NEW PASTORAL LETTER FROM BISHOP BARRES ON CANONIZATION OF CARDINAL NEWMAN

Dear Friends,

THE LETTER TO THE HEBREWS RELATES A GLORIOUS AND CONSOLING FACT: “WE ARE SURROUNDED BY A GREAT CLOUD OF WITNESSES” (12:1). IN OUR JOURNEY TO HEAVEN, GOD, THE GIVER OF EVERY GOOD GIFT, AFFORDS US COMMUNION WITH THE HOLY ONES WHO HAVE GONE BEFORE US AND LIVE NOW WITH HIM FOREVER. HE OFFERS US FRIENDSHIP WITH THE SAINTS.

Last year, around the time of his canonization, I wrote to you about Saint Oscar Arnulfo Romero, a new friend of God in heaven. Together, we beheld this saintly martyrArchbishop of San Salvador who made the holy sacrifice of his life while celebrating the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. I am grateful for the ways we have allowed his luminous life to encourage our daily participation in the Paschal Mystery of Christ.

In these days, the universal Church is preparing for the canonization of another holy one of God, John Henry Cardinal Newman. This nineteenth-century Englishman – a seeker of truth, Anglican clergyman, preacher at Oxford University, noted intellectual, gifted writer, convert to Catholicism, Catholic priest, and Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church – will be raised to the altars on October 13, 2019, and declared a saint. Soon his holy life and heroic virtue will be held up by the Church, and another friend of God will be close to us.

Want to read more?

Hear Speaks to Heart – A Pastoral Letter from Bishop John O. Barres to the People of God in the Diocese of Rockville Centre on the Occasion of the Canonization of St. John Henry Newman.