... topics and priorities?

Yeah.

Um, again, I think that, uh, uh, it's nothing new.

Uh, I live in a house, the first bishop's house in the United States.

And in my house, there was Gibbons and John Ireland, um, who were thought to be someone on the left, and then you had Bernard McQuaid of Rochester, uh, and others, uh, who would have had very different ideas about how the church ought to relate to the culture.

Um, and those were very real divisions, but there was an underlying sense of mission that the church had to grow as the United States grew and expanded westward, that we had to have schools, that we had to have charities, that we had to engage the immigrants that were pouring into our country at the time.

I, I think really, um, uh, for all of us, whether we are members of the laity in lay leadership or whether we are clergy who are in leadership, I think it's the focus on the person of Christ and on the mission, and it's allowing our faith to reset how we think and how we relate.

What do you think our Catholic tradition has to offer the United States in this 250th year?

We will now hear Archbishop Laurie's homily, consecrating the nation to the sacred heart as it approaches its 250th anniversary.

Brother bishops, dear priests and deacons, women and men in consecrated life, faithful lay women and men, dear friends in Christ all, What a remarkable moment of grace we are privileged to share.

On the threshold of our nation's 250th anniversary, we gather not first to celebrate ourselves, but to consecrate, to entrust, to place the Church in the United States, and indeed to place our whole nation into the sacred heart of Jesus Christ.

Why do we do this? Because consecration is an act of faith.

It is an acknowledgement that history is not simply the story of what human beings can accomplish.

It is the story of God's faithful love at work in the world.

We give thanks for the blessings of these past 250 years, but we do so with a humble faith, recognizing that every nation stands in need of God's mercy, wisdom, and guidance.

How do you hold those two in balance without simply reading the scriptures to suit the nation's moment or the nation to suit the scriptures, but actually to hear what was being invited of you in that moment?