Jan 19, 2017
With today’s readings, we begin the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) It is the first of the five great proclamations of Jesus in Matthew’s gospel, and is the beginning of Discipleship 1.0. When Jesus speaks of the reign of God, he names its characteristics and results for people here in the Beatitudes. The lectionary does not finish the Sermon on the Mount because Lent begins on March 1, Ash Wednesday. Commentaries on the Beatitudes abound. In this first teaching on discipleship, the overall focus is on the diminishment and erasure of the self. The Greek verb σμικροζω means “to make one’s self small”. In a society of inflated egos, Jesus presents an enormous challenge. Jesus emptied himself of his divinity to become human, and even of our humanity be dying on the cross as a criminal. To make one’s self small is also to move to the margins and to dwell in the company of the “small.” Jesus often refers to these “little ones”, and not all time about children.
OT 4 A Lectionary Catechesis
Jan 19, 2017
by Gabino Zavala, Justice and Peace Director
For the third straight year we have broken the record for the highest temperature on record as reported by NASA and the National and Oceanic Atmospheric Administration. Doesn’t this reality beg the questions, “Why is this happening?”, and “Where are we headed?” Doesn’t this challenge us to reflect on the future of our common home? Doesn’t this challenge us to act differently?
In his Encyclical Laudato Si, Pope Francis wrote, “The climate is a common good, belonging to all and meant for all.” If we are interested in preserving creation and being stewards of what God has created we must take ownership of this situation. Throughout the Encyclical Pope Francis points out that the negative effects of climate change can only be improved if the human family works together.
The United States leads all nations in consumption of natural resources and is second only to China in producing pollutants that harm the atmosphere. We have made efforts in recent times to address this reality. However, we have not done enough. With the election of Donald Trump we are faced with some promises that the made on the campaign trail that he would overturn in his first 100 days as president. He stated that he would:
- Lift restrictions on the production of the country’s shale, oil, natural gas and clean coal energy reserves;
- Green light the development of new pipelines, inviting a resubmission of the Keystone pipeline;
- Pull the United States out of the Paris Agreement.
In light of this reality please join me in urging the new administration to honor the Paris Agreement. Ask President-elect Trump to demonstrate bold leadership with this issue as he enters office.
Sign the online petition here: https://catholicclimatecovenant.salsalabs.org/fantrumppetition/index.html
Jan 18, 2017
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The Vietnamese New Year (Tet) is the most important celebration in Vietnamese culture. It celebrates the arrival of spring based on the Vietnamese calendar. Tet Nguyen Dan means “Feast of the First Morning of the First Day.” It is all about wishing New Year’s greetings as one forgets about the troubles of the past year and hopes for a better upcoming year. People have a tendency to be generous as they visit family and friends.
I admired our three pledged candidates along with their formation director during this year’s break for the celebration of the new year. I saw first hand how they were moved by the spirit of the season. They went back to the area in which they did Summer Ministries and gave food packages to the poor. Hoa Vu, Ky Phung and Hao Pham joined Nhan Bui and a social work company in going to Tan Thanh Parish of the Phu Cuong Diocese to distribute the food. The pastor, Fr. Dominic Minh was once again very welcoming to them and appreciated their generosity.
The Vietnam Mission desires to keep an ongoing relationship with this parish into the future. We would like to establish a mission house there someday. The conditions are favorable with the local government and the people are accepting of us being there. That is where Ky is currently doing full-time ministry.
“Chuc Mung Nam Moi”(Happy New Year)
-Br. Daryl Charron, C.PP.S.
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Jan 16, 2017
Father Bernard (Ben) Diekhoff, C.PP.S. of the Kansas City Province of the Missionaries of the Precious Blood died on Saturday, January 7, 2017, at St. Charles Center in Carthagena, OH. He was 95 years old.
Father Ben was born on March 11, 1921 in Indianapolis, IN to Louis J. and Etta (Sheets) Diekhoff. He entered Brunnerdale Seminary in Canton, OH in September, 1935 and made Temporary Incorporation on December 8, 1939 at St. Joseph College in Rensselaer, IN. He was Definitively Incorporated as a Missionary of the Precious Blood on December 3, 1942 at St. Charles Seminary in Carthagena, OH, and Ordained to the Priesthood at St. Charles on May 15, 1947.
