Sacred Heart Parish
MASS INTENTIONS FOR THE WEEK
Monday, August 10
12:05 PM Dominic D’Innocenzo
Friday, August 14
12:05 PM Edward Slavin
Saturday, August 15
4:00 PM Peter & Raymond Scichilone
Sunday, August 16
9:00 AM Parishioners of Sacred Heart
11:45 AM Daly Family
CONFESSIONS
Saturday, August 15 – 2:00 to 3:30 PM – Fr. Connelly
READINGS FOR THE TWENTIETH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
First reading: Proverbs 9:1-6
Second Reading: Ephesians 5:15-20
Gospel Reading: John 6:51-58
FEAST OF THE ASSUMPTION OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY – AUGUST 15
Because this feast day falls on a Saturday this year, there is no obligation to attend Mass for the solemnity. However, why should you miss the opportunity to celebrate this beautiful Marian feast? Join us for Mass on Saturday morning at 9:00 AM and perhaps remain awhile for the rosary and adoration!
WORLDWIDE MARRIAGE ENCOUNTER
MARRIED COUPLES: Are you exercising and dieting, to stay fit and trim? What are you doing to keep your marriage in good shape? The next Worldwide Marriage Encounter Weekends in New England are September 11-13, September 18-20, September 25-27 and October 23-25. For more information call Ralph & Jane Becker at 1-800-710-WWME or visit our webpage at www.wwmeMA.org
CATHOLIC TV NEWS
CatholicTV offers a free monthly magazine for those who like to watch CatholicTV. The magazine offers articles, the television schedule, and information about new shows. To subscribe, write to CatholicTV, P.O. Box 9196, Watertown, MA 02471 or email Jane at:
JGIORDANO@CATHOLICTV.COM.
OFFERTORY INCOME
Weekend of August 1/2 $4,802
Church in Central and Eastern Europe $ 736
A NOTE FROM FATHER C
I hate to see the 4th of July come – And the reason? I knew Labor Day would be coming soon and that would be the end of the summer which, of course, we really haven’t had. We ought to send back to whoever is responsible for it the months of June and July which brought tears to the eyes of many vacationers.
Another reason for being unhappy with the arrival of the 4th of July was my realization that it would have been wonderful to have a full complement of Religious Education teachers all ready to go for the fall season. If there is anyone in the parish with some teaching experience, if there are any college university students in our midst, if there are any parishioners who love their faith and who love children who are seeking Jesus so as to follow him, then please give some thought to being a Religious Education teacher. It’s not easy at times and can be discouraging at times, but every once in a while the teacher is inwardly delighted because he or she has set-up a good relationship with the students who see in the teacher an example of what is being taught in the Catechism. Our young people, like all baptized persons, belong to two cities – God’s city and the secular city. We don’t want them not to live in the secular city; this is where we must all try to live the Gospel. To be followers of Jesus in the secular city without a knowledge of the Catechism makes no sense to our young people and they drop away from the Gospel. To know the Catechism, to believe in the Gospel is the great challenge for all of us. It is also a challenge for our young people whether at Mason-Rice or Bowen, or whether at Newton North or Newton South. Mrs. Solomon tells me these are our needs:
Tuesday Afternoons: 1st, 2nd and 5th grades.
Sunday Mornings: 2nd, 4th and 5th grades.
Father Connelly
ARISE – TOGETHER IN CHRIST
SEASON 3 – In the Footsteps of Christ
October 4 – November 13
Registration: September 12 – 20
Save the dates and spread the word!!
