St. Mary's Parish

Bulletin Reflection

Prayer for Leadership

Alice Camille

How often do you pray for the president? It doesn’t matter if you didn’t vote for him—maybe you should pray harder for those you didn’t want to elect! Have you ever prayed for the leaders of Europe, or Russia, or China, or the Middle East? Would you lift up a prayer for a poor leader or one you deemed outright evil?

Leadership might be one of the world’s most neglected vocations. There will always be folks who grab power, but leadership is something else again. When we look to the gospel for direction, we see that a leader must first of all be a servant. To serve at the top, one must be familiar with the bottom. To know how and where to lead, you have to know where your followers are to begin with and where they need to go.

The church teaches something called the “common good.” If leaders want to serve their people best, they should determine what’s best for all, not only for the strongest, smartest, or loudest. “Survival of the fittest” is not a principle that serves the common good. “The last will be first” is more like it.

This is why, on this World Day of Prayer for Vocations, we might consider the example of Saint Peter, the church’s rock. Even if Jesus hadn’t appointed him as head over all, perhaps he might have been voted in by popular acclaim. It’s hard not to like Peter: bold, passionate, articulate, impetuous. Above all, he’s very human. Peter makes sense to us. He also wakes up our inner hero and makes us aspire to be like him.

Consider his speech today, delivered after a night spent in jail under custody of the religious authorities. These are the same authorities who mere weeks ago dragged Jesus before Pilate and demanded his crucifixion. Peter has every reason to be afraid. If ever there was a time to soft-pedal your dogma, this is it.

But Peter’s learned some things from his time at the bottom—about the true cost of compromise and the grief of denying your friends and yourself. He’s not going to take the safe way out and refuse to acknowledge the one he denied before. So he declares that he comes in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, the crucified one, the Risen One, the stone rejected, the cornerstone, the name that saves. Clear enough?

Such courage garners a collective gasp from the Sanhedrin. They instinctively know they can’t contain this determination. So they let their captives go. If we want to see this kind of courage in the world again, all we have to do is pray for it. Today’s a good day for that. Every day is.

Reprinted with permission

Prepare the Word (©2011)

www.preparetheword.com

 Bulletin Announcements

K of C Our Mother of Perpetual Help Council #9538 are celebrating their 25th anniversary on May 1. 2012.  A celebration Mass will be held at 6:00pm with a banquet at 7:30pm.  Tickets for this event are $15.00 and will be available April 1, 2012 following the Masses.  This celebration is open to all parishioners of St. Mary’s.

 Kateri Pilgrimage:  Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish invites you to join us July 8 to 15, 2012 ,  for a week-long pilgrimage to the birth place (Auresville, N.Y.) and the burial site (Kahnawake, Quebec) of Blessed Kateri Tekawitha. The pilgrimage is to celebrate the canonization of Blessed Kateri, which will take place in Rome, October 21, 2012. Blessed Kateri will be the First North American Aboriginal person to be declared a saint. Included in the pilgrimage are visits to many other shrines and sacred places throughout Quebec and New York State. Cost for the pilgrimage is $1,978. A $300 deposit must be made upon registration and submitted to Mary Jacobi at Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish. For more information please contact Mary at 653-4945, or email maryjacobi@shaw.ca . Pilgrimage arranged by Rev. Ralph Kleiter, Ministry to Tourism, Diocese of Saskatoon.

Correction Attention all present and former students/staff of St. Mary’s School in Saskatoon!  An invitation is extended to all past and present students, staff and community members of St. Mary’s School to attend the St. Mary’s Community School Reunion being held on Saturday May 5, 2012 beginning at 12:00 noon with a Mass at St. Mary’s Church to celebrate the event followed by a program, desserts and tours at the school at 1 p.m. Please consider attending and celebrating with us on this day. For more information, please call Tony Bairos at 281-9564.

St. Mary’s CWL – General Meeting will be held on Wednesday, May 2nd after the 7:15 p.m. Mass.

ADORATION OF THE BLESSED SACRAMENT Please join fellow parishioners for this valuable way of prayer on Saturday, May 5th, following the 9:00 a.m. Mass.  Due to other commitments, Adoration will end at 11:00am for the month only.

