The following is the text of Bishop Malooly’s Fortnight for Freedom homily at the July 5 Mass at 11 a.m. in the Cathedral of St. Peter in Wilmington. The Fortnight, June 21-July 4, was the U.S. bishops’ national observance of two weeks of prayer focused on the role of faith in public life and the preservation of religious freedom in our society.
This weekend we celebrate our freedom, our liberty from sin. We do it every time we stand around the altar.
It was through Jesus’ death and resurrection that we have been saved and freed.
Today and this weekend, we also celebrate our freedom as a country from oppression. Our ancestors sacrificed wealth, stature, homes, and family on our behalf. Most revolutionaries have very little to lose. Out ancestors had a great deal.
For nearly a century, just to pose the reason for our Fortnight for Freedom, the Catholic bishops of the United States have been and continue to be consistent advocates for comprehensive health-care reform, to insure access to comprehensive health care for all, especially the poorest and most vulnerable.
However, the bishops, as you know, ultimately opposed the final passage of the Affordable Care Act for several reasons.
First, it allows the use of federal funds to pay for elective abortions, and for plans that cover such abortions, contradicting the long-standing federal policy.
It also fails to include longstanding, necessary language to provide essential conscience protection.
When you look back in our diocese long before we were a diocese, the Catholics here, without religious freedom, lived out their faith well.
As you know, the Diocese of Wilmington is the state of Delaware and nine Maryland counties. In Old Bohemia, which is east of Middletown, Delaware, in 1704 Jesuits established a parish, St. Francis Xavier Parish, there long before our country had any freedoms.
This coming Sunday (July 12), I will be at St. Joseph’s in Cordova (Maryland). It was a mission of Old Bohemia founded in 1765. This will be their 250th anniversary. Typical of that day and age it looks like a Colonial house in Hockessin, because you couldn’t make a church look like a church back then. We even had a mission of St. Francis Xavier up in Coffee Run, which is now the Hockessin area. That goes way back.
It’s interesting that in 1789 a lot of things happened. George Washington in April of that year became the first president of the United States. John Carroll was appointed by the pope to be the first diocesan bishop of this country in what was the Diocese of Baltimore.
Interestingly enough, in that same year, George Washington wrote about religious liberty. He wrote to the United Baptist Churches in Virginia and he said the following:
“If I could have entertained the slightest apprehension that the Constitution framed in the convention where I had the honor to preside might possibly endanger the religious rights of any ecclesiastical society, certainly I would never have placed my signature to it; and if I could now conceive that the general government might be so administered as to render the liberty of conscience insecure, I beg you will be persuaded that no one would be more zealous than I to establish effectual barriers against the horrors of spiritual tyranny and every species of religious persecution.”
1789 – Compare that with the Supreme Court decision about marriage stepping on territory that for most of us we feel, even without a legal background, goes beyond what they are called to do.
Our celebration this year for the Fortnight for Freedom is the “freedom to bear witness.” That’s what happened in Old Bohemia; that’s what happened in Cordova; that’s what happened in Coffee Run, even when it couldn’t be done.
The freedom to bear witness: to speak and witness what is important to us, to live our faith out, especially in our care for the poor, and to lift up our values — not attack people — and to lift up our values because they are important.
I would like as a sidebar to encourage you to thank our Delaware legislators for passing the budget to include nurses for our schools again this year and also the transportation segments. It’s because so many of you told our legislators that is what you wanted. And they represent you and represent us. Thank them for what they did.
Now the readings, I mentioned them at the beginning: it’s all about rejection.
Mark’s gospel [Mark 6: 1-6] has Jesus at home in Nazareth, the people are curious, he does wonders, they are amazed and yet, they reject him. The way it is phrased, “they found him too much.”
Their lack of faith distressed Jesus. It was a tragic end to his Galilean ministry.
We see much the same in the first reading, Ezekiel [2:2-5]. God tells Ezekiel the prophet the message and messenger will be rebuked. Thus says the Lord.
We understand God does not force us to listen nor does he abandon us to stubbornness, we do that ourselves. But he says, “They will know a prophet has been among them regardless.”
Simply because Ezekiel would speak, they would know a prophet had been among them regardless.
Then, Paul in his letter to the Corinthians [2 Cor 12:7-10] — Paul in so many ways is always upbeat and kind of bouncing from one community to the other bringing the good news. He can’t wait to get to the next person, doesn’t want anyone to miss out on hearing the good news. But in today’s reading you can hear the frustration he has, not only because he has a physical ailment of some sort, but he’s also been rejected, he’s been persecuted, he knows that others are flashier than he is, yet he comes to the logical conclusion: it’s not his work; it’s God’s work. If he’s rebuked, at least they will have heard the words of an Apostle.
“In our weakness,” he says, “we are made strong. I willingly boast of my weakness.”
Going back to our ancestors whom we honor this week, they struggled with right and wrong. They tried to figure out —should they work within the system or outside the system? Should they wait for King George to die or do something now? As I said earlier, they had a lot of means. These weren’t poor people but they risked their lives, their families and their fortunes.
Their moral values were strong. That’s all we can ask of ourselves. We can’t force anyone else, but if we are true to God’s mission and message, we will encounter rejection.
Clearly in our society and in our day and age, many say that people are entitled to whatever freedoms they want, they don’t have to be true. We will encounter rejection for standing strong in our convictions. But the Gospel can never be watered down.
The reason many don’t heed the Gospel is they don’t want to change. They don’t want to be responsible. They like where they are and that’s all the more reason for us not to in any way attack other people, but continue to voice, live out and encourage the values of Jesus.
Yesterday at the National Shrine at the closing Mass for the Fortnight for Freedom, Archbishop Tom Wenski of Miami was the homilist. He concluded his homily in this way. He said, “We are not of the world but we are in the world.”
We are not of the world but we are in the world and we have to do our part. Then he said, “God bless America. May she always be the home of the free and the brave.”
And I would echo that sentiment this morning.
