It is that week here at Sacred Heart Major Seminary, mid-term exams. Of course, our students are not unlike students everywhere, somewhat panic stricken as they come face to face with the rewards of put-off-to-the last-minute-ism. Some mornings I think the seasonal affective disorder has struck the whole institution (the sun is having a tough time getting through the clouds) and the low point of Lent is upon us. It is so good to realize that our future priests are normal human beings, facing the unheavals and downheavals (is there such a word?) of a real world. My task as an “internal faculty member” is to help them graduate and be ordained as real people. Perhaps it is a noble task but it is also a somewhat scary task. It is so easy to drift off to the hopelessly liberal side or the equally hopeless conservative side, but the Church needs a clergy that is balanced in its viewpoint, solid in its prayer life and deeply committed to the ministry. I wish you could be here with these gentlemen…you would share my optimism about the future. Here we have the largest number of seminarians in thirty-eight years, exactly one hundred, and they have weathered the exhaustive screening process to enter into the formation and education program. We cannot leave aside, however, the work of the Holy Spirit. We may screen, test, form, educate, and evaluate until we are blue in the face, but our work is mere arm-waving if we do not have the Holy Spirit behind, within and before all we do. The prayers of the whole church for the success of the seminary work and the seminarians themselves is essential. Our begging of your prayers is not some formality, folks, it is a plea from the heart that what we do here will stretch the Church to answer the needs of its members, the world, and the young men who will carry on its work.