“Ten were cleansed, were they not? Where are the other nine?
Has none but this foreigner returned to give thanks to God?” (Luke 17:17-18)
This past Tuesday we celebrated the Feast of St. Francis of
Assisi. He is my patron saint (it’s my
middle name) and I chose him for my confirmation saint. Two weeks before I became pastor of this
parish, I travelled to Assisi for the very first time. After our tour of the town and the tombs of
Saints Francis and Claire, I asked our tour guide how I could get to San
Damiano: a small chapel on the outskirts of town. Why did I want to go
there? Well, for those who don’t know
the story of St. Francis in San Damiano here goes: When Francis was discerning his vocation, he
retreated to this small chapel which laid in ruins. All that was left there was a cross and the
saint heard the Lord say to him, “Francis, rebuild my church.” Now Francis saw this as a tangible sign from
the Lord to do something concrete with his life and he started literally rebuilding
San Damiano stone by stone. But there
was also a deeper meaning behind this invitation, for Francis would turn out to
be a transformative figure in the Church of the 13th century as the
universal Church needed some rebuilding as well and the Franciscans would breathe
some life into an aristocratic and “too wealthy for its own good” Church.” So I wanted to travel to where St. Francis
had heard the voice of the Lord, and even though it was late in the day and the
chapel was closed, I convinced a taxi driver to take my mother, a friend, and
myself to San Damiano.
I said in one of my pilgrimage videos three months ago, that
if Assisi is the most peaceful place on earth, then San Damiano is the most
peaceful place in Assisi. We arrived and
I asked the taxi driver to wait for us and to keep the meter running because it
was a long walk back into town and it was getting late. The meter didn’t matter to me. I was transfixed by this place. I stood staring at this chapel that St.
Francis had rebuilt with his two hands and thought about the mission that I was
about to embark on as soon as I returned home.
I kept repeating the words of Jesus to Francis in my head: “rebuild my
church.” When it was time to go, you can
see in the picture below that while my feet look ready to leave, my head is
still firmly pointing towards the chapel.
I did not want to leave, but just as the disciples had to descend from
Mount Tabor, I too had to get down from this mountain to begin my new
mission. What was going through my mind
in that picture below? I was thinking of
all the incredible parishioners that I had yet to meet. I was thinking about
rebuilding a church. I was thinking of
Immaculate Conception.
Now you may think there’s nothing wrong with our parish,
that no rebuilding is needed here. We
come to Mass; things go smoothly, so no problem. But that’s not the Church that our Lord
envisioned. We are an apostolic
Church! Called to go out and not to be
merely pew dwellers.
Last week, I referenced the first part of our mission
statement that focused on being disciples.
This week, the focus is on us being a “Eucharistic people called to go
out and bring the presence of Christ into the world.” What does it mean to be “Eucharistic?” Well,
just look at today’s gospel. Eucharist
means thanksgiving and we see one of the ten lepers come back glorifying God
and thanking Him for being cured. This
spirit of thanksgiving is how we should live our lives. (We must be thankful this week especially because
we were spared from the hurricane.)
Being Eucharistic also means being the presence of Christ in the world
because Jesus asks a very important question when this leper returns: “Where
are the other nine?” The statistic of 1
in 10 used in the gospel is the same statistic the Archbishop constantly
reminds his priests of: only 1 in 10 Catholics in the Archdiocese go to
Mass. So it’s up to us to go out and
find the other nine. It’s up to us to be
apostolic. It’s up to us to be a
Eucharistic people. It’s up to us to
rebuild this church together! All of us
are living stone, as we hear in 1 Peter 2:5, that make up this beautiful parish,
but there are many stones that are missing.
I give thanks to God for the ones that are here and are doing great
works, but now we must invite others to be part of this continual rebuilding
process. God has blessed us with so
much, how do we repay him and how do we help him rebuild his church?
