Dear Friend, 

Monday, March 11, 2024

Reflection by Rev. Msgr. Joseph Reilly, S.T.L., Ph.D.

I was inspired and encouraged last week to have had the privilege of attending the blessing of the new home for the high school my mom had attended, Cathedral High School in New York City.  I was grateful that the ceremony was brief.  I was also surprised how lasting the impact has been in my heart. 

Founded in 1905, Cathedral has been a place of eduction and opportunity for young women.  My sense that this legacy is still very much alive was palpable that morning.  There are now 35,000 alumnae, my mom and aunt among them – young women who were given “a chance for advanced learning that would open many career doors and enrich the human person,” as the school website states.  These women were given an excellent education, with a proper understanding of oneself, the world and God.  Their outlook on life was expanded, as was their appreciation for the Christian disposition towards life – one that is grounded in faith and oriented towards serving others, the “one consistent thread that has tied all of these women of Cathedral all together.” 

While my mom graduated in 1949 and passed away in 1983, I felt her presence that morning in a very real manner.  Before leaving my apartment that day, I had put her prayer card in my pocket close to my heart.  As I looked out over the young women gathered in the gymnasium, three words came to my mind: gratitude, praise, and hope.  I was grateful to be there and for all this school had done for my own mother (and consequently for my brothers and me through her example of faith and love).  I could not help but praise God for the manifest ways he shows his love and care for us – his daughters, and sons.  God’s generosity is truly overwhelming.  In my heart, I felt hope – for the future; because, just as my mother and aunt were children of immigrants, so too, many of these young women are being given a chance at a brighter future.  Hope gives life, from one generation to the next.  I could see it right before my own eyes.

The Holy Season of Lent is about reconnecting with our memories in faith, about bringing them to Jesus Christ and allowing our hearts to be lifted and expanded by God’s grace.  Perhaps we could take some time today to bring to heart and mind those holy women and men who have touched our own lives.  As we bring these individuals before our eyes of faith, let our hearts be moved to gratitude, to praise and to make an act of hope.  Our memories develop inside of us and become part of who we are.  They can change our lives in the present and in the future.

“When you and I met, the meeting was over very shortly, it was nothing.  Now it is growing something as we remember it … what it will be when I remember it as I lie down to die, what it makes in me all my days till then – that is the real meeting.  The other is only the beginning of it.”  C.S. Lewis Out of the Silent Planet

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Rev. Msgr. Joseph Reilly, S.T.L., Ph.D., Vice Provost for Academics and Catholic Identity Seton Hall University and Rector/Dean Emeritus, Immaculate Conception Seminary School of Theology. He holds a Bachelor of Sacred Theology from Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome, a licentiate in Sacred Theology (STL) from Pontificio Istituto Teresianum, Rome, and a Ph.D. in Educational Administration from Fordham University. He has served as a member of the Archdiocesan Priest Personnel Board, the Advisory Committee on Continuing Education and Ongoing Formation of Priests, the Archdiocesan Vocations Board, and the Board of Trustees of Seton Hall University. Pope John Paul II named him a Chaplain to His Holiness in 2005, with the title of Reverend Monsignor. In 2016 during the Holy Year of Mercy, the Pontifical Council for Promoting New Evangelization sought priests who were living signs "of the Father's welcome to all those in search of His forgiveness." He was the only priest from the Archdiocese of Newark formally commissioned as a Missionary of Mercy by Pope Francis.