Happy Fourth Sunday of Advent! We are only a couple of days away from the great Christ Mass, the great Feast of the Incarnation, the feast of the family, the feast and cause of our joy. I know that many in our community are traveling these days back to their family homes in Mexico, others will be traveling to visit their children or siblings in other parts of the State or country, and others will be putting their last minute decorations and preparations together in their homes! We will be hanging lights at the Rectory and the Church, I’ll finally take our my Christmas tree and begin to put out the Christmas decorations with Fr. Peter. These last days will be filled with quiet preparations and silent joy for these moments that await us!
 
Even if we do not have large expectations, or if this Christmas will be heavy with loss or loneliness, our Gospel today reminds us of what it is that renders us truly blessed: our faith. Elizabeth exclaims to the Most Blessed Virgin: “Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.” Indeed, we decorate our homes and we light candles and hearths, we bake and wrap gifts not just because of the family or friends we will share it with. We find ourselves expectant and joyful not simply because of the things that we have or those who are around us, but we do it all because we believe! One of our youth leaders was speaking with a youth recently who has struggled to continue attending Mass because she does so without family support or friends to accompany her there. I was impressed when he asked her: “why do you go to Church? It isn’t for anyone else, and it isn’t even for you, but you should go to Church for God. I don’t go for father or for anyone else, I go because I know it is for God and He deserves that much from us.” What faith! This is not only behind our Sunday obligations but behind our feasting and fasting, it is the source and summit of all we do: for the Glory of God!
 
This Christmas we are living different and unique realities, some of us more saddened or burdened than others. We have different traditions about when to put up lights and when to decorate, or who brings our gifts and how we celebrate together, but each of us will be blessed in as much as our faith in Christ is behind it all. With Him, and with faith, it can all be filled with joy, even if we find ourselves alone in a stable with the poor Holy Family. Let us in these days of quiet preparation live in that Silent Night when our Savior was born, and so live with that joy that comes with faith.

“You are my inheritance, O Lord!” As we draw near to the end of the Liturgical year and to Thanksgiving it is a good time to reflect upon what we have received, what we have, and what we value most. To think of our “Inheritance.” There are so many gifts, of course. Some of us are grateful for the parents we have received, or the grandparents, cousins, or children. Maybe we are most grateful for the nation we were blessed to inherit or the modern technologies that make our life and comfort possible. We have received recipes and tools, instruction and books, we have received so rich an inheritance, even if we are rarely conscious of it!
 
It's beautiful that we are also adding on to the inheritance of our own parish community, the inheritance of Catholics in our valley for centuries to come. This week we begin our custody of the new property on Archer Street and the parish center that we will establish there. We bring into our fold the large property, the mature trees, the history of the place and the memories that will form there. Can you imagine? In three years together we will have doubled the space and treasure of our little community, and we will leave behind a still greater inheritance than we received. What else will we leave behind as an inheritance? Will we leave an inheritance of a thriving catechesis program? A strong society of adoration? Will we leave behind for the next generations of Catholics a vibrant parish, a deep desire for the sacraments?
 
The greatest inheritance I hope to leave here, is not in buildings; not the rectory or the parish center, not parking spaces or beautifying Churches. These will be a part of our work, without a doubt! But the greatest inheritance I hope to leave here, is a deep sense of our tradition, and a true faith in Christ and His Holy Church. Men and women, families and children who truly believe in Christ Jesus and have confided themselves totally to Him through His Church.
 
What is the inheritance you wish to leave for your children? What is the inheritance you wish to leave this valley? This Church? Christ has left us the most extraordinary inheritance: eternal life. He has left us His own Sonship, and allows us to live with Him forever in heaven. Will we pass it on to those that follow us?

"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
 
Indeed, there is no greater commandment, this is the goal of our Christian life! And it’s fitting that as we begin this month of the Four Last Things, as we meditate upon the nearness of the Kingdom, we are reminded of what is most important. I think there is another fitting aspect of our Gospel for this week, especially for Election Day on Tuesday! It can be so common, especially in our valley for people to have apathy towards elections. Most people might say, “it doesn’t matter,” or “my vote doesn’t make a difference.” Other’s may hide behind the Kingship of Christ or the primacy of our love as reasons to shirk this civic duty. But our love, both of God and man makes demands on us. Jesus says, “if you love me you will keep my commandments,” and He places the Good Samaritan as an example of this love in action. He separates souls based upon what they have done – how they have treated the least among them. This commandment of love is not something abstract or “nice,” but it is radical. Maybe it is difficult to speak about politics, to fear divisions that may arise or feelings that could be injured, why does it matter, you might ask, if Christians are just called to love?
 
Politics matters, because policy matters, because people matter, as a commentator I hear likes to say. Politics affects the policy that is made, and policy affects people, and people do matter. They matter to God, and therefore they matter to us. Politics affects policy, and policy affects people, especially the most vulnerable people among us. It affects those who are sick and need medical care. It affects those who live in more impoverished neighborhoods and worry about safety and protection. It especially affects children in schools and at home, and especially the unborn children who have no political power or voice, who can not fight back but literally depend on Christians who realize that policy matters to vote for their legal right to live.
 
