Tag: Christianity

At the Easter Vigil last month in the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, 66-year-old Michael Cardona was received into the Catholic Church after a spiritual journey that included two Protestant baptisms and 30 years as a Hindu guru.

“I was lost,” said Cardona, who identifies with the prodigal son. He had significant health problems and sensed the Holy Spirit urging him not to delay.

“I had to make sure that I at least got the Eucharist one time before I die,” he said.

He joined a surge of adults who entered the Church nationwide this Easter. Baptisms of adults, older children, and teens hit an all-time high in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles with 2,075 — an increase of 38% over the 2016 record. Cardona was among 1,521 candidates received after baptism in other Christian traditions, bringing the total to 3,696.

National numbers are unavailable, but many individual dioceses reported dramatic increases. The Archdiocese of Baltimore rose more than a third to 663. The 2,364 converts in the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston marked the first total above 2,000 since 2019. Increases were not confined to large, urban archdioceses. The Diocese of Yakima in the high desert of central Washington reported the most converts in its 73-year history, with 460.

Social scientists attribute the increase to pent-up demand after COVID-19.  

Mark Gray crunches sacramental statistics as the senior research associate at the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA). Pointing to indications that Sunday Mass attendance is back to pre-COVID levels, he believes increased conversions reflect that rebound.

During COVID, “a lot of parishes were unable to have Mass and to celebrate the sacraments. There are people who would have entered the Church at that time, but couldn’t,” he said.

Engagement to a Catholic is the most common reason people enter RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults), he said.

“So not only did you probably have a delay in those marriages, but it also delayed people being able to go through RCIA.”

Marilyn Santos, associate director of the Secretariat of Evangelization and Catechesis at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, believes that post-COVID catch-up is just one part of the story.

She hears increasing reports of whole families participating in the RCIA (which the U.S. bishops now refer to with a slightly changed translation: the OCIA, or “Order of Christian Initiation of Adults.” While most converts enter the Church at the Easter Vigil, this new structure acknowledges that converts could be baptized or welcomed into the Church at any point in the year, even taking multiple years before making the final decision. Practically speaking, parishes will be adjusting to this new term over the next few years, phasing out the term RCIA and switching over to the use of the term OCIA.)

Perhaps, she said, part of COVID’s impact was to show the value of family, faith, and community. She also wonders if the explosion of devotion to Blessed Carlo Acutis during the National Eucharistic Revival has played a part, since he led his own parents into the Church.

“We have heard some incredible stories during the National Eucharistic Revival of people who have experienced total conversion because of the revival,” she said.

Regardless of why non-Catholics are attracted to the Church, “kindness and hospitality mean a lot,” she said. “If you do something as simple as being welcoming, the rest will come.”

Just before COVID struck, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles had committed to upgrading its adult initiation process with better training for parish leaders. Leticia Perez, now archdiocesan coordinator for Christian initiation, began full-time assistance to parish initiation ministries after years of juggling it with other duties.

During COVID, it was impossible to do RCIA online because it required liturgical gatherings. However, the sudden shift to virtual meetings allowed the archdiocese to immediately involve RCIA leaders from every parish in its extensive new training. Participants emerged from COVID far more prepared to lead the initiation of adults, Perez said.

She believes that’s a key to the record baptisms and receptions in the LA Archdiocese.

Unlike when she was a parish RCIA leader years ago, “we have a lot of resources. They can call me and ask questions. If I don’t know the answer, I can find out.”

A new trend she has recently become aware of is for some parents to delay their children’s baptism for years, so they receive all three sacraments through RCIA at age 7 or 8.

She suspects that some parents think it will be too difficult to prepare adolescents for confirmation.

“I think parents (are concerned) that they cannot control teenagers to bring them to the Church,” Perez said. “That is one of the realities. Another is work, another is convenience. Or you can have a situation of divorce, where the child isn’t baptized, or they were raised in another denomination. So, there are many different reasons.”

Regardless of why more people became Catholic this year, it’s a sign that God is at work, said Santos at the U.S. bishops’ conference.

“The message is that, in spite of the hard times — that are sometimes by our own fault — God is bigger,” she said. 

