Pastoral Message: The Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen will be declared a Blessed of the Church in four months (September 24, 2026), in St. Louis, Missouri. As we celebrate 250 years as a nation, his work, For God and Country, published in 1941, seems very relevant for this occasion. One of the points he made is that the preservation of The United States of America as a nation depends upon our attitude toward God and his place in society.

He noted that in times of crisis America has always turned to prayer and penance, to her religious roots for healing and renewal. He cited exhortations by the U.S. Presidents, calling citizens to humble themselves before God and beg for his mercy. For example:

President Adams in 1799 proclaimed that "in circumstances of great urgency and seasons of imminent danger earnest and particular supplications should be made to God Who is able to defend or to destroy."

President Madison three times between 1812 and 1815, called for "public humiliation for the transgressions which might justly provoke the manifestations of His Divine Displeasure."

President Buchanan set aside January 4, 1861, as the day when "all people should assemble according to their several forms of worship, to keep a solemn fast."

President Lincoln five times during his Presidency called on the people to "bow down in humble submission to God's chastisement to confess and deplore their sins and transgressions in the full conviction that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and to pray with all fervency and contrition for the pardon of past offences, that we might be spared further punishment, though most

justly deserved and that the Throne of Love might bring down plentiful blessings on our country."

President Jackson made a moving plea for a "day of humbling ourselves before Almighty God."

President Grant in 1871 set aside November 30 as a day for asking Almighty God for "merciful exemptions from evils."

President Wilson delivered the last Presidential Proclamation issued in the United States which admitted the possibility that we ought to ask God for something else than prosperity and which envisaged the possibility that we needed some regeneration was that of President Wilson who proclaimed Thursday, May 30, 1918 as a day of "public humiliation, prayer and fasting."

He concluded, "America will never be beaten from without, as long as she is moral from within." These words are prophetic as we celebrate this national milestone.

Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us.

Fr. Tim Byerley, Pastor