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 Dear
Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Welcome to our celebration of the Second Sunday of
Advent! Today, as we light our second candle on our Advent wreath, we continue
to prepare our hearts for the return of Jesus. And today, in the beginning of
his Gospel, St. Mark introduces us to John the Baptist, who calls us to repent
and return to God. Everything about John the Baptist is radical. John was
“in-your-face” kind of guy. He didn’t mince words when it came to calling God’s
people to repent and believe. We should take seriously his words this weekend,
as he once again addresses them to us!
Certainly the best way for us to respond to John the
Baptist’s challenge is for us to go to Reconciliation. Our Advent Communal
Penance Service is this coming Thursday evening, Dec. 11th,
at 7:00 PM, right here in our main sanctuary. It is my sincere hope that as
many of you as possible will be able to join us Thursday evening, to receive
God’s mercy and forgiveness. I remind you again of just how important these
penance services are to a Parish of our size and situation. Unfortunately,
there’s no way that Fr. Dale and I can hear everybody’s Confessions, by
ourselves, before Christmas. That means that as Catholic Christians here at St.
Maria Goretti, we really need to take advantage of these opportunities where
there will be many priests available to help us receive the Sacrament of
Reconciliation. If you can’t make it to our Service on Thursday evening, then
maybe you could make it to one of the others in the surrounding area. They are
all listed in this week’s bulletin. The most important thing is that all of us
take responsibility for making sure that we get ourselves and our families to
Confession before Christmas.
All of us sin. All of us make mistakes. All of us hurt
God and hurt each other. We all need this Sacrament and this fresh start before
we get to Christmas. I’m always amazed at how many Catholics haven’t gone to
Confession for years. How can anybody deny themselves God’s love and grace in
this way? Going to Confession may still not be my favorite thing to do, but I
don’t want to ever miss the opportunity to turn back to God and to prove to Him
just how much I love Him. And when we give Him that chance, well that is
exactly when He best proves His love for all of us! Going to Confession is not
supposed to be torture. I’ve gone to Confession my whole life and I’ve never
been yelled at, or treated poorly, or looked down on. That’s not what the
priest is there for. He’s there to help you to receive both God’s and the
Church’s forgiveness. I did have a priest once, and it was at St. Peter’s in
Rome, actually fall asleep on me while I was going to Confession. I have always
chalked this up to the priest not getting enough sleep the night before, and not
to how boring my sins were.
This week, we need to take a good hard look at our own
lives, and call to mind all of the times that we have offended God. Far too
often, we are much better at doing this for others, than what we are at doing it
for ourselves. What’s a serious sin? Unfortunately, far too much of the time,
those kind of sins are those really bad things that so many other people are
doing, and not what we ourselves are doing. We blind ourselves to our own
wrong-doing and sinfulness, all the while being so quick to judge what our
brothers and sisters are doing. In fact, one of the best reasons for becoming a
regular penitent and for going to Confession on a regular basis, is that it
helps each of us to become more merciful to others. When we ourselves have
experienced God’s great mercy and forgiveness, it makes us a whole lot more will
to extend mercy and forgiveness to others. God’s got a great deal and a great
plan for us here, folks! All we have to do is take advantage of it, and go to
Confession. We ALL need to be here on Thursday evening. Start making your list
of things that need to be Confessed, now! It is exactly what John the Baptist
is calling us to, this week, in our Gospel.
Tomorrow, Monday, December 8th,
is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. It is a Holy Day of Obligation.
Because the Vigil for the Feast Day falls on Sunday, no Vigil Mass is allowed.
So there will be only two Masses for the Holy Day, and those are at 8:00 AM
tomorrow morning with our school community and at 5:30 PM tomorrow evening. It
is also the Fourth Anniversary of the Dedication of our church.
These are great days! Advent is truly a very special
time of the year for Catholic Christians. Let us get the most out of these
days!
In Christ,
Fr. Kevin
In prayer, it is better to have a heart without words, than words
without a heart. |
