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June 29, 2021Priesthood Ordination of Fr. Brannon Lepak
The Cathedral of Our Lady of Perpetual Help
June 26, 2021
Throughout the centuries, throughout history, priestly ideals, the ideals of the priesthood have changed from time to time with different epochs of history, different eras, different cultures. Today, in our time, it is not enough for a priest to strive to become a good churchman as important as that might be. Today a priest must be first and foremost a faithful disciple, a disciple of Jesus Christ, in fact a missionary disciple and a credible witness to Jesus.
A priest today as in every age is called to be a herald of the Gospel at a moment in history in which we are witnessing the rapid changes that we are all aware of taking place in our society that certainly affects our Church. Someone said, we are living not through just an age of change, but a change of ages. Who could dispute this - looking around and seeing all that we see and hear? As Christians, we are entering an age, I would propose, not so very different from that of the apostolic age following Pentecost. At that time, there was little to no institutional support for the apostles as they set out from Jerusalem to “go make disciples” of all nations impelled only by the Holy Spirit and to carry the Good News to the ends of the earth – a daunting challenge. Not only was there no institutional support but there was frequently outright hostility, persecution and martyrdom awaiting them. That early apostolic age eventually gave way to a new age, the age of Christendom when Church and Gospel became the dominant influences in the culture. That age of Christendom lasted for many centuries, over a millennium.
Today, in our time, we have moved well past what was once known as Christendom in which we the Church could rely on the more or less Christian culture to help sustain our faith and our institutions with little more required of us than maintaining what we received and simply trying not to mess it up. We have entered a new age, a new apostolic age, like that which followed Pentecost, which calls us to a new kind of witness and to a new kind of ministry. We must be more mission-focused, more intentional or we will be carried along and swept away in the fast-moving and dangerous currents of secularism in which we will find ourselves becoming indistinguishable from the world into which we have been sent to be light and salt.
This is the urgent pastoral challenge in our moment in history! Today, we are living in an age of increasing indifference and even hostility toward faith and toward the Church. The generation of priests who are being ordained today will, I suspect, witness increasing not only indifference, but persecution and perhaps even a new age of martyrdom. It is happening already all over the world. Given the disturbing signs of our times today, it is naïve to think that it couldn’t happen here. Face it, we could be “canceled” by a dominant culture, which is increasingly intolerant of dissent from its secular orthodoxy.
On this ordination day, therefore, it is increasingly important for us to be clear about what we are doing here and what Deacon Brannon is called to do. The priesthood is not a career. It is not a path to be chosen for those seeking a comfortable life, as perhaps it could have been in another age or in another culture. The priesthood is a vocation of radical discipleship, of radical dependence on Jesus Christ, who came not to be served but to serve, to give his life for others in witness to Jesus Christ. Today, as perhaps never before in our country, a priest must be ready for great sacrifice and courageous witness. All that being said, this is a wonderful time, a wonderful time to be a Catholic. It’s a wonderful time to be a priest. It is a time of great opportunity to embark upon the great adventure of Christian discipleship and the priesthood.
A priest is many things to many people, and that has not changed. It has always been so. Today, however, the expectations are perhaps different, certainly more complex, maybe more demanding than before in an age of Christendom. The culture could be relied upon to encourage us, to sustain us, to understand us. A priest is always a steward, a steward of the mysteries of God. A priest is a pastoral leader. He’s a shepherd. A priest is an ambassador of the temporal goods of the Church, called to be a good steward.
Through Holy Orders, every priest shares sacramentally in the threefold office of Jesus our High Priest, who is teacher, who is shepherd, who is sanctifier. But, priesthood is not merely what we do. It is a life. It is an identity, rooted in our very being. It is a call from the Lord Jesus, a call to mission. At the heart of this priestly identity is a friendship. “Peter, do you love me?” “Peter, do you love me more than these?” Tend my lambs; feed my sheep. “Peter, do you love me?” Jesus calls each and every priest to be his friend and to share his life. It is from that special intimate friendship, from the intimacy born of daily conversation with Jesus in prayer and reflection on his Word, rooted in a sacramental communion with Jesus Christ as Head, Shepherd and Spouse of the Church that the fruitfulness of our priestly ministry flows. “I have told you this that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete!”
Today, we are rejoicing, are we not, that the Lord continues to call men to this special friendship, to anoint and consecrate for service those he has chosen from among us for a special share in his one eternal priesthood, the priesthood of Jesus Christ.
This is a day of tremendous rejoicing and gladness for the Church in the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City. The Lord has chosen one of our own for this dignity. He has blessed us with a new priest who is prepared to dedicate his entire life to serving this Church as a herald of the Gospel, a minister of God’s grace and mercy and a leader and shepherd of his people, prepared to lay down his life; prepared to offer himself. This is a day of special joy for our presbyterate our priests as we welcome into our ranks a new brother, a new friend, a new co-worker.
