The following was released by the Very Rev. James M. Shea, S.J., Provincial of the Maryland Province of the Society of Jesus:
The Maryland Province of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) is deeply committed to continuing to fulfill its mission of service to the people of the Mid-Atlantic region through education, pastoral care and social justice, as we have for nearly 380 years.
Through the years, as needs and resources have changed, so have our ministries. Today, our province faces a decline in the number of Jesuit priests. Due to this decline in numbers, we are in the process of combining three provinces, and we have to make some very painful and difficult decisions about how to allocate our priests.
After prayerful reflection and careful consideration of how we can best use our human resources to serve those in need, we concluded that we can no longer staff St. Aloysius Gonzaga Parish at 19 Eye St., NW (900 block of North Capitol Street), Washington, DC. The Jesuits will continue to be present in the Archdiocese of Washington through two other parishes, three schools, a university and a retreat center. The 300-household parish will merge with nearby Holy Redeemer Parish, which is located just three blocks away on New York Avenue, NW. The transition will begin July 1 and continue through the summer months. We are grateful to the Archdiocese of Washington and to Fr. David Bava, pastor of Holy Redeemer, for their support and welcome during this transition.
The church, which is owned by the Jesuits, is part of the Gonzaga College High School campus. Because it is physically connected with other buildings and integrated into the campus, it is not feasible to establish a non-Jesuit parish there. The church will continue to be used for school liturgies and, on a limited basis and in coordination with Fr. Bava, for special liturgies of Holy Redeemer parish, weddings and funerals for alumni and former parishioners, and other special events.
In addition, the Father McKenna Center, the drop-in center for homeless men that has been on site since 1983, will continue to operate. This was a very difficult decision and one I wish did not have to be made. This change will be painful. Unfortunately, the Province can no longer staff the parish.
Link (here) to read the full statement
10 comments:
Excerpt from: " A Prophet for the Priesthood Biography: Father Gerald Fitzgerald
Servant of God Fr. John Hardon S.J.
"...when it came to moving his own followers or others to pray for priests, he did not hesitate to point out, in stark terms, how absolutely indispensable was prayer, much prayer if the shepherds of the flock were to be restored to their priestly life and dignity.
Statements abound in which Father Gerald makes no secret of the malice of sin in a priest, and of the harm he does to the Church by his infidelity. "Who has struck the beautiful spouse of Christ? What has disfigured the spouse of Christ? The sins of priests." (D-130).
Unworthy priests are more than a source of scandal to the faithful. They renew the mockery of the Mystical Christ today, even as the Roman soldiers mocked the physical Christ during His Passion on Holy Thursday night.
Those poor soldiers, all they thought was that Jesus was a poor dreamer, a poor seer and perhaps, a half-wit, a poor victim of the mob who was given to them that they might have some fun according to their ideas of fun. As cruel men sometimes cast a poor little rabbit to the hounds after they have caught it, or a poor little mouse to the cat to be played with, they did not know that this was the King of Kings.
But, when I or another priest of God do anything unworthy, I step up to Him and bow my knee in mockery, and make the world laugh. The world who hates Christ and does not believe. They smile and say, "There is your priest for you." I set the crown back hard and deep into the Sacred Seat of Divine Wisdom. Oh, this is a mystery of suffering that is especially continued through time.
How Christ suffers in being mocked in the person of His priest! It is too late for a priest to make a decision, would to God it was not, it is too late for a priest to turn back and be something else. (J-4, p. 38).
But they cannot be anything else. They are ordained forever. And even if they try to forget, the world never forgets. It knows, as by supernatural instinct, what a priest should be and if he shows himself unfaithful, the whole Church suffers by the counterwitness he gives to everyone who enters his life.
It follows, then, that the sins of priests are particularly offensive to God.
There is a passage in the Psalms that applies especially to sin in a priest. The Psalmist says I was wounded in the house of a friend. If ever there is a place that should be the house of a friend, it should be the soul of a priest. It should be a house that is given over as a true friend gives over his home when a friend comes to him; so before all else a priest's soul belongs to Christ. It should be the house of his friend. And there the wounds that He receives by the sins of a priest all represent a special depth of anguish; they have a special poignancy to Our Lord because He loves so much. (D-127)."
I am made to think of the psalmist:
"Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain".
No accident that it is Fr. McKenna's work that survives...
What does Mari'a s excerpt from Fr. Hardon--a protector of a sexual predator--have to do with the topic of the article?
Yes we are greatful Fr McKenna's work at the Father Mckenna Center will survives, but the many other works that have been inspired by Fr McKenna are in flux and we ask for prayers that they too might continue.
