What a day that was! Sept. 11-9/11 - has had such a tremendous impact on us as a people, as a church - an impact felt throughout the world. We continue to ride out the effects of that stormy day and probably will for some time to come. The death and destruction changed the way we live our lives, the way we view ourselves, the way we see the world.

The year 2002 brought more shock, though in some ways less dramatic and sudden. Trusted corporations have collapsed in scandals over accounting practices, over dishonesty to stockholders lies and theft. Yes, the year 2002 brought more shock and another explosion - the sexual abuse scandal in our beloved church. That, too, has changed the way we live our lives, the way we view ourselves, the way we see the world. We are stunned, anguished, ashamed and searching - searching for a clear course as we journey together in faith.

That fateful day of Sept. 10, I was in Newark attending the national convention of Catholic Charities USA. At that time Fathe Bryan Hehir was the organization's new executive director. That morning Father Hehir shared his reflections about the work and ministry of the church in its social outreach. He talked about the Catholic Church as institution and our common need to grapple with our times and look to the future. The Catholic Church as institution, he said, is what helps us to lay hands upon society, upon our world. Church as institution constantly searches out opportunities: opportunities to effectively live and proclaim the Gospel to a real world of real need, great challenges, suffering, tragedies and broken relationships.

We emulate Jesus. That is our call. Jesus in his ministry frequently laid hands on people's lives, both literally and figuratively. He touched them physically - he cured them, forgave them. Pie touched their lives - he celebrated with them, he loved them. He charged them - as he charges us - to follow him, to teach as he taught, to heal as he healed, to live as he lived - touching people's lives, touching people's hearts. And the people responded. As we hear in the Gospel of St. Mark, people reached out to touch him because power flowed from him. As we follow Jesus' call to action, to touch people's lives, over and over we see examples of this church, this institution, laying its hands of healing on a troubled world, touching the heart of a society in pain and in need. Over and over again, pictures and video clips from the after¬ math of 9/11 showed the world our priesthood as we touched lives, touched hearts, sought to bring the healing touch of Jesus to a world in pain. All of us were deeply touched by the heartbreaking photo of Father Mychal Judge carried out of the ruins by four courageous firefighters. That picture hangs in my office at home. For weeks after 9/11, our national media provided glimpses of the hundreds and hundreds of funerals. All the world saw 7 lives touched, hearts touched, with the comforting, healing power of our funeral liturgies. Your own experience tells you that our funeral liturgy is one of our best moments of evangelization. Moments of tragedy and calamity, personal and national: Our priesthood helps our sisters, our brothers and ourselves as we try to lay hands on life in celebration, in sorrow, in hope, in trust. And we do so with the sure knowledge that the promise of God will be fulfilled.

The events of 2002 have had a jarring impact on all of us. We priests have been dismayed by the enormity and publicity of the sexual abuse situation. Parishioners have also been tremendously affected by these events. They have reacted in ways undreamed of a couple of years ago. They give ready voice to their anger leveled at all of us, and we may well ask ourselves why has all of this occurred on our watch. The impact touches both priests and bishops. Who could have dreamed of the fallout and the intense scrutiny that have occurred over the past months? As we deal with the crisis, as we attempt to re-examine the ways we do church, relationships between a bishop and his priests can become strained. We might wish that it would all go away. We know in our heart of hearts that it will not. We can analyze the moment, ponder what God's will for us could be, where God is leading us through such difficult challenges. We might all well ask, What is God saying to us - saying to me - today?

Cardinal Martini is the retired archbishop of Milan and a great Scripture scholar. He commented once on the importance of constantly reflecting on the daily readings of the liturgy. Each day, each period of life, brings us a new set of experiences which helps to process the word of God. Our life experiences in each period of life can help us make that word come alive in our hearts, in our ministry, in the hearts of our faith communities and our world. One bishop friend told me, "This is not the ship I signed up for." But it is the ship we are on. It is a ship buffeted by storm and sea, from crisis within and without. We have to remember the Gospel story of- the storm on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus was clear about our response to storms, and that response cannot be terror or fear.

You know the old story of the pastor who experienced a flood in his parish. As the floodwaters rose to the church steps, the fire department came and offered to evacuate him. No, he wasn't about to leave. He trusted in divine providence. The waters rose halfway up the bell tower, and a local rescue unit approached in a boat. No, he wouldn't leave. Divine providence would help him. And finally, as the waters rose to the church steeple, a helicopter came to rescue him and again he refused. Divine providence would make sure he was safe. Ultimately he drowned, and his encounter in heaven was a stormy one with the Lord. "Why didn't you save me? I trusted in your divine providence!" he challenged Jesus. Jesus answered, "I did come to help you. I sent the firemen, the rescue boat and the helicopter. Every time you refused." We have to ask ourselves if we are refusing to listen to the help God has sent us. As we examine our lives, our ministry, our interaction with the world, we have to ask, over and over again: What is God saying to us? What is God saying to us in the word and what is God saying to us in our ministry, in the life of the church? The Holy Spirit speaks to us in many ways, some expected, some not.

