Lent is Coming! Are You Ready to Pray, Fast and Give Alms???

Dear Parishioners:                                

It was a long night last Sunday as I watched the Superbowl with some priest friends. It wasn’t the ending we were hoping for but it was a game to watch.  I offer my congratulations to the Eagles and their fans on their first Superbowl victory.     

Football season is now over and MLB Spring Training  begins soon.  But we have a much more important season ahead of us.  The Holy Season of Lent begins this Wednesday, February 14th!  There has been much discussion about Ash Wednesday as this year  it falls on Valentine’s Day!

The observance of Ash Wednesday requires prayer, fasting  and abstinence from meat. Valentine's Day, on the other hand, is a day for celebrating romantic love, often by dining out on fancy meals and giving  chocolate and expensive gifts to a beloved. It's the first time since 1945 that Ash Wednesday and Valentine's Day have fallen on the same date.

As Catholics our observance of Ash Wednesday should take precedence over any Valentine’s Day celebration. There are  Catholic roots to Valentine’s Day as it is associated with a Catholic saint and martyr. However,  the holiday  as celebrated today is a commercial enterprise complete with greeting cards, expensive meals, candy, flowers and  people spending millions of dollars.

Ash Wednesday begins our forty days of prayer, fasting and alms giving. Ashes are smeared on our foreheads with the words: “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.” The act of putting on ashes on foreheads symbolizes fragility and mortality, and the need for repentance. Far from being a merely external act, the Church has retained the use of ashes to symbolize that attitude of internal penance to which all the baptized are called during Lent.

Ash Wednesday is but the opening pitch for forty days of “spiritual spring training,” Lent.  The goal is Easter.  The hope is that, if we unite ourselves more closely with Jesus on His cross through more fervent prayer, greater charity to others, and sincere penance for our sins through His mercy we’ll be united with Him in His Resurrection.

There is a complete schedule in the bulletin for Ash Wednesday and the Season of Lent at OLM.  There are four Masses on Ash Wednesday and they usually see great crowds.  Also I ask you to please take up works of charity by supporting the Rice Bowl Collection and the Catholic Charity Appeal.

Rice Bowls are available to take home and place your  sacrificial offerings in throughout Lent.  This important collection for the work of Catholic Relief Services aids the hungry of the world is  taken up on Palm Sunday.  The Annual Catholic Charity Appeal which supports the good works of our Diocese is to be taken up on the weekend of February 25th.

Lent is also a time of penance and conversion from sin. Confessions are heard daily Monday through Friday during Lent at OLM.  Also an extra guest confessor joins us every Monday night during Lent. On March 24th there are All-Day Confessions at OLM. This Lent make sure to get to Confession!

A penance should be taken up during Lent that might include fasting from some pleasure or comfort in our lives.  Giving up something in a sacrificial not superficial way always helps us gain a deeper understanding of Christ’s loving sacrifice for us on the Cross.  Also consider taking up some extra daily prayer and committing to a Lenten devotion.  With two Daily Masses during Lent we are truly blessed with opportunity to be nourished by the Eucharist.  Also the Stations of the Cross  are celebrated every Friday and are a great Lenten Devotion. Plan on making the Lenten Mission in March with Monsignor Douglas Cook.

Pope Francis teaches us: “Lent is the favorable season for renewing our encounter with Christ, living in His Word, in the sacraments and in our neighbor. The Lord, who overcame the deceptions of the Tempter during the forty days in the desert, shows us the path we must take.”

So take up your Lenten path  with zeal and commitment  on Ash Wednesday.  Please consider moving your Valentine’s Day to Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras) and keep the Lenten Fast on Ash Wednesday! Pray, fast and give alms! Take up your cross and live your Catholic Faith! Do good. Be well. A Blessed Lent!

Blessing Throats in the Flu Season

Dear Parishioners:                                

I hope you enjoyed Catholic Schools Week at OLM.  Our terrific students did a marvelous job speaking at Masses last weekend about why they love OLM School.  Their brief words speak volumes about the quality of  our parish school students. We thank them for their witness to Catholic Education.

I would also like to thank and commend Mr. Scott Fuller, the OLM School Principal, for the tremendous job he does leading our school and ensuring a great education and a truly Catholic environment for our budding saints and scholars.  Our outstanding teachers deserve our gratitude for their hard work, dedication and commitment to making OLM truly a great school.  And we also thank our OLM School Parents for the sacrifice they make in choosing Catholic Schools.

