Parish Information

Joining the Parish

New Parishioners are always welcome. Census forms can be found in the vestibule of the churches. Simply fill one out and drop it in the collection basket.

Planning a Baptism

The birth of a child brings joy to the family. Through Baptism, that child is joined to the family of God, which brings great joy to the church. Parents seeking Baptism are asked to contact the parish office.

Scheduling Weddings

Couples contemplating marriage are asked to contact the parish office

and set up an appointment with Fr. Ken before making any other plans for their wedding. This appointment should take place at least one year before the contemplated date.

Our Parish Intercessory Prayer

Group provides prayers for anyone

in need throughout the parish. Mary Ann Magda is the Coordinator and can be reached at 570-655-1218.

Outreach to the Homebound

Sr. Madonna SSCM, assisted by our dedicated EMOCs, provides Sacramental care to the elderly, homebound and hospitalized. If you, or someone you know, are homebound or in need of a pastoral visit, please contact Sr. Madonna.

Anointing of the Sick

The Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick may take place at any time, especially if one is seriously ill. Please contact the parish office to set up a time for Fr. Ken to visit.

Funeral Preparations

The loss of a loved one is a particularly difficult time for those who are bereaved. Our parish community collaborates with local funeral directors in assisting families during their time of grief.

Bequests to the Parish

Please Remember St. Andre Bessette Parish with Memorial gifts at the time of death or with a bequest in your will. Make a return to the Lord for all the good He has given you.

SWING INTO SPRING DINNER DANCE

Saturday, April 30, 6:30—10:30 pm St. Mary’s Hall

$20.00 per person Tickets available this weekend

includes dinner and dessert with soft beverage

Responsible BYOB Must be 21 or older to attend.

The Best of the Oldies by

Rockin’ Father Kloton

April 10, 2016 Third Sunday of Easter

St. Andre Bessette Parish

Night At the Races

April 9, 2016

St. Mary’s Byzantine

Social Hall

Madison St. Wilkes-Barre, PA Doors open at 6 p.m.

FIRST EUCHARIST 2016

We congratulate three of our parish children who

are receiving Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament for

the first time this Sunday:

Kayla Giannelli Ireona Nirka Hailey Stephens

May the Lord continue to dwell with them and

guide them along the path to everlasting Life.

Check out the Gigunda Basket Raffle!!

20 + Baskets of the most amazing prizes.

They Would make even the most

discerning Bunny green with envy!

ADMINISTRATIVE COUNCILS

PARISH COMMITTEES

The Young at Heart Committee will meet on Wednesday, April 20th at 1 p.m. for a time of fellowship,

All seniors are welcome.

Loaves &

Fishes

Food for April

Tea Bags

The next formation

night for new council

members will be April 6,

2016 in the POMR.

The Parish Social

Justice Council will

meet in the POMR on

April 14 at 6:00 p.m.

The Pastoral Council

will meet on Thursday,

April 28th in the Parish

Office Meeting Room. Fr.

Ken will be at the

Diocesan Clergy

Convocation on the 21st!

The Liturgical Council

will meet on Tuesday,

April 26 at 7 p.m.

Discussion will focus on

the Easter Season and

beyond.

The Finance Council will

meet on Thursday, May

19th at 6:30 p.m. All

members of the Finance

Council are asked to plan

to attend.

Sponsored by Scranton Prep Players

Friday, April 8th and 15th

at 7:30 p.m.

Saturday, April 9th and 16th

at 7:30 p.m.

Sunday, April 10 and 17

at 2:00 p.m.

Bellarmine Theater at Scranton Prep

1000 Wyoming Ave., Scranton.

For further information

contact Prep at 570-941-PREP

Homemade

Pasta and Sausage Dinner

St. Maria Goretti Parish

Laflin Rd., Laflin

Sunday April 10, 2016

Noon—5 p.m.

Dinner includes Salad,

Rolls/Butter,

Beverage and Dessert

$11.00

Tickets available at the

door.

Take—out Noon—4 p.m.

Book and Bake Sale

Soup for the Soul

Committee

Exaltation of the

Holy Cross

Buttonwood

Thursday, April 14,

10 am-6pm

Friday, April 15,

10 am-6pm

Saturday, April 16,

10 am-4pm

Gently used books

at bargain pricing!

For information

contact

Barry at

570-200-5634

or

Sylvia at

570-825-6370

April 10, 2016 Third Sunday of Easter

Holy Redeemer

Art Show

Spring Concert

Senior Waltz

April 16 and 17 6:00 p.m.

Mc Carthy Auditorium

Holy Redeemer High School is now accepting registrations for the 2016-17 school year. Any student interested in shadowing or registering for high school may call Guidance

Holy Redeemer

Players

April 8th and 9th

7:00 p.m. in

McCarthy Auditorium

Tickets available at the door

Adults $5 ; Seniors $4 Students $3

April 10, 2016 Third Sunday of Easter

Year of Mercy Pilgrimages

The Women’s Spirituality Group is sponsoring a Pilgrimage to the Basilica of Sts.

Cyril and Methodius in Danville on Saturday, May 14th from 10

a.m.—4 p.m.

The Basilica is a designated

Pilgrimage site for the Year of Mercy. We will be leaving from St. Andre Bessette by 9 a.m. The day includes a guided tour of the

Basilica, a self-guided tour of the grounds (guide booklet included), time for group and private prayer, morning coffee and noon meal with the Sisters. Carpooling expected unless we have enough interest to rent a bus. Fee will

be determined by number participating.

The Women’s Spirituality Group is also sponsoring a pilgrimage to the Cathedral of St.

Peter on Saturday, June 4th. The Cathedral is a designated Pilgrimage Site within the diocese for the year of Mercy. The day includes a tour

of the Cathedral, a spiritual talk, opportunity for confession, and noon Mass followed by lunch.

A $10 donation per person is asked by the Cathedral.

