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'Ad limina' visits enable bishops to account for their dioceses
February 5, 2012

 
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Melczek's Past Columns

   On Tuesday, I will travel to Rome with the bishops of Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin for our “ad limina” visit.  During our visit, we will express our solidarity with the Holy Father and with the other bishops of the Universal Church.  Each of us will also render an accounting of our stewardship in the Church to which we have been assigned responsibilities to teach, sanctify, and govern in unity and charity.

   Just as St. Peter and the other apostles constituted a single apostolic College, in like fashion, the Holy Father, St. Peter’s successor, and the bishops, the successors of the apostles, are related with and united to one another in a bond of hierarchical communion.  I look forward to this visit with Pope Benedict XVI, who has the responsibility, as did St. Peter, “to strengthen your brothers” (Lk 22:32).

   We call our visits “ad limina” as “limina” means tombs.  During our ad limina visit, we will celebrate Masses for the people of our dioceses over the tombs of the two great apostles, St. Peter and St. Paul.  We will also celebrate Mass at the altar above the remains of Blessed Pope John Paul II and in the other major basilicas in Rome.

   The Holy See designates the time for our ad limina visit.  The bishops of Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin have been asked to be in Rome from February 8th to February 18th.

   In the past, the individual meetings with the Holy Father, during which I shared the opportunities and challenges of living and sharing the faith in our diocese, was the highlight of my ad limina visits.  Pope Benedict XVI has changed the format somewhat this year.  He will meet with us in small groups of six or seven for about an hour.  He will ask each bishop to share the highlights of his ministry within his diocese and then engage in a free-flowing heart-to-heart discussion.

   The pope spends a large part of his ministry engaging in such conversations with bishops from every country throughout the world within a period of five years.  He also holds regular meetings with heads of state and ambassadors from throughout the world.  Those visits, and his own worldwide travels, enable him to have a deep grasp of the realities of life in every sector of the globe.

   In addition to our fraternal meeting with the Holy Father, we also meet with his closest collaborators in the Roman Curia, such as the Cardinal Prefects of the Congregations of the Doctrine of the Faith, Divine Worship, Clergy, Consecrated Life, Catholic Education, and the Cardinal Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, the Church’s highest court, also with the Cardinal Prefects of the Pontifical Councils of Laity, Christian Unity, Family, Justice and Peace, and the New Evangelization. 

   These meetings give us a privileged opportunity to give an account of the situation and needs in our local dioceses and to learn more about the hopes, joys, and difficulties experienced by dioceses throughout the Universal Church.

   During our time in Rome, we will have the opportunity to meet with students at the North American College where our own Deacon Ben Ross is completing his studies prior to ordination next June, with the U.S. bishops and priests who work at the various Vatican Congregations and offices, and with the U.S. ambassadors to the Vatican and to Italy.

   Several months prior to the scheduled ad limina visit, each bishop is required to send the Holy See a detailed report on the state of his diocese following a format provided by the Holy See.  I submitted the 105-page report of our diocese, along with much supplemental information, in October.  The Holy Father and the appropriate Cardinal Prefects will have received summaries of the report prior to our visits.  I will share some of the highlights of our report in next week’s column.

   Each bishop is the principal sign of unity within the diocese and together, with all the other bishops, expresses the unity and communion in Christ of all the faithful throughout the world.  Our Masses and prayers together each day, along with our visits with the Holy Father and the cardinals who collaborate with him in the Curia, are wonderful expressions of our fraternal communion with each other in the Lord Jesus.

   I make this ad limina visit joined in spirit with each one of you who constitute this local Church of the Diocese of Gary.  I will keep you in my Masses and prayers each day.  I invite your prayers in behalf of our local Church and in behalf of all the churches throughout the world with whom we share communion, especially those churches which suffer persecution and remarkable hardship.



To be updated as information becomes available.

Thursday, February 2
Catholic Schools’ Week Mass – Marquette Catholic High School,
Michigan City, 9 a.m.

Friday, February 3
Catholic Foundation, 8 a.m.

Sunday, February 5
Mass and blessing of new altar and ambo – St. Martin, LaCrosse, 9:30 a.m.

Monday, February 6
Priests’ Council, 1 p.m.

February 8 – 18
Ad Limina visit, Rome

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