Tilting Against Windmills?

          At present I subscribe to only 3 YouTube Channels: one is the Vatican and another is that of “Word on Fire” by Father Robert Barron. Recently, I took a book recommendation from Father Barron and I am glad I did: “The Rage against God: How Atheism Led Me to Faith” by Peter Hitchens.

The other day Father Barron used the judgment scene from the prophet Ezekiel and the figure of the heavenly scribe marking with a cross the foreheads of those to be spared to talk about the role of the baptized in the present crisis facing the Church. Father synthesized the crisis brilliantly and spoke about “unprecedented corruption in the Church”. His overall message was masterful and I will not fault him either for his assessment or for his exhortation.

The passage from the Office of Readings for this morning (Saturday of the 27^th Week in Ordinary Time) and my own knowledge of history give me pause however to urge caution to the baptized who would take up Father’s exhortation and to invite Father to go back to his own book recommendation and look at Peter Hitchens’ analysis of the parallels between past forms of atheism and present anti-theistic campaigns by people like his brother Christopher or the infamous Professor Dawkins and ask himself whether “unprecedented corruption” might not be a rhetorical flourish good for fireworks but not for sharpshooting.

          If you don’t have a full breviary, let me share this familiar passage from St. Gregory the Great as a means for setting the scene.

The performance of our ministry

A homily of Pope St Gregory the Great

“Let us listen to what the Lord says as he sends the preachers forth: ‘The harvest is great but the laborers are few. Pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send laborers into his harvest.’ We can speak only with a heavy heart of so few laborers for such a great harvest, for although there are many to hear the good news there are only a few to preach it. Look about you and see how full the world is of priests, yet in God’s harvest a laborer is rarely to be found; for although we have accepted the priestly office, we do not fulfill its demands.

Beloved brothers, consider what has been said: ‘Pray the Lord of the harvest to send laborers into his harvest.’ Pray for us so that we may have the strength to work on your behalf, that our tongue may not grow weary of exhortation, and that after we have accepted the office of preaching, our silence may not condemn us before the just judge. For frequently the preacher’s tongue is bound fast on account of his own wickedness; while on the other hand it sometimes happens that because of the people’s sins, the word of preaching is withdrawn from those who preside over the assembly.

With reference to the wickedness of the preacher, the psalmist says: ‘But God asks the sinner: Why do you recite my commandments?’ And with reference to the latter, the Lord tells Ezekiel: ‘I will make your tongue cleave to the roof of your mouth, so that you shall be dumb and unable to reprove them, for they are a rebellious house.’ He clearly means this: the word of preaching will be taken away from you because as long as this people irritates me by their deeds, they are unworthy to hear the exhortation of truth. It is not easy to know for whose sinfulness the preacher’s word is withheld, but it is indisputable that the shepherd’s silence while often injurious to himself will always harm his flock.

There is something else about the life of the shepherds, dearest brothers, which discourages me greatly. But lest what I claim should seem unjust to anyone, I accuse myself of the very same thing, although I fall into it unwillingly – compelled by the urgency of these barbarous times. I speak of our absorption in external affairs; we accept the duties of office, but by our actions we show that we are attentive to other things. We abandon the ministry of preaching and, in my opinion, are called bishops to our detriment, for we retain the honorable office but fail to practice the virtues proper to it. Those who have been entrusted to us abandon God, and we are silent. They fall into sin, and we do not extend a hand of rebuke.

But how can we who neglect ourselves be able to correct someone else? We are wrapped up in worldly concerns, and the more we devote ourselves to external things, the more insensitive we become in spirit.

For this reason the Church rightfully says about her own feeble members: ‘They made me keeper of the vineyards, but my own vineyard I have not kept.’ We are set to guard the vineyards but do not guard our own, for we get involved in irrelevant pursuits and neglect the performance of our ministry.”

          I start here because here and elsewhere Gregory assumes full responsibility as a shepherd, as the Bishop of Rome and, as he called himself, Servus Servorum Dei – The Servant of the Servants of God, for failing to be vigilant with all the tragic consequences that had for those entrusted to his shepherding care. He does not take the legitimate excuse that the absence of civil authority has called him to civil service; first things first for Gregory, and to his mind, the office of bishop has been neglected.

