Enhanced Offertory Campaign Announced

Here's Monsignor Sullivan's remarks on the enhanced offertory campaign announced this week by Bishop McManus.

As was announced to you in Bishop McManus’ second letter of invitation, the original purpose of today’s meeting was simply to report on the fiscal challenges that we have just reviewed. But that changed and so now we move to the second part of our agenda.

Over the past few months, as we prepared for this meeting, we have simultaneously been discussing the need to find ways for parishes to increase their income so that they can better meet their obligations at the local and diocesan levels, and/or expand ministry in the parishes. Our parishes clearly need to increase their revenue.

Early last spring, some of us began to consider the possibility of an all-diocesan increased offertory campaign to be undertaken by each parish in 2010. Its important to say that an all-diocesan increased offertory campaign is not a capital campaign, where you seek funds to make improvements to the property, or seek funds for new buildings, or to establish endowments, and where substantive donations are requested from individuals, often over a period of years.

The idea for such an increased offertory campaign was first discussed by our Deans at the Presbyteral Council meeting last May and the initial discussion was intriguing and largely favorable. Most of the Deans then had discussions with the priests in their deaneries in the later spring or early fall. Again, for the most part, the discussions were positive.

The Presbyteral Council discussed it a second time three weeks ago, when I offered a more complete description of what it might look like and how it might work, and again the response was favorable. One expressed concern was relative to what company would be chosen to serve as fundraising counsel since we don’t have the necessary staff to conduct it ourselves.

From what we have learned from the Deans, who represent a dozen or so priests in their respective deaneries, it would appear that the priests of the Diocese stand ready to go forward with this undertaking and so I want to explain how something like this would conceivably work.

While an increased offertory campaign is not by any means a panacea or a total solution, by any means, to the complex issues that we have reviewed today, it does represent a serious step in the right direction. Its purpose is to enable parishes to more adequately meet their financial obligations as well as perhaps expand ministry within our parishes.

At this point, I want to insert a parenthesis. Mike Gillespie, my colleague and our Diocesan Director of Stewardship, without whom the Diocese could not nearly have been so effective in Partners in Charity this past year, has knocked himself out for the past couple of years, doing stewardship education programs in scores of parishes, speaking at all the weekend Masses in too many parishes for me to remember, and meeting with parish or finance councils. But with all his efforts, realistically, only a few parishes have taken steps in the direction of beginning a wholistic stewardship approach.

Engaging an overall stewardship approach, which is something we must continue to work at, and should do as a Diocese in the future, would seek to increase the time that parishioners offer to their parishes, would call upon the vast array of God-given talents that parishioners can share with others – and would also ask and receive a larger share of parishioners’ “treasure.”

While few have elected to step into the ‘universe of stewardship,’ just about everyone can relate to the need to increase revenue.Hence, dealing with the more immediate issues and needs we’ve discussed earlier, we’ve studied and we propose an increased-offertory approach at this time, but it can and should certainly rest on stewardship principles.

An increased offertory campaign is a ‘softer approach’ than a capital campaign. It calls upon everyone in the parish to increase their offertory, as they are able. It does not seek large gifts from a few individuals.

It’s also an approach known to be successful, throughout the nation, where it is undertaken in a serious manner at the parish level.

In the past few months we have sought the advice of outside fundraising counsel as to how to proceed. While there are any number of companies which have a history of successfully conducting these campaigns in individual parishes, there are only a couple known to conduct campaigns for a whole diocese at one time.

We reviewed the approach of a number of companies and conducted a couple of interviews and had some telephone conversations, and that having been done would like to engage Community Counseling Service as fundraising counsel for the Diocese. This is the same company that conducted the Forward-in-Faith campaign in 1999. CCS would do the legwork in working with the parishes.

We would begin by immediately organizing a Diocesan Steering Committee comprised of Pastors and Lay Leaders. Generally, they would meet once a month, from now through the conclusion of the campaign a year from December.

Under the guidance given, each parish would form its own committee and the role of the pastor is indispensable. The pastor must provide the leadership necessary for a success.

Each parish would determine what it will do with the increased revenue. For some, it would be to rid themselves of debt. Where there is no debt, it might mean hiring additional staff or expanding ministry. For others, it could mean making capital improvements at the parish. For others, it could mean increased saving or starting an endowment.

