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July 28, 2019, 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

Dear Friends,

Today we celebrate the Parents’ Day! I am very grateful to our lovely parents who are so committed to their faith. They love God so deeply that they want to honor him by perpetuating it to their future generation. We understand that parenting today has become a massive challenge and an enormous responsibility. It comes naturally to some and they love to raise children joyfully. Yet some find it enormously challenging and tediously laborious. Yet we know as Christians that the parents have a special responsibility for fostering Christian virtues within their children. 

What should be the goal of parents?  Most parents would love for their children to be good and productive members of society. But as Catholics we have a totally different perspective on parenting. Ken Yasinski, a Catholic speaker, says: “My number one priority is to get my children to heaven… because this is God’s priority for them as well. The duty of every parent is to raise their children in the ways of God… We are to raise World Changers whose focus is their holiness and the holiness of others; who develop the gifts and talents not to help themselves but to help build the kingdom of God… Nature tells us dead fish always floats downstream. Growing in Christ always is an uphill battle.”

In this context I love for you to consider the role of grandparents who impart so much of influence in the faith life of their grandchildren.  In certain cases, if not for the grandparents most grandchildren would never be baptized or even come to church to celebrate the Eucharist. While I admire all of our parents for their commitment and dedication, I want to especially thank the grandparents for their unrelenting, unconditional and undying love for their grandchildren and for their one great priority in getting their family to heaven. As Deacon Gary and Kay Aitchison would say: “They are our models, mentors and memory-makers.”

Any wonder why they bond so well with their grandchildren? The late humorist Sam Levinson once described it by saying, “The reason grandparents and grandchildren get along so well is because they have a common enemy!”

Every year on the 26th July our Holy Mother Church celebrates the feast of Saints Joachim and Anne, the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the grandparents of Jesus. Sadly, we do not have any mention of them in the scriptures but we do know from tradition a few things about them. I give below a brief narration about them as given by Robert Ritchie:

“Although Scripture is silent about the grandparents of Jesus, tradition tells us that Saints Anne and Joachim were married for many years before God blessed them with a child. During those years, they fasted, prayed and wept, mourning the child that would not come.

Years of longing did not weaken their trust in God, but grief eventually drove Saint Joachim into the wilderness to fast and pray. Saint Anne, remaining at home, dressed in mourning clothes and wept because she had no child of her own. Seeing her mistress distressed, a servant girl reminded Anne to put her trust in God. Saint Anne washed her face, put on her bridal clothes and went to a garden to plead with God for a child.

Angels appeared to Saint Anne in her garden and Saint Joachim in the desert, promising that, despite their old age, they would give birth to a child who would be known throughout the world. The new parents ran to meet one another at Jerusalem’s Golden Gate, and rejoiced in the new life which God had promised would be theirs.

When that child became a woman and pronounced her "Fiat" to Saint Gabriel, Saints Anne and Joachim saw an even more wondrous answer to their prayers. Not just a grandchild, but a Savior who was God Himself, Jesus Christ.”

Let us look to Saints Joachim and Anne for a model of perseverance and trust in God’s mercy.  Let us pray that our families here in St. John’s might be willing to model their lives on that of Mother Mary and her parents Joachim and Anne. May they protect and safeguard our families.

Today we celebrate the 17th Sunday C and the readings from the Book of Genesis and the Gospel of Luke invite us to reflect on the power of prayer and how we need to persist in asking God for what we truly need. Again, please be reminded that prayer not getting what we want but it is aligning our will to the will of God. May our lives and the goals of our lives be one that will align with God’s purpose for us!

Happy Parents’ Day!

Have a Blessed Week!

With love,

Fr. John

CHAPTER III  DIES ECCLESIAE (Continued)

The Eucharistic Assembly: Heart of Sunday

From Mass to "mission"

  1. Receiving the Bread of Life, the disciples of Christ ready themselves to undertake with the strength of the Risen Lord and his Spirit the tasks which await them in their ordinary life. For the faithful who have understood the meaning of what they have done, the Eucharistic celebration does not stop at the church door. Like the first witnesses of the Resurrection, Christians who gather each Sunday to experience and proclaim the presence of the Risen Lord are called to evangelize and bear witness in their daily lives. Given this, the Prayer after Communion and the Concluding Rite — the Final Blessing and the Dismissal — need to be better valued and appreciated, so that all who have shared in the Eucharist may come to a deeper sense of the responsibility which is entrusted to them. Once the assembly disperses, Christ's disciples return to their everyday surroundings with the commitment to make their whole life a gift, a spiritual sacrifice pleasing to God (cf. Rom 12:1). They feel indebted to their brothers and sisters because of what they have received in the celebration, not unlike the disciples of Emmaus who, once they had recognized the Risen Christ "in the breaking of the bread" (cf. Lk 24:30-32), felt the need to return immediately to share with their brothers and sisters the joy of meeting the Lord (cf. Lk 24:33-35).

     The Sunday obligation 

  2. In his first Apology addressed to the Emperor Antoninus and the Senate, Saint Justin proudly described the Christian practice of the Sunday assembly, which gathered in one place Christians from both the city and the countryside.(76) When, during the persecution of Diocletian, their assemblies were banned with the greatest severity, many were courageous enough to defy the imperial decree and accepted death rather than miss the Sunday Eucharist. This was the case of the martyrs of Abitina, in Proconsular Africa, who replied to their accusers: "Without fear of any kind we have celebrated the Lord's Supper, because it cannot be missed; that is our law"; "We cannot live without the Lord's Supper". As she confessed her faith, one of the martyrs said: "Yes, I went to the assembly and I celebrated the Lord's Supper with my brothers and sisters, because I am a Christian".(77) 

  3. Since the Eucharist is the very heart of Sunday, it is clear why, from the earliest centuries, the Pastors of the Church have not ceased to remind the faithful of the need to take part in the liturgical assembly. "Leave everything on the Lord's Day", urges the third century text known as the Didascalia, "and run diligently to your assembly, because it is your praise of God. Otherwise, what excuse will they make to God, those who do not come together on the Lord's Day to hear the word of life and feed on the divine nourishment which lasts forever?".(75) The faithful have generally accepted this call of the Pastors with conviction of soul and, although there have been times and situations when this duty has not been perfectly met, one should never forget the genuine heroism of priests and faithful who have fulfilled this obligation even when faced with danger and the denial of religious freedom, as can be documented from the first centuries of Christianity up to our own time.

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    (75) II, 59, 2-3: ed. F. X. Funk, 1905, pp. 170-171.

    (76) Cf. Apologia I, 67, 3-5: PG 6, 430.

    (77) Acta SS. Saturnini, Dativi et aliorum plurimorum Martyrum in Africa, 7, 9, 10: PL 8, 707, 709-710.