stceceliastgabriel

Receiving the Body of Christ

Last weekend we celebrated First Holy Communions for 44 young members of our parish. First Communions are always one of the best days of the year. As the priest celebrant, I had the special privilege of seeing them approach the sanctuary with deep reverence, and receive the Most Blessed Sacrament with obvious faith. It wasContinue reading “Receiving the Body of Christ”

Month of Mary

May is the month of Mary. In May 2020, when the world was still suffering in the early stages of the pandemic, Pope Francis shared with the faithful his own devotion to the Blessed Mother and encouraged us to pray the rosary each day. “Contemplating the face of Christ with the heart of Mary our Mother will make us evenContinue reading “Month of Mary”

4th Sunday of Easter

Please click the following link to watch our parish’s Mass for the 4th Sunday of Easter on our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/ju-GjOlFbQ4 posted 4/25/21

Hearing the Call of the Shepherd

In this Sunday’s gospel, Our Lord refers to Himself as the Good Shepherd, thus inviting us to consider the mystery of vocation. The Second Vatican Council reminds us that there is a universal vocation to holiness, which means that every single person is called to be a saint. For the sake of helping people respond to the universal vocation, we believe the Lord gives aContinue reading “Hearing the Call of the Shepherd”

The Spirit Moves Us

It was my first year in seminary and I was out with my family at a restaurant in Fairfield when we ran into some old friends of ours who had lived in our neighborhood when we were growing up. Jim, the father, was interested in what I was doing and so we talked about how my experience at St. JohnContinue reading “The Spirit Moves Us”

3rd Sunday of Easter

Please click the following link to view the parish Mass for the 3rd Sunday of Easter on our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/zWQVkgv91jI posted 4/18/21

Learning the Narrative

You hear sometimes people in politics and public relations talking about “controlling the narrative.” Usually, this means trying to get a jump on a story by being the first to explain what is going on. The hope is that a “narrative” friendly to one’s position will be established in the mind of the public so that adversaries will be at a disadvantage,Continue reading “Learning the Narrative”

Emmaus

We have come to the end of Easter Sunday. Yes, the Solemnity of Easter was a week ago, but we must remember that Easter is such a big deal that the Church gives us eight days to celebrate it properly. We call that eight-day period the “Easter Octave.” The second Sunday of Easter – Divine Mercy Sunday – is the final day inContinue reading “Emmaus”

Easter

Msgr. Luigi Giussani (1922-2005) was an Italian priest and professor of theology, who spent many years teaching in Milan but who is best known as the founder of the Communion and Liberation movement. When he died in 2005, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict XVI) preached his funeral Mass, saying: “[Msgr. Giussani] understood that Christianity is not an intellectualContinue reading “Easter”

Hosanna

It is part of the human experience that when we do something enough times it becomes second nature to us. When it’s a good pattern of behavior, we call it virtue. It’s it bad, we call it vice. Even things that seem complicated and difficult at first can become, over time, so much a part of us thatContinue reading “Hosanna”