Cardinal’s Visit, First Sunday of Lent, February 20, 2021 – Genesis 9:8-15; 1 Peter 3:18-22; Mark 1:12-15

I’m very happy to be here in your parish. Covid messed up the number of Masses we were able to have at the cathedral, just as at most churches. These days, usually, they’re all scheduled. I usually try to have 10 to 15 Masses at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in midtown every Sunday. And then usually this would have been scheduled a year in advance for Saturday night in a parish, or Sunday afternoon for like a parish anniversary or something. But because of Covid, all that has been cancelled. So, I just each week say, “Where can we go to visit.” And I especially enjoy it. Just to come to a parish, unannounced. It doesn’t have to be big. Just to be with you, God’s people, for the great prayer of the Mass.

But I tell you what I wanted to do this year, since our Holy Father, Pope Francis, has declared this to be the year of St. Joseph. I said, “You know what I should try to do, is visit all the parishes in the archdiocese that are dedicated to St. Joseph, as you are. You know there’s a lot of them; I think there’s a couple dozen of them. So, I’m going to have my Saturday nights filled from now until Christmas. But I love doing it. It gives me a chance just to see you, and to meet you, and to get to know our parishes better. It gives me a chance to let you know how much I love you. How grateful, how very grateful, I am to you for your loyalty and love to Jesus and this church. And just how proud I am to be your archbishop. It gives me a chance to thank your priest. Father Mathias, we’re sure glad you’re here. I’ve seen firsthand the great work you do at Woodbourne with our prisoners. So, thank you for that. And Father Madori, thank you. I told him beforehand how much I admire him. You know his health is not the most robust, and his age isn’t the youngest, so he could’ve moved to Florida a long time ago. But he said, “Who would move to Florida after having grown up in Wurtsboro?” He loves you all here. And I’m just grateful to him that he said, “I want to stay as long as I can.” And we want you to, Father. Thank you. Thank you for being a good shepherd.

I need to talk a little about God’s Holy Word. Last Wednesday was Ash Wednesday, of course, and I had noon mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and it was pretty jammed. And afterwards, this lady, as I was walking by, she wasn’t in the best of moods, and she said, “You know, Cardinal Dolan, the world is messed up.” And she said, “What’s worse is, I’m messed up. And what’s worse is, everybody else is messed up.” She said, “I’m just getting so tired of nothing working.” And she said, “It’s just as if nothing’s right, everything’s wrong.” And she kind of looked at me, and expected me - I think, because she was surprised the way I reacted - she expected me, I think, to try to cheer her up, and to talk her out of it. And I said, “You know what? You’re right. There’s something wrong with the world. There’s something wrong with me. There’s something wrong with you. And you know this. And we call it sin. We call it sin. That’s what’s wrong with the world. That’s what’s wrong with me. That’s what’s wrong with you.” I said, “For some strange reason, we’re kind of reluctant to talk about sin. I don’t know why. Maybe because we worry about being dismissed as guilt ridden or hung up on sin. We’re not hung up on sin, we’re hung up on God’s mercy, His grace and mercy.” But I said to this woman, “Your insight, that things are messed up, is especially appropriate on Ash Wednesday, as we begin the holy season of Lent.”

She’s right. She went on to explain how things this past year, with the Covid and all, were particularly destructive for her and her family. So, she had special reasons to be upset. But I was thinking to myself, I was thinking of her story as I was getting my little homily ready. Because when you think about it, God the Father, felt the same way. Isn’t that what the Bible story tonight is about - Noah, and the flood of forty days, the destruction of the Earth? God, the Father, said, “This creation of mine is messed up. These creatures that I made have blown it. I gave them free will and they have ruined it. And I think I’m going to destroy all of it.” So we had the flood of forty days, and He did spare some, in the Ark, but when He was done, He said, “I regret doing that. I’ll never do it again. I always want to give my people a chance. I always want to save them. I always want to rescue them.” And He made that covenant, that He would do that for us. And, of course, that’s only going to take place when Jesus, His only begotten Son, comes.

Because, you see what we got, everybody, with that wonderful lady that spoke to me after Ash Wednesday Mass. What’re we going to do? Are we going to remain depressed, and discouraged, and down in the dumps? Are we going to remain sick, and tired, as she said she was? Or are we going to look for the antidote? And really, what she’s saying, I hope - we spoke about this - you’ve now got the invitation to take the next step, because what you’ve done is say the world is messed up, I’m messed up, I’m a sinner, the world is sinful, and what’s the next step? To say I need a Savior. I can’t save myself. The world can’t save itself. We try. We have a step forward, and two steps backwards. I need a savior. And that, of course, is the beginning of salvation. We have a God who wants to save us. We have a God who wants to rescue us, you see.

You know who had the great insight on this, was St. Augustine, the great St. Augustine. And, boy, He had a long religious journey. He was a big sinner, as you probably know his story. He had a long religious journey, and, finally, he said, “I know what’s wrong here. I keep looking for some teacher, or I keep looking for some guide, or I keep looking for a model, somebody that can be my exemplar.” He said, “I don’t need a teacher. I don’t need a guide. And I don’t need a model. I need a savior.” I need a savior.

Now, one of the ways that God saves us, in and through Jesus, our Lord and Savior, is through the sacrament of Baptism. We have that in our reading from St. Peter today, from the Bible, right? He said, “Look everybody, just as God destroyed sin in the waters of the flood for forty days and nights, so does he destroy sin in our life, through the waters of Baptism.”

Lent, traditionally, is the time we reverently and gratefully recall our own baptism. Most of us can’t remember it, see? But we do know that part of Lent, when we get to the Easter Vigil and Easter Sunday, will be that we renew our baptismal promises. Alright? Because Lent is the time that we think of our own baptism. I miss it, Father Matthias and Father Madori, I miss that we don’t have the RCIA visible. Do you have any candidates at all? No, see, because of Covid.

Can you remember the RCIA? The Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults. That every year, throughout the three hundred parishes in the archdiocese, we would have about two thousand adults that wanted to enter the church through Baptism, on Holy Saturday. And they’d spend the year preparing. And I miss that. Because we watched them getting ready for baptism, and we were reminded of our own. And at Eastertime, when they were baptized, it kind of revived us, you see, it revived us.

So that’s what Lent is about. The time to steer, pessimistic, realistic, as we stare into the eyes of the brutal fact that I’m a sinner, so are you, and the world is sinful. But we also admit, with a lot of hope and confidence, that we have a Savior who has come to wash away my own sins and the sins of the world. So I asked that woman, on Ash Wednesday, “Would you do me a favor and come back to the Easter Vigil here at St. Patrick’s?” She couldn’t, because she’s out of town. But I said “Well, go in your parish.” And I said, “If you take Lent seriously, and if you take your baptismal promises seriously, after Easter you’re not going to say, “I’m sick and tired. I’m frustrated. The world is dysfunctional. The world is a mess.” You’re going to say, “Nope, I’m hopeful. I’m filled with confidence. Because I have a Savior, who wants to wash away my sins and to make things right. And that’s going to give me a lot of joy, and a lot of hope, and a lot of confidence. That’s going to bring a rainbow to my life, as God sent the rainbow to Noah at the end of the flood.”