Students, faculty and staff gathered Tuesday, Sept. 2, in the chapel of Sacred Heart Major Seminary for the annual Mass of the Holy Spirit, ushering in the academic institution’s 106th academic year.
Seminary rector and president Fr. Stephen Burr, who celebrated the Mass alongside Detroit Archbishop-emeritus Allen H. Vigneron, reminded the seminary community to “dwell well” in the house the Lord has given to them now — in anticipation of God’s promise that his children will dwell in His house in the future.
“In the anticipation of dwelling in His house all the days of our lives, He’s given us this: to dwell well here, to dwell well together, to be His community and body in the works that we do now and do with the enthusiasm of His love,” Fr. Burr said in his homily.
Following Fr. Burr’s homily, Sacred Heart’s newest faculty member, Fr. Timothy Wezner, stood before the student body and made a profession of faith and oath of fidelity.
Fr. Burr encouraged seminarians, lay students and faculty alike to seek God and to live with Him through their daily tasks of teaching, learning and ministering to others.
“Today, we come here because we know we are with the Lord and that we have a future only in the Lord; that’s how we start our academic year because it is the principle in which we live and work,” Fr. Burr said.
It can be challenging to remain faithful to God in every moment of every day and to continue to do his work, especially when trials and darkness can sometimes seem overbearing or all-consuming, Fr. Burr said.
“The trials seem to be the things that overtake, but our role within this house is to know that we are a people of the light … and to know that the rays of the Lord’s hope and His love exist, and that our very mission in living with Christ and knowing that he is our future is to widen the beam of his light so that it not only shines over us, but everyone,” Fr. Burr said. “In our teaching, our studying, our working with the poor, our caring for one another, we seek to widen the beam of His love and grace, His charity, His mercy for us.”
In inaugurating a new academic year, Fr. Burr reminded the seminary community to keep God’s grace at the forefront in everything.
“May the Holy Spirit come upon us as we pray today, so that we seek His grace,” Fr. Burr said. “This year, we look forward to all the newness that will come. The Holy Spirit moves in ways that we anticipate already and in so many ways that surprise, because the gifts of the Lord are abundant and always beyond what we can imagine.”
