Dear Friends,
I am so grateful to all of you for your wishes and prayers for my 60th birthday. I thank God and my parents for their gifts to me that allow me to serve you as I do. I thank each and every one of you for your help in making my ministry here worthwhile and productive. A special thanks to Shamir, Lou Seiler, Kathy Badger, and the many, many parishioners who organized the celebration, arranged for and took part in the video project, prepared the food, and did all the other needful things to create the event. I cannot possibly repay the out pouring of love shown to me except to offer my prayers for you every day. THANK YOU for the expression of your love. I ask all of you, beloved brothers and sisters, to continue to pray for me, that I may to serve you with even more zeal, love, and joy!
We now enter the heart of Advent. The Third Week of Advent begins with what is known as Gaudete Sunday or Rejoice Sunday. Paul conveys the tone of the week when he says to the Thessalonians (Th 5: 16): Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus. Hmm, a great verse for our pondering. How can we rejoice in all circumstances? Is this possible, even when we are experiencing dark valleys of pain or suffering on account of so many things, even loss or approaching death? I think we can, but only if we are rooted in Christ. That’s what the saints teach us. So then, I say to you: Rejoice in all circumstances!
On Tuesday, 19th December, we have the opportunity to experience the Stations of the Crib in the Church at 7 p.m. This is a very peaceful, meditative encounter with the events leading up the Birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. The contemplative experience will be enhanced by beautiful songs that reflect on the meaning of these events. Please do not miss it.
Congratulations to Louis and Catherine Cardinale, the recipients of the Family of the Month award for December 2023. Both Lou and Cathy were among the founding members of our parish, and they have been actively involved in many ministries ever since, including leading the Rosary after the weekday Masses since 2007. Thank you, Lou and Cathy, for your dedication to our parish family.
Please know that because the 4th Sunday of Advent falls on 24th December, we have a unique problem that comes only every once in a while. How can we both meet our Sunday Mass obligation and yet also welcome our Lord in one of the special Christmas Masses? To make it easier on the clergy and yet accommodate the need to celebrate both the last Sunday in Advent and the Solemnity of Christmas, we have arranged the Masses for December 23 – 25, 2023 in this manner:
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 23
VIGIL MASS FOR THE 4TH SUNDAY OF ADVENT 4:30 P.M.
THE 4TH SUNDAY OF ADVENT
REGULAR MASSES on SUNDAY DECEMBER 24
No Mass at 7:15 A.M.
MASS AT 9:00 A.M. ; MASS AT 11:00 A.M.
CHRISTMAS EVE
MASSES on SUNDAY, DECEMBER 24; 4:00 P.M.; 6:00 P.M.; 8:00 P.M. ;
MIDNIGHT (12:00 A.M.)
CHRISTMAS DAY
MASSES on MONDAY, DECEMBER 25; 10:00 A.M.
1:00 P.M. - Mass in Tamil Language
Let us now move forward with the Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation of Pope Benedict XVI entitled: Sacramentum Caritatis. Continue to enjoy the Season of Advent!
With love,
Fr. John
W e e k 25 — SA C R A M E N T U M C A R I T AT I S ( TH E SA C R A M E N T O F C H A R I T Y : T H E E U C H AR I ST )
CONTINUATION OF THE POST-SYNODAL APOSTOLIC EXHORTATION SACRAMENTUM CARITATIS OF THE HOLY FATHER BENEDICT XVI TO THE BISHOPS, CLERGY, CONSECRATED PERSONS AND THE LAY FAITHFUL ON THE EUCHARIST AS THE SOURCE AND SUMMIT OF THE CHURCH'S LIFE AND MISSION
P A R T T H R E E : T H E E U C H A R I ST , A M Y ST E R Y T O B E L I V E D
"As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats me will live because of me" (Jn 6:57)
THE EUCHARISTIC FORM OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE
SPIRITUAL WORSHIP – LOGIKÉ LATREÍA (ROM 12:1)
- The Lord Jesus, who became for us the food of truth and love, speaks of the gift of his life and assures us that "if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever" (Jn 6:51). This "eternal life" begins in us even now, thanks to the transformation effected in us by the gift of the Eucharist: "He who eats me will live because of me" (Jn 6:57). These words of Jesus make us realize how the mystery "believed" and "celebrated" contains an innate power making it the principle of new life within us and the form of our Christian existence. By receiving the body and blood of Jesus Christ we become sharers in the divine life in an ever more adult and conscious way. Here too, we can apply Saint Augustine's words, in his Confessions, about the eternal Logos as the food of our souls. Stressing the mysterious nature of this food, Augustine imagines the Lord saying to him: "I am the food of grown men; grow, and you shall feed upon me; nor shall you change me, like the food of your flesh, into yourself, but you shall be changed into " (198) It is not the eucharistic food that is changed into us, but rather we who are mysteriously transformed by it. Christ nourishes us by uniting us to himself; "he draws us into himself."(199)
