"Friendship and demand more"--Fr. Steve's goodbye Mass at St. Mary Mystical Rose

Published: May 1, 2022, 11:32 a.m.

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Today is the Feast of St. Catherine of Siena. \\xa0Fr. Steve speaks on friendship with the saints and each other, as well as the model of St. Catherine was for us to demand more from Holy Mother Church! \\xa0

Jesus' words to Catherine on the Priesthood:

The reverence you pay to [priests] is not actually paid to them but to me, in virtue of the blood I have entrusted to their ministry. If this were not so, you should pay them as much reverence as to anyone else, and no more. It is this ministry of theirs that dictates that you should reverence them and come to them, not for what they are in themselves but for the power I have entrusted to them, if you would receive the sacraments of the Church\\u2026.

So the reverence belongs not to the ministers, but to me and to this glorious blood made one thing with me because of the union of divinity with humanity. And just as the reverence is done to me, so also is the irreverence, for I have already told you that you must not reverence them for themselves, but for the authority I have entrusted to them. Therefore you must not sin against them, because if you do, you are really sinning not against them but against me. This I have forbidden, and I have said that it is my will that no one should touch them. (116)

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