In this JUBILEE Year of Hope 2025, there is so much to celebrate during LENT: A TIME TO GIVE AND FORGIVE, A TIME TO CONVERT, A TIME TO RECEIVE GOD’s LOVE AND MERCY! Lent is around the corner, beginning in a few days: March 5. Every Lent is different. Every Lent we are invited to ask God to help choose some Lenten Resolution or Theme for each of us individually, as a family or a parish to help us focus. This Lent 2025, there is an obvious theme: LENT IS JUBILEE. Pope Francis has called the entire Year 2025: a JUBILEE OF HOPE. This Saturday March 1st, we have invited you to a JUBILEE RETREAT2025. You will learn what a Jubilee Year means today in the Catholic Church, starting from its Biblical roots. You will also have time to reflect on what a Jubilee means for you individually, as a family, and also as a parishioner. It will also be a good time to reflect on your 40 days of Lent. I look forward to seeing you this First Saturday March 1st at the 9 am Mass. Then, you are invited to join us at...

Through the prophet Jeremiah we all receive a WORD OF HOPE, a message much needed in a more and more secular/materialistic world. God tells each one of us facing daily challenges and tribulations: Do not worry! Trust in Me! Pray! Rejoice! I have a beautiful plan for you! Remember the Jubilee Year 2025! A Year filled with Hope in the Lord! At my recent silent retreat of priests, Father Timothy Gallagher gave us a choice of Scripture passages for meditation. The Holy Spirit inspired me to select Jeremiah 29: 11-14. Our Retreat Master had given it the overall title “JEREMIAH’s WORD OF HOPE”. It is the central part of God’s letter to His people in a time of EXILE in Babylon. They had lost everything. Their...

Our Retreat Master, Father Timothy Gallagher, ended his homily on the last day of our silent retreat for priests with a message of HOPE: “Today is not the end of a spiritual retreat. Today is A NEW BEGINNING for each of you in this Jubilee Year of Hope.” He then specifically referred to Pope Francis’ first audience with Pilgrims of Hope in Rome on January 11. Back in Waldorf last week the first thing I did was to search for Pope Francis’ remarks. Here are some extracts: “Dear brothers and sisters, good morning! Many of you are here in Rome as “pilgrims of hope”. This morning, we are starting the Saturday Jubilee audiences, which will ideally...

Lent is always a time to repent, a time to convert turning toward God, a time to forgive, a time to fast, a time to share our spiritual and material riches with those in need through spiritual and corporal works of mercy. In this Jubilee Year 2025 it will also be a time to Hope, a time to expect a special encounter with our Lord Jesus Christ, a time to be transformed by opening our hearts to the Holy Spirit, a time to Rejoice, a time to Love and a time to have Inner Peace. We plan to have all Lenten activities and beyond with a Jubilee Focus: 1. We will have a pre-Lenten parish retreat on Saturday March 1st from 9 AM through 3 PM focusing on...