Cardinal's Column, Calendar & Appointments

May 22, 2005

Pentecost: Why the Church is alive and young

Cardinal George wrote this column in early May before leaving on a pilgrimage to Ukraine.

During his homily at his inaugural Mass as Pope, Benedict XVI said that the Church is full of life and is young. He may have been thinking of the several million people, most of them young men and women, who poured into Rome for Pope John Paul II’s funeral because the ministry of the late Pope had truly turned their lives to the Lord. Good theologian that he is, Pope Benedict may also have been thinking of what he had written in 1978: “What air is for our biological life, that the Holy Spirit is for the human soul. Where he breathes, human life can begin, humanity can exist, God can really dwell. We must preserve the pure air of the Holy Spirit to prevent pollution of the spiritual environment.”

The Holy Spirit, given with great force to the apostles and the Blessed Virgin Mary on the first Pentecost, keeps the Church as young as God. If the Church looks old and decrepit, it’s because our sins continue to drag us down. Holiness is always contemporary and is constantly attractive, especially to young people.

The first encounter of Pope Benedict XVI with the youth of the world will take place this coming August in Cologne, Germany. As plans stand now, over 500 young people and adults from Chicago will go together to this 20th World Youth Day. I plan to be among them.

Preparations are being made by Angus McDonnell, Archdiocesan Youth Ministry Director. He is helped by his own staff, by parish youth ministers and pastors and by many others. The first Archdiocesan-wide gathering for the Chicago pilgrims was hosted on Pentecost Sunday, May 15, at St. Charles Borromeo Church. On July 18, a second gathering will be held at St. Michael’s Parish in Orland Park. The purpose of these gatherings is to help those going to Cologne to get to know one another, to prepare them for the trip and to set their minds and hearts on making it a true pilgrimage, a spiritual journey.

Youth ministry in the Archdiocese has been strengthened in the past year in many ways. Award banquets to celebrate the leadership of young people in our parishes have multiplied. Teens, parents, family members, priests, youth ministers, catechists and episcopal vicars gather to honor and encourage their young people who have demonstrated leadership in putting their faith into action.

Service projects have become ever more a part of all youth ministry. While service projects have been part of Confirmation preparation for years, they are becoming special events in themselves. Hundreds of teens, usually with adults, take a week out of their summer to pick up garbage, paint, visit the sick and build houses. These Catholic Heart Work Camps are centered on the daily reception of the Holy Eucharist, for service projects as part of youth ministry are not only designed to train young people to help the poor but to do so in the name of Jesus Christ.

The Youth Ministry Office has begun a new initiative in catechizing young people, the “Quarterly Catechetical Gathering for those who minister to youth.” The next such gathering will take place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. June 18 at Quigley Preparatory Seminary and will address the topic of living the year of the Eucharist. The day will end with music and formation for youth and their families. Those interested should contact the Youth Ministry Office for more information at (312) 751-8308 and www.spiritandsong.com.

The Catholic Charismatic Conference has a youth track, and turnout was high this past April. A congress on the Bible, helping young people to pray with Holy Scripture, began this year. And each year, over 20,000 young Catholics in the Archdiocese are prepared to receive the fullness of the Holy Spirit in the sacrament of Confirmation.

One often thinks of young people as full of energy and enthusiasm, searching for love and unity, generous and self-sacrificing. But these are characteristic signs of the Holy Spirit’s action in our lives. What nature begins, grace completes—if we give the Holy Spirit a chance. In 1986, the then Cardinal Ratzinger said in a radio broadcast: “Where we no longer expose ourselves to God’s fire, the frictions among us become insupportable and the Church, to quote St. Basil, is torn by cries of interior factionalism. Only when we are not afraid of the tongues of fire or of the strong wind that accompanies them does the Church become an icon of the Holy Spirit. And only then does she open up the world to the light of God.”

May the celebration of Pentecost this year continue to renew the Church’s youth and make all of us young in the Spirit that unites Father and Son and is the soul of the Church. God bless you.