Again, carpooling is expected, unless we have enough interest to rent a bus. Additional fees will be determined by number participating. Call the parish office to register for

either:(570-823-4988)

PILGRIMAGES ARE OPEN TO ANYONE IN THE PARISH!

Annual Pro-Life Friday, April 15th 2—6 p.m. Saturday, April 16th 8 a.m.—4 p.m. Bag Day Saturday 2 pm –4 pm

Wyoming Valley Presbyterian Fowler Hall

2 Lockhart St., Wilkes– Barre

To Donate, call 570-826-1819 one person’s junk is another person’s treasure!

BENEFITS THE PRO+LIFE CENTER @ 31 Hanover St. WB

Jewelry, Dolls, Belleek, Lenox,

Staffordshire Ironstone, Paden City

Pottery, Quoizel Lighting,

silverware, housewares, home

décor, knic knacks, linens, purses,

toys, holiday items, dishes, vases,

glassware, DVDs, CDs, VHS,

luggage, small appliances, picture

frames, and much more!

Wine and Spirit

Catholic Faith

and the

Electoral

Process

Wednesday, April 27, 2016 Cork Restaurant

$5.00 per person

Presenter: Rev. Richard G. Malloy SJ

The Great FIFTY DAYS

Eucharist: Christ the Bridegroom’s Gesture of Surrender

Simeon Leiva OCSO

Eucharistic Congress, Diocese of Saint Augustine Florida Jacksonville, 29 March 2014

TENDERNESS AND MERCY ARE THE HEART OF

THE GOSPEL. Otherwise, one doesn’t understand

Jesus Christ, or the tenderness of the Father who

sends Him to listen to us, to heal us, to save us.”1

Perhaps you recognize these words as conveying the

signature message of our holy father Francis. Yes, we

Christians have been urgently entrusted by God with

the mission of allowing the flood of tenderness God

has already made to flow into us, to flow out further

through us into the whole world. How appropriate it is

to begin with this theme of tenderness and mercy our

reflection on the Eucharist as the gesture of surrender

of Christ the Bridegroom.

1. Christ loved us and handed himself over for us

The experience of divine tenderness should be for us

far more than a private emotion of overwhelming

security. In God love is not an emotion but the law of

his Being, his very identity and substance; and so, too,

must such unwavering and substantial love become

the law and spontaneous operation of our own being.

“Be imitators of God, as beloved children,” St. Paul

exhorts the Ephesians, “and walk in love, as Christ

loved us and handed himself over for us as a sacrificial

offering to God” (Eph 5:1-2). Paul is here describing

how it was that God’s tender love entered the world

historically, and how it continues to operate in our

lives today. God’s love, he says, is the communication

of his person and life to us as the result of a particular

free act on his part.

Divine love is not a vague and faceless cosmic

“energy”, automatically diffused throughout the

universe like some ethereal gas. The human heart

yearns for far more than the reassurance that the

world is somehow pervaded by a friendly, benign

“force”. If the cosmos is full of the beauty and wonder

of stupendous processes, this is because it came into

being by the work of a Master Artist whose glory it

reflects.

Paul’s words convey the double truth that God is a

personal being motivated by infinite love, and that “our

hearts remain restless until they rest in him”. Christ’s

‘handing-over-of– himself’ for our sake reveals the

specific act of love we must imitate as God’s “beloved

children” in order to come to rest in him.

God’s self-surrender in love was something he decided

to do out of his eternal and infinite freedom. There is

nothing automatic or compulsory about God’s gift of

himself, because love can never be the result of

constraint or inevitable cycles that recur impersonally.

Once God decides to give himself as exhaustively as he

does in Christ, he sets the bar very high for us.

God came to us in

human flesh to make

his self-surrender

possible. This self-

bestowal occurred at

a given moment of

historical time. To be

Christian is to imitate

in our own present

time an act of total

self-surrender that

God accomplished in

Christ when he was

born in Bethlehem;

but it was an act of

such magnitude that

it has vital repercussions in every succeeding age

because, in fact, it is an act of unceasing self-

surrender in the present. That is how far the Love God

is (1 Jn 4:8,16) made him go: the Uncreated became

creaturely; pure Spirit took on flesh; the Infinite

accepted limitations; and the Eternal embraced the

temporal as his own dwelling-place—all for the sake of

being with us and sharing our mortal existence to the

full.

A few verses later in this same chapter 5 of Ephesians

I have quoted, the plot thickens when Paul writes:

“Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ loved the

church and handed himself over for her to sanctify

her” (Eph 5:25-27). God’s gift of self is not a

suspended abstraction; it is the surrender of a lover to

his beloved. Christ’s deliberate handing-over of himself

is a gesture that reveals that God’s love for us is not a

generic benevolence but rather the specific love driving

the heart of a passionately committed Bridegroom.

http://www.spencerabbey.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Gesture-of-Surrender.pdf

In the Incarnation,

Christ comes to

encounter us as the

Bridegroom of redeemed

Humanity and of each of

our souls. This is his

most intimate identity.

Think of what being a

bridegroom implies by

way of desire for union,

passionate attachment

to the beloved,

unceasing labor for her

benefit, and fidelity to

the point of death. Paul

says elsewhere: “The

husband does not rule

over his own body, but

the wife does” (1 Cor

7:4). This principle

graphically illustrates how totally wedded spouses

should surrender their whole persons to one another.

But it also has a strong Eucharistic resonance because

it shows how unconditionally the Lord Jesus has

entrusted his Real Presence into the hands of the

Church, for his Spouse to do with him whatever she

deems necessary for the salvation of the world. This

includes not only the Eucharistic Sacrifice, but also the

Reserved Sacrament for adoration and as viaticum for

the sick and dying.

