Dear Brothers and Sisters,

The season of Lent gives us a chance to strengthen our relationship with Our Lord. Through daily prayer, intentional fasting, and selfless almsgiving, our relationship with God and others can help us to grow in love. God is love and the two greatest commandments emphasize the love we are called to have as a disciple of Our Lord Jesus. These two commandments are: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:30-31}

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

The celebration of Holy Mass harkens back to the Jewish worship described in the Old Testament. It is good to remember that Christianity has its roots in the Jewish traditions. Christ, as a Jew, even said: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them” (Matthew 5:17). The Catholic Church, in her Sacred Liturgy, reaches back into the traditions of the past with great awareness of all that God has revealed throughout history. We don’t have to make up our own Mass, rather we are blessed to draw from the history of worshipping God as revealed in Sacred Scripture in connection with our Jewish brothers and sisters.

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

In his book, "Nothing Superfluous" Fr. James W. Jackson, FSSP, takes a deep dive into everything that has to do with the Holy Mass. This book is for those who want to know the meaning, depth, and beauty of Sacred Liturgy. If you ever wondered why a church building has stained glass windows, high ceilings, or a tabernacle, Fr. Jackson does a great job of answering these questions and many more. I highly recommend this book.

For the next few issues of my pastor's notes, I want to focus on the function and purpose of a Communion rail. As you know, our beautiful church was built with a traditional Communion rail. The Communion rail (also called the altar rail) separates the sanctuary area from the rest of the church area. This rail is called the Communion rail because this is the place where faithful are able to kneel or stand while receiving Holy Communion.

This Tuesday the Church observes the World Day of the Sick. We invite those who are suffering with any sickness, their caregivers and any medical workers to attend the 8:30am mass which will include special prayers and the celebration of the Anointing of the Sick.

Pope John Paul II initiated this day of prayer in 1993 to encourage people to pray for those who suffer from chronic illness/disease, for their caregivers and for medical personnel who assist the sick. If you are old enough to recall it, the Pope himself had been diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease a year before and many believe that it was his own experience of chronic illness that led him to inaugurate this day of prayer.

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

This Sunday we celebrate a special feast day called the "Presentation of the Lord". The presentation took place 40 days after Our Lord's birth which is February 2nd. This special feast day is also the day the Church blesses candles that are to be used in your home throughout the coming year. Also recognized as Candlemas, this event invites us to reflect on the recent celebration of Christmas and the birth of Christ. We should also turn our minds to the approaching season of Easter. The feast of Candlemas, which we celebrate today, can be traced to the year 543 where we first hear of the "Feast of the Lighted Candles."

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

The Wall Street Journal published an article in June of 2018 named, "The Catholic School Difference." It included the findings of a study by scholars at the University of California-Santa Barbara regarding the success of Catholic schools. Students in Catholic schools, "are more likely to control their temper, respect others' property, accept their fellow students' ideas, and handle peer pressure." In other words, Catholic School students exhibit more self-discipline and have a more productive environment in which to learn and academically and spiritually excel.

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Sadly, the unwillingness to offer real sacrifices and the lack of true love has led many people to believe that life is disposable. This tragic way of thinking has impacted our world in many negative ways i.e., marriages, families, workplaces, government, the economy, communities and even the Church.

It is so easy to become puffed up with pride and a false sense of self-reliance; many selfishly choose their own path; many seek to maximize personal pleasure and avoid giving of themselves in sacrificial love to others and therefore miss the beauty of God's creation all together.

Our Lord is the answer. His response to all the selfishness and hatred in our world can be found on the cross. He showed us how to love and how to see others as God sees them. Love always involves sacrifice. For example:

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Last year, the New York state legislature voted to allow the so called "fundamental right" to abortion in their state law and eliminate protections for preborn babies until birth. The bill asserts that "Every individual who becomes pregnant has the fundamental right to choose to carry the pregnancy to term, to give birth to a child, or to have an abortion." The bill also erases the state's recognition of preborn babies older than 24 weeks as potential homicide victims, removes abortion from the penal code entirely, and allows licensed health practitioners other than full doctors to commit abortions.

As Catholics we celebrate the Right to Life. We are Pro Life. Our Lord reminds us of the sacredness of every human life… born and unborn. Catholics have always held, and will always preach, the value of human life. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that:

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

In today's Gospel, we hear a strange conversation between Our Lord and John the Baptist. It is strange because John called people to repentance, to turn away from sin and turn to God. Jesus had no sins. Jesus is the Savior. Jesus doesn't need to repent, and therefore He has no need to be baptized. And yet, Our Lord shows up by the river and gets in line anyway. John sees him and objects, but Jesus insists on taking His place right beside those who need Him most.

