Lent will soon be here. It is intended to be a season of grace in which we are given a privileged opportunity to renew our faith and allow our faith to inform our daily living.
There are three areas to which we ought to give attention in the Lenten season, and our desire is to identify a practice or action that we can take that is reasonable for us to sustain throughout our forty-day journey. Keep it simple, and you’ll be successful.
Prayer. What is the state of your prayer currently? How often do you pray? How much time do you spend in prayer? What is the character of your prayer—petitionary, devotional practices (rosary, novenas, etc.), meditative, Lectio Divina? If you currently do not have a regular practice of prayer, start small. Identify the time of day that is best for you to pray—early in the morning before others wake up, later in the evening when the children are in their rooms preparing for bed, lunchtime when you carve out 20 minutes for yourself. In the time period that is best for you, stop, put your phone on silent mode, and set aside 10-15 minutes for prayer. Start by simply breathing in and out for 2-3 minutes. Allow yourself to enter the moment. When you feel a bit recollected, then offer a brief prayer of thanksgiving to God. What are you most thankful for that day? After expressing thanks to God, tell God the one thing that weighs most heavily on your mind in that moment. Just name it! Entrust that concern to God and ask God to help you handle it with God’s wisdom and strength. End your prayer with an expression of confidence in God’s presence with you and gratitude for God’s never-failing love for you. If you think doing this daily is too ambitious a goal, start with a goal of 3 days a week and see if, over the Lenten time, you are able to do more. If you have an established pattern of prayer, then take inventory of what you feel is currently lacking in your prayer. If nothing is lacking, then this part of your Lenten program is complete! If something is lacking, identify what you will do to address it in a way that is not overly burdensome for you but, instead, is doable.
Almsgiving. What can you do this Lent to direct your focus to others in need? Can you call or visit someone you know is homebound and do so at least once a week? Can you give up two treats to yourself each week (your double mocha frappuccino or your bagel with a schmear) and donate that money to an organization that will leverage your gift so that it has a greater impact? Consider City Relief or New York Common Pantry. Can you identify one homeless person near your home, or your place of work, whom you will know by name, and to whom you will provide a set level of assistance each week? Keep it simple and doable!
Fasting. From what do you need to fast? It may not be food or alcohol. It may be from gossip, from anger, from grudges, from wounding words, from impatience, from prejudice. Take time now to identify what it is in you that most depletes your positive energy or is most hurtful of others. What will you do this Lent to abstain from this? Will you be attentive to when this tendency is asserting itself and immediately seek to direct your energy elsewhere?
All that we do in Lent is done to open ourselves to the abundant grace that God wishes to shower upon us. What we take up this Lent, or lay down this Lent, is nothing compared to what we receive in return from God. Happy Lent!
— Fr. Mark Hallinan, S.J., Associate Pastor
January 28, 2024 Essay: Unclean Spirits“It’s the American way.” So said a friend as we pondered the many demons that seem to be torturing our society—family estrangement, addiction, loneliness, indebtedness, pornography, violence, militarism, conspiratorialism, racism, “the Big Lie”, among many others. This week’s gospel invites us to contemplate Jesus’s authority to rebuke and cast out the unclean spirits that maliciously seek to undermine us and drive us apart. He is the one power who can destroy them, as the demons themselves acknowledge.
Mark opens the scene with Jesus in the Capernaum synagogue, a word that had dual meanings for ancient Israel, referring to both a building where the community gathered for prayer and the community itself. One possessed was shunned and kept apart, lest the uncleanness contaminate others, which makes it particularly ironic that the evil spirit chooses to manifest itself here. It’s as if this little devil of division is flaunting its destructive impact. Jesus, by healing the poor man, restores him to communion with his neighbors, his faith community, and his nation. Cut off from his “synagogue”, the unclean man was dead; he is alive again through the healing grace of Jesus.
