This week has been an occasion to celebrate many important anniversaries in our local Catholic community. The first of these was on Friday (9/14), when I went to the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester for a Mass to commemorate their 175th anniversary... It was wonderful to be present to celebrate this important milestone of New England's oldest Catholic college.

Jesuit ordinations

On Saturday (9/15), I had the joy of ordaining 11 Jesuit transitional deacons at St. Ignatius Church in Brighton. As I mentioned in a previous post, these men are from various Jesuit provinces throughout the United States and the world who are studying together in Boston.

Many of them assist in our parishes as seminarians, deacons, and eventually as priests, during their time here. Their service is a great blessing for us, and so it was my great pleasure to be able to celebrate their ordinations.

Mass of the Holy Spirit in Cambridge

Sunday morning (9/16), I went to St. Paul's Church in Cambridge to celebrate the Mass of the Holy Spirit to mark the opening of the academic year at Harvard University and at St. Paul's Choir School.

Many members of the Harvard Catholic community, including several Catholic faculty members in their academic regalia, were present with us for the Mass and, of course, the choir provided magnificent music for us. It was a very beautiful celebration.

Women Religious Mass

That afternoon, I went to St. Theresa of Avila Parish in West Roxbury for our annual Mass and reception to honor the religious women in our archdiocese who are marking significant anniversaries of religious life.

This is always a very important moment to honor our religious sisters who have made such an extraordinary contribution to the life of our archdiocese and our Church. This year, we were honoring 122 sisters from 26 religious communities who have given a combined total of over 7,500 years of service to the Church.

After the Mass, there was a lovely reception for the sisters in the parish school. We are grateful to Msgr. William Helmick for hosting us again this year. In fact, this was the weekend that he announced his retirement after almost 30 years as pastor of St. Theresa's. He has always been so gracious in hosting this Mass and reception for the sisters. It was a wonderful occasion to thank and congratulate the sisters who are celebrating their jubilees.

Meeting with recently ordained priests

Tuesday afternoon (9/18), I met with our recently ordained priests for one of our regular afternoons of prayer and reflection. Of course, in these days in which we are experiencing so many challenges, it was important for us to be together, have a dialogue and pray together. I am very proud of our young priests for their generosity and courage in the face of the difficulties that we are all experiencing. It was a great opportunity to be together with them and I found it, as always, very life-giving.