    

Christ is Risen! Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him (1 Cor. 2:9). We either believe in this, confess this, have experienced this in our lives and try not to forget it, or we return again and again like a dog to our own vomit (cf. Prov. 26:11), to lack of faith, doubt, despondency, despair, fear, and faintheartedness.

Everyone has or will have to pay what’s owed to human weakness, but not forever. The Lord is waiting for us to get stronger in our trust in Him, so that His words, “fear not”, which He so often pronounced in Holy Scripture, would finally produce some fruit. The more we enter into the meaning of this Feast of Feasts and Triumph of Triumphs, the more often and attentively we reread Holy Scripture, the more our faith in the Risen Lord will produce beautiful and saving fruit in our souls.

May the Lord grant that the time of Great Lent, filled with both repentant joy and temptations, and that the time of Bright Pascha and the first week of Pascha, would bring us precisely to this faith, to this hope, that there is no other meaning for us in life than living in order to come to know our Lord Jesus Christ and confirm our faith in Him. We and those we love can only find true life here and eternal life in this.

For those who are still not at home in the Church, I would like to wish that they would feel and see for themselves how beautiful, good, and wondrously bright life is in Christ’s Church; how much goodness there is prepared in it for every person.

St. Peter of Tarentaise was born in 1102 near Vienne, France. When he was 20, he entered the Cistercian Order, convincing his family to join him. Two brothers and his father entered the religious community of Bonnevaux with him, and his sister became a religious.

Ten years after his entry, Peter was sent to found a new house in Switzerland, in the Tarentaise mountains. He also opened a hospital, which served as a guest house for travelers through the mountains.

In 1142, Peter was appointed as Archbishop of Tarentaise. Although he was happiest living the simple life of a monk, he accepted at the urging of St. Bernard and other monks in his order. As bishop, Peter reformed the diocese and began programs to provide education and food to the poor. His tradition of donating food, called “May Bread,” lasted until the French Revolution in 1789.

Peter performed many miraculous healings as bishop, but after 13 years, he fled his diocese disguised as a lay brother and went to a Cistercian abbey in Switzerland. He hid there for about a year, until he was discovered and his superiors forced him to return to Tarentaise.

When the anti-pope Victor and the true Pope Alexander III were at strife, Peter was one of the only major Church voices to support Alexander’s claim, even going against the emperor Frederick Barbarossa. Pope Alexander III recognized Peter’s loyalty and holiness and sent him to reconcile King Louis VII of France and Henry II of England. Shortly after an unsuccessful reconciliation attempt, St. Peter died of an illness in 1175. He was canonized in 1191.

As many as 1,000 people participated in prayer vigils and rallies in four Iowa cities May 1 in support of human dignity and to call for the repeal of a new state law on illegal migration that opponents say is punitive.

On that same day, the feast of St. Joseph the Worker, Iowa’s bishops issued a statement opposing the law and calling for a fair, compassionate resolution to challenges with migration.

The law, which takes effect July 1, is similar to a Texas law passed last year but is on hold pending court appeals.

In Iowa, Catholic parishes and the Iowa City Catholic Worker houses anchored the rallies and vigils in three of the four cities — Davenport, Iowa City and Waterloo. Organizers held the events simultaneously to oppose enactment of SF 2340, according to Quad Cities Interfaith, one of the organizing groups. Banners that proclaimed “For Human Dignity” and “Por La Dignidad Humana” in Spanish provided a visual link at each site.

Outside historic St. Anthony Catholic Church in downtown Davenport, adults and children of all ages spilled out from the front lawn to the sidewalks. Many held placards bearing hand-printed messages: “Does Iowa care????,” “No Human Being Is Illegal,” “Immigrants make the U.S. STRONGER!,” “Today We March Tomorrow We Vote” and “No SF2340.”

Senate File 2340, which Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, Republican, signed into law April 10, “makes it an aggravated misdemeanor for a person previously denied admission or deported from the U.S. to be in Iowa,” the Iowa Catholic Conference said. “The bill does not allow police to make arrests on school property, church grounds or hospitals.” It requires a judge, after a finding of probable cause for arrest, to order the person released and to leave the country.

