Sam Lucero: Photographic Genius

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words.  It's cliche, I know, but absolutely true.  I could write on and on for hours and still not be able to adequately capture the beauty of God's glory that is evident in a single photograph of a glorious sunset that blazes with color, the perfection of an infant's foot, the joy of a child's toothless grin, the love of an elderly couple holding hands, the peace of a woman kneeling in prayer, or the wonder of an Archbishop embracing a newly-ordained man so tenderly that it resembles the way that God will surely embrace each of us when we finally meet him face to face.

I have shared my favorite photograph of now-Cardinal Dolan embracing a young man more than once on this blog.  That picture has moved me deeply.  But, what I failed to do in sharing my love for that photograph, is to give credit to the photographer whose genius and skill captured the moment that captured my heart.  I can only imagine how it must feel to be looking at a story on the internet, only to find your own words written on someone else's blog without giving credit to the original author, and the same is certainly true, and even more so, for photographs.

So to Sam Lucero, whose brillliant skills give glory to God over and over again in his photographic work, I apologize for not recognizing the gift that you have given to the world through your wonderful work.  And I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your gentle reminder in a blog comment, when you very well could have been outrageously angered over my use of your picture without giving you credit.  You are a true gentleman, of that I'm certain.

And so, dear reader, I encourage you to please pay a visit to Sam's website, Inspired Images,  where you will find more evidence of his beautiful photography that is sure to uplift your soul to the heights of heaven. 

Photo Credit:  Sam Lucero

Cardinal Dolan: Who Do You Say That I Am?

my favorite photo of Cardinal Dolan-credit:  Sam Lucero-visit Inspired Images website

This past Wednesday, at daily Mass, Bishop Sklba shared a charming story about Cardinal Dolan.  It seems that Bishop Sklba spent some time in New York visiting the Cardinal and they decided to go for a walk to a museum that was about a mile away.  It was probably the longest mile they ever walked because Cardinal Dolan couldn't take more than two steps before people would recognize him and ask him to pray for them or would share their concerns with the good Cardinal.  Bishop Sklba said that he imagined that Cardinal Dolan has a good idea of what Jesus felt like in  the passage from Luke 4:38-44 where the people were all bringing their sick to Jesus and tried to preventing him from leaving their town because they were so pleased with all of the good he was doing.  Everybody just wants him to stay nearby.

It's clear that the people of Milwaukee are certainly pleased with Cardinal Dolan for all of the good that he does and we want him to stay nearby as well, as was evident by the crowd of 4000 people who showed up at the Milwaukee Theater to hear him speak at the tenth annual Pallium Lecture, the lecture series that Cardinal Dolan himself started when he was Archbishop of Milwaukee.

The evening's emcee was Fr. Paul Hartman, the president of Waukesha's Catholic Memorial High School.  On surveying the size of the crowd, Fr. Paul cracked that it was a normal size for Cardinal Dolan's typical Sunday Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral, the size of a symposium given in San Francisco by Bishop Sklba, and the size of Bishop Hying's fan club!  Cardinal Dolan commented that the crowd of 4000 was bigger than a normal Met's game!

Cardinal Dolan's topic was "Who Do You Say That I Am?  Encountering Christ and Responding to Christ through His Living Body, the Church."

Cardinal Dolan began his talk with these loving words:  "My seven years in Milwaukee were extraordinarily happy ones and I miss you."  Then he joked that four cardinals have come from Milwaukee, and one day Milwaukee will have it's own version of Mount Rushmore with the four cardinal's faces all engraved upon the Allen-Bradley clock tower!

He shared the story of how, when he was still an auxiliary bishop in St. Louis, he was called to the apostolic nuncio's office.  He was offered a cigarette and he declined because he doesn't smoke.  Then he was offered a drink, and he said no thanks, he'd wait until they went out to dinner.  Then the nuncio told him that Pope John Paul II wanted him to be the Archbishop of Milwaukee and to that the Cardinal said, "I'll take that cigarette and drink now!"

After the laughter subsided, Cardinal Dolan became dead serious about his topic for the evening.  He began by sharing the story of St. Paul falling from his horse and the Lord's question of him, "Saul, why are you persecuting me?"  He didn't ask, why are you persecuting my Church, but why are you persecuting me.  That's because Jesus and His Church are one, synonymous, a package deal.   St. Paul loved the Church and Jesus passionately because they are one.  He then quoted Henri de Lubac regarding the Catholic Church:  "For what would I ever have known of Him without Her?"  He said we can't call God our Father if we don't call the Church our Mother.