K OF C BREAKFAST The next Knights of Columbus Breakfast will be held on Sunday May 13thfollowing the 9:00 a.m. and 11:00 a.m. Masses.  Everyone is welcome

ANOINTING MASS  Our annual Mass with Anointing of the Sick will be held on May 8th at 1:00pm.  Refreshments will be served in the upper hall following the Mass.  If you require a ride to this event, please contact the parish office no later than Friday May 4.  VOLUNTEERS, please inform the people you visit about this Mass and offer to bring them, if possible.

GOT YARN?  WE’LL KNIT!!!  If you come across any yarn that you will not be using and could be used for creating our prayer shawls, we would be happy to receive it and restock our empty bins.  Thank you!  Contact Iris at 244-2983.

ST GEORGE’S SENIOR CENTRE will be hosting a Mother’s Day tea on Wednesday May 9th from 1:00pm to 4:00pm.  The cost of the event is $3.00/person.  Please join us for music, bingo, and door prizes.

Saskatoon Global Day of Prayer 2012, May 27, City Centre Church (720-20th St. West), 7 p.m. – 9 p.m.  Join us for 10 days of prayer leading up to the GDOP, beginning Thursday, May 17-Saturday May 26.  Contact the organizing team at gdop.saskatoon@gmail.com or look for us on facebook:  Global Day of Prayer May 27, 2012 in Saskatoon.

Upcoming Pro-Life events include the annual March For Life Saskatoon on Mother’s Day, Sunday, May 13 from 2:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. along College Frive, followed by pro-life updates and refreshments. For information contact Denise at (306) 249-2764.

Saskatoon City Deanery Choir -  Every deanery in our diocese was invited to organize a choir to perform at the Taste of the Diocese & Music Fest scheduled for Wednesday, May 9, 6:30 to 9:30 PM.  This event is part of the week long celebrations being sponsored to celebrate the opening of our new Cathedral.  The Saskatoon City Deanery Choir is being organized with the leadership of Shelly Lord and Darcie Lich.  Practices are scheduled for April 15, 22 and 29th, 3:00 – 4:30 at the Cathedral of the Holy Family.  Singers and musicians are all welcome.  For further information please contact Shelly Lord at slord@gscs.sk.ca

Home Ministry of Care

Caring for others bridges the unmet needs in our broken world.  We are people of hearts … the Gospel message flows from us.  We touch hearts and we touch lives.

CONFIDENTIALITY is of utmost importance.  When you make a pastoral visit, the person must feel comfortable to share, with the assurance that what is said in confidence will not be betrayed.

This ends our series on “Caring for Others.”  Hopefully it was helpful.  We interact with people all the time and it is of great value to practice the qualities explained in the past few weeks, be it in a care giving situation or not.

SODALITAS: Are you grieving and suffering from a loss?  Join us for SODALITAS; a safe caring group for reflecting and sharing for those who are experiencing grief.  Our next meeting is Saturday, May 5, 2012 at 10:00AM in the upper room of St. Mary’s Parish Hall.

 Altar Server, Youth & Other News

The first important piece of business for this space is about an exciting moment which is happening next Sunday.  In May, there is a great chance to move into the future.  Sunday morning, May 6 at 10:00am, there is a farewell mass at St. Paul’s Cathedral and then a walk from there to the New Diocese Home, the Cathedral of the Holy Family.

This walk, of about seven kilometres, gives all of us a chance to move into the future.  Everyone in the Parish is invited, the Knights and  the Catholic Women’s League.  The youth in our parish are strongly encouraged to join us.  We will walk as a group from St. Paul’s to Holy Family and grow in solidarity as members of this community.  It is a great way to get to know our brothers and sisters, not to mention the walk is a great way to spend a Sunday morning.  Please check the Diocese Newsletter www.DioceseofSaskatoon.com for more information.  Fr. Steve will be representing St. Mary’s, come and walk with him.

Altar Servers are having a practise, social and lunch on Saturday May 19th, (the week after Mother’s Day) all servers need to be there.  Permission forms for the upcoming campout on June 30th  at the Ukrainian Park and Campground will be available then.  Servers and interested parents need to be there for more information and permission forms. we will also talk about costs for the weekend then.

