Wednesday 11th Week
USCCB Special Assembly
San Diego, California
June 18, 2025
Occupational Hazards
Critics and wags sometimes say that, when it comes to church administration, the best observed line in Scripture is the Lord’s admonition not to let the left hand know what the right hand is doing. A high school basketball coach said the same thing about me when I tried out for the team. Of course, today’s readings aren’t asking us to be disorganized or clumsy. We are challenged on the one hand to be open and cheerful in our giving, and on the other to be hidden in our charity and in our prayer.
As public persons, we bishops know how difficult such authenticity can be. We know how easily scandal can be given or taken or both. We come equipped with a pretty good filter that prevents us from saying things sometimes we’d like to say. We have an inbuilt scanner that reviews our homilies and public statements, lest they give offense or cause controversy. Add to that our profile in the media, especially social media that touts our visits to parishes, soup kitchens, and youth rallies. While episcopal styles vary from one bishop to another, we generally maintain a certain bearing, especially in public. And who of us doesn’t like a little public affirmation, now and again?
Dual Vices
As bishops, we do indeed live with the public/private divide every day. But to help us do so well and wisely, the reading from 2nd Corinthians and the Gospel of Matthew present two vices for us to avoid and two virtues for us to embrace.
The first vice to be avoided is the sinful illusion that we are the source of what we give to others, whether it’s pastoral care or material support. In urging the congregation at Corinth to be generous to a collection for the needs of the Church at Jerusalem, Paul reminds them that God is the source of all their blessings and that it is God who provides whatever it is they will share with others. In the Gospel, Jesus teaches us that “[e]very Christian deed must be…[an] extension of the eternal mercy of God that dwells in the heart of the believer” [Levia-Merikakis, Fire of Mercy, Vol 1, 244]. Indeed, we are neither the source nor the object of our prayer and our charity. God, not ourselves, is the source all that we are, all that we have, and all that we give.
The second vice is to pray and to give of ourselves for public consumption. We look askance at politicians who engage in political theatre so as to garner attention and get votes – we call them ‘empty suits’. But it’s worse when works of piety and mercy are done for human praise. There’s a thin line between tooting one’s horn and bearing witness. The first celebrates oneself. The second celebrates what God has done for us. How do we know when we’re celebrating ourselves versus bearing witness? Here’s a simple litmus test I use: When I’m praised for something or another, do I pat myself on the back or do I humbly thank God? When, as is more likely, I’m criticized, do I go into a blue funk, or do I entrust my cares to the Lord who suffered and died to forgive my sins?
Dual Virtues
But enough about vices. What about the virtues today’s Scriptures urge? The first is the habit of deep and daily interior prayer . . .and all of us know from formation and experience how essential this is. In the Gospel, Jesus tells us to withdraw from the public eye to retreat into our inner room and to pray to our Father. In this inmost space, we encounter God. Here we shed our pride, our illusions, our chaos. In intimate conversation with God, we are made whole. While we, like Augustine, sometimes search for God solely in the exterior world, God is always waiting for us, within.
The second virtue is magnanimity or great-heartedness. When we encounter God within, our hearts are enlarged. We find God and his image everywhere and respond accordingly. When we encounter God in prayer, we tap into the source of everything we give. We encounter those we serve in the green pastures God has provided. We give of ourselves in pastoral charity, not to meet our needs, but in praise of God and service of others. Released from petty self-interest, we do indeed become cheerful givers and convincing witnesses.
A Witness
In my own life and ministry, I was fortunate at have as my boss, mentor, and friend James Cardinal Hickey. I lived and worked with him in one way or another for nearly 18 years, and that’s why I am convinced he is reigning gloriously in heaven. I learned many things from Cardinal Hickey, for he was a born teacher, but perhaps his most important lesson was never verbalized, but lived. Consistently and continually over 18 years, I knew him to be the same person publicly and privately. To be sure, he met the demands of being in public, and like all of us, he experienced private moments of frustration, anger, and sorrow. But there was never a public persona and a private persona. He was the same person in public and in private. He had that integrity and generosity of spirit that comes from daily prayer.
As bishops and priests, all of us are blessed with good mentors and friends. Let us enlist their help and their prayers so that our ministry and our witness may flow from that deep place where we are alone with God and where his voice resounds. And may God bless us and keep us always in his love.