This last few weeks have been quite interesting days in the Catholic Church. They have been times of trial and tribulation for our Church. But we know that through the power of God our Heavenly Father, the Passion of his Son Jesus Christ, and the power of the Holy Spirit we will get though all adversity.  Some of you are wondering what the heck I am talking about; others of you know exactly what I am talking about. This morning Fr. Matt and I were in the kitchen looking at the newspaper and it seemed everywhere you looked there was something about the Catholic Church, even our Bishop being attacked. Many people have stopped by my office, emailed, called, all asking the same question, Father what are we going to do? How are we as a Church going to react to the Mandate the current Federal Administration has put upon our Church? And I have looked at most and said well firstly we are going to pray. We are going to pray that God will continue to lead us and that this act of the current administration will strengthen and unify our Church. And secondly we have to support our Bishops and we have to support our Church. Two weeks ago Bishop Jackels stood at this very pulpit and listed off a number of concerns about this mandate, while all where alarming and concerning one really stood out to me, Bishop said “Concerned also because religious liberty and conscience protection are being threatened in a very real and concrete way, right here and now: the government forcing a Church to do something that it judges to be morally objectionable.”

Our conscience our freedoms as Catholics are being ripped right out of our hands, being torn away from us. Cardinal-elect Dolan, president of the USCCB said, “this shouldn’t happen in a land where free exercise of religion ranks first in the Bill of Rights” We, the Church, did not bring this battle to the Government, The Church’s teachings have remained the same for years, on contraceptives, birth-control, and abortion. Some of these teachings are older than our government itself. The current administration brought this battle to us. Our Former Bishop Thomas Olmsted, simply said his diocese would NOT comply.  They are taking our freedom of practicing our religion, away from us. Another Bishop wrote a document entitled “To Hell with You,” I think that one speaks for itself. Freedom of Religion is the reason our fore fathers came to the United States of America. And this is now being attacked by the same government how will we react?

I know there are people in these pews right now whom are mad, that I am up here preaching about this, I know that I am going to get phone calls and emails. I know that I am going to be hated by a few. That is fine, I can take it, but I cannot take my bride, Holy Mother Church being attacked and neither should you. Delivering and writing this homily is not easy, it has taken a lot of prayer and time, and I went back in forth and whether or not to do it or not. At one time, I was trying to use the excuse well Bishop discussed this a couple weeks ago so I do not have to, but then I read the second reading we heard today, in which St. Paul says, “An obligation has been imposed on me, and woe to me if I do not preach it!” That hit me like a ton of bricks, and it should you as well. I as a priest have the obligation and duty to lead my people to Christ, to lead you in your relationship with Him. But you have a duty and obligation to accept and strengthen that relationship. But furthermore we all have the duty and obligation to stand up for our Church when she is attacked, whether or not you believe in what she teaches or not, you have a duty and obligation to defend her and love her, in the weakest of times, and the strongest of times. We defend, we unite, we gather, and we fight for her, because we love her, and we want what is best for her. We do not always understand why we do what we do, and we do not always understand how to explain it. But we are Catholic, and because of that we all have a role to play from the oldest person to the newest member.  We all have role to defend our faith and to stand up for her. Our Government has drawn a huge line in the sand, not even a line but a brick wall. Where will you be? What side of that wall will you stand on, The Church or The State? How will you help to defend our most beloved Church and her teaching? I echo the words of Bishop Jackels, “My hope is…that we will contact our elected leaders and let them know that we do not want to be forced to act against our beliefs, we or anyone else, and that we want religious liberty and conscience protection restored. And pray, pray more, pray harder.”  Now is the time, more than ever, for us to Unite, and strengthen our Church.