Father’s Column 2/14

Posted on February 14, 2016 View all news

Laudetur Jesus Christus!
Gelobt sei Jesus Christus!
Praised be Jesus Christ!

The Eucharist is the most important gift given to the Church. She has been charged with ensuring that the Eucharist is properly cared for and reserved, so that we can continue to have spiritual nourishment on our journey to Heaven, just as the Israelites had Manna from Heaven for their journey to the Promised Land. Last Sunday someone discovered a Host stuck to the window near the baby changing station. It is my hope that whoever did this did so because they did not know what the Eucharist is, and came up for Holy Communion by accident. I ask that all parishioners remain vigilant in their care for the Holy Eucharist. If you notice someone walking away from the Communion Rail with the Sacred Host, please approach them. The priests do their best to watch, but things can and do slip by us. While I do not believe there was anything malicious in this particular incident, there have been malicious events in other Churches where people will take Hosts and use them for Black Masses or other gravely evil purposes. Thank you to all of our parishioners to their reverence for the Eucharist and thank you in advance for your vigilance. Please find this reflection from St. Augustine for our first Sunday in Lent. Have a blessed week ahead!

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“It is evident that by these precepts we are bidden to seek for inner gladness, lest, by running after that reward which is without, we should become conformed to the fashion of this world, and should so lose the promise of seeking for inner gladness, lest, by running after that reward which is without, we should become conformed to the fashion of this world, and should so lose the promise of that blessing which is all the truer and more stable that it is inward, that blessing wherein God hath chosen us to be conformed to the likeness of His Son. In this chapter we will principally consider the fact that vain-glory findeth a ground for its exercise in struggling poverty as much as in worldly distinction and display; and this development is the most dangerous, because it entices under pretense of being the serving of God. He that is characterized by unbridled indulgence in luxury or in dress, or any other display, is by these very things easily shown to be a follower of worldly vanities, and deceiveth no one by putting on an hypocritical mask of godliness. But those professors of Christianity, who turn all eyes on themselves by an eccentric show of grovelling and dirtiness, not suffered by necessity, but by their own choice, of them we must judge by their other works whether their conduct really proceedeth from the desire of mortification by giving up unnecessary comfort, or is only the mean of some ambition the Lord biddeth us beware of wolves in sheep’s clothing, but by their fruits, saith He, ye shall know them.

The test is when, by diverse trials, such persons lose those things which under the cover of seeming unworldliness they have either gained or sought to gain. Then must it needs appear whether they be wolves in sheep’s clothing, or indeed sheep in their own. But that hypocrites do the contrary maketh it no duty of a Christian to shine before the eyes of men with a display of needless luxury the sheep need not to lay aside their own clothing because wolves sometimes falsely assume it.” – St. Augustine