Salve, Regina, Mater Misericordiae.
Tonight on this holy night, we relive the Last Supper,
and we are immersed in the person of Jesus and what he's suffering.
He's suffering, most of all, the betrayal of one of his best friends, Judas,
one of his closest friends and disciples, Judas.
This is the thing that stings his heart the most,
and he's carrying that with him throughout the whole night of the Last Supper,
where he's instituting the Holy Eucharist, instituting the Sacrament of Holy Orders,
ordaining his first priests and bishops,
and he's giving us the commandment of love to love one another as Christ has loved us.
And this holy night, we are immersed in this solemn arrangement,
this solemn institution of the Church, which Jesus is doing in the midst of him being betrayed.
He's even organizing his own betrayal,
that fits into his plan of redemption for all of us.
And so we are immersed in this act of, this event of the love of Jesus for us,
giving himself to us in the fullest way, in his body and blood,
also instituting the Sacrament of Holy Orders,
which we preach.
And this is a great gift to the Church, a great gift to each of us individual priests to be ordained a priest.
It is a great treasure to be a priest and a great dignity but a great and awesome responsibility to be a priest.
It's a calling and that's not something that we just choose to do.
Oh, I want to be a priest.
I want to be a lawyer.
I want to be a carpenter and so I study.
No, this is a calling from God.
It's a gift to a man who is not worthy of it.
There's nothing special about him, but he is called and chosen to serve others.
And so it's a great, great gift to that priest personally because he can be so close to the sacraments, so close to Jesus,
so close to holiness and so close to the fountain of grace.
And he can become so holy and so perfect through this touching of the sacraments, touching of Jesus.
And then the great gift of being able to serve, to administer the sacraments, to help souls,
and to sacrifice and to be a victim for the world as Jesus was.
This is a gift for a man who is called to serve.
man who is called to the priesthood and is something we are full of
gratitude and thanksgiving for although we are
unworthy and we are fully conscious of our
unworthiness that we are sinners just like everyone else
and yet god has chosen us to do this service to have this dignity and we
must never forget it never forget the great
dignity of the priesthood and let it sanctify us personally and
then seek to sanctify the world seek to sanctify the faithful it is a
is a gift not primarily for oneself but for
the world for the faithful to give to give jesus to the world
give him in the sacraments to give him in
through preaching as well and the preaching of the priest
is benefits him as well he has to study and learn and delve into the
scriptures delve into the mysteries of god
to be able to preach it and then once he preaches it
he has to practice it himself because he if he doesn't practice what he preaches
he'll be a fool he'd be a fool and looked upon
that way and not be listened to but if he
preaches and he listens to the word of god that
god speaks through him then he can sanctify
himself and as well as the people so it's a great gift to preach as
well for the priests as well as the people to
hear the word of god and to put it into practice and to live it and
the priesthood is a great gift a great power
a great power for himself but especially for the world the power
to sanctify the world to give christ to the
to the world in the sacraments in forgiveness of sins in the
sacrament of confession and it's a joy to be able to
do that for the faithful to be able to help
the faithful to arrive at salvation and to
continue to help them to sanctify themselves as well
as we seek to do it for ourselves so the priesthood is a great gift for
all of the church for all of us we need to be full of
gratitude for this gift and to pray
to pray that we are all worthy of it and to pray for
good and holy priests for the faithful and for
ourselves to pray for this to pray for the church
because without holy priests who's going to sanctify the church or the
faithful going to do it themselves they are
called to do that we're all called to sanctify ourselves on our own
we can't blame it on the priest if he's unfaithful we can't blame our own lack
of sanctification on the priest but it is a
great help and a great
support and and if the priests are not holy then they cannot lead
lead the faithful into the truth because the faithful need
need that need that leadership need that example
need that help through the power that god has given to the faithful and to the
ministers so we are thanking god today for the
gifts of the priesthood for the gift of priests and bishops
for the gift of the institution of the hierarchy and the institution of the
church which is a strength and a pillar and a
structure which we can live in and under to toward to our to our
salvation and we are thankful for that we're full
full of the sentiments of thankfulness of thanksgiving to god this night for
for the priesthood but for especially the
holy eucharist jesus giving himself totally pouring
himself out into the bread and wine to pour
himself out into our hearts through his body and blood
and we are full of thanks especially for that and a thanksgiving
which eucharist means of course thanksgiving we're full of thanks
to jesus himself and as every time we receive
jesus we are full of thanksgiving for the love
of jesus that he gives the greatest gift of himself
there this is a group one of the greatest ways of praying
is to thank god to be full of thanksgiving that
nourishes the love that we have for god the love
in our hearts thanksgiving one of the most beautiful ways of
praying to thank god and saint paul speaks of
dedicating ourselves to thanksgiving to thank god
throughout the day all the days of our life to be full of thanksgiving helps us
to to love god and to serve him and to give
back give back to jesus and
we thank him for himself we thank him for the gifts that he gives us in the
eucharist all the graces all the strength that we need all the
enlightenment and help and support and consolation enlightenment from jesus but
especially we thank him for himself we thank him for the
person of jesus the divine person that
gives himself to us and all of his love all of his tender
love this is what we see in the last supper the tender love of jesus he just
pours himself out there's no admonitions there's no
reproof there's no corrections this night it's only this tender
love of jesus for his apostles his closest
friends and that's also you and me the tender
love of jesus is given to us in the eucharist and that should really touch
our hearts and help us to realize that this is love for us personally
his mercy is poured out to each of us how can we
think of god as a terrifying horrible uh task master when he is this way
this is the way he is this is the way god is he showed it to us
in his own actions in the last supper as well as many of his parables and crucifixion and
and death the tender love of god for all of us which should really in in
really enrich us and help us so much to to be thankful to god and to serve him to serve him in
that joy and love uh for for what he has done for us so let us take back with us today this spirit
the sentiment of thanksgiving this night and this thanksgiving to jesus for his love for us and to
be filled with that same love and to share it to our brothers and sisters in observance of that
commandment of love to love our brothers and sisters with all our heart and soul and love
uh as love as jesus has loved us
uh
you