CALENDAR NOTES
COFFEE HOUR AFTER THE ASL MASS:
Sunday, August 9 – 11:30 AM to 1 PM – Parish Center
KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS:
Wednesday, August 12 – 8 PM – Convent Dining Room
COFFEE HOUR:
Friday, August 14 – Following 9 AM Mass – Parish Center
LITURGY, ADORATION AND THE ROSARY:
Saturday, Aug. 15 – 9 AM to 12:30 PM – Lower Church
COFFEE HOUR AFTER THE ASL MASS:
Sunday, August 16 – 11:30 AM to 1 PM – Parish Center
LECTIO DIVINA – SPIRITUAL READING
“Lectio Divina” is a time-honored “spiritual exercise” which has nourished saints and scholars from the first beginnings of the Gospel. Perhaps I should translate lectio divina as “divine reading or holy reading” because of the ambiguity of the word “spiritual” in our present society. Many lay persons are doing “holy reading” regularly. Father Michael Casey, as you will see, is an excellent teacher of lectio divina. I promised last Monday that I would print in the bulletin his ten basic principles of lectio divina. I hope it helps a good number of our bulletin readers.
-
Recognize the value of regularity -- lectio should be done according to rules: fixed times, fixed periods, in season and out of season.
-
Allocate time. Nobody finds time; you have to make it.
-
Choose a quiet, temperate, harmonious, dedicated place. The place is more important than most people think.
-
Choose reading that is able to sustain your attention. Try the Gospels, one by one, taking a passage each day.
-
Vocalize as you read -- this will slow down the reading, and helps ensure that your words and your thoughts move together.
-
Progress through a whole book -- "in order and entirely" (per ordinem et integro) it says in the Rule of St. Benedict -- rather than leaping about within it, or between books.
-
Read closely, word by word, line by line; every word must be understood. It is all too easy to pass over words that are unfamiliar, challenging or shocking, but these are often the ones that have something to say to you.
-
Allow yourself to puzzle over obscurities.
-
Actively attempt to make the text meaningful -- the purpose of lectio is to form the mind in Christ.
-
Activate, if necessary, the different stages: start with lectio (reading), then move to meditatio (chewing over the words), then onto oratio (prayer) and finally contemplatio (when you allow the Holy Spirit to act in the heart). This is not a method, but a description of what, in the experience of monks, happens in an hour's lectio divina.
The Holy Spirit, says Fr. Casey, is as active in the reading of Scriptures as He was in their writing. The power of lectio comes from the Spirit being present in the interaction between Scripture and our own experience -- of life and of God.
CHAPTER 6 OF JOHN’S GOSPEL
Our world today is a hungry world: a majority of the world’s population hungers for daily bread; so many in our secular/consumerist society hunger for meaning. “What’s it all about, Alfie?” First you live, then you die: every human being, knowingly or unknowingly, hungers for God – according to St. Augustine’s famous phrasing – “God has made us for himself and we will not rest until we rest in God”.
As we began our Liturgy this morning, we said in prayer to the risen Christ – “You came in history to gather us into the peace of God’s kingdom”. We call this “objective redemption” – Christ the Lord, by his paschal mystery of dying and rising, has redeemed the world. We then said in prayer to the risen Christ – “You come now in word and in sacrament to strengthen us in holiness”. This is what we call “subjective redemption”. What good would objective redemption be if men and women down the centuries do not or cannot encounter the risen Lord who meets his people in word and in sacrament?
The Church, as we have heard so often, has always venerated the divine Scriptures, just as the Church venerates the body of the Lord in the Eucharist, since, especially in the Sacred Liturgy, the Church unceasingly receives and offers to the faithful the bread of life from the table both of God’s word and of Christ’s body. Chapter 6 in John’s Gospel is an excellent example of how the risen Christ encounters his people and how they encounter him in word and sacrament. We should note how John structures his Chapter 6, which often bears the title “The Bread of Life Discourse”.
-
The author first gives us an account of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, which was astounding to those who were present.
-
Because Jesus feared that the people were going to try to make him king, some sort of political messiah to do battle with the hated Romans, he went off by himself after instructing his disciples to meet him on the other side of the lake. While they were rowing across the lake, the disciples were more than surprised to see Jesus approaching them while walking on the water. Why does the author narrate this incident? You will get the answer as you approach the end of Chapter 6, when Christ gives his own body and blood as nourishing food for his own disciples. If God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, can create the universe without much difficulty and if Jesus reveals himself as sharing with the Father and Holy Spirit the mystery of divinity, then, surely Jesus has the power to give us the great gift of the Eucharist.
