I have been very grateful to hear from many parish groups, priests, parishioners, and others who want to send Christmas greetings to our seminarians. I spent the early days of December visiting with our six men and they are all doing very well. All of the seminarians will get a well-deserved winter break, but I’ve been very pleased that all of them want to dive into parish life while also spending time with their families and friends. Please tell our men hello and encourage them to keep working hard if you see them in your parish this Christmas.

In his book Priests for the Third Millennium, Cardinal Timothy Dolan writes about the virtues that a diocesan priest must have to properly care for his people. A man must develop virtues like humility, fidelity, courtesy, integrity, simplicity of life and joy in order to minister effectively as a diocesan priest. I am very proud of our seminarians for the dedication they have displayed to their formation. Each one of them has different gifts, strengths and weaknesses, but they are all trying to develop these virtues that are so necessary to caring for God’s people.

As a short update on their status…Grayson Foley is our youngest seminarian and will complete his 2nd year of formation this spring. His priestly ordination would be in the Spring of 2028. Will Foggo has two less years of formation than Grayson since he had already completed three years of undergraduate work at Mississippi State. Will’s priestly ordination would be in the Spring of 2026. Ryan Stoer and Tristan Stovall are past the halfway mark of formation. They are scheduled for priestly ordination in Spring 2024. Our “senior” seminarians include Carlisle Beggerly of West Point. Carlisle’s diaconate ordination is set for June 4, 2022, and he will be ordained a priest in Spring 2023. Deacon Andrew Bowden’s priestly ordination is set for May 14, 2022 at the Cathedral of St. Peter the Apostle. Deacon Andrew grew up at St. Jude in Pearl.

Thank you for your constant prayers and encouragement for these men. I am encouraged by the way they are using their talents and are courageously offering their lives to the Lord. Pray that they continue to develop the virtues a diocesan priest needs to serve you the best they can when, God willing, they come to their ordination day.

IN EXILE
By Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI
I could never be a literary critic, not because I can’t tell good literature from bad, but because I lack the hard edge. If I dislike a book, I hesitate to say so. Conversely, if I like a book, I tend to be more its cheerleader than its critical assessor. Be that as it may, I want to strongly endorse Ashlee Eiland’s new book, Human(Kind) – How Reclaiming Human Worth and Embracing Radical Kindness Will Bring Us Back Together.

This is not some sentimental, feel good book on how we need to be kind to each other. It’s more like a Sermon on the Mount for our time, or at least how we might work towards living the Sermon on the Mount. How do we remain soulful, warm, and human inside all the things that tend to unhealthily either inflate or embitter our hearts? Here’s how she describes her book.

“This is my story – a story of a black woman who grew up in the South and who discovered some wholeness and some holes along the way. As I looked back over my life, there were moments I remembered so vividly. Upon reflection, they were vivid because they mattered. They marked me in both beautiful and painful ways. But as I sat with these moments and memories, I realized they mattered because they taught me to be kind to my own worthy self. Recalling them helped me acknowledge the good gifts I’ve been given, the gifts I now hope to give to others, and enabled me to see the painful and hard moments as opportunities to be more fully human, to remind myself to receive grace where there’s been grievance.”

The book is a series of stories from her life, all of them told by a gifted storyteller and all of them written with an aesthetics that never sinks into sentimentality or self-pity. And they are stories both of being graced and being wounded. Eiland’s life has been one of contrasts.

On the one hand, her life has been one of privilege – loving parents, the opportunity for a first-rate education, never economically desperate, and always with a supportive family and community around her. On the other hand, she has lived as a black woman inside a world of injustice and inequality. She has had to live as one who must forever be conscious of the color of her skin, who every time she walks into a room needs to look around to see how many others like her are in the room. She also had to endure the ultimate racial slur being shouted in her face. And so, as she says, she has been deeply scarred both in beautiful and painful ways.