Iowa’s bishops and the Diocese of Davenport’s diocesan administrator oppose measures such as SF 2340 “because they place a disproportionate emphasis on punitive sanctions, undermine family unity, reduce humanitarian protections, and provide no viable solutions for long-time residents without legal status. Nor can the State of Iowa simply ‘remove’ people to another sovereign nation without that country’s permission,” the Catholic leaders said in their statement.

They asked federal lawmakers to “resist easy answers and do their job,” calling for border protection policies consistent with humanitarian values, which treat all individuals with respect, and that allow authorities to identify and prevent entry of terrorists and dangerous criminals. “As we remember our history as immigrants in Iowa, let us work together towards a fair and compassionate resolution of our challenges with migration,” they said.

St. Anthony Church was “built by immigrant labor in 1837 to serve immigrants to Iowa,” Father Rudolph Juarez, the parish’s pastor said, alternating between English and Spanish in his talk. “The immigrants of 2024 share the same human dignity and deserve the same respect as the immigrants to Iowa in 1837 regardless of legal status.”

He described SF 2340 as “disproportionately punitive in nature” and said it “does not provide any viable solutions for residents without legal status. The deputizing of state and local officials to prosecute individuals for state immigration crimes comes without funding for sufficient training of public officials and runs the risk of racial profiling and legal challenges.” The interfaith speakers who followed him echoed his criticisms of the law.

“We stand together today with the immigrant community to call for meaningful immigration reform that identifies and prevents entry of terrorists and dangerous criminals but which protects human rights and dignity of all persons involved,” Father Juarez said. “As voters and concerned citizens, we pledge to work for the common good with all people of good will to reform our laws, protect the most vulnerable among us, welcome the stranger and live in peace with all people.”

Guitarists and singers led the gathering in songs interspersed in English and in Spanish between the talks.

Daniel Salazar, state director of the League of United Latin American Citizens, or LULAC, identified the vigil’s three-fold purpose. The first point: to “send a clear message to elected officials and voters across Iowa that the Latino community, the immigrant community, and all its allies are present and paying attention.” Second, “to affirm our commitment to collaboration with law enforcement and legislators to make fair, equal and equitable laws” regarding immigration legislation. Third, to call for repeal of Senate File 2340.

Salazar read a letter from Davenport Police Chief Jeffrey Bladel addressed to LULAC that underscored the police department’s commitment to ensuring public safety for “all residents, regardless of immigration status.” Bladel said the state has provided no guidance or direction regarding the law’s implementation. He said the police department remains steadfast in upholding “policies that promote fairness and impartiality in our law enforcement practices.”

Laney Gonzalez, a senior at St. Ambrose University in Davenport, said, “we will continue to demand what we have been asking of them for decades: comprehensive immigration reform. Without it, our homes and towns will become unwelcoming places for our neighbors, our friends, and our families.”

Iowa City Mayor Bruce Teague participated in the Iowa City rally, which began outside the second of two Iowa City Catholic Worker houses. In a proclamation that he read to an estimated gathering of 250 people, he said Iowa City recognizes “the rich diversity of its residents, including immigrants from around the world who have chosen to call Iowa City home.”

Immigrants “have played an integral role in shaping the cultural, economic, and social fabric of Iowa City,” Teague said, and play “an essential role in filling workforce gaps, driving innovation and sustaining economic growth in communities across our state.”

In Waterloo, a demonstration and march to protest SF 2340 began in the parking lot of Queen of Peace Catholic Church. The pastor, Father Nils Jesús Hernández, said the event aimed to raise awareness about the adverse impact the new law would have on the immigrant community and to assure immigrants they are welcome and appreciated in Iowa, according to a news release.

Father Hernández, who was born in Nicaragua, urged the Waterloo City Council April 15 to make a statement of support “so we immigrant citizens can trust our civil leaders again.”

Events held in Des Moines outside the state Capitol in a steady rain drew immigrants and others who believe the new law targets the Latino community, KCCI News 8 reported. The report included a clip from Reynolds. She said she had a responsibility to protect the health and safety of the state’s citizens. In a news clip from The Gazette, she said, “Let’s work with Congress; let’s get an immigration bill passed.”

