The week of installations

This is turning out to be the week for installing bishops in Canada. For the second time in as many days, one of the shepherds of the Church in Canada takes possession of his Diocese today and begins this new phase of his episcopal ministry.

Born in Ottawa (Ontario) on September 28, 1943, Brendan Michael O'Brien was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of Ottawa (Ontario) on June 1, 1968. On May 6, 1987, he was appointed Auxiliary Bishop of Ottawa where he served along with Archbishop Aurèle Plourde and Archbishop Marcel Gervais until May 5, 1993. On this latter date, he was named Bishop of Pembroke, Ottawa's neighboring diocese to the west. He served in Pembroke for seven years until he was named Archbishop of Saint John's, NF on December 4, 2000. Most recently (on June 1, 2007), Benedict XVI appointed Archbishop O'Brien to the See of Kingston, which has been vacant since the death of it's former shepherd Anthony Meagher on January 14, 2007. Archbishop O'Brien begins his ministry in the Archdiocese of Kingston today.

United with the Holy Father

On June 29, 2007, the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, Archbishop O'Brien was one of five Canadian Archbishops to participate in a special Mass celebrated in the piazza of Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome. Every year, on this Feast, the Holy Father presents newly-named Metropolitan Archbishops (those who have pastoral charge for specific Archdioceses throughout the world), and those who have been transferred to Metropolitan Archdioceses throughout the previous year with a pallium. Gérard Pettipas, C.Ss.R. of Grouard-McLellan (Alberta); Richard Smith (Edmonton); Terrence Prendergast, S.J., (Ottawa); Brendan O’Brien (Kingston) and Thomas Collins (Toronto) were all in attendance for the celebration in Rome and received their pallia from the hands of the Holy Fahter himself.

A pallium is a circle of wool that hangs around the neck and shoulders of the Archbishop with two long pieces draping one over the chest and the other along the back. It is decorated with six black crosses and weighed with pieces of lead.

The wool for the pallium comes from two lambs offered every year to the Pope on January 21, the Feast of St. Agnes. They are first taken to the Church of St. Agnes to be blessed. The lambs arrive wearing floral crowns, one white and one red. These represent the purity of Agnes, which the archbishops should emulate, and the martyrdom of Agnes, which the archbishops should be prepared to follow.

The lambs are then shorn and the pallia are made. On the eve of the feast of the great apostles Peter and Paul (June 28), the pallia are stored overnight in the silver casket above Peter's tomb in the Vatican crypt. The following day (June 29) the pallia are given to the newly appointed metropolitan bishops, the only occasion in which more than one bishop can be seen wearing the pallium at the same time. Symbolically, the Pope is sharing his mission to "Feed my sheep and lambs" with the archbishops. The wool over the shoulders evokes the lamb over the shoulders of the Good Shepherd. It also reminds the archbishops of the burdens of their office. By investing each new Archbishop with the pallium, the Holy Father confers some of his own weight and responsibilities on him.

At his own inauguration of Petrine Ministry as Bishop of Rome on April 24, 2005, Pope Benedict XVI spoke moving words about the pallium he had received during that ceremony: “The symbolism of the Pallium is even more concrete: the lamb’s wool is meant to represent the lost, sick or weak sheep which the shepherd places on his shoulders and carries to the waters of life.