Father Leo Hausmann
Homily from the Rite of Election
February 18, 2024

Today we celebrate this important time in the lives of these people here as they are called to the Rites here today. As I mentioned earlier it’s sad that the bishop cannot be here, that the bishop has passed on, and the empty chair, the big chair there, which we call the cathedra, is empty and nobody sits in that chair except for a bishop. And so, I get to sit in the big little chair over there, but not in the big chair because that’s reserved for a bishop. It’s called the cathedra, as I said, and this is called the cathedral and so that tells you the importance of that chair. Only a bishop can be seated in that chair because when Bishop Peter was ordained bishop, another bishop laid hands on his head for that ordination. And someone else had laid hands on that bishop’s head, and all the way back from bishop to bishop to bishop to bishop to the apostles themselves who Jesus had breathed the Holy Spirit on. 

That empty chair reminds us of how our faith is ancient but also it is true. It’s ancient because it goes back to the apostles themselves and to Jesus. It’s true because it comes from Jesus himself. That fact of, not just tradition but this very physical connection between the bishops today and the apostles and Jesus Christ himself, is essential for what we profess as our faith. Their faith is our faith. It is ancient and it is true. It’s also ever new by the Holy Spirit who rests upon this Church, this Catholic Church. 

That first reading comes right after the flood has receded and Noah and his family enter into a covenant relationship with God and that flood itself, as we heard in the second reading, prefigures baptism. 

The early baptismals had eight sides and today some of them do too. In a commentary that I read it said that those eight sides represent the eight survivors of Noah’s family of the flood. Again our faith is tied back even to the time of the Jewish people, our older brothers and sisters in the faith, and how amazing that is. 

As you come to this cathedral today for the Rite of Election or the Rite of Continuing Conversion, it is because the church has done this from very early times. I read an account of an early Christian woman named Etheria, and this is what she wrote: “Whoever wishes to give in his name just so on the eve of Lent, and a priest notes down all the names. The next day, the opening of Lent, in the middle of the church, a seat is placed for the bishop and one by one the candidates are led up to him if. If they are men, they come with their godfathers. If they are women, with their godmothers. Then the bishop questions the neighbors of each person who comes in saying, ‘does he lead a good life? Does he respect his parents? Is he given to drunkenness or lying?’ If the candidate is announced beyond reproach by all those who are thus questioned in the presence of witnesses, with his own hand the bishop notes down the man’s name. But if the candidate is accused of failing at any point the bishop tells him to go out saying, ‘let him amend his life and when he has amended it let him come to baptism.’”

That sounds like an awful lot like what you will be doing here today. This was an account from the very early Church. We have that connection once again to the early Church. An important connection. 

It wasn’t too long ago in the Church that Lent was really a good thing for all of us to do, as we all have made baptismal promises or for those who are baptized as a baby, as I was, that my godparents and parents who made those baptismal promises for me and as I grew older, I came to take them on to myself. So, every year at Easter time we renew our baptismal promises, all of us, in those Easter Liturgies. Lent has become a time for the whole Church to join with you as we are called to conversion ourselves and so we walk this journey together. That sounds very Catholic to me because that’s what Catholics do. We are a community of believers. A family of God. Brothers and sisters in Christ. 

Jesus himself did penance before he began his public life at the beginning of his beginning of public life. We are called to that same thing. In the Gospel Jesus, his first message as he went out and preached publicly, was repent. Believe in the Gospel. Believe in the Good News. God is calling us into eternal life. That is a journey for us. 

We no longer call it RCIA, the Rite of Christian initiation, but now what you are doing we call the Order of Christian Initiation because it’s not just a moment but it’s a lifetime of conversion. Putting away our selfishness. Putting away anger that we have in our hearts. Putting away immorality in our life so that we truly can walk with Jesus and truly are prepared for when the Lord calls us to himself. 

So today we celebrate this important moment with you. Our prayers go with you not only today but every day as you continue this important journey in your life.