Cardinal Dolan spoke about the post-ecclesiastical world in which we live where we want the King without the Kingdom, to believe without belonging, spirituality without religion and Christ without the Church.  Impossible!  He quoted Archbishop Listecki who said, "There is no freelance Christianity.  Without the Church, there is no Christ."

In speaking of the many Catholics who refer to themselves as "former Catholics," those who have fallen away from the practice of the church, he suggested three possible roads as a model to bring those lapsed Catholics back to the fold.

1.  Family

The Church is my spiritual family.  Ninety-nine percent of Catholics are born into the faith.  It's in our DNA, our bones, our genes.  We might drift and get mad and be scandalized or confused by it.  So what?  Our spiritual family is just like our human family.  We get angry, scandalized and confused by our human family too.  "Have you ever met my brother Bob?" he joked.  But we never leave our family.  We are there at all of the pivotal moments-Christmas, Easter, births and deaths.  We're at the table every Sunday.  We're stuck with our last names whether we like them or not.  Catholics are marinated, seasoned in the Church.  The Church is my spiritual family.  It's my  home.

He shared an example from the book, "The Power and the Glory" by Graham Greene.  In it, a whiskey priest from Mexico was hiding in a barn, and a young girl who was helping him suggested that he renounce his Catholic faith for his safety.  The priest replied that it would be impossible, he could never do it.  And then the girl understood that the Catholic faith is like a birthmark, it is always a part of who you are.  You are born with it and it will remain with you forever.

2.  Apologetics

Apologetics is the art of credibly, convincingly presenting our faith.  It's not  in-your-face and brash,  but rather a humble, cheerful, rational, confident grounding in faith.  The Cardinal used an example familiar to every parish priest at this time of year.  A young man leaves home for college after a strong Catholic upbringing with regular Sunday Mass attendance and an education at Catholic schools.  At his first visit home he tells his parents that he doesn't go to Mass anymore.  Instead he is attending the church of his roommate.  The parents are filled with sorrow and question how this could have happened.  The answer is because the roommate was well-off in apologetics and swayed their son away from the Catholic faith.

The Church is necessary for salvation.  We have survived dungeon, fire and sword. Apologetics prepares us to defend our faith against those who would take it from us.  Those liberators might be late-night talk show hosts or writers of newspaper editorials.  We have to be strong in knowledge of our faith so that when they accuse us of worshiping the Pope, or of being cannibals, or of treating Mary as if she were God, we can remain strong.  We need to let them know that we cherish our Church and are prepared to care for it.  That is apologetics and we need it more than ever.

3.  Repentance

We need to fess up to the sinful side of the Church.  We need it.  People are shocked, saddened and sickened by acts of the clergy and hierarchy.  It's been said that the Catholic Church is clearly from God because no human organization that is run with such imbecility could have survived two weeks let alone 2000 years!

It was Flannery O'Connor who said, "Suffering for  the church doesn't bother me.  It's suffering from her that's hard to take!"  Blessed Pope John Paul II apologized fifty-five times during the Jubilee Year for the past sins of the Church and Ronald Rolheiser describes the Church as Christ hanging between two thieves.  But where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.  After the resurrection, Jesus showed us that His wounds remained.  We are also wounded.

The Cardinal shared a story from Bishop Skbla about a parish in the northern regions of the Archdiocese that was being closed.  The parishioners came to accept the closing and after all of the sacramentals had been removed and only an empty building remained, it was decided to burn the building down as a sacred offering.  Everyone came to watch as the volunteer fire department set the blaze which burned so intensely that everyone had to back away.  The next morning, Bishop Sklba returned to find people with gloves on gathering up the thick nails that were stacked up along the foundation.  They were collecting them as souvenirs.  It was the nails that had held the church together.  It's the nails of Christ that hold the Church together.  We are a wounded Church and we love Her all the more for Her wounds.

When people say that they left the Church because She's so sinful, we say we cling to Her because we are too. St. Francis de Sales had a simple motto written on his tombstone:  "He loved the Church."  That needs to be our motto, too.  We believe in One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church and She gives us the answer to Christ's question, "Who do you say that I am?"

To learn more about the Pallium Lecture Series visit this link.  Photos below courtesy of Mary Anne Urlakis.  Thanks, Mary Anne!

