Dear friend,<\/p>\n
I hope everyone has a safe and fun 4th<\/sup> of July. This week always feels like the halfway time of summer. In celebration of the day, we will have one Mass at 8am. The Parish Office will be closed on the 3rd<\/sup> and 4th<\/sup>. Certainly we all have much to be thankful with our nation and our faith. With our recent celebration of Memorial Day to remember those who gave their lives for the freedom of our nation and the celebration of Independence Day, we are given the opportunity to thank those who went before us while reflecting on our call to serve one another. Christianity invites us to love God and neighbor, while praying for those that persecute us. This is one of the great challenges from Jesus. The Lord\u2019s Prayer calls us to forgive others as we want God to forgive us. We pray that the Lord inspire us to know the ways we can forgive others and seek God\u2019s forgiveness through the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Travel safe if you are going out of town.<\/p>\n The Emmaus Days Summer Retreats for the boys are coming soon at Peoria Notre Dame. Emmaus Days Session III is for boys entering their freshman and sophomore years of high school. Emmaus Days Session IV is for boys entering 7th<\/sup> and 8th<\/sup> grades. The Diocesan Vocation Office and the Seminarians run the retreats each summer. There is a good mix of prayer, Mass, spiritual talks, moral formation and fun\/play time. As a seminarian, I always enjoyed the time with the children. It helped me learn how best to teach and model Christ to others, while also developing an understanding of how to relate to the next generation. Fr. Daniel is willing to help sign up any of our 7th<\/sup> graders through sophomores to attend the retreat days. If you have a son interested in the retreat days, please contact Fr. Daniel at the office.<\/p>\n The readings this weekend call us to reflect on our connection to Jesus Christ. In short, through baptism we believe a spiritual bond takes place between Christ and the Christian. We share in the benefits of the Cross of Jesus. His Cross redeems us, saves us, blesses us, and strengthens us to live the Christian life. We are not only to see what we receive from Jesus, but also what we offer Jesus. Jesus spoke several times about each person carrying the sacrificial cross. As Jesus laid down his life for all of us, we are each invited to lay down our lives for others. This means that life is about others and not ourselves. Sometimes this means the cross is challenging, difficult, uncomfortable or burdensome; but, always the cross is a means to the goal of salvation. We focus on the other because it helps us really understand what Christ-like love is all about. The practical application of carrying one\u2019s cross is not forcing or exerting our wills on others, not judging or condemning, refusing to require others to meet our own personal expectations, as well as all the spiritual virtues. I don\u2019t think we need to be afraid of carrying the cross and we certainly don\u2019t need to go looking for a cross to carry, but we do need to be spiritually willing to follow Jesus, and sometimes that means doing or saying the true things we\u2019d rather not.\u00a0 May the Lord give us all the courage to see the sacraments as gifts on the path toward heaven and always opportunities for growth and blessing.<\/p>\n God bless,<\/p>\n Father David<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"