Like the possessed man at Capernaum, “the American way” has become characterized by alienation from each other, an alienation that has infected our politics, our churches, our families. Reliable research reports, for example, that nearly 30% of Americans are estranged from a family member, 1 in 5 condone using violence against their fellow citizens to further political agendas, and 1 in 4 young adults report feeling lonely and without significant connection to others. Moreover, nearly a third of us believe the “Big Lie” that the 2020 election was stolen. While talk of demons and evil spirits might be gauche among the intellectually sophisticated, it does seem that there is a divisive, deceiving, malevolent force at work among us.
Our time is not the first the world has faced the dark power of “unclean spirits.” In August of 1942, when the Nazis appeared to be winning, the eminent and insightful Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung wrote, “Is there still a chance to save ourselves from this spiritual decay? Yes, but a miracle will have to happen. And miracles only happen when one believes in miracles. Small islands like mountaintops would have to grow out of the chaotic sludge; islands of contemplation and of a sense of justice. Perhaps a new world will develop from these islands.” Jung understood that powers of demonic darkness were wrapping their tentacles around a vulnerable world, but that light could ultimately prevail if intentionally chosen and cultivated.
Communities such as our parish can be these islands of which Jung wrote. We together serve as a counter-witness to these “unclean spirits” through our ministries of solidarity and justice, through our breaking the bread and breaking open the word, through our dedication to lives of prayer and morality, and through our commitment to being a place where all are welcome. Jesus empowers us, as the Body of Christ, to cast out these demons, but as with all miracles, it will require our cooperation with Jesus’ healing grace. We are called to make a daily choice to say “yes” to the way of Christ, and “no” to “The American way,” my friend sighed over—when that American way means collusion with the unclean spirits.
Our journey to healing begins by bringing ourselves before Jesus with those unclean spirits that torment us—the spirits of hatred, anxiety, isolation, mistrust, violence, fear, and all that keeps us separated from others and ourselves. Naming and facing these within and without, allowing God’s healing light to penetrate those darkest places of the heart, can transform us into channels of grace for our world. I invite you to spend time in prayer this week with Jesus, the exorcist of unclean spirits.
— Brian B. Pinter, Pastoral Associate
Essay: Creation CareThe parish’s commitment to “Reverence God in the Wonder of Creation” is “a fundamental cornerstone to our mission.” With that vision in mind, our recently published Laudato Si’ Action Platform is a formal action related to our Vision Statement Implementation Plan. Part of that plan is to offer and spread the continuing awareness that our actions are joined to a worldwide, faith-based call to praise and honor God. Together, in gratitude, we can become good stewards of the Earth, God’s Creation.
Reverencing God in caring for all of creation is and has always been a central dimension of our faith, the importance of which has become paramount as we face the consequences of climate change. The evolving empirical evidence and information we receive on climate change offers both increased urgent alarm as well as evolving possibilities for solutions. Those solutions can be as far-reaching as using space-based lasers to gauge how much planet-warming carbon the trees are keeping out of the earth’s atmosphere to what we do in our homes by having a less wasteful holiday period by buying durable goods, minimizing food waste, and composting the leftovers.
The recently completed COP 28 global climate summit agreement includes aspects of transitioning away from fossil fuels, tripling renewable energy and doubling energy efficiency measures by 2030, halting forest degradation, safeguarding marine ecosystems, and a commitment to a fund for loss and damage. The worldwide Laudato Si’ Movement and the US-based Catholic Climate Covenant, among other faith-based organizations, have unequivocally expressed continuing to be active in these efforts.
As worded in a message from the Catholic Climate Covenant, “How we—each of us, and together, with the Holy Spirit—make that happen, is where the hope and progress is and will be.”
— Nicholas Naccari
January 7, 2024 Essay: “We Hold These Truths to Be Self-Evident…”: St. Ignatius Loyola Lecture Series for 2024On January 6, 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered his eighth State of the Union address, now known as the Four Freedoms speech. His words came at a time of extreme American isolationism and curbs on immigration quotas. In the historic speech, Roosevelt announced his vision for the world, “a world attainable in our own time and generation,” and founded upon four essential human freedoms: freedom of speech and expression, freedom of worship, freedom from want, and freedom from fear. These freedoms, Roosevelt declared, must triumph everywhere in the world, and act as a basis of a new moral order. “Freedom,” Roosevelt declared, “means the supremacy of human rights everywhere.”
