Visitation of Mary

It has been a few days since I last wrote one of my daily blogs. I am still on vacation but it will soon end on this feast of Mary as I return to my parishes. These have been good days of rest and relaxation. In the midst of these days I celebrated my birthday on the 27th, which also happened to be Pentecost Sunday, the birthday of the Church. Now, as the Church celebrates the Visitation of Mary, I also mark another important milestone as a priest. The Feast of the Visitation marks my 15th Anniversary as a priest. I have always had a special devotion to our Blessed Mother, so when it came time for me to pick an ordination date back in1997, I chose this feast. Thankfully, the date was open on the bishop's calendar and it just so happened to be on a Saturday. I thank God everyday for calling me to be a priest and it has been a joy and blessing to serve His people. Some time ago, I was preaching on the priesthood and I told the people if they were to ask me what I needed I would say two things: I ask your forgiveness because I am a sinner in need of God's mercy and forgiveness. I have faults, failings, and shortcomings. I always hope that people can forgive me for decisions that I have made as a priest and pastor. For times that I have not been nice on the phone or any other cordial setting. So, I can always use forgiveness. Secondly, I need prayers. Please pray for me and for my ministry as a priest. There have been challenges, struggles, blessings, and rewards these past 15 years and I am truly grateful to God for calling me to this beautiful vocation. As I mark this Anniversary of Ordination, I ask for God's continued blessing and the intercession of our Blessed Mother. Thank you for your prayers. May God Bless You!!!

New Technology

I hope everyone has had a blessed week! I am on vacation with Fr. Tom and it has been a good week! We have gotten some good days of bike riding in, some disc golf, and seeing the sights! Father Tom has always been good with new technology, using the gifts of communication very well. Today I ended up getting an upgrade to my technology by getting an iPhone and iPad. I am still learning but these are wonderful tools to help in the New Evangelization. We need to use our resources to get the message of Jesus Christ to our brothers and sisters. This way we can always send a blog no matter where we are to share the Good News and check out resources to help us grow in our faith and keep the mission of the Church going. Our tools for media need to be used in the right way. May we do our part to share the Good News, especially as we prepare to celebrate the birthday of the Church this Sunday with the Solemnity of Pentecost! God Bless You!!!

The Ascension Continues!!!

We have now begun the week between the Ascension and Pentecost Sunday, after celebrating the Feast of the Ascension on May 20th. These feasts may be one day but what we gain from them is eternal. Jesus instructed his disciples to go out into the whole world and proclaim the Good News. In the scriptures for the Ascension, there were two different scenarios. The first reading, Acts 1:1-10, after Jesus ascended, the disciples stood there looking up into the sky and it was two angels that told them they needed to get to work. While in the gospel, Mark 16:15-20, we are told that after the Ascension the disciples went immediately to proclaim the Good News around the world. Whatever the scenario may be, our call is very clear as disciples' of Jesus, we have been entrusted with a great mission and we need to stick to it. Just as this commentator writes, "So, what do we walk away with today? We learn that the Church, the community of faith, has a mandate from Christ himself to preach the Gospel. This is the responsibility of the whole Church, including each of us as individuals. The reason we preach the Gospel is to share the good news that we will follow Christ and share in His glory. This is a message of hope and a promise that all of our spiritual work will be worth it. We cannot just stand around. Let's get busy. We have a message to announce" (The Priest, April 2012). That quote truly says it all. Each one of us is called to proclaim the Good News and we do so not just with words but by our very example in how we live our lives and our faith. The Dismissal at Mass calls us to continue the mission when we leave church. The dismissal that is appropriate for Mass on the Ascension and each day is, "Go and announce the Gospel of the Lord." We have been renewed by God's Word and nourished by the Body and Blood of Christ, now we need to put what we have received into practice. Let us pray that we may follow the mandate of the Lord to proclaim the Good News and live with the promise that our Lord is with us until the end of the age. God Bless You and Your Journey!!! On a Personal Note: I have reached the time for vacation. I will be away from some days of rest and relaxation and will try and get a blog written during that time. Please keep me and Fr. Tom (the priest I vacation with) in your prayers!

Graduation Time

We are at that time of the year where graduations are taking place. Young people in college, high school, 8th grade are moving on their educational endeavors or putting their learning to use in the work force. This is also a special time for those seminarians who have completed their seminary training and will be ordained as priests as the summer moves forward. The Diocese of Salina will ordain two men this coming Saturday. This past Monday evening, St. John Catholic School in Hanover had their Eighth Grade Promotion. This weekend, Washington High School and Hanover High School will have their graduation ceremonies. To begin, our Catholic students will attend Mass as a class on Sunday. Much has been accomplished by our young people! They have completed their education in one area and will begin anew elsewhere. However, their Catholic faith is not completed. As I told the 8th Graders on Monday evening, since it was the Feast of Saint Matthias, you are now witnesses of the Lord's resurrection and His working in our lives. We never graduate from living our Catholic faith. That is the beautiful gift that sustains us throughout our lives. Above all, I told them to make attendance at Mass an important part of their spiritual lives and to pray daily, several times a day in fact. In line with the Vine and the branches, we need to stay connected to the True Vine who is Jesus Christ. As branches, the Lord is relying on us to continue the mission entrusted to us and we will bear much fruit. Hopefully our young people are listening because they are not only our future leaders in society and the Church, but they are the Church of today. Our young people have a very important role to play and we need to give them our encouragement and prayerful support. We ask God to bless our young people and bless our graduates as they begin a new chapter in their lives. Always remember, the foundation has been poured to live your faith and you continue to build upon that structure each day. May our graduates be those people who stay close to the Vine of Christ, be witnesses of the Lord's resurrection, and be those faithful, dedicated disciples that will bear much fruit. God Bless You!!!

