Jesus and His Church

07-31-2022Pastor's LetterFr. Oliver Vietor

Hello,

When it comes to Christian morality, particularly in regard to the Church’s teachings on sexuality, people sometimes want to separate Jesus and Saint Paul. Paul is more explicit and complete on such questions, and so when people are uncomfortable with this, they want to ignore Paul and focus on Jesus, who says less and is perhaps a little less clear. This move is appealing because it puts the priority on Jesus and holds him up as our ultimate authority. The trouble is that it just doesn’t work. We can’t separate Jesus from Saint Paul.

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Rely on your Church Family

07-24-2022Pastor's LetterFr. Oliver Vietor

Hello,

I had my vacation and now it is Fr. Connealy’s turn, so he is away for a bit. As always seems to be the case, my vacation was great but it is nice to be back. We mostly stayed close to home but I did travel back East briefly. This was for my father’s funeral, which went as well as it could. One point that I will always remember was at the committal.

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Gifts I am Grateful For

07-17-2022Pastor's LetterFr. Dan Connealy

Happy Sunday!

Thank you to everyone for the birthday wishes! I’m grateful to God for another year of life and to be here at St. Joan of Arc with all of you. The gift of the priesthood is another gift from God for which I am incredibly grateful. The Sacraments are the life of our parish and it is a great joy to be a minister of the Holy Eucharist. All of the Sacraments give us the grace to encounter the Risen Lord and experience the Divine Life here and now. I pray that this week each of us is able to spend time to reflect more intently on the Sacred Mysteries and God’s loving action in our lives.

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Encourage Deeper Understanding of Scripture

07-10-2022Gospel Reflection

We can learn a great deal from Mister Rogers. Remember him? He was the gentle soul who found his way into living rooms worldwide starting as far back as 1968. Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood was a beloved program that celebrated and exalted people, especially children. He taught us that we are neighbors and that everyone has a place. Everyone matters. He had a vision, born of his relationship with God that highlighted every human life’s innocence, beauty, and uniqueness. To that end, he called us to be responsible for each other, saying nothing different than what Jesus said. Viewers quickly learned that life is not just about me.

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Happy Independence Day!

07-03-2022Pastor's LetterFr. Dan Connealy

Happy Sunday and Happy 4th of July Weekend!

This week we celebrate the signing of the Declaration of Independence. We recall those famous words of the Declaration, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” These truths acknowledged by the founders of our country remind us that these rights are “unalienable”, that is, they are not able to be alienated from the person.

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