Now is the time. As we prepare for the end of this liturgical year and the start of Advent in two weeks, our liturgy points us to the end times when Christ will come again. The Father prompts us to pray, "Come, Lord Jesus" to be eager for Christ's coming in glory.

Our Scriptures this Sunday speak about God's offering of Himself to us and our offerings to God. God has offered Himself completely, and He asks us for just a small offering. When we make an offering to Him, we see miracles happen in our lives!

November is a month to pray for the dead. Consider lighting a votive candle in church for the deceased, having a Mass celebrated with their intention, visiting a cemetery, and making special intercession for them in your prayers this month.

This weekend our Church celebrates Priesthood Sunday! We've all been blessed by priests who serve us and deepen our faith and participation in the life of Christ especially through the Sacraments.

We are pleased to offer our July 1, 2023 - June 30, 2024 financial report. More than numbers on a sheet, a parish financial report captures the life and energy of a parish, the generosity of the people, and the various initiatives undertaken for the year, both spiritual and temporal.

In our Scripture this weekend, we have the occasion to reflect on the one flesh consecrated union of marriage between man and woman. In Genesis, the original gift of creation to man and man to creation is enhanced by the gift of woman to man and man to woman.

This Sunday, Jesus helps us examine the good works and desires of those who may not share our faith or values. As He says, "Whoever is not against us is for us." As the Body of Christ, the Church doesn't go around looking to make enemies, but rather looks for seeds of truth and goodness inherent in the people, works, and ideas around us.

Last Friday night I returned from our Footsteps of St. Paul Pilgrimage in Greece and Turkey with our tour group. A pilgrimage is a blessed time of encounter with the Lord, holy places, and cultures throughout the world. I am still soaking in the graces of that blessed time, and I hope to offer a presentation to the parish this Fall with photos and stories to help share with you what we received.

As I mentioned during last week’s Mass, I will visit Korea for a few weeks. I’m excited because this will be my first visit since May last year. I look forward to sharing my experiences as a priest with my family and friends. I am also excited about celebrating Mass in Korean.

I greet you today as Fr. Scott is on his pilgrimage to Greece and Turkey. Please keep the pilgrims in your prayers so they may have a blessed time in the Lord. In today’s gospel, Jesus encounters a deaf man with a speech impediment. The people around him beg Jesus to lay His hands on him. Jesus takes the man aside, away from the crowd, and performs a healing that is both physical and symbolic.

After listening to the Eucharistic discourses from John 6 the past five weeks, the words "Eucharistic consistency" keep coming back to me in prayer. The real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist means that He wants to share His entire life and being with us, that we may become another Christ for the world and live His life anew in our own.

We conclude our Eucharistic discourse Gospels from John 6 after this weekend. Confronted with the choice to believe in the Eucharist as the real Body and Blood of Jesus, many walk away, but Simon Peter has a different response…he says, "Master, to whom shall we go?

We rarely consider the radical call in Jesus' words about Himself: "The bread that I will give is my Flesh for the life of the world. Whoever eats my Flesh and drinks my Blood has eternal life, and remains in Me and I in him.”

In 2007, I studied abroad in Rome for a semester. Every day I would pass in front of St. Peter’s Basilica to get to class. The first few weeks, I would stop in amazement before the Basilica to savor the richness and beauty of the place. As the weeks progressed, my amazement faded and even the marvel of our great Basilica became “ordinary.”

Last Sunday we began week one of five of the Bread of Life Gospels from John 6. Jesus fed the hungry crowd by performing a miracle of multiplication for them. This Sunday the crowds have grown hungry again and are back for more!

The Church in America just celebrated its 10th Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis last weekend. Over 60,000 Catholics participated along with thousands of priests, bishops, seminarians, and men and women religious.

I greet you all again this week. I hope you had a great week! In today’s Gospel, we see a beautiful invitation from Jesus to His disciples: “Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.”

Since Fr. Scott is on retreat, I get to greet you all this week. Please keep Fr. Scott in your prayers so he may receive much of the Lord’s grace and strength during his retreat.

One of the strongest lies we face time and again throughout life is, "I am not enough." It's tempting to believe because it's not entirely false. Deep down we feel and even know that this is the reality, that we aren't sufficient on our own. Some self-help guides try to combat this difficult truth with the even more deadly lie that "I am enough."

“God did not make death.” This stark opening line from our first reading is answered at the end of that same passage: “By the envy of the devil, death entered the world.” God made us to live eternally with Him, through Him, and in Him. By enticing us to sin, the devil knew we would die because of our disconnection from God, the source of eternal life.