Pentecost XXV
Bishop’s Corner
I am writing this on Martinmas, the great feast of St. Martin, the original autumn harvest festival or Thanksgiving Day, and our Veterans’ Day, 11/11. It is, sure enough, St. Martin’s summer this week. We call it “Indian summer,” these warm sunny days after a freeze. I’ve just learned that this weather was named “Indian summer” as meaning false or not true; lying. Politically incorrect! So, if anyone uses that term with you, explain how denigrating it is to the Native Americans, and suggest they substitute “St. Martin’s summer” instead. We call it that because all of the trees and flowers, already wasted with winter, returned to life and blossomed as St. Martin’s funeral procession passed by.
Our Rosary processions last Sunday were very well attended, the young Fathers tell me. Doubtless many souls were relieved and released as you passed by and prayed. Meanwhile, my adult Baptism in Albuquerque went well, despite the attempts of Novus Ordo and ex-Pius X Motu priests to stop it. God and St. Gertrude are a formidable foe.
Fr. Cekada reports a good seminary week. In addition to his classes, he’s been preparing the servers and the ceremony for our next Ordination December 15th. Pray for our future Fr. Fleiss, as well as all of our seminarians and priests, including those who have fallen away, and cause the most grief. How dear they are to Our Lord!
What better time for prayer than the Forty Hours Prayer? I don’t ask for all forty of you, but surely an extra hour or so, and a procession or two would be possible? Thirty years now we’ve been “under roof,” and Our Lord with us, unworthy though we be. So much to be thankful for this season of Thanksgiving! Let the Holy Eucharist (which means thanksgiving) be yours.
But the big news this weekend has to be the fresh coat of paint you see in church today. Seven years ago I chose in haste the wrong shade–a chilly greenish blue–for a church with so much orange and salmon and brown. The light, bright golden shade should match the floor better and brighten up our beautiful church in time for our anniversary.
Plan to be with us. The two special evening ceremonies conclude with a little meal, so you won’t be going home hungry. But you wouldn’t anyway, as Our Lord will be Himself your food, your friend, your all.
A Blessed Forty Hours to you!
–Bishop Dolan