This Sunday, we celebrate the great SOLEMNITY OF ALL SAINTS. At every Mass, not only on All Saints Day, we pray with all the Saints in Heaven. All SAINTS are an integral part of the CHURCH. While Jesus is the Head of the Church, the Saints in Heaven and all the baptized Catholics living on earth constitute the BODY OF THE CHURCH. As all the baptized are CALLED TO BE SAINTS, we can say that our Church is a CHURCH OF SAINTS, Saints in Heaven, and all potential Saints on Earth. Anyone entering Heaven becomes a saint (with a small s). To enter Heaven forever, we do not need to be recognized/canonized by the Church as a Saint, with a Capital S (e.g. St John Paul II, St John XXIII or St Teresa of Calcutta). To be in Heaven is to be with God. God is present at each Mass; Jesus, who is both God and the Son of God, is fully present in the Eucharist, the Body of Christ. MASS IS HEAVEN ON EARTH, the Saints in Heaven are present not only at ALL SAINTS MASS, but at every Mass. I recall...

Every morning in the last few days, I listen to the birds singing in our backyard at the rectory: the little sparrows, the blue jays, the cardinals, the robins and many more that I do not recognize. The birds are singing. They are not worried as many of us about continuing uncertainties and challenges. They are not listening to the news on the radio. They are just singing, singing songs of joy! As the weather has been cold and then warm again, they may believe that Spring is coming! With God it is always Spring Time! Time for Renewal and Joy! I pray to God that we can all find the Joy of Spring in our hearts, the Joy of a new Life, the Joy of a transfiguration of our souls to be conformed to the image of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Joy of Conversion: going to the Sacrament of Reconciliation, being at Peace with God, accepting God's invitation to come to the Feast on Sunday, the Wedding Feast of His Son, the prelude to the Eternal, Heavenly Banquet, receiving the Body of Christ, receiving God, the Son of God in the Eucharist , and being transformed. I loved watching...

Dear Parishioners, I would like to express all my appreciation for your generous support to the Capital Campaign, which has now been completed successfully. To paraphrase St Paul (this weekend’s first Letter to the Thessalonians 1:1-3) "I give thanks to God for the generosity of all of you, remembering you in my prayers." When we launched the Capital Campaign four years ago, we wrote to all of you, "The top priority is to renovate the Sanctuary and Narthex; the current 400 chairs (380 to be exact) and the carpet in Sanctuary need to be replaced; with a new configuration, we will be able to provide a seating capacity of about 450. A second priority is to provide additional space for multi-purpose classrooms, meeting rooms and storage. A third priority is to evangelize by making the outdoor space in front of our church more prayerful: we plan to have a small Perpetual Adoration Chapel and we will have a beautification project and a new, larger steeple for our church. For this capital campaign to be successful, we will need broad support to raise the estimated investment cost of...

In the Introduction to his Encyclical "THE GOSPEL OF LIFE", St John Paul II reminds us that "The Gospel of Life is at the heart of Jesus' message... It is to be preached with dauntless fidelity as the GOOD NEWS to the people of every age and culture... At the dawn of salvation, it is the BIRTH of a Child which is proclaimed as GOOD NEWS...The source of this great joy is the Birth of the Savior, but Christmas also reveals the full meaning of every human birth... When Jesus presents the heart of his redemptive mission, he says he came that they may have life, and have it abundantly (John 10:10). It is in that new and eternal life that all the aspects and stages of human life achieve their full significance." Last weekend, we celebrated "RESPECT LIFE SUNDAY”. Both Deacon Rich and Deacon Bill preached beautiful homilies about "respecting lives at all stages" from the beginning of the embryo in the womb to natural death" with special emphasis on protecting the "unborn". St John Paul II encouraged all of us to preach the Gospel of Life to all people at all times. We need to fight the growing culture of death. The gravest attack on life in our current culture is...

In the Second Reading of this coming Sunday, we have one of the most powerful passages from St Paul's Letter to the Philippians ( 2:1-11). It is all about HUMILITY and how humility LEADS us to JOY through BEING ONE in JESUS. HUMILITY is the foundation of our Christian life. St Paul encourages us to live a humble life, imitating Jesus' own humility, "Do nothing out of selfishness or out of vainglory; rather, HUMBLY REGARD OTHERS AS MORE IMPORTANT THAN YOURSELVES, each looking out not for his own interests but also for those of others. Have in you the SAME ATTITUDE that is also in CHRIST JESUS... who, though He was in the form of God, emptied Himself taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, He HUMBLED HIMSELF, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. I suggest that you keep asking God to grant you the virtue of humility by praying daily the inspirational LITANY OF HUMILITY...