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For Christmas gift in the year 2000 a friend, Mary Ann Morin, gave me a DVD and CD recording of Andrea Bocelli’s recording entitled “Sacred Arias.” Since then, I have made it a habit to listen to those arias on the CD each Christmas season. Each year, I am struck not only by their beauty—especially the “Amen” from Rossini’s Stabat Mater—but more so by the beauty of the tenor’s rendition of each aria. This past Christmas season, I did something different. Instead of listening to the CD, I watched the DVD. I was impressed by the beauty of the music and the Church in which Andrea Bocelli performed the sacred arias (the Basilica of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, Rome’s only Gothic church). But, I was especially impressed by the intensity of Bocelli’s performance which I of course did not “see” when I listened to the CD. I also read the little booklet that accompanied the recordings. Within its cover, I discovered something that has very much to do with the solemnity we celebrate today, the Solemnity of the Epiphany. In that little booklet, Andrea Bocelli relates how as a young boy growing up in a small town in Italy he grew passionately fond of opera. Friends and relatives would give young Andrea records of world famous tenors—like Enrico Caruso and Luciano Pavarotti—singing sacred arias. Bocelli relates how the experience sometimes would bring him to tears, as his opera superstars sang words written intended by their composers to glorify and magnify God’s greatness. As a youngster hearing these tenors, Andrea says he could feel his soul surging towards God. Of his desire at the time, Bocelli notes:
I
wanted to sing some of the most touching and purest arias ever
written—arias which I have known since I was a child….I would never have
thought that one day my dream would come true—that I could record these
pieces myself, that I could listen to them again, and leave them to my
children. But, for Andrea Bocelli, singing sacred arias is something more than that. He also believes that God has entrusted him with a gift which is also a prayer, that is, “one of the most eloquent ways human beings have discovered to praise their Creator.” Through the gift of song, Bocelli remarks, this is how he offers God thanks for the gift of life and the earth’s bounty. Andrea Bocelli also suggests that he believes his gift is a vocation—a divine destiny—that God intends for him to use in a way that reaches out and touches the lives of other people so that, in turn, they might also glorify and magnify God. Bocelli considers his ability to sing as an opportunity through which he can uniquely and in an unrepeatable way in all of human history express the deepest spiritual sentiments that all people—as children of God—share. Bocelli finds fulfillment in doing what he loves by using his divine gifts to bring something of God’s love and light to others. Like Andrea Bocelli, each of us has a personal vocation, that is, a unique and unrepeatable way of expressing God’s divine life through our words and actions. But, to “see” that vocation, like the Magi from the East who were searching for the newborn King, we have to be on the alert, to look for, and to be willing to follow that star…wherever it may lead us. For Andrea Bocelli, that star included listening to world-famous tenors singing not opera libretti but sacred arias and allowing the words and music to fill his soul with God’s love and light. Bocelli’s testimony to his personal vocation and how God’s love and light fill his soul as Bocelli lives out his personal vocation raises a very important question on this Solemnity of the Epiphany. It’s an especially crucial question for the lives of our young people. It’s the question concerning who our “stars” are and the direction where these stars are leading us. Think for a moment about who you look up to and who you want to emulate though your words and actions. Are these stars doing the kinds of things that will help you “find the true king?”, not the one Herod pretended to be seeking but the “King of Kings,” the light of all nations, before whom all other earthly rulers will give way? Research indicates that heroes and heroines play a very important role in the formation of young people. The heroic exploits of these people encourage the development in young people of the powers of imagination, storytelling, and creative expression. Research also suggests that the qualities young people admire most in their heroes and heroines can spur young people to aspire to those same qualities by overcoming obstacles and accomplishing great things in their lives. For example, heroes and heroines teach the values of persistence and determination as well as helping others when they are in need. Heroes and heroines can also teach how obstacles are really opportunities in disguise. In sum, the stories about heroes and heroines make it possible for young people to recognize those qualities of character that not only make human beings extraordinary but make it possible for young people to do ordinary things extraordinarily well in their own lives. In Catholic homes, parents oftentimes will place a copy of Butler’s Lives of the Saints on a bookshelf or on a coffee table. It seems like such a simple