Combining Parishes

Dear Parishioners,

Back in the late 1960s, I read an article in the Catholic Review about the declining number of priests in the country. The vocations crisis was just beginning, so I thought maybe I could help. After making a private weekend retreat at the Jesuit house of Manresa overlooking the Naval Academy, I contacted the Vocations Director for the Archdiocese, had several interviews, attended the seminary in Washington, and was ordained along with eleven other men in 1975. Back then the shortage was not being felt as we had four priests serving St. Dominic’s on Harford Road. Now there is only one priest, and he is also pastor of another previously large parish.

With this happening throughout the Archdiocese, over the years, a plan was needed. So five years ago, after extensive listening, the Archbishop issued a pastoral letter titled A Light Brightly Visible. While partly intended to enable the diocese to operate more efficient administratively, financially, and pastorally, a main objective was to improve on evangelization efforts, the primary objective of the Church. To do this, some individual parishes were needed to combine and form a pastorate with one pastor responsible for two or more parishes. Some pastorates would have an associate pastor as well.

When the pastorates were designed, it was decided to join St. Jane Frances and Our Lady of the Chesapeake. The timing will be a gradual process over a period of years. It will start when I retire as of July 1, 2022.  At this time, the plan is for Father Stephen Hook to be appointed Pastor of St. Jane Frances while continuing to serve as Pastor of Our Lady of the Chesapeake.

While it will be difficult to leave St. Jane’s, I do so knowing I am leaving it in capable hands of a good, talented, holy priest.

Fr. Carl

Faith In Action

Dear Parishioners,

Who do we say Jesus is? Is He our savior? Is He our Lord? Is He our God? If we answer “yes He is,” do our actions reflect this profession of faith? Are we a people who walk the talk no matter what the consequences?

In the Gospel, Peter represents the Christian community, both in his profession of faith and in his misunderstanding of the faith (Mk 8:27-35). We, too, are most willing, even eager at times, to proclaim what we believe about Jesus. But most of the time, we are only half ready to follow through with the implications of what we say, especially when it calls us to follow the redeeming suffering of the Savior. Jesus says to the Church, too, what he said to Peter: “Get in line behind me; walk in my path; go where I will lead.” May our faith in action follow in the footsteps of Christ which will lead us to everlasting life.

God Bless,
Deacon Howard

Work and Rest

Dear Parishioners,

As we mark the end of most summer vacations this Labor Day Weekend, we celebrate the work and workers not only of our country but also of the world. Sometimes we are tempted to think of work as drudgery and the exploitation of freedom. Certainly, when we think about slavery in the past and some of the injustice in some places in the world today, that is true. However, work in itself has been ennobled not only by Jesus and Joseph in their work as carpenters but also by the Father himself. The Book of Genesis portrays the story of creation as the work of God. “Thus the heavens and the earth and all their array were completed. Since on the seventh day God was finished with the work he had been doing, he rested on all the work he had undertaken. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work he had done in creation.” (Gen 2:1-3)

Now before the fall of Adam and Eve, life in the garden was not an idyllic stroll in the park. Since God worked, so too did Adam and Eve, for they were created in the image and likeness of God. They were told by God to not only be fertile but also fill the earth and subdue it. In giving them seed-bearing plants and seed-bearing fruit trees, God was turning them into farmers to produce food. And while it was work, it was a sharing in God’s work and therefore satisfying. Only after original sin, did it become more difficult and challenging.

Still along with work, God gives us a day to rest, recharge our batteries, build family relationships, and the opportunity to strengthen our connection to God in worship. In the old covenant, it was the Sabbath (Saturday); in the new covenant, it is Sunday, the new creation occasioned by the Resurrection of Jesus. The two—rest and work—give balance to our lives. Work gives meaning to our lives from which we can take pride of accomplishment; rest and Sunday worship put it all in perspective. We need both; that’s why God worked and rested. May you have a Happy and Restful Labor Day.

Fr. Carl

What Is Your Heart Condition?

Dear Parishioners,

What is our heart condition? The readings this week speak about our heart condition. Jesus sees what is in the heart of people. (Dt 4:1-2, 6-8; Ps 15:2-5 [1a]/Jas 1:17-18, 21b-22, 27; Mk 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23)

The heart is the center of our spiritual life just as it is the center of our biological life. Our thinking comes from the heart. Also, our desires and fears arise from our heart. That is why Jesus is perfectly clear when He says that from the heart come evil thoughts, lust, and many other undesirable behaviors. Thus, we sin from within, not from outside.