My point is that it is not only in our day and time that members of the Church’s hierarchy have fallen “asleep at the tiller”, to use a euphemism. We can speak of shortcomings and failings even back when the Successor of Peter was one of the all-time “greats”. Gregory deserved his “Great” because he was great and did marvels, which have benefitted the Church of all times (think Gregorian chant), bequeathing her in writing not only the life of St. Benedict but a book which has been the manual for pastors, especially for bishops, over the centuries: “The Book of Pastoral Rule”. Repenting of our shortcomings and failings, admonishing sinners whether of lowly or higher station, is only one piece in the puzzle.

          I say it is only one piece in the puzzle with an eye to the tragic situation which presently has a strangle-hold on the Church in Ireland, where the mantra “unprecedented corruption” has blinded people to the fact that on lots of fronts the Church, yes in Ireland, is fighting for its life not only against the hirelings who have betrayed the flock, but perhaps more so against those who would replace God and Sunday Mass with a heroic sort of materialism which typically demonstrates its heroism as it crawls out of bed at noon or later on a Sunday after a whole night of dancing, drinking and perhaps doing designer drugs, having squandered on new clothes and a day spa what’s left after a world economic crisis which ignored God’s laws and decrees managed to cripple the “Celtic Tiger”.

          Lenin and Stalin, with Trotsky and whomever, vilified the Church in Russia, and as Hitchens points out Khrushchev continued to rage against the Orthodoxy which had been the backbone of Mother Russia ever since the Baptism of the Rus over a millennium ago. Hitchens points out the devastation is so great, even yet today 20 years (that is, almost a generation) after the collapse of the Soviet Union that faith still flags and too few children are learning their prayers. Lenin’s mummy still hasn’t been buried. Obviously, Our Lady of Fatima’s plea to pray for the conversion of Russia has lost none of its poignancy.

           Without taking the slightest away from the Western world’s shock and shame over child abuse and the objective wrong involved in the sacred trust betrayed, Hitchens points out that the bulk of what goes on in the Church is no more than what he experienced as a boy at an Anglican school in England over 40 years ago, namely homosexual teachers preying on their young male students. Hitchens warns that the anti-theists of England and other Western Countries, including the United States and Canada, feign horror over these crimes and use this situation to achieve their real end, the destruction of all religion. They have no substitute; they wish only to destroy. They are motivated not by reason but by sentiments spewing out of the depths of Hell.

          Hitchens means well also in matters of faith. The faith to which atheism led him back is a sort of cultural Anglicanism. I think he is open to more, but perhaps short on spiritual nourishment. In any case, the merit of Peter Hitchens’ book and of his cause on behalf of his brother Christopher whom he wishes to save from the ignorance of his rage against God is that he casts light on the darkness of the anti-theist agenda which seeks to compromise the truth with multiculturalism, comparative religious studies that lead nowhere, and ultimately with banning God not only from the public square but from the hearts and minds of children.

          Father Barron, go back to Hitchens for the other component of the equation and look to Gregory for the reasons why the “unprecedented” might just be an exaggeration. The exaggeration would be documented not so much by downplaying the heinousness of the crimes and corruption which may be found in some corners of the Church today, but by recognizing that God’s and our enemies use our failings not only to destroy the Church but to pervert Western Civilization and banish God from our lands.

          We pray they will not succeed, but the devastation along the southern and eastern rim of the Mediterranean has been all too lasting and complete. Just this week the news comes out of Saudi Arabia of the arrest of some Filipino Catholics and a French priest who attempted to celebrate Mass privately in a hotel in the Kingdom. Hitchens would claim that Orthodoxy has little more than a niche existence in Russia yet today. It would seem that our struggle is not only against mortals but against principalities and powers.

Our Lady of the Holy Rosary, pray for us!

Speak, Lord, Your Servant is Listening

Holy Mass for the Closing of the Academic Year
at the Regional Seminary of
St. John Vianney and the Uganda Martyrs

15 May 2008, 6:30 p.m.

Solemnity of St. Charles Lwanga and Companions, Martyrs
Reading I: 2 Maccabees 7:1-2.9-14
Reading II: 2 Cor. 4:7-15
Gospel: Matthew 5:1-12

The poor in spirit, the gentle, those who mourn, those who hunger and thirst for what is right, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those who are persecuted in the cause of right… and all of this because of me, Jesus says, rejoice and be glad for heaven!