A few months ago I was reminded of this when Governor Lujan Grisham pledged $10 million to an abortion clinic in Las Cruces and even came for a groundbreaking ceremony. I looked around our community and saw our great struggles with mental health, addiction to alcohol and drugs and then I looked around and saw the 4 abortion clinics already in Las Cruces and the one in Santa Theresa. How many different issues do you see all around us? People matter – and so the policy that directs rules, regulations, funding and services, those matter too! They matter a great deal, because they affect everyone we know and love. And the politics of our nation, even if it is rancorous and difficult, it matters too, because it is what decides the policy that affects our people. We might have different opinions on how best to solve the problems we face, we may disagree on who will best represent these policies and positions, but we should not disagree on how important it is to participate in the process, because we should all be able to agree that people matter. There is, after all, no greater commandment than to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.” So, this Tuesday, take part in our civic expression of this love – choose the politician whose policy you believe may best love the people whom God has created. It’s part of how we can make a difference for our community. 

“The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.”
Or so the Psalmist sang out today! But I wonder: do we feel the same? Israel rejoiced after their captivity, after their exile and so proclaimed to all the earth that God had done marvels for them. I love that line from Psalm 126: “those that sow in tears shall reap rejoicing; though they go forth weeping carrying the seed to be sown, they shall come back rejoicing, carrying their sheaves.” It is a message of hope that reminds us that beyond the suffering is joy, beyond the cross is resurrection. But today, I wonder if we are really convinced that God has done great things for us, I wonder if we are convinced by this hope, because it does not seem like we are all filled with joy.
I was recently reminded of a terrible phrase that has been used by many in our valley: “Hatch el pueblo chiquito, infierno grande!” I’ve heard it used with some frequency whenever things seem bleak, but I’ve always dislike it. It did, however, come to my mind this week as I heard through so many different rumors about peoples discontentment, about complaints and drama and divisions. I almost felt like repeating this darn phrase myself it began to feel so all encompassing! How often we make these small difficulties and dramas in our small town the biggest part of our day or life. It seems far too common that we make these difficulties the central part of our relationships and of our conversations! And this week I was tempted to do the same. It is so easy in such a small community to hear these negative things and to feel surrounded by the drama. To make the negative seem like the totality of it all! But just as this temptation arouse, the Psalmist invited me to sing with him: “the Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.”
We don’t want to overlook or ignore real problems. We certainly don’t want to plug our ears to the real complaints or struggles that we have in our parish or in our valley – it’s a part of life! And it’s important to have a real understanding of our problems if we are ever to improve, grow, become holy. But there is actually something that will help us improve, grow and be sanctified more quickly and more surely: gratitude. Thanksgiving is literally at the center of our faith as we call the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Eucharist (which means thanksgiving)! To give glory to God for all things, even as Christ did on the cross, this is the center of true religion and the heart of faith. We could focus on the chisme, the slander, the lies, the divorces or the insults – or we can focus the “great things the Lord has done for us.” What we focus on, what we place at the center of our hearts and minds will actually determine what fruits we bear: and I don’t know about you, but I know that I want to be filled with joy.
Maybe if we looked more at the immense gifts of our community, if we spoke more about all the great things God has done, is doing, and will do we won’t call this “pueblo chiquito” an “infierno grande,” but we can truly see it as it is: a “pueblo chiquito” al “cielo grande.” God wants to take us from this small village to the enormity of heaven! He wants us to move from these small streets to the golden roads of heaven, from our humble table to the Eternal Banquet. St. John Marie Vianney famously remarked when he was lost on his way to Ars and found a young boy on the road: “you show me the way to Ars, and I will show you the way to heaven!” If we focus all of our thoughts and conversation on critiques and drama then we will find ourselves in an “infierno grande,” but if we center our thoughts and conversations on the great things God has done, we will actually find this pueblo chiquito to feel like “el cielo grande.” Ultimately what we are centered on here below will determine where we are for all ages. CS Lewis in The Great Divorce reminds us that our life on earth is like the entrance to our eternal life. If we live it like a hell, it is because we will live all eternity in hell and so it is the entrance to that eternal torment. If we live like in heaven, then it truly will be like the entrance room to that eternal rest. So we have to choose this weekend, how will we live? For heaven with joy at all the good there is, or in our own “infierno” focused on all that has gone wrong. 

“Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”
 
