 A few months ago, I was having a conversation with a priest who had just returned from a 30-day silent retreat. I asked him if it was easy to enter into the silence. He said that it took him about three days to let go of all the noise in his mind… three days. I then shared that I’ve always felt a desire to go on a silent retreat, but that I am afraid I would go crazy. He then said something I had not considered before. He said that he too would go crazy if he had no one to talk to for 30 days, but that is not what he was doing. He was talking with God. And right there, in a moment of silence, I felt my heart respond. An almost imperceptible movement of desire, stirring below my thoughts.
For Christians, the goal of silence is not emptiness; it is Presence. Perhaps nowhere can we see this with greater clarity than in the tomb of the Tabernacle.
Things are not what they seem. Our natural eyes can’t see; our natural ears can’t hear. When we cry to God from the depths of our grief and suffering and He seems silent, let us not give up hope.
Yes, the King slept in the flesh… but only for three days. And in the silence, God was acting. Three days of darkness, three days of silence. “God has died in the flesh, and the underworld has trembled.”
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By: Ivonne J. Hernandez  We were out of town celebrating our wedding anniversary when we found out that the funeral Mass for Fr. Matt would be celebrated the day we were set to return home. We immediately decided to change our plans. We would check out of the hotel right after breakfast and drive straight to the Church. Thankfully, we had packed some clothes that would be acceptable to wear for a funeral, though our shoes were more casual than we would have preferred. That morning, traffic flowed easily, and we made it just in time for the viewing, which was happening right before the Funeral Mass. The casket was open, at the foot of the altar, as the faithful lined up to pay respects and say goodbye. When it was my turn, I just had to touch his hands. I thanked him for each absolution, each blessing, and each host I received, consecrated through those beautiful hands, hands anointed at his ordination.
The priesthood of Jesus Christ is the greatest gift we have. Without the priesthood, we would have no Blessed Sacrament. Just as without Mary we have no Jesus, without priests we have no Eucharist. Their greatness comes from the One who acts through them, from the One they bring to us. The Eucharist is at the heart of the priesthood. During ordination, the Bishop hands the ordinand a chalice and a paten. He then says to them:
One thing became very clear as I was sharing the news of our dear Fr. Matt’s death with parishioners and friends. He does not belong to any one of us, but he belongs to the family of God. Fr. Matt was very special to my family, with many memories of times shared. Still, everywhere I turned there was yet another story of someone who was impacted by his love for Christ and his Church. “We love Fr. Matt!” … “He heard my first Confession.” “He brought my son back to Church.” “He anointed my father at his deathbed.” When a priest offers his life at ordination, he leaves his mother and his father for his new bride, the Church. He, in union with Christ, offers his life as a sacrifice for us. In a letter to Mrs. Tholin-Bost, St. Peter Julian Eymard writes:
Lex orandi, lex credendi (Latin: "the law of what is prayed [is] the law of what is believed"). When we pay attention to the prayers of the Church, we can better understand what it is that we believe. At a priest’s funeral Mass, the deceased priest is vested as for the celebration of Mass, and the casket is placed with the head towards the altar, symbolizing the position the priest was in when he celebrated the Mass. He is vested and in position… he is celebrating his own funeral Mass.
As we gathered in that Church to commend to God the soul of our dear Fr. Matt, we were reminded that the Church entrusts the souls of our dearly departed to our prayers. As much consolation as it brings to my heart to think that perhaps his longsuffering illness purged his soul and prepared him to enter heavenly rest, the truth is that we do not know. Our duty, now more than ever, is to pray for him and all the faithful departed. In this Jubilee Year of Hope, the Church gives us many opportunities to gain indulgences, which can be applied to ourselves or to the souls in purgatory, “so that the temporal punishments due to their sins may be remitted.” (CCC 1479)
We hope those who have gone before us will one day be in Heaven and intercede for us again. But unless (and until) the Church in her authority declares someone a Saint, we must pray for their eternal rest. If you are reading this, may I ask that you offer a prayer for the repose of the soul of Fr. Matt, and also bring to mind all the dearly departed that have a place in your hearts? And to echo St. Bernadette… when I die, please pray A LOT for the repose of my soul. "Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen." Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament, pray for us!
 A few years ago, I was organizing my closet and came upon a bag of undeveloped film… from the 1990’s! I immediately started researching companies that could still develop those photos for me. The process of getting it done was cumbersome, so I put it off. But that little tangent took me off track from the task I had started. In the end, my closet was not organized, and the film is still undeveloped. Most of us would not have to look very hard to find an unfinished project in our hands. Perhaps we began to organize old photos one day and ran out of time; perhaps we started to write a book or decided to learn a new language, but something else caught our attention, and we left our project behind. Then there are the repetitive, never-ending tasks relating to our daily lives. Whether it is a basket of laundry waiting to be folded, or an overflowing trashcan needing to be taken out, most of us will find something we left to finish later, because something else seemed more pressing (or more interesting) at the time. And though there definitely are times when stopping what we are doing and leaving it behind is the right thing to do, at least for myself, I know this is not the case most of the time. One day, as I watched the priest purify the sacred vessels during Mass, I was moved by the significance of that action happening on the altar. Everyone watched and waited while the priest completed each task. This made me realize something. What seems like drudgery is in fact important and necessary; it is part of the sacrifice we offer to the Lord. How does this apply to the offerings I bring to the Lord at other times in my life? If our whole lives are to be a living sacrifice for the Lord, then this means that if a work is worth doing, it is worth completing, to the best of our abilities. Of course, this presupposes that the task we were doing was what we were supposed to be doing in the first place.
The fact that they completed their fasting and prayer before moving on to the next mission caught my attention. The Spirit had led them to pray, and He did not instruct them to stop. They remained steadfast, completed the task at hand, and only then did they move on. One of the things we hear often during the season of Lent is that many of us do not finish the race strong. Like many New Year’s resolutions, fasting, prayer, and almsgiving hopes for Lent are left behind like Ash Wednesday dust. Perhaps we tried too much. Did we consult the Holy Spirit before we started, or did we choose our sacrifices on our own? If we took a wrong turn, then, by all means, let us take correction from God and change course. But, if the road we are on is the one the Holy Spirit has chosen for us, and we are just getting tired because it is harder and longer than we thought… then let us ask God for the gift of perseverance, for the gift of hope.
Each day brings within itself the possibility of a new beginning. God knows our attention span is short, that we get tired, and we get bored. When we offer God our day, we are giving him all our unfinished work. He meets us where we are with a new sunrise and a fresh start. We ask for the necessary grace; He gives us our daily bread. We can choose to live our lives as puppets, pulled by strings of emotions and whims, or we can ask God to help us live like sailboats led by the winds of the Holy Spirit. When we come to understand that all the things in this world are there for our sanctification, then we can see each task and each work as holy. We can see that it is good and necessary to give all we have with as much love as we have to give. Everything we do becomes an offering to God. In this way, we become a living prayer. Our very breath becomes a song of praise. Let us persevere in the good work at hand…
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AuthorsWe are Ivonne J. Hernandez, Rick Hernandez and Laura Worhacz, Lay Associates of the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament, and brothers and sisters in Christ. 
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