Sacred Heart Parish
MASS INTENTIONS FOR THE WEEK
Saturday, September 24
4:00 PM Claire Carroll
Sunday, September 25
9:00 AM Parishioners of Sacred Heart
10:30 AM Arthur Kiley
11:45 AM James Patrick Walsh
Saturday, October 1
4:00 PM Barry Joseph O’Leary
Sunday, October 2
9:00 AM Parishioners of Sacred Heart
CELEBRANTS FOR NEXT WEEKEND’S MASSES
Saturday, October 1
4:00 PM Fr. St. Martin
Sunday, October 2
9:00 AM Fr. Imbelli
10:30 AM Fr. Carey
11:45 AM Fr. Connelly
READINGS FOR THE TWENTY-SEVENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
First Reading: Isaiah 5:1-7
Second Reading: Philippians 4:6-9
Gospel Reading: Matthew 21:33-43
CONFESSIONS
Saturday, October 1 – 2:00-3:30 PM – Fr. Connelly
WOMEN’S DISCUSSION GROUP BEGINS 10-2
The Women’s Discussion Group has selected Faith That Dares To Speak by Donald Cozzens, (Liturgical Press) as their next book. The first meeting will be held in the convent dining room on Sunday, October 2 at 10:30 AM. New members are encouraged to join and are most welcome.
SACRED HAPPENINGS
Anne Marie Anderson and Anthony Coleman, lectors at the 4 PM liturgy for some time now, have officially left us for Bangor, ME. They will be returning to the parish to be married in Saturday, October 1, at 1 PM. They would like everyone to know that all members of Sacred Heart Parish are invited to attend the ceremony. It will be a wonderful way to both celebrate their new life together and to say good-bye to two parishioners who treasured their time in our religious community.
OFFERTORY INCOME
Weekend of September 17/18 $ 4,616.00
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION NEWS
Today and on Tuesday we begin our Religious Education program. I would like to thank all those teachers who responded to the love of Christ by offering themselves for the sake of the gospel. Please pray for the teachers and families of our students that together we will be filled with the Holy Spirit and grow in the knowledge of God’s self-sacrificing love. We ask that at least one parent accompany their student on the first day for an opening address and important information for the coming year. Plan to stay for about 30 minutes.
We continue our prayerful pleading to God for several more CCD teachers for the Tuesday afternoon program from 4-5:15pm! Let this be the time you answer God’s call to “teach them all I have commanded you”. Please contact me by email: religious.education@sacredheart.ws or call 617-969-4031.
Michelle Solomon, Director of Religious Education
A CATECHIST’S REFLECTION
So many of us are thankful for what God has given us. Isn't it time to give back? There is great joy in watching a child grow in faith. I've discovered as a CCD teacher, that a child saying "that was the best class ever" far outweighs the effort involved. This is my fourth year of teaching and it has been one of the most worthwhile ways of spending my time. I look forward to many more years ahead. Won't you join me? Faithfully, Chris Sanroma, Grade 2
HELP SUPPORT CATHOLICTV® NETWORK
Please tune in to the 2011 CatholicTV® Telethon on Friday, September 30 and Saturday, October 1 from 9 AM to 10 PM (Comcast Ch 268; Verizon Ch 296, Charter Ch 101). Call and support this very important work of the Church.
WALK FOR LIFE!
Join us on Sunday, October 2nd for the Massachusetts Citizens for Life annual Walk for Life. Come to show support for the many wonderful pro-life programs doing good work and saving lives across the state. The Pre-Walk Celebration begins in the Boston Common at 1:30 PM and the Walk begins at 2:30 at the Parkman Bandstand near the corner of Tremont and Boylston Streets. Registration is $5 per person payable at the event. Sacred Heart Parish is pleased to provide round trip bus transportation for those interested in attending. The bus will leave from the parking lot adjacent to the Church at 1:00 PM, following the 11:45 AM Mass. Please call the rectory (617-969-2248) and let us know in advance (by Friday 9/30) if you would like to travel with us on the bus so that we have an accurate head count. This event is a wonderful way to kick off Respect Life Month and we encourage you to attend!
FAITH AND CULTURE
Pope John Paul II introduces his encyclical letter “Faith and Reason” with these words: “Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth – in a word, to know himself – so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women my also come to the fullness of truth about themselves.”
