SCCR Parish Blog

  UPDATED: 25 November Christmas Mass times will be posted soon on our parish website, www.ccc.city .   We hope that many will be able to join us for Mass.  But whether or not that is safe for you, there are many other ways that will help to keep the Advent season and Christmas seasons hholy.  Here are a few suggestions. Pray together as a family.  Here's a short Advent prayer from the EWTN television apostolate, anticipating Christmas.  Read the Christmas story from one of the Gospels from your Bible at home.  If you don't have one handy, you can read it online: Luke chapter 2 , Matthew 1:18-25 , John 1:1-18 ,  Bless your Advent wreath, manger scene, Christmas tree at home.  ETWN provides the prayers you can use. If you can't come to Mass in person, pray along with a livestream Mass.  There are many options here:  Archdiocese of Cincinnati , EWTN , Mass from St. Peter's in Vatican City .  We are still working on whether o...

  UPDATED: 24 November In response to some inquiries and some rumors, Archbishop has asked us pastors to let our parishioners know that he has no intention of suspending public Masses. He has shared with his priests a letter he sent to one of the faithful (below).  Here in our region, we are continuing to follow all Covid protocols in the celebration of Mass and will continue to celebrate daily and Sunday Masses as well as Christmas Masses.  As a reminder however, it is temporarily  not obligatory to attend Sunday Mass. Until that obligation is restored, parishioners should feel free to use their own judgment about the risk and as always stay home if there are any symptoms of any contagious illness. Here's that letter from the Archbishop. ====== Dear ______________,     Thank you for your recent letter. Unlike governors in some states, Governor De Wine has never aske d the C atholic B ishops of Ohio to lock churches or discont inue the public celebration ...

  Servant of God Julia Greeley: A Name Written in the Sacred Heart On Fridays during ordinary time of the litrugical year (including today) I celebrate the daily Mass for the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  This is a beautiful devotion popularized by many saints over the years including St. Gertrude the Great and St. Margaret Mary Alocoque .   St. Gertrude is especially timely because, in addition to her devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, she is famous for her prayers for the holy souls in purgatory .  I encourage parish families to pray to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and find an image at a Catholic bookstore to display in their homes. One of the newer saints-on-the-way is an American named Julia Greeley .  She was an ex-slave from Colorado who lived a life of extraordinary humility and charity.  Julia is now a Servant of God (first step of being declared a saint in the Church).  She put the burning love of the Sacred Heart of Jesus into action.  ...

   As we approach Thanksgiving Day, wanted to post some prayers from Catholic Digest for the holiday that your family might offer together. Also, wanted to post this proclamation from President Abraham Lincoln , who advanced the celebration of a national thanksgiving holiday.  Scholars debate whether he was a Christian or not, but he certainly believed in a good God and Father who provided for us.  I was struck that he wrote this during one of the most difficult periods the nation has faced -- the heart of the U.S. Civil War (War Between the States).   Even then, he wanted to emphasize gratitude to God for His gifts.  I think there's a lesson in that for our troubled times!

  UPDATED: Nov. 18th In light of the recent election, I've received some questions about Catholic politicians who oppose the faith and the question of Communion (for example, elected officials who support abortion or same-sex "marriage.") These are complicated questions, so here are some considerations. Is someone like Mr. Biden who opposes Church teaching in public office still Catholic? The short answer is, yes.   There is a saying, "Once Catholic, always Catholic."  It means that one is incorporated into the Catholic Church by virtue of baptism, and once baptized into the Church, that  can not be changed.  It is still possible for someone to renounce the Catholic faith of course (technical term: apostasy ) or refuse to follow the teachings and disciplines of the Church, or even to stubbornly contradict the truths of the Church (technical term: heresy ).  This is a separate question from whether or not someone is Catholic.  A good summary of thi...