My Brother, The Pope-A Book Review

It's hard to believe that our Holy Father is now 85 years old having celebrated his birthday just yesterday! God bless him! It seems that those who are related to our famous religious leaders have been drawn to share their stories of what it was like to grow up with such saintly siblings. Recently Bob Dolan wrote a charming book, Life Lessons, about his brother Timothy Cardinal Dolan and now Georg Ratzinger has come out with My Brother, The Pope which is an equally enchanting and sweet book filled with his tender memories about growing up with Pope Benedict.

The book of memoirs written by the older brother of Pope Benedict opens our eyes to what it was like to grow up in the holy and faith-filled family that produced our current fabulous pope. It is filled with family photos that add vibrancy to the author's words.

I was most impressed to read about how the Ratzinger family suffered through World War II and about the rapid rise of the young priest, Fr. Joseph Ratzinger, into the world of academics and faith. But what touched my heart most deeply were the references to Pope Benedict's love for bears beginning with his early childhood love for a toy teddy bear. It's the type of information that the world just would never learn about if there weren't a sibling willing to share those little life details.

I was deeply struck by Georg Ratzinger's recollections of meals that he personally ate that fondly remained in his heart so much so that he had to include the details in this book of memoirs. It seemed to me to be an unusual sharing of something that was personally significant to the author and it made me smile to think of how food and the sharing of a meal can have such an important place in all of our memories. Nearly every chapter contained a description of a memorable meal which the author enjoyed, such as this passage where he recounted a trip to attend his uncle's funeral after the family had been mistakenly led to believe that their father had died:

"...I accompanied him on that trip to Rickering, his birthplace. That same day, the clergy of the deanery met at the parish in Schwanenkirchen, and I was also invited to attend. "You sit here", they said, and then a wonderful Bavarian snack was served, which I ate with great relish: smoked meat (bacon), bread and butter, and a beer with it. Things like that leave an impression, you do not forget them for the rest of your life! But it all tasted twice as good because I was so relieved that our father was still alive."

I couldn't help but notice the similarities between Georg Ratzinger's frequent recollections of memorable meals and Bob Dolan's oft-mentioned stories of memorable drinks that he shared with his brother, Cardinal Dolan. And this was not the only part of Pope Benedict's and Cardinal Dolan's stories written by their brothers that seemed quite similar...

Throughout Life Lessons, Bob Dolan insists that his brother will never be Pope despite the fact that rumors are nearly always swirling about stating that Cardinal Dolan would make very good Pope material. Could that be because he harbors a fear that if his brother were to become Pope someday, he would lose the close relationship that he has always valued with his brother, that as Pope, Cardinal Dolan would have fewer opportunities to spend time with his family? That certainly seemed to be the concern of Georg Ratzinger when Pope John Paul II had become seriously ill during his final days of life:

"...I was repeatedly asked by people and by journalists too, whether my brother would become pope. My answer was always the same: "No, he certainly will not!"...

And his story about how he finally heard the news about his brother actually being chosen to be the successor to St. Peter was deeply touching:

"I even experienced the "Habemus Papem" live. At the time I was called by a journalist who said she had just heard that white smoke had gone up in Rome and wanted to hear from me whether I knew anything more specific. "No," I answered truthfully, "I know nothing." Then I turned on the television and heard it there, like everybody else....I must quite honestly say that at that moment I was rather disheartened. It was a great challenge, an enormous task for him, I thought, and I was seriously worried. I saw neither the pomp nor the beauty of it, but only the challenge of this office, which now demanded everything of him, and the burden it meant for him. And I was sad that now he would probably have no more time for me. So that evening I went to bed rather depressed."

I can't imagine what it must be like to have such a famous and well-loved brother, one you'd like to keep for yourself but instead must share with the world. But now through the words of Georg Ratzinger, I have a little better idea of who our beloved Pope Benedict really is and of how much he and his older brother and fellow priest value their close family relationship which from every aspect seemed to be formed through a normal family life filled with love and prayer.

I heartily enjoyed My Brother, The Pope, and read through it quickly and eagerly. I am confident that all those who open the pages of this book will be deeply drawn into the loving story of two brothers whose only life desire has been to serve the Lord through the use of their talents and to draw others closer to Him and to His wondrous love.

(If you are in the Milwaukee area, you may be interested in attending a book signing and discussion with Bob Dolan about his book Life Lessons at St. Francis de Sales Seminary on April 23rd. You can view the event details at the Vocations Office Website "Think Priest" which can be found at this link.)