Many people may not be aware that we have a very active Bereavement Ministry. One of the offerings is that at Easter the Confirmation class takes an Easter plant to each family who had someone from their family buried during the previous year from Mother of Divine Providence Parish. Our Director of Religious Education, Lauren Joyce, has been helping me with this experience and has received many wonderful responses from those who received a plant. But we have also heard from those who helped with this event. The following are some comments from both: “Operation Resurrection was a very good idea. One elderly woman who lost her husband cried when we gave her the flowers. She was so touched. I think it is good for the children to deliver the flowers and cards personally. This keeps everyone connected to MDP.” Another said: “Thank you for your prayers and the beautiful Easter lily plant in memory of our sister.” Special thanks to all those who participated in Operation Resurrection. Our hope is that it will be able to continue next year.
Category: Archived
Explain to anyone who asks why you are hopeful and filled with joy! John 14:15-21
We live in a society that is becoming more and more hostile to God and increasingly more anxious, impatient and confused. In such an atmosphere, a disciple stands out as different and as counter cultural. My friends, Catholics are becoming voices in the wilderness, crying out, ‘make straight the way of the Lord.’ Imagine a person whose trust is completely in God. What peace, what joy!
If you have ever been with the dying, you would learn the true meaning of life. Where is nothing left of the earthly but only God, the dying see the only treasure in life that matters: love, compassion, forgiveness and mercy.
The challenge for any disciple of Jesus is to constantly sanctify Christ in our hearts. Always be ready to explain the reason for your hope and joy! But ‘do it with gentleness and reverence so that those who defame your good conduct may themselves be put to shame.’
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“You have faith in God, Have faith also in Me.” John 14:1-12
“Do not let your hearts be troubled, have faith in God and faith in me.”
My dear friends, the Risen Life is never an easy life. It is filled with questions, doubts and sometimes confusion; what the scriptures refer to as ‘stormy seas.’ In spite of this the community of believers continues to grow.
Our nation is filled with self-doubt and as Catholics we are surrounded by people who misunderstand us, or who are afraid that our confession of Jesus will shed light on society’s growing desire for a self-satisfaction that is hurtful to the dignity of all human beings.
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God Bless Our New Transitional Deacons!
On Saturday, May 10th Archbishop Charles Chaput ordained (8) men as Transitional Deacons during a beautiful Mass in Saint Martin’s Chapel at Saint Charles Borromeo Seminary.
Transitional deacons are seminarians in their last year of preparation for ordination to the priesthood. A Transitional Deacon may baptize, preach, distribute Communion, witness marriages and lead rites for Christian burial. Three of the ordained men are well known to our parish: Reverend Mr. Daniel Arechabala is a son of our parish (he grew up in Mother of Divine Providence Parish from the age of 2!), Reverend Mr. Steven Kiernan is the adopted son of our parish (he comes to us from another Diocese, but he will be ordained for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, so he found a home here with us), Reverend Mr. Joseph Zaleski served an internship summer here (he visited our homebound and assisted wherever possible).
Our parish witnessed Rev. Mr. Daniel Arechabala’s first homily during the 9:30 AM Mass, and Rev. Mr. Steven Kiernan’s first homily during the 11:30 AM Mass this past Sunday, May 11th. Here is a transcription of their homilies: Continue reading “God Bless Our New Transitional Deacons!”
First Holy Communion Weekend 2014
What a wonderful day it is boys and girls! Our parish is celebrating an event that you will remember for the rest of your lives- your First Holy Communion Day. There will be lots of pictures taken of you today and in years from now you will at those pictures and see yourself as you are now and you will remember that this was a special day and you will feel that moment inside you, the first time you and Jesus were of one heart and one mind!
Your parents have brought you here and asked that you be allowed to join our procession to the Altar of God. Your teachers and catechists have helped your parents teach you the catechism; they have brought you to confession so you can be pure of heart and worthy to receive this Holy Communion. I am grateful to them for teaching you what our parish believes.
Installation of Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion – April 29, 2014
My dear friends,
Your installation today as Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion comes at an incredible time in the history of the Church, of our Archdiocese and of our parish.
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Be healed by touching the wounds of Christ – John 20:19-31
Today, the first day of the week, the Risen Jesus appears to His disciples, breathing on them a peace that ignites within them a zeal to ‘go out’ into the world and proclaim a new way of living; a new way of loving with forgiveness and mercy.
The story of Thomas challenges us today in our commitment to this Gospel lived out in our families and in this parish. This challenge is not testing our belief that Jesus is risen, but that He shows us His wounds and asks us to touch them and through them ‘believe.’
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Easter 2014
The Easter we celebrate with joy today is not simply a passive commemoration of the past, but an active participation in the Mystery that presents itself in the person of Jesus.
These past few days have reminded us that true disciples of Jesus are willing to lay down their lives that others may come to believe! This is at the heart of who we are as a parish. We are believers, willing to sacrifice ourselves to make the world more human, more Christ-like.
As believers, we are not spectators to what we believe. Charity is Love in action. We are believers who not only teach a new path to holiness, we put it into practice, perhaps not perfectly but certainly purposefully.
Commemoration of the Lord’s Passion
From the wood of the Manger to the wood of the Cross, we are poor in His poverty. The silence of Calvary is deafening now. The splinters of the Cross highlight the woundedness of our collective humanity as we commemorate the Passion of Jesus Christ. His death on the Cross means we suffer and die as a people continuously impoverished by our own weaknesses and ignorance.
It is from Calvary that we become seekers of the isolated, friends to the abandoned; teachers to the ignorant, gifts to the poor and seers for the confused for “God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that we might believe in Him.”
Mass of the Lord’s Supper – “Do This in Memory of Me.”
“This day shall be a memorial feast for you, which all your generations shall celebrate with pilgrimage to the Lord as a perpetual institution” (Exodus 12:14).
What is the memory that makes for a perpetual institution? It is God’s memory; the 4500 year memory that caused the author of Exodus to write, the 2000 year memory of Paul who told us that Jesus took bread blessed and broke. It is our memory of encountering Christ in our daily living, the memory of God being made manifest at the Altar of Sacrifice, the very stone of Calvary.
We approach this sacred place, as we are ready to do this in memory. It is here on this sacrificial stone of Golgotha that alone God desires to meet us face to face. Tonight we enter the Upper Room as pilgrims with the Apostles to witness the priest breathe over the bread and wine, changing them into the Son of God and then sacrifice Him Whom we believe to be the true Bread from Heaven.
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