 As national and some election results are still being sorted out, there are many closely divided governing bodies.  This division will be important in the ongoing struggle of Christian citizens to work to protect innocent life in the womb. Since we have a mostly two-party system of governance, it is important to understand the underlying philosophy of the parties on the right to life and the question of requiring citizens to pay for the destruction of life. Here are the links to the party platforms (statements of philosophy), with some commentary from a pro-life website. The Democratic Party platform on the life issues The Repulican Party platform on the life issues

  Like many of you, I have immigrant roots as an American citizen.  My great grandparents on both sides immigrated to the United States from Germany. Yesterday, we celebrated the feast day of the first canonized American saint, Mother Frances Cabrini from Italy.  (She was Italian-born and became a U.S. citizen). This little Italian nun managed to accomplish extraordinary things, especially for the immigrant population, in spite of the anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic sentiment that was still strong here and her sometimes frail health. Here's the blurb on her from the Magnificat devotional magazine: Frances Cabrini was born in the Lombardy region of Italy. She took private religious vows at age twenty-seven, adding “Xavier” to her name in honor of the great Jesuit missionary to the East. In 1880, she founded the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus with the aim of evangelizing in China, yet Pope Leo XIII advised her to go “not to the east, but to the west...

   While the nation is still fixed on news of settling the presidential election, we may be missing the beginning of a very important story.  The Supreme Court will hear a case on religious liberty with potentially sweeping implications.  The City of Philadelphia is attempting to prevent Catholic Social Services there from participating in fostering and adoption programs, because of their unwillingness according to Catholic belief of placing children with a same-sex couple.  Other government entities (such as the State of Illinois) have already succeeded in shutting down Catholic adoption agencies for this reason, and the City of Philadelphia, showing a real contempt for Catholic teaching, are currently depriving many children of foster homes.   Rulings can be issued broadly or narrowly.  Let's pray for a broad ruling that prevents any governmental agency from blocking the access of Catholic agencies to serve those in need because of their religio...

  The First Thanksgiving, by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris, ca. 1912 This year, we will have celebrate the Mass for Thanksgiving Day at St. Mary's at 9:00 a.m.  Please join us to give thanks to God for the blessings He has bestowed upon our nation and, more importantly, the saving sacrifice of His Son on the Cross. I'm including a link from a blog on the liturgy ( New Liturgical Movement ) which dives deep into the history of the Catholic Church and Thanksgiving, all the way back to the first Thanksgiving at Plymouth.  A bit long and detailed, but something to ponder over turkey and dressing this year. I was particularly interested in the fact that Pope Pius XII celebrated Thanksgiving (and praised the holiday) to the American seminarians in Rome around 1950.  As an aside, there's a really cool picture in the post of Pope Pius in his sedia gestatoria , the portable throne that popes formerly used when they made public appearances.  That was traveling in style!

For anyone who has the Amazon Prime service, I have a recommendation for a good family-friendly TV series.  It's produced by Chris Stefanick, a Catholic father of six, author, and motivational speaker who speaks and writes on the joy of living the Catholic life. The series is entitled Real Life Catholic .  Chris interviews ordinary Catholics from all over the country and all walks of life, who live the faith with gusto.  (In one episode, he skis the best slopes Colorado has to offer, meeting up with faithful Catholic who are young Olympic hopefuls.  Part adventure, part entertainment, it's worth watching. Here's the blurb from the series trailer: Each week, Chris experiences life with Catholics around the world - from farming crawfish alongside Cajuns, to surfing in Kauai, to serving the homeless, and grieving extreme loss with a friend. Real Life Catholic features everyday people whose lives are anything but average. They know that in the midst of everyday life, the...

  It appears likely that we will have a baptized Catholic president who has publicly claimed that he is "personally opposed" to abortion but does not believe it is right to impose that "belief" on others who disagree. He is not the first baptized Catholic politician to make this claim. American politicians of both parties have tried to hide behind this cover.  One can try to twist his reasoning into knots to try to make this justification work, but the argument simply doesn't hold water. There's a good article from the National Catholic Register that sums up why this argument fails, as well as briefly detailing the history of this argument. One line from that stands out:  What if someone argued, "I'm personally opposed to racism, but I insist that we fund racist acts, because I don't want to impose my beliefs on someone else."  That wouldn't get him very far. The heart of the question is, Why is someone personally opposed. It might be t...