Dear Beloved Parishioners,
Thanks to all who volunteered a home for the SHOPSMITH Mark V unit. In a surprising turn of events, it turns out that my brother’s parish at Most Sacred Heart not only had the room but needed that equipment for some building and renovation they are doing. Indeed a win-win… (plus my brother actually thinks I’m nice for a change! Little does he know…)
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Our first of two fish fries is this coming Friday. Work starts tomorrow, though, on prepping things and getting everything ready. So whether you can help tomorrow or almost any day this week or on Friday itself, please email SJMfishfry@gmail.com or call the rectory, and we will put you to work…
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As a part of All Things New, unceasing prayer remains a key pillar. And I have been less than on top of my game in getting some of those resources into your hands. So, here is the prayer for the week as well as the intention for the week…
Jesus,
You call us to pray, fast and give alms. We, of the Archdiocese of St. Louis, thank You for Your call this Lent to grow steadfast in faith. In our Archdiocesan journey may we stay close to the Word and grow in virtue, so that we may find mutual affection for one another as we embrace the plan for the future of the Archdiocese. Strengthen us with discipline of prayer, aid us in fasting from negativity and self-indulgence. Stir through the Spirit, a generosity for the needs of others so that we may grow in charity. As we journey through these days of Lent, may we seek the power of the Spirit to grow through your transformative Love.
This we pray, through Christ our Lord, Amen.
St. Vincent de Paul, Pray for Us!
St. Rose Philippine Duchesne, Pray for Us!
St. Louis IX, Pray for Us!
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Intention for First Week of Lent: That all Catholics in the Archdiocese of St. Louis may enter this holy season of repentance and grace by partaking in the sacrament of penance and reconciliation as a means of being steadfast in faith, let us pray to the Lord…
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The Deeper Dive into the Sunday Scripture…
….comes to us once more from Fr. Terrence Klein and America Magazine. It is a though provoking, and imaginative examination of the primal sin of Adam and Eve, and I dare say, all of us – pride…
A Homily for the First Sunday of Lent
Readings: Genesis 2:7-9, 3: 1-7 Romans 5:12-19 Matthew 4:1-11
I am pride. I am the primordial sin. Indeed, I came before humanity itself. Why, the galaxies had not yet been hung when I laid low the angels, God’s first creatures. Amazing, really. They had only to be who they already were; everything was given to them. But I convinced them to desire the one thing they could never be: their own creator.
Make no mistake. The doctrine of creation is still reality’s deepest truth. Science itself is but an infant swaddled in its arms. Nothing is its own origin, its own end. Everything that exists revolves around something beyond itself.
I am pride. I am the primordial sin of humanity. You were easier to bring down than the angels. Pure, potent spirits; material creation still responds to their call. You are cruder, clumsier and infinitely more stupid. Nature has always resisted your voice, seeing that you are fashioned of its own stuff: seed, fruit and dung.
In Adam and Eve, God gave creation to you. You had to accept it as a gift, meaning that you had to acknowledge God as the giver. You had to admit that you are yourselves part of a natural world, a biological order, which is becoming spiritual. One that is neither its own origin nor its own goal. Certainly not its own center.
I am pride. I am the most potent sin. I require so little tinder to scorch all that I touch. Eating an apple is such a trivial thing, but therein lies my genius. I am pride. I am not a brute. I am subtlety itself. I do not labor at the level of objects or even actions. To accomplish my aim, I need only to infect intention.
You can reject the truth of your own existence with the most insignificant of objects and actions. Eating fruit, betraying a friend with a kiss, saying one thing while meaning another. Lord above! How I mock you! I have made it so that humans need not even speak to utter lies. At my command, they lie to themselves in the silence of their hearts: Others do not understand me; they underestimate me; they have done me wrong.
I am pride, the primordial, the potent, the great pretender. I chant into the hearts of the educated how much they know. I constantly compare them to the unlettered fools, who surround them, lest they look up, see a vast ocean of mystery, which they will never fathom, and humble themselves.
I am pride. I am a puzzle even to myself. Who else could make circumstances of birth a point of personal possession? Education, nationality, wealth: These are mere tools that I use to convince you, or at least make you forget that you are not your own origin, your own destiny, and that the world does not revolve around you.
I am pride, the pious. Religion is not my foe. It is my ape. I can so easily make religious people to accomplish my purposes. It is simple to convince them that they are the source of their own righteousness, that they have made the correct choices when so many others have failed. Why, God himself must be ever so grateful that they have chosen to come his way! That is what I whisper into their inflated heads.
Have you ever tried mixing religion with education? Allow me, Pride, to indulge myself. It is my finest brew! No need for academic degrees. Just let them read something that corresponds to their own prejudices. How many lettered religious damn themselves because they make mercy and righteousness so small? Heaven itself is too cramped for those who so overestimate themselves.
I am pride, the pinnacle. I am the one sin you can still commit on your deathbed, when your limbs and your bowels have failed you. You squirm in the sheets, yet you still look about and judge others.
It is only faith that I fear, this throwing yourself into the arms of another, one whom you cannot even see. I knew in the first chapters of the Gospel that the Nazarene would be my end. He saw through it all, saw right through me.
He knew that bread was only a question of circumstance and that it is in the very nature of circumstances to change. He had already attained the purpose of learning: the knowledge of how little one knows. He did not credit himself for being one of the chosen because he knew that he had not been the one who chose. Religion meant only one thing to him: accepting the will of the creator.
If only I, Pride, had a creator! How I would indict the injustice that laid me low. I was duped. How was I to know, how could I have ever suspected that, in the person of the Son, the creator himself would insist that he was not the world’s origin or its pinnacle, that he did not stand at its center?
I had always envied the unity of God, God’s lack of origin, God’s freedom from all want. How was I to know that God was triune? That the Son comes forth from the Father? That Father and Son are compelled to pour out themselves in love of the other and into a third?
Father, Son and Holy Spirit: They stand forever beyond the primordial, the potent and the pious. Why, the real pinnacle is pure puzzle. That’s how it slays pride itself.
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And, as a little bonus, here is a link to a 7 minute 40 second video about the first Sunday of Lent and the Temptation with Fr. John Burns. I found it well done.
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Finally, the SONG OF THE DAY, was the introductory hymn/rite for the 5 and 9 am Masses – Hold Us in your Mercy.
blessings,
fr bill