SPECIAL 2016 EDITION

Fine Sermons ■ by Fr. Richard G. Cipolla
One of the tragedies of the
post-Conciliar time of the Church is
the disappearance of the Ember Days.
As part of the liturgical reform, the
Ember Days were suppressed, but Pope
Paul VI asked that the bishops of each
country encourage the celebration of
Masses during the year that would echo
the themes of the Ember Days. He also
lifted the requirement of abstinence for
these days. But the fact is that once a
custom grounded in Tradition is made
optional or left to the judgment of a
local church, that custom disappears.
In retrospect, we can see that at the
very time when Catholics, faced with
an increasingly secular culture, needed
these four times in the year to fast
and pray in the rhythm of the Church
year and the year of nature to remind
themselves of who they are and what is
ultimately important, the Ember Days
were removed from the universal calendar
in the name of reform.
Surely the loss of Catholic
identity that is a mark
of this present time is in
part due to the removal
and suppression of those
very ways, liturgically
and naturally, that are
reminders to Catholics
of who they are and to
what they are called.
44 ■ the traditionalist
Surely the loss of Catholic identity
that is a mark of this present time is in
part due to the removal and suppression
of those very ways, liturgically and
naturally, that are reminders to Catholics
of who they are and to what they
are called. It is a great blessing that we
come here today and celebrate this Saturday
Ember Day in this shrine church.
And we do so in the presence of the
mortal remains of una santa grande,
a great saint, Mother Frances Xavier
Cabrini. She heard these readings every
year at Mass, and surely they resonated
with her and her mission. Jesus’ healing
miracle in the Gospel must have struck
her in a special way, she for whom faith
and good works were inseparable.
Like all great saints, Mother Cabrini
understood that faith is not something
that is held close and put into a lovely
box to look at when the mood strikes.
She thought she had a calling to the religious
life early on in Italy, but because
of her poor health, she was refused. So
she went to run an orphanage in Lombardia,
and it was there that she drew
other women around her and founded
the beginnings of what she envisaged as
a missionary institute and what would
eventually become the Missionary Sisters
of the Sacred Heart.
Perhaps somewhat romantically,
she dreamed of a missionary effort in
China. But in her meeting with the
great Pope Leo XIII, she heard from
him those words oft quoted: Not to
the East, Sister, but to the West. For
the Pope was acutely aware of the dire
need for a ministry to the hundreds of
thousands of Italian immigrants who
came to the United States to escape the
poverty and the turmoil of their life in
Italy, especially in the poverty-stricken
southern part of Italy. They came here
not knowing the language, strangers
in a foreign land, looked down upon,
unsure of their faith in a Protestant
country, subject to proselytizing by
those taking advantage of their ignorance
and poverty.
And so Mother Cabrini came to
New York, hoping to found an orphanage
for Italian immigrant children.
Cardinal Corrigan told her that it was
not opportune to do what she wanted
to do and told her to return to Italy.
But Mother Cabrini did not return to
Italy, and instead stayed in Manhattan
and ministered in a remarkable way to
the Italian immigrants. And she ministered
to them not only spiritually but
in practical ways: in housing, in education,
in gaining employment. She was
a realist, and this realism came from
her Catholic faith. She said: “When one
works for the glory of God, then His
works are subjected to violence. This
is why I am never surprised when I
meet opposition in my ventures. In fact,
I look upon them as good signs. For
to whatever degree I am confronted
by opposition or violence, that is the
measure of how much I succeeded in
glorifying the Divine Majesty.”
Mother Cabrini was not just another
woman who did much good among the
poor and dispossessed. Her holiness
came from her faith that compelled
her to do what she did. This is what
our age does not understand. Contrary
to the New York Times, it does matter
for a Catholic religious whether he or
she is at one with the teaching of the
Church, for without this unity of mind,
heart and spirit with the Church, good
works performed are not what they
should be: pointers to the love of God
in Jesus Christ, without which all good
works are in vain. What drove her was
her love for Christ. She said: I will go
anywhere and do anything in order to
communicate the love of Jesus to those
who do not know Him or who have