Our late and beloved Fr. Ralph Kuehner told me a number of times over dinner how Victory Housing got started. During his time as Pastor of Our Lady of Victory Parish in Washington, DC, an elderly parishioner lived in a nearby apartment building and would walk to church on Sundays and other times during the week. The owners of the apartment building realized that they could make a lot more money from the properties by turning the apartments into condominiums. The elderly widow like so many in the building were being forced out of their apartments without a place to live that was affordable. The stress of the situation caused the women to have a heart attack. She died in the hospital. When he would relate this story and discuss what had happened to this woman, he would shake his head and say, “We can do better than that.”

I am continuing today the reflection that I began last week on Patris Corde (“With a Father’s Heart”), the Apostolic Letter that Pope Francis released last month to announce the beginning of a Year Dedicated to Saint Joseph.

On December 8, 1870 Blessed Pius IX declared Saint Joseph to be the Patron of the Universal Church. To mark that anniversary Pope Francis has announced that the Catholic Church would observe a Year in Honor of Saint Joseph, which actually began on December 8, 2020 and will end on December 8, 2021. Pope Francis has explained all this in his new Apostolic Letter entitled Patris Corde (“With a Father’ Heart”). There Pope Francis describes Saint Joseph as a beloved Father, a tender and loving Father, an obedient Father, and father who is creatively courageous, a working father, and a father in the shadows.

On December 1, 2019, Pope Francis issued an Apostolic Letter entitled Admirabile Signum (“Enchanting Image”) on the meaning and importance of the Nativity Scene. As you read this it is now two days after Christmas. Happily we are still within the Christmas season which will last until January 10 when we celebrate the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. One of the scenes that Pope Francis recalls in his Apostolic Letter is the origin of the Christmas crèche and the role that St. Francis of Assisi had in its origins. Let’s listen to the Holy Father tell this story:

We have experienced many disappointments during this time of pandemic. One of them was that Saint Nicholas had to cancel his customary visit to our parish on the Sunday, December 6, the Second Sunday of Advent and his actual feast day. Perhaps because Saint Nicholas (known by some by the nickname Santa Claus) had to cancel his travel plans this year, some of the children of the parish might be asking the question that Virginia O’Hanlon asked the editor of a New York newspaper many years ago. In anticipation of Christmas, which we will celebrate on this coming Friday, I want to print what is probably the most reprinted editorial in any newspaper in the English language. In 1897, the New York Sun received a letter to the Editor from Virginia O’Hanlon, who was eight years old and a resident of New York City. Her letter was only a four sentences long:

For many centuries this particular Sunday in Advent has had a special name “Gaudete Sunday.” This comes from today’s opening antiphon which begins with the word Gaudete, which means “rejoice.” Originally Advent was a forty-day period of penance that used to begin on November 12. Because this is one day after the Memorial of Saint Martin of Tours, Advent used to be called “St. Martin’s Lent.” Now Advent begins on the Sunday closest to the feast of St. Andrew (sometime between November 27-December 3). While Advent is primarily penitential in spirit, it also reflects the joy of anticipation. The expectation not only refers to Christ’s first appearance on earth but also reflects his Second Coming. For the people of God who are waiting in between there is a third coming of Christ whereby he is in the hearts of all the faithful by his grace.

We are now in the second week of a new liturgical year. Often people make resolutions at the beginning of the year in the hope that they can make small improvements in their lives that will help us grow in virtue. One of the things that we could look at is how we spend our time, and notably how we spend our Sundays. What might we do now in the midst of the COVID-19 restrictions on our time and activities? What might we do when we return to a more “normal” schedule? Here are some thoughts.

The McCarrick report remains in the news and probably will remain in the news for some time as we absorb some of things that have been related in it. Greg Erlandson, director and editor-in-chief of Catholic News Service, commented that that were heroes in this sad story. One such hero was the late Cardinal John J. O’Connor who tried unsuccessfully to stop our former archbishop Theodore McCarrick’s appointment to the Archdiocese of Washington where often the Archbishop receives the red hat. Even more courageous were the victim survivors who tried to speak up, the mother who sought to protect her children, the counselors who warned of the allegations that they were hearing. Sadly, the impression that we receive is that those who wanted to raise concerns were not given an attentive listening and rumors were dismissed rather than investigated thoroughly.

Even though we have waited for nearly two years for the McCarrick Report and knew that the news in it wouldn’t be good, at least I am still dealing with the shock of some of the details in it. One detail from the Vatican’s report on our former archbishop that saddens me is the following. Repeatedly senior officials were warned that something was unsuitable and inappropriate with promoting McCarrick and that charges from serious people needed to be considered. On each occasion a Vatican official disregarded the testimony of lay people, priests, and religious and based decisions exclusively on the advice of other bishops.

This week we will go over the answers to the last ten questions in the Faithful Citizenship Quiz.

As you read this, Election Day has come and gone. The call to be informed and faithful citizens remains. To that end let’s go over the answers to the first ten questions in the Faithful Citizenship Quiz that I put in last week’s bulletin. We’ll go over the answers to the remaining questions in next week’s column.

The Faithful Citizenship section of the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) contains lots of interesting and useful information. As the next election will be in just a couple of days, I think that I would present here twenty questions for faithful citizens. I invite you to take the quiz today, which I got from the USCCB website.