Though many, many have had a part to play over the years in encouraging and preparing Deacon Brannon for his priestly vocation, few if any have had as much influence as the members of his own family, especially you Gloria and Brannon’s late father, Louis. Thank you for the life and love that you have given him and the faith you have nurtured in him. On behalf of the entire archdiocesan family, I thank you for your generosity and sacrifice in offering us the gift of your son for service to the Church. I want to acknowledge and thank also Father Brian Kiely. Father Kiely is the rector of Pope Saint John XXIII Seminary. I thank you Father Kiely for your work and the work of your seminary community with Deacon Brannon in preparing him and so many others for priestly ministry in the Church.
My dear brothers and sisters, because Brannon, our son, brother and friend is now to be advanced to the Order of Priests, we must consider carefully the nature of this rank in the Church to which he is about to be raised and the ministry he is about to assume.
It is true that God has made his entire holy people a royal priesthood in Christ. Nevertheless, our great High Priest himself, Jesus Christ, chose certain disciples to carry out publicly in his name, and on behalf of all, a priestly office in the Church. For Christ was sent by the Father and he in turn sent the Apostles into the world, so that through them and through their successors, the bishops, he might continue to exercise his office of Teacher, Priest, and Shepherd. Indeed, priests are established as co-workers with the Order of Bishops, with whom they are joined in the priestly office and with whom they are called to the service of the people of God.
After mature, lengthy discernment and deliberation and years of formation, Deacon Brannon Lepak, is now to be ordained to the priesthood so as to serve Christ as teacher, priest and shepherd, by whose ministry his body, that is, the Church, is built up and grows into the people of God, a holy temple.
In being configured to Christ the eternal High Priest and joined to the priesthood of the bishops, Brannon will be consecrated as a true priest of the New Testament, to preach the Gospel, to shepherd God’s people, to celebrate the sacred liturgy, especially the Lord’s sacrifice.
Now, Deacon Brannon, you are to be raised to the Order of the Priesthood. For your part you will exercise the sacred duty of teaching in the name of Christ the Teacher. Be submissive to the Word with the obedience of faith. Impart to everyone the Word of God, which you have received with joy. Prayerfully meditating each day on the law of the Lord, see that you believe what you read, that you teach in its fullness what you believe, and that you practice what you teach. Thus, your teaching, your preaching will have the ring of authority and compelling power of the truth.
In this way, let what you teach be nourishment for the people of God. Let the holiness of your life be a delightful fragrance to Christ’s faithful, so that by word and example you may build up the house which is God’s Church. And by your joyful witness draw others whom the Lord will call to follow him in priestly service and lives of special consecration. Our greatest tool for promoting vocations to the priesthood is happy and joyful priests! Let your people, especially the young, see and experience the joy you have in serving the Lord and giving yourself generously in love for his people. What a blessing to have so many of our seminarians with us today, who are also discerning and responding to the Lord.
Likewise, Deacon Brannon, you will exercise in Christ the office of sanctifying. For by your ministry the spiritual sacrifice of the faithful will be made perfect, being united to the sacrifice of Christ, which will be offered through your hands on the altar, in union with the faithful, in the celebration of the sacraments. As a steward of the mysteries of the Lord’s death and resurrection, you must constantly strive to put to death whatever in your heart, mind or body is sinful, and to walk in newness and holiness of life.
Remember that when you gather others into the people of God through Baptism, and when you forgive sins in the name of Christ and the Church in the Sacrament of Penance; when you comfort the sick and anoint them with holy oil and celebrate the sacred rites, when you offer prayers of praise and thanksgiving to God in the Liturgy of the Hours, not only for the people of God but for the whole world – remember then that you are taken from among men and women and appointed on their behalf for those things that pertain to God. You are to be a bridge, pontific, a bridge between heaven and earth, bringing Jesus to the world and bringing your brothers and sisters to Jesus. Therefore, carry out the ministry of Christ the Priest with humility and in simplicity of life, with constant joy and genuine love, attending not to your own concerns but always to the concerns of Jesus Christ. Be a man of God and a man of prayer. It is only through prayer that you will be able to sustain and grow in that personal intimacy and friendship with Jesus Christ who will be your source of joy and apostolic fruitfulness. It comes from him.
Finally, Deacon Brannon, exercising for your part the office of Christ, Head and Shepherd, while united with the bishop and obedient to him, strive to bring the faithful together into one family, in unity, so that you may lead them to God the Father through Christ in the Holy Spirit. Keep always before your eyes the example of the Good Shepherd who came not to be served but to serve, and who came to seek out and save what was lost.