The OLM School Open House saw quite a few visitors and prospective students stop by last Sunday.  The many and varied opportunities to develop the minds and souls of our young saints and scholars were on display for all to enjoy.  From Robotics to the Friends of Mercy, the quality of our curriculum of academics, arts, athletics, charitable good works and living Catholic faith was seen by many.

On this weekend the Church gives a "Blessing of the Throats" in honor of St. Blaise. It couldn’t come at a better time with the onslaught of the flu across the area and entire country. It has been a very tough flu season even deadly in some cases. We received the
following memorandum from the Diocese of Providence:

“Each year at this time concerns are raised regarding the potential spread of influenza throughout various communities. The most recent weekly report from the State Department of Public Health categorizes the statewide estimate of influenza activity as ‘widespread’. In addition, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), this year's flu vaccine is less effective in the prevention of influenza A(H3N2) than in prior years. As pastors committed to promoting and protecting the well-being of our parishioners, we need to be as cautious and prudent as possible in responding to any possible threat, especially for children and the elderly. Parishioners who have symptoms of illness should be very careful to avoid any physical contact that could transmit the virus with others. Likewise, parishioners should be reminded that if they have symptoms of serious illness they are dispensed from attending Holy Mass on Sundays and in fact should not attend Holy Mass. This is an obligation in charity that parishioners should take very seriously.  Finally, but certainly not least in importance, we approach this situation as we approach everything in life, from the perspective of our faith and in prayer. Please ask the Lord's protection upon our community during this time of widespread illness.”

Common sense should be our guide during this time of flu. Don’t offer the Sign of Peace with your hands if you have the sniffles.  The Sign of Peace can be offered verbally without a handshake or with a nod of the head. Don’t take offense if someone doesn’t put their hand out to shake.  And above all pray for  the sick.

We turn to St. Blasé this weekend as he is one of the Fourteen Holy Helpers and is invoked for all throat afflictions and sickness. On his feast two candles are used with a prayer that God  free from all such
afflictions those who receive this blessing. St. Blaise enjoyed widespread veneration in the Eastern and Western Churches due to many cures attributed to him. According to tradition, he was Bishop of Sebaste in Armenia and was martyred. From the eighth century he has been invoked on behalf of the sick, especially those afflicted with illnesses of the throat.  May he intercede for us!

Well, today is, of course, Superbowl Sunday!  Yes, once again Tom Terrific is leading our Patriots at the big game Sunday night! With kickoff at 6:30pm we’ve decided to cancel the RE Classes on Sunday evening so the students don’t miss the game.  Hopefully all of New England is smiling on Monday morning and basking in yet another victory for the Pats!   I know there are a few Eagles’ Fans in the pews, don’t worry I’ll pray for you!! 

Do good. Be well. God Bless! Go Pats, Go!!!

Celebrating Catholic Schools Week at OLM

Dear Parishioners:                                

It is Catholic Schools Week across the country and here at OLM.  Now we don’t often speak  about love in education. Not even  when we speak about Catholic Schools. Instead, we focus on more tangible measures of success: how 99 percent of Catholic school students get their high-school diplomas; how a black or Latino child is 2.5 times more likely to graduate from college if he or she has attended a Catholic high school; how Catholic schools manage to do all this at a fraction of the cost of public schools.

Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, an alumna of Blessed Sacrament School in The Bronx, calls Catholic schools a “pipeline to opportunity” for people like her. That’s true. And it’s true largely because Catholic school students are not just taught, but loved.

Yes we are always proud when our OLM students succeed academically.  We like it when our OLM alumni excel at area high schools and beyond. Academic success is important too. In the popular view, our Catholic schools succeed because they have greater discipline, higher standards and more committed teachers.

However, it helps to remember that the Latin root for the verb “to discipline” is not “to punish” but “to teach.” It’s a lesson that begins with recognizing the equal and God-given dignity of every human being as a child of God.  In short, the Gospel that commands us to love one another obliges us to treat each person we encounter as we would Christ.  We know that’s not always an easy thing to ask of any school, even a Catholic school. Though many people might argue that Catholic education, is about many things but not love.  I firmly believe that the center of all Catholic Education is love. 

