|
 Dear
Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Welcome back as we continue our celebration of the
Octave of Christmas with the Feast of the Holy Family! Today we
remember that the Holy Family, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, are such
a great inspiration for all of us. It’s hard to be a family
today. It’s hard to really love one another. It’s hard not to
be selfish. It’s hard to serve others, especially others that
you know so very well, both the good about them and the bad!
And yet, the family is the basic building block of the Church.
If we can’t live together as families, then there is no way that
we are going to be able to live together as Church, which is
just a BIG family of believers. This Feast today then is
important for all of us in the Church. The Holy Family endured
many very trying times together. Just as God took care of them,
so too He takes care of all of us and our families. This Feast
is our Feast Day. What a fitting way to come to the end of our
eight days of the Octave of Christmas! The Christmas season
continues on until the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord on
January 8th.
We still have several days of celebrating to do before we go
back into Ordinary time. Next Sunday, is the Feast of the
Epiphany.
You may have read in
The Catholic Moment
last week, that our Diocese has prepared a batch of mid-year
clergy transfers to better meet the needs of the whole Local
Church. Just south of us, at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish,
they are losing Fr. Dominic Young, who is going to Lafayette to
become the Pastor of St Ann Catholic Church in that city. This
transfer leaves Our Lady of Mt. Carmel very short on priests.
The Bishop has asked St. Maria Goretti to help with this
situation until next summer and the priesthood ordinations in
June. And so effective January 15th,
Fr. Dale Ehrman, who is in residence here at St. Maria Goretti,
with assignment to Saint Theodore Guerin High School, will begin
helping out with weekend Masses at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel. This
will mean that we won’t see a lot of Fr. Dale until June. He
will still maintain his residence here at our rectory. On
weekends when Fr. Dale is gone or has obligations at the high
school, Fr. Joshua or myself will help out also at Our Lady of
Mt. Carmel. This will mean some sacrificing on all of us here
at St. Maria Goretti for a few months. It is not permanent.
But it is what needs to be done at this time to cover the
shortage at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel. Once again, this should be
a wake-up call to all of us to keep praying for more Diocesan
priests and to keep praying for the priests that we have. Today
we are always just a couple of emergencies away from the
re-shuffling that can occur that can lead to our losing our
priests. Hopefully all of this can go smoothly as we do our
best to keep both of these parishes strong and active.
This weekend we are putting into place for good the
changes that we tried two weeks ago. I remind you that now, the
signal for everyone to kneel down after the Communion
procession, is when the LAST person goes to Communion up front.
Please do not wait until the priest kneels down. Now, in order
to get us in line with the Vatican’s decision that priests and
deacons must purify the patens and chalices after Communion,
while you kneel down and pray after Communion, the presiding
priest along with Deacon Steve if he is present, will “purify”
the patens and chalices immediately after Communion while the
rest of us begin our prayer and meditation. Following Mass, the
Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion will wash the patens
and chalices with hot soapy water AFTER the priest or deacon has
removed all particles and drops of the Body and Blood during
Mass. This is not a big deal. It doesn’t affect most of us
except we will get to kneel down a little bit earlier. The
Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion now all need to take
the patens to the main altar and the cups to the creedance table
after they are finished giving Communion. We can do this
easily. And it keeps us in line with what the Holy Father is
asking us to do to safeguard the Holy Eucharist.
Speaking of the Holy Eucharist, PLEASE remember to
keep your appointment with Jesus for Adoration. We cannot leave
the Eucharist alone. If you can’t be there during your
scheduled time, please get a substitute to help you out that
week. The Adoration Chapel IS OPEN regular hours on Monday, New
Year’s Day and throughout the rest of the week. Remember also
that this year, the Feast of Mary, Mother of God, is NOT a holy
day of obligation because it falls on Monday. We will celebrate
the Feast with Masses tomorrow at 9:00 AM in the main sanctuary
and at 5:30 PM in the Daily Mass Chapel. Mass tonight at 5:00
PM is for the Feast of the Holy Family.
We do wish you a Happy, Safe, and Healthy New Year in
2007! Have a great New Year’s!
In Christ,
Fr. Kevin
A true Christian is a man who never forgets for even a
moment what God has done for him in Christ. |
