Hillsdale, NJ 07642
201-664-3131
| FROM THE PASTOR'S DESK |
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SOLEMNITY OF PENTECOST |
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| Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ, Joyful greetings on this Day of Pentecost, one of Church’s principal feasts of the liturgical calendar year. If it were not for Pentecost, the original apostles and disciples of Jesus never would have gotten the mission Jesus entrusted to them off the launching pad. 50 days after that first Easter, on the Jewish feast of Pentecost which commemorated God’s gift of the Covenant to Moses and celebrated the first harvest of Spring, the apostles and other disciples experienced an extraordinary outpouring of the Holy Spirit. This outpouring of God’s Spirit, the fulfillment of Jesus’ promise that the apostles would receive an ”Advocate”, had transforming and empowering effects on them and gave birth to the ‘infant Church’. If this event had not taken place we would not be here as “Church”. Since that time the Church celebrates the closing of the Easter season with Pentecost. Our prayer today: “COME, HOLY SPIRIT!” In today’s second reading, Saint Paul’s First Letter to the Church at Corinth (1 Corinthians 12:3-7, 12-13), the Apostle reminds us that the Church’s faith and our personal faith is a gift of the Spirit: “No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit.” Here is the basis of the Church’s mission of preaching, witness and catechesis. So is our communion in one “Church of God”a gift. Paul goes on to say: “by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body” of Christ.. Whatever our ethnic background, our standing in society, our differences, we are all brothers and sisters of Christ and brothers and sisters to each other, for “we were all given to drink of one Spirit.” The Holy Spirit calls us and forms us into one community, a new life of communion in Christ. Our communion in Christ is the basis of our service to those in need and our commitment to the concerns of social justice. Paul also reminds us that the Holy Spirit endows each member of the church with different kinds of spiritual gifts for different kinds of service that empower us for carrying on the mission of Christ in each age. “To each individual the manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit.” Here is the basis of our renewed understanding of discipleship. As disciples of Jesus we are called and empowered as Christian stewards to share our time, our talents and our treasure for the up-building of the Church of God and the continuation of the mission of Christ. This calling/gifting from the Holy Spirit is directed to every Christian. It is your calling and mine right here in our parish community. This is the calling of the 90 teen members who are being sealed with the Holy Spirit as they are confirmed by Bishop Edgar da Cunha in their Catholic faith this Pentecost weekend. We pray today for them, “Come, Holy Spirit!” We pray also for the adults and children baptized and the150 youngsters who celebrated their First Eucharist at Saint John’s in the Easter season. “Come, Holy Spirit!” We pray for all their parents, and sponsors and for ourselves who make up this parish community, that they and all of us will give them a true example of what it is to live with the Spirit alive in our hearts, an example of discipleship, of Christian stewardship and service, the life of faith in Jesus to which we are called, “Come, Holy Spirit!" God Love You, Msgr Phil |
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