How insolent they sound, don’t they? How childish and how weak! How…. How like us, they sound. How often we as children do this with our parents: I want you to buy me pizza, I want you to take me to my friends, I want you to ____. How often we do so here with our parish priest too! I want this kind of group, or I want this language or I want this particular time. How often we come to our beloved, to our State, to our Church, or to Our Lord with this petulant attitude, wanting “whatever we ask.” Yet… Jesus doesn’t rebuke them this, nor do I you! Just like a good parent doesn’t berate their child who comes seeking a real good from their parents. Jesus actually wanted James and John to ask Him for great and marvelous things, to trust Him with everything, to know how great His power is to be able to grant whatever they need! Yes, I can imagine Jesus smiling as these close friends, these beloved disciples came up to Him after all they had seen and heard and with the faith of the Centurion to ask Jesus boldly for a great grace. I can imagine this smile, because He has shown it so often to me, with my many desires, supplications, and childish pleadings. I also know it because I have often felt it too! Sometimes (because dissimilar to our High Priest who is like us in all things but sin) I am impatient or selfish or rude in my own sinfulness when my flock approaches me with such requests; but at other times, (and I hope more often than not,) I feel a similar love for the faithful and their requests. Honestly, I believe that Jesus is speaking to – or trying to speak to – every single one of you! I believe He has something special for each of His baptized, and He is inviting you to fulfill and offer something that no one else can or will offer. I am not the origin or fount or source of all good ideas, movements, ministries or plans for our parish – Christ is! And He speaks to YOU, and so it is a gift when you come forward desiring to add more to this great mosaic of our Parish Life. It’s a gift when you trust me with a need or desire and express it to me with confidence! And there is no anger even if it is a request that isn’t fully understood. Just like when your children ask you to buy them something but have no idea how tight the budget is, or how stressed you are over finances – you’re not angry, so too your pastor feels with many requests that you may bring. Sometimes I can only respond like Jesus, “you do not know what you are asking.” You don’t know Canon 905 when you ask me to add another Mass, or you don’t know Sacrosanctum Concilium 54 when you speak about the language you want used at Mass. You may not understand what 20 other people have brought forward and requested though it be the opposite of your own request. There is often just so much that is not understood by us in our questioning! But that doesn’t make the question bad, actually, it helps make the question great! Jesus actually affirmed their desire, their request, while pointing it to its true fulfilment. I pray for the grace to do the same as your Shepherd. To receive your desires and your requests with joyful love, and to direct them to the deeper truth, to a real understanding. After all, just like Christ, I have come, “not to be served but to serve and give [my] life as a ransom for many.” So do not be afraid to ask for great and marvelous things for our parish! Do not be afraid of sounding insolent or childish – just like you and just like Christ – this Father also delights in your requests and in the desires of your heart. Be bold. Have faith. Trust the Good Shepherd who will give what we need.
 
In His Most Sacred Heart,
Fr. Ivan 

“I prayed and prudence was given me; I pleaded, and the spirit of wisdom came to me. I preferred her to scepter and throne, and deemed riches nothing in comparison with her… because all gold in view of her, is a little sand.”
 
Some of us will hear these words and find them utterly confusing, others will hear them and find them nice or idealistic, but few of us will hear them and hear our own heart voicing these words with Solomon. In fact, if you’re familiar with Solomon’s one desire and wish for wisdom that earned the greatest praise from God, you might have found yourself a bit confused even if slightly moved to desire the same. Most of us would prefer riches and silver (we could certainly use some to purchase our parish center or to hire more help or update our bathrooms or church). Some of us may even pray for virtues like patience, or courage, maybe chastity or discipline; very few of us pray for the virtue of Prudence, but today we hear Solomon proclaim how near it is to Wisdom, and how inestimable her worth.
 
We live in a society that values “choice” above almost anything, don’t we? And we’re surrounded by more choices than we can make! 20 choices of shampoos, 30 choices of chips, countless choices of shows to watch and youtube channels to get lost in. Most people have actually come to believe that we have a “fundamental right” to choose any action, regardless of its moral good, without consequences. But we know that the “ability to choose is inherently a neutral thing. It is rather what we choose that matters, and that’s where prudence comes in.” The virtue of Prudence is the first of the Cardinal Virtues and often called the “charioteer of the virtues” because this is what helps to “know our true good in every circumstance and to choose the right means of achieving it.” When we don’t know what the good thing we should do it, or how  we should do it, this is the virtue that we need! And that makes it a little bit easier to see how important it is, doesn’t it? This is what the Rich Young Man in the Gospel today was lacking, for he had many virtues to follow the commandments, but could not see the true good of poverty, obedience, and chastity before him in the invitation to follow Christ. He could not see the true good nor the means to achieve it when it was right before him. This is truly worth far more than any gold or silver, it would allow us to always know the right way forward.
 
This is going to be a virtue that we need as a parish too! While we discern how to add another Mass time, how to schedule our calendar, where to celebrate that Mass and in what language. Do we put another holy hour? Do we center things and grow them here or continue to spread thin to cover more distance? What will we spend on our money on: reconstruction of the property, or paying off the debt? There are so many needs and opportunities before us, and so many of them are good ones! But still, choices must be made. We will need to decide between the goods before our eyes and the means to achieve them. Pray for your parish and finance councils, for our staff and volunteers, pray for me, your pastor that we may “look where we are going,” and choose the right path. Pray not only that each of us may receive this true grace of Prudence, but that as a community we may also live this grace because then we will be, as St. James writes, “doers of the word, and not hearers only.”
 
-       Fr. Ivan

“He put his finger into the man’s ears and, spitting, touched his tongue; then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him, “Ephphatha!”— that is, “Be opened!” — And immediately the man’s ears were opened, his speech impediment was removed, and he spoke plainly.”
 
