• Just three weeks ago, we had a momentous event in the life of the Church, the election of a new Pope. Robert Cardinal Prevost became the 267th successor of St. Peter and so the oldest institution in the world continues.
• And yet there are some in the traditional Catholic world who do not accept that Leo XIV is the Pope of the Catholic Church. These people are called sedevacantists.
• Sedevacantists are Catholics who believe that there is no Pope of the Catholic Church because the Pope has fallen into heresy. Most believe that there has not been a legitimate Pope since Pope Pius XII died in 1958. I want to warn you against this opinion.
• The sedevacantists represent something new in the history of the Church. There have been bad Popes throughout the Church’s history, as well as anti-Popes, but never a movement of people who have claimed that the Pope had no authority over them and yet claimed to remain Catholic. It is striking that Our Lord Himself was not a sedevacantist. The religious leaders of His time were evil, yet He supported their authority, “ The scribes and the Pharisees have sitten on the chair of Moses. All things therefore whatsoever they shall say to you, observe and do: but according to their works do ye not; for they say, and do not” (Matt. 23:2) Perhaps this example of Our Lord is why there has been no real sedevacantist movement until modern times, despite the fact that there have been plenty of bad Popes.
• Perhaps another reason why there have never been sedevacantists until the current crisis in the Church is that no one in the Church has the authority to depose the Pope. There is a principle in Canon Law which states that “No one judges the first seat”. There are theologians who have speculated that the Pope might automatically lose office if he falls into heresy. But it is clear that no individual Catholic is in a position to say whether that has happened or not. Our Lord certainly does not ask us to decide whether this or that person is the Pope or not. The Church could never have any real unity if that were the case. Just think what would happen if a company would run that way. For Abp. Lefebvre, it was theoretically possible that a Pope could lose his office by falling into heresy. But, in practice, he realized that he was not in a position to make that judgment and the prudent thing to do was to give the Pope the benefit of the doubt. That was why, while he recognized the terrible scandals that were happening in the pontificate of John Paul II, he yet went to the Pope and tried to work with him to get permission to consecrate bishops. We will obviously be doing the same with Pope Leo XIV. Unlike Abp. Lefebvre, the sedevacantists do believe that they are in a position to decide with certainty that there is no Pope. But this seems rash, imprudent and prideful. It also seems to represent a bad ecclesiology. The Church simply cannot work that way.

• This is a day of great joy for us. There are few things in this life that make you so happy as to see someone rewarded for the good that they have done.
• Today is the day that Our Lord receives His reward for the great good that He did for the human race. At the Last Supper, Our Lord prayed to the Father, saying, “Father, the hour has come! Glorify Your Son, that Your Son may glorify You, even as You have given Him power over all flesh, in order that to all You have given Him He may give everlasting life.”
• Today is the day that His prayer is answered, when He receives the glory that the Father has prepared for Him.
• And it makes us very happy to see this triumph of Our Lord,
  • because we love Him and we know so well how much He deserves it.
  • It makes us happy because His triumph is a very wonderful thing.
  • It makes us happy because it gives us a glimpse of the glory that we hope to receive one day

• We are familiar with ceremonies of triumph that take place on this earth. Ancient Rome was famous for its triumphal processions. Julius Caesar would come back from conquering a foreign nation that he had subjugated to the Empire.
• The people would line the streets. First would pass by them the treasures of the conquered nation, all of the spoils that were going to Rome. Then would come the people of the nation who were now going to be made slaves of Rome. Then the defeated king and defeated general who would soon be executed.
• Then the Roman senate. And finally Julius Caesar himself, the great hero who was responsible for the victory. The celebration was so overwhelming that they would have a slave stand by Caesar to whisper in his ear to remind him that he was going to die one day, that he was not a god.
• This is an example of one of the greatest triumphal celebrations in human history. If we tried to compare it to something closer to us, we can think about when the Denver Nuggets won their championship in 2023. Thousands of people lined the streets. They put the players in the top of a fire truck and drove them down the streets. They received the adulation and adoration of the crowds.
• These triumphs are nothing compared to the triumph of Our Lord Jesus Christ on the day of His Ascension. Our Lord took His followers to the Mount of Olives. He blessed them. Then, on His own power, using the glorified body that He earned through His death, He lifted Himself up to Heaven.
• When He reached Heaven, He opened its gates. All of the angels were assembled to receive Him. He went first into Heaven. Behind Him, He brought with Him His spoils. These were all of the souls in the history of the world who had died in the state of grace. Thousands upon thousands of souls followed Him into Heaven, from the first man and woman Adam and Eve to St. Joseph and St. John the Baptist.
• Our Lord took His place in Heaven on His throne seat, at the right hand of the heavenly Father. He assigned to everyone else their place in Heaven.
• A new song was sung in Our Lord’s honor, a more triumphal song than any we have ever heard on this earth.
• This triumph of Our Lord was greater than any triumph that we have ever seen here below, because it was more magnificent than anything that happens here on earth. It was a supernatural triumph, a celebration prepared by God Himself.

