2016 Red Mass | Archbishop Bernardito Auza: homily text

‘Give your servants, Lord, an understanding heart’

Here are extended excerpts from the prepared text of the homily by Archbishop Bernardito Auza, the Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, for the 2016 Red Mass for the Diocese of Honolulu, delivered Jan. 19 in the Cathedral Basilica of Our Lady of Peace.

I am very honored to be with you for this Red Mass, to turn with you to God in prayer. But for what should we pray?

Let us consider the first reading. At the age of 18, Solomon ascended to the throne of his father, the great King David. The shoes were too big, even for someone much older and experienced.

Before God, the young leader … did not ask for a brilliant mind, but for an understanding heart, because he was wise enough already to grasp that not even the best intellectual, bureaucratic and technocratic qualities alone are adequate to rule and serve wisely. He also didn’t ask merely for an empathetic heart, because feelings alone are fleeting; feelings alone wouldn’t suffice to help a caring mom or dad resolve a conflict among several beloved children. To ask for a wise heart showed that Solomon recognized he needed both truth and love, both justice and mercy to exercise his authority wisely.

Today, we turn to God and ask for the same gift.

We ask for the Holy Spirit to illumine our minds with the light of truth and ignite our hearts with the warmth of love, so that we can lead with an understanding heart.

We ask that the same “Spirit of the Lord,” whom Jesus affirmed in the Gospel was upon him, to be upon us, so that we, too, can bring good news to the poor, justice to those unfairly treated, and freedom to those unjustly bound.

We ask him to assist us in building a society in which no one is left behind, in which might does not make right, money does not rule and power does not corrupt.

We ask him to fill us with the wisdom to comprehend his “law,” the law that we proclaimed in today’s Psalm to be flawless, refreshing, trustworthy, right, joyful, clear, enlightening, pure, true, just, enduring, more valuable than gold, and sweeter than honey.

And we ask him to make us living testimonies of that understanding heart, by putting that wisdom into practice. …

These images and insights from today’s readings all describe the impact men and women, judges and lawyers, governors and legislators, priests and public servants with understanding hearts are able to make. They allow us to frame one of the chief summons Pope Francis is making to leaders at every level of service in the world: at a time of so many crises across the globe, among countries, within countries, even within our homes, the world needs many more men and women with understanding hearts.

When Pope Francis came to the United Nations on Sept. 25 to speak to the greatest numerical assemblage of world leaders in history, he framed his entire talk on a proper understanding and application of justice. He noted that the work of the United Nations “can be seen as the development and promotion of the rule of law, based on the realization that justice is an essential condition for achieving the ideal of universal fraternity” and peace.

The classic definition of justice, he said, is the “constant and perpetual will … to give each his own” and Pope Francis exhorted all leaders to have “a will that is effective, practical and constant.” …

The observance of justice requires a persistent and unflagging will, which means the resolve to get beyond mere declarations or token, inadequate actions, so that our institutions prove truly effective and so that people’s rights are genuinely respected. Justice is hard work and requires hard workers who don’t quit, who do more than just “something,” but who fight for what’s right and know to break the exercise of power when power becomes harmful to individuals and detrimental to society.

Implicit in what Pope Francis was saying is that injustice is rife in the world and that those in positions of authority are called to strive tenaciously to bring things into proper order. He called out these forms of injustices by name: the pollution and destruction of our environment, social and economic exclusion, the rapidly growing inequalities between the haves and the have-nots, human trafficking, the marketing of human organs and tissues, sexual exploitation and prostitution, slave labor, the drug and arms trade, organized crime, corruption, usury, money laundering, ideological colonization, the denial of human fundamental rights, religious persecutions and racial discrimination, the weakening of the institution of the family as the basic unit of society, terrorism and wars which provoke massive displacements of populations.

But Pope Francis is neither naive nor a pessimist; he is a realist and has confidence in the human capacity to do good. In spite of the many problems and challenges we face, we are not doomed; we are not lost. If we are capable of the worst, even more so we are capable of the best.

That’s why the pope is confident that we are capable of righting what is wrong. To confront these inequities, the pope prescribed a “higher degree of wisdom,” one that rises on the “foundations of a right understanding of universal fraternity and respect for the sacredness of every human life, of every man and every woman, the poor, the elderly, children, the infirm, the unborn, the unemployed, the abandoned, those considered disposable because they are only considered as part of a statistic” or as economically useless. It requires laboring steadfastly to give each of these, and everyone else, what they deserve.

At the same time, the pope says, merely bringing justice to those in these inequitable or baleful circumstances is not enough for leaders with understanding hearts. Even in the most just society, something else is likewise needed: namely, mercy.

On Dec. 8, Pope Francis inaugurated an extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy in the Catholic Church: something that is meant to influence everything the church and Catholics do, including the exercise of their profession.

The exercise of mercy does not in any way contradict the correct exercise of justice. Pope Francis said that the temptation to “focus exclusively on justice [has] made us forget that this is only the first, albeit necessary and indispensable step. The church needs to go beyond and strive for a higher and more important goal,” namely, to unite justice and mercy, to imitate the just mercy and merciful justice of God. Justice and mercy “are not two contradictory realities, but two dimensions of a single reality that unfolds progressively until it culminates in the fullness of love.”

Mercy purifies justice and ensures that we judge and govern not merely with a comprehending mind but also an understanding heart. …

The Jubilee of Mercy, this “year acceptable to the Lord,” is an opportunity for everyone in the church to receive a heart transplant, replacing our stony hearts and spiritually clogged arteries with a more understanding heart, a heart that increasingly resembles that of Jesus, who is simultaneously the just judge of the living and the dead and mercy incarnate.

May God bless you all and reward you a hundredfold for your service justly rendered to all with a comprehending mind and an understanding heart! Amen.