Category: News & updates

The Code of Canon Law defines a parish as “a certain community of the Christian faithful stably constituted in a particular church, whose pastoral care is entrusted to a pastor as its proper pastor under the authority of the diocesan bishop” (Canon 515 §1). But what is the purpose of a parish – why have them at all? The USCCB statement Communities of Salt and Light says “The parish is where the Church lives. Parishes are communities of faith, of action, and of hope. They are where the gospel is proclaimed and celebrated, where believers are formed and sent to renew the earth.”

This last Sunday – in both my homily and in the pastor’s notes of the bulletin (see page 4) – I made an appeal that I’ll repeat here: Saint Mark parish needs help. I need help. The work of our parish is at stake – without regular, committed, and on-going help, we will be unable to maintain essential ministries & programs. Please consider how you can help, both in prayer and action! Even the smallest of works help our parish proclaim and live the gospel more fully.

Speaking of small acts, there’s a neat story I want to share. Every month I send out birthday & anniversary postcards to my brother priests. My July anniversary cards happened to have a photo of the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth, Israel on the front, a brief description of which I included on the bottom right corner of the message side of the card.

By some machine glitch of the USPS – and despite me properly addressing the cards and only paying for regular postcard postage – all of them were accidently sent to Nazareth! From there, Israeli Post delivered them all to the basilica, where they were received by the bemused and more than slightly confused Franciscan community who cares for the church.

To my great delight, one of the members of the community went to the effort to help me out. Initially, he simply forwarded the first postcard to its proper destination. When twelve more arrive, he gathered them all together and sent them back with a kind note explaining what had happened. I’ve since gotten them to their intended recipients (sent in envelopes that do not have potentially machine-confusing labeling 🙄), but now with a story of how their card not only has a picture of the Holy Land…but actually went there and back! In the words of the Exultet: ‘O happy fault!’

I hope that this week also brings you many ‘happy faults’, with all the blessings & delights that come with them. Know of my prayers for you throughout.

Yours in Christ,
Father Maurer

P.S. The photo that triggered this whole saga (above) is of the altar in Mary’s home, where the angel Gabriel appeared to her to announce the conception of Christ.

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Monday, September 4 – In 1981, Pope John Paul II published his encyclical Laborem Exercens, itself celebrating the ninetieth anniversary of its predecessor Rerum Novarum. Our annual Labor Day celebration is an excellent cue for Catholics to revisit the Church’s teaching on the dignity of laborers, the gift of work, and how the exercise of our talents & skills fits into the Lord’s plan for mankind and eternity!

September 8 – The feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary is a traditional celebration of the birth of Mary, celebrated since at least the sixth century. Though Scripture does not give an account of her birth, the apocryphal Protoevangelium of James offers a non-historical expression of Christian piety on the development of the tradition of her birth. Read more at Loyola Press.

September 9 – Today is the memorial of Saint Peter Claver, ‘apostle to the slaves’. When he was just 20 years old, Peter joined the Society of Jesus. Ten years later he left for Cartagena in present-day Colombia – one of the primary hubs of the Spanish slave trade – where he finished his seminary training. The plight of the slaves he encountered so touched him that at his final profession to the Jesuit order he signed his vows ‘Peter Claver, the slave of the Africans forever’. For 40 years, he served them while also preaching to slaver traders, criminals, and the wealthy before eventually catching the plague. He was canonized in 1888, together with his friend & mentor Alphonsus Rodriguez. Read more about him at Word on Fire.

This Sunday we offered our goodbyes and thanks to Deacon Kirk Altenhofen as he celebrated his last Masses at Saint Mark parish. As I mentioned in last week’s pastor’s post, he has served faithfully at nearly every liturgy, coordinated our faith formation programs, and offered himself in ministry for the last several years. We have been blessed to have him. Please join me in praying for him as he discerns how God is calling him in his vocation as husband, father, and deacon.

This last week also saw the last of our ‘Ask Me Anything’ summer series. Thank you to Dane for leading the conversation on suffering, as well as fielding the many questions that were offered across a variety of topics. Despite it being the final session, we had 30+ folks come to share in food, fellowship, and faith sharing. This is definitely something we hope to revisit in the future.

There was one question asked that comes up with some regularity in parishes: ‘why don’t we more frequently use Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion’? As you might imagine, this is especially relevant given that I will be the only cleric at Masses starting next month! The short answer is that that the name of such ministers gives away the intention of the Church: that they are extraordinary (ie, out of the ordinary).

In 2004, the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacrament (now called the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments) released a document called Redemptionis Sacramentum. Among many other things, it explicitly speaks to how Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion (Redemptionis Sacramentum, 154-160) may only assist at Mass for sufficient reason. The teaching document even goes so far as to name brief prolongation of the Mass as insufficient reason for their use. If you’re interested in learning more about this, I highly recommend reading the whole section of the document – it is just a few paragraphs and is both enlightening & edifying.

This is not to say we don’t need help at our parish – especially at Mass! As the summer comes to an end, we are in real need of assistance for a number of ministries in & out of Mass: lectors, ushers, confirmation (youth) and RCIA (adult converts) teachers, in particular. And if there is some other way you’d like to be involved at the parish, please give us a shout!

Finally, please keep our parish and our archdiocese in your prayers, especially in the coming weeks. As you know, Partners in the Gospel is rolling out – we will be having our own input session on the draft family configuration on Thursday, September 28. As we discern how God is calling us locally and beyond, may we be sure to entrust ourselves to His loving will.

Yours in Christ,

Father Maurer

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Monday, August 28 – Bishop of Hippo and a Doctor of the Church, Saint Augustine not only had great influence during his lifetime but continues to provide inspiration & wisdom to modern Christians. One of the greatest Catholic minds of history, his works are cited throughout the Catechism, Church documents, and by Christians worldwide.

Saint Augustine never failed to credit his faith, rooted as it is in Christ, as having been placed in his heart through the intercession of his mother, Saint Monica (whose feast day, August 27, is not celebrated this year because it lands on a Sunday). Despite his wanderlust – and oh how he wandered! – it was his mother’s faith that ultimately brought him to Christ. Finally sharing the faith here on earth, they yet looked to heaven – one such conversation is recorded by Saint Augustine in his book, Confessions (you can read about it, and them both, at Aleteia). May we ask the intercession of these two faithful saints, and pray for our own conversion, and that of the whole world.

Tuesday, August 29 – Though he famously said ‘I must decrease, he must increase’, we nonetheless celebrate Saint John the Baptist in the liturgical calendar – on the feast of his birth (June 24) and today, the Passion of Saint John the Baptist. Though he was known on earth for his prophetic lifestyle (and wardrobe!) and his role in preparing the way for Christ, perhaps his greatest triumph was offering his life for the Lord – first in stepping aside when his role as “the voice of one crying out in the desert, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord'” (John 1:23), and lastly in his martyrdom at the hands of Herod.

May we, like Saint John the Baptist, humbly embrace our own vocations! Though we are small in comparison to the Lord, He no less treasures our part in His plan. Let us witness to Christ in our words and our work – perhaps asking along the way for the gift of humility in all we do.