As the Extraordinary Jubilee of the Year of Mercy drew to a close Nov. 20, hundreds joined Bishop David M. O’Connell, C.M., in St. Robert Bellarmine Church, Freehold, in a diocesan farewell to the months of special devotion Pope Francis described as the “very foundation of the Church’s life.”
In his homily, Bishop O’Connell noted that the Holy Year of Mercy proclaimed by Pope Francis to call attention to God’s Mercy and justice was closing on the Feast of Christ the King. He asked the throng in the wide expanse of the nave to consider the imagery in the day’s Scriptures of a king described as beaten and bowed. On the Cross, the Bishop said, Jesus showed the kind of “King he was and is: no royal display; no pomp and glory; none of the trappings that usually surround a ‘king,’ no. As he hung on the Cross, he was watching us,” the Bishop said.
“He died for us, this ‘King;’ he brought our sins, our lives to the Cross and forgave us; he promised us – ‘good thieves all’ – that we would be with him in his Kingdom, in paradise … His royalty, signified by the Cross, is a Majesty of Mercy.”
You can listen to Bishop O’Connell’s full homily, recorded by Domestic Church Media, HERE, and hear an archived version of the full Mass, HERE.
You also can read the full story and view a photo gallery from the Mass from The Monitor, HERE.