Archbishop Allen Vigneron: I'm Archbishop Allen Vigneron of the Archdiocese of Detroit, and this is the Eyes on Jesus podcast. Mike Chamberland: Hello, and welcome to the Eyes on Jesus podcast with Archbishop Vigneron. I'm your host, Mike Chamberland. Mary Wilkerson: And I am your host, Mary Wilkerson. Mike Chamberland: We're so excited to release new episodes once a month, so please make sure to subscribe and review wherever it is that you listen to podcasts. Archbishop, I hope you're doing well. It's been a while since I've seen you. We're still recording these via Cleanfeed kind of remotely. So I hope you're doing well. I'm sorry that I can't see you face-to-face, but thanks for joining us. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Glad to be with you, Mike, Mary. I hope you're all doing well in the midst of this peculiar time. Mary Wilkerson: Absolutely. Mike Chamberland: Yeah. Yes, indeed. Archbishop, how have you been? How was your last month? As I understand, you went on a recent retreat. Is that right? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: I did. I was able to put a few days together and I went on retreat, and actually, I wound up having to spend most of it in quarantine. I had been at a gathering where it turned out somebody tested positive for COVID, and so it was providential. I was already scheduled to be- Mary Wilkerson: Alone. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Alone. And I was even more alone. Mary Wilkerson: Oh, that's funny. Wow. Mike Chamberland: Everything worked out okay though, Archbishop? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Yeah. Mike Chamberland: Okay. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: No, I don't have any symptoms, so that was fine. Mary Wilkerson: And was it a personal retreat that you took just by yourself or [crosstalk 00:01:31]? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Yeah. I used writings of a French spiritual author named [inaudible 00:01:41]. It's the record of conferences he gives based on the spirituality of Saint Therese, The Little Flower. Mike Chamberland: Oh, beautiful. Mary Wilkerson: Wow. That's awesome. Mike Chamberland: Very nice. When you do that, Archbishop, do you just go off to like a lake house or someplace on your own and just spend the time in prayer and reading those types of things and meditating on them? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Yes. [crosstalk 00:02:04]. And I try to be pretty disciplined about my day to be sure I spend at least four distinct hours in contemplation. Mike Chamberland: Wow. Mary Wilkerson: How often do you get to take personal retreats? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, I've tried to do it every year. I mean, the obligation is for all of us priests to do a retreat every year. Mary Wilkerson: Awesome. So we have started schools. So public schools have started, Catholic schools have started, homeschooling. I'm homeschooling this year. We're all in a little bit of a different reality with our schools this year. Our Catholic schools started last week and this week. Do you have any messages for students and teachers? Many of them are returning to school for the first time since March, so it's been a while and under very unusual circumstances. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, certainly, welcome back to everybody, whatever back is. As you say, Mary, it's going to be different for different people. But certainly, this makes the project of education all the more challenging in this new context. And I think as a priest, one thing I can say to everybody is the effort we put into this will give God glory. And that's really what we're made for is to be sons and daughters in God's son, Jesus, and to, along with Jesus, give the Father glory. So the hard work, the effort we make, and certainly, it takes a great deal of extra effort, is not only a payoff in one's own preparation for life, but it pays off in glorifying our Heavenly Father. Mary Wilkerson: We were able to speak with a Catholic school teacher on Friday, and he was explaining some of the things that his school has done to rise to the occasion. And he described it as awesome. And he said it was like really all inspiring to see what our Catholic schools have done to be able to safely meet in person and to put virtual programs together. Have you been able to see a little bit about that or read a little bit about that? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Certainly read about it, and I'm very appreciative for what our school leadership has done to make it possible for us to begin in-person teaching. I'm grateful to everybody's for everybody's efforts. We talk about works of mercy. Education is one of the great works of mercy. It's put a little baldly in the spiritual works of mercy, instruct the ignorant, but that's all of us, isn't it? Mary Wilkerson: Right. Mike Chamberland: Yeah. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And it is a great work of mercy. And it's a work the church has always cherished very deeply from the very beginning. Mike Chamberland: Wonderful. Archbishop, to you actually, we don't normally say when we're recording, but today we're actually recording, September 8th. And obviously, we remember on that day, the feast of Nativity of the Blessed Virgin. I know in just a few days, we'll honor her name as well. Would you mind just sharing a little bit about those feast days and how they came about and what they mean to you? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, Mike, I appreciate that you gave me a heads up so I was able to do a little bit of research about it. And the scholars tell us that just as we have for John the Baptist to celebrate his death and his nativity, so the church has had an instinct to do the same for the Blessed Virgin Mary, and to celebrate her birthday as the dawn. This is the great image that's used throughout the liturgy that Christ is the sun, the great new day, and the birthday of the Blessed Virgin is the dawn that promises this new day. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: I think the reading from Romans that's chosen for the mass today is beautiful. It talks about God's plan and how each of us is planned by God to accomplish something for him. And so what's true for our lady is by analogy also true for all of us. Each of us is born to accomplish something great for God. And we look to our lady as our example for that. Mary Wilkerson: Do you do anything special to celebrate the Blessed Mother's birthday or have you in the past? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: I gave her a present, Mary. Mary Wilkerson: Listen, we make cake for her. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: I have to say for me, the principle I keep her birthday in mind is through the liturgy, the hours, and the Holy Eucharist. But I think this would be a great thing for kids to celebrate. Mary Wilkerson: Sure. I guess that's always my angle, Archbishop Vigneron. So this morning, we woke up and we have our cake baking materials on the stove for when I get home at lunch, we're going to make her a little cake. So I suppose that type of celebration is more appropriate in families with little children than it would be for you at the rectories. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, fair enough. But what I really like about that, Mary, is it translates or expresses membership in the church as truly a familial reality. That's great. Mary Wilkerson: It's great, yeah. I find that our church calendar is so helpful for families to be able to make the faith come alive. And so days like today are a win for young families, I think. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, as long as the cake turns out okay. Mary Wilkerson: It's true. You never know. And Archbishop Vigneron, I am not a Baker, so we'll see how this goes. Very good. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Also, there's another Marian feast day coming up too? Mary Wilkerson: Yeah. Tell us about that. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, that's on the 12th, the celebration. Is it the 12th? Yeah. Mary Wilkerson: Yeah. Mm-hmm (affirmative), I've heard. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: The feast of the Holy Name of Mary. And it's really an opportunity to appreciate once again, how often we call on her by name in the life of the church. And really, it's a part of the heritage we have from Israel. A person's name is that person made present to us. And so we invoke the holy name of Mary so often in our prayers. Mary Wilkerson: That's a good reminder to focus on her name and her role, right? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Right. Mary Wilkerson: So that's awesome. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: She's a great example to us. Mary Wilkerson: Sure. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And not only, I think intercession certainly, but I also think of our lady as a prayer partner, and the [inaudible 00:08:56] of course is a great way for us to be engaged with our lady in prayer. She is a champion at prayer and she's very good at it. She's the Olympic star. Mary Wilkerson: The Olympic star of prayer. I love that. We had an episode, I think last season where we talked pretty specifically about the Blessed Mother. And that was a big focus that you had shared with us to walk with Mary in our daily lives and our daily experiences. And I know that that's enhanced my spirituality. So it's good to keep that in mind. Today, we have the privilege of talking about the sacraments of the church. And this month, as a church in Detroit, we've kept a little bit of a focus on the sacraments in some of our publications and things because we had a bit of an unusual situation. Mary Wilkerson: Just to give people a review of what happened, at the beginning of August, the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith issued a note on baptism clarifying that saying we baptize instead of saying I baptize invalidates the sacrament. And now retired deacon of the archdiocese has indicated that he used the invalid, we baptize formula for more than a decade at St. Anastasia resulting in hundreds of invalid baptisms of the parishioners there. Mary Wilkerson: One of these individuals, Father Matthew Hood, had recently seen a video of his own baptism and realized that he was invalidly baptized, and therefore, invalidly ordained to the priesthood in 2017. While his sacramental situation was quickly remedied, the people from fatherhood's ministry realize that some of the sacraments they thought that they received from fatherhood weren't valid since he was not a validly ordained priest. Mary Wilkerson: When I heard about this, I just could not even believe the predicament that we were in. And I think it's a really good teachable moment. So I'm excited that this month we get to talk a little bit about the sacraments and God's role in the sacraments and our role in the sacraments, why we have the sacraments. So we're going to do a little bit of catechesis on evangelization and sacraments and what the sacraments mean. When you heard this news about fatherhood, Archbishop Vigneron, what was your initial reaction? How did you feel? What message do you have for those impacted? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: My first reaction continues to be my reaction that this is a great injustice and we have to do everything we can to remedy it. My message to those who are impacted is to offer up the trial of it. God will provide and he will set out the paths for us to remedy what is the miss. Mary Wilkerson: Did you know the path forward to remedy it? Did you have to talk to people or did the archdiocese have to do some research to figure out what you do with an invalid baptism when it comes to an invalid ordination? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, I knew immediately that if Father Hood had never been baptized, confirmation for him had been invalid and so had his ordination. And we had to begin to think about the sacraments he celebrated since he was not in fact a priest. So it was pretty clear on all of that, but I didn't want to act until I had a group of experts. People who are our own local people, knowledgeable about sacramental theology and canon law had actually formulated an organized plan. And besides the plan to remedy it, I wanted to be sure that we had a good communications plan that at once shared this news with the faithful because people have a right to know, but shared it in a way that didn't create more problems. But we were at the same time able to offer the faithful pastoral care. Mike Chamberland: I think you guys did a great job with the sharing of the information, but also, trying to back it up with the educational element, the personal witness and testimony from Father Hood himself. And I think all of that was really well done. I know it was a big deal. It made national news, it made John Allen, who runs the Crux, I mean, he mentioned it on his own podcast as a point of news, which is ... Obviously, there's hundreds of thousands of subscribers to that, which is kind of more of an international Catholic news source. So it's a big deal. Mike Chamberland: But I think also, there's a beauty in it because it hopefully can help zero in and give a point of focus to the beauty of sacraments and the need to celebrate sacraments appropriately and in the way that Christ instilled it for us. So I did want to ask you, Archbishop, can you explain just a little bit, especially for some of our listeners that maybe feel like we baptize, I baptize, it's such a small little thing, but why is that seemingly small change, just that one pronoun, how does that really invalidate an entire sacrament? Why is it so important that we use these specific words? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, the congregation, which really is a group of experts led by a body of Cardinals really that advises the holy father on this, so we ought to keep in mind where this comes from, it really has the authority, ultimately, of our holy father, the Pope. Words are important. And the congregation pointed out that this is very significant because to switch the pronoun implies a very different understanding of what the sacraments are. And the words we use, especially in what's called the form, the very specific words that effect the sacrament, these are very important because they express our attitude. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And here, the point is when the person who baptizes, and anyone can baptize, you Mike, you Mary, you can baptize, but when you do that, when anyone baptizes, that person is acting in the person of Jesus. It isn't the church without Jesus that baptizes. The church joins with Jesus as he performs the baptism. And that's very, very important because ultimately, we don't save ourselves. The church exists under the Lordship of Jesus. He acts. He acts with us and in us, but he is the principal agent. And the fathers of the congregation said that's why this is so significant and needs ... We're talking about the difference of one pronoun, but it's a very significant difference because to shift it, they say it was to have shifted the very understanding of what baptism is. Mike Chamberland: I remember hearing years ago about, I think it was especially in Australia where there was a case similar to this, but the words that were being used was baptizing instead of the father, son, and Holy Spirit, they were saying, I baptize you in the name of the creator, the redeemer, and the sanctifier, which also made it obviously invalid. I know that there's obviously very specific words which are meant to be there in the ritual form. And can you, Archbishop, just give us a little bit of background, and what are the biblical origins for not only baptism, but just sacraments in general and the very specific words that tie to those sacraments? Would you mind expressing that a little bit? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: The sacraments are instituted by Christ, and there are very specific forms of rituals that accomplish what they express. And that's what is specifically different about the sacraments from other from the blessings, say of throats, or the blessing of a rosary. In the sacraments, Christ acts. He is always there to accomplish what he established the sacrament to do. Now, the New Testament witness to some sacraments is more rich than for others, but there is a witness for all of them in the New Testament. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: For the form for baptism, of course, we take ours from the gospel, baptize them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. We take the form for the Eucharistic consecration from the New Testament. Actually, it's a bit of an amalgam of the narrative in different parts, but it's basically built on what our Lord said on the night before he died. For other sacraments, the church herself establishes the form by her authority, but in establishing the form, she doesn't take away the authority of Jesus who acts, say through the anointing of the sick, for example. Mike Chamberland: Well, of course, biblically speaking too, right? The church has that authority based off of you can biblically trace that authority back when obviously, Christ makes Peter rock and he tells what you bound on earth is bound in heaven. And you obviously see that biblical authority being passed on and given as that role of being a protector of these sacraments, isn't that right, Archbishop? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Right. Our Lord himself chose the apostles after he spent the night in prayer, and we see the apostles passing on that office as they choose Mathias. And then it continues to be passed on in the New Testament through the imposition of hands, which is a Jewish ritual gesture for sharing the Holy Spirit. Mary Wilkerson: It's sometimes stunning to think about the fragility of humankind and our ability to mess things up, and yet Jesus still entrusted us with this awesome task. Isn't that incredible. Especially as an archbishop, when you're leading our diocese and understanding the role of the sacraments, there's so much humanity involved sometimes with this huge responsibility. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: You know, Mary, it's another way to be awestruck by the incarnation, that it's the mystery of Christmas. It's why we genuflect when we say, and he became man, that God himself, the creator of the whole cosmos, what do they say? Billions and billions of stars. He willed to take on a created nature, a human nature. And ultimately, it's the incomparable generosity of God that he would so humble himself to need to have his diapers changed. And so all of the rest of what you say goes along with this same kind of what we might call an ecology of the entrustment of these great divine realities to us poor, frail human beings. I mean, I think about this. I mean, that's for me the sense of my own being a priest, that who am I that I should be entrusted with these divine things? Mike Chamberland: Archbishop, I know some people might be listening this and maybe they're not Catholic, or they might kind of say or they view the sacraments as kind of these rites of passage or very nice symbols and they're kind of nice rites of passage, but what would you say as far as the purpose of the sacraments in our lives? Why do we do this as a church? Why is it so foundational important? And I think this obviously ties very much to using the correct words. Obviously, if it's that important to use the right words, there's something more going on here. Do you want to express a little bit about that, Archbishop? What are the purpose of these sacraments in our lives? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: It's to enjoy the saving work of Jesus even 2,000 years after he walked on this earth, so that you and I are none the poorer than Lazarus or Mary or Peter. I mean, everybody wanted to be touched by Christ, and this is a way for us to be touched by him. Now, this is not to say that they don't mark very important moments in our lives. They mark for example, sickness. It's a very significant hour in everybody's life. But it is principally Christ. The anointing of the sick, it's Christ who touches the sick. And that is a great blessing to have his healing, his strengthening touch in the middle of my suffering. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And baptism, of course, for so many people, Mark, it comes at the beginning of life, baptism of infants, but that's not the only time people are baptized. We have adult baptism as well. And it always marks a new beginning, and say for an adult, it marks a commitment. But the commitment is a response to Christ. That's not the first thing that happens is I decide to be committed. I make the decision to believe, to make a commitment in response to Christ who has invited me. And baptism is that consecration of what Christ has accomplished. Mary Wilkerson: We talk about unleashing the gospel and this importance of sharing the good news of evangelization of making sure people are invited and understand what Jesus wants to give them. I love that you use the expression that the sacraments are a moment for us to be touched by Christ in the same way that many of the same people in the scriptures were touched by Christ. I'm not sure though, that always translates. Listening to you, I'm like, oh, every time I go to the Eucharist, it should be just this surreal moment in my life. And sometimes we lose that in the day-to-day experience of receiving the sacraments and going through the motions. So how do we truly use the sacraments and allow the sacraments to move us to this place of evangelization and understanding our role in the kingdom of God with the sacraments? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, we can always be more reflective, more recollected about our celebration of the sacraments. And yet, we don't want to become scrupulous about that either. It's better to come to mass distracted than to stay away because I don't have the full focus that I might like to have because the baby knocked over the plant and I had to clean that up before we could get into the car. God takes us where we're at. And one of the great things about salvation as our Lord works it in our lives is he's happy even to take our distracted self and we offer him that as well. But you're right, that's not an excuse to be nonchalant about the sacraments. We should do our very best to enter into them with recollection in our whole heart and hold spirit. Mary Wilkerson: How do you see the sacraments as playing into evangelization? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, I think it's two things. One, it's the goal for evangelization. I mean, evangelization is offering Christ to those whom he wants to invite into his kingdom, and the sacraments are the consummation of that invitation. The first step of evangelization is not to baptize somebody. It's about adults. I mean, that's how we begin with children, but not adults. But it's the goal and it's the promise, say for baptism. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: We evangelize by saying, the Lord Jesus offers victory over sin and death and eternal life, and we're going to help you learn about that, we want to invite you to share that, and you will receive it in baptism confirmation in the Holy Eucharist. And it's also the strength we need as evangelizers to go out and fulfill the great commission. That's why I like the new dismissal text that we can use, go and announce the gospel of the Lord, tell people what you've got and invite them to share in it. Mary Wilkerson: It's funny in the publications that followed letting the faithful, especially in the Archdiocese of Detroit, but it became a national story as Mike said, about what happened and why it was important. I was blown away by how much teaching were both in your response and in the different things the Detroit Catholic put out. My faith was enriched by an explanation of why these things are important and the institution of Christ in the words that we use. So did you see this? I know that at first, the injustice stood out, but it's a moment to be able to teach the faithful about what the sacraments are. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Oh, yes. I think that's really very important for us to ... One of the things that [inaudible 00:28:39] said is we need to become focused among other things on evangelizing the evangelizers. And it would be a shame if somehow what we're going through was seen as mirror legalism. It's in fact a way to announce the good news that Christ acts in his church and he's faithful to that. He's not going to let us down in spite of whatever unworthiness the minister brings or we as recipients bring. Now, the more worthily we receive, the more he's able to act. But he will always act in the sacraments. Mary Wilkerson: It's funny you say that because when I first heard about it before I read anything, and I've been involved in the Catholic church quite heavily for 40 years, my first response was, well, isn't that a little bit legalistic. It was just a gut reaction that we need to redo all of these things. And then allowing myself to be taught and to remind myself of what I know to be true. That it's Jesus that is the one that is doing these sacraments in his words. And that's why we don't have the ability to change words. It's not something we can do. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And that's a grace, it's not an inhibition. It's not inhibiting our freedom. But this is a great gift that we can have this confidence in him and put ourselves in the background. Mike Chamberland: As Mary said, I think sometimes we can get ... In our faith, we just go through the motions and we don't stop to necessarily think on a deeper level or reflect on our deeper level about what we're doing and why we're doing it. And sometimes, the details and the distinctions that are made about these things help us to better appreciate the beauty of what we actually have. Archbishop, I wanted to ask in that light, what actually happens or doesn't happen when a sacrament is invalid? What are the distinctions there that make something valid or invalid? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, a sacrament can be invalid because the form, the words are not sufficient. It can happen because the matter, the material, the ritual gesture and the way it's used are not appropriate. And it can also be invalid because the intention of the celebrant is not appropriate, it's deficient. The occasion can still be an occasion of grace, but it's accomplished through a different causality. It becomes a little bit like a sacramental at that point. It can be a moment in which Christ acts, but it isn't the same way as if he acted through the efficacy of the sacrament itself. Mary Wilkerson: And in Father Matt Hood's case, the fact that he wasn't baptized, like you said, it meant that he wasn't confirmed, which meant that he wasn't validly ordained. Right? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Right. Mary Wilkerson: I mean, it's stunning when you think about that. So what would you say, because there's hundreds of people that have been affected by this very personally that they aren't confident anymore that they received the sacrament of baptism, what is your response to that, to the uncertainty or to the worry, and how should they respond if they were close to this parish or even not at this parish? What if people are wondering now, well, I had this priest that didn't always use the right words, so maybe this is me too. How do we even respond to that? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, we have a task group that's helping on this, Mary. And if anybody has a concern about the sacraments in their life, they should go to the archdiocesan website. So just go to the archdiocesan website, and it comes right up. The item is pastoral care regarding the Vatican's note on baptism. And if people have a question, they can fill out a form and somebody will get back with them to help them with their doubt. Mike Chamberland: Archbishop, I know that St. Thomas Aquinas, obviously, he's a man of distinctions. He likes to think deeply on these things and help us to better appreciate them by making various distinctions. And one of the things that he obviously has instructed us through the Summa Theologiae is the idea that God has bound himself to the sacraments, but he himself is not bound by the sacraments. What does this mean exactly, and how does that apply to this situation or anybody else's situation who perhaps was maybe invalidly baptized or invalidly received any sacrament? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Well, it doesn't to make up for the invalidity. That's what that first part is about. God has bound himself to the sacraments as the sacraments, but not bound by the sacraments is the way to say that God can act apart from the sacraments. And so that's what I was trying to get at with my remark earlier that even the invalid celebration of sacraments can be times of grace. God can act apart from the validity of sacraments. We obviously aren't expected to rely on that, but we can have confidence in God being at work. Mike Chamberland: I always like to think of that too. God is a just God. So if I, in good faith, believed that I was baptized properly and as a child, and then have lived my life seeking to live that out and become the saint that God's called me to be, and then I die and go to heaven and find out that I actually wasn't validly baptized, I like to think that God being a God of justice will judge me accordingly. That he [crosstalk 00:34:48]. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Oh, for certain. Certainly. Mike Chamberland: Yeah, right. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And in virtue of your good intention, he will have been very much at work in your life. Mike Chamberland: Yeah. Mary Wilkerson: I find this moment to be so interesting too though, because that's so true, of course. But also, we don't want to be presumptuous with God either, and that's why I think if we know that a sacrament has been invalidly done, that we would have the actual sacrament take place because you don't want [crosstalk 00:35:18]. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Right. We would remedy it. Mary Wilkerson: Right. There's a duty to do that, right? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Yes. Mary Wilkerson: It would be easier maybe to say, well, God will figure it all out in the everlasting kingdom. There is though, I think that part of us wants to, maybe part of me sometimes can be tempted to think that. It's like that, when you know better, you do better. Like if you found out that something happened, as much as it could cause scandal ... Because I'm sure, Archbishop, there was a level of scandal when you announced that hundreds of people were not validly baptized. That we're still going to do this because we're not presumptuous with God's grace and we're bound by what he has put forth for us. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Right. And people deserve this truth, and it's a truth about the reality of the sacraments. Mary Wilkerson: What do you think that the faithful ... Just in terms of everything we've talked about today, Jesus' movement within the sacraments, being touched by Christ within them, seeing this very obvious instance of humanity and brokenness being a part of the Sacramento mystery, what is something we can all take away from this situation? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: I think we can take away a kind of confident humility that Christ is in our midst through the sacraments, and we are called again to appreciate the reality of his working through them oftentimes in spite of our limitations. And I think, especially, we can think about that with those who minister the sacraments, that the power of the sacrament is not dependent on the talent of the minister, but that it's Christ who is there. I think that's a very, very important point. Mary Wilkerson: Right. And that leads me to another question that I was just thinking about as I was reviewing notes for this. When young men are in formation for the priesthood or for the diaconate, how important is it to teach the form and make sure that the form is kept as is for the integrity of the sacraments? Is that a piece of formation as men are moving through the seminary? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: It's essential. Sure, Mary. It's very, very important. That's why when Father Hood saw the film of the home video of his baptism, he knew there was a problem. Mary Wilkerson: And I mean, did you preside over his ordination? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: His priesthood ordination. Mary Wilkerson: Yeah, his priesthood ordination. That's just incredible. What an incredible moment. And I love that you attached the word humility to it, recognizing who we are and who God is, and the way that he can work, but then our duty to respond to that. Is there anything else you want to add as we end our conversation on this moment in time in the church with this situation with Father Matt Hood? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: I think to have confidence that out of this mess, God will bring good. He permitted it and he didn't will it, but out of his providence, he can bring a great good. And I know it causes a lot of people's suffering and I deeply regret that, but God will advance his kingdom through all of this. And then I think to thank God for the sacraments, which is also to thank him for the church, that we don't invent the church. It's not like the church is a voluntary association where we come together and we make it a reality that reinforces what each of us has as a goal. But the church exists before us, and it's the spouse of Christ, and the Lord invites us to be married to him by being part of the church. Mary Wilkerson: Well, thank you for sharing about this. Mike, did you have something to add? Mike Chamberland: I was just going to say, and just listeners, I know Archbishop mentioned it earlier, but if you yourself are just concerned about your own validity of baptism, anyone that would want to desire more information or help, they can go to the website, AOD, www.aod.org/sacramentsupdate. That's where they can fill out that form the Archbishop mentioned earlier. Mike Chamberland: And also, please know that most parishes that the archdiocese believes are impacted by this, those parishes have been contacted and the people who believe that this might happen with have been contacted. So I know the Archbishop and the archdiocese is doing all it can to try to remedy any issues with this. But if you are, like I said, in any concern yourself, please visit the website and fill out any form. Mary Wilkerson: Now is the time that we get to ask you, Archbishop Vigneron, questions that the faithful have submitted. If anyone listening has a question, please consider submitting it to Eyes on Jesus podcast at aod.org. When you submit it, make sure to leave your name and the parish that you attend, and we would love to be able to have an opportunity to read it on air. So are you ready for some questions, Archbishop Vigneron? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: I am, Mary. Mary Wilkerson: Okay. Here we go. Cecilia from Our Lady of Sorrows asks, what do you see as the role of young people, high school, and especially college students in the church? How can they add to the work of the church and how can they help church leaders? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Youth itself, Mary, is a great gift from God. Every period in our lives is a providential moment, whether it's being middle age, whether it's being old like me, or being a young adult, a teenager. And so I think youth brings with it the great gift of enthusiasm. And Saint John Paul used to also talk a lot about the gift of looking out into the future and having aspirations for that. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: So I think that's a particular gift that young people can give to the church. I mean, they are part of the church. They're not second class citizens, they're full members. They perhaps don't enjoy the same level of leadership that they might once they're in their 40s or 50s, but they bring this future orientation to the church. I also think they have a special competency in the media, and they can be very good in helping the rest of us think about how to use the media in order to share the gospel. Those would be a couple of thoughts that come to my mind. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Oh, I guess the third thing, and this has to do with looking out to the future and aspirations, one of the great gifts that young people have is the discernment about the path in life that they are going to take. And a contribution they can make is to prayerfully consider what God's will is for them, and to make their life choices in terms of what will please Christ. That is perhaps the most important thing that they can do to build up the church is to be faithful to the vocation they have at this particular moment in life, and that vocation is to think about where God is calling them to end up. Mary Wilkerson: That's an important piece. I love that you referenced Saint John Paul II. I was a teenager when he was a Pope and got to go to several world youth days with him. And I remember when he would talk to young people, when he would talk to me, I really felt like he was personally talking to me and trusting me with the enthusiasm and the joy and evangelization and all these big things that we sometimes are thought of as people in their midlife or older are the ones in charge of this for the church. And he just had a way of really making me feel personally engaged with the direction of our church and who our church is and my role as a disciple. So many young people were not accidental to him as it were necessary to the church. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Exactly. Part of our confidence in the presence of the Holy Spirit in the churches that the church doesn't get older, she just keeps getting young. And I think that the young people in the church are in some ways an icon of that truth about the church. And I think young people oughtn't to lose sight of the fact that they're a great source of encouragement to old fogies. They're a sign that the church is headed into the future. I meant myself as an old fogy, neither of you. Mary Wilkerson: I don't know, we're getting there. That's great. Mike Chamberland: I like what you said about the discernment piece too. I mean, as we walk with young people and watch them discern God's call, hopefully they're discerning God's call for them in their future for employment, and marriage, or religious life, or priesthood, as we view them do that, it reminds us to always be discerning God's will, whether we're middle aged or whether we're older. It's just the constant movement. So I like that. That was great, Archbishop. Archbishop, I have another question for you here. This is actually from Vicky from Corpus Christi in Detroit, And she asks the question, what is one of your favorite movies, religious or nonreligious? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: For religious, it's the Song of Bernadette. I love that movie. I think it's really beautiful. Depiction of the role Bernadette had as an evangelist. I've come more to think of [inaudible 00:45:52] as a center for evangelization. That first of all, a lady was sent there by her son to announce the good news of his mercy, and then she recruited Bernadette to help her with it. So I love that movie very much as a religious movie. And a movie that's not religious that I like very much is called [Gosford Park 00:46:18], which is kind of a murder mystery, but it's really more of a study about English country home murder stories. Mary Wilkerson: Oh, interesting. Mike Chamberland: When did that come out, Archbishop? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Oh, I don't know, Mike. Mary Wilkerson: I think it's super old. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: No, I think that maybe it's the 80s. I don't know. Mike Chamberland: Oh, okay. Mary Wilkerson: We should do a movie night with our spouses, Mike, a double date where we watched that. Mike Chamberland: Okay. Sounds good. Mary Wilkerson: Awesome. All right. Sandy from Our Lady of Good Counsel asks this, how does someone know when something is placed on their heart that it is truly God or truly of God? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: There's a long tradition in the spiritual life called the discernment of spirits precisely to assist us in this. And one of the great experts at this is Saint Ignatius of Loyola, who gave a set of rules for discernment. Perhaps the simplest one is God will never put anything in your heart that contradicts the teachings of the church. If you were inclined to receive a message that led you to contradict the teaching of the church, you could be sure that doesn't come from God. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: A second thing is God's not going to ask you to be disobedient to appropriate authority. He may ask you to address something to authority and even present to someone in authority, your parish priest, a spouse, to the other member, to her spouse, his spouse, say I've got this idea, but you have to create harmony and communion. And then other things to look for are, does the inspiration besides, is it harmonious with the teaching of the gospel? Does it bring you peace? Does it offer a kind of a constellation, which is not necessarily some sort of giddy feeling, but just the sense that this has a rightness and I can be at peace with it. And then another very important step can be to present your inspiration to your confessor, who can probe and ask questions and help you see what God is trying to accomplish. Mary Wilkerson: And each of those things that you just laid out, does Saint Ignatius of Loyola go through each of those or was that just a reference point that he'd be good to [crosstalk 00:49:13]? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: No, no, he articulates them much better than I have. Mary Wilkerson: That's great. It's such a good [inaudible 00:49:19]. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And I'm sure if you Google Ignatius' rules for discernment, you'll be able to find them. Mary Wilkerson: What a good and relevant time to talk about that. I find that there's a lot of just confusion right now. I personally am experienced a lot of confusion, so it's good reminders of concrete things that we can do to be able to properly discern spirits and know where God wants our hearts and our minds and our souls. That's super helpful. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And it's very important not to overlook this because this is the way God advances the life of the church and is going to advance evangelization. In 1,000 hearts, he's going to inspire 1,000 different initiatives that people can take up. It might be the simple initiative of who did God put it on my heart to invite to come to a Bible study with me? Mike Chamberland: Wonderful. Archbishop, we just have one last question here for you. This is a question from Katie at Saint Genevieve and Saint Maurice, and she asks the question, how do you deal with the pressures of being an Archbishop? That's a great question. Mary Wilkerson: I liked this question. Mike Chamberland: I love that question. Yeah. Mary Wilkerson: I loved it. Mike Chamberland: A very good question. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: One of my priest who was my colleague and teaching at the seminary who then went on to be the Bishop of Madison, Bishop Morlino, used to insist on two things for every priest every day. You look in the mirror and say, I am not the Messiah, and two, the people have no right to expect me to be the Messiah. And so part of it is an act of humility that I'm not the Messiah, and that lets some of the steam out of the pressures I might face. That God is at work, he will accomplish his purpose. If I do my duty every day, he will bring about the good he wants to accomplish. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And I was talking about the teachings of Saint Therese. She points out, and this is very consoling, that God will even use my limitations and my mistakes to advance my work as an Archbishop. And that's part of what I look to for Jesus to accomplish as my savior to be able to do that as well. And I also then try to keep my life in good order and in balance and hold myself accountable for that. So I take my daily meditation, I don't skimp on my prayer, I also get some exercise, do all of those natural and supernatural things to keep my life in balance, and my spiritual director holds me accountable for that. He asks me how I'm doing on those things. Mary Wilkerson: I would imagine there's a lot of pressure too. It's funny that you shared that piece of wisdom. I had heard a version of that. Obviously, it was from someone else, but one of my first pastors told me it's not as terrible. He said, "Every day, I look in the mirror and I say to myself, people are crazy and I'm not Jesus." So he's like, this is my first boss in the church. He said, "That's what I do when I start every single morning." And it did give me a special perspective when I was working at a parish. But that's really helpful. I like that you mentioned too that the regular things of our daily movements, keeping our lives in order is an essential part of staying healthy and dealing with pressures. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: And I try to remember that I'm not alone in this. I mean, I'm certainly aware that my brother priests are dealing with the same stresses, and it's not just us clergy. I'm sure, you Mary, you Mike, you have stresses that you have to manage as well. And it's by managing them in faith that we give God glory. And that's our first responsibility is to glorify the father and to be his faithful sons and daughters. Mike Chamberland: Amen. Well, given that question, Archbishop, about the pressures, is there anything specific that our listeners and Mary and myself could pray for you? Do you have any special intentions that you'd like us to pray for you for this upcoming month? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Let's all continue to pray for our teachers and our students, and not only in our own Catholic schools, but in all schools that this opening up of the new school year will be a blessing for all those involved. Mike Chamberland: You got it. Archbishop, also, would you mind closing us with a prayer and blessing? Archbishop Allen Vigneron: No. Happy to do that. Let's recur to the Memorare too, especially in these days when we celebrate so many feast days of our lady. Remember, oh most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy help [inaudible 00:54:59] intercession was left unaided. Inspired by this confidence, we fly unto the all virgin of virgins, our mother. To thee do we come, before thee we stand sinful and sorrowful. Oh mother of the incarnate word, despise not our petitions, but in thy mercy hear and answer us. Amen. Mike Chamberland: Amen. Mary Wilkerson: Amen. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: May Almighty God bless all of you, Almighty God, the Father, and the son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Mary Wilkerson: Amen. Mike Chamberland: Amen. Thank you so much, Archbishop. Archbishop Allen Vigneron: Oh, thank you both. Mary Wilkerson: Stay tuned for the next episode of Eyes on Jesus, a new episode every month. And if you enjoyed listening, you might also like the Open Door Policy podcast with Fathers Steve Pullis and Danielle Center, a podcast for joyful missionary disciples and our movement to unleash the gospel. Find it on your favorite podcast app.