Among my all-time favorites from the Second Readings in the Office of Readings of the Liturgy of Hours are two in the course of the year from Pope Paul VI, of blessed memory: one, assigned to the Feast of the Holy Family, comes from his talk in Nazareth about all the lessons to be learned from the school of the house of Jesus, Mary and Joseph at Nazareth; the other is from his 1964 homily at the canonization of the martyrs of Uganda.

Part of what thrills me about this excerpt from the Pope’s canonization homily is precisely the fact, that I (the Nuncio), a non-European, am hearing a great European sing the praises of another part of the world other than Europe. I am sure that Europeans are not and cannot be touched by the Pope’s message for the Feast of the Uganda Martyrs in the same way as I or most of us can. Let me quote the text ever so briefly:

“Who could have predicted to the famous African confessors and martyrs such as Cyprian, Felicity, Perpetua and – the greatest of all – Augustine, that we would one day add names so dear to us as Charles Lwanga and Matthias Mulumba Kalemba and their twenty companions?”

They were young men for the most part, whom the Church gladly identifies with the seven sons and their mother from the Book of Maccabees, and who in Christian art are often portrayed as the Black counterparts of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, the three young men singing unharmed in the fiery furnace of Babylon. The reading from Pope Paul VI continues:

“The infamous crime by which these young men were put to death was so unspeakable and so expressive of the times. It shows us clearly that a new people needs a moral foundation, needs new spiritual customs firmly planted, to be handed down to posterity. Symbolically, this crime also reveals that a simple and rough way of life – enriched by many fine human qualities yet enslaved by its own weakness and corruption – must give way to a more civilized life wherein the higher expressions of the mind and better social conditions prevail.”

Hold that thought and let me switch gears for just a moment!

It is a commonly held opinion that today’s students, especially theology students, and major seminarians par excellence, are much more serious about learning than we were years ago. I’ve also read that your typical vocation to the priesthood today is more serious than we were once upon a time. I am glad for you, but also a bit puzzled and will try and explain myself by reflecting for a moment on your great patrons, the Uganda Martyrs.

The heroism of the young men in the Book of Maccabees, brutally tortured and killed for their refusal to eat pork from a pagan sacrifice in violation of God’s Covenant and Law given to Moses and the Chosen People always causes me to shudder, but I have no real problem understanding or accepting their zeal. They give evidence of the typical psychology or should we say appreciation of noble values as understood and embraced by boys, youths and young men of any day and time. Faith in the God of their ancestors was certainly the cornerstone of their sacrifice, but they were martyred essentially because of their adherence to the Commandments and dietary laws of Judaism which were concrete and judged worth holding. This they had learned at their mother’s knee. It is true the Book of Maccabees here and elsewhere offers us among the most articulate Jewish expressions of faith in a future resurrection, but central to these young men’s oblation was their adherence to the law of the God of their fathers.

The Uganda Martyrs, as the Pope points out so clearly, are of a piece with the great North African Martyrs and Saints of the early centuries, whose sacrifice is not described first and foremost by a strict adherence on their part to the observance of the Law but rather by their faith in Christ, to whom they had bound themselves firmly, bound themselves in love and fidelity, bound themselves to Jesus, to the Risen One, to the Victor over sin and death. They, the Uganda Martyrs like centuries of Christian martyrs before them, had embraced what the seven brothers and their mother could only salute from afar.

Recently in Curacao I had a conversation with a man I’d judge to be in his forties, who expressed optimism concerning the attractiveness of priesthood today as a vocational choice for young men here in our region. Even though he seemed to me to be a regular “man in the pew” my guess is that he had also heard as I had about this new generation of conscientious students and hardworking or more-dedicated-than-my-generation seminarians. I’m afraid I may have burst his optimism bubble, by insisting on the old faith imparted to me in primary school by Sister and by Father from the pulpit back when I was just a little boy in the 1950’s.