The  former New York Jet, Damien Woody,  sent his children to St. Vincent Catholic School even though his family wasn’t Catholic. At a Christmas Pageant, another school parent asked him why. He answered, “My wife and I believe that a school where they love God will love my children.”

Such love is the hallmark of every Catholic School.  That love exists here at OLM School every day.  It is a deep love of God and of our neighbor. This Christian love is vastly different than simple humanitarianism.  Such love is lived out in response to the call of Jesus Christ who is the way, the truth and the life. It is the sacrificial love offered by parents who work hard to afford tuition, a sacrificial love of a faculty who dedicate themselves  to teaching their students without high salaries, and the pure and innocent love of  the young minds encountering Christ in one another, in the classroom and in the Sacraments.

Our Lady of Mercy School Mission  Statement reads: “Our Mission at Our Lady of Mercy School is to follow the Lord Jesus Christ and His Church as we pursue excellence in academics, athletics and the arts. In the midst of a safe and nurturing environment we seek to develop a good moral character built upon the teachings of the Catholic Church.  We strive to be Saints and Scholars who serve the evangelical mission of our parish so that Mercy may
flourish “

The measure of success at OLM School is not to be solely found in  its great academic achievements, athletic victories, or artistic accomplishments. As  Pope John Paul II wrote in his first encyclical letter, the Redeemer of Man: "Man cannot live without love and his life is senseless if love is not revealed to him, if he does not encounter love, if he does not experience it and make it his own, if he does not participate intimately in it.”

After all any student at any school can expertly learn to add and to subtract, to read and to write, to run and throw or to paint and act.  No, Catholic Schools are not about being “socially useful” or  are they simply about good “values.”  Catholic education is about making saints and growing the seeds of virtue and truth and flourishing Christian mercy and love.  Anything less cheats our children of their dignity.

If Catholic schools are really to be about love, then this love must be sustained,supported and nourished by us.  So celebrate Catholic Schools this week! Visit OLM School this Sunday during the Open House. Do good. Be well. God Bless! Go Pats!!! We’re off to the Superbowl!! 

Living the Gospel of Life: Pray, Act and Advocate

Dear Parishioners:                                

On Friday thousands of people marched through Washington, DC for the Annual March for Life.  This annual event draws people from all across the nation who stand up in defense of the innocent unborn.     Abortion on demand has been legal in the United States since the Roe v. Wade Decision in 1973. It is estimated that over 50 million abortions have taken place since this tragic decision of 45 years ago.  That number is simply staggering, shocking and sad!!

The U.S. Bishops teach us in their statement, Living the Gospel of Life: A Challenge to American Catholics: “Among important issues involving the dignity of human life with which the Church is concerned, abortion necessarily plays a central role. Abortion, the direct killing of an innocent human being, is always gravely immoral (The Gospel of Life, no. 57); its victims are the most vulnerable and defenseless members of the human family. It is imperative that those who are called to serve the least among us give urgent attention and priority to this issue of justice.”

This week the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade Decision falls on Monday.  It has been designated as a Day of Prayer for the Legal Protection of Unborn Children.  I invite you to join us for Mass on Monday at 7:30am as we offer the Mass and our prayers for this intention.  Also I invite to join us on Monday night at 7:00pm as we offer a Holy Hour for Life.  Father Patrick Mary Briscoe, OP, a young Dominican Friar and the Associate Pastor at St. Pius Church in Providence is to offer a reflection on the Sanctity of Human Life.

This time of prayer and reflection includes Eucharistic Adoration, recitation of the rosary and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. We are called to pray, act and advocate for an increase of respect for life.  We can certainly all find time to pray for the unborn and for an end to abortion in our nation.  We can certainly act in defense of life by supporting the Pro-Life activities of the Diocese of Providence and RI Right to Life Services.  And we most certainly can advocate for life with our elected officials.

This year Planned Parenthood and their allies are mounting a vigorous campaign to expand abortion rights in Rhode Island.  It includes deregulating abortion mills in our state and mandating taxpayer funding of abortions in RI.  They are very organized and very committed to their extreme agenda of abortion.