 Mass Intentions

Monday, April 30  9:00 a.m  †Alec Dekovic

Tuesday, May 1  9:00 a.m  †Garry Bohun

Wednesday, May 2    9:00 a.m  †Ana & Luis Moreira & Family

7:15 p.m  †Alfred & Norma Raiche

Thursday, May 3    9:00 a.m  †Alex Lucyshyn

Friday, May 4    9:00 a.m  †Terisa Berzolla

Saturday, May 5    9:00 a.m  †Camiel & Emil Demeester & Family

7:00 p.m  †Jose Silveria

Sunday, May 6  9:00 a.m  †Josephine Cechanowicz

11:00 a.m  For the parish

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Bulletin Reflection

For folks who only go green on St. Patrick’s Day, it should be noted that today is Earth Day. People around the world are pleading the case for Mother Earth once more. Many Christians remain skeptical about a show of support for a world which is surely passing. Does the planet matter so much, because the Kingdom is coming and we’re on our way out of here anyway?

Pope Benedict XVI, not a granola-munching liberal, updated the pop-justice bumper sticker in 2010 by declaring: “If You Want Peace, Protect Creation.” Calling governments, corporations, and individuals to account, the pope asked, “Can we remain indifferent before the problems associated with such realities as climate change, desertification, the deterioration and loss of productivity in vast agricultural areas, the pollution of rivers and aquifers, the loss of biodiversity, the increase of natural catastrophes, and the deforestation of equatorial and tropical regions?”

In saying that Benedict added his voice to that of Pope Paul VI, who pointed out that by exploiting nature, we create wide-ranging social problems which concern the entire human family. Pope John Paul II noted decades ago that “world peace is threatened” by a lack of due respect for nature. It seems the church insists on getting its hands dirty in the politics of ecology, no matter how much some may resist it.

The material world does matter. Religion might seem like a purely spiritual realm properly concerned with prayer and ritual and inward things, but Christianity can never beg off on corporeal realities. Luke’s gospel deliberately makes the case that Christians are not Gnostics, who blow off the grim material world in favor of a higher spiritual plain. Honestly, Jesus the Ghost would have made more sense, been received more readily, and made a tidier religious doctrine to loft into the future. The body of Christ was tortured, torn upon the cross, and died. Best to leave it in the tomb and move on!

Evangelists like Luke won’t take the easy way out. Easter begins as the women go out to anoint the body. Yes, Jesus has been dead for days, but what happens to his body still matters. Next, the pair traveling to Emmaus encounter Jesus. He might have appeared as a beam of light or a voice from heaven but he prefers to be a traveling companion and dinner guest, breaking bread with them. Finally, as these two recount the event to the astonished disciples, Jesus appears again and insists he is no ghost. He demands to be touched, and he asks for food. Jesus won’t be a vision from heaven or remain God’s Great Idea up in the sky. Jesus insists we wash feet, anoint the sick, feed the hungry, and keep our fingers close to the world’s wounds.

Reprinted with permission

Prepare the Word (©2011)

www.preparetheword.com

 Announcements

K of C Our Mother of Perpetual Help Council #9538 are celebrating their 25th anniversary on May 1. 2012.  A celebration Mass will be held at 6:00pm with a banquet at 7:30pm.  Tickets for this event are $15.00 and will be available April 1, 2012 following the Masses.  This celebration is open to all parishioners of St. Mary’s.

Accomodations Wanted  A single immigrant woman in her 30′s working full time weekdays is seeking room and board in Saskatoon with a female senior citizen in exchange for cleaning, assistance with evening meal and bedtime preparation and companionship. References available. Contact number 880-2484.

CWL NEWS – Our Lady of Good Counsel Pot Luck Supper is at Our Lady of Lourdes Friday, April 27th.  Mass is at 5:30 p.m. followed by dinner and entertainment.

Kateri Pilgrimage:  Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish invites you to join us July 8 to 15, 2012 ,  for a week-long pilgrimage to the birth place (Auresville, N.Y.) and the burial site (Kahnawake, Quebec) of Blessed Kateri Tekawitha. The pilgrimage is to celebrate the canonization of Blessed Kateri, which will take place in Rome, October 21, 2012. Blessed Kateri will be the First North American Aboriginal person to be declared a saint. Included in the pilgrimage are visits to many other shrines and sacred places throughout Quebec and New York State. Cost for the pilgrimage is $1,978. A $300 deposit must be made upon registration and submitted to Mary Jacobi at Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish. For more information please contact Mary at 653-4945, or email maryjacobi@shaw.ca . Pilgrimage arranged by Rev. Ralph Kleiter, Ministry to Tourism, Diocese of Saskatoon.