Although washing hands is a good practice to maintain good physical health, it has nothing to do with our spiritual health. To avoid sin and thus maintain purity, we need to follow God’s commandments; the greatest of them is to love Him and to love others as we love ourselves. Indeed, it is important that we make our body clean, but it is far more important to keep our mind and heart free from evil thoughts and sinful desires.

God Bless,
Deacon Howard

Making The Right Choice

Dear Parishioners,

One of the things we all need to do is be more grateful and thankful for the blessings we have and the people around us. I want to thank everybody for their prayers and support for one another and the parish during the pandemic. I was particularly impressed by the good stewards who helped clean the pews after each Mass week after week, the ushers who helped seat the people with distance spacing, the many who signed up for electronic fund transfers (EFTs) when they couldn’t bring their envelopes to Mass, the gentleman who recently refinished the pews damaged by the cleaning solutions, and you, so many of whom have come back to Mass. Somebody jokingly said, “They might just get used to watching the Mass on TV in their pajamas with a latte in their hand and the newspaper by their side.” But if there’s anything we learned in the past month from the Gospel of John, if we want to share in the life of Jesus, we must eat the “Bread of Life,” Jesus in Holy Communion. And we can’t do that through television.

Today’s readings call for us to make a choice (Jos 24:1 2a, 15-17, 18b; Ps 34:2-3, 16-17, 18-19, 20-21; Eph 5:21-32 or 5:2a, 25-32; Jn 6:60-69). At Shechem, Joshua invites the Israelites to make a choice. It’s either the God who liberated them from Egypt or the gods of the Amorites. The people and Joshua made the right choice. The gospel shows Jesus offering Peter a choice as well. He could stay with Jesus or go with the many who left because the teaching of Jesus was “hard to endure.” Peter made the right choice. May we always do the same even when we find His teachings through the Church “hard to endure.”

Please pray for Haiti and Afghanistan.
Fr. Carl

Feast of the Assumption

Dear Parishioners,

This Sunday we celebrate the Assumption of Mary. Have you ever wondered why the church uses the word “assumption” instead of “ascension” for this dogma of faith? The Catholic Church teaches that Mary was Assumed body and soul into heaven, but artistic representations throughout the centuries have portrayed our Blessed Mother as Ascending into heaven in a similar fashion as Christ, perhaps carried on the wings of Angels. The reality is assumption is a deeply biblical concept, but is brought about by God’s action. In contrast, an ascension is only recorded once in Sacred Scripture, and it implies that the one who ascends does so by their own power. Therefore, “No one has ascended into heaven but he who descended from heaven, the Son of man.” It is only Jesus, the Son of God, who can ascend and descend from heaven by His own power.  Truly the Feast of the Assumption is good news for all of us who believe in the resurrection of Christ from the dead. We see the Easter promise of our salvation realized in the Assumption of Mary. Mary is the first to receive the fullness of the redemption that her son has won for all of humanity.

God Bless,
Deacon Howard

The Bread of Life

Dear Parishioners,

Again we pause and take a break from Mark’s gospel and listen to John’s. John is the only gospel writer to leave out Jesus’ institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper. Instead, John gives us 45 verses of Jesus referring to himself as the Bread of Life and what it means for our lives—namely that it is Jesus who give us real life.

The opening verse of today’s gospel uses an unusual word “murmur”. “The Jews started to murmur in protest because Jesus claimed ‘I am the bread that came down from heaven’.” Murmur means rumble or complain and was first used in the Book of Exodus. The Israelites in the desert without water grumble and complain to Moses. Life is hard and they aren’t happy with it. As always, God comes through and leads them to a place with 12 springs and 70 palm trees. So, their murmuring stops until they run out of food and complain to Moses again. So God provides quail to quench their hunger and grumbling.

Human nature often leads to complaining when difficulties or hardships occur. It was that way with both the Jews of Moses’ time and those of Jesus’ time. For the latter, it was hard to believe that a man could actually have come down from heaven and be the bread of life and that eating this bread would lead to eternal life.

Hopefully, we have learned that grumbling, complaining, or murmuring is not the way to go when we encounter any kind of hardship. God loves us and is with us. Let us turn to him for support to help us weather whatever hardships come our way.

Fr. Carl