This gesture of handing-over of self, moreover, is not

only an action of the incarnate Word himself. It is

important to see also that, because the Son does

everything out of loving obedience to his Father, the

Son gives himself to us as total gift only in absolute

coöperation with the Father. Christ makes himself our

gift only through the Father’s own action of giving him

to us. Christ consents to be given as gift. “[God] who

did not spare his own Son,” Paul tells us, “but handed

him over for us all, how will he not also make us the

free gift of everything else along with him?” (Rom

8:32).

2. For our sake God made him to be sin who

knew no sin

Up to now we have been comforted by the luminous

aspects of the Paschal Mystery. But now we must

pursue our meditation into the dark side of the

Redemption, because this is a darkness we all carry

within us. We must glimpse into the abyss of suffering

into which our Lord Jesus was plunged in the hours

that led him into the desolation of abandonment by

the Father and, ultimately, to a horrendous death. In

the days of his Passion, Jesus, obeying the will of the

Father, willingly and even joyously (Heb 12:2) entered

into what Paul calls “the mystery of iniquity” (2 Thes

2:7). Fully aware of what was involved, and with full

consent of heart and will, Jesus handed himself over

into the hands of sinners, to be treated by them as

they pleased.

But who are these “sinners” into whose hands Jesus

so willingly hands himself? Ourselves, of course. And

yet Jesus sits at our table and eats with us,

scandalizing the Pharisees. He surrenders himself into

our sinful hands just as literally as the fact that we

today receive his Body as bread in our hands and

drink his outpoured Blood as wine. ‘When you did not

have mercy on one of these, the least of my brothers,

you did not have mercy on me’, the all-knowing King

says to us at the Last Judgment (cf. Mt 25:31-46).

How could we forget this painful truth a mere two

weeks away from Holy Week? Jesus knew who we

were; he knew what we would do with him; and yet

he still surrendered himself totally into our hands. If

we are ever tempted to view Jesus’ Passion and Death

as merely the regrettable failure of an otherwise

admirable mission, then we should read the Gospels

carefully again. There we would see clearly the

dazzling light of an ardent love, a light that blinds our

natural logic with the divine truth that precisely

surrendering into the hands of sinners who he knew

would kill him WAS the strategy of divine love to

redeem the world. “For our sake [the Father] made

him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we

might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:21).

“We were reconciled to God by the death of his Son

while we were [his] enemies” (Rom 5:10). What an

incredible exchange!

Don’t such declarations make us

gasp? Consider the depth of the

mystery of divine love: On the one

hand, God cannot be God without

being from all eternity the Father of

his only Son, his beloved Jesus

Christ. At the very same time,

however, God did not love the One

by whose sonship he is God more

than us, his creatures! Paul’s words

above declare this wonderful,

terrible truth: God did not spare his

own Son but made him to be sin for our sake. For us

to be liberated from the death of sin, the Father

deemed it necessary that his innocent Son should

become sin, that which is most abhorrent to God!

Christ, the All-Holy One, became sin by taking up into

his person the full consequence of our sins, namely,

death. The very God who would not allow Abraham to

kill his beloved son Isaac “did not spare his own Son

but handed him over for us all”! The all-powerful King

exchanged his dignity for that of the condemned

slave. The greatest truths are always unbelievable,

and that’s precisely why we have to believe them.

The supreme power by which Christ is able to destroy

death is not human-styled violence raised to an

omnipotent degree. No: God’s only power is the power

of love, which means the power of tenderness and

mercy, which means in turn that Christ takes upon

himself the corporate sin of all ages and allows it to

crush him on the Cross. Only the power of God’s

infinite love is capable of absorbing all evil in this way:

it hurls the raging dragon into the consuming heart of

the sun. And God’s infinite love was housed within a

very human person, Jesus of Nazareth, who bled when

wounded and endured horrific anguish when

abandoned by those he thought loved him; and so his

absorption of the collected sin of the world utterly

broke his human frame. In Christ, God still makes

himself vulnerable every day as he entrusts himself

into our hands. The mystery of iniquity into which

Christ descended in the Passion could only be done

away with by the courage of an even greater love, a

love that descends into the gaping jaws of hell itself to

rescue the beloved. Christ consented to “catching sin”

as a dog catches rabies, and he died of it. As the

saying goes, “Once the dog dies, the rabies dies with

him”; and in the Passion, Jesus made himself less

than a dog, less than the dogs who licked the ulcers of

Lazarus the poor man in Luke (16:21): He was “a man

scoured by suffering; people hid their faces from him;

he was despised, and we considered him nothing”, as

Isaiah prophesies (Is 53:3). “When Christ came into

our midst to redeem us,” says a great theologian, “he

descended so low that after that no one would be able

to fall without falling into him”.2

But what does Christ’s handing-over of self out of love

look like “on the ground”, so to speak, that is, at the

level of the concrete events of Christ’s life toward the

end of Jesus’ earthly sojourn?

Just before the events of Palm

Sunday in Matthew’s Gospel,

we read of Jesus’ third

prediction of his Passion to his

disciples: “As Jesus was going

up to Jerusalem, he took the

twelve aside by themselves,

and said to them on the way,

‘Behold, we are going up to

Jerusalem, and the Son of

Man will be handed over to

the chief priests and the

scribes, and they will

condemn him to death, and

hand him over to the Gentiles

to be mocked and scourged and crucified, and he will

be raised on the third day’” (Mt 20:17-19). And in the

Gospel of John we witness the first station on the Way

of the Cross: “Then [Pilate] handed him over to them

to be crucified. And carrying the cross himself [Jesus]

went out to what is called the Place of the Skull, in

Hebrew ‘Golgotha’” (Jn 19:16-17).

