If we were to sum up all of the Jesus’ teachings in the Gospels, the one word summary is, “Love.” We hear that very clearly in this weekend’s Gospel. Love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. Both sound simple to do, but our humanity complicates this. I do love God above all things, but there’s my to-do list and obligations that fill up my day, so I run out of time to pray. I love my neighbor, but if s/he cuts me off on the highway or does something to annoy me, then I don’t like them anymore. Both of the previous sentences are examples of how our humanness gets in the way.

Jesus’ message of loves includes God’s unconditional love for us. God knows we are human, and that we are imperfect. God still loves us in immeasurable ways. There is no way to quantify God’s love for us. Take some time this week to allow yourself to be still and feel God’s love for you. If it is helpful, set your phone alarm for 15 minutes of silence to be in God’s presence. When we allow ourselves to truly consider God’s love for us and allow it to penetrate our being, it is easier to love our neighbor. It changes our whole perspective.      

As Fr. Pedro Arrupe says in his famous poem Fall in Love: “Nothing is more practical than finding God, than falling in Love in a quite absolute, final way. What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect everything.”

One of the great gifts God entrusted me with is a spiritual friendship with one of God’s beloved priests, Fr. Dennis Mende. We share a bond that is similar to the relationships between St. Francis and St. Clare or St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila. I often describe it as sharing a soul.

When we met in 1995 there was an immediate connection. Our shared love of history and Catholicism allowed for endless conversation. We also learned that we both loved the Addams Family and things that were related to that. About a year later I took my first trip to Walt Disney World and fell in love with the Haunted Mansion, just as Fr. Dennis presumed I would!

Our greatest shared passion was Catholicism, and a love of liturgy. He served as the Director for the Diocesan Office of Worship for several years. When we talked Church there was often no need to finish our sentences. We shared an ecclesiology and a theology of ministry, so we usually had the same reactions to Church related things.

Fr. Dennis went home to Jesus on September 8, 2021. I recall telling a friend, “a part of my heart died today.” Two years later I greatly miss being able to talk with my soul friend, especially as our diocese is restructuring into Families of Parishes. He always had such great vision and he helped me see and appreciate the bigger picture.

The friend who can be silent with us
in a moment of despair or confusion,
who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement,
who can tolerate not knowing… not healing, not curing…
that is a friend who cares.
(Henri Nouwen)

Barely five months into our friendship Fr. Dennis’ mom passed away. She was his last surviving parent. At times I have wondered if God put us together at that particular time so we could journey through that grief together. That time embodied Nouwen’s quote. Whenever either of us experienced a difficult time, just being together was a balm to our souls.

To this day I refer to Fr. Dennis as my “best priest friend.” He had very few close friends because he was an extremely private person. Two were a priest and a vowed religious sister that he had served with. His private nature is also what made our friendship unique – how does a lay woman crack through the many “walls” he had?!? That is proof that God intended for us to be soul friends.

Every year we got together during the Christmas season. The gathering was more special when he texted me from Walt Disney World to say that he bought the Haunted Mansion dinnerware for us to use. Shortly after our first HM meal he told me that I would be given the dinnerware upon his death. Imagine my surprise when three months after his death, his niece told me that he had an addendum in his will that gave all of his Haunted Mansion collection to me. Thankfully I had met his niece years before, and she understood the friendship I shared with him.

Grief always sucks. There is no poetic sugar coated word to describe it. “Sucks” is the word. Each grief is unique because each relationship is different. It was Fr. Dennis who told me that grieving is working to incorporate the hole in your heart that nothing else can fill. Grief is learning to live with the hole.

I have a huge hole from his loss. Especially as I watch my diocese continue to change and struggle. Oh the conversations he and I would be having if he was physically here. However, I know he is “here” because love never ends. Even in my saddest moments of grief, I often pause to thank God for entrusting me with Fr. Dennis’ friendship.

Spiritual friendship with a priest is a tremendous blessing. To share prayer and ministry and to journey together requires a great love for Eucharist and Church. As I reflect on the 28 years of friendship I remain in awe of the Eucharistic nature of it. Our shared passion for God was larger than anything else in our lives. That is what allowed us to be spiritual friends. We were Eucharist for each other, and our friendship helped us to be Eucharist for others.

I was honored to sit in the front pew at his funeral. His niece insisted. He lived two hours away, so I was fortunate to find black calla lilies at his local supermarket. His appreciation of all things Addams family/macabre often had him talking about his wake and funeral. One of his requests was that I place a calla lily in his hands in the casket. I stood next to the funeral director who placed the calla lily in his hands right before the casket was closed for the funeral Mass.

