The 11th Sunday of Ordinary Time
From The Font
“Jesus said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few; so ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest.’”
Prayer is inherently contradictory. On the one hand, God knows what’s best and brings it about. On the other hand, God tells us that we should chime in our praise, our thanksgiving, our requests, and our concerns. But why? Our perspectives are so limited and absurd in comparison to God’s. Why, for example, does He want or need for us to ask Him to send out laborers into the vineyard?
The answer is not easy to explain! It’s hard to explain because our purpose as part of God’s creation is not so simplistic as it may seem.
First, God doesn’t need anything at all that we can provide. He doesn’t need praise, thanks, our prayers, or anything else we have. He is complete in Himself, without us. God creates us out of His perfect loving generosity, not because He wants or needs anything beyond Himself.
Second, God actively chooses to have His will enacted, affected, and even subverted by our free will. This is beyond bizarre! God chooses, in some specific matters, to be faithful to us even beyond His faithfulness to His own will.
Because of that, we can speak of a kind of an “economy of Grace.” Grace is the animating power, life, and love of the Holy Spirit acting in this world... It is amplified and multiplied by prayer, fasting, good works, and, especially, the Sacraments. It is decreased and suppressed by sin and moral mediocrity. That means that your prayers for me have real, tangible effects upon my capacity to live my spiritual life!! Read that again!
This is why Jesus tells us that prayer is so important. God, in establishing the Church, has placed a large part of our own salvation and the salvation of others into the hands of human beings. God allows His own will to be subverted as an act of love and mercy. That’s why Jesus tells us to pray like our lives and our world depend on it!
This is, by the way, just the slightest taste of the kind of philosophy which makes our Catholic teaching so important... There’s so much more to Christianity than we often see!
Thoughts from Fr. Ryan
This coming Saturday is the feast of the Birthday of St John the Baptist. It’s one of my favorite liturgical days. In German tradition, the people would build a gigantic bonfire on the night of the 24th - exactly six months before and after Christmas. The priest blesses the bonfire and the prayer he reads points out that from this day forward, the days will get shorter and the nights will get longer. Symbolically, at the solstice, night begins to take over from the reign of daylight. BUT we are not without Hope because John the Baptist prefigured Jesus. John preached and baptized and told people that Jesus would be the light of the world. And we, as Christians, don’t fear the ascent of darkness because we KNOW that in six months, we’ll be celebrating Christmas at the winter solstice. And on that day, we’ll be aware that the nights are as long as they’re going to be and from that point forward, the days will lengthen and the nights will recede.
We do this kind of thing because we believe that God created this world on purpose! It’s not just a Darwinian game of chance. All the matter in the universe only exists because - for an unknown reason - some unidentified force causes the energy (which is the only thing that really exists) to hold on to a certain shape... Seriously, science has no idea why this happens. In many ways, particle physics is the modern equivalent of St. Paul’s sermon at the shrine of the unknown God (c.f. Acts 17). We believe that the seasons, and the nature of life, and the symbolism of light and dark, and our biological human nature, and our psychological human nature are on purpose! We believe that God gave us this world with its ups and downs intentionally. We believe that this world exists in order to provide a framework within which we can work out our salvation (c.f. Phil 2:12) and which is positively covered with the fingerprints of God.
Modern society asks us to believe that the world and, indeed, the universe is random and meaningless. It asks us to believe that we are meaningless. It asks us to deny our natural instincts and desires for meaning and to simply dismiss all the great thinkers of history before the mid-1800s. That’s what modern philosophy and modern society ask. Modernity says “this is the most enlightened humanity has ever been” while abortion, euthanasia, and slavery are embraced at the highest numbers in history. And yet those same people would refuse even to consider that the complexity of the universe is an argument for an intelligence and a designer. Nihilism, aka, modern American and Western society, is just so stupid that we have to be educated into it... or propagandized into it by TV, movies, music, and modern entertainment culture.
The antidote for this trash is celebrating feast days like this Saturday. In recognizing God’s plan for St John the Baptist and the correlation between the birth of John, the Birth of Jesus, and the solstices, we’re acknowledging God’s greater plan for the world and for ourselves. And by acknowledging that plan, we humble ourselves before the greatness of the creator rather than humbling ourselves before the meaninglessness of an arbitrary, uncreated darkness.
