My Dear Parishioners: One of the most wonderful things about our Catholic faith is that it is very incarnational. By this I mean that not only our minds, but our bodies and senses, too, are engaged completely when we worship during Mass. For example, scented incense is sometimes used to represent our prayers rising to…
Pastor’s Corner
November 7 – Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time
My Dear Parishioners: “It’s all taking and no giving!” as Dolly Parton belted it out, in the Film: Working Nine to Five, and her next line was to mock that way of life: “What a way to make a living!”. Today’s Scriptures point to another way. The good life manages to blend gracious taking with…
October 31 – Thirty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time
My Dear Parishioners: Jesus has just given us his challenging advice on how to be good people. He has told us, in fact, how to be the best people we can be, and about the qualities he wants to see in us, his followers. A quick focus on those qualities shows us that they are…
October 24 – Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time
My Dear Parishioners: There are many stories in the gospel about blind people being healed, but this one about Bartimaeus is probably the best known, and it has a nice lesson for us. The poor man was blind, and when he heard that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, he had to make a choice,…
October 17 – Twenty-Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time
My Dear Parishioners: The theme of the willing servant matches the missionary ideal perfectly. The ideal missionary is so devoted to the good of the people whom s/he is sent to serve that they plan both their activities and their life-style to match the real needs of those people. There is a huge effort of…
Mass Intentions Information and Guidelines
What does it mean to have a Mass “offered” for someone? ~ A Message from Father John Thomas An individual may ask a priest to offer a Mass for several reasons: for example, in thanksgiving, for the intentions of another person (such as on a birthday), or, as is most common, for the repose of…
October 10 – Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time
My Dear Parishioners: At first sight the young man comes across as an exceptionally good person, deferential to Jesus and somehow searching for the way of eternal life. He had kept God’s commands since his youth, and Jesus looked on him with love. An ideal person, you would think, to receive the gospel. And yet…
October 3 – Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time
My Dear Parishioners: According to Genesis chapter 2, God created man from the earth and God created woman from the side of man. This account has often been misinterpreted to suggest the subordination of woman to man. The translation ‘helpmate’ is not an accurate translation of the Hebrew word. Something like ‘indispensable partner’ would be…
September 26 – Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time
My Dear Parishioners: More than once I have had the experience of walking along and then suddenly falling forward, having stubbed my foot against a slightly raised paving slab. Sometimes the very paving that is meant to help us walk safely can prove to be a stumbling stone because they are out of alignment with…
September 19 – Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
What does it mean to have a Mass “offered” for someone? An individual may ask a priest to offer a Mass for several reasons: for example, in thanksgiving, for the intentions of another person (such as on a birthday), or, as is most common, for the repose of the soul of someone who has died.…