Encouraging the Culture of Encounter with Jesus Christ, His Church, and All People

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Happy Father’s Day!
A child’s dad is the person who images God the Father to his sons and daughters.  When our dads fulfill their role as loving protector, guardian of the family, self-sacrificing provider, and spiritual head of the family then they image God the Father to their children.  While only our Heavenly Father is perfect, He has seen fit to gives us earthly fathers, who even if not perfect, have great potential to convey God’s grace.  May we honor our fathers today and thank them for their sacrificial love and example.  In this month when we celebrate the Sacred Heart of Jesus, we pray for our fathers to grow in their relationship with Christ and to love as He loves with a Father’s heart. 

Pride and the Need for Holy Fathers
Sadly, we are in great need for virtuous men and fathers in our society.  Our culture is now celebrating Pride Month.  How unfortunate that we have come to a point where we not only ignore Jesus this month, but we replace Him, not with a harmless Easter bunny, but one of the capital sins! - PRIDE!  One might argue that Pride month began in protest of the unjust and violent persecution of those with same-sex attraction. We can denounce violence without celebrating what Pride month has become.  It is now an all-out assault on God’s design for men, women, children, family, and society.  Sexual perversions are celebrated and those who dare to disagree and not celebrate this month are shamed.  Big media, big tech, big business, and big government have seemed to jump on board the pride bandwagon.  All the while we forget that this form of pride is a sin.  It is literally saying, “No God, not your way - my way!” The pride of exerting one’s “self-identity” flies in the face of reality, natural law, and the very way God loves. This rejection leads us to spiritual and societal ruin.

Our culture is quite confused on many things.  Not only when it comes to ethics and morality, but even regarding the reality of human nature.  Men, women, and the basics of family life, are muddled and blurred in the name of pride.  Children need moms and dads to grow bodily, psychologically, and spiritually. In God’s plan only women can be mothers and only men can be fathers.  This does not deny the reality of unique situations where there may be single moms or dads or uncles or grandmas taking care of kids.  Children are resilient and can still grow in unique circumstances as long as they are formed with the understanding of God’s plan of husband, wife and family.  More and more our world is making up its own circumstances and forcing children into unhealthy relationships and forming them against what God has given to us naturally.  We see this through the unnatural means of conception (in vitro fertilization), surrogacy, and selective abortions.  There are cases where people who live the homosexual or other varied orientation lifestyle then adopt children and raise them with good intention, but unavoidably form them to misunderstand God’s plan for sexuality and family life. 

We need good mothers and fathers, women and men called by God to live the gift of marriage as God designed it to raise children for His Kingdom. In particular I believe God is calling the men of today to embrace their authentic masculinity, their fatherhood.  Priests are called father because they are meant to sacrifice themselves and provide for the spiritual needs of their flocks.  Dads are to be that fatherly example for their sons and daughters so that they know being a man requires the desire to sacrifice.  Single men can grow a fatherly heart that sacrifices for others rather than fostering selfishness or sloth.  We need strong men becoming fathers humble enough to rely on God (as opposed to the pride of our age) and willing to sacrifice themselves for their families, the Church, and the common good.

Honoring St. Joseph
How blessed we are to have this year of St. Joseph. He is the patron of husbands, fathers, and the universal church. May we look to his example to help us as we pray for our fathers. Thank you to Nikolai Burke (who received his first communion last month) for helping us with the crowning of St. Joseph statue.  Join us at the 11:30 Mass this weekend where we can be with Nikolai as we honor St. Joseph.  We will continue honoring St. Joseph in the coming weeks by praying his litany after all the Masses. 

God bless!
Fr. Pfr