In the beginning, each parish assesses the integrity of its electronic data for its parishioners. Are the parish records up to date? Is the software used adequate to the task of conducting this campaign or better communicating with out parishioners? Do we need to improve our software at this time or move to a software package that better addresses the needs of a parish or a Diocese, something like ParishSoft for example? That would be addressed locally. But there is no question that adequate software at the parish is needed.

In the next two-and-half months, fundraising counsel would conduct a meeting with each pastor and the parish leadership team. Their needs, their software, their goals would be discussed.

Common brochures and materials would be designed for use throughout the Diocese but on each brochure one of the panels would reflect the needs and goals of that specific parish, and that brochure would only be used with the parishioners of that parish.

A common DVD or video would likely be produced and used in parishes throughout the Diocese.

Generally, when a campaign like this is conducted, you can expect that revenues will increase from between a low of 15% to a high of 25% to 30%. It is not unheard of, however, and I’ve seen some of the results from other dioceses, where individual parishes, in some instances, could see results as high as 50%, but those cases are rarer and that happens where the motivation levels are extraordinary.

Normally, we could project increased revenue in the range of 25%, sustained over a five-year period, because you renew the program each year, and you’re taught how to do that, which is something you do at the parish level in 2011 and beyond.

Results will vary from parish to parish. Leadership and the leadership team will make the difference. Generally, like politics, increased offertory results are “all local.”

The formal campaign would begin in January and February of 2010 with some ‘pilot parishes,’ a dozen or so parishes, which become the ‘models’ for others and provide enthusiasm and confidence for the Diocese. Thus, they are carefully chosen. In the ‘pilots,’ generally, you have a mix of urban, suburban and rural parishes; a mix of affluent, middle-income, and inner-city parishes.

The pilot parishes would be selected by the Diocesan Steering Committee, working in dialogue with the fundraising counsel. The pilot parishes would complete their campaign prior to the onset of the Annual Partners in Charity Appeal because you’d never conduct two campaigns at the same time.

We would measure the progress of the ‘pilots’ and plan for the general campaign which would take place next fall in all the remaining parishes of the Diocese. There would likely be 3 ‘flights,’ 3 successive waves of parishes conducting the campaign, and there would be some overlapping so that as some are finishing up, others are beginning.

Generally, how is the campaign conducted? At the heart of it are parish-tailored and parishioner-personalized mailings which are sent to the parishioners by the parish leadership team. Usually, 7 letters are sent to active families in the parish and 3 to inactive families. This is done over a period of weeks or couple of months. The crafting of the letters is guided by the fundraising counsel.

At the height of the campaign, a lay leader at the parish speaks to the parishioners at all the Masses on a given weekend. The pastor speaks to the people the following weekend. The parishioners are encouraged, in that way, to increase their offerings and are told why this is necessary and what the increased revenue will provide. Their emphasis is positive, not desperate. The people complete commitment cards that are provided and begin to make their increased donations. All that information stays at the parish. It is not shared with the Diocese.

In studying this campaign, we have also requested, and we hope every parish would elect to attempt this, electronic transfer of funds. This is where parishioners, having pledged a certain amount of dollars per week or month or quarter, automatically have it deducted from their bank account. It is automatically transferred to the parish account.

All of us realize that most parishioners do not “make up their envelopes,” after snowstorms, winter flight to Florida, summer vacations, or periods when they are away from the parish. Electronic Transfer of Funds, ETF, provides income when individual parishioners are away, for whatever reason. Certainly not everyone chooses to do this, but those who do make a great difference, and it will grow in the future because so many of the young meet their obligations this way.

And, that’s basically how it works. Parishes thank and continue to thank their donors. Throughout the year and into the future, they report on how the increased revenue is being used because the need for accountability and reporting is vital. They renew the pledging on an annual basis.

To conduct a campaign like this costs money. I’d like to break-out the costs as we have studied them and talk about a possible ‘formula’ for absorbing the costs. Ultimately, this would be established by the Diocesan Steering Committee in dialogue with Bishop McManus.

We know that the projected overall diocesan-level costs will be $866,500. This will provide for the management of the campaign, and all the guidance provided by the onsite parish counselors for about 15 months. It includes the costs of the brochures, manuals and commitment cards to be used, as well as the miscellaneous office supplies, travel, and meetings at the diocesan level.

The Diocese stands ready to absorb two-thirds of the cost of providing the fundraising counsel and the production of materials. That’s about $572,000.

