On Sunday, March 22, a private Mass was celebrated at and livestreamed from the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Richmond. Bishop Barry C. Knestout, who was in self-isolation while awaiting the results of his COVID-19 test, gave the homily and consecrated the Catholic Diocese of Richmond to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary from a side chapel in the cathedral. Father Michael Boehling, vicar general of the diocese, and Father Anthony Marques, rector of the cathedral, concelebrated the Mass. You can listen to or read Bishop’s homily and the prayers of consecration below.
Bishop Knestout’s Homily:
In these days we have understandable concerns about physical illness caused by a virus that is an unseen, quiet, a gradual danger to so many. We take extraordinary measures to keep everyone safe and to keep our health care system from being overwhelmed.
But we also confront a spiritual danger, one of fear, anxiety, anger, frustration, and possibly even despair for some. This danger is caused by our interior response to an external threat to our life, to our culture, our work and our home. As we confront this threat to our wellbeing, it’s important to remember that we must attend to our spiritual, as well as our physical health. Both are interrelated, and one affects the other.
For instance, this past week, after experiencing the symptoms of a common cold but no fever, I received the advice from my doctor recommending the test for COVID-19. When I was finally able to arrange for the test, I went to the outdoor triage and testing tent in the parking lot at St. Mary’s Hospital in Richmond.
The courageous and kind nurses at the tent, covered with smocks, gloves and masks, asked me a series of questions, took my vital signs, examined my throat and ears, and made a triage determination about whether I should even get tested at all.
Now allow me to pause for a moment to mention that we keep close in our hearts all those who are first responders, whether they be health care professionals or law enforcement personnel, paramedics or fire fighters. They risk their lives every day for our safety and for the common good. We have an enormous debt to them and assure them and their families, who sacrifice with them, of our prayers, our support and our deep gratitude.
The nurses at St. Mary’s tested me first for the flu and then for strep. When both results were negative, they gave me the COVID-19 test. Although the flu and strep test took just an hour, I needed to wait three days for the result – at least three days – for the result of the COVID-19 test. And I’m still awaiting that result.
Since I have yet to hear back, I am giving this homily here from a distance from isolation from those who are celebrating the Mass and of course all those who are joining us through the livestreaming.
After completing the test, I was given instructions to make sure I continued self-isolating, which I had been doing since the symptoms began on Saturday and was given a few prescriptions for my cold. Nothing extraordinary, just Tylenol and Motrin.
During this whole experience and throughout much of the last two weeks, but certainly in the last week, as the alarms in the media and from government leaders were being raised and growing stronger, I could feel worries and emotions of fear building up within me.
We have a natural desire in times of uncertainty to draw close to one another to seek out the comfort and help of friends and family. We are made to thrive in a communal setting. God calls us into his life in the context of an assembly, an Ecclesia, a Church. Yet fear over this virus tends to require us to pull apart, to distance ourselves from one another.
This conflict between the attraction of love and the caution of fear creates tension within, anxiety within our hearts. In the fog of this war, it is hard to see clearly what we should do, how we should respond. What is appropriate and what is an overreaction? What is prudent and what is complacent?
What is the remedy, then, to this emotional and spiritual conflict within us?
Most of us are familiar with written prescriptions like the one I received earlier this week. They have a familiar symbol printed on them. We’ve all seen it. It is the Symbol “RX.”
This is a symbol for the Latin word, which is also familiar, the word “recipe.” A recipe is an instruction. And in this case, this instruction for a combination of ingredients, medicines, combined making that medication, intended to remedy a disease or illness.
We can look at the prescription in a different way, though, with the eyes of faith. What is remedy, and how do we find that remedy? In Latin, RX means prescription, but in Greek, XR is the Chi-Ro – it means Christ.
Christ and his Holy Spirit, which we have dwelling within us and who is present to us, even when we are distant from the comfort of the Sacraments, shows us the way. He enlightens us and guides us. He enlightens our hearts and grants us grace to deal with conflict, both within and outside of us. Christ is God’s mercy and the Holy Spirit his Comforter.
The Holy Spirit is God’s love, God’s mercy, his charity. And charity always calls us to move toward one another, always to ensure the greatest good of the other.
Amid calls to distance, we must still remember charity and the command to respond to the needs of the vulnerable, the weak and the poor. Isolation can be as dangerous to life as a virus. Let’s not allow the anxiety about the virus to keep us from expressing charity to those in need wherever we find them.
To do this requires grace, the grace of the Holy Spirit. And one of those graces, those gifts: courage. Courage is that gift from God to overcome our hesitation about doing what is right and good, even when there is some risk associated with it.
At the same time, we do this with another grace, another gift of the Holy Spirit, the gift of Counsel, of right judgement. The virtue of prudence calls us to pause, to consider thoughtfully how we are reaching out in charity to others. Prudence calls us to keep some distance and to act as if we might carry that infection, even if we don’t. Our love for others then keeps us from being too hasty and acting in such a way that might cause another danger or harm.
