Greetings and Happy Father’s Day. Blessings to all our fathers, grandfathers, great-grandfathers, godfathers, and fathers-in-law. May you and your families have a very special day, filled with grace and heavenly blessings as we pray: You are God: we praise you; you are the Lord: we acclaim you; you are the eternal Father: all creation worships you. To you all angels, all… Read More »Happy Father’s Day!
“It must be tremendously interesting to be a schoolmaster, to watch boys grow up and help them along; to see their characters develop and what they become when they leave school and the world gets hold of them. I don’t see how you could ever get old in a world that’s always young.” Goodbye, Mr. Chips It is graduation time,… Read More »2023 Graduation!
The National Eucharist Revival is a three year endeavor for the Church in the United States “to be healed, converted, formed, and unified by an encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist – and then sent out on mission for the life of the world.” The year-long initial phase on the Diocesan level concludes this week. A National Eucharistic Congress, celebrated… Read More »National Eucharist Revival
I once celebrated a funeral Mass for a woman who was one of the first to drive across the Walt Whitman Bridge. Her father was one of the bridge builders, and she was entrusted with the task of motoring over the Delaware River. Her first of many such peregrinations from Philly to the Jersey Shore, but probably the only one… Read More »Walt Witman
The Memorial of St. Philip Neri is on Friday, 26 May. St. Philip was a member of one of the greatest canonization classes in the history of the Church. Canonized with him on 12 March, 1622 were St. Teresa of Avila, St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Francis Xavier, and St. Isidore. St. Isidore was a twelfth century farmer; but the… Read More »Fire-pit Discussions
Happy Mother’s Day. Blessings to all our mothers, grandmothers, great-grandmothers, godmothers, and mothers-in-law. May you and your families have a very special day, filled with grace, as we offer this prayer to our Blessed Mother. Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of mercy. Hail, our life, our sweetness, and our hope. To thee do we cry poor banished children of Eve; to… Read More »Happy Mother’s Day!
Given the light but steady rain of the previous night, the early morning humidity was not unexpected. Yet somehow the chapel’s floor maintained its chill. It was nearly nippy. This welcome temperature transition seemed to be mindful of the moment at hand. The Ontological Change of the Sacrament was within reach. The lay bowing to the clerical. I was soon… Read More »Ordination Season
May begins tomorrow and it launches us into a very busy week liturgically. Our week begins with the celebration of the memorial of St. Joseph the Worker, on Monday, 1 May. This feast was instituted by Pope Pius XII in 1955 as a religious response to communist May Day celebrations. St. Joseph is the Patron Saint of the Universal Church… Read More »May the Fourth be with you
I spent some time this past week back at Little Flower High School with the Class of 2018. It was not for their fifth year reunion but for a more somber gathering. The bestowal of a class ring to the family of a student who died during the Easter Break of her Freshman year. The bestowal of the ring is… Read More »Circle…
Greetings. Today is Divine Mercy Sunday. This feast was instituted by Pope St. John Paul II in 2000. The feast of Divine Mercy originated from private revelations offered to Sr. Mary Faustina, in Poland, beginning in 1924 and culminating with the vision of Jesus as the “King of Divine Mercy” on 22 February 1931. Jesus, in this vision, asked Sr.… Read More »Divine Mercy Sunday