Certainly one of the ways is through the Basic Plan for the Ongoing Formation of Priests. The events of 2002 have been a challenge like we have never faced before. Yet 2003 provides the opportunity to move forward in hope - if we will. We can search out the ways that life affords us occasions of grace, even in times that seem so incredibly difficult, if not impossible. Yet even in difficult moments, in moments of profound challenge, we can - we must - be attentive to how God speaks to us through the life and ministry in the church.

Last June the bishops in Dallas faced a difficult situation. They were forced to perform their work the best they could while undergoing intense media scrutiny. The bishops took strong administrative measures. Some of the breach between bishops and their priests can be attributed to the fallout of the Dallas meeting. Many priests felt they were used as sacrificial lambs, while the accountability of bishops was left unaddressed. There has been turmoil, there has been pain. Some of that pain is still with us. Despite that pain, we have moved forward. We have reached a new moment. That new moment is a time for strong pastoral measures. A time for the renewal of the church's pastoral leadership. A time of urgency which calls us to bring the healing touch of Jesus to the heart of the church. It is a time for us to work together, priest and bishop, to renew the church, to heal the church, to rebuild the church - to touch the church as Jesus did, to bring new life.

Winter brings death to the land. That death is what makes possible the new life of spring. New life can come to the church - it will come to the church - but not without death. We must examine the clerical culture, the episcopal culture. Our church culture must | be scrutinized and evaluated fearlessly as we strive to be in touch with the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus tells the apostles, and he reminds us, "The Holy Spirit will come and teach you everything." It is up to us to listen to that Spirit.

Several years ago, when I was actively involved with the bishops' Committee on the Permanent Diaconate, I met a deacon's wife, a remarkable woman who in a relatively short time had lost both her father and her husband to cancer. The question she kept asking herself was, "Why me, Lord?" until the morning other husband's funeral. She and the family walked down the aisle behind the casket. Suddenly, the overpowering feeling welled up in her heart, and she said to herself, "Why not?" She said she walked down the aisle feeling like a bride. Can you and I approach this special moment and also say to ourselves, Why not? God's ways can be painful. They can be mysterious and difficult and hard. But that does not stop them from being transforming.

This moment is our opportunity. This moment is a grace, a time to l)e honest, a chance to restore credibility and trust, to be accountable. This is our moment to ask what the Lord is saying to us, and this is our moment to respond. The basic plan outlines the context for priestly life and ministry in the United States. Aspects of that context include the shortage of priests, the complexity of the Catholic population, the divisions within our own presbyterates, the need for ongoing personal growth and development, the increased complexity of parish congregations, conflicting cultural values and yet opportunities for a new evangelization. All of these meld into an important moment, a watershed moment, perhaps even a critical moment in the life of the church in the United States

The times are challenging, and the times are complex. Our need for continued growth and development is clear and it is urgent. We have been given opportunities to implement the process of evangelization - of ourselves in ministry and of the entire church. Yes, Jesus tells us to go out into the whole world, to the ends of the earth. We have done that. Cardinal George of Chicago said it well a few years ago: The challenge now is to go to the ends of the human heart. Perhaps that is and will be the greatest challenge of all in fulfilling the Lord's command.

Life today is complex. Life in the parish is no different from the rest of society. There are increased demands on our priestly ministry, our pastoral leadership. Our priestly mission was, is, continues to be, the proclamation of the Gospel. We have been given a critical moment, a graced moment, to examine how we fulfill that mission. We dare not squander God's opportunity. The Basic Plan for the Ongoing Formation of Priests lays out steps for addressing our challenge.

First of all, we need to have a renewed sense of who we are as priests. We have all seen the negative publicity focused on us as priests and bishops. To stand against the negative, to continue to minister as Jesus has called us to minister, we must know who we really are, not the irresponsible monsters some paint us to be. But that self-knowledge, even self-assurance, cannot include the negative behaviors of the past: control, narcissism, superficiality.

