10 Apr Good Friday

“Our journey is not in vain; it does not come up against a tombstone.  A single phrase astounds the woman and changes history: “Why do you seek the living among the dead?” Why do you think that everything is hopeless, that no one can take away your own tombstones?  Why do you give into resignation and failure?  Easter is the feast of tombstones taken away, rocks rolled aside.  God takes away even the hardest stones against which our hopes and expectations crash: death, sin, fear, worldliness.  Human history does not end before a tombstone, because today it encounters the “living stone,” the risen Jesus.   –– Pope Francis

FROM YOUR PASTOR

For Good Friday, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops offered the following Prayer For An End To The Pandemic:

Let us pray, dearly beloved, for a swift end
to the coronavirus pandemic that afflicts our world,
that our God and Father will heal the sick,
strengthen those who care for them,
and help us all to persevere in faith.

Almighty and merciful God,
source of all life, health and healing,
look with compassion on our world, brought low by disease;
protect us in the midst of the grave challenges that assail us
and in your fatherly providence
grant recovery to the stricken,
strength to those who care for them,
and success to those working to eradicate this scourge.
Through Christ our Lord. Amen. 

For you and me, the Pandemic of 2020 has become a Tombstone — Physically and Spiritually…and for some it is closed and for others it is removed.

Physically, it has become a TOMBSTONE CLOSED for those who have been Called Home by the virus, and for their Loved Ones left behind who were separated from their loved one in their last moments.

Physically,  it has become a TOMBSTONE CLOSED for those who have lost their Business or their Job in the Service, Hospitality, and Seasonal  Industries closed as non-essential.

Spiritually, it has been a TOMBSTONE REMOVED for those First Responders, Doctors and Nurses, Caregivers, Military Providers, Scientists, and Civil Servants who are responding to both the grim Life-Taking and the heroic Life-Saving Realities of a Pandemic World.

Spiritually, it has been a TOMBSTONE REMOVED for those who Minister to the Home-bound and Vulnerable and Homeless, for those who Underwrite and Provide groceries for Food Lines and Food Banks, and for those who Pray All These Good Samaritans Forward.

Then, where is OUR HOPE?  Through our Baptism, we are a People of The Resurrection — looking Beyond OUR CROSS  to the Promise Of New Life…a life PURIFIED BY THE BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST ON HIS CROSS.

For Disciples, Easter IS our ‘Feast of Tombstones Taken Away.’ As Disciples,  we bring the RISEN JESUS CHRIST TO THOSE WHO NEED this ‘Living Stone’…Physically and Spiritually…

And we do it…In THIS Time AND In ALL Ages.

+May God Bless You and Keep You+