-
When the people find out where the Lord has gone, they followed him and he gives them the Bread of Life Discourse.
-
The Bread of Life discourse means the wisdom of Jesus’ teaching, and faith in his word indicates that Jesus who is the Bread of Life now gives his people the Bread of Life which means the body and blood, soul and divinity of the risen Christ.
How are we to understand our Gospel reading? The crowd for whom Jesus had worked the great sign of the loaves and fishes were looking for Jesus and found him across the Sea of Galilee. The Lord says to them – “You are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled.” He reminds them not to be overly concerned “for the food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you”. The crowd persisted in asking for a sign and reminded Jesus, as though he needed reminding, that their ancestors ate manna in the desert, as it is written – “he gave them bread from heaven to eat”. Jesus reminded them that it was not Moses who gave them bread from heaven – “It is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven, the bread of God which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world”. Spontaneously, his hearers said to him – “Give us this bread always”. At that, Jesus reveals himself by saying – “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst”. In Chapter 6 we have that part of the Bread of Life discourse as described under “c” in the above paragraph. In this section, Jesus himself is the living bread come down from heaven. He offers in his teaching God’s wisdom. Jesus himself is our way and our truth. He reminds his hearers – “Whoever comes to me will never hunger; and whoever believes in me will never thirst.” To drink of his wisdom means to see Jesus with the eyes of faith, to believe in him, to put one’s trust in him, to follow him as the great saints have done.
Then comes the climax of Chapter 6. Jesus who is the Bread of Life gives us an astounding gift which we call the Bread of Life – the great gift of the Eucharist, so that Jesus can say – “I am the living bread come down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.” How does the risen Christ encounter us? How do we encounter the risen Christ? The answer is through word and sacrament. Both are necessary. The word of God enlightens our minds and tells us what the Lord Jesus has done for us. The sacraments are what give us a share in God’s life, nourishing us, strengthening us, helping us to grow in faith, hope and love and restoring our sharing in God’s life if we have lost it through sin. As we say at Mass so often in prayer to the risen Christ: “Lord Jesus, you came in history to gather us into the peace of God’s kingdom; you come now in word and sacrament to strengthen us in holiness.” Many of us are faithful to the Eucharist. Should we not be equally faithful to Lectio Divina which will help us enter into the wisdom of the saints?
Father Connelly
ST. FRANCIS HOUSE
Thank you for your continued support of St. Francis House. The items needed for August are fruit juices. You may place your donations in the containers at the entrances to the church at any time during the month.
SIGNINGS
Good People,
When Jesus says that he is the Bread of Life, He is saying that he is the source of life. He is the life of life. He is the founder, maker, inventor, sustainer, maintainer, rebuilder, renovator, of life.
We need to find Him; this Bread for our lives so that our lives can be really alive. The Bread is clearly seen here at Mass. It comes down from heaven and is with us and comes into us. That "Life Bread" goes through a triple transformation.
First it starts out as something coming from God, growing from the earth. So God makes it through the earth. It goes from seed then through the earth; it grows and transforms into a living plant. That is the first wonderful change.
The second change happens through human hands. God gives us smarts to know how to take that plant and using our knowledge and skill we can take it and crush it and mix it and, Pah! it becomes transformed into bread. This is the second wonderful change.
The third change is that then God takes the bread we made from the earth and transforms it again. It becomes Bread that feeds the life of our life. It goes beyond only our body. It becomes food that through our bodies gives our eternal souls life.
We all, like the bread, need a triple change. We come from dirt too like the plants. We become human beings through the process of nature. That is the first change.
Then we, through our parents and family and friends and teachers and good people around us, learn language and become friends. That is the second change.
Then with the third step we become transformed by God through his Church into His Children and become friends with God and His friends in a way that never ends and goes beyond this earthly world.
The Eucharist does this. We see this when a person like Barbara Bossi dies. She had no children but she was a good Catholic and she had really become family with God and us. She did not die alone. We were with her and she is helped on her way to the completion of the third transformation in Heaven by our prayers at Mass today.
In Christ,
Fr. St. Martin