Category: Archived

This humbled Child comes for you…

Posted on by Father Cioppi

I want to welcome you here tonight. This is our spiritual home, built with many sacrifices. Here children are born to new life, here we perform the burial rites for those who die. Here every Sunday God gives us new life and a love that will never pass away.

In the 1947 film, The Bishop’s Wife, the Bishop tells his congregation, “Tonight I want to tell you the story of an empty stocking. 

Once upon a midnight clear, there was a child’s cry, a blazing star hung over a stable, and wise men came with birthday gifts.

We haven’t forgotten that night down the centuries; we celebrate it with stars on Christmas trees, with the sound of bells, and with gifts, but especially with gifts. You give me a book, I give you a sweater, Aunt Kathy has always wanted an IPad and Uncle Henry can do with a new Keuric Coffee Maker.

We don’t forget anybody, adult or child.

All the stockings are filled, all that is, except one. And we have even forgotten to hang it up, the stocking for the child born in a manger.

It’s his birthday we’re celebrating after all. Don’t let us ever forget that. 
But let us ask ourselves what He would wish for most. And then, let each one of us put in his share: charity, joy, peace, patience, loving kindness, goodness, patient suffering, mildness, faith, modesty, contentment, chastity and warm hearts that can stretch out and embrace even those who are alien to us. All the shinning gifts that make peace on earth and goodwill toward men.”

My friends, these are the things that matter, not the book, or the sweater or the IPod.

Look in the manger. See there the poverty of the Child Jesus and ask yourselves tonight, do I need these material things to be like Him?

With all the things I worry about. With all the anxiety and impatience that surrounds me. What is it I really need to take his place in this cave of poverty, peace and serenity?

This day, Jesus is calling you to discover the gifts within you like wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety and fear of the Lord. With these we may not have gifts to fill stockings but we will have gifts to fill hearts – and aren’t they the most important gifts of all.

Merry Christmas to you all, and may your hearts beam with the Light of this humbled Child who comes for you this night to show you the dawn of a new day.

 

Mary's "Yes" is our hope!

Posted on by Father Cioppi

As we begin our final movement in the fourth week of Advent, I would like to reflect a moment on Mary, as she is present in the Vatican II document Lumen Gentium:  ‘the sign of true hope and comfort for the pilgrim people of God.’

“Mary, the Mother of Jesus walks with us on our journey of faith from conception to resurrection she is present to us-by her life example and through her powerful intercession-she is a model for our own call to holiness. As we celebrate the birth of Jesus, the birth of the Church we value this model of virtue because it is through our meditation on her life that ‘the Church reverently penetrates more deeply the great mystery of the Incarnation  and becomes more and more like Christ. (LG-65)” .

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Mary is present at the birth of the Church in the manger. She is present at the first manifestation of the Church in Cana. She is present at the birth of the Church under the Cross-on Calvary. She is present still in the fear and the fire of Pentecost.  But now we stand with her, watching and waiting. We anticipate her great anxiety and joy, her fear and her confidence. We are expectant with her Word made Flesh in our own humanity.

Throughout the long history of Incarnation, Mary stands ready to pray with us, and to pray in supplication for us as Mother of God and Mother of the Church.

It is Mary who helps us understand our humanity and how it has been transformed, given dignity and respect. She teaches us how to wait patiently and expect joyfully the Birth of Jesus in our own lives. She teaches us that each life is significant to God, and because of that significance, how we can manifest it to a lonely and shadowy world.  Karl Barth once wrote: “Anyone who has really understood that God became human can never speak or act in an inhuman way.”

In her action, through her wondrous ‘yes’ ‘May Mary continue to intercede for us, in fellowship with all the saints, as close as she is to her Son-the Church, until all families of people, be happily gathered together in peace and harmony into One People of God, for the glory of the Most Holy and Undivided Trinity” (LG-22)

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Leaping with Joy!

Posted on by Father Cioppi

Today is Gaudete Sunday!

The Scriptures proclaim it as do we; “I rejoice heartily in the Lord, in my God is the joy of my soul.”
Today the Church moves from preparation into expectation. “Lord Jesus, come!

