Amid the Crisis of Communal Commitment

“In our time humanity is experiencing a turning-point in its history, as we can see from the advances being made is so many fields. We can only praise the steps being taken to improve people’s welfare in areas such as health care, education and communications. At the same time we have to remember that the majority of our contemporaries are barely living from day to day, with dire consequences.

A number of diseases are spreading. The hearts of many people are gripped by fear and desperation, even in the so-called rich countries. The joy of living frequently fades, lack of respect for others, and violence are on the rise, and inequality is increasingly evident. It is a struggle to live and, often, to live with precious little dignity.

This epochal change has been set in motion by the enormous qualitative, quantitative, rapid and cumulative advances occurring the sciences and technology, and by their instant application in different areas of nature and of life. We are in an age of knowledge and information, which has led to new and often anonymous kinds of power.”

A Very Happy Mother’s Day!

Today’s Gospel gives us many memorable quotes: “Do not let your hearts be troubled,” “in my Father’s house there are many dwelling places,” and “I am the way the truth and the life,” and from the rst letter of Peter: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own.”This is what we have been given by Jesus; this gives us our identity. Christianity in its early years was called “The Way.” This was to protect the early Christians from persecution, but all of those who followed “The Way” knew what that meant. Through our celebration of Easter, we have recommitted ourselves to con- tinue our journey on “The Way.”

This week we join with the churches in our Parish Cluster – St. John the Baptist, Holy Cross, Holy Innocents, and Sts. Cyril and Methodius – for the Parish Mission titled “Revive: Faith Every Day.” Elsewhere in the bulletin is information of “Revive” with Fr. Innocent Smith, O.P., the speaker each evening. We are the host for these three evenings – Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday at 6:30 PM. Please join us along with our guests!

Next Sunday is the annual Korean Bazaar. There will be delicious Korean food, tables with items for sale, and many Korean specialties. It begins at 10 AM and goes through the afternoon until 5 PM on Broadway between 31st and 32nd Street. Don’t miss this annual event!

Fr. Andrew Reitz, O.F.M

“A Church which ‘goes forth’ is a Church whose doors are open. Going out to others in order to reach the fringes of humanity does not mean rushing out aimlessly into the world. Often it is better simply to slow down, to put aside our eagerness in order to see and listen to others, to stop rushing from one thing to another and to remain with someone who has faltered along the way.

At times we have to be like the father of the prodigal son, who always keeps his door open so that when the son returns, he can readily pass through it… The Church is called to be the house of the Father, with doors always wide open…so that if someone, moved by the Spirit, comes there looking for God, he or she will not nd a closed door. There are other doors that should not be closed either…nor should the doors of the sacraments be closed for simply any reason.”

You may notice that Acts of the Apostles is the source of the  first reading during the Easter season. This book describes how Christianity grew from a handful of disciples to a major religion. Today’s reading about an ideal Christian community is meant to show ordinary believers how to be extraordinary, using three examples I call power, property, and prayer.

Power means the “signs and wonders” (Acts 2:43) performed by the disciples through the power of the Holy Spirit. This should be named last, because it takes a lot of faith to heal the sick. “Of course, we can visit the sick and comfort the dying. Just leave it up to God to cure anyone,” you might say. If you had the same faith as the apostles, you just might be able to cure the sick. Or you might study to become a doctor and cure them with medical skills. As long as you acknowledge that God gave you the brains and the talent to become a doctor, you are doing God’s work.

By property, I mean sharing what you have with those in need. Many disciples were moved to sell their goods and share them with the poor, and word of that must have spread. If you are not called to sell all your goods and become a monk or a nun, you can still tithe to your church or the poor. You can donate time as well, perhaps tutoring disadvantaged kids, helping build or repair houses in poor areas, or bringing meals to shut-ins. The point is that followers of Christ are not just individual do-gooders. They are a community of believers who care about each other and also care about the non-believers who need help of any kind.

So where did these  first disciples get the faith to cure the sick and the love to help the needy? The answer is the third example – prayer. Twice in the first reading we hear how “they devoted themselves . . . to the breaking of the bread” (Acts 2:42, 46). Breaking bread was their name for the Eucharist. They also went to the temple to pray, because at that time most disciples were Jewish Christians. As they heard the Hebrew scriptures, they saw how God’s promises were fulfilled in Christ. Later, they added reading from the letters of Paul and preaching about Jesus’ works and teachings. All of these practices helped unite them to Christ and to each other.

-Tom Schmidt

“The parish is not an outdated institution; precisely because it possesses great  flexibility, it can assume quite different contours…The parish is the presence of the Church in a given territory, an environment for hearing God’s word, for growth in the Christian life, for dialogue, proclamation, charitable outreach, worship and celebration. In all its activities the parish encourages and trains its members to be evangelizers. It is a community of communities, a sanctuary where the thirsty come to drink in the midst of their journey, and a center of constant missionary outreach.”