The St. Ignatius Loyola Lecture Series for 2024 will be dedicated to the four freedoms enunciated by President Roosevelt. I am pleased to present the program, which consists of five lectures to be given monthly from January to May.
The inaugural lecture, on Wednesday, January 31st, will be given by Professor Basil Smikle, Jr., Ph.D., of Hunter College. He is Director of the Roosevelt House Institute for Public Policy at Hunter and Member of the FDR Library Board of Trustees. The lecture will present the historical context of the Four Freedoms Speech, the formulation of Roosevelt’s vision, and its impact on the post-war world and its relevance today. The title of the lecture is, “Mobilizing ‘Thoughts and Prayers’ to Secure Our Freedoms.” With over 15 years in higher education and 25 years of a career dedicated to public service, Basil regularly shares insights on electoral politics, governance, and public policy on national media outlets such as MSNBC, CNN, and Bloomberg TV. He holds a PhD in Politics and Education and an MPA from Columbia University and received a Bachelor of Science from Cornell University.
The second lecture will be given by President Tania Tetlow of Fordham University. The title is “Free Speech and Civility on College Campuses.” The date is Wednesday, February 14th. The discussion will concern the realities of engaging civil discourse and free speech on college campuses. Tetlow, a renowned legal scholar and former federal prosecutor before her career in higher education, will share how she navigates this terrain via theory and real-life examples. She has served as president of Fordham University since July 1, 2022. Previously, she was president of Loyola University New Orleans. She is the first woman and the first layperson to hold each of those positions at those two Catholic universities.
The third lecture, on Freedom of Worship, will be announced in a separate essay.
The fourth lecture, on Freedom from Want, will be given by New York City Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services, Anne Williams-Isom. The lecture will take place on Monday, April 8th. With the title, “Fulfilling America’s Promise: Delivering on FDR’s Vision of Freedom from Want,” Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom will discuss the foundations, challenges, opportunities, and lessons for leaders as America works to deliver on FDR’s “Freedom from Want.” This Freedom is defined in modern terms as freedom related to economic security and other basic needs to thrive in society. Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom will delve into areas including: poverty, equity issues, the ongoing asylum humanitarian crisis, and how we, as leaders of faith, can advance the wellbeing of New Yorkers and the people we serve. A graduate of Fordham University and Columbia Law School, she was Chief Operating Officer of the Harlem Children’s Zone.
The concluding lecture, on Freedom from Fear, will be presented in a separate essay.
All lectures will begin at 7:00 pm in Wallace Hall and will be followed by time for questions and light refreshments.
—Rev. Michael P. Hilbert, S.J., Associate Pastor
January 14, 2024: Forming the Beloved CommunityAs our nation marks the birthday of the civil rights icon, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., it is appropriate to remember the beloved community that he wished to see this nation become and to rededicate ourselves to realizing this noble vision he had for our country.
All of us readily associate Dr. King with the fight for civil rights for Black Americans. Dr. King was lionized by many for his leadership in the epic battle to win for Black Americans their right to participate fully and freely in the society to which they had contributed at so great a cost, but which had long denied them their full civil and political rights. So long as Dr. King focused his rhetoric and his actions on the need to give Black Americans the political and civil rights that they were undeniably due, King was seen by many as a worthy champion of Black Americans. But when King revealed that the breadth of his vision for America was far bolder, encompassing a call for economic justice for all, more Americans began to resist his summons to a fundamental reorientation of American society and of American values.
