Institution to the Acolytate of Matthew Hepburn
Blessing of Icons
St. Joseph’s Greenock
27 October 2016
 
 
Dear brothers and sisters, I am delighted to be with you this evening as we celebrate two significant events in the life and history of Saint Joseph’s parish community. 
 
Firstly we celebrate the institution as Acolyte of our parishioner Matthew Hepburn. This ministry was opened up to the lay faithful as long as fifty years ago in the reforms of the second Vatican Council.  News of it, it seems, is just reaching Scotland!  In truth I believe this institution will constitute Matthew as the first lay acolyte of our diocese. Truly an historic event in our diocesan life! 
 
The First Reading for this Mass shows us the ancient and divine origin of the ministry of Acolyte.  When we say ancient we mean that its roots go as far back as the Mosaic liturgy established in the desert when the Lord dwelled in a tent in the midst of his people.  When we say its origins are divine we mean just that.  It was God Himself Who, by a revelation to Moses, established that His sanctuary and altar be served by well-trained men of devotion and faith.  The Lord charged Moses to find suitable men to assist priests by performing duties for them and the whole community at the tent of meeting and around the tabernacle. They were charged with the care of the sanctuary vessels, in service given over wholly to the Lord in the Liturgy.
 
Of course the development in understanding of the Church in our times, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, to extend this ministry to the lay vocation should give us pause for thought.  A ministry, so precious in the Church that it was reserved to the sub-diaconate as a service only really one step removed from diaconate and priesthood, is now opened up as a charism to be shared in and employed by the lay faithful.  So this evening can be seen to represent an important milestone also in our journey to implement the vision of our Paisley Synod where the New Evangelisation must become a task of the lay faithful as of our clergy. 
 
Matthew has ministered as an Altar Server in Saint Joseph’s ever since his boyhood and has always been ready and willing to use his gift of the altar at our Cathedral and in parishes around our diocese as a Master of Ceremonies.  He is well known, esteemed and trusted by our priests and by me and it seems right to us and to the Holy Spirit that there should now be conferred on him this stable, enhanced and universal ministry of the Catholic Church. 
 
May I also take the opportunity to commend Fr John, your parish priest, for his inspiration to petition for this ministry to be conferred on Matthew.  He put a lot of work and heart into making it, along with Frs. Gerry McNellis and Frank Hannigan, who gave moving and glowing testimonies of Matthew’s faith and character and his worthiness of this exalted office in the Church.   It is a credit to you, Matthew, that all three of these highly regarded priests of our diocese would take such time and effort over you, and it is well deserved.  It is a credit to them that, in busy ministries, they showed the heart of shepherds to do God’s bidding and help bring a quiet, faithful servant of the Church out into the light.
 
It is in the Liturgy that Matthew now serves as an officer of the Church that Our Lord Jesus makes Himself truly present among His people until He comes again in glory.  The one Who became flesh and dwelled among us as our Emmanuel, God with us, promised to be with us till the end of time.  Saint John the Evangelist, who leaned upon the Lord’s breast as Jesus was about to pass from this world to the next, understood the enormous gift of God among us.  In his first Letter he wrote, ‘ The One that we have seen with our own eyes, The One that we have touched and felt with our own hands, The One that we have heard with our own ears, The One that in the depths of our hearts we have met: He is the One who we proclaim to you.  His splendour is on all for he shines upon the world’.
So what could be more appropriate in this evening when we raise our first son of the diocese to lay service at the Altar that we should also bless these reredos Icons that make the Lord’s presence and saving love so visible and appealing to us believers.  In his letter to the Philippians Saint Paul tells us how the Only Begotten Son, though He was from all eternity in the form of God, emptied Himself of His glory to take on a human face and dwelled among us.  From then on this humbling of Our Lord Jesus would become for us who love Him, an even greater glory on His part.  While the angels glorify the Son for His likeness to the Father we, men and women on earth, can never glorify, praise and thank Him enough for the love that made Him take on a likeness to us, even to wearing our look of shame by His death on the Cross.  Therefore, as God raises Him high, so do we in praise of Him as our One and Only Saviour, Jesus Christ. 
It is an honour for me to welcome to this Mass Bernadette Reilly, the writer of the Icons of the Passion which now adorn our Sanctuary.  The writer also of our diocesan Our Lady of Paisley Icon, she is here with her family and is most welcome.  As Fr Bollan says in his introduction, Bernadette has produced these Icons as beautiful and prayerful images of Our Loving Lord, His Blessed Mother and His beloved disciple, Saint John.
After taking the chalice of Golgotha Jesus said, ‘It is accomplished’ and, with that, He bowed his head and gave up his spirit.  Meanwhile His Mother Mary and his good disciple lived on to preserve His saving Mystery in their hearts and to pass it on just as they had received it. 
 
As we reach the fulfilment of another chapter in the life of Saint Joseph’s parish may we cherish in our hearts these precious gifts, of Acolytate and Icons adoring of Our Lord’s liturgy, and pass them on faithfully so that others can see and therefore believe until He comes in glory.  
 
 
 
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