Letter From Pastor 12-13-2015

This past week on the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (December 8th), Pope Francis inaugurated a Jubilee Year of Mercy.  We are called to cultivate the virtue of mercy in our lives, our families, our parishes and in our world. What does it mean to celebrate a “jubilee” year?

In biblical times, jubilees were years (usually every 50 years) when mercy would reign supreme:  slaves were emancipated; alienated lands were returned to their owners; debts were forgiven.  Can you even imagine those kinds of things happening in today’s world?  Even among Christians this seems extraor- dinary.  And yet this is the kind of mercy that has been shown to us through Jesus Christ our Lord! Saint Paul tells us:  "God demonstrates his love for us in this way:  While we’re still sinners, Christ died for us!”  

All that Christ did for us is undeserved.  We didn’t do anything to earn God’s love! Rather, God freely loves us and is always, at all times, in all situations, offering us his mercy. It is a pure gift! What is our response to this kind of mercy?  Two things: gratitude and the resolve to be more merciful in our own lives. This Jubilee year, feast in God’s unending mercy. Accept it with gratitude and then bring it into this broken world of ours!

Father Al