For the closing procession I was the first person behind his coffin carrying a black calla lily to his final resting place. I can still vividly recall walking down the aisle of his beloved Church and knowing that my walking with our favorite flower is exactly what he wanted.

I write those last two paragraphs for my own memory, but also because they are evidence of the unique place I was blessed to have in his life. The word Eucharist originates from the Greek word eucharistia which means thanksgiving. This entry is my thanksgiving for the gift of friendship with my best priest friend.

Tim Hortons’ coffee was one of the few things Ma could still taste. Her taste buds were destroyed from all of the medications she’d been on for thirteen years. She’d darkened death’s door many times in those years, but today was the day, at 83 years of age, that she would walk through it. She was in ICU and signed the papers for palliative care. Technology could keep her alive, but it was not the coherent life that she wanted. Very few would choose to live on a machine.

Ma was a woman hardened by life. She had a rough childhood, a marriage to an unfaithful spouse that ended with divorce, followed by a relationship with an alcoholic that had its own challenges. She went from monetary riches in her marriage to financial struggles as a single mom. The circumstances and decisions created a difficult life for her, and her last two years were the worst physically. Stubborn Polish woman that she was – she refused to walk after breaking her femur. It “hurt too much,” she said as she dealt with her limited mobility.

Thus we were in ICU, the papers were signed, and now we waited for Ma to die. My daughter, niece and I were in the room with Ma. My brother called from the Tim Hortons in the lobby with the question, “Does Ma want her last cup of coffee?” I thought for a brief moment and replied, “Yes.”

I hung up the phone and got Ma’s attention.

“Ma, guess what? Bob is bringing you Tim Hortons’ coffee.”

In her grumbling voice, “I don’t want any coffee.”

“We’ve got to do one last thing for our boy.”

“Alright.” she said.

I asked the nurse to hold off on stopping the medications that were keeping Ma alive until the coffee came. I also asked for a spoon since Ma had not sat up in days. She stayed in a reclined position in the hospital bed. The only way she was having that coffee was if I fed it to her.

Bob brought the coffee and Ma had a few spoons of it. Then she started moving around in the bed and we couldn’t figure out what she was trying to do. It looked like she was trying to push herself to sit up straight. I asked her what she was doing.

“I want the cup.”

We all watched in amazement as she sat up, took the coffee cup in her right hand and drank it.

Then she lay back down as we observed her act of love in silence.

Yes she’d had a rough life. Yes she was a difficult woman. Yes she was a mother.

A mother’s love is unique, and it can defy odds. Ma did pass peacefully a few hours after drinking her last cup of coffee. Her last act on this earth was doing one more thing for her boy.

On Monday, July 18, 2022 my mom, Judith Heineman, went home to Jesus. The Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated on July 22^nd by my dear friend Fr. Sean Paul with Deacon Mark and Deacon Paul. My Church/St. John’s School/Alden family rallied in support of me and my family, and the celebration of my mother’s life was better than I could have hoped for.

As mom transitioned to palliative care I took my girls (Jessica, my daughter and Arianna, my niece) to move my car out of the ramp and to an ice cream place 9 minutes away from the hospital. I needed chocolate given the roller coaster we had been on since Ma moved to ICU three days prior. As we drove we discussed the funeral and 14 year old Ari said, “I can preach!” When I asked her what she’d say about her grandmother she spoke beautifully. My daughter noted that if any grandchild spoke at the funeral it should be Ari because she was the closest to her.

In the image is Arianna’s eulogy. I read it for her and she stood by my side. My mother loved to play with words and make rhymes and poems. Ari’s words reflect that gift and her great love for her grandmother.

Unbelievable and not sadly. The corruption in our Catholic Church is abominable.

I love Eucharist and Catholicism. That does not change. However the institutional leadership needs an overhaul (that word seems inadequate.)

As redundant as “synod on synodality” sounds ~ it, and more, are needed to get the Catholic Church back on course. An important note of caution: returning to pre-Vatican II practices is a questionable solution because a majority of clergy sexual abuse happened at that time. When in crisis it is natural to return to the safe and familiar, but that is not a solution for moving forward.

““We ain’t what we oughta be. We ain’t what we want to be. We ain’t what we gonna be. But, thank God, we ain’t what we was.” Dr. Martin Luther King

I am praying for my Catholic Church even more today

Note: I originally posted this on February 8th on my social media.