For us, priestly identity is much more than a matter of function. It is a radical identification with the Good Shepherd, the Lord Jesus. In the Old Testament Book of Jeremiah (3: 15) we hear God speaking to us: "I will give you shepherds after my own heart." It is such a privilege to align our ministry with that of the Great Shepherd! And it is a privilege, a privilege which should not leave us wilted in discouragement or frustrated with our humanity. It is a privilege which should energize us all the more, animate us all the more. This privilege should inspire us to better relationships, to better ministry. Many of us are already up to our eyebrows with demands of time for functions and relationships. We are not talking about doing more. Rather, we are talking about doing what we already do, but doing it better. We are talking about letting people know that we want to be good shepherds, that we want to be holy, humble servants.

The sexual abuse scandal has shown that sometimes our people have a higher theology of priesthood than we do ourselves. Victims of sexual abuse and the victim-advocate groups describe the damage and hurt caused by these transgressions. These descriptions reflect an understanding of the identity of the priest in our Catholic religious sensibility as well as in our sacramental theology. A few weeks ago I was talking to a reporter, a non- Catholic. It was her belief that the news media in general held the church, and priests in particular, to a higher standard of behavior and conduct than the rest of society. People expect more from us.

The basic plan from the U.S. Catholic bishops, Pastores Dabo Vobis from our Holy Father and the new letter from the Congregation of Clergy on the role of pastors make foremost the issue of priestly identity. This is a time to remember who we are by virtue of our ordination. The reclaiming of priestly identity must l)e done at the service of the mission we have been given as priests. At this time of scandal, the question becomes our effectiveness in fulfilling this mission. This is true of priests, and this is true of bishops. In some ways the impact has been greater on bishops. In order to exercise true leadership with this mission, the first step is to remember and reclaim again who we are.

We have the special mission and privilege of communicating- Jesus to the world. We do that as human beings who are growing and developing. Its interesting how our young people have taken to asking, What would Jesus do? - WWJD - as a way of inspiring them to lie more Christlike in their daily living. A few months ago a teen-ager gave me a braided bracelet with this inscription. Her parting comment was that she hoped I would wear it. As the plan reminds us, we are a complex and unique creation that expresses uniquely who we are in our physical, psychological, sexual, cultural and social makeup. Each of these factors contributes to and is a part ol- our identity. These combinations of life experiences and realities form a mosaic that is uniquely patterned and formed into a Bill Skylstad, a Mark Hession, a John Kinney or anyone of us.

We are believers in and disciples of the Lord Jesus. This is the factor with the greatest impact on our identity. Being a believer and being a disciple should automatically mean a dynamic relationship with the Lord Jesus, a relationship that speaks of a growing faith, a growing love, a growing hope. We are open to the presence and movement of God in our lives. That means we are works in progress. The Lord isn't finished with us yet. I have caught myself many times being critical of the lack of progress in others until I begin to take stock of my own life and the many opportunities I have for growth and learning. How many people can experience as we do the many times of prayer, celebrations of eucharist, retreats, workshops, ministerial experiences that can be so rich and transforming? This last year I suspect we have come to appreciate how important and necessary the virtue of hope is in our lives. Dom Helder Camara, the former archbishop of Recife, Brazil, said this about his own priestly identity:

"I can't even imagine being anything but a priest. Just think, I consider the lack of imagination a crime, and yet I haven't the imagination to see myself as not a priest. For me, being a priest isn't just a choice; it's a way of life. Its what water is for a fish, the sky for a bird. I really believe in Christ; Christ for me is not an abstract idea - he's a personal friend. Being a priest has never disappointed me nor given regrets. Celibacy, chastity, the absence of family in the way laymen understand it, all of this has never been a burden to me. If I've missed certain joys, I've had and I have others so much more sublime. If you only knew what I felt when I say Mass, how I become one with it! The Mass for me is truly Calvary and the resurrection; it is mad joy.

"Look, there are those who are born to sing, those who are born to write, those who are born to play soccer and those who are born to be priests. I was born to be a priest - I started saying so at the age of 8, and certainly not because my parents had put the idea in my head. My father was a Mason, and my mother went to church once a year. "I even remember that one day my father got frightened and said: 'My son, you're always saying you want to be a priest. But do you know what that means? A priest is someone who doesn't belong to himself, because he belongs to God and to people, someone who must dispense only love and faith and charity.' "And I said, "I know. That's why I want to be a priest.'"

Just over a month ago, I was in the Holy Land listening to religious leaders talk about their situation. Again and again, both sides spoke of their difficult and deteriorating situation with a sense of hopelessness. Yet I saw in some a deeply rooted hope in the Savior, whose promise they knew would eventually be fulfilled. I came away humbled by their witness, asking myself if I would live out their pain and hurt with the same determination and faithfulness to the Lord.

