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UPDATE May 14, 2020 Message from Bishop O'Connell UPDATE May 13, 2020 Bishop O'Connell Announces Phase One Reopening Click here for OLPH Plans for Phase One ReopeningMasses are being held privately and broadcasted to the internet. We encourage all of our parishioners to live their spiritual lives the best they can from home. Tune into YouTube messages from Father Wilson Follow us on:
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Pentecost & Memory
Dear Parish Family,
Remember where you were this time last year? I do! Eating lamb chops and running around the parking lot making sure everyone was having a good time. It was our 100th Anniversary Parish Celebration. Bishop O’Connell presided over a glorious Mass. The church was full and the party afterwards was a tremendous sign of the love that knits our parish family together.
I also celebrated 10 years of priesthood. I offered my first Mass, by God’s grace, on the Solemnity of Pentecost, which perfectly corresponds with this year’s calendar. So, the same date -- May 31st - in 2009 and in 2020 occurs on the same day on both secular and liturgical calendars. Today is Pentecost, the day to focus on the Holy Spirit and the Birthday of the Church.
Heartache and Hope
Dear Parish Family,
This weekend we observe Memorial Day, a time when we remember those who have sacrificed for the greater good of the nation. During this time of pandemic our realization of the true breadth of that number grows. We can see more clearly now - during these days - the nurses & doctors in the fields of our bloodiest war, the Civil War, amputating grizzly limbs from soldiers with little anesthetic. Scars remain on the bodies of young men sent to war against their brothers, but also etched in the minds of those who cared for the wounded and the dead. The sacrifice of war permeated our whole society. It is not merely the sacrifice of the soldier, as heroic as that is, but really the cost paid by the nation. Memorial Day began to recall the great cost of fighting a war.
40 Days to Make a Habit
Dear sisters and brothers,
Experts say it takes 40 days to make a habit. We have been in lock down, since - more or less - March 15th. So, we have passed the 40 day mark. Who’s counting?! In the first few days and weeks of our new temporary reality, things were topsy-turvy like those tea-cup rides down the shore that make me mildly seasick. Do not get on one of those rides having recently consumed a bag of popcorn and a snowcone. Interesting memory!
We are also approaching the holy Ascension, 40 days after the Resurrection, Jesus ascends to our Father to take his seat at the right hand in glory. Normally, we keep the Ascension on Thursday. Many dioceses around the country have transferred the Solemnity to the following Sunday. This year, in the light of the pandemic, we are doing the same. So next Sunday, May 24th will be Ascension Thursday. A Sunday becomes a Thursday…. Ha! Only in liturgical time.