For example, one of her stories recounts an incident in which she went out to a restaurant with some Asian friends for a Korean specialty of pork dumplings. The evening went well and driving back from the restaurant and laughing with each other in the car, she felt a life-long weight lift from her. “For the first time, I didn’t feel as if I had to qualify the conversation with a reminder to my friends – or to myself – of my actual race. … Before that day, I felt I had to tiptoe out of one world into another. But that kind of posture, I realized, is laced with shame. It allows the ‘not fully enough’ narrative to run rampant, terrorizing what is oftentimes the best part about sharing our lives with one another.”

We need her narrative. We live in a time of bitterness and division, when civil discourse and respect have broken down, where we demonize each other, where injustice, inequality, and racism still define us more than their opposites, and where kindness is often seen as a weakness. Moreover, there is an ever-intensifying hypersensitivity where even a well-intended word is a potential landmine. Paranoia has replaced metanoia, bringing out the worst in us.

Ashlee Eiland gives us a formula for bringing out what is best in us. How do we react to injustice, offense,and demonization? For example, here is how she reacted after trying to be good to someone and being repaid for her effort by the ultimate racial taunt being hurled in her face: “Humiliated, I went about my day, doing as much good as I could for an afternoon … but knowing that sometimes even doing good is not enough. Sometimes we just have to sit with what’s hard and humiliating about the difficult work of unity and do our best not to let it kill us. Instead, we need to let it shape us in some other way that sobers us up and forces us to take off our rose-colored glasses, to admit that sometimes moving closer and trying to do good and closing the gaps between us and others doesn’t work out the way we want. But maybe it’s worth showing up anyway.”

Lacking the critical edge, I’m not always sure of what constitutes “soul music,” but I can still recognize “soul literature.”

(Oblate Father Ron Rolheiser is a theologian, teacher and award-winning author. He can be contacted through his website www.ronrolheiser.com.)

GUEST COLUMN
By Shannen Dee Williams (CNS)

On Tuesday, Nov. 30, 2021, the third day of Advent and the last day of Black Catholic History Month, I visited the historic Elmwood Cemetery in my hometown of Memphis, Tennessee, and gazed upon the gravesite of “Servant of God” Sister Thea Bowman, one of six African Americans currently under consideration for sainthood.

Although I grew up Black and Catholic, I did not learn about the existence of African American nuns until 2007, while enrolled in graduate school.

Two years later, a conversation in Memphis with then-Bishop J. Terry Steib directed me to the principal’s office of the diocese’s Holy Names of Mary and Jesus School for an interview with Sister Donna Banfield.

During our meeting, Sister Donna, who led Holy Names from 2006 to 2010, informed me of Sister Thea’s final resting place in the city.

I also learned that Sister Donna, a former president of the National Black Sisters’ Conference, led her students on an annual trip to Sister Thea’s gravesite to pay their respects and bear to witness to the lived reality of Black Catholic saints in our midst.

Inspired by Sister Donna’s leadership, I decided to make my own pilgrimage to Sister Thea’s gravesite but not until I completed my planned book on the largely hidden history of the nation’s Black sisters. I wanted the visit to be special, and it truly was.

Reflecting on Sister Thea’s short but powerful epitaph, “She tried,” etched onto her family’s headstone, I thanked her for championing the intellectual, spiritual and cultural gifts of the African American community in the face of discrimination and resistance in our church. I also thanked Sister Thea for being a model of excellence and compassion for all humankind.

“Be woman. Be man. Be priest,” Sister Thea liked to say. “Be single, be married. … Be Irish American, be Italian American, be Native American, be African American, but be one in Christ.”

In these trying times, one can only wonder what Sister Thea, an unapologetic champion of Black life, mothers, families and social equality, might say about the current state of our bitterly divided nation and church.

From the various attempts to stop the teaching of Black history and the nation’s original sins of racism and colonialism to the global climate crisis to the current attempts to roll back the civil rights victories of the middle decades of the 20th century – especially voting rights – I also wonder what advice Sister Thea, a member of the pioneering generation of Black Catholic women and girls who desegregated the nation’s white sisterhoods, would give those fearful of the uncertain future ahead.

