With some of his own parishes about to close, Father Bill Quinlivan used his time at Our Lady of Fatima Shrine to ask for healing for those suffering from the closing or merging of their parishes.
Father Quinlivan, pastor of the Catholic Family of South Buffalo and celebrant of the Nov. 3 healing Mass, asked who in the congregation came from a parish that was closing or merging. Only a few raised a hand.
“Raise your hand if you’re the pastor of a parish that’s doing both,” he then asked, raising his own hand. “Times are tough folks. We need to pray. We need the healing of the Lord with His great mercy.”
The Barnabite-directed Our Lady of Fatima Shrine, located in Youngstown, hosts healing Masses the first Sunday of the month from July to November.
With a theme of “Healing Mercy in a Season of Change,” November’s service welcomed everyone to pray for inner peace as parish mergers begin to take place in the Diocese of Buffalo.
Father Quinlivan said with wars in Ukraine and Israel and the upcoming election, we need to “wrap our heads around the fact that God has a plan for us.”
“A healing Mass can also be a hearing Mass. To hear the Word of God is healing for us,” Father Quinlivan said as he told of a friend of his, an Irish nun, who experienced a healing from crippling rheumatoid arthritis at Mass while listening to a homily.
“She said she felt a hand touch her head. She opened her eyes and said, ‘Why did a priest come over and put his hand on me during the homily?’ She opened her eyes and didn’t see a priest, then realized it was Jesus who touched her. It was the Word that touched her and freed her. When she looked down, her arthritic ankles and legs were straightened out before her eyes. She said the power went through her head to toe. … Because the Lord had plans for her. But it was hearing that caused the miraculous healing.”
Following Mass, with the lights turned low for reflective prayer, Father Quinlivan carried a monstrance with the Blessed Sacrament through the pews of the shrine.
“Give grief its season, for healing requires that,” he said.
He also recognized the difficulty some people have in letting go of a building that has become a special place for years and even generations.
“Lord help our hearts to understand why change is so difficult, so painful. Help us recognize, Jesus, if we have let fear into our hearts. Your words tell us that fear is useless. And we know that it can paralyze our hearts or even tempt us to flight, to run from and hold back our gifts from the Church. …
“Our churches are places, sacred sanctuaries built for worship. Our parish churches hold a special place in the feeding of our souls all our lives. These holy structures are where we should have the indelible mark of baptism, where we found the healing fount of mercy and reconciliation, where we renew the fire of Your spirit, where You nourish our souls, become food for our souls in the most Blessed Sacrament, where are souls have experienced the great joy of weddings in our churches, the sacred ritual of funerals for our loved ones and our friends and our fellow parishioners,” he said, while Mary Palmer accompanied him with her guitar.