Greetings in Christ!

May God bless our Palm Sunday with great love and give us a steady commitment to enter into this Holy Week with purpose.

Palm Sunday is the day that kicks off the Holiest Week of the Year. We commemorate the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem.  We call it Palm Sunday because we receive Palm branches which are then blessed and used in our procession into the Church.  We recall Jesus entry into Jerusalem and walk with him in his triumph.

For us, its the start of the week where we walk with Jesus on Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday.  This whole week, we ask for the grace to remain constantly conscious of who Jesus is and what He has done out of love for us.

One thing I always recommend is that each family in our parish commit to lighting a candle and placing it in a very obvious place in our house all week.  Each time we see it, we remember that this is not just another week: its a special, holy week.  You can even commit to a short prayer whenever you see it.  Here’s a few suggestions for a prayer to say:

“Jesus meek and humble of heart, make my heart like unto thine” (say 3x)

“For the sake of His sorrowful passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world”

“Draw me closer to your Sacred Heart, Oh Lord”

“Blessed Mother, walk with me as I walk with you through the Passion of your son”

These are suggestions, obviously, you can make your own prayer or choose another one…anything; just pray!!

Don’t forget our Holy Week Celebrations are at different times and this year, both St. Mary on the Lake and Sacred Heart are doing one Holy Week together.

Beyond our normal celebrations, I’m excited about another opportunity this year:

Apparently, for some time Sacred Heart in Hudson hosted an Ecumenical Prayer Service on Good Friday for all Christians who want to participate.  We are doing it again this year!  Any who are interested, please come to Sacred Heart at Noon on Good Friday for a brief (45 min?) time of prayer.  We will do a Biblical Stations of the Cross, which is a bit different from our usual Stations of the Cross.  I think its a great way for all people to see that, Catholic or Protestant, we want to work together for God’s Kingdom.  This does not “replace” our Good Friday Service at 3pm, its simply another way we can honor the supreme sacrifice of Our God.

Final note: don’t forget that Easter Sunday schedule is different than our usual Sunday schedule and, when we gather for mass, someone will probably be in your seat.  It’s your mission to pray for that person.  🙂

So…lots and lots this coming week: pray for the grace of conversion in each of us.  Pray for the grace to enter into His Passion so that we can enter into His Resurrection!

Greetings in Christ!

Just like last weeks bulletin, I’m writing this on March 3rd, before I head out for a week off.  Because of that, I obviously won’t be commenting on anything current.  Instead, its my hope to use this and the next article to hype our upcoming Triduum Feasts at Sacred Heart and St. Mary.  Last week, I posted on Good Friday and, this week, I want to walk us through Holy Saturday.

On Holy Thursday, we sat at the Last Supper with Jesus.  He washed our feet and gave us the gift of the Eucharist.  We then walked to the Garden with him.  On Friday, we walked through the passion with Jesus and spent Friday night “in the tomb” with Jesus.

With our service on Holy Saturday, we move from the tomb to the Glory of the Resurrection.   The service contains four parts: the service of Light, Liturgy of the Word, Christian Initiation and Renewal and Holy Eucharist.

The Service of Light begins outside where we bless our Easter Fire and Pascal Candle.  The mass continues inside in darkness to remind us of Jesus in the tomb.

The Darkness in Church continues as we move into the Liturgy of the Word, where we read multiple readings from the Old Testament.

Then, the lights will all come on as we sing the Gloria together and read from the New Testament.   The lights coming on and the Gloria being sung are the sign of our movement from the darkness of the tomb into the Glory of the Resurrection.   We haven’t sung or said the Gloria in more than six weeks and we rejoice at this time.

If you wish, you can bring bells to this service and ring them as we sing. We will read from the New Testament and Gospel and have a homily.

We then move into the time when we bring into the Church those who have been going through RCIA for the last many months.   This is a great and beautiful time where we remember our own baptism and thank God that we are a part of an unbroken chain of Catholicism and rejoice in those who join our faith.

Mass then proceeds as normal while we move into the Liturgy of the Eucharist as we usually do.

This service is long, but absolutely beautiful and, as with Holy Thursday and Good Friday, I strongly encourage all of us to make this our first priority: don’t miss this joy!

May Jesus bless our Lenten efforts!

Greetings in Christ!

I’m writing this on March 3rd, before I head out for a week off.  Because of that, I obviously won’t be commenting on anything current.  Instead, its my hope to use this and the next article to hype our upcoming Triduum Feasts at Sacred Heart and St. Mary.  Last week, I posted on Holy Thursday and, this week, I want to walk us through Good Friday Service.

A couple notes before I walk us through the service…

Please welcome Fr. John Quinn, who will speak on behalf of Cross Catholic Outreach, which was founded to create a meaningful link between parishes in America and the Church overseas in the Caribbean, Africa, Asia, Central and South America.  Please be generous in your response to Father’s appeal.

