28TH SUNDAY
IN ORDINARY TIME – C
Today we gather for this regional Mass celebrating the
150th anniversary of the Sisters of Saint Francis of Perpetual
Adoration. We gather to give thanks to
God for the gift of this religious community and for the gift of their holy
foundress, Mother Maria Theresia Bonzel, who will be beatified in
November.
The theme of thanksgiving is prominent in today’s
readings. In the second book of Kings,
Naaman the Syrian, who suffered the terrible disease of leprosy, was cured by
the prophet Elisha. The Scriptures tell
us that “his flesh became again like the flesh of a little child.” The cure brought this man, a foreigner and
enemy of God’s people, to faith. Naaman
said to Elisha: “Now I know that there is no God in all the earth, except in
Israel.” His profession of faith was
really the greater miracle in this story.
And he makes an act of thanksgiving.
Naaman’s cure was an unmerited gift from God. Naaman in his deep gratitude tried to give
Elisha a gift in thanksgiving, but Elisha refused the gift because it was truly
God who cured Naaman, not himself, God’s prophet. So instead, Naaman took two mule-loads of
earth from that place so that he would later offer a sacrifice to God on soil
from the holy land of Israel.
In today’s Gospel, one very familiar to us since it is
often read on Thanksgiving Day, we heard about Jesus’ cure of the ten
lepers. After the cure, only one of the
group, the Samaritan, went back to thank Jesus.
Like Naaman in the Old Testament, he was considered a foreigner, of
another religion. But he received the
gift of faith. The Gospel tells us he
returned to Jesus, “glorifying God in a loud voice.” He fell at the feet of Jesus and thanked Him
for the cure. This was a beautiful
gesture of humility and gratitude. Our
Lord was delighted by the gratitude of the Samaritan, but disappointed that the
other nine did not return to thank Him.
The message for us today is very clear. Do we practice the wonderful virtue of
gratitude in our lives or are we at times remiss or even ungrateful? Perhaps the nine lepers just forgot about
Jesus in the midst of their excitement at being cleansed. Perhaps we forget or take for granted the
many gifts we receive every day from God.
How do we give thanks?
First, of course, is our prayer of thanksgiving. Saint Paul wrote: “Give thanks in all
circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” Of course, the Mass is our ultimate prayer of
thanksgiving to God. In the Preface
dialogue at Mass, the priest says: “Let us give thanks to the Lord our God” and
we respond: “It is right and just.” Yes,
it is right and just to give the Lord thanks and praise for all that is good
and beautiful, for God’s manifold gifts to us, for our life, and most
importantly, for the gift of His Son as our Redeemer, for the new life we
receive in Christ and the gift of redemption.
We also give thanks by being generous to others,
imitating God’s generosity to us. A
grateful person is a generous person.
This is stewardship: recognizing that all we have and are is God’s gift
to us and then giving back to God of our time, our talents, and our treasure to
Him and His Church.
Mother Maria Theresia Bonzel was a woman filled with
gratitude to God. She was a woman of
great faith who had encountered God’s love in her life. She received the call to follow Christ and to
found the congregation of the Sisters of Saint Francis of Perpetual
Adoration. Filled with gratitude for
God’s love, she set out courageously to spread that love to the sick and the
poor. She realized very deeply that this
calling was a gift from God. She knew
that all gifts and talents, every good, come from God. And she wanted to make a return to the Lord
for His goodness. It was the deep
experience of God’s love that inspired her to respond in gratitude by leading a
new religious congregation. In her
writings, she continually offered praise and thanks to God for his kindness,
goodness, and mercy. She was much like
Saint Francis, who never tired of singing the glories of God. She never praised herself. Her heart was filled with gratitude to
God. Allow me to quote Mother Maria
Theresia’s own words. She wrote: “The love, the extraordinary love God has
shown me, demands that I love and honor God perfectly, and live with a view to
the goal and end of my life. God has
proved His love for me in the great grace of the vocation to the religious
life. He has called me regardless of His
own benefit. ‘You have not chosen me; I
have chosen you’.”
Mother Maria Theresia acknowledged that all good found in her and in her
actions did not proceed from her, but was a gift of divine love. That allowed her to serve the Lord with such
selfless dedication, even in the midst of huge challenges and much
suffering. She was able to persevere
because she turned to God in all situations, in joys and sorrows. She knew that the Lord was with her. She surrendered herself totally to Him. She had a beautiful interior life, a life of
prayer and contemplation, that then bore fruit in the beautiful works of the
apostolate. And the Holy Eucharist was
the center of her religious life. This
is the inheritance received by the thousands of Sisters who, for the past 150
years, have embraced the contemplative and active life of Mother Maria Theresia
Bonzel as Sisters of Saint Francis of Perpetual Adoration. And this is what we celebrate today. In particular, we celebrate the Sisters’
presence in our diocese.
