The Diocese has three dinners each year for priests to bring young men that they think may have a religious vocation. They are called the St Andrew’s dinners, called that because of St Andrew’s words to St Peter with reference to Jesus: “Come and see”. This past Tuesday I brought 13 young men from St Mary’s to the St. Andrew’s dinner held at the bishop’s former residence in Trumbull. Fr. Connaughton, the Vocations director of the diocese, thanked me for bring so many young men to the dinner. He asked all those from St. Mary’s to raise their hands. The effect was amazing for all to see.
I do not know if all these young men have a calling to the priesthood. But I do know that they have come to love Jesus Christ and the Church because of their love of the Traditional Roman Mass. They come from all over the place: Throgs Neck in the Bronx to Westchester to upstate Connecticut and yes, even from Norwalk. And they have the real faith they have because of the Traditional Mass and the grace that is at the heart of the Mass. The Traditional Roman Mass is the antidote to the present state of the Church, a Church that has lost its grounding in the person of Jesus Christ and rolls over dead with great delight before the secular onslaught of a disbelieving world. The bishops are paralyzed by hyper-papalism by fear of offending not only the world but also Catholics who are quite comfortable in the milk toast version of Catholicism that is the norm in the years after the Second Vatican Council, and by being burdened with a liturgy that is discontinuous with Tradition.
Please pray for the young men who serve at the altar at St. Mary’s, that their encounter with the transcendental beauty of the Traditional Mass will deepen their faith and foster a vocation to the Sacred Priesthood of the Church.
Father Richard Gennaro Cipolla
PS: Be sure to come to the dedication of the Shrine of Our Lady of Norwalk on Wednesday, February 7 at 6 p. m. And bring friends and family!
