Friday-March 29th * 24 Hours For The Lord * 15 Hours Adoration and Confession * starting at 8 am with Mass * 8:30 am Confessions and Adoration until Midnight * 3 pm Divine Chaplet and Rosary * at Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish in Mfld.
0 Comments
From the Pope
In The Pope Video for the month of March, a project of the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network, Francis says that “it might be hard for us to believe, but there are more martyrs today than in the first centuries,” because “they speak the truth and proclaim Jesus Christ.” And this despite being “in countries where, in theory and on paper, they protect freedom and human rights.” He asks us all to “pray that Christian communities, especially those who are persecuted, feel that they are close to Christ and have their rights respected.” Read More... Information Meeting for Adventure Camp and Steubenville Rochester. April 9th, 6:30pm-7:30pm in the St. Francis Room of St. John's Primary School. There is an Adventure Camp Scholarship due April 1st (before the meeting), please contact me for details. Adventure Camp will be August 4th-9th, and Steubenville Rochester will be July 12-14th. Adventure Camp will be $450 for youth and $300 for chaperones. Hope you can join us! Praised be Jesus Christ! If you attended Mass in the Diocese of La Crosse last weekend you heard something about Safehaven Sunday. As a follow up, I’d like to share a short scene from the book The Hiding Place: The author of the book is a little girl (10 or 11 years old) at the time of this scene (her name is Corrie Ten Boom – she’s the author of the book). She and her Dad are riding a train to Amsterdam and she had recently come across a word about human sexuality in a poem they read in school and she asks her father about it. Here’s the rest of the scene: He turned to look at me, as he always did when answering a question, but to my surprise he said nothing. At last he stood up, lifted his traveling case from the rack over our heads, and set it on the floor. “Will you carry it off the train, Corrie?” He said. I stood up and tugged at it. It was crammed with watches and spare parts he had purchased that morning. “It’s too heavy,” I said. “Yes,” he said. “And it would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a load. It’s the same way, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you.” And I was satisfied. More than satisfied – wonderfully at peace. There were answers to this and all my hard questions – for now I was content to leave them in my father’s keeping.” Now I found this to be just about the best explanation for preserving the innocence and wonder of our children. And that’s why pornography and its relatives are to be avoided and maybe even someday banned from our world. Recently Pope Francis spoke about the antecedents to child abuse, and pornography is almost without exception a constitutive part. Not everyone who looks at pornography abuses children, thanks be to God. But just about every abuser has indulged deeply in pornography and crossed the terrible threshold of realizing that just seeing such images was no longer enough. Pope Francis went on to point out how the devil is craftily leading us away from God by attacking the purity of our hearts. But God is never outdone. In fact, we must always remember that Jesus wins – He did at Calvary, He does in the confessional, and He will when Satan tempts us for the last time. Lent is a beautiful time for us to honestly approach God’s tender mercy and experience His relentless love. God never gave up on any sinner, and anyway, struggles with sins of the flesh are as old as the world. In the confessional we engage the spiritual battles that continue to rage in our time and place. An old priest once said, “A saint is just a sinner who loves God more than his sins.” And that is the key – plus priests who are available for confession and kind to people who struggle with habitual sins. Saint John Vianney was arguably the finest confessor of all time, and a story that appeared recently gave some insight as to why this was true. Young Vianney was to report for military duty, but somehow got lost on the way. When he came home his Dad was so angry at him that he would not allow him to enter the house. It turns out that while Vianney was lost, his brother had to take his place in the army and died on the German front. Vianney’s Mom, having thought that both of her sons were lost to her forever, died of grief. John Vianney was crushed by this and wrote many letters to his Dad begging for his pardon. Is it any wonder that once he became a priest Father John Vianney was so sensitive to the suffering of penitents who came to him filled with shame and guilt? And just like that, God drew a greater good from a sad situation than He would have had it never happened at all. God will do that with your sins if you trust Him enough to tell Him where it hurts.
May God heal our world of the sins that cause us the deepest shame and guilt so that we might know His joy! Your friend in Christ, Father Martin Evening of Recollection * Led by Fr. Martin * Eucharistic Adoration and Reflection * The evenings will alternate between St. John and Christ the King parishes. Time: 6:30 pm-8 pm Thursday–April 4, 2019 Theme: Interpreting Church Art @ Christ the King-Spencer.