Dr. King had never hidden his vision of what this reorientation of American society would require. Preaching in Ebeneezer Baptist Church in 1965, King declared: “I still dream that one day all of God’s children will have food and clothing and material well-being for their bodies, culture and education for their minds, and freedom for their spirits.” Dr. King was fighting for more than civil and political rights for Black Americans. He was at the forefront of a broader struggle to secure for all Americans a life commensurate with human dignity. This is why he was in Memphis in 1968 where he was killed. He went there to support striking sanitation workers who were seeking just wages, fair benefits and humane working conditions. Dr. King’s vision for America was in perfect alignment with what our Church taught to be the fundamental rights of the human person. In his 1963 encyclical, Pacem in Terris¸ St. Pope John XXIII wrote: “[Human persons] have the right to live…and to the means necessary for the proper development of life, particularly food, clothing, shelter, medical care, rest, and, finally, the necessary social services. In consequence, they have the right to be looked after in the event of ill health; disability stemming from work; widowhood; old age; enforced unemployment; or whenever through no fault of their own they are deprived of the means of livelihood.” It is not surprising that Dr. King, steeped in the gospel of Jesus Christ as he was, articulated the same vision of a just and equitable society as did John XXIII.
Dr. King also called for a revolution in American values in which an ethos of love informed all aspects of our society; a love that is an undefeatable force for what is good, right, and just. It was to this vision of a nation transformed by love that Dr. King dedicated his life and it was for this vision that he died. Early in the civil rights struggle, King articulated the goal to which all his work was directed. “… The end is reconciliation …the creation of the Beloved Community. It is this type of spirit and this type of love that can transform opponents into friends. It is this type of understanding goodwill that will transform the deep gloom of the old age into the exuberant gladness of the new age. It is this love that will bring about miracles in the hearts of men [and women].”
May of all of us have the courage to embrace the challenge with which he left us: “…Let us rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter, but beautiful, struggle for a new world. This is the calling of the sons [and daughters] of God.”
— Rev. Mark C. Hallinan, S.J., Associate Pastor
December 31, 2023 Essay: Our Light Overpowers the DarknessAs we come to the close of this year, darkness seems to shroud us—the ongoing war in Gaza will leave a humanitarian catastrophe which there is currently no plan to address, critical domestic and international issues are being ignored in Congress while our representatives and senators engage in performative politics, and the campaign for the 2024 presidential election foreshadows a potentially frightening future for our country. As a people of faith, what should be our response to the darkness enveloping our nation and the larger world?
“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it” (1.5) This is from the prologue of the Gospel of John which is one of the Christmas gospels. This is a foundational truth of our faith. In Jesus, the light of God shone in our world and the forces of darkness—hate, evil, ignorance, and power—sought to extinguish that light by killing Jesus. Yet, by his suffering, death, and resurrection, Jesus triumphed over this world. The light of God triumphed over the darkness of this world and that light will never be extinguished. The forces of evil have been defeated. Love has conquered hate. The heart of our Christian faith is the proclamation of the triumph of love, light, and goodness over the forces of hate, darkness, and evil. This is what should enable us to persevere in living our faith even when, as now, darkness seems to be enveloping us, evil seems to be more powerful than the good, and hate seems to be suffocating love. Every day, we have to remind ourselves of the truth of what we believe. Light, love, and goodness are now victorious and will prevail.
The challenge we face as Christians is whether we will succumb to the forces of this world, or, instead, stand fast for the values of Jesus Christ. Will you make it clear to others that hate has no home in your heart by registering your disapproval of racist, antisemitic, Islamophobic, or homophobic words or actions? Will you make it clear that your heart is open to all in the respect and courtesy you extend to all persons regardless of their race, their creed, their class, their sexual orientation, their immigration status, or their housing status? Will you have the courage to advocate for what is necessary for all persons to live in the dignity with which God gifted each and every one of the children of God—life, health care, education, opportunities for employment, affordable and safe housing, opportunities for leisure, and an income sufficient to provide a life commensurate with human dignity when employment ends due to age or disability? Will you strive to offer mercy and forgiveness to those who hurt you in any way? Every day, in the concrete choices we make, we testify as to whether we have succumbed to the forces of this world, or are working to transform this world. We transform this world by our words of kindness, hope, encouragement, forgiveness, and by our deeds of love, compassion, mercy, and goodness. Each day we have to light the candle of our faith and let the light of our lives dispel the darkness that surrounds us.
As the New Year dawns, we acknowledge that there is much darkness in the world and that evil and hate seem to grow more powerful by the day. We, however, do not cower in fear, or surrender to despair. Instead, we turn to the One who is our light, Jesus Christ, and recommit ourselves to following the way he set before us—the way that has proven victorious over darkness, evil, and hate. We remember the counsel of Jesus in the gospel of John: “While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of the light” (12.36).