Recall that I spoke earlier of a portion of our investments called the Diocesan Management Fund, about $6.9 million that we have invested, and the only ‘unreserved monies’ that remain. That is where we would take it from.

This two-thirds would be understood as our own kind of ‘stimulus package’ for the parishes.

The remaining 1/3, or about $286,000, would be absorbed by the 117 parishes and 4 missions in the Diocese collectively. There would be designed a fair-share formula so that all the parishes would be on a level-playing field. One ‘model’ we’ve explored, for example, might be that each parish would contribute 1% of its gross annual offertory. So, if a parish’s income for the year is $85,000 and there are some that small, that parish would pay $850. If a parish’s annual income were $500,000, it would pay $5,000. Something like that could be considered.

There would be additional costs to the parishes, and these are primarily associated with mailings. The parishes would pay for their own stationery to be used for the mailings, just the regular stationery that they now use. The parishes would also pay for the postage for the mailings. The general rule of thumb is that this cost will average between $4 to $5 for every family in the parish. The postage expense could be a little higher in the case of those parishes using 44-cent postage stamps or metered mail, or a little lower for those parishes using a non- profit stamp that looks like a real stamp but isn’t, and which flies for 23 cents rather than 44 cents.

The parish costs expended – the diocesan portion and the local mailings/postage expense – are generally completely paid for by the results of the increased revenue in the first few weeks of the campaign. Obviously, that depends on the success in each parish. After that, everything else “is gravy,” if I may be so bold.

At this time, we’d like to pass out another sheet, which illustrates the costs I’ve just described and how these costs would be completely paid for in the first few weeks of the campaign.

I think that you can see that if parish income is increased between 15% to 25%, there will be an obvious benefit to the parishes.

We also hope there would be a substantive benefit to the Diocese. We hope that parishes would begin to significantly reduce their indebtedness where there is debt, both to the Central Administration and to the DEF because, as you recognize perhaps now more than ever before, we must do so. That would be the greatest ‘pay- back,’ for lack of a better word, to the Diocese.

The Diocese would also hope to recoup some of its outlay of funds for this project through an increase in the overall Cathedraticum we could project.

If the parishes increased their revenues that would mean the Cathedraticum would increase. For every dollar raised by the parishes the Cathedraticum would increase by 71⁄2 cents. If the average of all parishes increased by 20%, which is very realistic, the Cathedraticum would grow by $450,000 a year. If the general increased revenues in the parishes grew by 25% the Cathedraticum would grow by $562,500. That would be very positive for us.

But the greatest benefit will be to the parishes collectively, who could see their collective revenue increase by $6 million to $7.5 million in the first year alone.

In one Diocese, the Diocese of Buffalo, bigger than our own, where an all-diocesan increased offertory drive took place, the result was 30% parish revenue growth in the first year, and they sustained their growth at a level of 25% increase in the next 4 years. In a five-year period, the parishes in the Diocese generated new revenues of $75,000,000. Not to be overlooked, they got 20,000 volunteers doing more for their parishes.

So, it is our hope to begin immediately to conduct this campaign. I assure you that it is a much more passive approach than that of a diocesan capital campaign like Forward-in-Faith, though if we had not done Forward- in-Faith ten years ago, as should by this time be clear, no one could project how much worse we’d be off now.

This campaign will mean work, but nothing of the magnitude of Forward-in-Faith, with its more passive approach. Its an opportunity, at least in part, to renew our parishes. It will help us to correct our negative drifting of the last ten years.

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Parenthetically, I want to say that there is much to be done in the work of evangelization and reaching out to those we know and don’t know and getting them back involved in our churches.

That’s the real sleeping giant in all of this. Before we take any questions on this let me give this one, final anecdote. Recently, a survey on religious practice was conducted in a middle-class neighborhood of the City of Worcester. Historically, religious practice had been strong in that part of the City...but clearly growing weaker in recent years.

In that section of the City, 43% of the people now identified themselves as “completely unchurched.”

When asked if they had any interest in belonging to a church, the results demonstrated that it was a very low priority for those 43%.

In that area, where the local Catholic parish had been losing about ten families a year, thus more than a hundred families in the past ten years, the experiences of the local Protestant churches were probably even worse. The three remaining Protestant parishes in the neighborhood have total Sunday congregations of 55 members, 53 members and 51 members.