We note at once how the context of the gruesome

events of the Passion violently alters our

understanding of the expression ‘to hand oneself

over’. Until now it has given us comforting feelings of

gratitude that Christ would so generously give himself

to us. It has also conveyed emotions of a deeply

reassuring intimacy, of a sweet embracing and being

embraced by a cherished beloved, of an affective

ecstasy beyond all human imagining, and all this

because we now possess the Father’s most prized

treasure as our very own. And these are all immensely

consoling truths. Now, however, in the Gospels, the

physical events of the Passion make us feel the full

shock of what it means for Jesus to descend into the

“mystery of iniquity” that will destroy him. His

wedding with humanity is going to be a blood-

wedding, the wedding feast of “the Lamb slain since

the foundation of the world” for the love of his Bride,

the Church (Rev 13:8; 19:7).

It has always been a hateful

and cowardly injustice to

blame the Jews alone for the

death of Jesus, because in the

drama of the Passion the Jews

represented only one portion

of guilty humanity. The

teachers of the Law, the non-

Jews in Jerusalem, the pagan

Roman Pilate himself, as well

as the Jewish high priests and

the clamoring multitude

outside the praetorium, all

taken together, represent us,

that is, the totality of human

beings of all times and places in our collusion with

evil. Let us confess that, at least initially, we do not

very gladly receive the gift of Jesus in our hands and

pass it on as something precious. Like that self-

serving crowd, we receive Jesus, rather, as an object

of scorn, as a source of irritation to be done away

with, or at best as an object of indifference, and

indifference can be just as murderous as hatred. From

Annas and Caiaphas and Pilate all the way down to the

last serving girl, all of these representatives of sinful

humanity are portrayed as handing Jesus over to one

another blasphemously as their common plaything—

for mockery, torture and crucifixion. The players in the

Passion reciprocate God’s tender gesture of handing

over his Son to them, not by joyfully embracing him,

but by betraying him. And the silent Jesus allows it to

happen; he allows himself to be made a thing to be

maliciously played with and thrown out in the end.

But: “Do you think that I cannot call upon my Father

and he will not provide me at this moment with more

than twelve legions of angels? But then how would the

Scriptures be fulfilled which say that it must come to

pass in this way?” (Mt 26:53-54). The Son saves us by

obeying the design of his Father. Here lies all the

power of his love.

The Greek word for what I have been translating as

‘handing-over’ is parádosis, and it contains a

meaningful ambiguity worth pursuing. This one word

can be translated not only as ‘to hand over’ or

‘surrender’ but also as ‘to betray’, because a certain

kind of handing-over can be a betrayal. A father

hands his daughter over to her bridegroom at the

altar full of love and hope, but Judas hands Jesus

over to his enemies to be rid of him.

3. The Lord Jesus, on the night he was handed

over, took bread

But what has all of this to do with the Eucharist? I’m

sure you sense it! The great clue to the connection

between handing-over/betrayal nd Eucharist is the

jarring coincidence in Jesus’ life of two antithetical

events, an event of utter goodness and an event of

utter malice, which nevertheless are fused by the

power of Jesus’ action into the single event of

Redemption.

Have you ever wondered

why Jesus chose to

institute the Holy

Eucharist precisely on the

very evening of his

betrayal, only shortly

before Judas kissed him

in the garden as he

handed him over to the

forces of destruction?

Judas surrendered Jesus

into the hands of his

enemies immediately

after Jesus had handed

himself over to Judas at

the Last Supper in sacramental communion. And, as

the betrayer leaves the cenacle to perform his

heinous deed, Jesus’ words to him are: “What you are

going to do, do quickly.” (Jn 13:27,30). This is a

command by Jesus that seems mysteriously to trigger

the drama leading to his own death.

Essential to understanding this mystery of coincidence

between Eucharist and betrayal is the paramount text

from St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians (chapter

11), which memorializes the Last Supper and its

permanent centrality to all Christian existence. Please

pay particular attention in this narrative to the

gestures performed by Jesus to accompany his

words:

For I received from the Lord what I also handed

on to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night he

was handed over, took bread, and, after he had

given thanks, broke it and said, “This is my body

that is for you. Do this in memory of me.” In the

same way also the cup, after supper, saying,

“This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do

this, as often as you drink it, in memory of me.”

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the

cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he

comes.3

This text portrays marvelously Jesus’ intentions and

actions on the threshold of the Passion, “on the night

he was handed over”. By describing so objectively the

significant words and gestures of Jesus at the end of

this momentous meal, Paul is in fact revealing to us—

if we know how to “read” the signs—the depth of

God’s creativity in Christ in the face of the Son’s

imminent suffering and death. Paul, who was not

present at the Last Supper, stresses that he is

handing on to the Corinthians what had been handed

on to him by the Apostles. The solemn care,

furthermore, with which Paul frames his account

means he is conscious that what he is giving us here

as his most precious legacy is of supreme importance

to the life of the Church, because Christ himself

decreed that it should be so. What Paul is here

handing on is what he himself had received: namely,

the celebration of the Eucharist by the Church as

containing and communicating sacramentally the

Death and Resurrection of Jesus under the material

signs of bread, wine, words and gestures.

In his text Paul uses the very same word, parádosis,

to refer to his handing-on of the celebration of the

Eucharist that we have seen him use to refer to the

Son’s own handing-down to humanity by the Father,

and that the Gospel also uses to refer to the betrayal

of the Son by Judas and all sinners. The Latin

equivalent of parádosis is traditio, and so we see here

that the Eucharist is the core and source of our living

tradition as Christians, our most precious heritage.

The gesture of surrender contained in the Eucharist,

then, communicates not two but three interrelated

meanings: (1) the eternal divine action of Father and

Son, (2) the temporal human action of betrayal at the

time of the Passion, and (3) the sacramental divine-

and-human action of the Church. All three are

parádosis, traditio, ‘handing-over’, and they are

inseparable from one another.

The great act of

thanksgiving that is the

Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

is, in fact, the obedient

execution by the Church

of Christ’s command: “Do

this in memory of me”.