— Rev. Mark C. Hallinan, S.J., Associate Pastor
December 24, 2023 Essay: A Season of Beauty and WonderAt this year’s Christmas Pageant, presented by our grammar school students, one of the student narrators who introduced the performance commented that Christmas is “a season of beauty and wonder.” That phrase remained with me throughout the pageant and has permeated my consciousness ever since. A season of beauty and wonder, and yet we live in a world of darkness and dread, bombarded by reports of events on distant shores and our own city streets that mute the strains of Peace on Earth and shatter our dreams for the future. Beauty and wonder seem but illusions.
Another vivid image that has had a place of prominence in my consciousness since I saw it was the photo of a creche prominently displayed in a church. Unlike the idyllic scenes we are accustomed to, the entire scene was filled with rubble, and at its center, the Infant Jesus was placed. There was no shelter for the child. There were no animals to bring warmth. There were no shepherds. And most tragic of all, there were no parents to protect the child from harm’s way. There was only devastation and debris, as though a giant abyss was about to swallow the child into a vortex of destruction and darkness. The scene was obviously intended to display graphically the tragedy unfolding today in the Holy Land.
A rather stark contrast of words and images that have been intruding on my consciousness as I prepare to celebrate the birth of the one promised by God to save the world from the folly of its own undoing. Happiness sparkled on the faces and in the smiles of the students who participated in the Christmas pageant. Parents and family members who were present beamed with pride. Each carol and pageant scene trumpeted the joy that is rightly associated with this season. Beauty and wonder were evident that night as we dared to dream, in that moment, that all was right with the world and would forever be. For unto us, the Prince of Peace is born.
And as for the searing image of the creche, I was drawn more deeply into it. The desolation I initially experienced began to fade as my reflections focused on the very center of the creche. There was an exquisite serenity that radiated from the vulnerable infant lying in the detritus of conflict. Beauty and wonder were captured in the glow of the infant’s gaze. His radiance was the incarnation of God with us, Emmanuel, wherever we are—in the midst of the rubble of our lives, in the deepest darkness of loneliness, at the center of everything that brings us joy, in our successes and failures, Emmanuel!
We will gather this Christmas season as others have done for more than two millennia. We will bring with us everything that is in our consciousness and hearts and place at the crib our dreams and hopes, our gratitude and praise, our fears and regrets, and, most important of all, our belief that this is truly a season of beauty and wonder. We do this trusting in God’s love for us, believing that the Father sent the Son into our world, an imperfect world, messy and blood-stained but filled with the beauty that is and that is yet to be. The wonders of His love exceed our every hope and dream. Joy to the World is the anthem that is befittingly sung by those who believe.
Christmas, in truth, is a season of beauty and wonder. May our hearts be open to receive the wonders of God’s love this Christmas and every day of our lives. Merry Christmas!
— Rev. Dennis J. Yesalonia, S.J., Pastor
December 17, 2023 Essay: Matter Matters! Celebrating the Centenary of GreccioThe global and social darkness of this Advent urges us to understand God’s relationship to creation, both the universe and the world we inhabit. God is not “outside” the whole order of creation. Rather, God dwells in the depths of creation, in our being and becoming. Teilhard de Chardin, S.J., considered matter and consciousness as two aspects of the “stuff” of creation. As this whole enterprise moves forward, Love or God is the unifying influence of existence. Such Love, ‘Incarnating’ within matter, consciousness, history, and personhood in its fulness, is the goal of creation’s becoming. God rises up by means of the energies of Love, bringing a divine presence to the wondrous exchange of the divine/human in the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ and in us.
