of the Mass. I must say, they are an ambitious group! They’re on a twelve-day adventure that began in Barcelona and passed through Venice and Orvieto (and probably a few other places that I didn’t catch) before coming to Rome. No wonder they looked so tired! Happy, but a little fatigued. It was a delight to be with them. 

 

As it turns out, this unplanned encounter set the stage beautifully for the meetings that had been planned. In our Catholic schools, we work very hard to create an environment fully permeated by the faith. The ultimate goal is to form our students as life-long disciples of Jesus, and throughout our history some of our students have heard the Lord call them to live out this baptismal call by means of a religious vocation. These were the precise themes discussed as we met, first, with the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life and, second, the Congregation for Catholic Education. In the former we discussed the challenge of a diminishment in religious vocations in certain areas of the world as well as the hopeful reality of an increase in others. We recalled the message of the Holy Father that we must at all times remain people of hope and never of resignation, since God is always present and at work in his Church to turn all things to the good. Therefore, we must never tire of promoting the joy, beauty and essentiality of vocations to priesthood and religious life. Our latter meeting at Catholic Education was an opportunity to affirm the great gift we have in Catholic schools and the joint responsibility shared by all believers to strengthen their identity and mission, especially in the face of the many pressures prevalent in the world today to insert into our classrooms ideologies contrary to the faith or to work against the very existence of Catholic schools. This Congregation is also responsible for Catholic universities and ecclesiastical institutes. In this respect, we spent time discussing among other things the good and challenging work of our chaplaincies, particularly where these operate in secular settings.

 

Basilica Papale San Paolo fuori le Mura

These were our final dicastery visits. We ended the day with our pilgrimage mass at the Basilica of St Paul Outside the Walls, built near the place where this great Apostle was martyred and where his bones are preserved and venerated. Here we brought to the intercession of the Saint the urgent need that emerged as a theme uniting all of our encounters and to which the Apostle dedicated himself fully: evangelization. To announce the Gospel is to proclaim to our suffering world the life and hope that only our Lord can give. It is a duty of all believers.

 

Tomorrow morning, we end formally our ad limina visit with our final mass at the Major Basilica of St. Mary Major, the Church built to the honour of Mary under her supreme title of Mother of God. There we shall entrust the needs of the whole Church, especially those of the people of our own Dioceses, to the powerful intercession of Our Lady.

Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore

It has been a very effective and worthwhile encounter, a real experience of fraternal communion with the Holy Father and his closest collaborators. Having crossed this “threshold of the Apostles,” we now cross back again over those of our own Dioceses. It is always good to get back home, and this time we do so refreshed in the Spirit who unites and empowers us for the task entrusted to us as Successors of the Apostles at the service of the Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

See all more photos from Bishop Bittman here: https://goo.gl/photos/js7ueZty6MHKboX3A
 

Read the Ad Limina Blog series here.

Part 5 (this post): http://archbishopsmith.blogspot.ca/2017/03/ad-limina-final-part-5.html
Part 4: http://archbishopsmith.blogspot.ca/2017/03/ad-limina-2017-part-4.html

Part 3: http://archbishopsmith.blogspot.ca/2017/03/ad-limina-2017-part-3.html
Part 2: http://archbishopsmith.blogspot.ca/2017/03/ad-limina-2017-part-2.html
Part 1: http://archbishopsmith.blogspot.ca/2017/03/ad-limina-2017.html