In the area of claiming our identity, we share in the presbyteral order. Through the sacrament of holy orders, we live out our priesthood being ever mindful of our relationship with the Lord Jesus, being conformed to him, reminding ourselves of the witness we give of presence. How often I have been on a plane when people have commented they were glad I was with them. Just a few weeks ago, as I boarded a flight in Spokane on a Sunday morning, one parishioner blurted out, "Bishop, I'm so glad you are here. I didn't go to Mass this morning." Somehow I guess my presence reminded her of what she should have done. The merciful Jesus does work through us, sometimes when we least expect it.

We live out our priesthood in communion with our bishop, living a life of chaste celibacy. We are connected in a special way to our local church through the bishop, and our celibacy provides a special way of loving God's people. We do so realizing the wonderful, constant occasions to let people know that we profoundly love them in the name of the Lord Jesus. As our Holy Father reminds us in Pastores Daho Vobis, "The church, as the spouse or Jesus Christ, wishes to be loved by the priest in the total and exclusive manner in which Jesus Christ, her head and spouse, loved her. Priestly celibacy, then, is the gift of self in and with Christ to his church and expresses the priest's service to the church in and with the Lord" (No. 29).

That's our life and ministry. It is powerful and much needed. That's who we are. We strive to love people into a fuller life. We well know that task is not easy. When appropriate boundaries are crossed and violated, great potential good is utterly eradicated. Terrible harm and devastation occur. It is clear that each of us meets life and its challenges at various key points. The basic plan highlights five key stages in the life of a priest today: first years, transitions, first pastorates, midlife and senior years. If our experience with the recent scandals has taught anything, it is that most of our priests are solid men. I've visited with many presbyterates around the country, sharing the retreat experience. Over and over again I find priests to be men of faith, skilled, committed to the church and filled with hope. They are great men. For the most part, they work hard. At times they are simply fatigued by the demands of ministry.

But even solid men can have their limits tested as they face the challenges outlined in these stages and set within priestly life and ministry today. There may be other personal challenges that come into priest's lives to complicate things even more, such as poor health or caring for an elderly parent or the death of a parent.

The stages in our priestly ministry may not always be quite as clearly denned as they are outlined in the basic plan. Some of our newer priests may be facing two or more of these stages at one single time. We live and minister in a complex culture. In that milieu the honeymoon of first priestly experience may be very short indeed. In our diocese of eastern Washington, a newly ordained priest may be appointed as pastor of two or more small rural parishes within two or three years of ordination. None of us would disagree with the reality that we go through significant adjustment when we enter into priestly ministry after ordination, But add to this a disillusionment phase that can quickly set in, a move from being a parochial vicar to being a pastor, the reality of a multicultural parish that demands language skills and sensitivity to culture as well as dealing with possible intercultural tensions, then I would say you have a significant challenge to be an effective priestly minister.

In a rural diocese like ours, other complications can set in as well. For instance, some of our pastors serve three or four separate parish communities, each community with its unique personality.  Flexibility is a must. Rural parish ministry also translates into a great deal of time spent behind the wheel of a car, trying to be present to parishioners spread across thinly populated areas. In our cultural milieu there continues to be considerable social change. This change might be exemplified by a decaying inner city or a dying rural community. Helping parishioners adjust to new realities can be a challenge. It can demand a huge amount of patience and understanding. One would think changing the times for Sunday Mass to facilitate a complex schedule would be a relatively simple matter, but it's not. The issue of addressing the viability of parishes and Catholic schools is never easy. But that is our life and ministry. Cultural shifts have their impact on us and on our view of pastoral ministry. Remember the old mentality that said bigger is better? Today bigger means more challenging, more demanding and more complex. The request now is quite often a nice, quiet, little parish.

Several months ago I was in Washington, D.C., for a meeting and had some extra time before returning home. I went over to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum to see an IMAX film about the space station. Beforehand the attendants passed out these special glasses one needed to view the film. The view without the glasses was confusing and certainly not clear. But with them, the screen became alive with views that were breathtaking. So it is with our priestly ministry. When we do not view our ministry with the lenses of a genuine spirituality and skills, then ministerial life can become difficult, frustrating and demoralizing. If we are not careful, the challenges of our priesthood will lead us to forget who we are, to lose our bearings. On the other hand, we can maintain our grounding by keeping balance, a good perspective, cultivating a sense of appreciation and living healthy relationships. The basic plan suggests that our continuing formation as priests is more than continuing education. In fact, it calls us to a whole new culture of formation - a culture that cultivates the pastoral, the spiritual and the human as well as the intellect. The basic plan points out the graces we can find when we do this. That we must be open to learning: not necessarily learning how to minister more, but how to minister better, smarter. Dr. Christa Klein of St. Mary's in Baltimore has coined the term a new culture of nation. That's a lifestyle we need to live.