Paul reminds us to ‘pray without ceasing’, ‘give thanks,’ ‘refrain from every kind of evil’ and ‘do not quench the Spirit.’ This message, though we hear it again and again, never gets old. It has become however, like a ‘voice crying out from the wilderness.’ We hear it, we recognize it but as we run the race of our present life, do we open our hearts to a more solid faith, joyful in hope and active in charity?

Gueric of Igny writes “we must greet Jesus’ coming with hearts straining with desire and leaping with joy!

Cookies, Cookies, Cookies

Posted on by Father Cioppi

The bakers in Mother of Divine Providence Parish are amazing!  I have never seen so many cookies in one place except for a bakery.  Homemade cookies have been delivered to 35 of our homebound parishioners.  It brings them great joy for many reasons.  They receive delicious cookies but even more important, a visit from the person who is doing the delivering.  There is something about cookies and tea that form a bond between people, even strangers.  Now they know someone new and can feel more connected to the people of Mother of Divine Providence.  Special thanks to all of our bakers and those who so generously gave their time to package and deliver this Christmas gift to our homebound parishioners.

Fear not to cry out: here is your God.

Posted on by Father Cioppi

My dear friends, when the Gospel of Mark says, “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ,” he is referring not to the beginning of time, but to our beginning in Jesus; the first time we encountered Christ and changed our lives forever, made us different people than we were.

Advent is a time to remember the whole history of God among His People. We share with St. Peter today his own experience with Christ when he says, ‘according to his promise we await new heavens and a new earth; and in that waiting we are eager to be found pure and holy before him.

In these days of Advent, as we look to Mary, our waiting Mother. How does she wait; anxious, fearful, ignorant perhaps, indifferent? Not at all. Mary is active in her waiting. She is prayerful; she adopts the virtue of humility and reflection. She remembers the promise made to us by Christ to be faithful, to be kind and to be our way to salvation.

We too can remember our own covenant with God and in that memory of Him allow his glory to be revealed for our whole parish and for our community. People who come here, who visit us, who roam our mall and shopping centers. All of them wait for the coming of Jesus in their lives. “Isaiah says it: Be not afraid to cry out: Here is your God, He is like a shepherd who leads his ewes with care!”

John baptized with water, but you have been baptized by the Holy Spirit. Remember that in your homes and on the streets, in your schools, in the mall, in the shopping centers and in the work places of your lives. Advent is the time to remember the whole history of God among His People including today.

May our sharing in this holy mystery teach us to judge wisely the things of earth and to love better the things of heaven. Amen.

Eucharistic Exposition and Adoration

Posted on by Father Cioppi

In faith, Catholics believe that when the words of concentration are pronounced over the bread and wine at Mass, the bread is no longer bread; it becomes the Body of Christ.  The wine in no longer wine; it becomes the Blood of Christ. Jesus, the Son of God made man is truly, really, wholly present in the Most Blessed Sacrament.  It is for this reason that the church adores Him in the sacrament during a time of Eucharistic Exposition and Adoration.

Pope John Paul II called the worship of the Holy Eucharist outside Mass “an important practice that becomes an inexhaustible source of holiness” and a practice “of inestimable value to the life of the Church.”  The Eucharistic presence of our Lord and savior is a priceless treasure to God’s faithful people.  By not only celebrating the Eucharist (at Mass), but also in praying before it outside of Mass, we are able to connect on a deeply personal level with the wellspring of all grace and holiness. Continue reading “Eucharistic Exposition and Adoration” →

Jesus in the Manger is Jesus on the Cross

Posted on by Father Cioppi

As we begin this solemn season of advent, the Church takes a moment to visualize the coming of Jesus in the manger at Bethlehem. The simplicity, the plain truth of it all speaks to our complex and distracted hearts and calls us to awaken once again that for which we naturally long: union with God.

In this time of greater distraction and pressure does the child come like a thief in the night and wonder if we are ready. It is the child in his simple outreached arms that remind us of the quiet of that Bethlehem night which reflects the manner of the Second Coming. Saint Augustine once wrote: “It is by design that Jesus hid the last days from us- so that we’d be on the look out for him every day of our lives.”

