Homily by Archbishop Charles Jude Scicluna
Dear Fr Jean-Paul, in a few minutes we will be able to call you Father. Dear Jean-Paul you are being ordained on this great day: the feast of the most Sacred Heart of Jesus and one with us you have heard his words: “My yoke is easy and my burden light” (Mt 11:30).
You are being called to carry a yoke. A yoke is something that unites two living beings together. You are being united with the sacred yoke of the priesthood to Jesus Christ. He will be with you. You will carry his yoke but he will also carry you. “My yoke is easy”.
He also talks about burden and it is a paradox to hear Jesus saying that his burden is light because no burden is actually light. What makes the yoke easy? What makes the burden light? It is him, Jesus with his love, with his compassion, with his mercy. He invites us to take his yoke upon us and learn from him. He is meek and humble of heart. Dear Jean-Paul, pray that you may always be a disciple of Jesus like Don Bosco: meek and humble of heart.
And as you dedicate your life to the service of the Church as a religious, consecrated in this family of the Salesians of Don Bosco, always remember the three wise loves of your founder: the Eucharist, Our Lady, the Pope. In the Eucharist you will find your joy, your consolation, the meaning of your ministry. In Our Lady Help of Christians you will find a mother, a true disciple, a true teacher of faith, hope and charity. In your fidelity to the Holy Father, you will open your heart to the Church universal. Your presence here with us is a sign of how Catholic we truly are, how universal we truly are.
Let him crown you with kindness and compassion not only for your good but especially for the good of all those who are going to meet you and meet him, Jesus, in you and through you.
You’ve come from the Congo and I would like to greet all your family and friends who are following, I hope, this live streaming. They are with us in spirit and we greet them and tell them how proud we are to be with you today and to present you to the Lord in their name.
In your heart you carry your country, you carry your history, you carry Africa. But you have been called to serve wherever your superiors tell you and although you didn’t arrive here shipwrecked like St Paul you are here among us. I hope that you feel welcome and that through your ministry you also bring the power of the word of Jesus and his healing touch.
Dear Jean-Paul, pray that you may always be a disciple of Jesus like Don Bosco: meek and humble of heart.
As the Psalm beautifully puts it, dear Jean-Paul, he redeems your life from destruction, crowns you with kindness and compassion, and so remember Fr Jean-Paul as you administer the sacred sacrament of reconciliation immediately after this ordination and you receive the faculty to confess, that you also need to confess your sins, to let him redeem your life from the destruction of sin, of the passions, of vices, of our failures, of our weaknesses. Let him crown you with kindness and compassion not only for your good but especially for the good of all those who are going to meet you and meet him, Jesus, in you and through you.
As we pray with you today we pray especially for our own fidelity. We also pray for our wholeness and holiness and we also pray for Holy Mother Church.
Never forget that our holiness is not an expression of our own merits or bravado.
Welcome, dear Jean-Paul into the great line of holy priests and never forget that our holiness is not an expression of our own merits or bravado. It is the wonderful mystery and masterpiece of the mercy and the grace of God. And that is why you are being ordained today by the laying of hands and the prayer of the Church through the power of the Spirit and that by your words people will be free from their sins and the offerings of the holy people of God, the simple bread and wine will be transformed, transubstantiated into the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.
We are all very little. The Lord has called us to great things and let us humbly admit that we need him to be that merciful covenant because he is a faithful God who keeps his merciful covenant with his people. And we pray that we become this merciful covenant, this merciful encounter of God with his people. May whatever you say, whatever you do bring to the people of God this merciful covenant. And may through you, the Congregation that you form part of and the Holy Mother Church through you, Fr Jean-Paul and through the mercy of God, through the intercession of Our Lady, St John Bosco and all the Salesian saints, may the people of God be crowned with kindness and compassion.
✠ Charles Jude Scicluna
Archbishop of Malta
Reading 1: Deuteronomy 7:6-11
Psalm: 103(102):1-2,3-4,6-7,8,10
Reading 2: 1 John 4:7-16
Gospel: Matthew 11:25-30