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 Dear
Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
As we gather together today to celebrate the Sixth
Sunday of the Easter season, we also celebrate and give thanks
for all of our mothers on this Mother’s Day 2007. The vocation
of motherhood is one of the most blessed of all vocations, for a
mother gets to perform that most unique role in a child’s life
that is never duplicated. We pray for all of our mothers today,
both living and deceased, in gratitude for all that they have
shared with us in making us the person that we are. Happy
Mother’s Day, Moms!
The weather’s warming up. The grass is greener than
ever. The leaves are filling out on the trees. And the prices
of strawberries and watermelon have started to come down. This
can mean only one thing: summer is almost here! As we head into
summer, I need to mention a couple of things once again.
First of all, it is so very important to this community,
that if you are traveling this summer or going to be away even
for one weekend, that you send your envelope in or drop it off
at the Parish Office. St. Maria Goretti is relying on the
support of each and every one of us each week, including during
the summertime, just to get by. We need your tithe. This
summer, more than ever, we are already starting out our summer
pretty far behind where our budget says that we need to be. A
bad summer of giving could really get our Parish family into a
real mess. We’re already headed in that direction. The time to
prevent this is right now. We need to catch up on our giving
AND we need to make sure that we keep up our tithe all through
the summer, even when we are traveling or not going to be here.
The Parish is counting on each one of us. It really is time
that each person and every family prayed about and re-evaluated
our giving. There’s something wrong when a parish of our size
can’t reach its budgeted projection week after week. I’d ask
you to think and pray about this. Are you doing your part?
Could you do more?
And beyond the financial aspect of our summer giving, is
the even more important prospect of our summer, Sunday Mass
attendance. For some reason, some Catholics feel like attending
Mass during the summer becomes more of an optional thing. This
couldn’t be farther from the truth! Every Sunday, we have an
obligation as Catholics to attend Mass. We should even do our
absolute best to find a Mass when we we’re traveling and on the
road. Just think of how angry we would be with God if God took
the summer off from us every year! What if God said, hey, it’s
summer time, I deserve a little break, so I’m not going to
listen to any prayers, and I’m not going to bestow any blessings
or graces, and I’m not going to forgive any sins. Thank God
that God doesn’t work the same way that some of us do! You
can’t take the summer off from Faith. I don’t know where some
of you got that idea. There seems to be some correlation
between Mass attendance and whether or not PRE is in session, in
that Mass attendance is higher when we have PRE. What message
is this sending to our children and our young people, when we
tell that PRE is so important that they have to be at that, but
they don’t have to go to Mass when we don’t have PRE? This is
terribly distorted and messed up. Mass is ALWAYS the priority,
especially Sunday Mass when there is a moral obligation on the
part of all Catholics to attend every Sunday. There should
never be a choice between PRE and Mass either. It is always
both, not one or the other, and Sunday Mass should never lose
out to anything.
Finally, I also remind you that St. Maria Goretti has a
very, very good air conditioning system. We are very blessed.
We can pray AND stay cool even on the warmest days of the
summer. This should allow all of us to come to Mass properly
and modestly dressed for prayer and for God. It kills me that
we will get more dressed up to go to nice restaurant in town,
than what we are willing to do to come and meet Jesus once a
week. And no, you’re right, God is probably really glad that
you’re just here. But doesn’t it show Him how much we love Him
that we wear our best and honor Him and His day? Mass, even in
the summer, is not the time to wear clothes that are more
appropriate at the gym or the beach. Perhaps we have become so
laid back about wearing whatever we want, wherever we want, that
we can forget that coming to Mass and Church is not like
anything else that we do. Here, we come to meet God and invite
God into our lives. Shouldn’t even our clothing, and our dress,
reflect our respect and the priority that Mass should be to each
one of us? Think about it. Maybe you could talk about this as
a family this week.
It’s going to be a great summer. It will be an even
greater summer if we can keep these things in mind. Have an
awesome week!
In Christ,
Fr. Kevin
It matters not how a man dies, but how he lives!
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