Taste Our Goodies

The Polish National Catholic Church has designated 2018 as the Year of the Family. In September, the church will focus on encouraging people to identify their unique talents and skills to enrich their family and the church community.

Holy Family will celebrate this theme by dedicating the new Ed Bartz Pavilion the handiwork of its carpenters and masons who built this structure over the summer. Here the community will celebrate family reunions, anniversaries, weddings, baptisms, birthdays, showers and any occasion where families bring their favorite recipes to the delight of their friends and neighbors.

The children of the parish have written prayers and memories that will placed in a time capsule that will be buried and opened in 2025. Included will be stories about the history of the parish that celebrates over 150 years of faith and love to God and neighbor. In addition, a new teeter totter will be blessed the result of the generosity of many local donor families.

Finally, a Memorial Walkway that leads to the Clayton Playground will be blessed and dedicated and serve as a prayerful journey to remember individuals living and deceased whose gifts of faith and unique talents have helped this parish continue to serve the spiritual needs of this county.

Holy Family’s mission is to welcome all people where the hopeless find hope. Where the lost find direction. Where the hurting find healing. People experience church in a refreshing new way. Where real people talk about real issues. It’s a community where people love God, love others and love our rural lifestyle.

As shepherd of this generous and talented faith community, we invite all parents and grandparents to come with their children and grandchildren and experience the best of who we are. Come and taste our goodies, play on our swings and meet old fashioned country folk who have open minds and open hearts. The celebration will being with our “Mass in the Grass” at 10am, followed by a bring a dish luncheon and old fashioned games for the kids.

There's a Hole in the Heart That Will Never Heal

A mother whose son died twelve years ago shared that there is a hole in her heart that will never heal.

Jesus taught: “whoever wants to be my disciple must deny one self, take up thier cross daily, and follow me.” What does Jesus mean by this?

First, it means accepting that suffering is a part of our lives. Accepting our cross means we have to make peace with the fact that frustration, disappointment, pain, misfortune, illness, unfairness, sadness, and death are a part of our lives and they must be accepted without bitterness. As long as we nurse the notion that pain in our lives is something we need not accept, we will habitually find ourselves bitter—bitter for not having accepted the cross.

Second, taking up our cross means that we may not, in our suffering, pass on any bitterness to those around us. There’s a difference between healthily groaning under the weight of our pain and unhealthily whining in self-pity and bitterness under that weight. The cross gives us permission to do the former, but not the latter. Jesus groaned under the weight of his cross, but no self-pity, whining, or bitterness issued forth from his lips or his beaten body.

Third, carrying our cross daily means accepting that God’s gift to us is often not what we expect. God always answers our prayers but, often times, by giving us what we really need rather than what we think we need. The Resurrection does not come when we expect it and rarely fits our notion of how a resurrection should happen. To carry your cross is to be open to surprise.

And finally, taking up your cross means living in a faith that believes that nothing is impossible for God. This means accepting that God is greater than the human imagination. Indeed, whenever we succumb to the notion that God cannot offer us a way out of our pain into some kind of newness, it’s precisely because we have reduced God down to the size of our own limited imagination. It’s only possible to accept our cross, to live in trust, and to not grow bitter inside pain if we believe in possibilities beyond what we can imagine, namely, if we believe in the Resurrection.

Lord, I pray for all my Sonshine Friends that you give them the patience to wait and give up their bitterness so that they we will take up their cross and believe in the Resurrection.

I Love You

Next time you are praying, try this. Open yourself in such a way that sometime—perhaps not today, but sometime—you are able to hear God say to you: ‘I love you!’

These words, addressed to you by God, are the most important words you will ever hear because, before you hear them, nothing is ever completely right with you, but, after you hear them, something will be right in your life at a very deep level.

These are simple words, but they capture what we ultimately try to do when we “lift mind and heart to God” in prayer.

We need to open ourselves to God in such a way that we are capable of hearing God say to us, individually, “I love you!”

This might sound pious and sentimental. It’s anything but that.

In the Gospel of John, we meet Jesus as an adult right on the first page and the first words out of Jesus’ mouth are a question: “What are you looking for?” That question remains throughout the rest of the gospel suggesting that beneath everything else a certain search is going on. A lot of things are happening on the surface, but underneath, there remains always the nagging, restless question: “What are you looking for?”

Jesus answers that question on the morning of the resurrection. Mary Magdalene goes looking for him, carrying spices with which to embalm his dead body. Jesus meets her, alive and in no need of embalming, but she doesn’t recognize him. Bewildered, but sincere, she asks Jesus where she might find Jesus. Jesus asks her: “What are you looking for?” Then he answers it. With deep affection, he pronounces her name: “Mary.”

In doing that, he tells her what she and everyone else are forever looking for, God’s voice, one-to-one, speaking unconditional love, gently saying your name. In the end, that’s what we are all looking for and most need. We need to hear God, affectionately, one-to-one, pronounce our names: “Carolyn!” “Julia!” “Steve!”  Nothing will heal us more of restlessness, bitterness, and insecurity than to hear God say: “I love you!”

Moreover, prayer is meant to be a mutual thing, it’s important too that we respond in kind: Part of prayer is also that we with affection, occasionally at least, say the same thing to God: “I love you!” In all our relationships, we have to occasionally prompt each other to hear expressions of affection and reassurance. It’s not good enough to tell a marriage partner or a friend just once “I love you!” It needs to be said regularly. The relationship of prayer is no different.

Prayer is not meant to change God but us. And nothing changes us as much for the good as to hear someone say that he or she loves us—especially if that someone is God.

Lord, I pray for all my Sonshine Friends and let them know that “I love them.”

Skip the Insults

Last evening, I was driving to CMAC in Canandaigua to see Steve Martin. On Route 20, I found myself behind a car creeping along and getting impatient. It reminded me of a story about a man screaming epithets and beating on the steering wheel when he was interrupted by a policeman, gun drawn, tapping on his window. The driver was ragging: "You can't arrest me for hollering in my car," but the policeman ordered him into the back seat of the police car. After checking over his car from top to bottom, the arresting officer advised him he was free to go. The driver said, "I knew you couldn't arrest me for what I was yelling in my own car. You haven't heard the last of this." The officer replied, "I didn't arrest you for shouting in your car. I was directly behind you at the light. I saw you screaming and beating your steering wheel, and I said to myself, 'What a jerk. Then I noticed the cross hanging from your rear-view mirror, the fish on the trunk lid, and the "My boss is a Jewish Carpenter," and the "Jesus is Coming Soon" bumper stickers. I was going to arrest you for stealing a car from a Christian."

So, you have not been attending Mass to protest the failure of the church to report the hideous crimes of its priests or you were just too busy on the golf course or taking your grandkids to the beach. To bring you up to date, Jesus has people walking away and scolding him for not following the rules of his synagogue.

However, Jesus is looking for people with a “teachable spirit.” While some may criticize us for our lack of presence, Jesus is focused on a faith that takes a neighbor shopping, bids on a steer to donate the hamburger to hungry families, calls a brother to express forgiveness and surrender our past resentment.

Revenge, anger, and dwelling on how someone hurt you will eat away at you. It is a huge barrier to finding healing and peace. God promises that if we seek his face instead of retribution, he will bring healing.

God prays for us as we reflect: “All bitterness, fury, anger, shouting, and reviling must be removed from you, along with all malice. [And] be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another as God has forgiven you in Christ.” Ephesians 4:31–32 .
Lord, I pray for all my Sonshine Friends that they will have a “teachable spirit” where the love of Jesus will help us be more compassionate and forgiving.