Pentecost XIII
Click the photo above for a slide show from our Summer boys’ camp.
Bishop’s Corner
I wish again to thank everyone for our perfectly splendid Summertime feast of the Assumption of Our Lady in our beautifully decorated church. How well you sang the Mass, and how devout were our little flower- bearing angels for the moving procession. Afterward, we all enjoyed refreshments and a little socializing. Seems this is an excellent year for tomatoes, too! We blessed quite a few of them, and have been blessed with many given to us.
We must, in first place, thank Our Lady who does indeed arrange everything so that we may celebrate her feasts fittingly. Soon it will be time for her birthday, and Holy Name and Seven Sorrows.
I must say, too, how touched I was to see so many of you at Tom Kamphaus’ funeral, a fitting tribute for a fine Catholic and friend, whom we will miss. I wondered who would be left for evening Mass and the Rosary Procession. I need not have worried! Some of you attended both, or helped in the afternoon and waited for the Mass and Procession. God reward you!
It was good to see some of our St. Clare parishioners at our Assumption Mass. This has been a difficult Summer for the loyal handful that was left, but we are working out a way to continue Holy Mass for them, and appreciate so much their understanding and enthusiasm.
Over the past five centuries, the Conquistadora statue has taken different appearance, following the fashion of the age. She was cut and reconfigured at a certain point so she could be dressed, and hold the Infant Jesus. Usually she appeared as a sorrowful Spanish Queen in regal robes, but at times she was dressed as simply as a ranch wife, they say. Under the Novus Ordo she is attired very plainly, and shows her age somewhat, as any lady would after five hundred years. Her face has lost much of its original beauty with time and retouchings poorly done, but the statue itself has lost none of its marvelous mystique, Mary in the midst of her people.
She now stands on a gilt pedestal, hand hewn in a workshop in the nearby atomic city of Los Alamos, not long after the terrible bombardment of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the two most Catholic cities of Japan. This pedestal is said to represent a continual prayer “that Mary may hold vanquished underfoot whatever there may be of evil in atomic power.” (Fray Chavez)
I thank Fr. McGuire who is offering all of the Masses today, and hope you don’t tire him out! He always tells me how much he enjoys a busy Sunday like this, and we are grateful for his enthusiasm and priestly zeal.
Enjoy the last full week of August. I hope you’re all on Summer vacation schedule still, as we are at Church. Time enough to start school in September!
With a blessing in Mary’s Immaculate Heart,
–Bishop Dolan