Florida Catholic | Bishop Barbarito’s Column

SLIDE SHOW STORY: The Ordination of Elifete St. Fort

An extraordinary sacred and silent moment

Published: 10.10.08

Following is the bishop’s homily on the occasion of the priesthood ordination of Father Elifete St. Fort, Sept. 27, at the Cathedral of St. Ignatius Loyola.

Today we rejoice as we come together as a church to celebrate the sacrament of holy orders and to confer upon Deacon Elifete St. Fort the very priesthood of Jesus Christ. This is indeed a great gift for Eli, for his family and for all of us as the particular church of the Diocese of Palm Beach. Today through this gift, Eli is joined to the entire presbyterate of the Diocese of Palm Beach and becomes a servant of the people of God here in southern Florida, enfleshing the words of Jesus that were just proclaimed in St. Matthew’s Gospel, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

My brother, Eli, you are about to be ordained a priest on a most fitting feast, that of St. Vincent de Paul, an extraordinary priest and servant of God’s people, especially to the poor and the needy. It is fitting that you have completed your preparation for the priesthood in our regional seminary of St. Vincent de Paul.

I wish to take this opportunity to thank Msgr. Keith Brennan and the entire faculty and staff of the seminary for their fine service to all of us in the Diocese of Palm Beach in preparing you and so many other candidates for the priesthood in southern Florida. We are very blessed by their outstanding ministry and by the seminary’s presence in our diocese. We wish all those associated with St. Vincent de Paul Seminary a happy patronal feast today and we thank them for their attendance here this morning.

It is also fitting that you are ordained on St. Vincent de Paul’s feast day as he was not only an ardent apostle of charity, but an excellent educator of clergy in Paris and Beauvois. He is well known for his Tuesday conferences with young priests, with his retreats for those to be ordained and for his overall renewal of the clergy in France. St. Vincent de Paul was a servant of the poor and also of the clergy, realizing that service to the clergy was also service to the poor. What a wonderful personal patron of a priest you have before you on your day of ordination.

In the second reading for today’s Mass of Ordination, we hear St. Paul speaking of that action which will soon ordain Eli a priest and configure him to Christ in a unique manner, the imposition of hands. Paul says to Timothy, “Do not neglect the gift you have, which was conferred on you through the imposition of hands by the presbyterate.” In his homily for the ordination of priests in Rome this past April, our Holy Father, Pope Benedict the XVI, made reference to this action of the imposition of hands by referring to it as one of “extraordinary spiritual intensity.” He urged the ordinands always to think back to this moment, which is full of mystery because it is the origin of the priest’s new mission.

He said, “In that silent prayer, the encounter between two freedoms comes into being: the freedom of God, who works through the Holy Spirit and the freedom of man. The imposition of hands visually expresses the specific manner of this meeting. The church, impersonated by the bishop standing with extended hands, prays to the Holy Spirit to consecrate the candidate; the deacon, on his knees, receives the imposition of hands and entrusts himself to this mediation. Altogether these gestures are important, but the invisible spiritual movement that they express is infinitely more important, a movement clearly evoked by the sacred silence that envelops everything, internal and external.”

Indeed that moment of “extraordinary spiritual intensity,” which we soon will experience in “sacred silence” establishes an intimate relationship of reciprocity between God the Father and the priest through the mediation of the Son and the Holy Spirit. The great Pope John Paul II in a homily to newly ordained priests instructed them that their priestly origin was Trinitarian. He said, “You are born from the depths of this unspeakable divine mystery: from the love of the Father, the grace of Jesus Christ, from the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

My brother, Eli, today your priestly origin is indeed in the depths of the Trinity, the very life of God himself, and will be passed on to you in the silence of God himself. That silence is love, the internal exchange of love between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. You will carry out your priestly ministry most effectively the more you enter into the life of the mystery of the Trinity into which you will be born. Daily prayer and the daily celebration of the fullness of the sacrificial love of the Eucharist must become the very core of your being if you are to serve and to love as a priest in the fashion of Christ himself. Indeed, only in this context do the words of St. Vincent de Paul from today’s Office of Readings make complete sense: “If a needy person requires ... help during prayer time, do whatever has to be done with peace of mind. Offer the deed to God as your prayer. … One of God’s works is merely interrupted so that another can be carried out.” However, my brother, never forget, in the spirit of St. Vincent de Paul, there can be no love without prayer and there can be no prayer without love.

St. Vincent de Paul communicated to the poor that God loved them to the core of their being. He was able to do this because, as a priest, he knew the love of God in the core of his being and was part of the vital exchange of love within the Trinity. St. Vincent de Paul had an intense devotion to the Trinity because he experienced the love which is the very life of God within the depths of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. He told priests in one of his regular spiritual conferences, “What is it that produces unity and community in God? Is it not equality and distinction between the Three Persons? What produces their mutual love, if not their perfect resemblance? If they did not possess mutual love, what would be lovable in them?”

What a powerful question! “If they did not possess mutual love, what would be lovable in them?” It is not God’s power, his omniscience, his eternity, not even his justice that makes him lovable. It is his love and only his love. That is why St. John tells us that “God is love.” Without love, born in the depths of God himself, Eli, you cannot carry out the service of a priest. It is not a service of power – it is a service of love. Again, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” In your preparation for priesthood, you have proved yourself to be a loving person, and you will continue to grow in that love and now share in it in an extraordinary manner through holy orders, which you are now going to receive.

Finally my brother, Eli, remember that St. Vincent de Paul was a man of joy. He was greatly influenced by his contemporary, St. Francis de Sales, and imitated his humility and gentleness. By nature, St. Vincent de Paul was an inpatient man, but his asceticism and his prayer led him to a great self-discipline. His service and love to others gave him joy. In his homily to those to be ordained this spring, Pope Benedict XVI expressed that the centrality of priestly ministry is joy. He said, “To proclaim and to witness joy: This is the centrality of your mission, dear deacons, who will soon become priests.”

These words are also addressed you this morning, Eli, as you are ordained a priest. You will be filled with joy by the imposition of hands during this sacred rite and solemn silent moment when you more deeply enter into the eternal exchange of love between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. You will become a minister of joy and you will grow in joy the more you grow in sacrificial love through prayer. We need your ministry because we need Christ and we need to know his love daily made manifest to us. Always keep the example of St. Vincent de Paul before you and you will know the joy of priesthood. As hands are imposed upon you in silence this day, make your own the words of Samuel we heard in the first reading, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”

My brothers and sisters, as we rejoice on this happy occasion, may we all continue to support and pray for Eli and for all of our priests. May the Lord continue to carry out his work of love which he has begun through them.

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