You see, I am a staunch believer in a timeless understanding of vocation, amply sustained by the descriptions of how men received their calling from God in both the Old and New Testaments. You’ll never convince me that the three basic prerequisites in a boy or young man for a priestly vocation have changed. What are they? They are very simply: 1. sound mind; 2. sound body; 3. somewhat better than average intelligence. Everything else that goes into a vocation is supernatural and mediated by the Church through the voice of authority. God called me to priesthood from my mother’s womb; He gave me the grace to respond; the Church confirmed the rightness of my childish, at first, later youthful and idealistic, longing. The Church trained me and ordained me and has never ceased in love to knock off all my rough edges and purify me, first and foremost for the service of the Altar.

The vocation or call to martyrdom in the act itself is as horrifying as Christ’s Passion. In the Light of Easter Sunday the sense of it all comes clear in God’s plan to raise us up, to save us and our world. Whether hung, drawn and quartered, flayed alive, stripped and locked away in a cold old starvation bunker in a concentration camp in Central Europe, impaled or burned facing the furious rejection of a blood relative who may be a temporal ruler but does not share our hope in Christ, we are talking in the martyr, male or female, child, youth or adult, we are talking in that person about the ultimate unto life’s blood witness of radical respect for the human person. We are talking about a new dignity and worth attributed to the human person through baptism into Christ, the Incarnate Son of God, Who in Himself has raised us to even greater nobility than that we had at the moment of the creation of our first parent. The New Testament or Christian martyr’s witness flows from a true love of God and neighbor. Death is swallowed up in death as we make up for what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ (to quote one of the most approved authors).

I hope and pray you all had a great academic year. Some people claim that studies are the ultimate bloodless martyrdom. Pope Paul VI would tell you that the Uganda Martyrs did not choose the path of confrontation but, when pressed to the wall and demanded to choose, chose Jesus. As little more than neophytes, barely graduated from the catechumenate, they were called by Christ. He made their hearts (boyish hearts, youngish or youthful hearts) his own. They knew the Commandments but more essentially they knew their Redeemer; they knew He would raise them up to life and never abandon them; they knew that whole, entire, glorified in the flesh they would with their own eyes see God.

“Symbolically, this crime also reveals that a simple and rough way of life – enriched by many fine human qualities yet enslaved by its own weakness and corruption – must give way to a more civilized life wherein the higher expressions of the mind and better social conditions prevail.”

As I say, I hope you all had a great academic year, that your studies have helped to equip you for “…a more civilized life wherein the higher expressions of the mind and better social conditions prevail.” I am convinced that the Hellenizers who tortured and killed the seven sons and their mother in Maccabees were indeed as enslaved to their own weakness and corruption as Uganda’s degenerate king. The young men of the Old Testament outstripped their torturers in their hope and adherence to principle. St. Charles Lwanga and his companions had the further advantage through their catechism lessons and youthful life of faith of having come to know, love and serve Christ.

The self-oblation of the young men from Uganda must be one of the best possible examples of the glories of the true faith without admixture or ambiguity. I would never wish martyrdom on myself or on any of you, but I am willing to predict that if your faith-life is as straightforward and centered in the person of Jesus Christ as that of any one of those twenty-two boys, youths or young men, we’ll soon be resorting to phrases like “a new Pentecost” to describe the renaissance of Catholic life spreading across the Caribbean like wildfire.

What is ultimately attractive and inspiring? What causes the Gospel to be spread? The life of virtue and adherence to the Person of Christ most certainly! These are gifts of grace, things we learn, things we are trained in. We can identify such traits in ourselves and in others; we can come to live them better and better each day. Our Gospel summary for this Feast again: The poor in spirit, the gentle, those who mourn, those who hunger and thirst for what is right, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those who are persecuted in the cause of right… and all of this because of me, Jesus says, rejoice and be glad for heaven!

I don’t know how much the bishops share with you about their anxious prayers and efforts for the sake of the life of the Regional Seminary of St. John Vianney and the Uganda Martyrs. We can only speculate concerning what the present and ongoing crisis of the seminary is all about. Part of the problem and perhaps the reason crowds of young men are not knocking down the doors and begging to serve may be that young people have been deprived of the encounter with the Lord Jesus which Charles Lwanga and his companions were blessed to have had at the dawn of the evangelization of Sub-Saharan Africa. No, that is not possible! I don’t believe it! Rather, I would say that maybe there haven’t been enough Eli’s out there to tell the little boys named Samuel, sleeping in the Lord’s House at Shiloh, to simply lift up their heads and say, “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening!”