In just a few weeks, I will ordain three men to the priesthood for the Diocese of Winona-Rochester. Ordaining priests is the greatest privilege that I have as a bishop. Period. When, at the high point of the ceremony, I place my hands on the heads of the deacons and call forth the Holy Spirit upon them, I will be standing in the tradition of the Apostles, who similarly laid hands on those to whom they imparted authority. I can testify that nothing in my life has ever made me feel more humble and more grateful.

There are three great promises that a man makes when he accepts diaconal and then priestly ordination, and each one of them is a marvelous countersign to our culture today. First, he promises to recite faithfully the Liturgy of the Hours, that wonderful compilation of Psalms, hymns, and prayers, offered at five points throughout the day. I have been engaging in this prayer for the past thirty-eight years of my priesthood, and I can testify that, though sometimes challenging, it has been a tremendous source of spiritual strength. It involves, to put it simply, the steady and conscious consecration of time.

As so many studies have shown, younger people today in the West are rapidly secularizing themselves and disaffiliating from the institutional churches. They constitute, as Charles Taylor has argued, the first generation literally in human history that is coming of age without a keen sense of the transcendent. And as I have been insisting for years, this emptying out of the sacred has wreaked havoc in the minds, hearts, and souls of this generation, among whom the numbers measuring anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation have been spiking. Therefore, when a young man makes a solemn promise before God and his community that he will, for the rest of his life, pray the Liturgy of the Hours every day, he is standing athwart this soul-killing secularism. He is declaiming that God exists and that God matters.

The second promise that a man makes is to live celibately. I know it has been said a thousand times, but it bears repeating: Celibacy is not a denigration of sex and marriage! We ought always to avoid a dualistic or Platonizing interpretation of celibacy whereby the renunciation of marriage is construed as a sort of judgment on physicality or pleasure. So what is the right way to read celibacy? It is, first, a path of freedom. Untied to spouse and children—and all of the responsibilities attendant thereto—the celibate man can dedicate himself entirely to God and the people he serves. As I type these words, I can see my bishop’s ring, which is not simply a sign of my office but also a wedding ring, for it signals my untrammeled devotion to the people the Lord has entrusted to me. St. Paul clearly teaches: “the unmarried man is anxious about the affairs of the Lord, how to please the Lord; but the married man is anxious about worldly affairs, how to please his wife, and his interests are divided” (1 Cor. 7:32–34). Moreover, celibacy provides a witness, even now, as to the way we will love in heaven, where, as Jesus himself said, “we neither marry nor are given in marriage.” This doesn’t mean, of course, that heavenly love is less than married love here below; on the contrary, it is greater, more intense, fuller, and richer. How indispensable that, in a society practically obsessed with sex and sexual freedom, there should be, living among us, men who embody a spiritualized form of love.

The third and final promise that a man makes at his ordination is to obey his bishop. “I promise obedience to you and your successors,” he says as he places his hands, in the manner of a feudal vassal, in the hands of the ordaining prelate. I vividly remember when I did this on the day of my ordination, placing my hands in those of Joseph Cardinal Bernardin of Chicago, whom I barely knew, and vowing to do, within the limits of law and morality, whatever he or his unnamed and unknown successors would ask me to do. At that moment, I surrendered my “career”—which is to say, any itinerary or trajectory that I would set for myself. I put my life in the hands of my bishop, trusting that, through his will, the Holy Spirit would direct me. Once more, how strange this move seems today! One of the most fundamental values for people now is self-determination, and not only regarding the direction of one’s life, but the very meaning of it. I have often referred to ours as “the culture of self-invention.” We have even reached the point where the determination of one’s gender and bodily identity is entirely a matter of personal choice. Whereas the default position of most young people today is that their lives belong entirely to them, the priest, on the day of his ordination, says that his life does not belong to him at all, but rather to God and for God’s purposes.

If you’re in the neighborhood of Winona this June 8^th, I invite you to come to the beautiful basilica of St. Stanislaus Kostka and watch three young men make a joyful and very countercultural commitment.