The Command of Love

It seems there are those weeks where the Mass readings have a central theme and sometimes you feel there is a sense of urgency when those themes are repeated. This week the focus has been on "Love." For three days we have been listening to the 15th chapter of Saint John's Gospel. On Wednesday, we heard the gospel from last weekend, "The Vine and the branches..." Then, yesterday and today, we have listened to the gospel passages about love. As a preview, we will also listen to the passages on love this weekend, especially if you hear the gospel from the Sixth Sunday of Easter. In John 15:12-17, Jesus says right at the beginning, "This is my commandment: love one another as I love you." The passage concludes with Jesus saying, "This I command you: love one another." Twice, Jesus reinforces the gift of love is a commandment. He even says that elsewhere in the gospels when he is questioned about what the great commandment is. At that time the Lord tells us the great commandment is to love God and to love our neighbor as ourself. Love is a beautiful gift and it is also a challenge! Maybe we find it difficult to show our love to someone or sometimes people struggle in their relationship with God and may find it hard to love Him. God loves us unconditionally! In fact, God loves us so much that He sent His only Son to be our Savior. Jesus is the ultimate example of this verse, "No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends." Jesus gave his all when he was nailed to the cross. That love extends to the resurrection because our Lord wants us to share in his gift of eternal life. Love is a key component in our lives and in our relationships and maybe that is where the urgency comes from. We live in a world that needs love. Perhaps that love needs to happen in our own communities, families, and churches. If we are going to preach love, we need to live it. As the song says, "They Will Know We Are Christians By Our Love..." Let us pray that the love of God will flow through our minds and hearts and radiate toward others. Love is a great gift and we need to share it now! Have a blessed day!!!

Saint Damien de Veuster

One of the beautiful features of the Third Edition, Roman Missal, is that we are introduced to some saints who have been canonized in recent years. I have seen them in other resources and have used their prayers on occasion to celebrate their life and the gift they are to the church. Now, we get to share fully by having their prayers in the Roman Missal. Today is a beautiful feast! It is the memorial of Saint Damien de Veuster. As his biography says, "Damien de Veuster was born in Tremeloo, Belgium, in 1840. He joined the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts, and volunteered for the missions in Hawaii where he was ordained to the priesthood upon his arrival in 1864. In 1873 he began his ministry among the quarantined lepers of Moloka'i until his death of leprosy in 1889. Blessed John Paul II beatified him in 1995, and Pope Benedict XVI canonized him in 2009" (Magnificat, 128). Truly, Saint Damien is a saint for our time, just being canonized several years ago. We thank God for the gift of this priest and saint of the Church. As the Collect read, "Saint Damien a shining witness of love for the poorest and most abandoned" (128). The gospel for his memorial is very appropriate, John 15:9-11. Jesus says to his disciples, "As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain in my love." The love that Jesus shares with us is the same love that Saint Damien shared with those he ministered to. Saint Damien gave his life to minister to those who suffered from leprosy, so much so that he suffered from the same disease and died from it. He lived his life, faith, and ministry to the fullest and he did so with great love. Saint Damien de Veuster, a saint for our times and an example that we can follow as we share the life and love of Christ with others. Saint Damien, pray for us!!!

The True Vine

Jesus Christ is the True Vine!!! Once again, the Church hears the call to stay connected to the vine because we are the branches. This past weekend we heard the gospel about Jesus being the vine and us being the branches. Now, we hear it again on this day, John 15:1-8. The Church gives us these beautiful reminders and hopefully we take them to heart. My homily over the weekend began with the story about the statue of Jesus that was in a church heavily damaged by a storm. When the parishioners came in to look everything over they noticed that the hands on the statue were broken off and someone had hung a sign around the statue that read, "I have no hands but yours." Saint Teresa of Avila offers this quote that coincides with that story: "Christ has no body but yours, no hands, no feet on earth but yours; yours are the eyes with which he looks compassionately at the world, yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good, and yours are the hands with which he is to bless us now" (Sunday Homily Helps, Franciscan Media). The commentator went on to say that Christ relies on the branches to continue the mission entrusted to them. Jesus wants us to remain connected to him, the true vine. As he says at the conclusion of the gospel from John, "By this is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples." There is no Plan B, Jesus is relying on us, just as he relied on the disciples before us. In order to accomplish the tasks given to us, we need to stay connected to the vine through Mass, the Sacraments, and Prayer. Do not be afraid to stay connected to Christ for he is the true vine. With our connection to the vine, we are fed and nourished so that we can truly become the Lord's disciples and bear much fruit. Have a blessed day!!!