The familiar words we

daily hear the priest

pronounce at the altar as

he bends over for the

consecration are really an

ecclesial synthesis of the

words of Paul in First Corinthians and of the

narratives of the Institution that we find in the

Synoptic Gospels:

For on the night he was betrayed [and entered

willingly into his Passion], he himself took

bread, and, giving you thanks, he said the

blessing, broke the bread and gave it to his

disciples, saying: TAKE THIS, ALL OF YOU, AND

EAT OF IT, FOR THIS IS MY BODY, WHICH WILL

BE GIVEN UP FOR YOU. In a similar way, when

supper was ended, he took the chalice, and,

giving you thanks, he said the blessing, and gave

the chalice to his disciples, saying: TAKE THIS,

ALL OF YOU, AND DRINK FROM IT, FOR THIS IS

THE CHALICE OF MY BLOOD, THE BLOOD OF THE

NEW AND ETERNAL COVENANT, WHICH WILL BE

POURED OUT FOR YOU AND FOR MANY FOR THE

FORGIVENESS OF SINS. DO THIS IN MEMORY OF

ME. 4

The most striking aspect of Jesus’ actions in this text of

the Mass is what can be called Jesus’ creative

anticipation of his death. We begin in the past

historical tense, which remembers that Jesus took

bread and broke it. But then we suddenly jump to the

present tense of our own life, and we see and hear

Jesus directly handing the bread over to his disciples

and commanding them to eat of it right here and now.

And the meaning Jesus himself gives these gestures

and actions is: “for this is my Body, which will be given

up for you”, in the future tense. In other words, here

Christ sacramentally institutes in the present an action

that overtakes in time the destructive historical action

of his murder that hasn’t yet occurred, while at the

same time giving to it a startling redemptive meaning.

Thus, the interior significance and effects of the future

action of betrayal are radically changed by divine

intervention before the betrayal occurs. The malice of

man is overtaken by the goodness of God. Love

swallows up hatred, even though the lover dies of its

poisoning. A hate-filled enemy—including both his evil

intentions and his murderous deed—is embraced as

brother and friend.

In the Sacrament, Jesus’

death becomes the source

of our life because the

power of his love

anticipates the mangling of

his body and the shedding

of his blood, and it

transforms their vital

meaning and effect: from

an act of violent hatred it is

transformed into the

execution of a sacrifice and

the preparation of its victim

as food. The separate

consecration of the bread

and the wine manifests the

character of the act as a

sacrifice since, according to Leviticus, all the blood of

the victim had to be drained off before its body could

be consumed (7:2). At a moment when one would

expect the victim to be overwhelmed with fear, such

anticipation is instead a forceful and deliberate

initiative by the One in whom the universe was first

created and which the

humiliated Word is now

recreating through his

Passion. Jesus takes bread,

pronounces a thanksgiving

that changes it

substantially into his Body,

breaks it and distributes it

for eating; takes wine,

blesses it and transforms it

into his Blood, and then

pours it out to be drunk.

This is Jesus’ way of

guaranteeing that the

Substance of his being will

not fall on the Cross into a

bottomless abyss as a

result of human violence,

but rather that that sacred Substance will be made

available to all as a source of new life and joy: “This is

why the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in

order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but

I lay it down on my own. I have power to lay it down,

and power to take it up again” (Jn 10:17-18). This

power and choice of Jesus to lay down his life contains

the whole secret of his love.

At the very moment when he is going to allow himself

to be handed over to the forces of darkness, Jesus

shows himself to be more than ever the sovereign Lord

of creation and of history: of creation, because he

takes the elements of bread and wine and re-creates

them, transforming them into his Body and Blood; of

history, because he takes the impending evil deed of

his betrayal and transforms it already before it occurs

into the best possible occasion for him to surrender his

person to us, his betrayers, out of love, as the

Bridegroom of the Church, with the total fidelity,

dedication and passionate love that befits a royal

bridegroom.

4. Do this in memory of me!

Paul’s narrative of the Institution of the Eucharist has

vital implications, and not only at the most obvious

level for our liturgical and sacramental life. His

account, but above all our Eucharistic practice, should

also leave a deep mark on our individual life of faith, in

which we struggle with doubts and temptations of

many kinds, and on our moral life, in which we strive

to live by the commandment “Love one another as I

have loved you” (Jn 13:34). The other command “Do

this in memory of me!” that concludes the solemn

words of institution refers not only to the liturgical

celebration of the Eucharist. It also refers—and with

special urgency, if we are to believe Pope Francis—to

the fact that our everyday life as Christians ought to be

the existential celebration of the Real Presence of

Christ in our ordinary interaction with the world.

“Do this in memory of

me!” Love doesn’t

forget; love

remembers; and the

memory of Jesus in us

throbs with the power of

his Word and the

promise of his

Resurrection. How

beautiful that Christ

asks us to do to others

out of love what he

has first done to us by

telling us to do it in his

memory—as if he

were saying: ‘Just

remember me and

love will come easily!’ Truly, it is the quality of our

interaction with others—at home, in the workplace, in

the street where we encounter the homeless—that will

confirm the authenticity and heartfelt devotion of the

liturgical Mystery celebrated in the church. Or do we

simply forget Christ and his gift of self to us when we

leave the church? Is the Mass nothing but a ritual

fantasy that confirms my self-complacency?

‘Do not forget what I have done for you,’ Jesus says to

us incessantly. When we are overwhelmed by sorrows

of any kind, or are perhaps suffering the pangs of a

devouring guilt that can tempt us to despair; when it

seems that our life has reached a dead-end either

through the treachery of others or through our own

grave errors: then our only salvation is to believe with

all our might in the power of Christ’s creative

anticipation, that is, in the sovereign ability Christ

demonstrated at the Last Supper and on the Cross to

take an evil deed that will lead to his own crucifixion

and providentially transform it into an event of

Resurrection. Christ’s unconditional handing-over of

himself to us in advance of anything we might do ought

to give us the certainty that no sin we commit can

defeat the Mercy of God, and that no wound that is

inflicted by others on us can surpass the power to heal

of the divine Physician. Indeed, Christ “has foresuffered

all”. 5 Let us not stubbornly clutch our sufferings to

our chest like greedy paupers; Christ’s tender deed of

creative anticipation on the Cross has made it so that

all my sufferings already belong, in advance, more to

him than to me.