PLAINTIFFS' MOTION TO ADD PRAYER FOR RELIEF
SEEKING PUNITIVE DAMAGES
"...Scores of McGuire victims -- including the three remaining Plaintiffs in this
case -- have had their lives altered forever because of McGuire's abuse and the Jesuits' failure to take any action whatsoever to stop it. As set forth above, at least
SIX PROVINCIALS OF THE CHICAGO JESUITS --
FATHER FLAHERTY,
FATHER KLEIN,
FATHER WILD,
FATHER SCHAEFFER,
FATHER BAUMAN,
AND FATHER SCHMIDT
RECEIVED SPECIFIC REPORTS REGARDING MCGUIRE'S ABHORRENT CONDUCT AND/OR HAD ACCESS TO CONDIFENTIAL FILES DETAILING SUCH MISCONDUCT. AT LEAST TWO CHICAGO JESUITS WHO SERVED AS SOCIUS-FATHERS DALY AND FATHER MCGURN-ALSO HAD CONSIDERABLE NOTICE REGARDING MCGUIRES PEDOPHILIAC TENCIES DURING THEIR TERMS IN OFFICE.
YET NONE OF THE CHICAGO JESUITS WHO BEAR RESPONSIBILITY FOR MCGUIRE'S BEHAVIOR AND RECKLESSLY ENDAGERING THE LIVES OF THESE YOUNG MEN HAS BEEN PUNISHED.
Though, I believe Schaeffer recently lost his job at BC.
Mr. Anonymous: You might want to actually read the legal motion prior to your efforts to assign blame to a man who has, despite being persecuted by his own Jesuits confreres, been named a Servant of God.
PS It would seem that the promotion of sodomy as a means of advancing one's soul in holiness, contraception, abortion, advocacy of women's ordination and other sundry efforts to overthrow the Church that Christ founded have proved unsuccessful in winning vocations for the Society.
Prayer for the Beatification and Canonization of Father John Hardon
Almighty God, You gave Your servant,
Father John Anthony Hardon of the Society of Jesus,
the grace of religious and priestly consecration after the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
Through Father Hardon,
You provided for your Flock an extraordinary teacher of the faith.
You entrusted Father Hardon into the loving
care of the Blessed Virgin Mary
whose counsel, "Do whatever he tells you" (Jn 2:5)
he faithfully followed and whose intercession he unceasingly invoked.
If it be Your holy will, please grant the request I now make,
calling upon the help of Father Hardon,
so that his heroic sanctity may be recognized in the whole Church.
I ask this through Your Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, Who
with You and the Holy Spirit, is one God forever and ever.
Amen
And Fr. Hardon--don't forget him Maria!
“To all our persecutors we say: ‘you are our brethren; apprehend not us but rather the truth of God."
--St Justin Martyr 150 AD
http://youtu.be/Ff1EBaUUneY
Weird that you would name other Jesuits (I make NO excuses for them so we agree about that--but they aren't up for sainthood).
As for the "Servant of God" title: that was bestowed before the story broke about Hardon's cover up.
Please be honest. Didn't they teach us that in Catholic school and our catechism?
PLAINTIFFS' MOTION TO ADD PRAYER FOR RELIEF
SEEKING PUNITIVE DAMAGES
"...Scores of McGuire victims -- including the three remaining Plaintiffs in this
case -- have had their lives altered forever because of McGuire's abuse and the Jesuits' failure to take any action whatsoever to stop it. As set forth above, at least
SIX PROVINCIALS OF THE CHICAGO JESUITS --
FATHER FLAHERTY,
FATHER KLEIN,
FATHER WILD,
FATHER SCHAEFFER,
FATHER BAUMAN,
AND FATHER SCHMIDT
RECEIVED SPECIFIC REPORTS REGARDING MCGUIRE'S ABHORRENT CONDUCT AND/OR HAD ACCESS TO CONFIDENTIAL FILES DETAILING SUCH MISCONDUCT. AT LEAST TWO CHICAGO JESUITS WHO SERVED AS SOCIUS-FATHERS DALY AND FATHER MCGURN-ALSO HAD CONSIDERABLE NOTICE REGARDING MCGUIRES PEDOPHILIAC TENDENCIES DURING THEIR TERMS IN OFFICE.
I did not see Fr. Hardon's name on this list.
YET NONE OF THE CHICAGO JESUITS WHO BEAR RESPONSIBILITY FOR MCGUIRE'S BEHAVIOR AND RECKLESSLY ENDAGERING THE LIVES OF THESE YOUNG MEN HAS BEEN PUNISHED.
Though, I believe Schaeffer recently lost his job at BC.
"I did not see Fr. Hardon's name on this list."
He's dead, remember?
The investigative piece on him just appeared. Also, he was a superior. He did provide some sinful advice regarding Fr. McG. which seems to have influenced McG.'s assignments. My reason for bringing this up is because some people have taken up his sainthood cause. . .
Since you are open to acknowledging that other clerics are guilty for hiding, excusing, etc. the harmful behavior of sexual abusers, why refuse to include Fr. Hardon?
Correction: I wrote "Also, he was a superior" when I clearly meant to write that Hardon was not a provincial superior or rector.
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