thing to do. But, this book and others like it tell stories about the virtues and exploits of Catholic heroes and heroines throughout the centuries that, when read by young people, can make it possible for them to be uplifted by the virtues that will make it possible for them to reveal something of God’s love and light to the world, the One before whom all other earthly rulers will give way. When I was a young person, there were many boring and rainy days when there was nothing to do. Sound familiar? Rather than let us watch television or listen to records all day (remember, those were the days before the innovation called cassettes!), whenever my sister, brother, or I would complain about how boring life was, my mother would tell us to read the Lives of the Saints. While it certainly wasn’t my first choice of things to do (the last, or course, being household chores like cleaning my room or dusting the furniture, baseboards, or louver doors), I didn’t think, “God, how b-o-r-i-n-g!!!” The first saint whose life I recall reading about was St. Peter Damien. The reason is that a holy card of St. Peter Damien was used as a bookmark in Butler’s Lives of the Saints. So, looking at his picture, I figured that I’d read the story behind the picture. What I found out is that Peter Damien was fearless and dogged man who rooted out sin on the part of the Catholic bishops and the clergy of his day. He succeeded in his efforts, but it didn’t come easily. Left an orphan as a youngster, Peter was adopted by an older brother, who ill-treated and under-fed Peter while making him take care of the family’s pigs. Blessed with a great intellect, Peter Damien eventually got out of swine herding, entered a monastery, and was ordained a priest. From the monastery, Peter Damian closely watched what was going on in the Church, and like his friend who became Pope Gregory VII, Peter Damien strove to purify the Church during what were very deplorable times. Peter’s most memorable written work is his treatise detailing the vices of the clergy of his day, the “Liber Gomorrhianus”…as in Sodom and Gomorrah. Seems like nothing’s new, huh? Besides championing morality by preaching against the immoral behavior of bishops and priests, Peter Damien was also a papal diplomat. Things were so bad in the Diocese of Milan that church offices were openly bought and sold. Members of the clergy also publicly “married” the women they lived with. The pope sent Peter Damien to go and clean up the mess. Preferring a life of solitude, quiet, and prayer, Peter’s personal vocation—to champion ecclesiastical morality—caused a great stir and aroused a lot of enmity against him. In the darkest of hours, Peter was known to pray not for himself and his problems but for those he was called by God to reform: “Lord, it is possible for you to restore hope of salvation even to the most despairing soul?” So, it’s important to ask parents: Who are the heroes and heroines that you are placing before your children (and, I might add, yourselves) today? Is there an updated copy of Butler’s Lives of the Saints available in your house so that you can have your children can read about the exploits of these heroes and heroines of our faith on those boring and rainy days? They don’t have to be saints of centuries long past, although their heroic virtue transcends the centuries, because did you know that more saints have been canonized in the past twenty five years than in the entire history of the Church? Most of these women and men lived out their personal vocations during the 20th century. There are young people, like the athlete and mountain climber Peter George Frassati. Many are lay persons and professionals, like physician/mother Gianna Molla. Two are a married couple, Luigi and Maria Quattrocchi. All of these heroes and heroines loved life so much that they lived in a way that glorified and magnified God’s greatness in a unique and unrepeatable way in all of human history. Because they followed the star that led them to Christ, their lives brought something of God’s love and light to the world. Unfortunately, many of the heroes and heroines presented to young people today don’t uplift young people to glorify and magnify God’s greatness in a unique and unrepeatable way in all of human history. No, all too many heroes and heroines—and especially those portrayed on television and the movies—expose young people to role models whose behavior does anything but glorify and magnify God’s greatness. Worse yet, they are idols whose behavior and exploits don’t uplift the souls of young people but eventually bring them down. Whether it’s Andrea Bocelli or for you and me, that star we must be on the alert and looking for is the “glory of the Lord shining up on you.” And, like Bocelli, as we follow that star where it may lead, we “shall be radiant at what we see” as the Prophet Isaiah has written. Our hearts “shall throb and overflow” in thanks for the gift of life and the earth’s bounty. And, in our own unique and unrepeatable way in all of human history, our words and actions will reveal the glory of the Lord shining in the lives of people whose deepest desire is to be uplifted as children of God. for a brief history of the three astrologers.
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HOMILY