• Yesterday was an important feast day for our parish, the feast of Our Lady Help of Christians. Before St. Isidore’s existed, we had a chapel in Denver, on Winona Court and West 39th Avenue.
• The chapel was called Our Lady Help of Christians Chapel. When this church was built, it was decided that the church would be dedicated to St. Isidore the Farmer and that the school would be placed under the protection of Our Lady Help of Christians.
• It was in this way that we came to have two patrons, whereas in many SSPX parishes, the church and the school have the same patron.
• Today, I would like to help us get to know our patroness a bit better and remind us why we are dedicated to her. I think that it is especially appropriate to do that today, given that we are celebrating the results of our campaign and the faithful have been so generous contributing to the future of Our Lady Help of Christians Academy.
• The practice of referring to Our Lady as the “Help of Christians” goes all the way back to St. John Chrysostom.
• But the devotion to Our Lady under this title really started to take off in the 1500s. It was at that time that the Church was engaged in religious wars against the Muslims and the Protestants.
• We all know that Pope St. Pius V was asking the Christian world to pray the Rosary to Our Lady as the Catholic naval army was preparing to face off against the Muslims. But he was asking them to invoke Our Lady under the title of Help of Christians.
• After the victory at Lepanto, the invocation “Help of Christians” was added to the Litany of Our Lady, also known as the Litany of Loreto.
• But devotion to Our Lady Help of Christians really reached its high point in the 19th century. At the beginning of the century, Pope Pius VII was kidnapped by Napoleon and imprisoned by him at a place called Fontainebleau in France.
• Eventually, Napoleon fell from power and the Pope was able to return safely to Rome. Pius VII attributed his release to the intercession of Our Lady. As a way of thanking her, he added the feast of Our Lady Help of Christians to the calendar on May 24.
• This happened in 1815. It was in that same year that a great saint was born who was to be a promoter of devotion to Our Lady Help of Christians as well as a great educator.

• Each one of us has the experience of attending a funeral. We assist at the Mass for the deceased and pray for his soul. We accompany the body to the cemetery and see the final rites performed over the body. Then we walk away.
• That’s it. Nothing happens after that and we do not expect anything else to happen. We do not expect that the person buried in the ground is going to do anything. None of those who are at the cemetery do anything after they are buried. They do not move or get up. They all just stay in the ground.
• And the same will be true for us one day. We will also die; we will also be taken to the cemetery. We will be put in the ground, the people will walk away, and we will stay in the ground.
• The reason why we will stay in the ground and why everyone who is buried at the cemetery stays in the ground is that we do not have power over life and death.
• We are going to die when our soul will no longer be able to remain with our body and we will not be able to bring life back to our body. Neither will our loved ones. Neither will our friends.
• There is no one in this world that is able to restore life to a dead body. We have all of the body parts that we need. We have all kinds of technology and machines. But we cannot give life.
• In all of our experience, whatever dies remains dead and does not come back to life.

Our Lord is the exception

• The one exception to this, of course, is Our Lord Jesus Christ. Like everyone else, He was buried in a tomb. Like everyone else, those who buried Him walked away after His burial. Like everyone else, they thought that He would remain dead and would not come back to life.
• But that is not what happened. Our Lord did what no one else is capable of doing. He gave life back to Himself, He rose from the dead, and He came out of the tomb.
• How is it possible that He alone, of all the many people who have died in the history of the world, He alone was able to come back from the dead. It is because He is the only one who possesses the power necessary to do it. He alone has power over life and death. He alone is God.

Our Lord promises He will raise us up

• These two facts must be very clear in our mind: a) I am going to die one day and I will have no power to restore life to myself; b) Our Lord Jesus Christ is the only one Who has the power to restore life to someone who is dead.