For those of us who live in the City, we know the story of Temple Emmanuel, which is really struggling for survival. Not so many years ago, in size, it was one of the top 25 Jewish congregations in the United States. Now they’re struggling to hang on to their building and probably can only do so because they have rented out parts of it to other religious groups.

So, the challenges of a changing culture affect everyone and we need to do much more with evangelization.

A peaceful interlude

Eight days ago, the night before the canonizations, I came upon this
peaceful scene in Saint Peter's Square. It is always amazing how the
spot where hordes of noisy pilgrims scramble and shout throught the
day becomes so peaceful when the sun goes down.

One more picture from October 16, 1978

Watching for the smoke from Saint Peter's Square are the present day Dean of Theology at Catholic University (the only in a collar), the Pastor of Annunciation Parish in Queensbury, New York, a future Rector of the North American College in Rome, Directory of Liturgy for the Diocese of Sioux City in Iowa and your rector. Can you tell which one is me?

THIRTY-ONE YEARS AGO TONIGHT

Thirty-one years ago tonight, your rector was standing in Saint Peter's square as a seminarian as Pope John Paul II was elected as Pope. The moment he came to the balcony of Saint Peter's Basilica and spoke has been wondrously recalled by Rocco Palmo of Whispers on the Loggia and here replicated with a translation of the Holy Father's wonderful remarks!

Praised be Jesus Christ! [Now and forever!]

Dear brothers and sisters,

We all remain downhearted after the death of our beloved Pope John Paul I. Yet here, the Eminent Cardinals have called forth a new bishop of Rome. They've called him from a far country... far, but always close, so close, in the communion of the faith and in the Christian tradition. I was fearful at receiving this nomination, but I have done so in the spirit of obedience to our Lord Jesus Christ and in total trust of his Mother, our Most Blessed Lady.

Also, I don't know if I can explain myself well in your... in ourItalian language. If I err, correct me! And thus I present myself to you, to confess our common faith, our hope, our trust in the Mother of Christ and of the Church, so to begin again along this road of history and of the Church -- to begin it again, with the help of God and the help of men.

COME MEET CARDINAL GEORGE!

On Friday, October 30, 2009, Cardinal Francis George, Archbishop of Chicago and President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, will be the Cathedral’s honored guest at a luncheon in his honor to benefit our Cathedral Church. Our Cathedral Choir School will also provide a musical component to this great occasion.

Would you like to meet Cardinal George and have an opportunity to ask a question of the President of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops? His Eminence is a member of several Roman Congregations and the Vox Clara Committee of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. Just this past week, Cardinal George issued USCCB statements on Catholic view of the Health Care Debate and refined the USCCB’s position in dialogue between Catholic and the Jewish community.

A buffet luncheon will be served and a donation of $50 per person is requested. Seating is limited, so make sure to reserve your place today for this exciting event. Reservations may be made by calling the Parish Office.

WHAT? A luncheon and question and answer session with Cardinal Francis George?
WHEN? Friday, October 30th, from noon to 1:30pm
WHERE? Saint Paul’s Cathedral Cenacle?
COST? $50 per person, to benefit the Cathedral Church of Saint Paul

thank you for SUPPORTING your cathedral church !

DEACON NICHOLAS

On Thursday last, Nick Desimone, one of our wonderful seminarian interns from this past summer, was ordained a deacon by in Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome. If you wish to send a card of congratulations to Nick, his address is: Deacon Nicholas Desimone
Pontifical North American College
Via del Gianicolo, 14
00120 Vatican City State
EUROPE

The promises taken at a diaconal ordination largely describe the deacon’s role and ministry in the Church. Many of you who were at the ordination of Deacon Colin and Deacon Tony a few months ago will recall the promises they took:

Do you resolve to be consecrated for the Church's ministry by the laying on of my hands and the gift of the Holy Spirit?
Do you resolve to discharge the office of deacon with humble charity in order to assist the priestly Order and to benefit the Christian people?
Do you resolve to hold fast to the mystery of faith with a clear conscience, as the Apostle urges, and to proclaim this faith in word and deed according to the Gospel and the Church's tradition?
Do you resolve to keep for ever this commitment as a sign of your dedication to Christ the Lord for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven, in the service of God and man?
Do you resolve to maintain and deepen the spirit of prayer that is proper to your way of life and, in keeping with this spirit and what is required of you, to celebrate faithfully the Liturgy of the Hours with and for the People of God and indeed for the whole world?
Do you resolve to conform your way of life always to the example of Christ, of whose Body and Blood you are ministers at the altar?