There are many of our elected officials in support of this extremist agenda.  Sadly they include some RI State Senators and Representatives who identify as Catholic!  Please pray for them and for their conversion of heart.  As the US Bishops have consistently taught: “Public officials are privileged in a special way to apply their moral convictions to the policy arena. We hold in high esteem those who, through such positions and authority, promote respect for all human life. Catholic civil leaders who reject or ignore the Church's teaching on the sanctity of human life do so at risk to their own spiritual well-being.”

I wish to publicly commend our local RI State Representative Anthony Giarusso for his strong commitment  to protecting the unborn.  He stands by the courage of his convictions and allows his Catholic Faith to guide his moral decisions.  Please let him know we support  his courageous  pro-life position!

The Annual Pro-Life Rally  at the RI Statehouse is  this Wednesday, January 24th at 3:00pm.    The pro-life community united with many of our pro-life elected officials stand together for the unborn at the rally.  They give voice of the voiceless unborn in the corridors of the statehouse and remind the agents of the culture of death that we won’t be silenced by their extremist campaign.

We kickoff Catholic Schools Week next week.  The wonderful students from OLM School are to speak at all Masses. An Alumni Mass for OLM School is also next Sunday at 9:00am.  An open house at OLM School follows the Mass.  Come by and see the great things going on at OLM School and help celebrate Catholic Schools!

We said goodbye to Fr. Connors on Sunday night and we thank him for his time with us.  He returns to be with us during Holy Week. As he resumes his studies in Rome, please be sure to pray for him.

Do good. Be well. God Bless! Go Pats!!!

Snowstorms, Frozen Pipes, and Helping Those in Need!!

Dear Parishioners:                                

I hope you survived the Blizzard of 2018! I think it was a blizzard even though the news media hyped it as a “Bomb-Cyclone”!  A much scarier moniker than Blizzard for sure.  I think I’ll stick with tradition and just call it the Blizzard of 2018!       

Our great OLM Maintenance crew was working in overdrive during the storm and the cold weather.  Plowing, shoveling, and sanding the sidewalks and parking lots to ensure safe passage to and from Church and School.  We thank them for their hard work and the tremendous job they did with the snow removal.

We  didn’t escape the cold weather unscathed as we had a pipe freeze in the school.  Fortunately it didn’t cause too much damage and the clean up has taken place.  It was an old pipe left over from the addition to the school over twenty years ago.  It froze toward the end of the school day and then burst. This set off the fire alarm and caused the school to be evacuated and the fire department to rush here. This was the afternoon before the Blizzard when the temperatures were dropping quickly!

Thankfully this pipe was located just outside the gym and did not cause any serious damage to the gym floor. The OLM Maintenance team were able to turn off the water and stop the flooding in good time.  Our friends, the GemmaBrothers from Gem Plumbing, were on the scene in no time and capped off the pipe. And thanks to OLM Parishioner, Frank Mattos, and his crack team from ServPro, the area was cleaned up, scrubbed and disinfected before Sunday!  Sadly for the school children we were forced to close school for two days!

Now let’s hope the weather  warms up and we can just worry about regular snowstorms not Bomb Cyclones and sub-zero temperatures. Of  course all this cold weather and snow should also cause us to be mindful of those who have no heat.  Therefore, we once again  are supporting Bishop Tobin’s Keep the Heat On Fund.  Donations to the OLM Outreach in late January and early February  go to support  this great work of helping those who need a hand in keeping their heat on. 

Your tremendous charity to OLM Outreach during December enabled us to help some local charities over the Christmas Season.  We donated $1000 to Emmanuel Homeless Shelter, McAuley House, Whitmarsh House for Troubled Youth and Mary’s House Meal Kitchen and Food Pantry at St. Patrick’s Church in Providence. We also helped RI Right to Life Services with a $1000 donation for their good work with mothers in a crisis pregnancy.  None of this is possible without your support and generosity.  In the name of the poor and needy who you’ve helped, I thank you.

OLM Outreach also provided gifts, food and help with bills to several area families at Christmas.  In addition, we were able to support several refugee families with donations of warm clothing and Christmas gifts. Again I thank you for your continued support of OLM Outreach and the  mission of mercy and good works at OLM.