The marvelous human traits of the Uganda Martyrs are present also in the youth of this region. God’s call of shepherds in sufficient number to tend the flock is guaranteed. We need more parents like Samuel’s mother who gave her son back to God no sooner than he was weaned and we need more Eli’s to say, “Boy, God is calling. Respond as you should!”

The nuncio prays for you and hopes at the close of this academic year that you’ll have a wonderful vacation or next stage in your life. Life only gets better when you allow the Lord, Who loves you more than yourself, to plot your course.

Recognize your dignity, O Christian!

The Easter Vigil
22 March 2008 (During the Night)
Rosary Monastery, St. Ann’s

In the midst of this beautiful Easter night Vigil so full of words and ideas, let me share just a brief reflection inspired by the Epistle Reading taken from the 6th Chapter of St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans. I would be remiss if I didn’t share this thought relevant to St. Paul’s teaching on Baptism as a share in Christ’s death and thereby in His resurrection.

Just a short while ago we heard these words: “If in union with Christ we have imitated his death (through Baptism), we shall also imitate him in his resurrection. We must realize that our former selves have been crucified with him to destroy this sinful body and to free us from the slavery of sin.”

If daily Mass is part of your life as it has been of mine for way more than half the years which have passed since I first saw the light of day, then perhaps you too sense something awkward or wrenching about the Holy Saturday just past, the one day of the whole Church year with no public liturgy and no celebration of any sacrament outside of the context of giving someone the Last Rites.

An ancient homily on Holy Saturday found in the Breviary expresses this sentiment and explains the significance of what now fills our hearts with joy:

“The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and hell trembles with fear.
He has gone to search for our first parent, as for a lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, he has gone to free from sorrow the captives Adam and Eve, he who is both God and the son of Eve. The Lord approached them bearing the cross, the weapon that had won him the victory… He took (Adam) by the hand and raised him up, saying: ‘Awake, O sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.’
I am your God, who for your sake have become your son… Rise from the dead, for I am the life of the dead. Rise up, work of my hands, you who were created in my image. Rise, let us leave this place, for you are in me and I am in you; together we form only one person and we cannot be separated.”

Maybe we cannot even get a handle on the wonder which is the Resurrection, but it is worth trying and I think that sharing the perspective of the Fathers of the Church who spent a lot of time reflecting on Jesus as the new Adam might be of help to us. Our Faith really is something “up close and personal” as the expression goes. Permit me to share an insight from my own life experience which helps me put flesh and bones on these highly exalted mysteries, that is, in some way to understand the dynamics of the way in which we were saved:

As the oldest of eight children and a boy, having been away from home in the seminary from my mid teens and maybe also for my temperament, when I was around my father or saw a picture of him, I drank in every detail especially of my father’s face. His smile, his laugh, and other expressions of emotion, plus just his face without any special expression, are here in my head to be called up from my memory as vivid pictures, even nearly 23 years after his death. Now that I am older and maybe even a bit jowly, there are times when I catch my own reflection out of the corner of my eye and I see his expression, the corner of his mouth in mine. What I used to blame on his dentures, I can now see was not the dentist’s fault. This little detail or experience makes me reflect on the moving experience older dads must have when they catch a glimpse of themselves in the face of an adult son.

That having been said, try to imagine the emotion of Adam on this night so many centuries ago, when looking up from the darkness and the shadow of death into which he and Eve had banished themselves, he saw himself in the glorious face of his Son, his Creator, his Savior!

“Rise, let us leave this place," Jesus, the Risen One, said to him, "for you are in me and I am in you; together we form only one person and we cannot be separated.”

Incarnation and Redemption – Christmas and Easter… How do I say it adequately? Understanding the implications of Easter, the consequences of our Baptism, should send us tumbling to our knees and by the same token jumping out of our skin for sheer joy. “You have put on Christ! You have become a new creation!” Recognize your dignity, O Christian! Recognize the favor shown to you! The Sun of Justice has dawned upon you, to take your hand, to lift you up and to take you to Himself. Ours is a life full of promise and blessing.