This expression, faith and reason, reminds us of a whole series of contrasted notions which abound in any theological discussion. We speak of grace and nature, we speak of the supernatural and the natural, church and world, the law of the Gospel and natural morals. One of the most interesting of these mutually contrasted concepts is faith and culture. It might be good to reflect on this at the start of the new parish year, at the start of a new year of religious education because we could not make much sense about faith if we do not reflect on the culture in which we live the faith.
What do we mean by culture? We men and women are always about doing things, acting this way or that way. We can call this the realm of the social, what we all do in society day in and day out in all the countries of the world. When studied scientifically, do we not call this sociology, a study of what men and women do in society? The more philosophical among us step back from the social in order to reflect on its meaning, and this is what we call a culture. A gentleman by the name of Clifford Geertz, well known among cultural scholars, offers this definition – “A culture denotes a historically transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in symbols; a system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic forms by means of which men and women communicate, perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about and their attitudes towards life.” Strange to say, sociologically speaking, our Catholic faith has certain features of a culture. As Father Dulles reminds us our Catholic faith is like a system of meanings, it is historically transmitted, it is embodied in symbols and doctrines and it is instilled into new members who come to the faith so that they can begin to think and judge and act in a characteristically Catholic way. In a certain sense, our Catholic faith is like a culture within a culture. Sociologists might call it a subculture. This is inevitably the nature of things because Catholic faith has to exist in a culture or it doesn’t really exist at all.
What then are some of the problems? Is the culture to dominate the faith? Is the faith to dominate the culture? One particular writer, H. R. Niebuhr in his classic study Christ and Culture proposes five models: Christ against the culture, Christ of the culture, Christ above the culture, Christ and culture in paradox, and Christ the transformer of culture. In discussing these models, Niebuhr refers to them as 1. advocating the rejection of culture, 2. advocating accommodation to the culture, 3. offering a synthesis of Christ and the culture, 4. posing a dualism between Christ and the culture, and finally 5. the conversion of the culture. In his writing Avery Dulles reduces these five models to three: a confrontational model, a synthesis model and a transformation model.
At first glance this seems difficult reading. However, does it not become quite clear when we picture our young people in the classrooms of our religious education program? They are very much part of their culture. Much in this culture seems hostile to Catholic faith. Do we expect the young student to reject the culture or to make all sorts of accommodations to the culture, or to study the faith in such a way that the student might see the faith as leading to a conversion of the culture, at least in the student’s cultural experience?
Father Connelly
PRAYING THE LITURGY
Dialogue responses: A familiar greeting by the priest (four times during the Mass) is “The Lord be with you”; the new response by the people is: “and with your spirit”, from the Latin, “Et cum spiritu tuo”. This gives a richer translation and alerts us to the fact that we are entering a sacramental realm. Both the greeting and the reply come from the Bible. Our response, “And with your spirit” is used by St. Paul as he addresses the entire Christian community. (2 Timothy 4:22, Galatians 6:18, Philippians 4:23 and Philemon 25). It expresses our desire that the Lord be present to the spirit of the entire community.
The Eucharistic Prayer begins with a dialogue using the same words, “The Lord be with you” “and with your spirit”; it concludes with the priest saying, “Let us give thanks to the Lord our God”, to which our new response is “It is right and just”, a declarative statement closer to the Latin. Our response also serves as a more natural bridge to the beginning phrase of the Preface prayer, as the priest says: “It is truly right and just”.
Winifred Murphy, Pastoral Associate
PARISH CAPITAL PROJECTS
The rectory has been repainted, the small parking lot has been repaved, and dormer project is almost complete. The work on the new grotto for Our Lady behind the convent is well underway. Check out the pictures on the display board in the gathering space, or take a walk around the grounds and see for yourself!
The Parish’s share of the cost for Our Lady’s grotto, including basic landscaping, is $7,800. If you would like to make a donation to help cover this expense, please make your check out to Sacred Heart and note it is for the grotto. For gifts in memory or honor of family members or friends, please also note their names.
SIGNINGS
Is there a member of your family who is not good at making friends? Does that person lack something that attracts others? Does that person lack a drive to go out to others in friendship? Is the person suffering from a lack of self worth?
Sometimes we tend to want to help such a person in the wrong way. We think that the person should be the same as we are; that they should find the courage, or discover some strength. We think that they should think more positively about themselves. We try to encourage them this way and it doesn't help.