In his first assignment as a priest as parochial vicar at St. Joseph Parish in Hamilton, OH, Father Ben began a ministry that would mark most of his almost seventy years of priesthood. “I walked the sidewalks to visit parishioners,” he said in an interview for The New Wine Press in 2007 when he celebrated his 60th anniversary of ordination. In December 1952, Father Ben was transferred to St. John the Baptist Parish in Glandorf, Ohio. After he left Glandorf in 1955, Father Ben worked with diocesan priests at St. Peter’s parish in Mansfield, OH, before moving to St. Joseph Church in Wapakoneta, OH in June 1957, where he spent six years. As he did in his previous assignments, Father Ben taught religion in the grade school and high school, while also finding time in the evening to visit parishioners.
In the summer of 1963, Father Ben’s first assignment as pastor took him from Ohio to western Kansas. When he arrived at St. Raphael’s Church in Syracuse, KS, he “reveled in being able to see miles upon miles down the road,” Father Ben said in 2007. “The quiet, moonlit nights had a way of soothing my soul. It was peaceful on the plains of Kansas.”
Father Ben continued to cultivate his ministry of home visits during the five years he served as pastor in Syracuse and its mission thirty miles to the south. In 1968, Father Ben moved from western Kansas to North Dakota to begin his longest stint as a pastor, ten years at St. Anthony Parish in Linton. “The visitation and blessing of parishioners in their homes became an even higher priority for me,” Father Ben said. One of his fondest memories of Linton was the “sizable number of parishioners at Daily Mass and their love of singing at these Masses.” Father Ben loved to sing and his beautiful rendition of “Danny Boy” in honor of the first provincial of the Kansas City Province, Father Danny Schaefer, became a highlight of provincial assemblies through the years.
In 1978, Father Ben moved to Nebraska City, NE as pastor of St. Benedict Church. Though he spent only two years there, he continued to enjoy visiting parishioners and sharing evening meals with the Precious Blood priests serving at St. Mary’s parish in Nebraska City.
Father Ben became chaplain at the Motherhouse of the Adorers of the Blood of Christ in Wichita, Kansas in 1980. During those seven years, Father Ben worked with the sisters on peace and justice issues, “attending vigil-light services to protest unfair practices or the injustice and horrors of abortion, and marching in the streets for charitable causes.” The ASC sisters not only engaged Ben in social justice activities, but also impressed him with their care for one another.
While always a primary focus of his priesthood, the ministry of visitation and compassionate presence became central in Father Ben’s life when he moved to St. Anthony Parish in Park Falls, WI as associate in 1987 and later at St. Francis Xavier Parish in St. Joseph, MO as senior priest in 1990. While in Park Falls, he visited more than 600 families. In St. Joe, that number of families Father Ben visited exceeded 1200. Father Bill Walter, C.PP.S., who has served at St. Francis Xavier since 2007 said parishioners still talk about Father Ben’s visits.
It was in St. Joseph when his life-long love affair with the golf reached its peak. On October 9, 1996, Father Ben recorded a hole-in-one. “There was something very special about that shot, about its accuracy (some say luck) with which it was executed,” Ben recalled. “Using a seven wood on a par three 135-yard hole, I knocked the ball directly into the hole, no bouncing across nor dribbling on the green. The ball just landed in the hole. That took real skill!”
Father Ben’s greatest skill, of course, was not on the links but in living his faith, in leading others in prayer and celebrating the sacraments, and in visiting thousands of homes of parishioners who experienced his gentleness, kindness and care.
He retired to St. Charles Center in Carthagena, OH in the summer of 2002. As his health allowed, he continued to assist with pastoral ministries when needed and to play golf. But for the past few years, Father Ben lived in the infirmary at Saint Charles where his gentle disposition, his patience and his prayerfulness were an inspiration to family, nursing staff, and members of the community.
Father Diekhoff is survived by his brother Norbert and sister-in-law Rosemary of Beech Grove, IN, and his sister, Rita Ferguson of Indianapolis, nieces and nephews. Visitation will be at St. Charles Center on Wednesday, January 11, beginning at 1:00 PM, with a wake service at 7:00 PM. The Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at 2:00 PM on Thursday, January 12, 2017 at St. Charles, with Rev. Joseph Nassal, C.PP.S., provincial director, presiding. Burial will follow at St. Charles Cemetery.
May he rest in God’s gracious peace.
Jan 12, 2017
The gospel suggests two possible directions to go with these readings: the proclamation of the core of the gospel and the call of disciples. The second reading, however, reminds us that either way there is the obstacle of the Cross. In other words, discipleship is not a matter of spiritual materialism, something one can buy to save one’s self. To proclaim the gospel, means we must first be called. How were you called?
OT 3 A Lectionary Catechesis