Let me take you back to 2018. A local television news reporter had been uncovering information about clergy sexual abuse within our diocese. As a Catholic and minister in the Church . . .

well . . .

I struggle to find the right words to adequately and justly describe the feelings I had at that time. Every word seems too mild or small to describe my emotions, the pain, and truth to accurately describe the reality.

Then the summer of 2018 revealed a whistleblower in our Catholic Center. This former assistant to the Bishop copied documents that were shared with the local television news reporter. Those documents blew the proverbial roof off the entire scandal. The levels of cover-up and corruption were beyond human imagination. That fact that this happened within the Catholic Church was beyond human comprehension.

As a minister at a local parish I had to face our people who rightly had questions. That August I was having small group meetings with 9^th graders and their parents about our new faith formation program. One of the largest news stories of the scandal had just come out. How could I face these people?

I was blessed to have connections with colleagues across the country that provided wisdom and insight for ministry during this time. Meetings began with me apologizing for the errors of the leaders of my Church. I thanked people for still staying with us. Yes we lost many people from our Church during this time. So it was very important to thank people for remaining with us.

Lay ecclesial ministers had an essential task of being the face of the Church to the people. Clergy/priests were not the people they wanted to hear from because for them the clergy represented the problem.

Youth retreats were also difficult. Young people’s greatest gift is their honesty. I could not talk with them about God and faith without acknowledging the elephant in the room – our diocese was a mess and our leaders had gravely sinned. My opening prayer for retreats changed so that I could open retreats by acknowledging and apologizing for our diocesan mess.

I recall saying, “I got my Masters in Theology for this.” often during that time. Then I would get questions like, “If my sins were forgiven by an accused priest, was the sacrament still valid?” That degree helped the people trust my answers to questions like that.

Carrying or dragging a 1,000 pound weight was a common analogy for ministry at that time. Our diocese was divided with calls for resignation of our Bishop, which did eventually happen. Every day we waited to see what corruption would be revealed next, and sadly more corruption was revealed. Too often it was worse than what we already knew.

Currently we’re living in the Covid pandemic which carries its own stresses. In early March 2020 I prayed that Covid would not touch the eight counties of our diocese because we were already exhausted. Our diocese had just filed Chapter 11 (bankruptcy) on February 27, 2020. I recall the members of our local Ministerium agreeing with my prayer – living in Buffalo they understood the stress Catholic ministers had.

Anyone who ministered in the Catholic Church in the diocese of Buffalo from 2018 to the present time deserves recognition and gratitude. With the pandemic the experiences of that time were overshadowed by the new crisis.

If you were/are a minister in our diocese, THANK YOU!!!! Thank you for loving God enough to accompany the people of God.

If you are a practicing Catholic, Thank You for staying with our faith community. I pray we can rebuild the post-pandemic Church together.

If you have left the Church, Thank You for being with us. I respectfully ask for your prayers as we try to become the Church Jesus meant us to be.

Our Church is made of human beings, and human beings make messes. In Buffalo the mess is unbelievable, yet ministry continues. For me the Catholic Church is proof of the existence of God. Despite how badly human beings mess it up, the Catholic Church continues. May the Spirit continue to guide her stumbling feet.

In 1992 I met Sr. Karen Klimczak for whom “hope” was her mission. She founded and coordinated Hope House which is a transitional living place for recently released prisoners. The house was in a former rectory where a priest had been murdered. She made the room he was killed in the prayer room in the house. For me that reflects her belief in hope in so many ways.

Spending time with her was like being with the energizer bunny. She never stopped, and she had a great sense of humor. Our first meeting involved her bringing some of “her guys” to our youth retreat house where she shared her ministry with our young people. Before the evening was over she and I had a water war throughout the two stories of our retreat house. She led “her guys” and I had the young people on my team. To know Karen was to love her. She also introduced me to Clown Ministry which I did for a number of years.

Sr. Karen was also the first person to take me onto AOL and teach me about the internet. Her screen name was KayHope, her friend Fr. Roy’s was RoyHope, so she set me up with DenHope. That is still part of my personal email to this day in honor of her. Sadly she was murdered by one of the men she was trying to help. She foresaw this in the late 80’s and wrote him a letter that was read at his sentencing. In it she forgave him for killing her. There are so many stories I could tell about her, but I’ll stop here. You may learn more about her on this website: http://www.sisterkarencenter.org/about-sister-karen

A few months ago I asked my good friend Mr. Mike Patin to do a presentation for the ministry leaders of our diocese. He chose “Hope is a Muscle” as the title and topic. There is no doubt that we need hope during this pandemic time. Sr. Karen was at the beginning of my youth ministry journey and I believe Mike’s topic selection as I embark on virtual ministry is appropriate.

