Second Sunday of Lent
/Dominica II in Quadragesima A
Safe Haven Sunday
8 March 2020
We are all aware of the large-scale response to the flu and in particular to the coronavirus this year. To limit spread of disease by human contact we are seeing responses around the world and changes to church practices too. Many bishops, including our own, have announced changes to liturgical practices. First, I think it is reasonable to emphasize that we should all remain calm and avoid hysteria. Secondly, we should observe good hygiene and vigilance at all times. This moment is an opportunity to give some instruction for some adjustments at Masses and to communicate some suggestions from the Archbishop.
The obligation to attend all Sunday and holy day Masses is most serious. However, the Church always recognizes that certain events, however rare, may remove that obligation. A serious, infectious illness is one such example where such an ill person is not bound to the obligation. This recognizes both the sick person’s need to rest and get healthy, and it recognizes a certain charity to not expose others in the community to serious health risk. Please be self-aware when you are sick.
Good and regular handwashing is advised, as is the use of alcohol-based hand sanitizers. I’m asking all extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion to have their own private bottle of sanitizer to use before distribution of Holy Communion. Regarding our use of hands at Holy Mass: The Church’s directions for Mass do not instruct us to hold hands at the Our Father. That is a popular practice in some locations but a posture the Church does not envision for that prayer. You might have noticed that our altar boys always keep their hands folded during the prayer. That is because I have trained them not to hold hands since it is not asked for in Mass instructions. At the suggestion of the Archbishop, beginning today we are not encouraging hand holding during the Our Father. I ask you not to make anyone feel forced into holding hands. Use of hands also impacts something that is actually optional at Mass, the shaking of hands at the sign of peace. Again, following the Archbishop’s suggestion, beginning today we are discontinuing the shaking of hands. The priest will give the ritual sign of peace and your response, as normal, is “And with your spirit.” But after that we will omit the shaking of hands and immediately begin chanting the “Lamb of God.”
It is already our regular practice here that we do not distribute from chalices. We have one chalice that we reserve in the sanctuary for parishioners who cannot receive the Sacred Host due to serious gluten allergy. That chalice will remain available to them. Today gives an opportunity to remind us all that the chalice that remains here in the sanctuary is only for those who do not and cannot receive the Host. Some parishioners report such a high level of allergy to wheat gluten that they cannot receive the Host and they also cannot drink from a chalice if someone consuming the Host drinks from it. So, today I want to remind us all that if you are able to receive the Host then you should do so and then return to your pew. Those who cannot receive the Host will find their way up to the chalice we keep here. Under no circumstance should someone consuming the Host also come up to this reserved chalice. Be assured, nothing of the grace and fullness of Christ is lacking by receiving under the form of the Host alone or the Precious Blood alone.
Since receiving Holy Communion on the tongue is the far more traditional practice, and since it contains its own built-in reverence by receiving, but not touching the Host, I am NOT going to instruct anyone to receive only on the hand. However, take note of some tips for receiving on the tongue. Our altar boys try to place the communion paten under your chin when you receive on the tongue. It would help if you keep your folded hands lower and not up high near your chin. When you arrive for Holy Communion, whether standing or kneeling, respond “Amen,” try to keep your head still, and then open your mouth sufficiently wide and also extend the tongue so the Sacred Host may be placed on it. Let the minister draw back the hand before closing your mouth and then return to your pew. Hand-to-hand contact is also a concern for those who opt to receive Holy Communion in the hand. If you do so it is necessary to have clean hands, to present your hands completely open and flat, with palms up, and one hand on top of the other. Please do not begin to close your hand on the minster’s fingers until the minister withdraws the hand. Finally, I know many of you like to kneel to receive Holy Communion and so we have kneelers in place at the main aisle Communion stations. That might help remove the amount of stretching of the arm and movement involved in putting the Host on the tongue.