These words from our gospel today are still heard and practiced in the Catholic Church throughout the world even now. The “Ephthatha” is a part of our baptismal liturgy, and it is a grace that holy mother church, begs for all of her faithful when they have been reborn by water and the spirit. Some of you may have noticed that our baptismal preparation has also changed somewhat. Miss Dulce Carter, after many many years of this service, is now focusing more on her wonderful role as a catechist, and deacon Tim and his wife Victoria have generously taken over our baptism program. They are not only supervising the catechesis portion for all of our parents and godparents, they are also helping to verify your practice of the faith, through the attendance of holy mass. It is now required that all parents and God parents at least attend two months worth of mass, before the sacrament of baptism will be conferred. As the Deacon and his wife are caring for your preparation in this matter, he will also be performing this sacrament, so that there is a fitting send to the whole process and he may exercise his ministry as an ordained Deacon of the church. I pray these changes will be helpful for us all. Even if they take some getting used to.
 
This prayer of baptism, that our Deacon will now be performing in my stead, is not something only reserved to baptism for two instance. It is rather a great calling for Christ Church in every time and age. Hope St. John’s call the second in the jubilee of the new Millennium also meditated upon these words of our savior, and the desire he has for ears and tongue to be open and loose in our world again today. I roll as your pastor, your role as catechist, lectors, adorers of the Blessed Sacrament, members of play communities, is to also thank God open your mind heart ears eyes tongue that you may go forth and do the same for our world. We know how flying our world is today. How do you recognize God’s presence for his love, and the great need for a change in our whole society. I pray that as we begin the new year of catechism, as we receive this new vicar to help us, the new communities that will be joined together as one, and future projects for the good of our people, is that we may be opening minds and hearts to receive the word of God, and to be able to speak lately about him and about what is true in our world. My prayer has your father and pastor, it also epthatga! That is be open! Receive Jesus Christ, and live him in our community.
 

Welcome to our visitors, and Happy Green Chile Festival weekend to all! This weekend is obviously quite different than most weekends in our valley throughout the year. It’s fitting, though, that as we celebrate another year of harvest, the first fruits of our valley and of our community, that St. James reminds us of the great gift of grace in our second reading today when He reminds us that “every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights.” He reminds us here of our Lord’s words in Mark 4:2, “he should sleep and rise night and day, and the seed should sprout and grow, he knows not how. The earth produces of itself…” Reminding us not only of the Providence of God in our farming, but of His Providence also in our life of grace. “He willed to give us birth by the word of truth that we may be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures!” And a question for us this weekend is, do we live as firstfruits? I love hearing farmers describe a good harvest when it comes. Speaking about the high yield and the large fruits. Speaking of how beautiful the chile or how large the onion. At the start of the harvest, one speaks with such hope and goodness at what is coming, but does the world speak of us in this way? Do they see in our community the joy of these firstfruits and of a good harvest for God?
 
Today, our Lord reminds us in a way of that meditation that He left us with last weekend, His closing question of His Eucharistic discourse in John 6: “will you also leave me?” He gave us the freedom to accept or reject His teaching, His Real Presence, His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, but He would not change it, nor Himself in an attempt to “keep us” or “win us over.” Today we’re reminded then of His great love, His desire, His plan for us, and of our need to “humbly welcome the word that has been planted in [us] and is able to save [our] souls.” It is up to us to receive it and to allow it to bear fruit. We don’t know how the gift of faith truly flowers, but we do know what it means for a rocky heart, or one filled with thorns and sins to choke out its life. And we must believe what we read, teach what we believe and practice what we teach,” being “doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding ourselves” as men and women of faith.
 
Today let us hear this invitation of God to a “religion that is pure and undefiled before God,” and even as we are surrounded by a great celebration of God’s earthly gifts to us, we must “keep ourselves unstained by the world.” We live in the world, but we are not of it. And so we can enjoy the festivities, enter into them, and increase them! But we do not let this weekend become our great festivity, nor the riches or attractions to become our great hope. Our festivity is this Sunday Resurrection, it is the joy of a life with Christ. The true harvest that fills us with joy is the harvest of grace God grants to our hearts. Happy Chile Festival Weekend! May God be praised forever, and may His valley know the fruit of His love by our lives.

“Brothers and sisters: be subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives should be subordinate to their husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is head of his wife just as Christ is head of the Church… as the Church is subordinate to Christ, so wives should be subordinate to their husbands in everything.”
 
Wow, talk about a difficult teaching! And how fitting that one of the most difficult passages of the New Testament is paired today with that “difficult teaching” of Christ that caused the crowds and His disciples to leave Him. “This saying is hard; who can accept it?” they ask in our Gospel today. They allow their shock at Christ’s teaching on the Eucharist to make them leave, but since we confess His Real Presence, maybe we can wrestle with other difficult sayings as well! After all, we have come to believe and confess with Peter, “to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”
 
Having just celebrated the Installation Mass with Bishop Baldacchino on Thursday, I wonder if we might be able to approach this passage from St. Paul with a different understanding and maybe even joy. All of you who generously gave up your evening to celebrate this installation with us saw one of my favorite (and one of the least common) rituals of our Church. In all formal institutions and installations, the Church’s ministers are invited to make the Profession of Faith and the Oath of Fidelity. I remember in seminary each year, the new formators (priest’s in charge) and teachers would stand before the Rector (the main priest in charge) and the whole community and profess the same Creed we profess each Sunday, and then make the Oath of Fidelity. It was a moving witness that these men were not there for themselves, but in service of something, of someone! They were not entrusted to form the future priests of the Church until they would make that formal profession, believing all that the Church has handed down, and that solemn oath to uphold all that is professed.
 