The Sisters of Saint Francis came to the Diocese of Fort Wayne in 1875 at
the invitation of our second bishop, Bishop Joseph Dwenger. At that time, the diocese included the whole
northern half of the state of Indiana. Bishop
Dwenger, during his ad limina visit to Rome in 1874, made a side trip to Olpe,
Germany to meet Mother Theresia at the motherhouse of the congregation. The congregation was still very young,
founded just 11 years earlier. At the
time of Bishop Dwenger’s visit to Olpe, the Church was suffering from the
anti-Catholic Prussian government’s persecution. Catholic religious orders were being suppressed. Under the circumstances, Mother Maria Thersia
accepted Bishop Dwenger’s invitation to come to the Diocese of Fort Wayne to
open a hospital in Lafayette. That was
the beginning of the long history of service of the Sisters of Saint Francis of
Perpetual Adoration in our diocese. The
community grew pretty rapidly. The
sisters’ motherhouse was in Lafayette and in 1885, The Sisters became a
separate American province, that is now, as you know, located in
Mishawaka. Through the decades, the
Sisters of Saint Francis have had a huge part in the life of the Church in our
diocese, especially in the teaching apostolate and in health care.
The soon to be “Blessed” Maria Theresia Bonzel visited the
Diocese of Fort Wayne three times during her life. I know that at least on her first visit, she
came here to the city of Fort Wayne to visit with Bishop Dwenger. The Sisters’ apostolic works in the first
decades were in areas that are now part of the dioceses of Lafayette and
Gary. I believe the first apostolate of
the sisters in the territory that is now the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend
was at Saint Patrick School in Lagro in 1889, followed by Saint Andrew School
in Fort Wayne in the year 1911, Saint John School in Goshen in 1917, and Saint
Mary’s School in Huntington in 1921. Over
100 Sisters of Saint Francis were teaching in our diocese by 1924.
The presence of the Sisters of Saint Francis here in the
city of Fort Wayne became quite prominent in 1944 when the community decided to
relocate Saint Francis College from Lafayette to Fort Wayne. This college, which began as a school to
train the sisters to be teachers, had been accredited in 1923. A few years before moving to Fort Wayne, the
college had expanded from a two-year to a four-year program and also had begun
to accept lay women as students. When
Saint Francis College opened in Fort Wayne, it had 62 lay women and fourteen
sisters as students. Eventually, the
college became coed. Enrollment
grew. Academic programs expanded. New buildings were constructed. In 1998, it became the “University of Saint
Francis.” It is very appropriate that this
regional celebration today is here on the campus of this university, a blessing
to the city of Fort Wayne and to our diocese for the past 69 years.
In this Fort Wayne area of our diocese, the Sisters of
Saint Francis have taught at Saint Therese School and at Bishop Luers High
School. In the South Bend area, they
have taught at Saint John the Baptist School in South Bend and Queen of Peace
School in Mishawaka. I am very grateful
that today the Sisters of Saint Francis teach at Marian High School in
Mishawaka and at Saint Anthony School in South Bend. I celebrated Confirmation at Saint Anthony’s
this past Friday evening. The candidates
were very well prepared, clear evidence that they were taught by the Sisters of
Saint Francis.
It is a special joy for me that the Sisters are receiving vocations among
the young women of our diocese. And it
is a great blessing to have so many sisters at the provincial motherhouse in
Mishawaka, over 30 Sisters of Saint Francis at Saint Francis Convent and over
30 retired sisters in residence at Our Lady of the Angels Convent, a real oasis
of prayer in our diocese. Perpetual
Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Saint Francis Convent is a great blessing
for our diocese.
Though we don’t have any hospitals of the Sisters in our diocese, the
corporate office of the Franciscan Alliance, the Sisters’ health care system,
is located in Mishawaka. The Sisters’
health care apostolate continues the beautiful commitment of Mother Maria
Theresia to the sick and the suffering.
I began this homily reflecting on the theme of
thanksgiving. Of course, we thank the
Sisters of Saint Francis of Perpetual Adoration on this 150th
anniversary. But I know Mother Maria
Theresia would want us to offer our thanks first to God, the source of all
blessings. That’s what we do now as we
celebrate the great sacrifice of thanksgiving which is the Holy Eucharist.
May Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament continue to pour out
His love and grace upon the Sisters of Saint Francis and upon our diocese! May Saint Francis of Assisi and Mother Maria
Theresia Bonzel pray for us!