Eight hundred years ago, at Christmas of 1223, St. Francis of Assisi went to Greccio, a tiny village in Rieiti, Italy, to celebrate God’s extravagant gift of Love in the birth of Jesus Christ. His vision of a ‘New Bethlehem’ gave rise to the Christmas Creche tradition. Francis shifted the perspective from “we go to the crib” to “ in Christ, the Incarnate God, comes to us.” A manger filled with straw, an ox, and an ass, was placed under an altar on the mountainside. There were no figures of parents, sheep, angels, or wise men! Not even a babe in the feeding trough! His desire was to enact the memory of Christ’s birth out in the open, in an out-of-the-way place, with Jesus Christ as the center-point of human history. Hundreds of villagers from far and near, carrying lighted lanterns, arrived, ecstatic with joy. The forest amplified their songs of jubilation!
For Francis, celebrating the Eucharist over the feeding trough stressed the significance of memory, “ensuring that we don’t forget.” (1 Celano). In his heart, the supreme “memorial” of the Eucharist continues Incarnation—the Body and Blood of the living Christ feeds us today. The Nativity of Greccio opens us to the ‘coming near’ of God. The Spiritual Senses of Joy, Beauty, Awe, Wonder, Love, Gratitude, and Peace engage with the physical senses of Sight, Hearing, Taste, Touch, and Smell. One’s whole being can be absorbed into the intoxication of such extravagant Love. The powerful Love of the Infant draws everyone present, beyond Himself, into communion with God and with one another.
What does this mean for our world today? In retrospect, the Greccio gift appears to be an extravagant, amazing communal experience of nature mysticism. Michael Blastic, OFM, posits that the event may be termed a “ Cosmic Liturgical Dialog.” The dynamism of the living Word made flesh draws Creation, Incarnation, Eucharist, and Humanity into a communion of opposites, becoming the reconciliation referred to by the gospel message ‘Peace on Earth Good Will to All.’’. Humans and creation harmonized in the echoes of the song across the forested valley. In medieval art, the Ox represented the Jewish tradition and the Ass, the ‘Pagan’ tradition, i.e., Muslims and non-believers. Both were depicted as feeding from the trough of the Babe at Greccio! Not much is known about the content of the homily preached by St. Francis during that Christmas Liturgy, except that it proclaimed Peace! Francis was adamant that the celebration witnessed simplicity, poverty (non-appropriation), and humility (respect and reverence). All are welcome! This New Bethlehem offers mutual Love without cost, distinction, or strings attached. Extravagant inclusion in communion is a hallmark of the Incarnation. ‘Fratelli Tutti’!
— Sr. Kathryn King FSP
December 10, 2023 Essay: The Waiting is the Hardest PartAfter reading this essay title, Tom Petty fans are probably humming the chorus to one of my favorites of his. The second Sunday of Advent, indeed ALL of Advent, is about waiting. Each week, we light the candles of the Advent wreath to commemorate the 4,000 years God’s People waited for the Messiah. For a child, however, Advent can be a sort of “holy countdown” to the main event—Christmas and Santa. When you are little, the waiting truly IS the hardest part of December.
As I get a little older and the more commercial and secular Christmas becomes, the more I treasure Advent. It’s as if the Church has given us extra time to prepare for the sacred season. It’s like when you have guests coming over for dinner, and that 5 PM work meeting has been canceled. Suddenly, you have a little more time to prepare and be ready to welcome your guests with calm and joy. This is the gift of the season.
I love everything about Advent—the readings, the colors, and especially the music. Today’s reading from Isaiah is particularly beautiful. It starts with words of comfort—desperately needed when Isaiah wrote them, and especially now, given the trauma of terrorism and loss of life in the Holy Land. How can we respond to these words? Isaiah gives us a roadmap—to prepare the way of the Lord by dedicating ourselves to loving Him and our fellow neighbor. We should measure our holiday hustle against these benchmarks: do our activities help us better love God and serve our neighbor? If not, maybe some of them this year and see how it affects our view and experience of Christmas.
What are some concrete ways to do this?
Get to know God better. In addition to Mass during Advent, commit to attending one of the educational events at St. Ignatius. Reading the Bible is another way to better understand God and His plan for us all. This can be daunting, but this year, I have done The Bible in a Year on the Hallow app. You can start any time of the year and go at your own pace—each session is about 22 minutes. Doing this over the year has helped me recognize the readings in Mass and their overall place in salvation history. Finally, find God through the experiences of others of faith. In working on the Mary Project, an interfaith discussion of Mary from the Catholic and Muslim traditions, I have seen the faithfulness of Mary and the presence of God in our world through a different lens, and I am making new friends, too!