It was a gift to be called to do the same this week before the bishop and before you. To publicly state that I am at service to “God’s Word, written or handed down in tradition and proposed by the Church,” and not merely in service to my own ideas or desires. There is a powerful section of this oath that inspires me, and that I thought of with our second reading today. “Moreover, I adhere with religious submission of will and intellect to the teachings which either the Roman Pontiff or the College of bishops enunciate when they exercise the authentic magisterium…” To submit, or to subordinate myself, not only in my actions, but in my will and intellect! Promising the true obedience to the Church that she herself shows to Christ. This is what wives offer to their husbands as well, as the husband offers her his life as a sacrifice and death to self. It is what each of us is called to. To submit ourselves and subordinate our desires and ideas to the desires and teachings of God and His Church. It is what I have done and done again for you. And isn’t that a joy, to know that your priest “firmly accepts and holds each and everything that is proposed by the Church definitively regarding teaching on faith and morals”? That is what your children, your neighbors, your community desires to see in each of you as well. To know that in faith, we are one, we are united, we are built on the solid foundation of Christ. So let us submit ourselves, not with difficulty but with joy – for “we have come to believe and are convinced that He is the Holy One of God.”

I love You, O my God, and my only desire is to love You until the last breath of my life. I love You, O my infinitely lovable God, and I would rather die loving You, than to live without loving You. I love You, Lord and the only grace I ask is to love You eternally. My God, if my tongue cannot say in every moment that I love You, I want my heart to repeat it to You as often as I draw breath. 

This Sunday is one of my favorite feast days in the Liturgical calendar, though it isn’t widely known or celebrated, it is the Feast of the Holy Cure of Ars, St. John Marie Vianney, the patron saint of parish priests. St. John Vianney was poor, uneducated, and assigned his whole life to a tiny village with only 250 villagers! Still, he was filled with zeal for God and His Church, and his deep love for the Sacraments converted not only the whole village, but thousands of souls in France and the world. St. John Vianney was so filled with this Love of God and zeal for souls that he spent 100hrs hearing confessions every week of his life! People would report that he always wore a smile, so filled with joy at each repentant believer. He would spend hours before the Blessed Sacrament “just looking at God and letting God look at him.” Indeed, it was “his unwavering faith, extraordinary piety, and profound love for the Eucharist that defined his spiritual journey and set him up for sainthood.”
 
It's profound then for me that we have this great example of St. John Vianney today as we continue our meditations on the Eucharist and the Real Presence of Christ. Fr. John Hardon once wrote that “what makes us Catholics [is that] we believe Christ instituted the Church so that through the Church, the graces of salvation might be communicated to a sin-laden world. [And] the main source of these salvific graces is Christ Himself in the Holy Eucharist, and the foundation of the Eucharist is the Real Presence.” This is why the bishops celebrated this great Eucharistic Revival, faced with the waning belief in the Real Presence, because it is so foundational for our faith as Catholics. 
 
Fr. Hardon again wrote that after 20 years of working for the Holy See: “I have learned that the deepest and most devastating crisis in all the 2,000 years of the Catholic Church’s history is what we are undergoing now. The root of this crisis from one perspective is the priesthood, and from another perspective is the Real Presence, without which the priesthood would not exist.” This critical era of the Catholic Church’s history is characterized by millions of once-believing Catholics giving up their faith, one diocese in our own nation even closed 40 parishes this past year! As we celebrate the feast of parish priests and meditate upon the Real Presence of Christ, “we can feel the gravity of this crisis of faith in the Real Presence considering the implications for the Catholic Priesthood.” Do you realize that the primary reason Christ instituted the priesthood was to perpetuate His sacrifice of Calvary in the Sacrifice of the Mass? “But the whole meaning of the Mass depends on faith in the Real Presence. Thus, without the Real Presence, there is no Mass. And without the Mass, there is no priesthood. Consequently, the whole of Catholic Christianity, the Catholic Faith, and the Catholic Church depends absolutely on the fact of the Real Presence. Without faith in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, there is no Catholic Church.”
 
St. John Vianney was so convinced of this fact that his profound reverence in celebrating the Holy Mass moved people from all walks of life. He once remarked that “there is nothing so great as the Eucharist, [for] if God had something more previous, He would have given it to us.” This Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, instituted at the Last Supper is why at that same Last Supper Christ instituted His priesthood. It is for this Real Presence of Jesus that the whole Church exists! And there is no greater gift.
 