Mass Intentions for the Coming Week
- Sat 5:30p In memory of Thomas Trichell (birth anni) Tommy Trichell
- Sun 9:00a Pro Populo for the Living & Deceased Members of our Parish
- Mon No Mass
- Tue NO MASS Fr Ryan out of town
- Wed 9:00a In memory of Mary Ernst/Gustafson
- Thu 9:00a In memory of Rosa and Gus Gremshell and May DiTomasso
- Fri 5:30p In memory of Delia Trichell/B Hayes
- Sat 5:30p In memory of Payton Trichell/M Trichell
- Sun 9:00a Pro Populo for the Living Deceased Members of our Parish
ALTAR CANDLES this week are burning for the special intentions of Margo Corulla
Assistants at Holy Mass
| Date | Servers | Lector(s) | EMHC(s) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6/17 5:30p | None Scheduled | M Rome | TBD |
| 6/18 9:00a | Kathleen, Evelyn | Youth | TBD |
| 6/24 5:30p | None Scheduled | C VanderVieren | TBD |
| 6/25 9:00a | Chandler, Annie | C Guizerix | TBD |
| 7/1 5:30p | None Scheduled | P Wilks | TBD |
| 7/2 9:00a | MaryKatherine, Courtland | J Howington | TBD |
Upcoming Events
- Confessions every Friday & Saturday from 5p until Mass and on Sunday from 9a until Mass
- Sunday Catechism and Donuts after Mass during the school year unless otherwise indicated
- Wednesday Morning Catechism about 9:30 a.m in Church and on Facebook and YouTube
- Pastoral Council meeting monthly on the third Wednesday at 6p
For Your Information:
ROSARY GROUP… a group of parishioners is meeting on Monday at 5:30 p.m. to pray the Rosary. Everyone is invited to join the group. If you need additional information, please contact the Coordinator, Louise Magoun, at 318-341-2403.
FORMED.ORG… FORMED has an entire page of weekly featured videos that are worth checking out at https://watch.formed.org/this-week-on-formed. Remember to sign in using our parish’s zip code (71282) at http://signup.formed.org
Stewardship In today’s Gospel, Jesus sends out the disciples to meet the needs of others. His admonition to them is the same challenge he makes to us. “The gift you have received, give as a gift.”
Next weekend …. the second collection will be the Peter’s Pence collection to support the charitable works of Pope Francis and the Holy See.
Our Return to the Lord
| Weekly Budget FY 2022-23 | $ 2,111 |
| May Budget | $ 8,444 |
| May Income | $ 10,689 |
| May Expenses | $ 10.690 |
| June Budget | $ 8,444 |
| June 10-11 Collection | $ 1,775 |
| June Income To Date | $ 2,513 |
Let us Rejoice in the Lord!
Happy Birthday Matt and Josh Hall (June 18), Robert Wood (June 18), Cindy Howington (June 23), Margo Corulla (June 26), Sally Reynolds (June 26)
Happy Anniversary Beth and Chip Sullivan (June 19)
In Our Daily Prayers…
Please let us know of anyone who is ill or hospitalized and would like to receive a visit from Father. Also, help us keep our prayer list up to date by advising us of those who should be added or removed.
Our Holy Father Pope Francis; Bishop Robert Marshall, and our Diocesan leaders, our President, Governor, Mayor and national, state and local elected representatives
Our parishioners who are sick, shut-in, or otherwise in need of our prayers: Connie and Dan Copes, Elizabeth Crothers, Leslye Ellerbee, Susan and Johnny Gilfoil, MaryJane Johnson, Bill Kennedy, Ed Mills, Terry and Susie Murphy, Sue & Mike Rome
Those under full-time care: Frances Kennedy, Carol Dunning
Our friends and relatives who need our prayers: Lee Adams (Smith), Ashley Alexander (Regan), Graham Allen (S Gilfoil), Kathryn Wood Allsopp (D Wood), Pam Amacker (Gilfoil), the family of Carolyn Arceneaux (Book), Marie Farlow Bellard, Tommy Bickham (C Copes), Chris Breard (Gilfoil), Sarah Cannon (Gilfoil), Fran Castile (Keene), Ruthie Coenen (Wilks), Jami Cook (Wilks), Marla Evans Cummings, Susan Ward Daigle (Gilfoil & Keene), Don Deweese, Mac Donaldson (Ellerbee), Joe Farlow, Mike Farlow, Patty Farlow, Monique Florence, Judy Fortenberry, April Franklin (Wilks), Thom Gilfoil, Wyly Gilfoil (Gilfoil), Charlotte Green, Rita Hargrave, Arlice Evans Headley, Evie Hilburn (Lancaster), Charles Howington, Dee Jones (Keene), Josh and Kim Wallace (Gilfoil), LaLa Lopez (Hernandez), Caroline Marcello (Watts), Michelle McGuire(Gilfoil), Mona Martin (MA Gilfoil), Boyce Miller, John Neill, Caryn Oliver, Wayne Pitre (Gilfoil), Levi and Kristin Reagan and their infant twins, Mary Anne and Adam Todd (Gilfoil/Ginn), Janie Saxon (Lancaster), Bailey, Scott and Tiffney Rome, Dianne W. Roper (Murphy),Tuleta Sasser (Wilks), Tommy Trichell, LeeAnn Rome Tranchina (Rome), Joe Yerger,
Our collegiates: Aidan Collins, Callie Ezell, Lilly Falgout, Chris Hall (USMC), Nick Hall, Bruen Johnson, Caroline Marsh, Emmy Lu Marsh, Blake Sullivan, Carter Sullivan, Walker Sullivan, Marsh Wood