British pro-life doctor Calum Miller also spoke at the event.

“If you lose the soul of medicine and make it a profession of killing, if you rob medicine of conscience by expelling those who listen to their conscience, everyone is in danger,” he said.

“Is that the sort of healthcare system you want looking after you when you are weak and vulnerable?” Miller added.

Anna Buday, a mother of a child who has Down Syndrome told the March for Life she had a message for any new or expecting parents who got a diagnosis of Down Syndrome.

“Don’t be afraid. There is hope. There is plenty of laughter and joy. There is learning. There is opportunity. There is kindness and capability. There is so much love!” Buday said.

Bishop Kevin Doran of Elphin and chairman of the Council for Life of the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference spoke at Mass before the March for Life.

He noted that the biology of cells was discovered less than four hundred years ago, and it is only a little more than 150 years since the discovery of DNA.

“Everything we have discovered since then has confirmed that, while pregnancy is a time of rapid growth and development, there is a radical continuity between the fertilized ovum and the child who is born at the end of nine months,” he said.

“That is not a matter of faith; it is a matter of scientific fact. Philosophers can interpret it, but they can’t change it.  A human embryo is an individual member of the human species; otherwise known as a person,” Doran continued.

He noted that Pope John Paul II, writing in Fides et Ratio, said there is no fundamental conflict between faith and science.

“We who seek to promote a renewed respect for the inherent dignity of every human person, certainly need to distinguish between science and fake news. We have no need to be afraid of science, but we do need to remember that science only goes part of the journey in understanding the human person,” he said.

Ireland passed the ‘Safe Access Zones’ Bill earlier In May, legislation Mulroy called “draconian.”

The legislation criminalizes any perceived attempt to influence one’s decision to have an abortion within a 100-metre zone of a premises where abortion could be provided, which includes areas where some churches are located.

“Nothing – no law, no public policy and no peer pressure from neighbours or colleagues can remove our right and indeed our responsibility to advocate publicly for those who are most vulnerable, especially at the beginning and at the end of life,” Mulroy said when the legislation was passed.

In his homily on Monday, Doran said no law, no public policy and no peer pressure from neighbors or colleagues “can remove our right and indeed our responsibility to advocate publicly for those who are most vulnerable, especially at the beginning and at the end of life.”

“While the Medical Council has no policy one way or the other on assisted suicide and has entirely removed the section on abortion from its code of conduct, we still stand with our doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals who refuse to be bullied into participating in ending the lives of their patients,” the bishop said.

“We do this, not just because of what science tells us, but also because we believe in the inherent God-given dignity of every human life. This is a dignity that does not depend on society or law, on wealth or nationality, on physical or mental health or ability, because before ever we are formed in the womb, God knows us intimately and loves us for all eternity,” Doran said.

On this day of our Lord’s Passion, let us also remember those Christians who have suffered and are persecuted by people who have succumbed to the forces of evil.

Photo: imghub.ru     

Christ is in our midst, my dear readers!

In these days, the world community is expressing its solidarity with the people of Rwanda in connection with the thirtieth anniversary of the genocide, in which no less than 800 thousand people died. I am sure that sooner or later, truth always beats down a path for itself.

Several decades ago, journalists and hosts on the Radio of a Thousand Hills fomented hatred and anger among some citizens of the country against others, in order to make it all end in a terrible, bloody massacre. Radio of A Thousand Hills. During those terrible events, even servants of God who preach the Gospel from the pulpit defiled their souls with terrible sins. The Catholic priest Athanase Seromba has been found guilty of the death of two thousand Tutsi refugees. They died under the rubble of the church where they were trying to hide from the killers. The priest ordered the church destroyed with a bulldozer. Neither a cassock nor a cross on the chest will guard a person from satanism. What can now be changed? Nothing. Eternal (what a terrible word!) shame and judgement to the murderers. But those who lead all of this will receive the most terrible sentence from God.   

Photo: pikabu.ru     

Evil is always evil, and goodness is always goodness. People can think up anything at all, they can slander, lie, and justify their sins, but the time will come when the Lord will show it all for what it is. The saddest thing is that then, nothing can be changed. But before, when it was happening, change was possible.

