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Pastor’s Letter: February 9, 2025

Dear St. Philomena Parish Family,

Blessings to you all this day! I hope everyone is healthy and well this week—I know many have been in the midst of sickness, especially at our school. As I am writing this, I decided to offer some extra prayer today for everyone’s physical health. Coupled with our St. Blaise throat blessings that we offered last week, may the Lord grant us good health…and good perseverance to those who are still in the midst of illness.

How is your prayer life? Most people I talk with say they feel like they don’t pray well…or that they aren’t consistent with prayer. Some feel too distracted…some want to try and handle things themselves. One of my favorite maxims on prayer was from Mother Teresa: “If you want to pray better, you just have to pray more.” It is a great reminder to keep going to the Lord, especially during those times where we don’t feel like our prayer is very fruitful.

Some might know a story about Mother Teresa and a bishop who was visiting her community. If you know the Missionaries of Charity, you know that they work very long days serving the poorest of the poor. Their long days are bookended by adoration prayer in the morning and evening, as well as some periodic prayer in the day…and of course the Mass each day. One time, a bishop was visiting and was completely amazed at how much the sisters were able to do in a day. Yet, being a practical man, he asked Mother Teresa, “Couldn’t you do even more work for the poor if you didn’t spend so much time praying?” She smiled and said in reply, “We could not do what we do if we weren’t strengthened by prayer.” She went on to challenge the bishop: “You should also pray this much every day.” He replied he would like to but he had so many meetings,..