Now at the beginning of this night of holiness we should brace ourselves to listen and watch for the stars in the sky. They can lead us to the stillness of the sacred moment when, like a breath, Christ will come to finish his work; the work he began when took on flesh and dwelled among us.

We have been warned. Centuries of writings by Ambrose and Gregory and Bernard and Augustine have all given us the words: Stay awake! You do not know the time or the day! Be on guard! Paul tells us , we have been ‘ richly endowed with every gift of speech and knowledge’ and that we ‘lack no spiritual gift as we wait for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

We must have courage then and determination to see this to the end in spite of the hurried shopping blitz and consumer panic all around us, we must look through the maze of all that and see the simple child in a manger embracing us, echoing words of Isaiah: “O Lord you are our Father; we are the clay and you are the potter: we are all the works of your hands.”

Being Grateful is Thanksgiving!

Posted on by Father Cioppi

I went over to school yesterday to review the Kindergarten’s wonderful POWOW of songs, prayers and food! They did such a great job and their costumes which they made themselves looked authentic.
Thanksgiving is one of our nation’s best holidays! Putting the food aside just for a moment, the day brings back so many national and family ideals: hospitality to strangers, helping those who have less than we, being gratitude to God for our lives, our families and our communities.
I was reminded of my own familial connection with this feast. My mother’s home town is Plymouth, England. When you walk through the old part of town there is a shrine on one of the docks that commemorates where the Mayflower moored waiting for its passengers to board before sailing to America.
Since my mother came directly to Philadelphia with the sole purpose of marrying my father at the end of World War II – she was an immigrant. My father’s father had come to Philadelphia from Italy when he was sixteen years old. In each case there were people who helped make these two feel at home in their new home; there were people willing to be friend and true neighbors and helped the Cioppi family become who they are today.
The gift of Thanksgiving is gratitude after all, and we show that is by being hospitable around the table, sitting together in the living room listening and talking with each other, not on our cells, and sharing with each other our lives, our spirits and our love.
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving with all the trimmings: laughter, love and yes good food and prayer to God, for His bountiful goodness to us all.


Bless us, O Lord, and these Thy Gifts which we are about to receive from Thy Bounty through Christ our Lord. Amen!

Letter to Families

Posted on by Father Cioppi

The Office of the Parish Priest
of Mother of Divine Providence
333 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, PA 19406

11.01.2011 –Solemnity of All Saints

My dear parishioners,
A parent’s role in the life of their children is more important in these days than even in our own. Popular culture continues its quest to alienate us from God Himself. Our inability to grasp the extent our human lives are being influenced by technology and busyness endangers all humans who are by nature communal, relational and open to the common good.

And yet, here we are preparing parishioners once again to be initiated into the Catholic Church, an initiation that will us lead to true freedom with responsibility. Our membership in the Church will bring us the ability to freely love God as a response to His own abiding love; it will enable us to share that love with others by accepting God’s command that His People worship Him on the holy mountain every Sunday.

We belong to this parish; a community of faith very much a People of God and as such we share responsibilities which enable us to practice what we believe. All of us strive not be Pharisees and so as we accept this initiation of our children into the Church, we publically declare our own intention to live our faith within the context of our own perfection of the spiritual life we have been given through the Holy Spirit at our own initiation.
‘Passing on the Faith’ is a promise parents make at the Baptism of the children. “This candle of faith is to be kept burning brightly.”
Jesus Christ teaches us that the regular reception of the Sacrament of Confession (every two weeks for children, at least once a month for adults) and our weekly attendance at Mass (and Holy Days of Obligation) are serious responsibilities attached to our freedom in faith. If we ignore these responsibilities for ourselves and for our children, our families risk serious sin which in fact enslaves rather than frees us.

My friends we are close to Jesus in the Sacraments when we accept them regularly for our salvation. Do not allow yourselves or your families to be alienated from Him! As our parish celebrates this initiation, we need to take time to renew our own initiation and our promised commitment to mature in our spiritual lives in a way that can be imitated by our children.
With God’s abundant blessing on our parish and in our individual families,
Father Cioppi

Reverend Martin T. Cioppi, Ed.D.