Now is a similar time. Also people who call themselves journalists, with the help of the media call white black, call for the destruction of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, slander it, and do everything possible to arouse hatred and anger to the very same Ukrainian citizens whose children are fighting at the front, who also worry about their homeland and suffer from war.

I do not doubt that truth will eventually prevail. The murderers, slanderers, and organizers of persecutions against our Mother Church will be punished by God, finding their eternal harbor in the same place as the hosts of the Radio of A Thousand Hills.

The difference between our persecutors and those who perpetrated the genocide in Rwanda is that ours still have time to change their eternal lot. All that is needed for this is to stop serving evil and turn to truth and goodness. It’s not too late! But whether these people will listen to me, I do not know. Probably not. And I sincerely pity them.

It was a spectacle to behold: More than two dozen stunning young women, all wearing purple dresses ornamented by the same design as a Greek ionic column, that made the women appear almost to be floating on air. It took place in Olympia, Greece. It was a fitting location, as it was the ceremony in which the Olympic Torch was set alight and sent off on its journey, eventually landing in Paris for the 2024 Summer Games. 

If I did not know that before I began watching video from the ceremony, it would have been easy for me to believe that maybe I stumbled upon some dark web pagan ceremony or the latest TikTok influencers behaving like they were under the influence.

But I was watching the National Broadcast Company (NBC) official YouTube Channel. An announcer described every move the “high priestess” made. I say “high priestess” because that is exactly how the announcer referred to her, with all the seriousness of a person announcing the arrival of the King of England at Parliament. The NBC producers reinforced the announcer’s solemnity with a chyron bearing the title of “high priestess” onscreen. And, not being an expert on ancient pagan ritual, I will assume she followed the right rubrics as she invoked the blessing of the god Apollo to help with the lighting of the Olympic torch.

After a little research, I found a historical nugget that made this neo-pagan ritual all the more disconcerting. It seems the tradition of the Olympic Torch being lit in Greece on the site where the concept of Olympic games originated, and then transported via a chain of human torch bearers to the host city of the Games, was the brainchild of the organizers of another Olympics — the Berlin games of 1936. The National Socialists were also big on neopagan symbolism and big ceremonies. Of course, there were no torch relays in 1940 and 1944, as the Germans were busy with their own kind of processions back to Greece and all points north, south, east, and west.

It may not sound like it, but I like the Olympics, and will probably watch many of the events, though I think I will take a pass on the odes to Odin or whatever other pagan pageantry that will be on display. I will appreciate the incredible athletic achievement and maintain my conviction that there is not a scintilla of metaphysical significance to the games. The International Olympic Committee has a list of scandals as long as Bob Beaman’s long jump record and the amount of money it generates make it clear that it all has more to do with the material than the ethereal.

As superficial and theatrical as pretending to be priestesses serving imaginary eternal beings may appear, there is a darker element to this side show. The official video of this ceremony produced by a major American media conglomerate is a spiritual heads-up for us Catholics who live sometimes too much a sedentary spiritual life in our middle-class comfort, with all the alliances and peace treaties we have made with the culture at large. But there are times, and the Greek god pantomime is a good example of it, we are reminded that our faith was and continues to be the real countercultural movement. If we get too comfortable with these seemingly “little” detours from the focus of THE God of the Universe, we do so at our peril.

There is a practical reason to be wary of such spectacles where occultist leanings are celebrated. It can open doors that are supposed to remain closed and bolted. If we want to view these neopagan exercises as some kind of harmless performance art, I would caution to think again. Unbolting those doors can lead to an unwelcome visitor, and this explains why the Vatican has an international association of exorcists. 

As Scripture makes clear, the road to heaven is rife with distractions and that is why Our Lord left us a Church and a road map. Through her teachings and guidance, the Church keeps us from steering ourselves off that road and into a spiritual sinkhole. Flirting with the occult, no matter how superficially, is driving while impaired.

