Bulletins

November 25, 2018

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With this recent observance of Thanksgiving, have you noticed something eerily different after weekday Mass? Have you heard the silence?

If not, it might be because weekday Mass is not part of your routine. I remember when my parents started going to Mass on Saturday morning in addition to Sunday morning. The quiet devotion of the smaller gathering seemed so much more intimate and prayerful than Sunday Mass. It also seemed like I was all of a sudden part of a hidden world. Now I might describe it as a gateway drug.

Anyway, daily Mass is beautifully simple.

Another hidden part of the life of the church are the prayers of the sacristy. Making a personal act of thanksgiving after Mass is integral to the Sacred Liturgy. In fact, Canon Law requires priests to do so. In the five minutes of silence you now enjoy after Mass please join us in this (composed by Fr. Scalia and recited by all St. John servers after Mass) and other prayers of thanksgiving:

Mary, holy virgin mother, I have received your Son, Jesus Christ. With love you became His mother, gave birth to Him, nursed Him and helped Him grow to manhood.

With love I return Him to you, to hold once more, to love with all your heart and to offer to the Holy Trinity as our supreme act of worship, for your honor and for the good of all your pilgrim brothers and sisters.

Mother, ask God to forgive my sins and to help me serve Him more faithfully. Keep me true to Christ until death and let me come to praise Him with you for ever and ever. Amen.

Mary, Mother of God, pray for us!
St. Bonaventure, pray for us!
St. Thomas Aquinas, pray for us!

Fr. Christopher J. Pollard

p.s. “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb 13,8). Amen? Amen!