We will miss his leadership here, but he's going to a higher position where he can be an even greater influence in the Church."As archbishop, building upon the strength of Catholic life in the Archdiocese, I tried to lead you in the new evangelization which is so needed in the totally secularized society in which we live. Your response has been dedicated and generous. In thanking you for your response to my pastoral leadership in carrying out the new evangelization, I urge you to continue to teach, to celebrate in prayer and the sacred liturgy, and to live in practice our Catholic faith with new enthusiasm and new energy, with the enthusiasm and energy of the first disciples of our Lord and of the first missionaries to our part of the world."
. . ."Our society, which esteems, above all, political correctness, views negatively anyone who is in the eye of a controversy over questions of faith and morals. Yet, in the Church, we know that we, like our Divine Master, are destined to be a "sign of contradiction" (Luke 2:34). It is not by chance that our most esteemed religious symbol is the crucified Christ.If a totally secularized society is not uncomfortable with the way we teach and pray and live, then we are not putting the truth of our faith into practice. While we must always speak the truth with love (Ephesians 4:15), we must speak the truth.
"A society which prefers the comfort of confusion and error will not be pleased. But what alone matters for us is that we be pleasing in the eyes of God. Thank you for holding fast to the truth of our Catholic faith, for praying and worshiping with the great devotion and fervor, and for witnessing to the truth of the faith in your attitudes, words, and actions."
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