“Our Lord is hidden there in the Blessed Sacrament, waiting for us to come and visit Him, and make our requests to Him.” – St. John Vianney

“Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two…”
 
Thank you all for the support you have shown in the last few days as I was blessed to celebrate another year of life, and as I turned 32 on Friday. It was to be honest, a long and difficult week, but oh my is God good! Even His share of the cross is sweet. As we continue to meditate upon the gift of the Mass, of the Eucharist, of God’s desire for us to draw close to Him who draws close to us, this passage was quite moving for my meditations. We could never exhaust the mystery of the Incarnation, and we should never cease to marvel at this great love – but it is equally astounding that this Divine Person has shared His work with mortal men. It’s incredible that God not only desired to renew the face of the earth, but that God has chosen to redeem our humanity in Christ and so use humanity in His work of redemption.
 
He not only came, but in coming, He has sent out so that he may come to every land and every heart in every age. He has shared His power, His authority, His majesty. God has not ceased His work. I love to meditate on this scene, on the sending-forth of His disciples. It’s an incredible image, because though it was unknown to the disciples at the time, this commission, this sending, it was a sending unto the ages. As Christ sent them forth, He was sending forth every bishop and priest, every missionary and martyr, He knew in His Divine Will those who would also go out in His name and I imagine our Savior watching the 12 go forth and seeing the millions who would go forth throughout the ages.
 
This image, this great mission of Christ with His Church offers my so much consolation. How good it is to know that Jesus saw my need 2,000 years ago and as He was moved with pity He sent forth the apostles, their successors and their coworkers so that I might be healed. To know that in His Divine Knowledge, God knew of my need and was already in love calling and sending men to help me, to heal me, to confess me, to make me new. As I think of these 32 years of life, and of all that God has done to seek me out and provide for me, I am also moved to realize that He has desired to send me out also. Not only did He send others to me, but He was sending me! How incredible it is to be here with you. To drive to your houses, to visit you in the hospital, to drive you to Denver for conferences. He may send us out with nothing, no walking stick, no bag, no matt or food, but He sends us out with His Divine command, and with others sent to our aid.
 
Today He restores us again in this Mass, and then we hear Him send us forth: “Ite Misa Est.” He sends you out too – with that same authority He gave you at your baptism: as priest, prophet, and king. May we see His kindness, and may He grant us His salvation. Pax et bonum!  

“As the eyes of a maid on the hands of her mistress, so are our eyes on the Lord, our God.”
 
My last year of university at NMSU was a bit unique because I was sure that I would be entering the seminary upon my completion, and so I began to tailor my classes to what might better prepare me for the life of a priest. One of these electives was Voice Lessons in the music department. I always loved singing in the pews as a child, and like all young adults I had songs that I loved to sing out loud when I was alone in my car or in the shower, but I did not have a very good voice, and I was terrified to sing in front of others. Our professor was a good Catholic woman and soon she was helping me with private voice lessons in her house as well as the university class because she was determined that a priest should know how to sing! In minor seminary I joined the choir, eager to learn sacred music and to exercise and improve voice, and when I was sent to Rome for theology, I knew that choir would be a part of my formation there too; and I am so glad that it was. My experience in the choir at The Pontifical North American College (PNAC) was one of the most incredible experiences of my life to that point. The PNAC had around 200 American seminarians at the time, and the choir was 30 or 40 strong, but I count one of my greatest blessings of that time as having Mr. Leon Grisbach as our choir director. A lay married man whose whole family lived on the seminary campus, he was a gifted musician, learned scholar, devout Catholic, and most of all a great director. I often marveled at how he could determine the best “part” each man should sing, how he could plan the music a year in advance and so what we would rehearse and when; and how he could produce the most beautiful arrangements out of such novice voices. We sang the most exquisite polyphonies and the most venerable chants, and it was in choir with Leon that I finally understood Psalm 123 that we sang together this Sunday. One of the most important aspects of the choir, was attention to the director, “our eyes on the hands of the leader.” We would hold our music in such a way that you could read it while watching his hands, his tempo and his cues. There was an intensity, a trust, and an obedience that we held for his hands as he moved us through the piece, and as we produced the most beautiful melodies for the faithful. I remember the first time we sang this Psalm together as I looked attentively to His hands and realized that was how I was meant to look to God! And isn’t this beautiful desire what each of us should cultivate for God? To keep our eyes on Him with intensity, trust, and obedience? To follow His own tempo and cues, to know His will and to follow it with trust, knowing that together with all the faithful, a great melody of praise will sing out? As we continue to meditate upon the Eucharist, the Mass, and the Sacraments this summer, God today invites us to enter into the Mass like I would enter into the choir: “as the eyes of a maid on the hand of her mistress; even so our eyes on the Lord, our God.” May we be attentive to His will, to all He does in the Mass, and may we our eyes be ever upon Him on earth, so that we may behold Him forever in heaven. 

My dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ Jesus our Lord,
 
May the Lord give you His peace! You may be wondering who are the two “ladies in white” who have been spotted around the valley over the past couple of weeks. Our names are Amma Chiara and Sr. Maria Teresa and we are religious sisters who have served in an active religious community in New York City for many years who have moved to the diocese to respond to the call of God into a deeper contemplative life. We live in a lovely home in Salem which we are calling “Heart of the Trinity Hermitage.” We arrived on June 2^nd (the Solemnity of Corpus Christi). We have set out to live the eremitical life or the life of a hermit. “Eremos” is a Greek word for “wilderness,” and a hermit is a person who goes into the wilderness or desert to be in closer union with God through repentance, intercession, and self-offering. So basically, we are consecrated women in vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience who are aspiring to a greater contemplative life as hermits. We are here with the warm welcome of Bishop Baldacchino, and we are grateful to have him as our shepherd!
 
