Pope
declares Junipero Serra a Saint
Vatican
Radio) Celebrating his first Mass in the United States on Wednesday, Pope
Francis declared a new saint of the United States. Fr. Junipero Serra, a
Spanish Franciscan priest known for starting nine missions in the 18th century
in what is today the US state of California, was raised to the glory of the
altars during a solemn open-air Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of
the Immaculate Conception, in the US capital, Washington. Several
cardinals and bishops, all in white vestments, joined him at the altar on a
state erected specially for the canonization, while many more sat in front of
the altar.
The
Pope who is in the US, following his visit to Cuba Sept. 19-22, was accorded a
state welcome Wednesday morning, at the Whitehouse in Washington by President
Barack Obama, after which he met US bishops in St. Matthew's
Cathedral. The canonization rite at the start of the evening Mass included
a biography of Fr. Serra and the chanting of the Litany of the Saints.
Pope Francis then pronounced the formula of canonization, officially declaring
Junipero Serra a saint.
In
his homily, Pope Francis held up the figure of America’s new Saint, Junipero
Serra, as a model of one who having experienced the joy of God’s merciful
anointing, in turn went out to joyfully proclaim the Good News to all people,
leaving behind the security and apathy of his comfort and home. Taking his
cue from St. Paul who invited Philippians to “Rejoice in the Lord always,” Pope
Francis, delivering the entire homily in Spanish, said the desire for a
fulfilling, meaningful and joyful life is something all have in their
hearts. He noted that the struggles of everyday life seems to stand in the way of this
invitation to rejoice. Our daily routine, he said, can often lead us
to a kind of glum apathy
which gradually becomes a habit, making our hearts grow numb.
But against this, Jesus offers us the answer. He says, “Go forth! Proclaim!
The joy of the Gospel is something to be experienced, something to be known and
lived only through giving it
away, through giving ourselves away.” “For
the source of our joy is “an endless desire to show mercy, the fruit of our own
experience of the power of the Father’s infinite mercy,”
the Pope stressed.
The
Pope said that Jesus intended his Good News for all, embracing life as he saw
it, in faces of pain, hunger,
sickness and sin, in faces of wounds, of thirst, of weariness, doubt and
pity. He said, Jesus embraced life as he found it, whether dirty,
unkempt or broken, and urges us to go out to tell the good news fearlessly,
without prejudice, without
superiority, without condescension, to all those who have lost the joy of
living. Go out to proclaim the merciful embrace of the Father…who wants
to anoint them with the oil of hope, the oil od salvation.
The
Pope explained that mission is never the fruit of a perfect planned program,
but is always the fruit of a life which knows what it is to be found and
healed, encountered and forgiven.
Mission is born of a constant experience of God’s merciful anointing. In this regard, Pope
Francis recalled the Aparecida Document
of the Latin American Bishops, saying “life grows by being given away, and it
weakens in isolation and comfort.” And one such person who witnessed to the joy
of the Gospel in these lands,
the Pope said, is Father Junípero Serra. He was the embodiment
of “a Church which goes forth”, a Church which sets out to bring
everywhere the reconciling tenderness of God. Junípero
Serra left his native land
and its way of life, and learned how to bring to birth and nurture God’s
life in the faces of everyone he met. Junípero
sought to defend the
dignity of the native community, to protect it from those who had mistreated and abused it.
The Pope said mistreatment and wrongs still trouble us today, especially
because of the hurt which
they cause in the lives of many people.
The
Canonization Mass at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception was in
Latin, Spanish and English, and one of the scripture readings was in a native
American language.
The prayer of the faithful was is Korean, Vietnamese, Tagalog of the
Philippines, Igbo of Nigeria,
Criollo and American sign language, symbolizing the rich multi-cultural
character that the US is known
for.
Below
is the prepared text of Pope Francis' homily at the Canonization Mass of St.
Junipero Serra in Washington:
Rejoice
in the Lord always! I say it again, rejoice! These are striking
words, words which impact
our lives.
Paul tells us to rejoice; he practically orders us to rejoice.
This command resonates with
the desire we all have for a
fulfilling life, a meaningful life, a joyful life. It is as if Paul could
hear what each one of us is
thinking in his or her heart and to voice what we are feeling, what we are experiencing.
Something deep within us
invites us to rejoice and tells us not to settle for placebos which simply keep
us comfortable.
At the same time, though, we all know the struggles of everyday life. So
much seems to stand in the way of this
invitation to rejoice. Our daily routine can often lead us to a kind
of glum apathy which gradually becomes
a habit, with a fatal consequence: our hearts grow numb.
