A message from Father Pete

For Sunday, November 30, 2025 Isaiah 2:1-5, Romans 13:11-14, Matthew 14:37-44 The First Sunday of Advent is the beginning of a new Church Year. The readings are spread across a three-year cycle — A, B and C. This year we are in Cycle A. All of the first readings this year are taken from the prophet Isaiah and all of them look to a future time marked by peace and tranquility. Our initial thoughts might be that we really need this in our world that is filled with conflict and suffering — conflict within and between countries, and suffering especially among the poor and underprivileged who are striving to survive — and society is not helping them. Here in our own country we are becoming much more aware of the poor, especially with the price of daily living — paying for food, rent and daily necessities, keeping our children safe and hopeful in a time where there is a huge lack of support and hope. We need peace in our lives. When Advent comes our mindset is focused on a time that we prepar...

For Sunday, November 23, 2025 2 Samuel 5:1-3, Colossians 1:12-20, Luke 23:35-43 While next weekend we begin the season of Advent, today we are celebrating the last Sunday of the Church Year with the feast of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of the Universe. The gospel from St. Luke reminds us of Jesus’ last day on earth facing His assassination — His horrible death inflicted by the Romans who had control over much of the world. They ruled by power and greed and had very little opposition. Their kingdom’s main cities usually were walled in, and the main entrances had crucifixions lining the streets to remind those who entered that Rome was in control — and anyone who opposed Rome or committed any sort of abomination or dishonored Caesar faced capital punishment. Today we’re looking at crucifixion where the accused was stripped of all clothes and bound by heavy ropes or nailed to a cross. “Christian” was the label first given to Jesus' followers in Antioch around 43 A.D., approxima...

For Sunday, November 16, 2025 Malachi 3:19-20, 2 Thessalonians 3:7-12, Luke 21:5-19 Today’s readings concern the final judgment. Much of the book of the prophet Malachi deals with “The Day of the Lord.” This expression echoes the end-time — the final judgment of God on all peoples. Another expression is “apocalyptic” — a writing with symbolism intended to give hope to a persecuted people; a violent change or upheaval in which evil forces are destroyed. After Jesus dies there is a very common belief that the end times, the end of the world, will come quickly. That is one reason why Scripture scholars tell us the Gospels were written 40 years after Jesus’ death: after all, why spend time writing when the most urgent need was telling the people about Jesus, converting them to His way of love and living? The people, those who believe, live in fear of the Romans who are arresting them no matter what happens. We can only imagine the fear they also have of the Jewish leaders, teachers and t...

For Sunday, November 9, 2025 Ezekiel 47:1-2, 8-9, 12; 1 Corinthians 3:9-11, 16-17; John 2:12-22 While I’m sure all of us have visited many churches in our lifetimes, the one that probably remains most vividly in our memory is the church of our youth or one that was special because it's where we were baptized, received our first communion or confirmation, were married there, or our parents’ or loved ones’ funerals were there. Special places, special events that signify the loving presence of Jesus through the sacraments. Many of us have traveled and seen magnificent churches: basilicas like St. Peter’s in Rome, Notre Dame in Paris, Our Lady of Nock in Ireland, and many other famous worshipping, faith-filled churches. Many of these are cathedrals. “Cathedral” is the Latin word for chair. We call the church in which the bishop’s chair is located a cathedral. Each diocese has only one cathedral and it is the mother church of that diocese. If I asked you to name the “mother church” of ...

For Sunday, November 2, 2025 Wisdom 3:1-9, Romans 5:5-11, John 6:37-40 It is unusual that we celebrate the feast of All Saints on a Saturday and All Souls on a Sunday. All Saints is a Holy Day of Obligation and All Souls is not. This year All Saints is not a holy day, so All Souls Day is the weekend celebration of the Church.    What is important is that all of us have family in heaven, and all of us have family who have passed on from this life and to the Lord, waiting to be welcomed into heaven. This waiting place is known as purgatory. Let us look at these goals Jesus explained and promised everyone.    From way back I remember the Catechism answer to why God created you, me, and everyone: God created me to know Him, love Him and serve Him in this world, and to be happy with Him forever in eternal life in heaven.  God is one, true, living being — supremely holy, unique, and omnipotent. God is above human understanding; a pure spirit, an absolutely loving b...

For Sunday, October 26, 2025 Sirach 35:12-14, 16-18; 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18; Luke 18:9-14 We pray. We are people of prayer. Our individual prayer is much varied, spontaneous, verbal — from the heart or established prayers. One distinction is that each of our prayers tends to be individual: It is mine ; I do it my way and have been doing it this way for years . That’s fine. It seems to be a consistent occupation of Christians to “discover ... find new devotions ... prayers ... that others have recommended and/or we feel will bring us closer to God.” It shows the insecurity we have in “God matters” … thinking, what does God want? What each person wants in all of this is to Know The Right Way to God through prayer . There is an insecurity in each of us and a desire to please God, who is totally consumed in love for each of us. The bottom line is that God is with you and me right now — God loves you and me right now — God is helping you and me right now to get closer to heaven. Scripture...

For Sunday, October 19, 2025   Exodus 17:8-13, 2 Timothy 3:14-4:2, Luke 18:1-8 On occasion I surprise people who are very sincere in their Spiritual lives yet often doubt that they are on the right track and ask them a simple question that jolts them: “Since you are an expert in prayer, how would you advise a person on the best way to pray?” They immediately stop me and say, “Why do you say I’m an expert in prayer? I certainly am not — I feel like I’m on the bottom rung going up. I just pray the way I have been praying for years and keep trying other ways and new devotions, prayers, liturgical exercises. I would say I’m an expert on the number of ways I have looked into ... tried ... abandoned ... given up ... on prayer. I guess you could say I’m always trying. BUT ‘expert?’ No way! ” I did an interesting twist and looked into AI to see how one can be an expert in prayer. AI’s expertise is based on in its design and the information it is trained on; it’s NOT a form of spiritual or...