Pentecost VI


YAG 2017! Thanks to everyone who worked hard to make this event a great success.


The blessing of the bonfire on the Vigil of St. John
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Daily Sermons
July 7 – Fr. McKenna – YAG I: Sacred Heart and True Love and Courtship
July 8 – Fr. McKenna – YAG II: St. Elizabeth of Portugal, the Faithful Wife
July 9 – Fr. McKenna – YAG III: Solemnity of the Precious Blood and Sacrifice in Marriage
July 12 – Fr. Lehtoranta – Girls’ Camp I: Jacinta and the 1st Secret of Fatima
July 13 – Fr. Lehtoranta – Girls’ Camp II: Francisco Marto and the Second Secret of Fatima
July 14 – Fr. Lehtoranta – Girls’ Camp III: Lucia and the Third Secret of Fatima
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zelusdomustuae
✠ The Bishop’s Corner ✠
This past week has been wet and hot and busy. But since the Master Himself has imposed these work conditions we do our best still to heed the admonition: “Come, labor on.” Not only Our Lord’s words but the abundant harvest of souls invites us. “The charity of Christ urges us.”

I’ve heard good echoes, as the French say, of a very successful Young Adult Get-Together. Friendships were made, the Faith was firmed up and a nice working unity of traditional Catholics from a number of different chapels and groups was demonstrated. Or, as Fr. Cekada phrased it: “There was a good buzz and group spirit.” Attaboys all around!

We could say the same of our Girls Camp, with its average of 27 each day. This apostolate drew young ladies from several states and even Canada, and the good Sisters from Florida. In addition to our same Catholic Faith and Mass, bowling provided a fine common denominator for both the YAG and the Girls Camp. It is a favored form of Trad recreation, and a lot safer than the girls’ canoeing, which was rained out this year. And, if the ladies can manage to avoid slacks, it’s also pretty modest as activities go. Oh, how I wish these apostolates of ours at St. Gertrude would contribute to a pants free generation. It would be nice to right some little part of this world of ours at least in this, and that in this Fatima year.

I had a good trip to Quebec, Canada. Although I had no time for shrine visiting (alas) it is indeed the land of Our Lady and the Saints. It was curious to be speaking French again, and sometimes difficult to understand the Old French they speak there. Their small group is composed of big young families, everyone dressed in their Sunday best, who patiently, eagerly assisted at a very long Mass and Confirmation on a very warm morning. Holy Mass was offered in a room overlooking the beautiful St. Lawrence river. Afterwards, we had a casual lunch together, and a long discussion period. I had a fairly gruesome trip back through Newark, but this is what our priests face so often when they travel.

Fr. Cekada has resumed his annual birthday visit to his native Milwaukee, and is offering Mass today for the faithful of St. Hugh. Fr. McKenna’s North Dakota travels will take him to Powers Lake, a name which will ring a bell for the old timers. Fr. Nelson, of Mary Faithful fame, made of it a great shrine (Our Lady of the Prairies) and a true Catholic center in the 1970’s, before his untimely death. I pray Fr. McKenna’s Masses there may continue, and contribute to the revival of this historical shrine.

This past week we lost a dear soul, Beckie Mattingly, whose Requiem was yesterday. Beckie moved here in her old age, for the Mass. She proved herself a most devout and determined soul in her love for the Faith, as well as in her loyalty and appreciation for St. Gertrude the Great. Pray for her soul. She is buried in Louisville tomorrow.

Thursday’s frequent lightning and thunderstorms dictated a prudent cancellation of the Fatima Rosary procession. But many of you came to pray the 15 decades with us in the hot church after Mass. So, Our Lady’s request for prayers and penance was heeded, as we prayed before the tabernacle and gained the indulgences.

The altar air conditioner has been out for a month now. By the afternoon the church grows very hot. Virgil (no, not the author) promises to repair it from time to time, but he knows the importance of penance, God love him, and has only our sanctification at heart.

I remember the hot July afternoon, long ago, when we first installed air conditioning in our old church in Sharonville. I had returned from the Boys Camp, then conducted at Schappachers’ dairy farm. What a difference it made! How did we survive without it?

The cats are both eating and sleeping more in the heat, and regular in their offerings. Puccini believes in tithing when it comes to small rodents. Caravaggio eyed warily a young doe the other day at dawn, and it eyed me, quite calm and unafraid, mildly curious. A mourning dove crashed into my bedroom door light, and lay dazed on the deck for awhile. Its mate sympathetically surveyed the scene and waited for recovery. They both then flew off, but silently and without their mourning cry. Who needs a zoo when you have St. Gertrude?

Oh, Fr. Larrabee said to say hello, and that he misses us. Thank you this week especially to our young people who have stepped forward to assume so many roles, and proved themselves young adults.

God bless you all, adults and children, and grant surcease of pain to our sick, and rest to our dead.

– Bishop Dolan