In her final years, Sister Thea, a Mississippi native who was also the granddaughter of enslaved people, made it clear where she stood on all forms of injustice. “I will never reconcile myself with … racism … sexism … classism … anything destructive,” she stated.

Too often those who champion Sister Thea and her canonization cause erase her clear understanding of the interconnected dimensions of oppression.

In so doing, they do a terrible disservice to her and other freedom fighters, who always understood that any demand for racial and educational justice not connected to the larger fight for human rights and justice was insincere and illegitimate.

As this nation seems poised with a return to a society that Sister Thea, and so many Black sisters like her fought to bury, I pray for the strength and grace to meet the stark challenges ahead.

During this Advent season, I also pray for the wisdom to remember Sister Thea’s great sacrifice for her beliefs and the courage to seek new ways of living that no longer require martyrdom to convince opponents of human equality to uphold the church’s most basic social teaching of affirming the lives and dignity of all people.

(Shannen Dee Williams is a cradle Catholic and associate professor of history at the University of Dayton. She is the author of “Subversive Habits: Black Catholic Nuns in the Long African American Freedom Struggle,” which will be published by Duke University Press on May 27, 2022. Follow her on Twitter at @BlkNunHistorian.)

Reflections on Life
By Melvin Arrington

St. Nicholas (270-343), whose feast day is December 6, is one of the most popular saints among children and adults alike, undoubtedly due to his association with Santa Claus. In spite of his renown, few facts are known about his life, and much of what we do know is probably legendary.

Born into a wealthy family, Nicholas became famous in his time for his anonymous acts of charity. When he learned of members of his community who were in great need, he would, under the cover of night, secretly enter their house and leave bags of gold.

The most-often recounted story of his generosity involved a poor man’s three daughters who, because they lacked dowries, were unable to marry. This meant they were facing the only other option available to them: a life of prostitution. On three separate nights Nicholas threw a bag of gold through the man’s window, thereby providing the means for each of the three girls to marry.

Nicholas served as bishop of Myra, a city located on the Mediterranean Sea in Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey). During the persecutions of the Emperor Diocletian, he was imprisoned for his faith, but released when Constantine rose to power. In the 11th century, after the Saracens took control of Myra, his relics were secretly removed from the Myra Cathedral and transferred to Bari, Italy. Over the centuries his popularity continued to grow and spread throughout Europe.

At the Council of Nicaea (325) Nicholas condemned Arianism and, according to legend, confronted Arius, the promoter of this heretical doctrine, striking him in the face. Whether he punched him in the nose or, more likely, slapped him, it was a bold gesture of righteous indignation, indicative of his zeal for defending the truth.

Countless miracles have been attributed to him, among them stories of sailors rescued at sea, corn multiplied in order to feed starving people, and children who had been murdered being brought back to life. It is said that a sweet-smelling oil with healing properties exudes from his remains to this day.

So, how did this fourth-century bishop evolve into the Santa Claus and Father Christmas of modern times? Much of it has to do with tales of the saint’s fabled generosity. Those accounts became a primary source, along with the visit of the Magi to the Christ Child, for our custom of giving gifts during the holidays. Linguistics also played a role in this makeover. Over time “Saint” became “Santa” and the last two syllables of his name, “cholas,” turned into “Claus.”

My notion of what Santa Claus looks like was formed by depictions of the jolly ole fellow in Coca-Cola advertising in the 1950s and by the huge Santa that would miraculously appear in the display window at the old McRae’s department store in downtown Jackson during the Christmas shopping season. Both showed him to be a plump, jovial, white-haired old man with a prodigious beard, dressed in a flashy red suit. I’m almost certain the original St. Nicholas looked nothing like those figures.