• Paschal candle dedicated to Our Lady with images of her titles on it. Two of them refer to Our Lady as a star: Stella Matutinis and Stella Maris
• We speak of Our Lady as a star because she is a guide for our life. Before we had modern means of navigation, sailors had to rely on the stars in order to set the course for their ships. The stars keep the same position in the heavens every night and so always point in the same direction.
• Our Lady is the star of the sea of our life to guide us. She is also the “morning star”, the brightest star in the sky: she is the clearest guide for our life.
• I want to speak today especially about Our Lady as a guide for our youth, as a guide for those of you who have not yet chosen your path in this life. It is like having your ship in the dock and you are getting out the map and charting your course, but you have not yet set out on your voyage. You have your life but you have not yet chosen what we call your state in life.
• Our Lady is a great guide for you because God her the ability to live different states of life all at the same time and to provide a perfect model for all of them. There are some guides who simply tell you where you need to go but do not walk on that path. There are other guides who show you the way to go by walking on that path themselves. That is what Our Lady has done.
• She says to our youth, “There are three different paths that you can choose in this life. I have walked on all of them in a certain way, but you will only be able to choose one of them. Each of these paths involves a gift of yourself. You are free to choose the path that you desire but you must seek to choose one of them rather than remain at the crossroads your whole life.”
• God has given us three states of life to choose from. Our Lady is a model for all of them.

• Our Lord Jesus Christ is the revelation of God. He shows us who God is.
• This is especially true at the end of Our Lord’s life. We reveal what we are particularly in a time of crisis. It is the time of Our Lord’s Passion that we see more clearly than ever before Who He is, Who God is.
• The Last Supper and the Passion make one thing very clear: our God is humble.
• Each event of the Last Supper and the Passion is a manifestation of Our Lord’s humility.
• There are many aspects of Our Lord’s humility that we could speak about. But I want to focus on one of them: Our Lord’s effort to lower Himself in order to do good to us.
• We could say that Our Lord has to make a choice between two things: love and justice. If He chooses justice, He maintains Himself strictly in His state of Godhood. If He chooses love, He lowers Himself so that He can stoop down to His miserable creatures and assist them.
• We see what Our Lord chooses. He chooses love, a love that works through humility. The love of God uses humility as the most effective way to express itself and achieve its goal of doing good to us.
• On this night of the Last Supper, Our Lord performs three great acts of humility that enable Him to do great good to the Apostles and also to us.

• Have you ever asked God for a miracle? I have.
• Why not? We know and believe that God is all-powerful.
  • When you are all-powerful, that means that it takes you no effort to do anything that you do.
  • How difficult was it for God to create the universe? It was not difficult at all. It took no effort. How difficult to create my soul? Easy.
  • How difficult is it for Him to work a miracle? He can work any miracle that He wants, at any time, no problem. Curing cancer, removing tumors, raising from the dead, curing blindness, whatever.
• Besides this, it seems that Our Lord wants us to ask for miracles.
  • His word about having faith the grain of a mustard seed. “the apostles said to the Lord: Increase our faith. And the Lord said: If you had faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree, Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea: and it would obey you” (Lk. 17:5-6). This seems to be a gratuitous miracle, without any purpose, and Our Lord is saying that they could ask for that.
  • Our Lord working so many miracles without being asked. Today’s miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes happened, even though there was no request or faith.
  • Two Masses of this week will give us Our Lord’s two greatest miracles: the raising from the dead of the son of the widow of Naim and the raising of Lazarus; in neither case was Our Lord asked to raise them from the dead.
  • Meanwhile, there are many occasions in the Gospel when Our Lord immediately grants a request for Him to work a miracle. Most often, after He works the miracle, He praises the person for asking for the miracle and tells them it was because of their faith that He granted it. It seems that the manifestation of our faith by asking a miracle delights Him.
  • Besides this, Our Lord encourages us to pray for whatever we need. His words are so strong and encouraging! “Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you. For every one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.” (Lk. 11:9-10)

• Right now in the United States, there is a lot of basketball being played and sometimes you hear commentators talk about second-chance points. This is when a team makes a shot, misses, gets its own rebound, and then manages to score.
• Second-chance points are not common because the defending team is in a better position to get the rebound. For this reason, teams know not to rely on second-chance points and always try to make a basket on their first try.
• In today’s Gospel, we hear Our Lord speaking about what might be called second-chance graces. The people who were with Him were experiencing incredible graces but were not fully realizing it. They had in front of them the Incarnate God Himself. They were in the midst of the most important time of the history of the human race.
• Our Lord was working incredible miracles and so providing proof of His divinity. In today’s Gospel, we also see that He was casting out devils. He was freeing people from slavery to the devil. But this situation was not meant to last long. Our Lord would only be among them for three years and then He would be crucified for our sins.
• If they do not accept Him now, chances are that there will be no second chance. He casts out the devil today and they say that He casts out the devil by the devil. Tomorrow, He is going to go away. Meanwhile, the devil is going to go and get reinforcements and come back to possess their souls. When he does so, who is going to help them?
• If they reject Him, there is not going to be anyone able to face off against the devil and they will be defeated by him. It is now or never. There will be no second chance.