Please join me in thanking God for the great gift of Worcester’s newest deacon. I am in Rome this week (although I missed the ordination by one day!) and will assure Nick of your fervent prayers!

HAPPY LITTLE FLOWER DAY!

Today is the feast of the great Little Flower, Saint Therese of Lisieux. I was privileged this year to prepare for the feast by preaching the novena at Saint Mary of the Hills in Boylston. I offer here my simple reflections on this great Saint in the hopes you may find something of interest in them. The first is a reflection on Saint Therese and Suffering and the second on the Little Flower as the greatest flower in God's Garden!

Saint Therese of Lisieux Novena
Sickness, Suffering, and Life

It is so appropriate that we begin this Novena, seeking the intercession of the Little Flower of Lisieux, with a celebration of the anointing of the sick. For while Therese lived at a time that seems so long ago (the year she was born was the same year our Cathedral was being built at the conclusion of the great Civil War), her experience of sickness and death are as real to us as they were exquisitely painful and joyful to her.

Yesterday afternoon, I anointed and brought Viaticum to two people in the Cathedral parish who were close to death. And while their names were not Zelie and Louis Martin, death, the great equalizer, drew me into the same mysteries of suffering which these now blessed parents knew, and which so informed the life of their saintly child.

So tonight, as we pray for all who are sick, and especially for those who are mortally ill, I invite you to return with me to the sickbeds of Therese’s mother and father in a time far away, but a circumstance as close as the aches and pains of our own bodies and hearts.

I

Therese was only four years old when her mother died of breast cancer. But her cancer was not the first encounter with sickness and death experienced by Zelie Martin. Zelie was a sick child and had been turned away from entering the convent due to a chronic bronchial condition and recurrent headaches. But even more terrible was the fact that four of her nine children (Joseph, Joseph-Jean-Baptiste, Helene, and Melanie) had died as babies. Even their youngest, the infant Therese, was subject to several bouts of several sickness, one of which was cured when she was placed before a statue in their family garden known as the smiling Virgin.

Zelie wrote of the deaths of her children, "When I closed the eyes of my dear little ones and prepared them for burial, I was indeed grief-stricken, but, thanks to God's grace, I have always been resigned to His will. I do not regret the pains and sacrifices I underwent for them." She then goes on to say that she "doesn't understand people who say 'You'd have been better not to have gone through all of that." She adds, "They're enjoying heaven now. Moreover, I have not lost them always. Life is short, and I shall find my little ones again in heaven."

Nor was the death of Zelie and Louis’ babies the only encounter with sickness and death in the course of their married life. Eight years before Therese was born, Louis’ father died. "I would never have believed,” Zelie wrote, “how his death could have affected me. I'm desolate." Four years later, her own Father died. At this time she wrote, "I hope, in fact I am certain that my father has been well received by the good God. I only wish that my death will be like his. I have already had Masses said for him, and we will have many more. His tomb will be near that of my two little Josephs."

Thus was Zelie well prepared for death. Saint Therese recalls the moment as seen through four year old eyes: “the ceremonies of Extreme Unction impressed themselves deeply upon my imagination. I can still see the place where I knelt beside Céline. All five of us were there in order of age, and poor, dear father knelt there too, sobbing."

II

And then there was the second great sorrow of Saint Therese’s life, suffered just a year after she entered the convent, when despite the thick walls which separated the Carmel from the outside world, her own Father’s death cut so deeply into her young heart.

It was the year after she entered that Louis suffered two paralyzing strokes as the result of a cerebral arteriosclerosis. The hardest part for Therese was that while she was, finally in her beloved Carmel, she was truly “a prisoner of love.” Reports would reach her through her sisters of the effect which the strokes were having on her father, of how he would wander from the house and disappear, to be found three or four days later at Le Havre or some other place.

Ironically, it is because of Louis’ illness that we admirers of the Little Flower possess one of the greatest memorials of her life. Since Louis could no longer visit the Carmel, Sister Pauline asked a gas lighting contractor working in the convent to take a picture of the young Therese so that her Father might see her in her Carmelite habit. I’m sure you’ve seen these two wonderful photos of Thérèse as a novice kneeling by a Cross. On the back of one of the pictures Pauline wrote, "Make sure nobody sees them. People might be scandalized at nuns having their picture taken."