Popular culture preserves this link between the saint and the North Pole’s most celebrated resident, as seen in the much-loved poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas” by Clement Clarke Moore (1823), which begins: “’Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house / Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse; / The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, / In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there.”

By 1953, when the singing cowboy Gene Autry released the version of the Yuletide classic, “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town” that I remember hearing as a child, the transformation to Santa Claus was complete.

Traditionally, much of the talk during the holidays is focused on acquisition of material goods: “What did Santa Claus bring you?” or “What did you ‘get’ for Christmas?” Our modern culture, through the media, preaches the message over and over, non-stop, that the more things we accumulate the happier we will be.

Just consider all the advertising we see this time of year for luxury items. But more is really less because we eventually grow weary with what we have and seek to acquire different, newer, better products. We want more and more but can never get enough.

Worldly goods just can’t satisfy the longings of the human heart. They may give us a temporary feeling of fulfillment and contentment, but that quickly fades, and soon we’re looking for something else to feed the hunger of our acquisitive nature.

St. Nicholas, on the other hand, teaches that we should place the emphasis not on receiving, acquiring and accumulating, but on giving – a concept that makes no sense at all from a worldly perspective.

Rather than just counting what I have received, perhaps I should reflect instead on what I have given this year. My reflection should also include the question, “Did I give from the heart or just out of a sense of social obligation?”

Love of God and neighbor will motivate us not only to make monetary donations but also an offering of ourselves, that is, our time and talents. There are no substitutes for giving and service. These are the only ways we will find fulfillment and true happiness.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He’s real, and his true name is Nicholas. On Christmas Eve Ole St. Nick is coming to town and, like the Magi, he’s bearing gifts. May we all join in the spirit of the season and be gift-bearers as well. Merry Christmas to one and all!

(Melvin Arrington is a Professor Emeritus of Modern Languages for the University of Mississippi and a member of St. John Oxford.)

GUEST COLUMN
By James Tomek, Ph.D

The Eucharist, being the theme of this liturgical year, inspired Bishop Joseph Kopacz to send priests, deacons and lay ecclesial ministers Bishop Robert Barron’s Eucharist, a study of the Mass, an elaboration on the aspects of meal, sacrifice and real presence of Christ.

Reading Bishop Barron’s book will help us be better Mass attenders. While Father Dennis Gill’s Ars Celebrandi details the structure of Mass; Bishop Barron concentrates more on three basic themes: the sacred meal, where “communion” takes place; sacrifice, that makes the communion possible; and the real presence of the host, that makes the meal possible.

After Bishop Barron’s comparison of Babette’s Feast and the Mass, this review will expound the themes of meal, sacrifice and real presence, hopefully to sit us better at the table with Christ – like the disciples at Emmaus in Luke’s Gospel.

Bishop Barron opens his thesis with a comparison of the Mass and Isak Dinesen’s Babette’s Feast, a short story and a 1987 film about how a servant, saved by two sisters, rewards them and their puritanical diminishing congregation with a lavish meal.

The two sisters took in a starving Babette. Their father was the pastor of a small Lutheran community. When Babette, who was a chef at the “three star” Café Anglais in Paris, wins a lottery, she decides to use all the money to cook a fabulous haute cuisine dinner, with multiple courses, for the remaining community. The dinner, which slowly pleases their bodily senses, also increases their soul senses as they become better acquainted with each other.

Babette’s sacrificial meal inspires Robert Barron to compare her to Christ, as her real sacrificial chef presence transfigures the dinner into a sacred meal where all the guests’ lives are raised physically and spiritually.

Bishop Barron compares the meal to God’s creation (20) as God showed Adam and Eve how and where to eat (Genesis 2:15-17), with the meal being God’s plan for unity. (24) Citing many biblical references, like the Passover, Bishop Barron shows that the meal is also the place for teaching. Divine teaching takes place with Jesus. (27) The feeding of the five thousand stands for nourishing a hungry human race, famished for the right kind of food. (30)

Bishop Barron goes through the entire story of creation, the fall, the formation of Israel, the passover to freedom, Isaiah’s holy mountain to Jesus’s table fellowship and the Last Supper, pointing to the sacred meal’s goal of universal fellowship (eschatological banquet – the word we use for how we want things to end), which is made present to us at Mass.

