Father Thomas Rosica, CSB, speaks on holiness and the example of the saints at a pastoral day at the Ottawa diocesan centre May 19.The saints give hope to a generation hungry for heroes, says Father Rosica
By Deborah Gyapong
Canadian Catholic News
OTTAWA (CCN)--Pope John Paul II canonized or beatified many saints because he knew “the world needed heroes,” Father Thomas Rosica, CSB, told priests and lay people gathered for a pastoral day May 19.
During a reflection on the call to holiness, Father Rosica recalled how in the 90s, when he was in charge of the University of Toronto’s Newman Centre, Michael Jackson and Madonna were all the rage. Young people were looking to rock stars, athletes and other celebrities.
What Pope John Paul II did was present “a lot of people who look like us,” the CEO of the Salt and Light Catholic Media Foundation and CEO of the 2002 World Youth Day in Toronto said.
“They became an invitation to others to be like them.”
He knew the Holy Father was onto something in shifting the focus to ordinary people who had led extraordinary lives for God.
Not all were mother abbesses, priests or members of religious orders, he said, but “real ordinary folks.”
These ordinary people show that no everyone is called to holiness and there are no excuses: “Oh, she’s a nun, she never had a husband, that’s why she’s a saint,” Father Rosica joked.
But saints are not grown in perfect conditions, he said.
“We are invited to holiness in the places where we are,” he said, noting it is often in a “backdrop of darkness and conflict.”
He recognized the challenges and burdens facing those who try to lead a life of holiness.
“At times do we not often run the other way to the lake and like Jonah, wait not for a whale but a speedboat or cruise ship to pick us up and take us to a quiet, peaceful place that is much less complicated and less hostile to our message?” he asked. “Like Jonah in the Old Testament, we must bring this Good News of Jesus and the call to holiness to our cities today- cities that are often so enormous, impersonal, busy and filled with noise.”
Penetrating the “hardness of heart, meanness of spirit, and faithlessness around us” begins, he said, with “celebrating the Eucharist with devotion and love.”
“We never respond to works of evil with more of the same. We pray incessantly. We continue to do many hidden, quiet sacrifices each day of our lives with love, peace and joy,” he said. “We take our Baptism seriously and activate the Beatitudes in daily living. We must never give up in living God's Word and preaching it to others in words and deeds… and many times with quiet deeds and very few words.”
He also reminded people who go around with a long face to smile. He said when people complain to him about how bad things are, he said, “There’s a tomb in Jerusalem and it’s empty!”
People saying, ‘I’m taking on the government,’ or “I’m going to change the Church,’ is a “recipe for hospitalization,” he said.
He described a saint as a “friend of God who takes the beatitudes seriously in his or her life.” Becoming a saint is “the task of every Christian.”
“Here and now, we can find holiness in our personal experience of putting forth our best efforts in the work place, patiently raising our children, and building good relationships at home, at school and at work,” he said. “If we make all of these things a part of our loving response to God, we are on the path of holiness. This need for good examples is also important in the area of Christian living.”
Father Rosica outlined the lives of several saints: Saint Brother Andre of Montreal whose his humble service to the poor, prayers for the sick and love for St. Joseph inspired so many; Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman, a brilliant English theologian who cultivated close friendships as “the best preparation for loving the world at large;” Blessed Franz Jägerstätter, an Austrian who was martyred for refusing to serve in the Nazi military; Saint Gianna Molla, an Italian pediatrician who led an “extraordinary life of virtue and holiness, selflessness and quiet joy” that culminated in her decision to give her life to save the life of her unborn baby daughter; and Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Worker movement, who lived the “radicalism of Christian love” in establishing houses of hospitality to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the sick, and bury the dead.
Father Rosica closed with a reflection on the life of Pope John Paul II and his recent beatification. He said the young people who chanted “Santo Subito” at the end of his funeral mass saw “someone who lived with God and lived with us.”
“He was a sinner who experienced God’s mercy and forgiveness. He was the prophetic teacher who went into the Ninevehs of our day and preached the word in season and out of season,” he said. “He looked at us, loved us, touched us, healed us and gave us hope.”
“He taught us not to be afraid. He showed us how to live, how to love, how to forgive and how to die,” he said. “He taught us how to embrace the cross in the most excruciating moments of life, knowing that the cross was not God’s final answer.”
“That a person is declared ‘Blessed’ is not a statement about perfection. It does mean that the person was without imperfection, blindness, deafness or sin,” he said. “Rather, it means that a person lived his or her life with God, relying totally on God’s infinite mercy, going forward with God’s strength and power, believing in the impossible, loving one’s enemies and persecutors, forgiving in the midst of evil and violence, hoping beyond all hope, and leaving the world a better place.”