If you were at Our Lord of Mercy or Our Lady of All Nations this past weekend, we stood up to make a brief introduction at Fr. Ivan’s invitation. The point of speaking at the Masses was to let you see our faces and hear our voices before we settle into “the hermit life.” Firstly, my name requires a little explanation—Amma Chiara. “Amma” means “Mother.” Remember the Glory and Praise hymn “Abba, Father”? The feminine counterpart to “Abba” is “Amma.” When you hear the title “Abba” or “Amma” used today it is most likely in reference to the “Ammas and Abbas” (Mothers and Fathers) of the third and fourth century who fled the cities for the desert to live a life of prayer and self-offering. “Chiara” might also be new to many of you. It is the Italian version of “Clare.”  The other “lady in white” is named Sister Maria Teresa, after Our Lady and Mother Teresa of Calcutta—simple and beautiful and easy to remember!
 
I will admit that we are learning ourselves what it is to be a hermit! But this much I can offer you, our life as hermits is modeled after the Eucharist. (Even our off-white habits look like the Eucharistic Host!) We aspire to be like the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament in three ways: we are silent like the Host, hidden like the Host, and we are for you like the Host. Just like Jesus comes on the altar and remains in the Blessed Sacrament for us, we have come to the desert for the Church, and the world yes, but very much for you. Basically, you now have two hermits as personal intercessors—specifically for you. Soon we will place a box in the back of the church to receive your intentions so that when you have something special you would like us to pray for you can let us know that way. (It it also might be good for you to know that we do not take a vow of silence and we are not under a vow of enclosure, so you can speak to us when you see us!)
 
So my dear brothers and sisters in Christ, we have already taken you to heart and to prayer. Please pray for us too! Thank you for welcoming us with open hearts!

                                                                                       In the Heart of the Trinity,
 
                                                                                       Amma Chiara and Sr. Maria Teresa

While sitting at my computer struggling to fill the white screen with words for this letter, I began to meditate upon the beautiful image of St. Junipero Serra sitting on my desk. Something that I normally take for granted, I was moved by this Franciscan Friar holding a wooden cross in one hand and one of his missions in the other. We ought to be more grateful, shouldn’t we, for the saints Holy Mother Church canonizes for us? As I stared at this image of a man I never met, from centuries apart and totally different worlds, I felt moved by his great love. How was it that St. Junipero could leave his homeland for so long a voyage at sea; suffer such difficult conditions, and accomplish so much. To found not only churches, schools, orphanages, but entire cities is incredible. I imagine his life, and it is shocking to me how I manage to think that my own life is difficult, or my own ministry “impossible”. Looking at this small stature, I wanted to be like him.
And as I sat there meditating upon the life of this great saint, God revealed to me what it is that I am so attracted to and what it is that allowed him to suffer and toil so greatly: he is a man after God’s own heart, a good father. St. Junipero could sacrifice and serve so generously because he loved all men like a father loves his children. He could work all day, every day of the week because his children were starving, they were lifeless, they needed hope. Is there anything else that explains it? St. Junipero, like all holy pastors before him, took the role of father seriously, loving God’s children in His name and as is own. I think that this explains what inspires me about his story, because it is similar to what inspires me about my grandfather’s story, or my father’s story, it is what inspires boys all over the world to look up to and aspire to be like their fathers. It is that heart of the Father when a man carries His heart within Him.
We desire this as men, don’t we? To provide, to protect, to plant and to build. We were made to give of ourselves, and to leave something behind. Some of us are really blessed to know men like this in our lives, and others of us haven’t. These secular holidays can be difficult, can’t they – especially when we no longer have our mothers or fathers, or when we have never known them or been unable to become them ourselves. We share a lot of hurts sometimes, when these ideals are brought about or when they are celebrated so publicly, but as I sat there looking at St. Junipero, I realized what a gift we truly have in the saints. Even if we never knew a good father, we have thousands that the Church provides to us in the saints. Even if we never get to have children, we have thousands of examples of saints who did not either, or of holy children who can show us how to become holy.
This father’s day, let us be thankful. Thankful to the fathers we have in our lives, thankful to the spiritual fathers that have shaped us, or the saintly fathers the Church raises to the altar, and most of all for the Heavenly Father who Himself is seeking our hearts. Like St. Junipero Serra, God the Father is the one who first came down to us; He is the one who worked tirelessly over generations to prepare our hearts and to send our Savior. The Heavenly Father is the one who, like in Christ’s parable today, scattered seed and cultivates the hearts of the faithful. All He wants, is for our flourishing. Like any good father on earth, who shares the heart of the Father, He desires us to be the best we can possibly be.