“If in union with Christ we have imitated his death (through Baptism), we shall also imitate him in his resurrection. We must realize that our former selves have been crucified with him to destroy this sinful body and to free us from the slavery of sin.”

Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia!

Our Hope in His Victory

Easter Vigil 2007
Rosary Monastery
St. Ann’s, Port of Spain

Homily


At the risk of provoking a puzzled look or two, I’m going to state that our whole life as Christians is one big, long Easter Vigil. Not only is the Easter Vigil the mother of all vigils, the night of nights, it is a metaphor for the way we live out our Baptism in the course of the years granted to us on this earth. Alleluia.
What is the Easter Vigil in a few words? What is our life as baptized Christians in a few words? It’s about remembering or recalling how God saved His people throughout history and about how in the fullness of time He sent his own Son to be our Redeemer. It’s about our hope and prayer that God (through this Easter celebration / through our living out of the grace of our baptism day by day, year for year) may bring to perfection the saving work He has begun in us by water and the Holy Spirit. “He is risen and He has appeared to Simon!” Our hope for this life and for the next is in His victory over sin and death. Nothing else really matters. Alleluia!
After lighting our Easter candle, we spent time this evening with the Scriptures, now we’ll renew the promises of our Baptism, and then we will celebrate in the Holy Eucharist the central mystery of our faith. This is our vigil and this is our life. It reaches its high point not only at Easter, but every single Sunday, which as we know is “Resurrection Day”.
The early Christians suffered martyrdom rather than go without their Sunday Mass. Why has the first announcement of the Gospel generally been accompanied by persecution of Christian believers and their martyrdom? Because Satan doesn’t give in that easily; he’s not willing to turn over his control of people’s lives that easily. We are washed clean in the Blood of the Lamb. The Lamb was slain in mortal combat but lives forever victorious over sin and death, over Satan’s power. The strife is o’er the battle done… as the Easter hymn goes. Alleluia! We walk in the footsteps of Christ, we go to Him, and we identify with Him who suffered, died and was buried outside the walls, outside the vineyard. He rose victorious from the dead and vanquished the power of evil. Again: Alleluia.
I don’t know about you, but I have the worst time getting over or getting away from being curious about “how the other half lives”. By that I don’t mean the “rich and famous”, movie stars or politicians: most of their tragedies or insufficiencies are too evident and their choice of a certain life holds no attraction whatever for me. No, I tend to waste time wondering how certain good people in the world have failed to become Christians. It’s nothing more than a distraction, I know. Invariably however, I find out that such people are not truly happy. They don’t necessarily remain where they are because they think their life is the best or because they are satisfied. They content themselves rather with their life because they can’t imagine a better option. In some cases they live in fear of what might happen, if they let down their guard for a moment. It goes without saying that I could also describe a lot of baptized people as living that the same way, like pagans. Maybe (to refer to the famous quote from Mahatma Gandhi) that’s why some thoughtful people aren’t even attracted to us. For others the message of the Gospel is just too good to be true.
The Easter Vigil is a reminder, a pep talk for each and every one of us the baptized, encouraging us to stir up the flame of faith within us. We are called to set the world around us on fire with what seems to be the little light and warmth flickering from our candle of faith lit at Baptism.
It is no small task, but be of good courage. If you proclaim Jesus, True God and True Man, the Savior of the World who hung upon the wood of the Cross, our Light, the true light which comes into the world, if you proclaim Jesus, not by so much talk, but by the choices of your life, by your holy life, by your living out as best you can your vocation whatever it might be: husband and father, grandfather, mother and spouse, grandmother, widow or widower, single person, student, son or daughter, religious woman of the active or contemplative life, priest, papal nuncio. If you do so not only will you live happy, but you’ll join the fight to make up what is still lacking in the sufferings of Christ for the salvation of the world. You will be His Body.
I spent three years of my career in Jerusalem and I must say that one of the things which impressed me there were the pilgrims coming to Jerusalem from Ethiopia for Holy Week each year. I never talked to one of them that I can remember, but you’d see them about their devotions always dressed in white robes, baptismal garments. The white garment is a symbol of our having put on Christ in baptism. With the garment at our Baptism come the words of the priest exhorting us, exhorting parents and godparents to keep that life in Christ unstained.
A most blessed Easter to one and all!