This past Christmas the staff and deacons of the diocese gave me a Garmin V, a Global Positioning System I use mostly in the car. This little gadget tells you where you are within 40 or 50 feet, anywhere on the globe. Not only that, it gives the elevation and the speed of walking or driving. I well admit that it may not be overly practical, but it is a source of wonder and amazement how well it works. And what an achievement of intellectual curiosity and design ingenuity! For ships, airplanes and even farmers in the field such technology can be and is extremely useful. Years ago I  got one of the first personal digital assistants, very crude by today's standard of a Palm 515. But I can't tell you bow much it has been helpful to me in my ministry. The same goes for a laptop computer and the Internet. Just as technology advances and gives us opportunities to work better and smarter, we have to be committed to our own continued growth and development as we address our priestly ministry in all of its complexity. For all of us, that approach demands constant formation and eagerness to grow and learn.

The final section of the basic plan is devoted to the formation of the presbvterate. This is the most radical part of the plan. It reflects the statements of Pope John Paul II in Piston's Dabo Ibh/s (No. 17) that "the priesthood has a radical communitarian nature." This is a difficult concept for Americans to grasp. Ours is a country greatly blessed by mobility7 and instantaneous communication and yet still filled with so many lonely people. How much effort is expended by so many to fill in this loneliness. For us priests, understanding the fraternal nature of our priesthood is absolutely fundamental.

The Dean Hoge study of the recently ordained indicated that those who departed from ministry did so because "they felt isolated and unappreciated." This is something we can do something about. It also points to a reality we must face. Too often, our presbyterates are not very united. They are not always welcoming communities of faith. They are not always characterized by genuine priestly fraternity The basic plan identifies some sources of division: masculine styles infected by competition and comparisons; different formational generations; clerical envy; lack of relationship with the bishop; a bishop's failure to encourage unity of the presbyterate; varying backgrounds of origin, spirituality and theology.

We as church call ourselves a community of faith. One of the first and foremost witnesses to that loving and caring community must be in our presbyterates in relationship to our bishops. Biblical witness and church teaching provide the foundation. The culture in which we live demands a sense of urgency to give witness not only for the sake of ourselves in priestly ministry, but also for the sake of the church we love and serve. In Miami several years ago our Holy Father spoke to the priests of the United States. He said, "Unity among priests lived out in fraternity and friendship becomes a demand and an integral part of the life of a priest." "Painful experience has taught us that when a priest is not connected to other priests, or to the bishop, or to his diocese or religious order, he is the most prone to get into serious difficulties, to break boundaries, to suffer emotional problems or perhaps even to leave active ministry."'

Our roles as priests in the church are very dependent upon how we relate to one another in friendship, fraternity and acceptance. One of the great tragedies in the comic strip medium is the cessation of Calvin and Hobbes. If you remember the characters of the strip, Calvin is the little boy who has this stuffed-tiger friend Hobbes, with whom he is in constant dialogue. In one particular scene Calvin is leaning over a large anthill and says, "Hey, ant, what's the colony done for you lately? Repress your individuality. Do your own thing. Take care of yourself. Get yours first." The final frame of the strip shows Calvin looking down over the anthill saying, "If they listen to me, that should solve our ant problem." We must not allow our fraternity and unity as priests to be weakened by rugged individuality or even benign neglect. One o{ the strong tenets of our church's social teaching is the responsibility we all have for the common good and the sense of connectedness with the human family. Its not a message easily sold today, let alone appreciated. But the common good of our presbyterate is vita! to the common good of the church and of our ministry.

This past summer I had the wonderful opportunity to attend World Youth Day in Toronto. The days there and especially Sunday eucharist on the last day were tremendous expressions of unity and solidarity in the church. Some of the articles in the local papers at the beginning of the visit were rather cynical in nature, to say the least. By the end of the week that cynical tone had changed. With the powerful celebration of eucharist, there was a tremendous sense of community, a tremendous sense of the universal church. It was not because the Mass occurred in a perfect setting. It didn't. The crowd was huge. A severe rain squall came through the park just as Mass began. Yet everyone felt the impact of coining together as a community, coining together as church. It was a living example of the reverence, respect and solidarity of the family of faith. Commentaries in the newspapers reflected accurately that atmosphere.