YEAR FOR PRIESTS - What Can We Do for Year of the Priests?

Fr. Mark Kirby of Vultus Christi has excellent suggestions.

1. You can ask your Parish Priest to offer the Votive Mass of Jesus Christ, Eternal High Priest on the First Thursday of the Month. Suggest that he use the parish bulletin and the Sunday homily to invite the faithful to participate in this monthly Mass for the sanctification of all priests.

2. Study the Holy Father's Letter for the Year of Priests in a small group. Make copies. Mark them up. Take the message to heart. So much of what the Holy Father writes never reaches ordinary Catholics! Get the word out!

3. Yes, you can offer all your sufferings -- physical, emotional, and spiritual -- for the sanctification of all priests.

4. Considering the damage done to the priesthood by sins of calumny, detraction, and tale-bearing, you can resolve to refrain from all critical, unkind, and judgmental speech (and blogging) concerning priests, and also resolve never to repeat disedifying comments, anecdotes, or gossip concerning priests, their sins, and their failings.

5. Don't forget the souls of priests in purgatory. You may want to join with others in having Masses offered for the happy repose of the souls of departed priests.

6. Resolve to show all priests a supernaturally motivated respect and reverence. Reclaim the beautiful Catholic custom of asking for a priest's blessing whenever you encounter him. And brother priests, don't hesitate to offer your priestly blessing on every occasion!

7. "And He said to them, "This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer and fasting" (Mk 9:32). In reparation for the sins of priests and to obtain for them graces of conversion, deliverance from patterns of habitual sin, and fortitude in spiritual combat, you can fast, abstain, or offer some other mortification for priests every Wednesday. (Spy Wednesday was the day of Judas' plotting against Our Lord.)

8. On Thursday (the day of the institution of the Most Holy Eucharist and of the Priesthood) you can spend one hour before the Blessed Sacrament in thanksgiving for the gift and mystery of the priesthood, and in confident supplication for the sanctification of all priests. I recommend that during this hour you meditate Our Lord's own prayer for priests in the 17th Chapter of Saint John's Gospel.

9. On Friday (the day of Our Lord's Blessed Passion) make the Way of the Cross for priests or pray the Litany of the Precious Blood or the Litany of the Sacred Heart for them.

10. Every Saturday (Our Blessed Lady's day) offer for priests five decades of the Rosary or the Ave, Maris Stella, a most suitable liturgical hymn for interceding for priests.