Bishop’s Note
This week has gone by quickly, hasn’t it?! Fr. McKenna no sooner returned from his long trip to the northern missions than he turned around and left for Boston for his maternal grandmother’s funeral. He is back today, holding down the fort with Fr. Lehtoranta while the rest of us are off gallivanting, so to speak. Fr. Brueggemann is in Milwaukee today and then Illinois tomorrow. I am in Dallas with Fr. Simpson, who has been most helpful in getting things ready for Confirmations this weekend in Dallas, Austin, and El Paso. Father is offering one of the two Masses in Dallas, then serving as chaplain for the second, assisting with the Confirmation ceremony—all before catching a flight back to SGG. I hope he gets some rest when he gets back. He sure has earned it.
Our Lady of Snows, the Transfiguration, Fourteen Holy Helpers, the Curè d’Ars, and St. Lawrence, all in one week! Fr. Lehtoranta reminded me that the feast of the Transfiguration is the original feast of the Holy Face until Pope Pius XII had a Mass written for the present feast of the Holy Face, which falls on the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday. The Holy Face is the devotion for making reparation for blasphemies. In fact, that is one of the very purposes mentioned in the prayers. This is one reason why it is so sad to see some spend their time trying to condemn the devotion to the Holy Face. We here at SGG love this devotion and will continue to propagate it as it should be. We still have much reparation to make for the hellish blasphemy against Our Lord at the Last Supper which was committed just last week before the Olympic games. The High Mass on the feast of the Transfiguration is a perfect way to do so!
The Sisters go on a three-day retreat beginning this Wednesday. Do remember them in your prayers during that time.
Don’t forget that August is the month of the Immaculate Heart. Go to her for everything. As she said in Guadalupe: “Am I not here, your Mother?”
In Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart,
Bishop McGuire