This is exactly what Our Lord does for us at every Mass. Whenever we receive Holy Communion, we are receiving God himself as our nourishment. Our Lord could not be any closer to us than He is in Holy Communion. He desires to take His place right with us!

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

One of the great Christmas traditions of the Church is to bless one's house to start a new year. "Chalking the door" is a centuries-old custom in which Christians gather on the feast of the Epiphany to ask God's blessing on their home. A traditional way of doing this is to take a piece of blessed chalk and inscribe above the entrance door to the home the following: The "20" and "19" refer to the actual date. The "+" between the letters symbolize the cross of Christ. The "C M B " initials have two meanings: 1) The initials of the three magi: Caspar, Melchoir and Balthazar, the three wise kings or Magi who visited the Christ Child. 2) This is the abbreviated Latin phrase, Christus mansion benedicat, which translates as "May Christ bless the house."

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

As we celebrate Christmas, there is a tradition that comes to mind that expresses the transforming effect of Christ's birth. That is, at midnight, the children in England were given bells to ring throughout the house. It was to remind them of the end of the reign of Satan through the birth of the Newborn King. As the prophet Isaiah proclaims about this beautiful day, "The Trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised!"

During Christmas time, there is much to celebrate. This Advent has been a beautiful season of preparation and I am grateful to so many people this week for making our celebration meaningful and prayerful. I bring them to your attention with the hope that you might add a few prayers of thanksgiving for each of them in exchange for their service to our community!

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Despite many historians' attempts to link the Christmas tree to an ancient pagan practice, it is completely Christian in origin. The origin of the Christmas tree begins in the year 723. St. Boniface was blessed to bring the good news of Jesus Christ to areas of modern Germany and parts of the Netherlands. As he was evangelizing the pagans, St. Boniface discovered that every winter, uninformed folks from the village of Geismar gathered around a huge old oak tree known as the "Thunder Oak". The tree was dedicated to the god Thor. This annual winter event of worship centered on sacrificing a human, usually a small child, to the pagan god. St. Boniface's zeal for serving Our Lord and saving innocent children from being slaughtered, impelled him to help others to know the love of God in the person of Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit. St. Boniface came up with a plan to convert the entire village by destroying the Thunder Oak. This is the very tree that the pagans believed the God of Boniface could not destroy.

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice. Indeed, the Lord is near!

I have a good friend who is a priest and lives in Indiana. He is about six and a half feet tall! He tends to stand out in a crowd… especially when he wears his clerics. He usually comes to visit once a year or so. While in town, we often go hiking because we do have some amazing trails. So to get a little exercise, I decided it would be good to try climbing Camelback mountain. If you have never hiked this mountain, I have to say it is a difficult climb. My friend let me know that it is especially difficult for a guy with size 15 shoes! Hiking with skies for feet is hard enough but my friend is not all that coordinated either - as he reminded me all the way up the mountain! Actually, I was nervous for him! There were lots of obstacles along the path and crevices and sheer cliffs. He kept reminding me that there was a shortage of priests and perhaps we should turn back!

The Advent Calendar

The Advent calendar, or Adventhaus, began in Scandanavia and Germany. Its purpose is to help children become aware of the expectancy of Advent. Sometimes the Advent calendar is a picture of a house with 23 small windows and 1 large window that are opened to reveal the tiny religious symbols, icons and pictures behind them. Another variation is to construct a Jacob's Ladder that leads step by step to the day of Christ's birth. Every morning or every evening before bedtime, the child opens a window, behind which appears a star, an angel, a manger or some other picture appropriate to the Advent season. (If there are several children in the family, the privilege of opening the windows rotates from one to another). An appropriate bible verse can serve as a caption to the picture. On the 23rd, all twenty-three small windows are open; the big window remains closed until Christmas Eve, when it is opened to reveal the Holy Child in the manger. When all the windows are opened, stand the calendar in front of a lamp or window. The light will shine through the paper, giving the little house a Christmas glow.

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

The word Advent comes from the Latin words, advenire (to come to) & adventus (an arrival), and refers to Christ's coming into this world. The Advent season is a time of joyful expectation and preparation for Christmas, the day upon which Christ's birth is celebrated and His first coming into this world. The focus of Advent is upon the centuries of waiting and preparation by God's chosen people, which preceded the coming of the Messiah. As such, it is a time marked by expectation, hope, preparedness and penance. The latter being mindful of John the Baptist's cry to prepare for the coming of the Lord with repentance (Treasury of Latin Prayers by Michael Martin).