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from 2023 Easter Pilgrimage for Young People to Rome, Assisi and Sansepolchro
Join Fr. Andrew O’Connor on a once-in-a-lifetime pilgrimage to Oberammergau, home of the Passion Play, with visits to Altotting, Munich, Hohenswangau, Salzburg, Cesky Krumlov and Prague!
Read More from Oberammergau Passion Play: Czech Republic, Austria & Germany
“A city should be a place where a little boy, walking through its streets can sense what he someday would like to be.”
“How does each of us hear them in his native language?” is the marvel that the many assembled witnessed when the Holy Spirt granted to humanity the healing of Babel. That each must tell their own story in their own tongue has been transformed to this universal story that everyone hears in a meaning that you can only access in your native tongue. Even the difference between “lengua nativa” in Spanish with “idioma” the common work for language seperates the word from the meaning of the word. Pentecost unites these…
First Holy Communion coincides with the birth of conscience for young people. Our conscience seeks to communicate in Jesus with the Father. We pray in our Eucharistic Prayers that the faithfully departed will behold the face of God as the fulness of living in God and it prepares us to receive the body of Christ. We pray that these children begin this path to holiness to live heaven in their earthly lives. We become what we do.
This week I have written a poem called “Woke Robin” that Doug Balliett is putting to music at the noon mass. The poem is based on Revelations 21, a favorite passage of mine, the second reading of the mass today, that I often have the groom in a wedding read to welcome the bride. “Revelation” as such simply means “lifting the veil.” Marriage was typically the first time that the groom would meet his bride…
n the religious sense of the Church of Jesus Christ is the mystical bride in the second reading from Revelation giving birth to all the saints of history who rejoice in the blood of the lamb. Mother and bride are unified in Christianity…
We are happy to announce that a former parishioner of St. Mary’s Parish Mr. Richard Ferreira has been called to the priesthood. The Most Reverend James F. Checchio, Bishop of the Diocese of Metuchen, to the Order of Diaconate will ordain him on Saturday, May 14, 2022 at the Cathedral of St. Francis of Assisi in Metuchen, New Jersey.
We pray that God will grant him the grace to accept whatever challenges, disappointments and acceptances that come his way. God Bless him always!
Fr. Andrew’s artwork is featured on p. 33 (spread 18 in the PDF).
Read More from Fr. Andrew’s Varela Mandorla sculpture featured in Archways
“Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion” – Palms signify “witnessing” to Christians. In Luke’s Gospel Jesus refers to himself at the “Son of Man” three times, identifying himself with us. Unbelievers ask if He is the “Son of God.” Disciples call him “Lord. “ In trial he is examined if he is the “Christ” of God or the king of the Jews. Jesus is spoken in narrative form 10 times and only once by name from the good thief. We witness, therefore, with our palms that he is “Lord.” But in mercy we call out to him using his holy name Jesus…
“All will be well” is a mantra from Julian of Norwich, an English mystic, that T. S. Eliot invokes in Little Gidding, the fourth of the Four Quartets poems written in England during the darkest days of WWII in 1942. “We will not cease from exploration/ And the end of all our exploring/ Will be to arrive where we started/ And know the place for the first time.” are the famous lines of the poem that invokes the fire of the Spirit that came onto the church at Pentecost…
The feast of St. Joseph reminds us of the church as a family. The old idea of a family is that of a “house” building up a amidst the decay of the world. New life emerges from the roots of faith…
“It was about eight days after he said this” is how Luke introduces the climb to the mount of transfiguration. “This” refers to accepting his cross. Think about how perplexing this was to the disciples…
A rooster and a goose fought at the Battle of Hastings
and they had a swan. They both rejected their progeny…
Welcome to Lent. Forty days of fasting, prayer and almsgiving that can be accomplished together in a way that is not possible outside of Lent…
“Repent and believe in the Gospel.” As we begin our Lenten pilgrimage, this year is marked with invasion in the Ukraine, a European war that we thought was part of black and white photos and an antiquarian fight of good against evil…
The Sermon from the Plain. Jesus fixes is eyes on his disciples and this great opening statement about the reign of God asks his disciples to draw happiness from this future event when in His mercy and love all will be made manifest. We are called be Jesus to live our faith in action.
When the Lord stepped aboard Peter’s fishing boat to hold steady before a crowd, to sit and to teach them, Jesus returned the favor by asking Peter to set out and drop nets for a catch. The love of Christ is the power of living in Him. The life of holiness could be felt by St. Peter in the first the pull of the nets. All things work to the good when unfettered from sin and death. Leaving the nets should be the first call of Christian life, specifically for the young to be supported and encouraged to consider religious life.
Word of God
Spoken first and heard last.
Unbegotten
Understood and standing stirring…
The First Miracle of Jesus is for the happiness of the human family. “You have saved the best wine until last” is the promise that betrothal to Christ in the sacramental life gives: beyond what we could plan or even desire in life, the water of our humanity has turned to wine. Let us be disposed to the Spirit, as Paul instructs us in the second reading, so that we may be ready to play our part.
Baptism of the Lord. In Luke’s Gospel God the Father speaks directly to his Son: “You are my beloved son. With you I am well pleased.” Later, in the Transfiguration the Father speaks from a cloud to his disciple: “This is my beloved son, listen to him.” The love of the Father for the Son, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit swirl around the meaning of baptism: the inner working of the trinitarian godhead. It is the taking flesh, its humility, with which the Father is well pleased. It bodes well for us that we are made to receive and to be filled with God in our humanity.
Let us practice looking up into the heavens.
Geometry proposes that whether close, middle or far
all angles sigh infinite sighs. You are standing beneath
and are determined by the heaven sent that changes but does not change: light and water…
St Mary’s Church
440 Grand Street
New York, NY 10002
St. Mary’s Rectory
28 Attorney Street
New York, NY 10002
(212) 674-3266
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