The problem is that we think of our own attractiveness to others, or our strength to go out to others; our gifts and talents are a credit to ourselves. We like to think well of ourselves and imagine that our beauty or our strength is a result of our own will. Others who don't succeed like us must not be trying so hard or working so hard as ourselves.
Often the opposite is true. The very beautiful or smart person usually needs to spend much less time and effort to succeed in being beautiful or excelling intellectually. The less smart or beautiful needs to work a lot harder to succeed in these areas and some may try much harder and experience no success at all.
So what does all this have to do with the Gospel? Jesus was talking to us about the kingdom again in the Gospel today. He emphasizes that the Kingdom is again like we heard last week - not a solution to inequality by an establishment of some spiritual egalitarian utopia. It is a place with people who are first and last just like earth.
Part of the answer to how things will work out in the Kingdom to come is that it will be something like an opposite world. That seems to be part of what Jesus is getting at. It is like high school maybe. Many who seem at first to be the most popular and mighty turn out to be surprisingly disappointing and sometimes the quiet hardworking high school student who needs to really work to succeed turns out to be a fruitful contributor to the world.
Heaven awaits and our place in it is being worked out now by how we use our gifts. Many gifts in this life might in the end prove a curse for many in the hierarchy of heaven.
In Christ,
Fr. St. Martin
SCHOOL SUPPLIES FOR MOTHER CAROLINE ACADEMY
At the Church entrances you will find receptacles for your donations to Mother Caroline Academy. This back to school drive for school supplies ends next weekend. Please check last week’s bulletin on line for needed items.
CLASSES AT THE MACKENZIE CENTER
Kids Karate - This session we will offer karate classes on Tuesdays 5-5:30 for ages 3-5 and 5:30-6:15 pm for Beginner and Returning students ages over 5. The first 6-week session begins September 27th and ends November 1st 2011. Try the first class on 9/27 for free. Cost for new students is $90.00 which includes a 6-week session and uniform. (Returning students cost is $60.00). If you would like a new uniform please let me know so I can have one for you at the start of the session. Instructor is Marisa Cimino, Fourth Degree Black Belt in Shorin-Ryu Karate.
Zumba Gold® – This session we will offer Zumba Gold classes on Tuesdays at 9am. The first 4 week session begins September 27th and ends October 25th 2011. Try the first class on 9/27 for free. Zumba Gold takes the Zumba formula and modifies it for the older participant as well as those just starting a fitness journey. It is a dance-fitness class that feels friendly, and most of all is fun! Cost is $12.50 per class with a 1 month commitment. We need a minimum of 8 participants to run the class. Instructor is Donna Montesanti Licensed Zumba and Zumba Gold instructor
COMPANION NEEDED FOR PARISHIONER
Kathie Long needs someone to be a companion for John, so that she can leave him in capable hands from time to time, especially Tuesday evenings this fall. Person must be willing to understand Alzheimer’s behavior; be kind, flexible and work for $15/hour. Own transportation or live nearby in Waban. Call the rectory for phone number.
CALENDAR NOTES
EXTENDED COFFEE HOUR:
Sunday, Sept. 25 – 10 AM – 1 PM – Parish Ctr.
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION – Grades 1-5
Sunday, Sept. 25 – 10:30 – 11:45 AM – Lower Church
BOY SCOUTS:
Monday, September 26 – 7:30 PM – Parish Center
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION – Tuesday, September 27:
Grades 1-5 – 4:00 to 5:15 PM – Lower Church
Grades 6-10 – 7:00 to 8:30 PM – Lower Church
PARENT INFORMATION NIGHT – Theology of the Body
Tuesday, September 27 – 7-8:00 PM – Lower Church Chapel
HOLLY HARVEST WORKSHOP:
Tuesday, September 27 – 7:00 PM – Convent Guild Room
KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS:
Wednesday, September 28 – 7:30 PM – Convent DR
PRAYER GROUP:
Wednesday, September 28 – 7:30 PM – Convent Chapel
COFFEE HOUR:
Friday, Sept. 30 – Following 9 AM Mass – Parish Center
LITURGY, ADORATION AND THE ROSARY:
Saturday, October 1 – 9 AM to 12:30 PM – Lower Church