(Thirtieth Sunday of the Year (B): This homily was given on October 26, 1997 at St. Pius X Church, Westerly, R.I. by Fr. Raymond Suriani. Read Hebrews 5: 1-10.)

"Why your priests need your prayers."

I won’t tell you how I came across the letter that I’m about to read to you. Suffice it to say, it wasn’t easy! Oh yes--the return address on the envelope was 666 Mark of the Beast Boulevard, Hell, zip code 66666.

Dear dastardly and disgusting demon friends,

This is a little ‘hate note’ from the boss. It has come to my attention that last month the most annoying Mother Teresa escaped our clutches and took up eternal residence with our arch-enemy. My most-reprehensible wretches, you failed again! Another one lost to the kingdom of light! This is precisely my reason for writing. Obviously some of you need a review of our basic, hellish strategy. First of all, let’s be clear about the goal: Our goal is not simply to cause confusion and a few natural disasters. Our goal is to win souls for hell! Our goal is the eternal destruction of human beings! (Oh, what a marvelously despicable thought!) And how are we to accomplish this goal? Well, at this point we must ask ourselves yet another question: What keeps souls out of hell? We all know that answer don’t we, my evil co-workers? What keeps souls out of hell is the grace and truth of ‘you-know-who.’ (I don’t want to say his name, because every time I do I have to fall down on my knees, and I hate falling down on my knees to anybody--especially Him!) You know his initials--J.C. Need I say more? It’s his grace that’s the problem! And how is his grace communicated to those sniveling little earth creatures, so that they avoid our evil clutches? Simple: his grace comes through his Church--that Church he founded on the rock of Peter. (Ah yes, Peter. Remember him? We almost had that boy on Holy Thursday night, but somebody messed up on their assignment! Oh there was hell to pay on that one!) But anyway--since the Church is the channel of the grace of salvation, then it’s obvious--the Church must be destroyed! At all costs! The work of the Church must be effectively undermined. That’s our demonic task. But how? I know what some of you are saying: "Persecute the Church! Throw more Christians to the lions!" My dear devils, this is why I’m the boss and you aren’t. We’ve tried this approach many, many times, and it’s always backfired! Just look at Poland in this century. We raised up a communist government to oppress the Church, and the Church there became stronger than ever. No, no, no--a much more effective strategy is to work from the inside. This has produced marvelous results in recent years, as many of us know. Here’s the formula: raise up a few heretics within the Church; get them to call themselves "dissenters"--it sounds much nicer in a politically correct age. Then have them placed in positions of authority and influence at so-called "Catholic universities" and other such places. And through these individuals, like termites, attack two of the essential pillars of the Church: the Eucharist and the priesthood. Get people to doubt the Real Presence of you-know-who in the Blessed Sacrament. Get them to think it’s nothing more than ordinary bread and wine. Then convince people that there’s nothing unique about the ordained priesthood. The rest will follow. It’s that simple, my detestable drones. You see, if you destroy faith in the Eucharist and the priesthood, you will isolate those weak little earthlings from the only One who can save them from our power! They will no longer seek his forgiveness in the sacrament of Confession--so mortal sins will abound!! Oh joy! And they will not receive the inner strength that comes to them from the worthy reception of his Body and Blood in the Eucharist. Consequently, they will be like sheep wandering in the wilderness without a Shepherd. Oh what fun for us wolves!

So, my evil emissaries, what are you waiting for? Let’s get to work. There’s lots of room in hell. So let’s start filling the place up! No more Mother Teresas--please!

Unaffectionately yours forever and ever,

Satan

My brothers and sisters, I wish I could stand here today and tell you that this diabolical advice has had little or no effect on the demons of hell, but that would not be true. Sad to say, they’ve obeyed their evil master exceedingly well--with horrible consequences for the Church! According to one recent poll, only 30% of all Catholics now accept the Church’s teaching on the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. And the simple fact that many Catholics think nothing of missing Sunday Mass seems to verify that statistic. Every once in a while a child will tell me that his parents did not take him to Mass on a given Sunday because "something really important came up." I’ll say to the young person, "What was so important?" He’ll reply, "A soccer game--a picnic--a vacation"--or some facsimile thereof. This is the message that some of our children are getting from their parents: that anything and everything is more important than Jesus Christ present in the Holy Eucharist.

And regarding the priesthood--I think it’s pretty clear that in today’s world the only noteworthy priest is a bad priest. Real-life bad priests are the only ones who get mentioned in the newspapers and on the nightly news. And fictitious bad priests--why, they get their own TV shows on ABC! And have you heard? Some priests, including some bishops, think this show ("Nothing Sacred") is fine. Imagine: a show about a priest who doubts the existence of God and urges his congregation to disobey the commandments--this is acceptable to some real-life clergy. Satan’s little demons have obviously been hard at work!

Why is this important, my brothers and sisters? It’s important because the salvation of our souls is at stake! Today’s second reading is from the Letter to the Hebrews. Here the author is talking about the priesthood of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. He begins by speaking of the high priests of the old covenant--although his words certainly apply to priests of the new covenant like yours truly. (In fact, this reading was done at my ordination 12 years ago.) "Every high priest is taken from among men and made their representative before God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins." That’s what a priest does--he offers a sacrifice to the Lord for sins. The sacrifice that I offer as a Catholic priest is the one sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the Cross. That’s what the Mass is: the unbloody representation of the one sacrifice of Christ on Good Friday.

The author continues, "He is able to deal patiently with erring sinners, for he is himself beset by weakness and so must make sin offerings for himself as well as for the people." This is why we should never fear going to Confession: the priest knows that he needs God’s forgiveness as much as anyone else.

Then the author talks specifically about the priesthood of Jesus, calling him "a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek." In other words our Lord has a priesthood that’s unique and eternal. As it says in Hebrews 7: "Under the old covenant there were many priests because they were prevented by death from remaining in office; but Jesus, because he remains forever, has a priesthood which does not pass away. Therefore he is always able to save those who approach God through him, since he forever lives to make intercession for them." Our response to that should be, "Thank you, Lord." Forgiveness and salvation are the fruits of the one sacrifice of Jesus. And those fruits are always available to us, because Jesus is risen and alive. But how do those fruits come to us, under normal circumstances? Normally they come to us through the sacraments! And this is why Satan wants to destroy the priesthood here on earth. Get rid of the priesthood, and you undermine the sacraments--the primary channels of God’s salvific grace. The Eucharist would be gone, Confession would be eliminated, and, as Satan put it in that fictitious letter I read a few minutes ago, he and his wolves would have a field day gobbling up little sheep all over the world.

And so I say to everyone today: Pray. That’s my simple message to you this morning: Pray, pray, pray! Every single day, pray for the Church, and pray for your priests--from the Pope on down to your assistant pastor. Pray that we will be holy. Pray that we will be faithful to Christ. Pray that we will be effective instruments of salvation for many people. That’s the best thing you can do for the world, and (believe it or not) it’s the best thing that you can do for yourselves! Because, as St. Pius X used to say, "A holy priest makes holy people."