Greetings in Christ, all!
With this weekend, we Catholics enter the season of Advent.
Advent is a lot of things for us and I think we all get the preparation to celebrate the Birthday of Christ. With that, we also want to remember that we are keeping it in our heart to prepare for the second coming of Jesus. There will be a day when Christ returns and all “will be assembled before His glorious throne” and be judged. We try to keep this in our hearts so that we don’t make decisions in our daily life as if our time on earth was/is all that matters. The fact is, our time on earth is the shortest stretch of our eternal existence.
It used to be that part of that preparation involved giving away what we don’t really need, but that has evolved into the tremendous pressure of buying gifts. This well-intentioned and beautiful custom is for many a serious hardship and comes with a feeling of great pressure. I promise to hold you all in my prayers so that God helps us all put aside societal pressures and focus all our decision making on the eternal.
For whatever it is worth to you, I am always astounded by your generosity and I hope you believe me when I tell you that I release you from any sense of obligation to get me anything. Your lives, your love, your commitment to Jesus is all the gift I will ever need. The fact that you let me love and lead you as best I can is the gift. I promise I mean this.
A couple important notes for the future:
December 8th is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary. This is a Holy Day of Obligation for us Catholics. Please make sure to plan today for which Mass you and your family will attend. As your priest, I invite you to remember that our kids need to see how seriously we take this day; please don’t let any secular obligations get in the way of the eternal!
This week on Thursday we host our Advent by Candlelight event. I’m really excited to share this time with any women of our parish who are interested. I will offer a short talk and Fr. Le will offer a prayer. There will be snacks and all kinds of goodness. Please know you are welcome to come!
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