Bulletin for June 24

Dear friends in Christ,

Merry Christmas! ... Huh? While it’s true that we are in the middle of summer (or rather the start of it since the solstice was just this past Thursday), today in the Church we get a bit of the Advent and Christmas seasons as we mark the Nativity of St. John the Baptist. This is one of the feast days of the Church that, if it were to fall on a Tuesday or Thursday, you probably wouldn’t think twice about. But since it falls on a Sunday this year, it gets special prominence and that’s a good thing. Ordinarily the Church observes the day of a saint’s death as his feast, because that day marks his entrance into heaven. To this rule there are two notable exceptions, the birthdays of Blessed Mary and of St. John the Baptist. Allow me to let the great St. Augustine tell us the reasoning behind this celebration. He wrote:
 

“Apart from the most holy solemnity commemorating our Savior’s birth, the Church keeps the birthday of no other person except that of John the Baptist. (Note that the feasts of the Immaculate Conception and of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin had not yet been introduced at the time Augustine wrote this.) In the case of other saints or of God’s chosen ones, the Church, as you know, solemnizes the day on which they were reborn to everlasting beatitude after ending the trials of this life and gloriously triumphing over the world. For all these the final day of their lives, the day on which they completed their earthly service is honored. But for John the day of his birth, the day on which he began this mortal life is likewise sacred. The reason for this is, of course, that the Lord willed to announce to men His own coming through the Baptist, lest if He appeared suddenly, they would fail to recognize Him. John represented the Old Covenant and the Law. Therefore he preceded the Redeemer, even as the Law preceded and heralded the new dispensation of grace.”

In other words, today's feast anticipates the feast of Christmas and makes us aware of the wonderful inner relationship between the sacred mysteries. So while you don’t have to send out “Happy Nativity of St. John the Baptist” cards or attend a “St. John the Baptist” tacky sweater party today, we would do well to remember and honor this wonderful saint by going forth and announcing the Good News of Christ to all we encounter today.
    
In other news I’m often asked about how a young person can join our altar server ministry at CtR and I’m happy to say we’ve got two upcoming trainings in July. The summer is an excellent time for students to join this vibrant ministry. We’ll get you trained and up-to-speed in short order, and we’d love to have more young boys and girls join us. I’m proud of servers as they take their role seriously and provide a tremendous help to us in ministering to God’s people. They are an excellent example to the rest of the community about living out Stewardship by serving God and the community.

We have trainings scheduled on Saturday, July 7 from 1-3 p.m., and again on Sunday, July 29 from 1-3 p.m. Servers must be in 5th grade or above, and we ask that new servers attend two training sessions before we start to gradually ease them into the regular rotation. Don’t worry – we’ll give them solid formation and we have some excellent veteran servers who will help serve as their mentors along the way. For more information, see the Altar Server page on the website, or just come to the training session. 

This past week we held our annual Vacation Bible School (VBS) session at CtR. We welcomed more than 600 kids (yes, you read that right: 600!) and about 300 adults and teen volunteers and they were all over the Parish Life Center throughout the week. Once again we offered both morning and evening sessions and you could truly feel the spirit of Christ in the air. VBS is a wonderful summer tradition and a great way for our children to grow closer to the Lord. My extra special thanks goes to Linda Watso from our staff who oversees all aspects of VBS. She was more than capably assisted by a dedicated team of volunteers including, among others, Allyson Akins, Kim Carrillo, Heather Duskie, Karen Finke, Megan Schulz, Rose Locascio, and DeeDee Rzasnicki. Carol Kubeczka did a great job with the decorations, and Kathleen Griffin and Taylor Garcia were equally amazing by creating some stunning costumes.  The Knight of Columbus and Ladies Auxiliary also provided some much-needed man and woman power. Thanks to all who volunteered their time and talent. VBS is definitely Stewardship in action!

Speaking of the Knights, congratulations are in order for our KofC Council 8771 which holds its annual officer installation commissioning and banquet this weekend. A big thank you to Vince Palazzolo who is moving on after two years as Grand Knight. Vince did a tremendous job in his role and my brother Knights and I are grateful for his service to our Council and our community. He turns the gavel over to Bob Suarez, who I know will do an equally fine job in leading this vital ministry with the other new officers.

One area the KCs have always been supportive is with our youth and I again offer my sincere thanks to them for honoring 10 of our graduating seniors this weekend with a $2,000 Knights of Columbus Msgr. Anton Frank Council College Scholarship. This year’s recipients are: Katie Chen, William Fedor, Garrett Lax, Emily Najvar, Kelly Peters, Asher Saet, Tabitha Simper, Claire Speight, Julianna Vecchio and Venessa Weitzman. We thank the Knights for their generosity in supporting the future education of our graduates.

Lastly, thank you all for your prayers during our recent parish pilgrimage to Ireland. A group of 53 of us from CtR had an amazing and spirit-filled trip seeing all of the holy sites in that beautiful country. Though the highlights are too numerous to mention, I particularly was overjoyed to visit St. Colman Church in Cobh, where many of our Irish ancestors departed for the New World. The Cathedral there was just stunning, as was our visit a few days later to the Shrine of Our Lady of Knock. Other special moments included the Cliffs of Moher, the Ring of Kerry, a cruise on the River Shannon, and so much more. Above that, the warmth and hospitality of the Irish people will stay with us for a long time.

We are beginning to formulate plans for a pilgrimage in 2019. I’m open to your suggestions so please let me know if there is some place in particular you’ve been wanting to visit. Our pilgrimages are always a lot of fun and we get the opportunity to visit and celebrate Mass in some of the world’s most beautiful churches. I hope you can join us on a future trip and enjoy all that a pilgrimage has to offer. Looking ahead to 2020, we are planning to attend the famous Passion Play in Obearmmergau, Germany and we’ll have more information on that soon, but our 2019 destination remains to be determined. I’ll keep you posted. 

Peace, Fr. Sean