Please join us in or Lenten Holy Hour of Adoration on Wednesday, March 21st at 7:00 pm.  We will begin the Holy Hour with Eucharistic Adoration and Procession, followed by a homily and time for us to silently reflect on Jesus’ presence in our lives.

Our Good Friday Service for both our Parish Families will be at 3pm at Sacred Heart.

All the events of Good Friday are commemorated in the Stations of the Cross, the devotion we usually pray during Lent and especially on Good Friday.  Another devotional, the Acts of Reparation, may also be prayed.

Good Friday is a day of fasting within the Church. Traditionally, there is no Mass and no celebration of the Eucharist on Good Friday.  A service will still be prayed with communion which will come from hosts consecrated on Holy Thursday. Baptism, penance, and anointing of the sick may be performed, but only in unusual circumstances. Church bells are silent and the altars are left bare.

Good Friday is the day where we place our Spiritual Focus on the suffering and death of Jesus.  We recognize that our sins come with a terrible price and that Jesus paid that price willingly out of love for us.  We pray that this day compels us to sorrow for our sins and a recognition of the love that drove Christ to such an incredible act.  Our celebration this day is not a mass, it’s called our Good Friday Service or Service of the Passion of the Lord and we will start it at 3pm, in honor of the moment in time that Jesus died.

This service begins in silence, with the clergy laying prostrate before the cross.  It continues with a reading from Scriptures and perhaps a homily that focuses on the role of suffering and loss in our life, as well as that of sin.   We then will pray a special set of prayers, asking God’s blessings and mercy on all areas of our world and Church.   Next, we adore the cross with a sign of reverence: some will kiss the cross, some will embrace it.  The key is for us to show our gratitude for the means that God saved us.

Finally, we will bring the Blessed Sacrament out from the place of reservation and all who are not prohibited can come forward to receive.  The service ends in silence.

This is a prayerful and amazing service and I cannot encourage us strongly enough to make it our highest priority: thanking Jesus for what He’s done for us and walking through His passion with him.

This year, we will also experience “Tenebrae”, which will be held at 8pm at St. Mary on the Lake on Good Friday.  Tenebrae is a church service observed during the final part of Holy Week commemorating the sufferings and death of Christ.

May Jesus bless our Lenten efforts!

Greetings in Christ!  A blessed and holy lent to you all!

The culmination of our Lenten season is the Triduum and I wanted to take a few articles in the bulletin to describe each service in order to encourage as much participation as possible in these wonderful, holy days.  This week, we’ll look at Holy Thursday, my favorite of the three Holy Days.

Both our parishes will celebrate Holy Thursday at St. Mary on the Lake this year. We’ll gather at 7:00pm.  This is the day where we, as Catholics focus on the Gift of the Eucharist.  We have only one mass this day at Church, with a special mass also at the Cathedral in the Morning.

For priests, the day will start at the Cathedral in Lansing.  We gather there at 10:30am for the Chrism mass.  At this mass, the Bishop will bless the oils that every Church in our diocese will use over the next year.  Also at that mass, all Priests will renew their vows.  This is an exciting and blessed celebration; please remember to pray for priests to be faithful followers of Christ and servants of His People.

After that, we will celebrate a mass on Holy Thursday night called The Mass of the Lord’s Supper.  Here, we remember the Last Supper Jesus celebrated with His disciples to begin His passion and death.  In a unique way, we recall the events of the Last Supper and include within this some beautiful rituals.  We have a procession of the oils we will use for the rest of the year: the ones I will bring back from the Morning mass at the Cathedral.  We also will remember and celebrate Jesus washing the feet of His Disciples, in order to connect in hearts the necessity of our love of the Eucharist compelling us to serve our fellow human beings.

As Jesus left the Last Supper to go to the Garden of Gethsemane, we process with the Eucharist out of the Church and down to the Parish Hall, where we will place the Blessed Sacrament.  Here, we will incense the Blessed Sacrament and sit in silence for a bit.  All who wish are encouraged to stay and pray in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament for a bit.

I’m very excited for this celebration…I hope we make this our top priority for our families, forsaking sports and all other things to gather together and pray.

Now, for a schedule update…

I’m heading off Sunday, March 4th to take a week off.  To be honest, I’m really quite wiped out and could use a week of rest.   Please pray for me and know that I will definitely be praying for you, both in gratitude and petition.  I carry my beautiful parish families with me wherever I go.

Father John Quinn will be visiting our parish next weekend to speak at all the Masses on behalf of Cross Catholic Outreach.  Thank you Fr. Quinn and all those who work to create a meaningful link between parishes in America and the priests and nuns working in the Church overseas in the Caribbean, Africa, Asia, Central and South America.

I’m so very grateful to be your priest!  Make sure and push hard through this Lenten Season to sacrifice, pray and help others with all you have and are!