Here the eucharistic celebration appears in all its power as the source and summit of the Church's life, since it expresses at once both the origin and the fulfilment of the new and definitive worship of God, the logiké latreía. (200) Saint Paul's exhortation to the Romans in this regard is a concise description of how the Eucharist makes our whole life a spiritual worship pleasing to God: "I appeal to you therefore, my brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship" (Rom 12:1). In these words the new worship appears as a total self-offering made in communion with the whole Church. The Apostle's insistence on the offering of our bodies emphasizes the concrete human reality of a worship which is anything but disincarnate. The Bishop of Hippo goes on to say that "this is the sacrifice of Christians: that we, though many, are one body in Christ. The Church celebrates this mystery in the sacrament of the altar, as the faithful know, and there she shows them clearly that in what is offered, she herself is offered." (201) Catholic doctrine, in fact, affirms that the Eucharist, as the sacrifice of Christ, is also the sacrifice of the Church, and thus of all the faithful. (202) This insistence on sacrifice – a "making sacred" – expresses all the existential depth implied in the transformation of our human reality as taken up by Christ (cf. Phil 3:12).
THE ALL-ENCOMPASSING EFFECT OF EUCHARISTIC WORSHIP
- Christianity's new worship includes and transfigures every aspect of life: "Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God" (1 Cor 10:31). Christians, in all their actions, are called to offer true worship to Here the intrinsically eucharistic nature of Christian life begins to take shape. The Eucharist, since it embraces the concrete, everyday existence of the believer, makes possible, day by day, the progressive transfiguration of all those called by grace to reflect the image of the Son of God (cf. Rom 8:29ff.). There is nothing authentically human – our thoughts and affections, our words and deeds – that does not find in the sacrament of the Eucharist the form it needs to be lived to the full. Here we can see the full human import of the radical newness brought by Christ in the Eucharist: the worship of God in our lives cannot be relegated to something private and individual, but tends by its nature to permeate every aspect of our existence. Worship pleasing to God thus becomes a new way of living our whole life, each particular moment of which is lifted up, since it is lived as part of a relationship with Christ and as an offering to God. The glory of God is the living man (cf. 1 Cor 10:31). And the life of man is the vision of God. (203)
IUXTA DOMINICAM VIVENTES – LIVING IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LORD'S DAY
- From the beginning Christians were clearly conscious of this radical newness which the Eucharist brings to human The faithful immediately perceived the profound influence of the eucharistic celebration on their manner of life. Saint Ignatius of Antioch expressed this truth when he called Christians "those who have attained a new hope," and described them as "those living in accordance with the Lord's Day" (iuxta dominicam viventes). (204) This phrase of the great Antiochene martyr highlights the connection between the reality of the Eucharist and everyday Christian life. The Christians' customary practice of gathering on the first day after the Sabbath to celebrate the resurrection of Christ – according to the account of Saint Justin Martyr(205) – is also what defines the form of a life renewed by an encounter with Christ. Saint Ignatius' phrase – "living in accordance with the Lord's Day" – also emphasizes that this holy day becomes paradigmatic for every other day of the week. Indeed, it is defined by something more than the simple suspension of one's ordinary activities, a sort of parenthesis in one's usual daily rhythm. Christians have always experienced this day as the first day of the week, since it commemorates the radical newness brought by Christ. Sunday is thus the day when Christians rediscover the eucharistic form which their lives are meant to have. "Living in accordance with the Lord's Day" means living in the awareness of the liberation brought by Christ and making our lives a constant self-offering to God, so that his victory may be fully revealed to all humanity through a profoundly renewed existence.
(198) VII, 10, 16: PL 32, 742.
(199) Benedict XVI, Homily at Marienfeld Esplanade (21 August 2005): AAS 97 (2005), 892; Homily for the Vigil of Pentecost(3 June 2006): AAS 98 (2006), 505.
(200) Relatio post disceptationem, 6, 47: L'Osservatore Romano, 14 October 2005, pp. 5-6; Propositio 43
(201) De Civitate Dei,X, 6: PL 41,
(202) Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1368.
(203) Saint Irenaeus,Adv. Haer., IV, 20, 7: PG 7, 1037.
(204) Ad Magnes.,9, 1: PG 5, 670.
(205) Cf. I Apologia,67, 1-6; 66: PG 6, 430ff., 427, 430.