April 2014

Low Sunday – “A” – April 27, 2014

From the Pastor /

Every Sunday at Mass we proclaim the Creed – the “I believe”. The word “creed” comes from the Latin word “credo”, meaning “I believe”; and the word “believe” derives ultimately from a word related to “love”. When we pray the Creed, when we say we believe, we are making a statement about the person in whom we trust, the one to whom we have given our hearts – just as Thomas did. “The truth is out there.” For the Christians, the truth of the resurrection will never be proved or disproved by scientific reasoning of historical data, but by the effects of that truth in our world and in our personal lives. The first reading gives an indication of some of those effects: a faithfulness to the teaching of the apostles, to the community, to the breaking of bread, to prayer. Perhaps most importantly, the real hallmarks of the risen Jesus are the peace and joy, the healing and reconciliation that this Spirit brings into people’s lives – driving out fear and sadness, overcoming the death-dealing power of sin. This is the real sign of the resurrestion, the truth that we are called to live out and embody, for the healing and salvation of the world.

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Resurrection of the Lord – “A” – April 20, 2014

Frackville, From the Pastor, PNCC /

We read in today’s Gospel that when the beloved disciple entered the tomb, he saw and he believed. What did he see? Not Jesus, certainly, only the empty tomb with the grave clothes. The Gospel tells us that up to this point they had failed to understand the teaching of scripture that Jesus must rise from the dead. The disciples were in a state of shock. Their world had been shattered as they witnessed the arrest of Jesus and His death on the cross. It took more than the evidence of an empty tomb to convince them that Jesus was truly risen from the dead. The empty tomb was the beginning of a process that led to faith. Gradually, over a period of 40 days, they had a variety of experiences of meeting the risen Lord, which enabled them finally to proclaim with conviction, as Peter says in today’s first reading. The relationship that the disciples had with Jesus began with an invitation to follow Him. They heard His words; they witnessed His miracles; they saw how He related to people with great love and understanding, and the conviction grew that He was the Christ, the Son of the living God. What this meant was severely challenged whey they witnessed the betrayal of Jesus, His arrest and torture, and the finally His death on the cross. They only really came to understand who Jesus was after the resurrection, when the Spirit came to lead them to complete truth.

Easter is the feast of all feasts. The feast of Christmas did not even exist for the first two centuries of the Church’s life, but Christianity is inconceivable without Easter. The risen Lord appears to those who have received the gift of faith, that gift of the Holy Spirit which brings us into a relationship with Jesus. When we believe in the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, we are enabled to die to the things of this world and come alive to the things of God. Our whole sense of values changes, because our life is now hidden with Christ in God. We begin to see with the eyes of Christ so that we can know His Father as our Father and feel His compassion for the needs of the world around us. Like the disciples, however, we have to grow in our faith. Like them, we have to follow the call of Jesus, to listen to His word, to allow a relationship with Him to develop. Without Jesus, our world is an empty tomb. Today let us open our hearts to the gift of the Spirit who will enable us to see what is not visible to the eyes of our body, and to believe that the Lord is truly risen and living among us.

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Schedule for Holy Week and Easter

Frackville, PNCC /

HOLY TUESDAY, April 15th

10:00AM – Central Diocese Clergy Conference in Scranton.
4:00PM – Holy Mass of Chrism in St. Stanislaus Cathedral, Scranton, PA.

HOLY WEDNESDAY, April 16th

6:00PM – Bitter Lamentations (2)

HOLY THURSDAY, April 17th

6:00PM – Holy Mass of the Lord’s Supper

GOOD FRIDAY, April 18th – The Lord’s Passion

12:00 (at Noon) – The Liturgy of the Good Friday with adoration of the Cross and Holy Communion. Adoration of the Most Blessed Sacrament will be held until 7:00PM.
2:00PM – Frackville Lenten Ecumenical Service (Trinity Evangelical Congregational Church).
7:15PM – Stations of the Cross

HOLY SATURDAY, April 19th

3:00PM – The Liturgy of the Blessing of Fire, Water and Paschal Candle. After the Liturgy – blessing of Easter food (baskets)

RESURRECTION OF OUR LORD, April 20th

7:00AM – Easter procession. After Procession – Holy Mass – intention: for All Parishioners.
10:00AM – Easter Sunday Holy Mass.

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Palm Sunday – “A” – April 13, 2014

From the Pastor /

Today we are being first-hand witnesses to the passion and death of our Lord Jesus Christ. Today we are being called to watch closely as Jesus undergoes and endures the journey to Calvary. Today we are being asked to decide whether to stay close and walk with Jesus. On the first Good Friday, all of Jesus’ disciples left Him at various times along the route. Today we are asked to make the decision: to stay by the Lord, or to do as the first disciples did and desert Him. The choice is ours. If we choose to stay close to the Lord and walk by His side, then as Jesus takes each step, the horror of what is happening and what is ultimately going to happen becomes clearer and clearer. Everyone has gone, and it seems that even God the Father is gone.

As disciples of the Lord in this present day there is much to do and to learn if we are to be effective witnesses to the glory of Jesus Christ. There are two men who walked with Jesus in His daily life and who were there with the Lord as He was arrested. The two men are Peter and Judas. We can learn important lessons from these two disciples.

First let us look at Judas and see what we can learn from him. There are many theories about the why and wherefore of Judas, but this is not the place to discuss them. The facts from the scriptures suffice, and they are that Judas betrayed Jesus, and then killed himself when he realized what was actually happening to Jesus. Then there is Peter, who in essence did virtually the same thing as Judas. He betrayed any knowledge of the Lord, and when the cock crowed Peter realized what was happening, then left and wept bitterly. He went away and wept, full of shame.
Even if we desert the Lord and run away, He will always be longing to welcome us back.

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Passion Sunday – “A” – April 6, 2014

From the Pastor /

What makes the tears of Jesus particularly striking is that they were not simply an emotional reaction. His emotions are perfectly integrated with His reason, and His reason is undamaged by sin, Jesus always sees to the very causes of all the sin and suffering in the world. One of those causes is, as srcipture tells us, the work of the devil. Tears by themselves, of course do not raise the dead. But because Jesus is also divine, He was, and is, able not merely to return life to a corpse, but truly to resurrect us all.

How do we apply all this to our lives? Part of the good news is that in the first place we don’t have to. In the first place God applies it all to us. Our part is to respond to and nourish this life of grace, to make the Holy Spirit welcome in our hearts and minds. By living a sacramental life in the Church, we are nourished by the sacraments and prayer and good works. But we can always do more to appreciate what God is doing with us.

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