“Love one another as I have loved you”, Jesus

commanded us (Jn 13:34). As Christians we are not

free to love any way we wish, half-heartedly or when

convenient. We must strive to love as we have been

loved, which is with all the tenderness of God’s whole

Heart. “The measure of love,” says St. Bernard, “is to

love without measure.” We cause something like a

short-circuit in the cosmic circulation of love, which is

supposed to flow on through us, if, after receiving

Christ from the Father, we do not imitate God’s gesture

and instead make his outpoured love stop abruptly with

ourselves.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus lays down this

teaching: “If you bring your gift to the altar, and there

recall that your brother has anything against you, leave

your gift there at the altar, go first and be reconciled

with your brother, and then come and offer your

gift” (Mt 5:23-24). This means that anger and

resentment between brothers clogs up the free

circulation of love, not only between

the two brothers at odds but also within the

worshipping community and between all believers and

God. Eucharist cannot be offered by one who hates.

Mercy is the power of self-giving; it is meant to flow

ever onward; the more of it we give, the more we

receive. Whoever receives mercy must give mercy, or

else he will choke on it. God gives me his mercy so

abundantly that I always will have more than enough

for myself and all I encounter. Like the miraculous

loaves, mercy becomes multiplied in the giving.

The Gospel everywhere

urges us to allow the

irresistible tenderness of

Christ to invade our person

and take over our every

thought, feeling and action.

Realistically, however, none

of us can by nature be as

selfless as Christ, the Good

Samaritan who has only to

glance at a wounded or

needy person to shudder

with mercy. The problem is

not so much that of willfully

imposing on ourselves a strict consistency between

faith and action; it is more a matter of allowing the

power of the Christ, who has given himself to me with

love, to have its full effect in my person, rather like a

pregnant mother-to-be who allows the child to grow in

her womb and simply nourishes it by offering it her

whole being and doing nothing to harm it.

This is not our work, but the work of God in us. Christ

in us is never a mere static object that we dispose of;

he is the Subject acting in my soul, the risen Lord who

lives in me and strengthens me, the true Protagonist of

my life and personal history.6

……..

In summary, then: It was his unbounded divine

compassion as response to human betrayal that moved

Jesus to institute the Holy Eucharist. The Eucharist is a

sacred work of total transformation which the Church

performs in obedience to and imitation of her Lord. It

effects a transformation of time, of matter, of the

meaning of emotions and experiences, and of the

human person. In it we see Jesus transform, not only

bread and wine into his Body and Blood, but also his

own human weakness and defeat and death into divine

tenderness and mercy. He makes one supreme

moment in time flood any other moment that

remembers his action—all by the power of the Holy

Spirit that indwells Jesus. This pattern of

transformation through the power of mercy should, in

turn, rule our whole life as Christians.

The act of eating the Body of Christ and drinking the

Blood of Christ with faith

generates a dynamic

process that forms Christ

in us,7 and this

transformation within us is

profoundly linked to the

Blessed Virgin’s own

conception of the Son of

God in her womb. We

conceive Christ in the

womb of our faith by the

power of the same Holy

Spirit that overshadowed Mary at the Annunciation (Lk

1:35), the same Holy Spirit whose fire effects at Mass,

through the epiclesis, the transformation of the

elements into the Body and Blood of Christ. Christ’s

incandescent, indeed radioactive, Presence in the

Blessed Sacrament is no inert object for mere distant

veneration. Christ wants to pervade my whole person

so that I become his Real Presence in the world. Christ

wants to be born into the world, wants to be handed

over by me to others, through my deeds of love, until

his love becomes the vital law and spontaneous

impulse of my own being.

Dear brothers and sisters: “Let us rejoice and exult and

give God the glory, for the marriage

feast of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made

herself ready” for him (Rev 19:7).

________________________________________

1.) Interview with Ferruccio de Bortoli Correiere de

Serra, 5 March 2014

2.) Hans Urs Von Balthasar, Heart of the World

3.) Ἐγὼ γὰρ παρέλαβον ἀπὸ τοῦ κυρίου, ὃ καὶ παρέδωκα ὑμῖν, ὅτι

ὁ κύριος Ἰησοῦς ἐν τῇ νυκτὶ ᾗ παρεδίδετο ἔλαβεν ἄρτον 24 καὶ

εὐχαριστήσας ἔκλασεν καὶ εἶπεν· τοῦτό μού ἐστιν τὸ σῶμα τὸ ὑπὲρ

ὑμῶν· τοῦτο ποιεῖτε εἰς τὴν ἐμὴν ἀνάμνησιν. 25 ὡσαύτως καὶ τὸ

ποτήριον μετὰ τὸ δειπνῆσαι λέγων· τοῦτο τὸ ποτήριον ἡ καινὴ

διαθήκη ἐστὶν ἐν τῷ ἐμῷ αἵματι· τοῦτο ποιεῖτε, ὁσάκις ἐὰν πίνητε,

εἰς τὴν ἐμὴν ἀνάμνησιν. 26 ὁσάκις γὰρ ἐὰν ἐσθίητε τὸν ἄρτον τοῦτον

καὶ τὸ ποτήριον πίνητε, τὸν θάνατον τοῦ κυρίου καταγγέλλετε ἄχρι

οὗ ἔλθῃ. (1 Cor 11:23-26)

4.) The introductory section is from EP3 while the

clause in brackets is from EP 2. The rest is common to

all Eucharistic prayers.

5) T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land “The Fire Sermon” with

reference to the Greek prophet Tiresias whom many

critics consider a Christ-figure in this poem.

