God's gifts help us to persevere

Sept. 6, 2007

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

In last Sunday's Gospel, we heard Jesus teaching a man who had invited him to dinner, exhorting him on the importance of humility and gratitude. Everything we have, everything we do, everything we achieve, every skill and talent, is a gift from God. God always gives us what we need to persevere in affliction and to prosper in joy, sufficient to know and love Him, and for others to know and love Him through us. Humility and gratitude are how we accept God's gifts without trying to bargain fruitlessly with Him for more or different gifts.

God's generosity is purposeful. Each of us needs exactly those gifts we have, not only for our own salvation, but also for that of those around us. When we reject God's goodness, we endanger our happiness in this life, and our eternal joy in Heaven, and the happiness and eternal joy of others who also depend on our gifts. This is why so many of our saints have taught so often that pride - the deadly sin opposed to humility and gratitude - is the source of all evil.

MARRIAGE: ONE MAN, ONE WOMAN

Marriage, too, is a gift from God, a gift to all people of all time. Like all mammals, the human species shows two and only two genders: male and female. Morally equal in dignity and value, both equally created in the "image and likeness of God," men and women are physically, emotionally, and spiritually distinct. This difference-in-sameness is complementary: man is fulfilled in woman, and woman in man. At the most primal level, men and women are made for each other. It is this fundamental complementarity that makes possible the conjugal bond that marriage is built upon.

Marriage is, by nature, the elevation of conjugal unity through the choice for life-long, exclusive, and fruitful commitment. Human society has universally recognized this permanent and monogamous commitment as normative, simply on the experience of it. Every other possible combination of human sexuality lacks something in comparison with marriage: permanence, or exclusivity, or fruitfulness, or any commitment at all. And because these other combinations lack externally, they also fall short internally: they fail to lead to either worldly happiness or spiritual joy. Human experience of all cultures and times and places offers the data for this conclusion: marriage is normative; other joinings are marginal.

Divine revelation raises the dignity of marriage still further. We call marriage a sacrament, not merely a normative experience. Jesus Christ blessed the wedding at Cana with his presence and his first public miracle. In changing water into wine, Jesus signified the unexpected fruitfulness of marriage, that is, its moral depth. For those who marry, it is, in all its daily struggle to love each other, the path to holiness.

Jesus gives each of us a vocation. This gift demands a choice from us. "I have not come to bring peace, but the sword." Jesus is never complacent in tolerating falsehood. He does not merely show a better good among other possible goods, but divides everything into Light and Dark: "If you are not for me, you are against me." If marriage is a sacrament, then no other sexual relationship can be sacramental. If marriage is the path to salvation for those who are called to marry, then no other sexual relationship can lead to the same end.

IOWA FIFTH DISTRICT COURT RULING

I want to say this as clearly as possible, after last week's surprising ruling by Judge Robert Hanson of Polk County District Court that the Iowa law (civil code 595.2(1)) mandating marriage as between one man and one woman violates the State Constitution. There is a great deal at stake in this ruling, not only for our Church and our faith, but for our society as well. Universal human experience recognizes permanent, exclusive, monogamous marriage between one man and one woman as normative, and the Church recognizes this relationship as a sacrament, because it is the best possible arrangement of human sexuality for the common good. Marriage is good for husbands and wives. Marriage is good for children. Marriage is good for friends and neighbors. Marriage - stable families raising virtuous children to be upstanding citizens in their turn - is the bedrock of a healthy society.

Same-sex relationships are not marriage. Even if they include life-long and exclusive commitment, they are not fruitful in the bearing and raising of children. They do not exemplify human dignity and complementarity. These relationships exemplify pride, in the presumption to take a divine gift and demand it become something else; and they exemplify selfishness, in the presumption that the individual good precedes the common good.

Our belief that marriage is sacramental in no way discriminates against those with a same-sex attraction. The Church teaches clearly that it is the homosexual act, not the desire itself, which is immoral. Christians must give witness to the whole moral truth, and oppose as immoral both homosexual acts and unjust discrimination against homosexual persons. The Catechism of the Catholic Church urges that homosexual persons "be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity" (CCC 2358). It also calls all people to chaste friendship. "Chastity [that is, the moral use of the gift of human sexuality] is expressed notably in friendship with one's neighbor. Whether it develops between persons of the same or opposite sex, friendship represents a great good for all" (CCC 2347). I urge all of you to do everything possible to preserve and promote marriage in our society, as God intended it to be experienced.

DIOCESAN MINISTRIES CONFERENCE

This year's Diocesan conference is nearly upon us! Please consider attending. You don't have to be actively involved in a Church ministry to benefit from this event. All the faithful will find something deep and personal and inspiring for your faith in the prayer and reflections that are planned. The Diocese is absorbing the whole cost of preparations, refreshments, speakers' travel, and facilities, so your only "cost" is your time, which will be well spent! We ask only that you register in advance so that we can offer enough refreshments for everyone; please email the Diocese at dmc07@scdiocese.org, or call Judy Forrest at 712-233-7520 to register. More information is available on the Diocesan website, and from your parish.

This year, although we have kept the name "Ministries Conference" for this event, we are really planning a kind of scaled-down Eucharistic congress. You may attend either Sunday afternoon (September 23rd), or Monday (September 24th). These days will be dedicated to returning the Precious Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, the "source and summit of our faith," and the means of our salvation for every vocation, to the center of our experience of faith. It will be inspiring and uplifting, and I for one am very much looking forward to it!

DIOCESAN ANNUAL APPEAL

September 8 & 9th is the kickoff weekend for the 2007 Diocesan Annual Appeal. You will soon be receiving a Diocesan Annual Appeal mailing. As you know, the Church in Northwest Iowa relies upon the financial support of its people. Our Diocese seeks to address the real needs of real people in a real world; a task that oftentimes seems to border on the impossible. Yet, through the grace of God and the generosity of you and our faith-filled community, the seemingly impossible becomes the reality.

It is of the utmost importance that the Catholic people of Northwest Iowa know that we have a real need to give -- to willingly and joyfully give of our time, talent, and treasure within the faith community, and thereby take part in the mission of the Church.

We approach this Appeal with awareness that many people experience economic hardship and that some are truly unable to give. The Diocese lives in the same economic world. As the needs of parishioners increase, so, too, do the needs of the Diocese. My hope is that those who cannot themselves give will support the Appeal through their prayers. I also hope that those who can contribute, will offer prayerful and generous gifts.

I am grateful for your dedication to your church and to the Diocese of Sioux City. I thank you for your generosity in the past, for the way that you have allowed the Lord to carry out his work through you. I admire every day your deep witness to the faith.

May God bless you all most abundantly with every good thing under Heaven, and may He lead all our efforts in and for the Church to success, for the glory of His name and His coming Kingdom!

Your brother in Christ,

Most Reverend R. Walker Nickless
Bishop of Sioux City