Mike is a mystic in many ways and truly speaks God’s message. If you start at 8 minutes into the video, he leads us through an exercise on keeping hope. Perhaps it will be of help to you at this time.

When the stay-at-home orders were announced in March 2020 there was shock and a variety of reactions. For most people, whose employment was now in jeopardy, a major concern was paying their bills if they were laid off or lost their jobs completely. Obviously everyone’s health in the midst of a pandemic with an unknown virus was the major concern, but how we would live during this time was a priority.

Equally shocking was that Churches would not be allowed to gather their people for public worship. Without gathering there would be no monetary collections. So Church leaders shared the concern of how do we pay the bills. Faith alone does not keep buildings heated, powered, etc. While this was a very valid concern what disturbed me was that it seemed to be the only concern.

If I think of what Church is or is supposed to be or even Jesus’ message in the Gospels my initial response to humanity facing an unknown virus and stay-at-home orders is:

How do we walk with the people of God during this time?

I believe that should have been our Church’s primary question. It should have guided our efforts. Instead I witnessed furloughs, lay-offs and even terminations of ministry positions. At the time when people needed prayer, companionship, etc. most, Church leaders were advising parish leaders about how to lay people off. That does not sound like the Jesus who stopped teaching to heal the paralytic whose friends lowered him through the roof.

I observed this pattern across the country in the Catholic Church. This was not only my diocese. I also know of many parishes who had their ministry leaders make personal phone calls to parishioners. It was a beautiful concerted effort. Another parish’s pastor gathered all of his staff the moment this began and started with that question, “How do we walk with the people of God during this time?” They created amazing outreach efforts, and their collections did not falter. When we truly minister to people, they respond in kind.

Jesus told people that he was the rock upon which his Church would be built. Peter was human like us. Our Church leaders represent that rock today, and I fear our rock is indeed crumbling. One could say that the abuse scandal, the cover-ups, the inhumane treatment of people – all of that alone is enough to say our rock is crumbling. However the response of Church leaders as this pandemic began disgusts me. The scandals involve the misuse and obsession with power on so many levels. The pandemic response seems to me to show that our Church does not care about its people.

My prayer is that this experience of our human weakness will help Church leaders to refocus our values and priorities. Perhaps we will one day be the Church Jesus meant us to be.

As someone who has worked in the Catholic Church for over 25 years it is no surprise that priests are a big part of my life. Some of my best friends are priests. So when comments and posts started appearing on social media that priests’ lives mattered less than the sacraments during the initial months of the pandemic – I took great offense. My offense was much more than personal though.

Eucharist

            Yes that word deserves one line and centering because Eucharist is who we are as Catholics. We become who and what we receive. The inability to receive Eucharist when Churches was closed was crushing for Catholics. Eucharist is our spiritual food for the journey, and we were unable to receive.

            Eucharist is also about the body of Christ and respecting every member of the body of Christ. Catholic Social Teaching calls it Respect for Life and Dignity of the Human Person. It is rooted in “Love your neighbor as yourself.” We respect all life from womb to tomb – there are no exceptions. Yet I was seeing on social media that priests were suddenly an exception. There was a post that indicated that for a priest to die while/from giving sacraments was beautiful because he was dying from what he is called to do . . .

I cannot wrap my Catholic brain and heart around that concept. I realize in our history that there are priests who ministered during plagues. There are many saints who did the same. Each of those was a personal choice made with prayer and discernment. In fairness to today’s ministers it must be noted that they did not have the scientific information we do today. To make universal statements that all priests should minister anyway is completely unfair, and does not take into account the priests’ personal health situation. Many of our Catholic priests are in the vulnerable population for this pandemic. Universal comments do not take that into account.

Martin Luther King Jr. said, “The ultimate measure of a person is not where one stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where one stands at times of challenge and controversy.” (inclusive language changes made by me) If our respect for life is second to sacraments, well I think we have some thinking to do as the people of God. Before one makes the argument that our faith will protect all of us, I think it is extremely important to note that our moral theology is about making informed decisions with our well-formed conscience. Universal statements that are not based on our values or teachings do not reflect our moral theology.

            My concern is that some of our faithful believed that sacraments were more important than human life. I have a wise friend that notes Jesus taught the adults and played with the children. Our Church catechizes children and not adults. Perhaps that is another one of our failures.