Okay, we got through all of that! So, we do all that to give reasonable attention to our bodily health and to avoid illness and threats to our bodily life. Would you agree with me that giving attention to our spiritual health, avoiding spiritual illness and even eternal death needs attention? Would you agree with me that if we have a proper hierarchy of values, a moral pandemic impacting our life as God’s children and risking spiritual death and Hell needs even more careful attention? That is what I really want to address today. Together with Archbishop Coakley we are observing a coordinated effort across the archdiocese this weekend for our second annual Safe Haven Sunday to address the sensitive but necessary topic of the moral pandemic of pornography. Because of the prevalence of the Internet and smartphones this issue impacts adults and teens, men and women, boys and girls, and even impacts our children at increasingly younger ages. First, our focus is to name and face this issue that negatively impacts so many of us and to call to conversion so that we may live more fully as God’s children. And, secondly, this effort is to equip parents to protect and confidently parent your children in a hyper-sexualized culture. As you leave Mass today we have a booklet resource for you. This resource is specific to treating this topic for parents of children, especially when you have discovered a child has been exposed or has a habit of use. If you have children and teens in the home I want you to make sure to pick up a booklet. There is no shame in taking that resource as an aid to your parenting. You will note on the booklet’s front cover and in its first pages an invitation for parents to sign up for a 7-day challenge that will provide a crash course via email of lessons and practices parents should observe to address this topic in the home. Given the statistics on this topic, parents, you should likely just assume your child has been exposed and that your middle school and high school child may already have a habit of use. We want to discourage passive parenting. I know these conversations are awkward and we’d just like to assume our children are immune. But by our silence do we really want to communicate to our kids that guarding their souls from sin is somehow less important than the instructions we readily give them about safe driving and getting good grades? Ironically, many would suggest they give their child a smartphone for a sense of security, for ease of contact, and to track or locate a child. But if parenting is passive, that very device becomes the pitfall. It can form habits whereby we engage in less real contact, preferring the screen to real human interaction, and it can become the portal for serious poison to come directly to your child. One of the simplest and smartest things I have heard a parent do is to have a house rule where at bedtime, or a certain time of evening, all smartphones have to be placed in a basket that is kept overnight in the parents’ bedroom. Since the majority of exposure and use happens while kids are bored and in their bedroom, this practice can greatly reduce access to this material. In addition, parental controls and filtering/blocking software should be placed on devices so that the very thing you give your child for a sense of security does not become the device that leads them astray.
With reference to the Scriptures I want to draw upon the idea of our vision and how it needs to be transformed. Last weekend in the first reading from Genesis we heard of the Fall, of Original Sin, and how the eyes of Adam and Eve were opened to what the serpent, the Evil One, wanted them to see. This week in the Collect we prayed that we may have “spiritual sight made pure” so that, as the Lord promised to Abram in today’s first reading, we may see the land that He will show us and thus know our destination and our inheritance. The Transfiguration of Jesus is the sneak peek of his future and ours, the sneak peek of our inheritance – the glorification of our bodies in Heaven forever! We need to be transformed by the Lord’s grace so that we grow in purity and strength against the serpent’s poison in our time, which is a stumbling block to our heavenly goal. Like the disciples in the Gospel may we train ourselves and purify our vision so that we too see “no one else but Jesus alone.” The truth is our vision is obscured by our fallen nature and our tendency toward sin; even more, our vision is blinded by serious sin. Use of explicit material makes us unable to see and accept the good of human sexuality and its nature and essence designed by God. We each need to strive to use the spiritual weapons available to us to root out sin and to grow in conformity to Christ. Part of this work is also attending to our children and young people so that they are not abandoned and without guidance in the face of lethal threats to their purity. Explicit material is not the only threat on our way to Heaven, but it has become a most serious and widespread threat. This threat, and others, needs even more attention than our efforts to avoid the flu or the coronavirus.
Thus, in addition to the booklet you should take as you leave Mass, I want to suggest some important practices.
Pray and beg the Lord to deliver you and your family from this sin. Ask him to strengthen your serious resolve to act against this sin. Pray the Rosary and the St. Michael Prayer.
Make use of regular and honest confession, especially to be able to receive Holy Communion worthily. See that your children regularly confess. Go as a family.
Willingly take on penances to atone for your own sins and those of your loved ones.
Have frank conversations with your spouse and age-appropriate conversations with your children. Speak not only about the sin of explicit material but talk about fostering real relationships, holiness, the goodness of the human person, the goodness of human sexuality and its proper place within marriage alone.
Consider how an accountability partner and filtering/blocking software like Covenant Eyes can help you have a source of strength in the battle.
Finally, we would be remiss here to avoid the blessing of Eucharistic Adoration and committing to a regular weekly time to make a Holy Hour in our chapel. There is no reason why any parishioner, men and women, whole families together, even our youth cannot take on this practice to grow in relationship with Jesus who is truly present among us. In particular, I want to appeal to our men: If you are not yet committed to a regular time of adoration, get involved by calling the Parish Office soon. We have some late night and early morning hours that can use a second person for adoration. That can be a way that you men can serve the role of guardians and protectors. You might also consider taking an hour at those times when one of our female parishioners is alone. We need you to step up. You won’t regret the blessings.
On this Safe Haven Sunday we want to promote conversion and purity of life. And we pray that parents be confident that your words and your example as a parent/guardian can inspire your child to appreciate, choose, and grow in chastity in order to live the beauty and truth of sexuality according to the liberating Good News of Jesus.