So, let’s all cheer on the athletes who will compete in Paris this summer. But let us all keep in mind, as we see more examples of a pagan-lite extravaganza, which I am sure the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2024 games will have in abundance, that we must keep our spiritual eyes on the Church’s own road signs. When it comes to pagan gods the sign reads: Road Closed Ahead.

    

Faithful Children of the God-protected Russian Orthodox Diocese of Sitka and Alaska, so beloved of our Risen Lord,

Christ is Risen! Truly, He is Risen!
Христос Воскресе! Во Истину Воскресе!
Kristusaaq Unguirtuq! Ilumun unguirtur!
Kristusaaq Aglagikux! Agangulakan Aglagikux!
​Xristos Kuxwoo digoot! Xegaa-kux Kuxwoo digoot!

Everyone living on Alaskan soil knows that as the seasons change there are times of abundance and times of scarcity. The Creator has always taught the people that there is a time to a fast and a time to feast. And the Holy Church reinforces that knowledge on the spiritual plane with the time of Lent and the time of Pascha. Pascha, our Lord’s Pascha, is a time to feast spiritually, a time of spiritual abundance, a time of God’s great mercy. Our Lord’s victory over sin, death, and the devil is a victory that He mercifully shares with all of us. “This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith” (1 John 5:4). Yes, our Holy Orthodox faith is victorious and what a victory it is! Saint Nicholai Velimirovich put it this way, “The victory of Christ is the only victory in which every human being, from the first to the last, can rejoice. Every other victory on earth has divided and is dividing people.” But the glorious Resurrection of our merciful Christ, it unites us in our common faith; it unites us in our common hope; it unites us in our common love. Pascha is a time of spiritual abundance, a time of God’s great mercy.

And so having received such great mercy through the Resurrection of the Holy Lord Jesus, we are now called to share that great mercy with those around us. What is that great mercy of the Lord Christ? It is His great forgiveness and the fullness of His love, “for behold forgiveness has shown forth from the grave.” This is why the Church urges us to “forgive all by the resurrection,” to forgive and be forgiven, to love and to be loved, because the Lord is Risen indeed.

And so on this Pascha, let us lay aside all bitterness, anger, hatred, disappointment, or bad feelings we might have towards our brothers and sisters, because Christ our God has Risen. He was crucified for all of us. And He rose again for all of us, for those who love us and for those who hate us, for those whom we love and those whom we struggle to love.  He tore up the handwriting of our sins, so that He might give us the joy of truly loving each other and the joy of truly living for each other. In removing the stone from the grave, He removed everything that could divide us from each other and everything that could divide us from Him. We cannot really be in the Church if we do not forgive. Being in Church without forgiveness is like having faith in Christ without His great mercy. And faith in God without mercy denies His very Resurrection. For this very reason, if we believe Christ is Risen, we must forgive all by His Holy Resurrection, we must forgive all and be reconciled with all, because Christ is Risen. And so, we embrace one another in our hearts, those near us and those afar off, we embrace them with the love of Christ. We no longer have enemies, only brothers and sisters with whom we share the joy of our Risen Lord.

It is a great joy for all of us to be Orthodox Christians. It is a great joy for all of us to share with our brothers and sisters the eternal life and great mercy that our merciful Savior has shared with us. It is a great joy that Christ is Risen from the dead and we forgive and love, because we are His.

This Pascha may the blessing of the Risen Christ, His love, forgiveness, and great mercy, fill your lives with His joy and guide our footsteps forever in the way of peace.

With much paternal love in our Risen Lord,

+ALEXEI
Bishop of the God-protected Diocese of Sitka and Alaska

May 5, 2024
The Glorious Resurrection and Pascha of the Lord

When the relic of St. Pope John Paul II touched his head, Andrew Lelonek felt like a new man. 

“I feel rejuvenated,” said a beaming Lelonek, a parishioner at St. Mary Magdalen Church in Camarillo. “I leave with hope for the things I pray for, hope for miraculous change.”

The memorable moment came during a special Mass and celebration April 28 at Our Lady of the Bright Mount Church in LA’s West Adams neighborhood marking the 10th anniversary of the Polish pope’s canonization. 