Sing a new song. Advent has arguably some of the most beautiful music of the season. Take some time and learn a new hymn and ALL its lyrics. Be sure to sing in Mass no matter what you think of your musical ability! My favorite is Comfort, Comfort, O My People, which is like today’s reading. One beautiful setting is the video by Ignatian Scola on YouTube. St. Augustine said, “He/She who sings prays twice.” Think about that the next time you are in Mass! Be sure to attend one of our parish’s Christmas concerts—today at 3 PM and December 17th at 3 PM. Both are beautiful and have ample opportunity for audience participation.
Reach out to your neighbor. Yes, there is plenty of opportunity for charitable donations this time of year, but in addition to those, reach out to family or friends you haven’t heard from in a while or a neighbor down the hall. Invite a friend feeling overwhelmed by the holiday to Mass or one of our concerts.
Each of these is a way for you to do a little bit to make straight the highway for our God. Happy Advent…happy waiting!
— Simon Vinocour McKeever, Chair, Ignatian Interfaith Ministry
December 3, 2023 Essay: Spiritual Treasure[This First Sunday of Advent, St. Ignatius Loyola Parish celebrates the RCIA Rite of Welcome, acknowledging a group of adults as they formally begin their journey toward becoming Catholic. This essay is written by Steve and Etra Rancourt, who were received into the Church at last year’s Easter Vigil.]
Recently, our family has been captivated by a television show that involves a group of friends searching for various gold treasures around the globe. The adventure on which these friends embark is both rewarding and challenging. It causes them to question many aspects of their lives prior to this adventure. When I think about our journey of becoming Catholic and part of St. Ignatius Loyola Parish, it can also be described as a treasure hunt, but one of the spirit. The parables below from Matthew speak to this spiritual treasure:
“The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure buried in a field, which a person finds and hides again, and out of joy goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant searching for fine pearls. When he finds a pearl of great price, he goes and sells all that he has and buys it.” (Matthew 13:44-46).
One such treasure has been the RCIA program. The teachers brought us to the Gospel. Each week was its own adventure, where you travel to a new destination. The vivid imagery contained in the verses made it feel as if we had been there in person a millennium ago. Oftentimes, the classes would result in us debating or helping each other understand the more complex lessons under the night sky on the walk home. The readings, handouts, and textbook were helpful guides to deciphering how the teachings of Jesus apply today. Faith has opened an entirely new dimension in our lives. We still have a lot to learn. We are grateful that St. Ignatius Loyola has so many engaged clergy and parishioners to help continue the exploration.
Another treasure we have discovered at St. Ignatius Loyola is the Interparish Religious Education Program (IREP) and Liturgy of the Word for Children. The teachers present lessons on humbleness, charity, gratitude, & forgiveness told through the Bible in an engaging and understandable manner. It is truly a unique and rare experience that is hard to find elsewhere. It is a privilege for our children to be able to attend these programs that help build character.
The most surprising treasure of all has been the experience of participating in Mass. Not until we experienced it for ourselves could we fully appreciate how transformational spending this time in personal reflection, communal fellowship, receiving the Eucharist, prayer, and rejoicing could be. The choir, homilies, community, and Communion Rite provide the map to guide us toward encountering Jesus in the Eucharist.
Once Mass concludes and we depart from the Church, we are ready to begin our week—inspired again. We know that we will not be perfect disciples in the days ahead, but we feel that each week we return to Mass, we are one step closer to the treasure buried in the field or the fine pearls of the parables.
In the spirit of the season, we thank you all for the love and support the parish community has shown our family. We thank the Lord for guiding us up the steps and through these doors. We pray for the RCIA Catechumens and Candidates experiencing this journey in the Welcome Rite today. Amen.
— Steve & Etra Rancourt, St. Ignatius Loyola Parishioners/2022 RCIA Group