Happy fathers day, thanks for letting me be your father too. – Fr. Ivan
 

Blessed Sunday in Ordinary Time! We’re finally back to the green, and I am not to be seen among you, but I promise it isn’t because of the shame of Adam that drove him to hide from God! I was invited by the Men’s ACTS team to be with them this weekend as a spiritual director, and with so many men from our valley serving on team and having attended, I greatly desired to be present with them. Even so, it means an interruption to our monthly meditations on modesty, dress, and preparation for the Holy Mass! And what a First Reading Holy Mother Church gave to us today to reflect upon. As our Lord in the Gospel deigns to call whoever among us does the Will of the Father his “brother and sister and mother,” we are reminded of our first parents who failed to do the Will of the Father. A great point of reflection for all we have been speaking of then, is how beautiful we were made by God. Without need for shame or clothes! It’s why Christ tells us in the Gospels not “to worry about what we will wear,” for God will provide “who clothes the flowers of the field with greater splendor” than any kingly wardrobe. If you find yourself struggling to understand “why God cares at all what I wear, or how I look,” we might find a clue here! Indeed, it is not His great priority. God isn’t a fashion critic judging our current style and its feaux-pauexs, He already made us more beautiful than the flowers of the field or the sunset in the sky! But we lost that innocence, that purity, that great beauty in our sinfulness. We have inherited the shame of Adam and Eve, and the need to hide from God, to cover ourselves to one another. The clothes which God originally did not create us to need have become an expression of ourselves and of our inward shame, pride, or joy. Adam and Eve expressed their newfound reality in two ways: hiding and covering. Their physical disposition and what they had done to their bodies (what they were wearing), spoke the internal reality of their hearts.
Two weeks ago we spoke about the coherence between what we say/believe, and our external expressions, and last week we spoke of how our external preparations speak of the internal preparation, and dispose us for what we celebrate. We see that Adam and Eve had full coherence, their external and internal were united, but they were united in fear and shame, in a hiddenness from God. What we wear also speaks profoundly about who we are, and what we believe. This is why you won’t find me in public if not in my cassock or clerical shirt. This is why you’ll always see our new hermits or the Dominican Sisters in their habits – we express our internal consecration by what we wear! This is why married people wear their wedding rings or why our newly baptized are clothed in white. Our clothes express and say something about who we are and what we believe, so what do your Sunday clothes say about what you believe? What do they say about who you are, and who God is? Clothes have become a normal part of our life, not because God “cares about what we wear,” but because in our fallen world what we wear is an expression of our hearts, and God cares so much about those.

Praying for you from the Cathedral! And so grateful to Fr. Joe for his assistance and generosity this weekend. Pray for the men who are facing their internal shame, and being restored to the grace of God this weekend. God bless.
 

I have been blessed to celebrate 4 of my cousins weddings in the last two years, and will celebrate another in the month of June, and I can certainly say that the Mass and the celebration after have been the most joyful family meals of our lives. You know what I mean, right? They are “both intimate and formal, joyous and solemn, scripted and yet somehow capturing the spontaneous feeling of a multitude.” At a marriage feast we are rejoicing at what God has brought together, and we are looking forward with joyful hope to a lasting communion, to a shared life! It’s been an incredible gift to celebrate weddings for my own family, and to be able to be a part of something so special and unique. The great gift for us is that we each have this same gift every time that we come to Mass! It’s announced at a “climactic moment in the Mass, just before we go forward for Holy Communion. The priest at the altar genuflects, takes the host and, holding it aloft, says: ‘Behold the Lamb of God, behold Him who takes away the sins of the world. Blessed are those called to the Supper of the Lamb.’” This beautiful announcement reminds us of one of my favorite Scripture passages, Revelation 19:9, where an angel proclaims: “Blessed are those who have been called to the wedding feast of the Lamb.”

Blessed are we! This acclamation is the climax of the Scriptures and all of Salvation History! “Blessed” connects us of the Scriptures, of God, of how He grants us more than just happiness, but Beatitude, blessing, is what we desire, the greatest desire of our heart. The Mass is our participation in the Lamb’s wedding feast. Our participation in that greatest of events that I have been able to take part in so much lately is our gift together each and every week! It’s funny, that in my memories of the weddings, along with the rehearsals, the Mass, the celebration, I always remember the day of preparation too! It takes hours to gather the family together, to coordinate and to prepare. There is a buzz, an excitement in the air that whole day while the wedding party primps and the guests and arrange themselves. A part of the special day is our own preparation for it – how special we feel because we got ready in a more special way than normal.

This is why we began to speak last week of our need to bring our best to God! Why we spoke of not “stuttering” in our expression of faith, and the importance of our “Sunday Best.” We must dress for a wedding when we dress for Mass. Of course, it isn’t necessary to spend hundreds or thousands like our secular society has done on wedding garments. It isn’t a question of what I think or what I say to you – it is a question of what we imagine this to be and how much we value the Mass. It is a question about how we are preparing each Sunday to make the Mass a “special event,” like we do for our families weddings. Our Sunday Best is meant to show others but also to show ourselves what is taking place, and what we believe. When we dress the part, we are able to pray, to enter into the mystery, to be filled with the great joy of knowing that we are “blessed, called to the wedding feast of the Lamb.”