But even a photo of his beloved youngest daughter was not enough to bring peace to poor Louis Martin. Finally, he was committed to an asylum for the insane. Yet even on the day he was committed, a kindly nurse said to him "You can exercise a wonderful apostolate here." And despite his growing mental disabilities, Louis replied: "I know, but I would prefer to exercise it anywhere else. Well, all my life I've been in command and giving orders, so maybe God is purifying me—to control my pride and officiousness by being subject to orders now." Three years later, Louis suffered a severe stroke and was paralyzed, was taken from the asylum and died at home in Lisieux after a heart attack.

It was Louis’ sickness which first drove Saint Therese to a reflection on the dark night of the soul of Saint John of the Cross, and his death which provoked some of her most beautiful reflections on how real love demands real suffering, and how sacrifice is a necessary part of union with the Cross of Christ. “Love,” she wrote at the time of her Father’s death, “proves itself by deeds, so how am I to show my love? Great deeds are forbidden me. The only way I can prove my love is by scattering flowers and these flowers are every little sacrifice, every glance and word, and the doing of the least actions for love."

In those words and with Louis’ death, Therese came to understand the teaching of Saint Francis of Assisi that it is giving that we receive, in pardoning that we are pardoned and in dying that we are born to eternal life.

III

As with each of us, the deaths of Therese’ blessed parents helped to prepare her for her own death. Her death, however, came so soon, at the age of twenty-four.

She was first stricken with tuberculosis at Easter time, and yet tried to hide it from her sisters, welcoming her sickness as a participation in the sufferings of Christ at Gethsemani. As she would cough up blood from her diseased lungs, she would smile and, as she later wrote, “sing the mercies of the Lord.”

For in her dying, Saint Therese seemed to have achieved a command of that suffering which was her everyday aspiration and her everyday work. On her last day on this earth she is reported to have declared: "I have reached the point of not being able to suffer any more, because all suffering is sweet to me." Her last words were the story of her life: "My God, I love You!"

Conclusion
Such was the experience of sickness, suffering and death in the life of Saint Therese of Lisieux. It’s enough for a series on HBO. The death of four baby siblings, the loss of a mother as a four year old child, the long and torturous death of a parent to mental and physical illnesses, the inability to help or control it all from within cloistered walls, and finally her own painful death to a dreadful disease.

But what did the Little Flower learn from all this suffering?

She learned that all people suffer, you me and the person sitting next to us. But that for the follower of Christ faith gives meaning to the mystery of suffering and value for our own salvation.

She learned that while the sick person should fight against illness, he is not along in this struggle. That indeed, doctors and nurses and the whole medical community work to find ways to get them better. And the whole Church, as we see tonight, fulfills the command of Saint James: Is there anyone sick among you? Then let him call for the Priests and let them anoint him and lay hands upon him in the name of the Lord Jesus.

She learned that we need the sick. For they remind us what is truly important and truly lasting. Faith, hope, and love are the only things that last! And all the rest will fade away. This voice you hear will grow weak in not so many years and this mind will grow dim. These hands will begin to shake and some day this heart will cease to beat. In the end, this body will stop working entirely. And I, who spend most of my waking moments in denial, need to be with sick people who remind me “of the essential or higher things.” The things that really last.

And finally, and most importantly, Saint Therese learned and teaches us that sickness is a gift. It is a sharing in the Passion of Christ. For “Christ is still pained and tormented in his members, made like him. We should always be prepared to fill up what is lacking in Christ’s sufferings for the salvation of the world.” (PCSD)
Through her many sufferings, through her many encounters with death, the little flower taught us many things. But most of all, she teaches us the little way. that even in suffering, and especially through suffering, we can cry with here: "My God, I love You!"


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The Little Flowers and the Roses
Second Night of Novena

I always find the gospel you just heard to be nothing short of shocking. Here Jesus has just finished explaining to his disciples that the Son of Man must suffer, and die. You would think that their reaction would be one of sorrow and compassion for that terrible ordeal which their Lord was soon to face.

But no, what is it that preoccupies the disciples as they walk the road to Capernaum? Jesus asks them. And their faces turned red. And they twitch. And try to look in another direction.

