"The Envelope, Please!"

Sunday ‘Envelope Talk’ by Fr Al

February 15 and 16th, 2014

 

“The envelope, please!” We all know that expression: “the envelope, please.” But no, Fr. Al is not here to talk to you about the Academy Awards or anyone named Oscar! I want to thank you for your stewardship in support of our parish. You gave us a marvelous Christmas season. You were very generous and we are very grateful and very encouraged. So, yes, I am here to talk about envelopes. These envelopes!

The Finance Council and the Parish Pastoral Council have asked me to come before you this weekend to tell you that, upon their counsel, we are moving to an envelope system for weekly offertory collections. Beginning the weekend of March 1 & 2, all registered parishioners, and even those who are not registered but are making a consistent weekly gifts to our parish, will be receiving a packet of collection envelopes.

We have come to the conclusion that the introduction of collection envelopes will help enhance parishioners’ experience of making gifts to our parish. Some of the benefits of this decision include: a nice friendly reminder, the recording of cash donations for year-end tax recognition and the inclusion of envelopes for special collections such as BUILD and many more.

Not only will this enhance the experience of gifting to our parish, but it will also be very helpful to our staff as we move to an online database to record gifts to the parish. Moving to an online database comes from another effort to serve our parish community better. In moving to an online database, we will be able to record more efficiently your generous weekly gifts and provide more accurate year-end tax letters.

The collection envelopes will be mailed to you in packets containing two months of envelopes, including special collection and Holy Day envelopes. They may begin arriving this coming week. Should you forget to bring your envelope to Mass, we will have extra envelopes in the narthex. Simply fill out the information on the envelope if you want your gift to be recorded for tax purposes.

And, yes, we will continue out EFT giving online. We are in the process of creating chips that read “I give by EFT.” You will pick one up in the narthex and drop in the collection basket as it passes by your row.

Students, this includes you, too! I have spoken with many of you, asking you to give $20.00 per month or $5.00 per week. Take a blank envelope when you arrive for Mass, insert your donation and include your name on the envelope.

I want to thank you once again for your tremendous support of our parish Newman Center. Together we support Christ’s Church and share our lives for God’s Greater Glory. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, once again!

Reverend Albert J. DeGiacomo, Pastor

Holy Spirit Parish Newman Center

15 February 2014

Homily: 2.9.14. Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time. "Salt and Light"

Is 58:7-10:3; Cor 2:1-5; Mt 5: 13-16

Salt and Light. Salt preserves and purifies. Light leads us forward. The message today is a simple one: Our good works preserve us in goodness. They lead to good for others.

Our baptismal light sheds light on others. Jesus says, "Let your light shine before others." It is thrown out in front of us. The focus is not on us (Margaret Ralph, Breaking Open the Lectionary: Cycle A, 59). Our good deeds throw Christ’s light on situations. This week we hear Christ announce the corporal works of mercy, good deeds: caring for the hungry, the naked, the homeless in the first reading. Today we also call these acts of justice. These acts reveal a loving God and they help others to believe in a loving God. We can do these acts out of duty, obligation, guilt and even for income tax deductions! (It’s okay to have mixed motivations. God can work all these together for the good,” as St. Paul tells us.) 

In the second reading St. Paul says, “I came to you in weakness.” Like Paul, our weakness can bear light. That is, it can lead us to identify with the weakness of others: the hungry, homeless, naked as the first reading tells. We have all known weakness and suffering. Our suffering can lead us to identify with those who suffer.  That’s how the salt comes in. It can purify us; that is, cleanse us from sin. Isaiah tells us today “Your wound will be healed and your light will shine.”

When I was a boy, I was prone to getting skin rashes when I played with the neighborhood kids in the woods near my house.  Because we lived near the ocean, my father would take us to the beach on Sunday.  He believed that the salt water was a cure-all; that it would clear up my skin rash.  It often did.  Our good deeds clear up our souls.  Through the grace of Christ working in us, our good deeds are like salt, cleansing us of sin, of all this is petty in us. Our wound is healed. The salt preserves us in virtue as it purifies us.  Our acts of justice purify us; we hear this in both the Hebrew and the Christian scriptures.  They grant us time off purgatory.  I think of this often when I am making a hospital call—especially the ones in the middle of the night. I am making up for my sins! These good deeds, in other words, “merit us salvation,” as the Eucharistic Prayers states.

Our good deeds bring light to others and they give glory to God. Men and women can believe in a loving God. This weekend in the bulletin you will find again information on BUILD.  It is one way to let your light shine. Go, throw your light!

Homily, 2.2.14. Feast of the Presentation. "We Present Ourselves."

Homily, Feast of the Presentation

Mal 3:1-4; Heb 2:14-18; Luke 2:22-40

La Presentación. The Presentation. Our Latino sisters and brothers understand this so well. In addition to the Rite of Baptism, they also have something called La Presentación, the Presentation. The child is presented to God in much the way we see in the Gospel today, the way Mary and Joseph presented Jesus. It is an act of dedication or consecration. It begins in infancy and grows through life. Notice that we hear Jesus grew in wisdom, age and grace. Just like us!

Scripture scholar Richard Sklba makes the point about growing in our consecration to God as we cooperate. “Although the action of Christ may be once and for all, the effect of that reality in our lives is not; it continues to deepen or diminish. Being ‘consecrated,’ like being ‘perfected,’ is a lifetime process (Richard J. Sklba. Fire Starters. Liturgical Press. Collegeville, MN: 2013. p 44).

How do we continue to grow in our dedication or consecration to God? Vatican II teaches that the call to holiness is universal. It is also perennial. Hopefully with each passing year, we grow in holiness; that is, we grow to be conformed more closely to his image. It depends on what we do with our freedom.

As I said last week, we are an intentional formation community as a university parish, Newman Center. Everything we do is designed to foster the growth of our students, and our own as well, as we support and nurture them. It is never easy, and sometimes it is difficult. This is how we grow. It wasn’t easy for Mary and Joseph either.

This is a great feast for parents. It illustrates what parents go through and we can look ahead to see what Mary and Joseph will suffer as they raise this child. We don’t hear much about Jesus again until he’s twelve when he is not presented in the temple, but rather, he presents himself in the temple, teaching the teachers. As much as Mary and Joseph suffered on that occasion, looking for a lost child, they also prepared him for this moment in his destiny. This is what all good parents do, forming their children to meet their futures. Then you trust your children to God just as Mary and Joseph did. We trust that God will be there, present and active.

As Mary and Joseph, Anna and Simeon waited for the coming of this child, so we, too, wait for the Holy Spirit to assist us in our own growth in dedication to God and God’s work.

Lent is coming soon. We can plan now for the works and activities that will assist us in growing in our dedication to God as we present our lives to him in service and in praise.

In the end Mary presented here son yet again – at the foot of the Cross. The human formation that he had received form Mary and Joseph had prepared him to present his life to God the Father: “Father, into your hand I commend my Spirit. In the end we all present our lives to God. If we have cooperated with God’s grace, as Alice Camille has noted, Mary will be there to assist us just as she did her Son.