6.) I am very grateful to my friend Fr. William Nelson,

a priest in Japan, who, on reading this passage,

commented as follows. Here the heart of a pastor is

truly speaking, giving the best possible evidence for

the indispensable nature of the Eucharist in human life:

“Here I think about the people I have been with

today—three very small congregations in very small

towns in Shikoku. Some immigrants, some workers,

some very old, some children, some baptized and

some not..., no one socially or economically very

important, no one with much higher education, but all

of them thirsty for a soul satisfying, joy-bringing,

overflowing love. These people (and I don’t suppose

they are all that different from people anywhere else)

are, for the most part, trying to do what they can to be

happy, and are, for the most part, very tired and

frustrated. How they, how we, welcome the good news

of love poured out, of love and rest! Do you remember

the old spiritual? There is a balm in Gilead, / to make

the wounded whole, / there is a balm in Gilead, to heal

the sin-sick soul. This is what I think as a pastor, as a

father, as a brother. There is a balm, a fountain, love

poured out and bread broken and wine served. What

more could we ask for?”

7.) “My children, for whom I am again in labor, until

Christ be formed in you. (Gal. 4:19)

ALLELUIA!

The Wedding Feast of the Lamb has begun!

His Bride is made ready to receive Him!

ALLELUIA!

ST. JOSEPH’S ABBEY 167 North Spencer Road • Spencer, MA 01562 • 508.885.8700

This Week’s Finances

Expenses

March 31-April 6, 2016

Administration 2,824.44

Parish Assessment

-0-

School Assessment

-0-

Clergy Residence

51.00

Liturgy 3,062.15

Religious Education

-0-

Social Justice -0-

Operation & Maintenance

2,139.79

Parish Debt -0-

Insurance -0-

Taxes -0-

Diocesan Collections

3,535.45

TOTAL EXPENSES THIS WEEK

$11,612.83

+

General Fund Recapitulation

General Fund Previous Balance

$17,888.37

+ Income this week

+8,511.59

- Expenses this week

-11,612.83

Balance Forward

$14,787.13

Income

April 2-3, 2016

In Church Mailed In

Loose 224.46 -0-

Sunday Offering 3,587.00 586.00

EASTER 595.00 1,021.00

Holy Days -0- -0-

Initial Offering -0- -0-

Dues 1,237.00 202.00

Debt Reduction 12.00 10.00

Holiday Flowers 10.00 -0-

TOTAL PARISH

COLLECTION

$5,665.46 $1,819.00

Our Weekly goal for our Total Parish Collection is

$7,500.00.

This will ensure the financial stability of our parish.

Diocesan and Other Collections These are charitable collections that go directly to the

Diocese and do not impact our operating budget.

Clergy Collection 667.74 7.00

Rice Bowl 50.00 106.39

Holy Land 20.00 132.00

TOTAL DIOCESAN COLLECTIONS

$737.74 $145.39

TOTAL SUNDAY

COLLECTION $6,403.20 $1,964.39

Other Income This income is in addition to our regular income and

contributes toward the operating budget.

Candles 44.00

Perquisites -0-

Rent -0-

Miscellaneous -0-

TOTAL OTHER

INCOME $44.00

TOTAL INCOME

GENERAL FUND

THIS WEEK $8,511.59

Mass Attendance

April 2-3, 2016

People In-Church Collection

Average Offering

Per person

4:00 p.m. 174 2,567.60 14.76

5:30 p.m. 74 1,601.60 21.64

8:00 a.m. 68 1,025.00 15.07

11:00 a.m. 70 1,209.00 17.27

Total 386 $6,403.20 $16.59

Monthly Diocesan Bills (July 1, 2015– June 30, 2016)

Title Amount Billed Amount Paid Balance

Parish Assessment 34,730.42 34,730.42 -0-

Assessment for Schools 59,434.83 43,637.46 15,797.37

Insurance 22,720.00 17,844.48 4,875.52

Clergy Pension 6,600.00 6,600.00 -0-

Clergy Medical (BC/BS) 14,663.00 14,663.00 -0-

Post Retirement Fund 5,200.00 5,200.00 -0-

Clergy Care and Wellness Fund (In addition to the Monthly

Collection)

9,732.00 9,732.00 -0-

BALANCE 153,080.25 132,407.36 20,672.89

Votive Offerings

Offered by In Memory of

Sanctuary

Lamp

Bread and Wine

Your Gift to God

April 2-3, 2016

>$100.00 1

$100.00 3

$76-99 1

$75 0

$51-74 0

$50 7

$26-49 15

$25 9

$21-24 1

$20 44

$16-19 0

$15 22

$11-14 3

$10 88

$6-9 10

$5 66

< $5 18

Total Used 288

$32,000

$16,000

$3,200

$22,400

Parish Appeal

$ 25,754.00

$12,800

$28,800

April 3, 2016 Feast of Divine Mercy

ENCYCLICAL LETTER: LAUDATO SI’ of Pope Francis

VII. THE TRINITY AND THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CREATURES

238. The Father is the ultimate source of everything, the loving and self-communicating foundation of all that exists. The Son, his reflection, through whom all things were created, united himself to this earth when he was formed in the womb of Mary. The Spirit, infinite bond of love, is intimately present at the very heart of the universe, inspiring and bringing new pathways. The world was created by the three Persons acting as a single divine principle, but each one of them performed this common work in accordance with his own personal property. Consequently, “when we contemplate with wonder the universe in all its grandeur and beauty, we must praise the whole Trinity”.[169]

239. For Christians, believing in one God who is trinitarian communion suggests that the Trinity has left its mark on all creation. Saint Bonaventure went so far as to say that human beings, before sin, were able to see how each creature “testifies that God is three”. The reflection of the Trinity was there to be recognized in nature “when that book was open to man and our eyes had not yet become darkened”.[170] The Franciscan saint teaches us that each creature bears in itself a specifically Trinitarian structure, so real that it could be readily contemplated if only the human gaze were not so partial, dark and fragile. In this way, he points out to us the challenge of trying to read reality in a Trinitarian key.

