Installation of Bishop Slawomir Szkredka as Episcopal Vicar of the Santa Barbara Pastoral Region

Most Reverend José H. Gomez
Archbishop of Los Angeles

Mission Basilica San Buenaventura
Ventura, California
November 26, 2023

My brothers and sisters in Christ,¹

I’m very happy to be with all of you today for this special celebration of the Eucharist. And especially for the installation of the new regional bishop of this pastoral region.

So we are gathered today to celebrate a special moment in the life of the family of God, as we install our brother, Bishop Slawomir, as episcopal vicar for the Santa Barbara Pastoral Region of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

And I was thinking that it is fitting that we are here in this historic mission, the final one established by St. Junípero Serra, the great apostle to California and, in a sense, the spiritual founder of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

We ask St. Junípero to pray for us, especially for our brother Bishop Slawomir.

Through his intercession we ask for the strength and courage to continue the urgent work that he started — to proclaim Jesus Christ and his salvation to every heart in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and to grow the Kingdom of God in America!

The bishop, before all else, is an apostle. He carries on the commission that Jesus gave to his Church — to go into all the world and preach the Gospel to the whole creation!²

And the message we proclaim is that God is the Creator of the universe, the Lord of history, and the Author of every life.

And God wants to make this whole world into his kingdom, to make all of us one family, to unite all things and every person in him, as brothers and sisters, children of God.

That is the meaning of the great solemnity that we celebrate today.
 
Christ is King, but he is not like any king this world has ever seen. And his Kingdom is not like any earthly kingdom.

Our King, Jesus, wears a crown of thorns. Our King comes to serve, not to be served.

The rulers of this world, Jesus once said, lord it over their subjects. But it is not that way with him.

We all remember that beautiful, tender image of the Last Supper, when he knelt before his apostles and washed their feet.

Our King comes as a servant, and he comes as a shepherd, as we hear in the first reading this afternoon, from the prophet Ezekiel.

“I will rescue them from every place where they are scattered,” he tells us. “The lost I will seek out, the strayed I will bring back, the injured I will bind up, the sick I will heal.”

So this is the mission of the Church, and the bishop is called to lead us, and to lead us in the footsteps of our King who is the Good Shepherd.

Like Jesus, the bishop must be the servant of his people, leading by his humility, by his generosity and sacrifice.

Like Jesus, the bishop must go and seek out the lost, he must go to all the dark and clouded places where the people are scattered, to the “peripheries,” as Pope Francis likes to say.

And we know, my dear brothers and sisters, that so many of our neighbors cannot find their way. As St. Paul tell us today:

“Christ has been raised from the dead. So too in Christ shall all be brought to life.”

This is, my brothers and sisters, the word of hope that we hold out to our neighbors!

Bishop Szkredka, I pray that you will proclaim this word always with confidence and joy! Always know that this word is the truth that sets men and women free!

God’s Kingdom comes in the love of the King, who laid down his life for us, giving his Body and Blood for every person on the cross.

Now he invites all of us to follow him on the path that he sets before us, which is the path of love.

As his bishop, my brother, you are called to lead us along this path, the path of love.

In the kingdom of love, we are called to love others with the same heart, with the same intensity and passion, that Jesus loved. Not only in word or speech, but in deed and in truth.³

That is the meaning of this great parable of the last judgment that he tells us in our Gospel this afternoon:

“Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of the least brothers of mine, you did for me.”

The Church’s mission is to seek the lost. But if we are going to reach them, if we are going to rescue them — then we need to recognize that it is Jesus who is suffering, it is Jesus whom we meet in our brothers and sisters.

Only love can heal all the anguish in the world, all the heartache and suffering, all the injustice.

Only love can lead others to love, and to the God who is love.

That is our mission in the Church, my dear brothers and sisters.

So, today let us ask Jesus today to widen our hearts, and give us the courage of compassion —  the courage to accompany our brothers and sisters with understanding and affection, and lead them to the King of love and his Kingdom.

So we ask our Lord to pour out his graces especially on our new bishop, that he may lead us in this beautiful way of love. 

And may our Blessed Mother Mary, the Queen of Heaven, wrap us all and keep us in the mantle of her love.