Dear St. Philomena Parish Family,<\/p>\n
May the blessings and joy of the Risen Christ continue to be in your hearts! I hope everyone has been enjoying the wonderful celebration of our Lord\u2019s Resurrection. He is risen, Alleluia!<\/p>\n
During my time at the farm this past week, I have been reflecting on many wonderful Easter blessings\u2014I am so thankful for everyone who helped make our Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter celebrations so beautiful. From the preparations\/decorations to the music and the liturgies\u2026and of course to our post-Easter Vigil feast\u2014it truly was a fitting way to celebrate these special days! Continued congratulations to the members of our OCIA class who received Sacraments\u2014I am always honored to make the journey of faith with them through our classes. I truly appreciate the courage it takes to open minds and hearts to learn new things, be challenged with how we think or how we live, and of course to trust with faith that our Lord will continue with them as they grow. This year, I thought our class especially grew together as a group over time\u2014a special shout out to our OCIA team members who helped foster good companionship for the faith journey. Our new Catholics remind us of the special gifts we have in the Sacraments\u2026and to be thankful for the generosity of Jesus being so close!<\/p>\n
This weekend, we are celebrating the octave of Easter (eight days) and calling to mind in a special way the Divine Mercy of Jesus. Many will remember Msgr. Greg Ketcham, one of our previous pastors here. Fr. Greg would often say that for him, the celebration of the Divine Mercy is really a follow-up to the celebration of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, where we came to know more about the love of Jesus through the appearances Jesus made to St. Margaret Mary. Of course for the celebration of Divine Mercy, we recall the appearance of Jesus to St. Faustina, revealing the image of rays of love and mercy pouring forth from His Sacred Heart\u2014rays extending out to come meet us where we are.<\/p>\n
This year, our area celebration of Divine Mercy will be a little different\u2026or should I say in a different place\u2014at St. Vincent\u2019s Parish. One of the things the priests of our area have been working on the past couple of years is building up our brotherhood. We have been gathering together monthly for a lunch with all the Peoria-area priests\u2014this lunch in particular is a great time to share time together, tell stories, and talk about important things in the life of the Church\u2026and our lives as priests. PND High School has also been hosting a quarterly priest lunch where we enjoy comradery and work together to support the good mission of our shared High School. In addition to these, priests have been working on getting together more often in smaller groups. The fruit of all these gatherings is the deepening of friendships and good growth in how we work together to serve God\u2019s people in our area.<\/p>\n
One fruit, in particular, is a renewed commitment to help each other out with things like penance services and covering Masses if a priest is sick or away. Some of you may know that the Heart of Peoria parishes have been joining us here at St. Philomena for our OCIA classes the past two years. Fr. Bill Miller has helped with our classes, including helping to teach some classes when I have been away for my continuing education or when I have had a meeting conflict. Another fruit of this growth is that more and more parishes are joining together for celebrations like the Divine Mercy Holy Hour, Chaplet, and Confessions, (last year, we were joined here by the Heart of Peoria, Holy Family, St. Ann, St. Anthony, and St. Mark Parishes). An interesting priest gathering coming up in June will be our first-ever priest convocation. Nearly all the priests of our Diocese will be away together for five days for time, brotherhood, prayer, and learning. Bishop Lou has really taken the lead in getting us together as priests\u2014this one will be a unique one away from our usual places we serve. To ensure that God\u2019s people are still cared for while the priests are away, Bishop is arranging for some religious order priests to help cover our hospitals. Additionally, for our Peoria area, one of our good priests with senior status is going to offer a Mass every day which everyone in the city and surrounding area will be invited to. Since St. Vincent is hosting the Divine Mercy celebration this year for our area, I volunteered St. Philomena to host these Masses for June 15-18, (more info on that week in the future).<\/p>\n
As I share about this strengthening of priestly brotherhood, I am thinking back to the goals that Bishop Lou has shared for us priests\u2014he wants us to be holy, happy, and healthy priests. Of course, like all of us, for priests these things are a work in progress! But, joyfully, we are committed to growing in these ways\u2014please pray for us and know how much we are strengthened by your prayers. It truly is a great joy to serve as Pastor of St. Philomena\u2014know that I keep you all in prayer and send you my blessing this day!<\/p>\n
In Christ,
\nFather Luke<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"