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 Dear
Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Today is Divine Mercy Sunday, as we come to our last day of
the Octave of Easter. We continue to celebrate the Resurrection of
the Lord, as today we remember His merciful grace that He offers to
each and every one of us. There will be Eucharistic Adoration today
following the 10:00 AM Mass until 4:00 PM this afternoon. At 3:00
PM, we will be praying the Divine Mercy Chaplet together. All are
invited to stop by church this afternoon and spend a little time
with Jesus, showing Him your gratitude for His saving graces! The
Congregation for Divine Worship in Rome decreed on May 23rd,
2000, that “throughout the world, the Second Sunday of Easter will
receive the name Divine Mercy Sunday, a perennial invitation to the
Christian world to face, with confidence in divine benevolence, the
difficulties and trials that humankind will experience in the years
to come.” The devotion to the Divine Mercy was promoted by Saint
Faustina Kowalska, who was canonized on April 30th,
2000 by Pope John Paul II. It is my hope that as many of us as
possible will be able to stop by and pray this afternoon, on this
important new Feast Day.
I would again like to thank everyone who worked so hard to make last
week’s Masses and liturgies so nice for all of us. The Easter
decoration are once again beautiful, thanks to Joleen McCann and our
wonderful decorating committee. It’s like the Garden of Eden up
there around the Altar, and it smells nice too! Our music was once
again beautiful and inspiring. I thank Cathy Rund and all of our
music groups who worked overtime getting everything ready for Holy
Week and Easter. I was so moved by the prayers and music offered
AFTER the Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday. I get
goose-bumps just thinking about it. It reminds me why Holy Thursday
is always one of my favorite nights of the year! I’d also like to
thank our high school teens for doing the readings during Adoration
on Holy Thursday night. You guys did a great job! I also thank our
Lectors, including the sponsors from this year’s RCIA class who read
at the Easter Vigil, our Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion,
our Ministers of Welcome, our Temple Knights of the Holy Eucharist,
and ALL of our Altar Servers. I offer my gratitude to Deacon Steve
and our seminarians, Josh Bennett and Clayton Thompson, for all
their help, to all our sacristans, who make life so much easier
these days, to the Boy Scouts who cleaned up the grounds for Easter
AND built the Easter fire, to our Jr. High students in HOPE, who
filled hundreds of plastic Easter eggs with candy for the Easter Egg
Hunt, and to the Holy Name Society for sponsoring the Easter Egg
Hunt for our youngest SMG angels. It was a great Easter! Thanks to
everybody who helped out!
As you may have seen in last week’s
The Catholic Moment,
our Diocesan newspaper, our Diocese has issued a warning concerning
the upcoming Susan G. Komen’s Race for the Cure. We are starting to
see more and more in local media for this event which is coming up
in just a couple of weeks. The basic goal of the race, and indeed
the Susan G. Komen foundation, which sponsors the race as one of its
main fundraisers, is to raise funds for Breast Cancer research and
to eventually wipe out breast cancer. This is a goal that we can
all agree with and pray for. As Catholic Christians, especially in
our community, we would all like for nothing more than for breast
cancer to wiped out as soon as possible. The problems lies in the
way that the Susan G. Komen organization goes about it. According
to the Diocese, “Due to its policy allowing affiliates (including
Planned Parenthood) to offer financial support to abortion,
providing facilities, and endorsement of embryonic stem cell
research, and the continued denial that abortion may in fact well
lead to the development of breast cancer, it is NOT appropriate for
Catholics to participate in the Susan G. Komen’s Race for the
Cure.” The statement goes on to encourage all Catholics to consider
making donations to local Catholic hospitals that “provide breast
cancer services including detection, treatment, research, and
patient support groups.” Perhaps before we sign up for the Race
for the Cure, or pledge any money toward it, maybe we need to think
more about what we are doing and get more information on exactly
where this money goes. The Diocesan statement is trying to help all
of us to make good decisions and stay well-informed.
This weekend we pray for all of our sisters who are making Women’s
Christ Renews His Parish Weekend #16. I continue to be awed by the
great things that happen at Christ Renews His Parish weekends. Let
us pray for all of the ladies involved this weekend. May the Holy
Spirit continue doing good things among us!
Alleluia! He is Risen! Have a great week! In Christ,
Fr. Kevin
If Christ be not risen, the dreadful consequence is not that death
ends life, but that we are still in our sins.
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