He knows what they were discussing. They were discussing which one of them would be the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven. Who would have the biggest throne. Who would get the room with a view or the corner office.

And then Jesus does something entirely remarkable. It is so incredible it would be worthy of Saint Therese. Jesus, the Christ, the son of the living God, the one through whom all things were made, kneels down in front of these arrogant gossiping disciples, places his arms around a little child, and says you won’t even get into the kingdom of happened unless you become like a little child.

Little. The secret of life is to be little, to be least, to be last, to be the servant of all and the one who who is willing to die for all, even the arrogant gossipy disciples.

Not a very popular message in today’s world. In fact, if you google biggest, you get 151 million hits, but if you google littlest, you get a mere 4 million. Most important generates 242 million sites, whiles least important hits only 144 million. And boss gets 128 million, while servant, only 44.

But, then again, being the least wasn’t very popular in Saint Theresa’s day either. Except with the little flower of Lisieux, and, in fact, that’s where she got her name. As she once wrote to her sister Pauline:

JESUS has decided to teach me a mystery.  He set before me the book of nature; I understood how all the flowers He has created are beautiful, how the splendor of the rose and the whiteness of the Lily do not take away the perfume of the little violet or the delightful simplicity of the daisy.  I understood that if all flowers wanted to be roses, nature would lose her springtime beauty, and the fields would no longer be decked out with little wild flowers.  And so it is in the world of souls, Jesus' garden.  He willed to create great souls comparable to lilies and roses, but He has created smaller ones and these must be content to be daisies or violets destined to give joy to God's glances when He looks down at His feet.  Perfection consists in doing His will, in being what He wills us to be.

Therese understood what had escaped the disciples: that those who aspire to be the least of the disciples are the greatest in the Kingdom of God. Want to be a Rose? Then be content as a dandelion, and be the best dandelion you can possibly be.
For the most pathetic of all men are those who aspire to greatness, because they believe themselves to be great. At the end of the day we are so blessed to be dandelions, for truth be told, we are usually more akin to weeds than to cultivated plants.

And why be content as a dandelion? Because, as the Gospel tells us, God shines on the dandelion and the Rose alike. And what really matters is not whether others tell us that our petals are so colorful or our odor is so sweet, but that we are what God has made us. Again, Saint Therese:

JUST AS THE sun shines simultaneously on the tall cedars and on each little flower as though it were alone on the earth, so Our Lord is occupied particularly with each soul as though there were no others like it.  And just as in nature all the seasons are arranged in such a way as to make the humblest daisy bloom on a set day, in the same way, everything works out for the good of each soul.

And if God looks down on the dandelions and the weeds with his loving sunlight, what should we do? Should we not care for the weeds and the flowers with the same unconditional love?

Do you want to be the sweetest and most beautiful of all the flowers in God’s Garden? Then remember Saint Therese’s admonition: “Nothing is sweeter than to think well of others.”

So, if you would be the sweetest of flowers in God’s Kingdom you will love the poor, the sick, the crazy, and all those people you find so difficult to be around. You will seek out the ones who smell, the ones who whine, and the ones whom no one else will listen to. “Love one another,” Jesus told us, “as I have loved you.”

Saint Francis understood this so very well. For like Therese, he chose to be the little flower, that God might shower him with Roses. Do you remember the story of Saint Francis and the Roses? One day he found himself subject to the worst temptations, so he threw himself into the thorny rose bushes by the Porziuncula in order to be distracted from the devil. But out of veneration for the man of God, the Rose bushes shed their thorns that the little one of God might fall to the ground unscratched.

That story from the Fioretti, the “Little Flowers of Saint Francis” illumines yet another aspect of the life of the Little Flower of Lisieux. For often, when we seek to be the littlest of the flowers in God’s Garden, it means we must endure the thorns of suffering, and sacrifice, and rejection.

Perhaps that is why the Rose was first chosen by God to bear a crown of thorns. For in its beauty, it reflects the beauty of the Son of God. It is as if this sweet smelling flower were preaching to us: that beauty is acquired only through self-sacrifice and holiness through suffering.

For if we, like the Rose, accept the crowns of thorns God sends to us, we will be joined to him who wore those thorns as a crown of triumph. And through our suffering with him, we will know the sweet odor of sanctity and will live for him in glory forever in Heaven.

Oh Little Flower, pray for us dandelions in the Garden of God!