I would suggest, during this time of pandemic, that each of us in a time when the environment demands isolation but our faith calls us to reach out to others in charity, to use the technology that we have, which is crafted from the genius of men and women and can be used as a tool to ensure charity even at a distance.
Each of us can plan to contact 10 people each day, to encourage them, to listen to them, find out if they have any needs, if they are struggling with any difficulties. Once we know these needs, with courage we should act to seek out ways to help and remedy their need. We can do this with right judgement, with prudence as we act.
Finally, we accompany all we do with prayer. Prayer places us in the presence of God, whether we are in a community or isolated and alone. In prayer we are never truly alone. In prayer we acquire the mind and attitude and desire of God. In prayer we encounter his love for all of us. Prayer changes us, changes our heart with charity, courage and counsel.
This prayer and encounter with God, calling us to charity with courage and right judgement, leads us to hope. Hope, a fruit of the spirit. These fruits will accompany us in times of trouble and uncertainty and give us other fruits as well, those of peace and joy. All this helps us to overcome anxiety and fear, anger and despair, those aspects of our experience now at this time.
In a time when we are fearful of a new virus threatening lives and we need to socially distance ourselves from one another to safeguard each other’s health, our faith allows us to see this time of isolation, and maybe anxiety, as an occasion for drawing close to God in solitude and prayer.
Our faith allows us to see that this crisis can be an occasion to enter more fully into an experience of Lenten sacrifice, united to the suffering of Christ, and offer this sacrifice for all others who are suffering, those who are fearful or isolated by internal or external bonds.
At a time when we must close our Church doors to large assemblies and allow no more than 10 to gather at any one time, faith helps us to see that the Church is more than a social institution, but also the Body of Christ to which we are united – deeply and truly and spiritually – in baptism and confirmation. Although communion is not possible for a little while, God still grants us the nourishment and life in his word proclaimed and in our immersion in this prayer.
In a time when it is harder to get access to the sacraments because possibly quarantine or self-isolation keeps us from the encounter with these tangible sources of grace, faith helps us to see that the spiritual communion and a growing hunger for God can come from this temporary distance from the sacraments. In this time of trial and isolation, we can encounter God’s presence and grace through sacrifice and prayer.
It is faith that enlightens us and gives life meaning, even when accompanied by suffering, and gives purpose to life that enables us the power to bear with any difficulty or burden.
I heard it once said that we can bear any “what” if we have a “why!”
The purpose and meaning for all we do, the “why,” is Christ. He is our remedy, our consoler, who gives us the ability to deal with any tragedy, any trial, with charity, with courage, with right judgement, and experience in the midst of that hope, peace, and even, on this Fourth Sunday of Lent, this Laetare Sunday, even with joy.
Prayers of Consecration:
Act of Consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary
We, the people of the Diocese of Richmond, repentant sinners, renew and ratify today in your hands, O Immaculate Mother, the vows of our baptism. We renounce Satan and resolve to follow Our Lord Jesus Christ even more closely than before.
Blessed Mary, we give you our hearts. Please set them on fire with love for your Son Jesus. Make them always attentive to the burning thirst for love and for souls. Keep our hearts in your most pure heart that we may love Jesus and the members of his Body with your own perfect love.
Holy Mary, we entrust ourselves totally to you: body and soul, our goods, both interior and exterior, and even the value of all our good actions. Please make of us, of all that we are and have, whatever most pleases you. Let us be fit instruments in your immaculate and merciful hands for bringing the greatest possible glory to God. If we fall, please lead us back to Jesus. Wash us in the blood and water that flow from his pierced side, and help us never to lose our trust in this fountain of love and mercy.
With you, O Immaculate Mother, you who always do the will of God, we have united ourselves to the perfect consecration of Jesus as he offers himself in the Spirit to the Father for the life of the world.
Act of Consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus
I, the Bishop of Richmond, in this cathedral church dedicated to the Most Sacred Heart of Lord Jesus Christ, give and consecrate to the same Sacred Heart, this diocese—our parishes and communities, our families, our lives and actions, our pains and sufferings—so that we may be delivered from the current pestilence, and live always to honor, love, and glorify the Sacred Heart.
It is our unchanging intention to be all His and to do all for love of Him. We renounce at the same time, with all our hearts, whatever can displease Him.
We, therefore, take You, O Sacred Heart, for the only object of our love, the protector of our lives, the pledge of our salvation, the remedy of our weakness and inconstancy, the atonement for the faults of our life, and the secure refuge at the hour of our death.
Be then, O Heart of goodness, our justification before God the Father, and turn away the contagion that surrounds us. O Heart of love, turn us toward You, and toward our brothers and sisters who are suffering. We hope for all things from Your mercy and generosity.
Destroy in us all that can displease or resist Your holy Will. Let Your pure love impress You so deeply upon our hearts that we may never forget You or be separated from You. May our names, by your loving kindness, be written in You, because in You we desire to place all our happiness and all our glory in living and dying bound to you.