The table for the meal is also the altar for the sacrifice. Covenants in the Old Testament were sealed with some forms of sacrifice. Jeremiah wanted the covenant to be written on our hearts, where we would know instinctively the right things to do (sacrifice means “holy doing”). Bishop Barron reminds us that at the Last Supper, Jesus invites his disciples to “ingest” his sacrifice – to imitate Jesus’s actions. (66-8)

In my studies of controversial issues of the Mass, the concept of “sacrifice” was more controversial than that of “real presence.” Does Jesus have to die again?

Bishop Barron reminds us that we really “re-present” Jesus’s sacrifice, with our intention to imitate it.

“I am suggesting that pain, consciously aligned to the sacrifice of Jesus can be spiritually transfiguring. Thus, the sufferer becomes not simply the person in pain, but Abraham giving away what he loves the most, Moses enduring the long discipline of the desert … or the crucified Messiah wondering why he has been forsaken by the Father.” (71)

The Liturgy is the re presentation of the sacrifice of the Lord. At Mass, we, if paying attention, not only witness the event of the Cross, we participate in it. (71-2) With the sacred and sacrificial meal, we are at a place where sins can be forgiven and friendship restored. (72)
In the chapter on real presence, Bishop Barron cites the great “Catholic” writer Flannery O’Connor’s response to the Eucharist as a symbol saying, that if it is a symbol, to hell with it. (73) O’Connor and Barron, in this chapter, are defining “symbol” in its arbitrary sense (for example, the bulldogs of Mississippi State point to their tenacity). There are other uses of symbols as expressions of meaningful experiences that Bishop Barron uses throughout the book, but, here, he is stressing the real presence of Jesus and wants to avoid the term “symbol.”
Bishop Barron explores chapter six of John’s gospel where Jesus says that he is the bread of life and tells his disciples that they must follow him by eating his flesh. (78-9) He contends that the Incarnation of God into the world requires the real presence of Christ. (81)

Is it the actual flesh and blood of Jesus that we consume at Mass? I was taught that it is the glorified real presence of Jesus.

To help us, Barron explains Aquinas’s interpretation of sacrament and real presence. All sacraments are designed to place the spiritual life within human beings. Just as we digest material food for our bodies, the Eucharist is ingested for our life of grace. Aquinas calls Jesus’s flesh “proper species,” which become the “sacramental species” that we consume at Mass. (91-3)

The Mass is the prolongation of the Incarnation. Jesus’s real presence is in all parts of the Mass. Bishop Barron includes the scripture readings at Mass too as he cites Origen’s thesis that the real presence of Jesus is also in the “Word” of God, which can stand both for Jesus and the Bible itself. (82)

Sacred meals end with a mission. Bishop Barron concludes his thesis referring to Jesus appearing to the disciples at Emmaus in Luke’s Gospel.
The two disciples meet the “glorified” Jesus, who explains to them the events of the crucifixion and resurrection. They invite Jesus to dinner and finally recognize him when he breaks the bread. Jesus then disappears.
Bishop Barron sums up the Mass by placing us back in time at Emmaus. (111) We come to Mass like the two disciples and beg for Jesus’s mercy. Jesus forgives us by opening up the scriptures for us. We need the meal to fully be conscious of who Jesus is, and we see him in the breaking of the bread. Jesus then disappears and we are sent to continue his mission. Thank you for the lesson, Bishop Barron.

(James Tomek is a retired language and literature professor at Delta State University who is currently a Lay Ecclesial Minister at Sacred Heart in Rosedale and also active in RCIA at Our Lady of Victories in Cleveland.)