Bright Mount also serves as the Archdiocese of Los Angeles’ official shrine to John Paul, and its only Polish parish. Regional dean Father Luis Espinoza, pastor of nearby St. Agnes Church, presided the Mass offered in English, Spanish, and Polish.

In his homily, Bright Mount pastor Father Miroslaw “Mirek” Frankowski, S.Ch., reflected on how the relatively unknown Polish churchman — who visited Bright Mount during a trip to LA in 1976 — went on to become a global force for good during his 27-year reign.

“Pope John Paul II changed the whole world,” Frankowski said. “He was not afraid to go to the places where people were oppressed and suffering because of political conflicts or wars.

“He tried to reach every heart and every soul of all peoples with his compassion, love, and mercy.”

The celebration began with the Divine Mercy chaplet, a devotion originated by Polish mystic St. Faustina Kowalska and made popular by John Paul’s establishment of Divine Mercy Sunday. During the recitation, parishioners asked for God’s grace and the faith to trust in Jesus.

“Jesus, I trust in you; this is my prayer every day,” said Boguslawa Doerr, who heads the Los Angeles chapter of the John Paul II Foundation. “It makes me stronger. St. John Paul II gave us this. He has been a huge influence on my life.”

John Paul was officially canonized by Pope Francis on April 27, 2014, on Divine Mercy Sunday. He was found eligible for sainthood after being credited with two miracles that happened after his death on April 2, 2005.

Frankowski told parishioners their beloved intercessor healed thousands more, including one man sitting in the pews whose story was so compelling it was submitted to the Vatican. 

In the early 2000s, Michael Mietek Dutkowski was suffering from multiple health conditions, including liver failure. He says parishioners from Our Lady of the Bright Mount and the St. John Paul II Polish Center in Yorba Linda began praying for his recovery through the intercession of John Paul.

“Prayers were answered, I was healed,” Dutkowski said. “My documents with medical history were delivered to the Vatican by the president of the John Paul II Foundation and included in the process of the beatification … [but] I believe he was a saint while alive.”

In addition to individual blessings with the first-class relic of John Paul’s hair, worshippers were invited to kneel and pray where the saint once sat. In 1976, then-Cardinal Karol Wojtyla visited the parish, stayed overnight in the rectory, then celebrated Mass. 

Several parishioners remember that day with awe. Andrew Goska was only 10 years old at the time but sensed something special about the man and the moment.

“The way he spoke to people, it was like the Holy Spirit was present,” said Goska, a parishioner at Our Lady of the Bright Mount. “I feel [my faith] has a lot to do with him being there shaking our hands and touching our souls. It was very powerful.”

Casey Habrat was also at this acclaimed Mass. He remembers the cardinal trying to connect with every person, a trait he carried into his papacy.

“What I really respect about him is that he took the Vatican out of the Vatican,” said Habrat, a parishioner at Our Lady of the Bright Mount. “He went out where the people were and didn’t wait for them to come to him.”

Most of the Mass-goers seemed to have a personal story about John Paul, including Father Frankowski. The Polish native said when he was discerning the priesthood, he prayed for a sign and got one through a dream.

“There’s Pope John Paul II sitting in the main chair of the sanctuary of the church,” Frankowski recalled. “My Mom says, ‘Well, Mirek, go and serve the pope.’ When I woke up, I knew what I had to do and I entered seminary.”

Admiration for John Paul and Polish culture was evident throughout the Mass. Father Espinoza wore a vestment bearing John Paul’s face while some parishioners opted for classic folk attire. Chris Grzelecki, in a dark wool vest and colorful striped pants, helped bring the gifts to the altar. 

“I came here for tradition, a lot of tradition,” said Grzelecki, a parishioner at Our Lady of the Bright Mount. “Yet it was nice to see so many different nationalities come together and share a reverence for Pope John Paul.”

Following Mass, attendees enjoyed a reception that included kielbasa, pierogies, stuffed cabbage, and further reminiscing about John Paul. Frankowski hopes the saint’s lessons are remembered in these times of global peril. 

“His legacy is the same as Jesus Christ,” Frankowski said. “He taught us to love one another, respect one another, and respect the freedom of all people.”