We don’t want apathy to guide our lives… or do we? We don’t want the
force of habit to rule
our life…
or do we? So we ought to ask ourselves: What can we do to
keep our heart from growing
numb, becoming
anesthetized? How do we make the joy of the Gospel increase
and take deeper root in our lives?
Jesus gives the answer. He said to his disciples then and he says it to
us now: Go forth!
Proclaim!
The joy of the Gospel is something to be experienced, something to be known and
lived only through giving it
away, through giving ourselves away.
The spirit of the world tells us to be like everyone else, to settle for what
comes easy. Faced
with this human way of
thinking, “we must regain the conviction that we need one another, that we have a shared
responsibility for others and for the world” (Laudato Si’,
229). It is the responsibility to proclaim the message of Jesus.
For the source of our joy is “an endless desire to show mercy, the fruit of our own
experience of the power of the Father’s infinite mercy”
(Evangelii Gaudium, 24).
Go out to all, proclaim
by anointing and anoint by proclaiming. This is what the Lord
tells us today.
He tells us:
A Christian finds joy in mission: Go out to people of every nation!
A Christian experiences joy in following a command: Go forth and proclaim the
good news!
A Christian finds ever new joy in answering a call: Go forth and anoint!
Jesus sends his disciples out to all nations. To every people. We
too were part of all those
people of two thousand
years ago. Jesus did not provide a short list of who is,
or is not, worthy of
receiving his message,
his presence. Instead, he always embraced life as he saw it. In
faces of pain, hunger, sickness and
sin. In faces of wounds, of thirst, of weariness,
doubt and pity. Far from expecting a pretty life, smartly-dressed and
neatly groomed, he embraced life as he found it. It made no difference
whether it was dirty, unkempt, broken. Jesus said: Go out and
tell the good news to everyone.
Go out and in my name embrace life as it is, and not as you think it should be.
Go out to the highways and
byways, go out to tell the good news fearlessly, without prejudice, without superiority,
without condescension, to all those who have lost the joy of living.
Go out to proclaim the merciful
embrace of the Father. Go out to those who are burdened by pain and failure, who feel that their
lives are empty, and proclaim the folly of a loving Father who wants to anoint them with the oil of
hope, the oil of salvation. Go out to proclaim the
good news that error, deceitful illusions and
falsehoods do not have the last word in a person’s life. Go out with the ointment which soothes
wounds and heals hearts.
Mission is never the fruit of a perfectly planned program or a well-organized
manual. Mission is always the fruit of a
life which knows what it is to be found and healed, encountered and forgiven.
Mission is born of a
constant experience of God’s merciful anointing.
The Church, the holy People of God, treads the dust-laden paths of history, so
often traversed by conflict, injustice
and violence, in order to encounter her children, our brothers and sisters.
The holy and faithful People of
God are not afraid of losing their way; they are afraid of becoming self-enclosed, frozen into élites,
clinging to their own security. They know that self-enclosure, in all the
many forms it takes, is the cause of
so much apathy.
So let us go out, let us go forth to offer everyone the life of Jesus Christ
(Evangelii Gaudium, 49).
The People of God can embrace everyone because we are the disciples of the One who knelt before his own to wash
their feet (ibid., 24).
The reason we are here today is that many other people wanted to respond to
that call. They
believed that “life
grows by being given away, and it weakens in isolation and comfort” (Aparecida Document, 360).
We are heirs to the bold missionary spirit of so many men and women who preferred not to be “shut
up within structures which give us a false sense of security…
within habits which make us feel safe,
while at our door people are starving” (Evangelii Gaudium,
49). We are indebted to a tradition, a chain of witnesses
who have made it possible for the good news of the Gospel to be, in every generation, both “good”
and “news”.
Today we remember one of those witnesses who testified to the joy of the Gospel
in these lands, Father Junípero
Serra. He was the embodiment of “a
Church which goes forth”, a Church which
sets out to bring everywhere
the reconciling tenderness of God. Junípero Serra left his native land and its way of life.
He was excited about blazing trails, going forth to meet many people, learning and valuing their particular customs
and ways of life. He learned how to bring to birth and nurture God’s life in
the faces of everyone he
met; he made them his brothers and sisters. Junípero
sought to defend the
dignity of the native community,
to protect it from those who had mistreated and abused it. Mistreatment and wrongs which today still
trouble us, especially because of the hurt which they cause in the lives of many people.
Father Serra had a motto which inspired his life and work, a saying he lived
his life by: siempre adelante!
Keep moving forward! For him, this was the way to continue
experiencing the joy
of the Gospel, to keep his
heart from growing numb, from being anesthetized. He kept moving forward, because the Lord was
waiting. He kept going, because his brothers and sisters
were waiting.
He kept going forward to the end
of his life. Today, like him, may we be able to say: Forward!
Let’s keep moving
forward!
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