USCCB Bishops' Conference - June 2008

USCCB Spring Meeting during Mass at National Shrine of Our Lady, Queen of Universe, Friday, June 13th, in Orlando, Florida

Today, we, bishops – successors of the Apostles – gather to celebrate Mass in this home of Mary, the first disciple. In coming to Mary’s house, we acknowledge that to be credible apostles we must first be committed disciples. 

And so we seek Mary’s intercession. She is that “Morningstar of hope” who with her “’yes’ opened the door of our world to God himself” (Spe Salvi).  Each one of us was first called to echo Mary’s unqualified “yes” to God long before we were called to the episcopacy.

During the three years in which Jesus walked with his apostles forming them for their future ministry he asked them to make a radical break with the values which this fallen world holds dear:  self-exaltation, carnal indulgence, earthy wealth.  And as each of us face these fundamental temptations isn’t Mary the model for all of us.  She addresses us as she addressed the servants at that wedding feast in Cana:  “Do whatever he tells you.”

Yes, the Church is hierarchical – and those exercising an apostolic office through Holy Orders have an indispensable role in teaching, governing and sanctifying the People of God.  And we can never surrender this role. Recognizing, as Pope Benedict reminded us in Washington this past April, that it cannot be assumed that “all Catholic citizens think in harmony with the Church’s teaching on today’s ethical questions”, we bishops issued last November, our statement, Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship.  We spoke as pastors and as teachers – not in the idiom of politics or polemics but in the language of the Gospel of Life.  In these weeks and months before next November and then beyond, we must continue to cultivate in our people a “Catholic identity which is based not so much on externals as on a way of thinking and acting grounded in the Gospel and enriched by the Church’s living tradition.” Like Mary we must never tire of telling our people:  “Do whatever he (Jesus) tells you”.

Of course that day is long gone when people thought that we could walk on water.  And, those first apostles couldn’t walk on water either. We are keenly conscious of our shortcomings and weaknesses, of our failures and sins.  And so in Mary’s house, we pray:  Holy Mary, Help of Christians and Mediatrix of all graces: Mother of God, pray for us, sinners, who have recourse to you.

St. Paul in writing to Titus defines in these words a rule of conduct for all who share in the “hierarchical structures” of the Church:  “Show yourself in all respects a model of good deeds, and in your teaching show integrity, gravity and sound speech that cannot be censured, so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say of us.” (Titus 2: 7-8).

St. Paul’s words remind us against that discipleship must precede apostleship. The Church is deeply and fundamentally called to be Marian. Her fiat, her “yes”, must be common denominator of all the faithful and it must precede any other role in the Church.  What the Second Vatican Council called the Universal Vocation of all the faithful to holiness is simply our vocation to be like Mary, to say “yes” to God, to walk in the way of discipleship.  Mary’s fiat defined her self-sacrificial cooperation with God’s plan of salvation. And our lives, as Christians and as bishops, must be defined by own fiat, our own “yes” to seek and do God’s will.

In his Spe Salvi, Pope Benedict offered this prayer:  ‘Holy Mary, Mother of God, our Mother, teach us to believe, to hope, to love with you. Show us the way to his Kingdom! Star of the Sea, shine upon us and guide us on our way!”  (Spe Salvi 49)

Through Mary’s intercession and protection, may we become more committed disciples and thereby more credible apostles so that the world might believe.