In his homily during last weekend’s Solemnity of the Epiphany, Pope Francis reminds us about giving:

“To give freely, for the Lord’s sake, without expecting anything in return: this is the sure sign that we have found Jesus. To do good without counting the cost, even when unasked, even when you gain nothing thereby, even if it is unpleasant. That is what God wants. He, who become small for our sake, asks us to offer something for the least of his brothers and sisters. Who are they? They are those who have nothing to give in return, the needy, the hungry, the stranger, the prisoner, the poor (cf. Mt 25:31-46). We give a gift pleasing to Jesus when we care for a sick person, spend time with a difficult person, help someone for the sake of helping, or forgive someone who has hurt us. These are gifts freely given, and they cannot be lacking in the lives of Christians.”

Fr. Connors returns to Rome this week to resume his doctoral studies.  Over the next few months he is finishing up his dissertation and is to  publicly defends it on June 1st.  We are grateful for his presence and ministry at OLM over these last few weeks.  It is always a joy to have him at OLM and enjoy his priestly fraternity.  Keep him in your prayers as he resumes his studies.

Do good. Be well. God Bless! Go Pats, Go!!!

Ephiphany Arrives, Christmas Departs and We Call Upon the Saints

Dear Parishioners:                                

With this Sunday’s celebration of the feast of the Epiphany, the Christmas Season draws to a close.  “The Twelve Days of Christmas" culminate with the Epiphany of the Lord, referring to the visitation of the Three Kings or Adoration of the  Magi, celebrated on January 6.  On Monday, we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord and then it’s back to Ordinary Time with its green vestments.

In a homily on the Epiphany, Bishop Robert Barron, Auxiliary Bishop of Los Angeles, teaches: “Jesus is not one philosopher or sage or political figure among many. He’s not just another wise religious teacher. Rather, he is the Word made flesh – Logos, in John’s language. That means the divine mind; the great pattern; the intelligibility through which all things were created, toward which all minds are tending.”

The beauty of Christmas reflects this profound revelation: the Son of God became a man that all men might become more like God. God became human, and nothing human was alien to him but sin. Even our greatest suffering, darkness, and doubt draws us closer to him through Calvary. There’s nothing new under the sun, but by His life, death, andresurrection, the Son made all things new. And our celebration of Epiphany  recalls the manifestation of that truth.  This manifestation made – and still makes – all the difference in the world.

The star that guided the Magi still shines in the Gospel, which continues to guide us along our pilgrim way. The Church, and every person of faith, has been entrusted with that same light and we are called to carry that light into the dark places of the world in our prayer, words and acts of charity.

This past Tuesday I attended the opening of the RI General Assembly as another legislative session begins.  This means that I am once again heading to Smith Hill during the week to advocate on behalf of Catholic values and virtues.  This requires my presence at the RI Statehouse during afternoons and sometimes later in the evening for hearings. We hope and pray that the new legislative session might truly be productive for our state and that nothing contrary to  Catholic teaching on human life, human dignity and the common good are able to advance and become law. 

However, issues such as the wide scale expansion of abortion rights including public financing  and also the legalization of physician assisted suicide are once again being vigorously supported by anti-life extremists and their many allies in the statehouse.  These anti-life forces are well organized and well funded. Along with these important fundamental issues of human life and dignity.  The Church is always vigilant in our advocacy of those issues concerning the rights of Catholic School Families, support for traditional family life, refugee services and immigration reform. 

With a projected huge state budget deficit  the issues of poverty and the social safety net for the vulnerable are also of concern. So I ask for your prayers for my  lobbying and advocacy  on behalf of  the RI Catholic Conference. Also please pray for all our elected officials that they may truly serve the common good of our state, work to protect all human life and  always truly respect human dignity.

If you have visited  our candle room then you have seen the  new statues.  We are deeply grateful to the Manocchia Family for their generous donation of a beautiful statue of St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta in memory of their late Mother, Matilda.  St. Teresa of Calcutta is the patron saint of the poor and also of doubters.

Also there are two older statues now in the candle room that are new to OLM.  They come to us from the now closed St. Casimir Church in Providence.  We were able to get  these beautiful statues of Our Lady of Lourdes and Our Lady of Sorrows for OLM at no cost.  They now have a new home in our Church after decades inspiring the faithful of St. Casimir’s.

So make a visit to the candle room, light a candle and  turn to Our Lady and the Saints for  their powerful intercession for your needs and intentions. All the candles that light up our candle room and the Our Lady of Mercy Shrine in Church,represent the many prayers we offer to God. It’s always better to light a candle than to curse the darkness!

Do good. Be well. God Bless! Go Pats!!!