Living the Liturgical Year

The Eucharist is in its very core an act of Thanksgiving. We give thanks to God who is the source of our being, and who keeps us in existence. This is the most fitting thing to do. And as we respond in the Preface, “it is right and just.” This weekend the church begins a new Liturgical season, the season of Advent. Advent is the season of preparation for Christmas. Major feasts in the church are marked by a period of preparation... [Click here to read more]

This weekend the church celebrates the Solemnity of Jesus Christ the Universal King. This feast was inaugurated for the universal church by Pope Pius XI in 1925 with the encyclical letter, Quas Primas. Pope Pius attributed the evils of the time to the fact that men had cast Jesus and his holy laws out of their lives. These had no place in people’s private or political lives. This rejection of Jesus as Savior and the refusal to come under his reign will continue to make peace elusive. This feast was therefore to call all people to acknowledge Jesus’ supremacy as King over all of creation and to submit to his kingship... [Click to read more]

As the liturgical season draws to its end, we will begin to see a shift in focus to the end of time, the last days, judgment and what follows. Last weekend the first reading presented us with the example of a Hebrew mother and her sons who demonstrated courage in the face of persecution, even to the point of willingly accepting bodily death in defense of the faith and traditions of their fathers. The story offered us one of the earliest Old Testament references to the belief in the resurrection, a life after death, implied in belief in the restoration of severed limbs. The saints, the heroes of our faith, did not see this earthly life as all there is. They believed that there is life even after death. And this faith urged them to live joyfully even when people treated them with contempt and so much hate. They knew that their destination was not this world, but the world which Christ had gone to prepare after his resurrection and ascension. [Click here to continue reading]

One of the core tenets of the Christian faith is belief in the resurrection from the dead. We believe that death is not the end, but that life continues even after bodily death. This faith is anchored in the belief that Christ both died and rose from the dead. He is the first fruit from the dead, and by his rising has won victory over death for those who believe in him. We believe that when our own earthly sojourn concludes in death, we too will rise with Christ again...