Save the Dates! We will be attending Adventure Camp August 4th - 9th. Adventure Camp is open to students entering the 7th grade this fall through 12th grade. Adult chaperones are needed also. This experience is a perfect blend of fun and faith. Please contact me if you are interested in attending. There are scholarships and fundraising opportunities available. Praised be Jesus Christ! I recently read the book Walk-On Warrior, written by Marshfield native John Willkom. Some of you already know that he walked on at Marquette and the book makes it clear that playing basketball at the Division 1 level is not for the faint of heart. Many athletes dream of playing sports at the highest level, but little do they know what such dreams will require of them in terms of discipline and physical pain. A book like this confirms the idealism that mostly lies dormant in our hearts – so many of us have dreams that we shelve away for a variety of reasons as we pass through this life. The Church in her wisdom tries to animate these deep and often hidden desires and she does so most effectively by re- minding us that we’re made to live in Heaven. The problem is that spiritually we’re couch potatoes that could never abide the beauty and love of God in our present state. And so every Lent the Church challenges us to live more selflessly, to repent of pride and manipulation, and to truly imitate the life of Jesus Christ. When was the last time you made a heroic Lent? A priest named Father Rick Heilman in the Diocese of Madison has been challenging people to step up and really engage the season of Lent with more traditional spiritual practices. For example, he encourages fasting on bread and water at least once a week. Have you ever tried such a thing? The key is remembering why you’re doing it – Jesus Himself fasted for forty days in the desert so as to overcome temptation. Sadly, the meatless Fridays are not really leading people into heroic sacrifice and so fasting is a way to provide a counter-balance. Saint Bernard of Clairvaux accurately identifies our typical approach to preparing for Heaven: “Timid prayer does not pierce heaven, because immoderate fear binds the soul . . . being lukewarm, it (prayer) grows weak in its flight and falls because it has no strength. Prayer that is faithful, humble and fervent will undoubtedly pierce heaven and it will certainly not return fruitless.” By the way, Saint Bernard fasted and prayed a lot! What about some other penitential practices, you ask? Have you ever slept on the floor? Saint Francis slept on the ground for many years, often with a rock for his pillow. Now the goal is not to punish the body, but merely to discipline it. Athletes do this all the time and rarely are they criticized; when those who aspire to love God heroically do things to advance this noble cause, people get concerned and wax on about spiritual fanaticism. The best thing to do is let God inspire us and to try humbly to follow His lead. Some take cold showers as a form of penance – it’s a very effective way to save water, by the way! One thing about cold showers that makes such a practice more sustainable is to shower with warm water first, then turn to cold for the rinsing process – saying a set number of prayers is one way to place a limit on the experience. And then there are many things we can give up that are a daily reminder that we’re training to live in Heaven: alcohol, smoking, sweets, gossip, swearing, lying, cheating. When people say you don’t have to give up things anymore for Lent, it’s similar to saying that you don’t really have to practice to play basketball or in the band – just show up and everything will be fine! Silly human beings – we’re made for greatness but settle for so much less. Von Balthasar, the renowned 20th century theologian, put it like this: “It is as if modern man had had a tendon cut, so that he can no longer run toward his original goal, as if his wings had been clipped, as if his spiritual awareness of transcendence had withered. How can that have come about?” Fair question, don’t you think? In the immortal words of high school students everywhere, go big or go home – a worthy summons to make this Lent remarkable.
May God inspire us to discipline our will, so that we may choose Him and what He wants for us! |
MASS SCHEDULE
Tuesday - Friday: 8:00 AM Saturday: 4:00 PM Sunday: 8:00 AM & 10:00 AM RECONCILIATION
Saturday: 3:15 - 3:45 PM OFFICE HOURS
Monday - Thursday: 8:30 AM – 5:00 PM Friday: 8:30 AM – 12:30 PM Stay Connected with Our ParishWelcome from Our PastorWelcome to Christ the King Catholic Church! Ever since 1938 this parish has been assisting souls in their quest for deeper union with God. Our mission statement is essentially found in the stained glass window above the main altar: “For Christ our King.” Insofar as God made us and we belong to Him, we have come to... Read More
Archives
February 2021
Categories
All
|