240. The divine Persons are subsistent relations, and the world, created according to the divine model, is a web of relationships. Creatures tend towards God, and in turn it is proper to every living being to tend towards other things, so that throughout the universe we can find any number of constant and secretly interwoven relationships.[171] This leads us not only to marvel at the manifold connections existing among creatures, but also to discover a key to our own fulfilment. The human person grows more, matures more and is sanctified more to the extent that he or she enters into relationships, going out from themselves to live in communion with God, with others and with all creatures. In this way, they make their own that trinitarian dynamism which God imprinted in them when they were created. Everything is interconnected, and this invites us to develop a spirituality of that global solidarity which flows from the mystery of the Trinity.

VIII. QUEEN OF ALL CREATION

241. Mary, the Mother who cared for Jesus, now cares with maternal affection and pain for this wounded world. Just as her pierced heart mourned the death of Jesus, so now she grieves for the sufferings of the crucified poor and for the creatures of this

world laid waste by human power. Completely transfigured, she now lives with Jesus, and all creatures sing of her fairness. She is the Woman, “clothed in the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars” (Rev 12:1). Carried up into heaven, she is the Mother and Queen of all creation. In her glorified body, together with the Risen Christ, part of creation has reached the fullness of its beauty. She treasures the entire life of Jesus in her heart (cf. Lk 2:19,51), and now understands the meaning of all things. Hence, we can ask her to enable us to look at this world with eyes of wisdom.

242. At her side in the Holy Family of Nazareth, stands the figure of Saint Joseph. Through his work and generous presence, he cared for and defended Mary and Jesus, delivering them from the violence of the unjust by bringing them to Egypt. The Gospel presents Joseph as a just man, hard-working and strong. But he also shows great tenderness, which is not a mark of the weak but of those who are genuinely strong, fully aware of reality and ready to love and serve in humility. That is why he was proclaimed custodian of the universal Church. He too can teach us how to show care; he can inspire us to work with generosity and tenderness in protecting this world which God has entrusted to us.

IX. BEYOND THE SUN

243. At the end, we will find ourselves face to face with the infinite beauty of God (cf. 1 Cor 13:12), and be able to read with admiration and happiness the mystery of the universe, which with us will share in unending plenitude. Even now we are journeying towards the sabbath of eternity, the new Jerusalem, towards our common home in heaven. Jesus says: “I make all things new” (Rev 21:5). Eternal life will be a shared experience of awe, in which each creature, resplendently transfigured, will take its rightful place and have something to give those poor men and women who will have been liberated once and for all.

244. In the meantime, we come together to take charge of this home which has been entrusted to us, knowing that all the good which exists here will be taken up into the heavenly feast. In union with all creatures, we journey through this land seeking God, for “if the world has a beginning and if it has been created, we must enquire who gave it this beginning, and who was its Creator”.[172] Let us sing as we go. May our struggles and our concern for this planet never take away the joy of our hope.

245. God, who calls us to generous commitment and to give him our all, offers us the light and the strength needed to continue on our way. In the heart of this world, the Lord of life, who loves us so much, is always present. He does not abandon us, he does not leave us alone, for he has united himself definitively to our earth, and his love constantly impels us to find new ways forward. Praise be to him!

_____________________________________________

[169] JOHN PAUL II, Catechesis (2 August 2000), 4: Insegnamenti 23/2 (2000), 112. [170] Quaest. Disp. de Myst. Trinitatis, 1, 2 concl [171] Cf. THOMAS AQUINAS, Summa Theologiae, I, q. 11, art. 3; q. 21, art. 1, ad 3; q. 47, art. 3. [172] BASIL THE GREAT, Hom. in Hexaemeron, I, 2, 6: PG 29, 8

Liturgical Ministries April 16-17, 2016 Fourth Sunday of Easter

Servers Lectors EMOC

4:00 pm A.J. Kondracki Ann Bergold John Bergold

5:30 pm Michael Boris Diane Gregor Mimi Tosh

8:00 am Nicholas Kreidler Christian Krupsha John Benz

11:00 am James Rushton Sandy Snyder Elaine Snyder

Third Week of Easter April 11-17,2016 Day and Date Time Intention Offered by Events of the Week

Monday, April 11 St. Stanislaus of Krakow

No Morning Mass Scheduled

Tuesday, April 12 EASTER WEEKDAY

8:00 am John Kuczma Mr. & Mrs. John Connell 5:30 p.m. Choir Rehearsal

Wednesday, April 13 Pope St. Martin I

8:00 am Thomas Tomko Carol Zukowski

Thursday, April 14 EASTER WEEKDAY 8:00 am Rosalyn Fazzi Mr. & Mrs. Michael Murphy

10 am Administrative Staff

Noon—5 pm Eucharistic Adoration

5 pm Vespers

6 p.m. Social Justice Council

Friday, April 15 EASTER WEEKDAY

8:00 am Theresa Barber John & Debbie Balut

Saturday, April 16 EASTER WEEKDAY No Morning Mass Scheduled

3 pm Confessions

Fourth Sunday of Easter

Vigil 1 Saturday

4 pm Parishioners Pastor

8 am Mass

9:30—11 am Religious Ed

11 am Mass

Noon RCIA

Vigil 2 Saturday

5:30 pm

Agnes & James McCabe James Jr. & Claire

Mary Therese McCabe

Sunday Sunday

8 am Laurie Merritt

Tony & Lorraine Shurmanek

Sunday Sunday

11 am Craig Cummings

Fr. Ken & the Parish of St. Andre Bessette

AGNUS DAY by Pastor James Weitzstein

is our

Song! We are an

Easter People