Attention all present and former students/staff of St. Mary’s School in Saskatoon!  An invitation is extended to all past and present students, staff and community members of St. Mary’s School to attend the St. Mary’s Community School Reunion being held on Saturday May 5, 2012 beginning at 1 p.m. A Mass will be held to celebrate the event at St. Mary’s Church followed by a program, desserts and tours at the school at 2 p.m. Please consider attending and celebrating with us on this day. For more information, please call Tony Bairos at 281-9564

St. Mary’s CWL – General Meeting will be held on Wednesday, May 2nd after the 7:15 p.m. Mass.

Fill These Hearts: God, Sex and the Universal Longing will be presented 7 p.m. Saturday April 28 at Circle Drive Alliance Church, Saskatoon. Join renowned author and speaker Christopher West for an evening of beauty and reflection on John Paul II’s Theology of the Body — a bold, organic and contemporary understanding of human love in the divine plan. West is joined by indie-folk band Mike Mangione & The Union whose music explores the themes of the Theology of the Body. Through spoken presentation, visual art and live performance, enter into the beauty of this message and how it illuminates life’s deepest questions. Come to know the “whys” behind the “what” of this Christian understanding of sexuality. Adults: $40, Students: $25 (save 10 per cent by registering before March 31.) For tickets call the box office at (306) 384-7727 or for more information go online: www.St-T.ca/fth2012

Momentum Youth Rally: for Grades 6-8, Saturday, April 28. Highlights: Praise and worship, great keynote talks, Mass with Bishop Donald Bolen; skits, epic games, faith enrichment, food and tons of fun! Who: All Grades 6-8 youth are welcome to this diocesan youth rally! High School students are able to apply as student leaders. Location: Cathedral of the Holy Family, 123 Nelson Road, Saskatoon; Cost: $40. Time: 10 a.m. to 9 p.m., Saturday, April 28; registration opens 9 a.m. Keynote Speaker this year is Greg Thompson; find out more about Greg online at: http://web.me.com/gtministry.  For more information about Momentum, talk to Fr. Steve or e-mail Colm Leyne at: youthmin@saskatoonrcdiocese.com

ST. ANN’S POLKA MASS Watrous, SK., at Danceland, Manitou Beach, Sunday, April 29th 2012, 11:00 am.  Plan to come and listen to the Gospel singing at 10:30 am.  Mass will be followed by a hot Brunch of Hashbrown Casserole, Ham, Pancakes, fruit and muffins, with Ice cream for dessert.  Adults – $8.00, 12 & Under – $5.00, Pre-school – Free

 Home Ministry of Care

Caring for others bridges the unmet needs in our broken world.  We are people of hearts … the Gospel message flows from us.  We touch hearts and we touch lives.

To be effective we must be have COMPASSION.  To be compassionate means to enter with other people where they are at in their suffering.  It means to enter the places of pain respectfully, genuinely, with empathy and understanding.  Caring an compassion go hand in hand.  It’s vital that we don’t run away from their pain and use phrases such as “Oh, it isn’t so bad”, or “things will be better tomorrow”.  These are NOT helpful and can just shut them off.  To enter into the pain of the other person, we must LISTEN with an open, caring heart, and not to try to “fix” them.  If someone feels they are being listened to and heard, and cared about, healing will take place.

If you are spring cleaning and come across some yarn that could be used for creating our prayer shawls, we would be happy to help you “downsize”.  Thank You!!

ANOINTING MASS  Our annual Mass with Anointing of the Sick will be held on May 8th at 1:00pm.  Refreshments will be served in the upper hall following the Mass.  If you require a ride to this event, please contact the parish office no later than Friday April 27.  VOLUNTEERS, please inform the people you visit about this Mass and offer to bring them, if possible.

 Youth Ministry

Jesus I trust in You!  These are the words our Easter season calls us too share.  They are clearly the words that Divine Mercy Sunday calls to us.  We are called to trust.  Every Sunday this space shows us different aspects of trust and this weekend is no different.  We trust in God’s mercy as we pray about and act on Vocation questions in our lives.  We pray for God’s tender mercy as we find ways for our parish young adults and youth to share their faith.

In the next few weeks we will be invited to trust in God’s great generosity for us as our Vocations are clearly brought to the forefront.  On Sunday April 29, the entire world, especially the church in Canada, celebrates the World Day of Prayer for Vocations.  We are given a chance to pray for our diocese, the seminarians for our diocese, all of our priests, the men and women who are being called by God, those people who have responded already and the many people who are called to live in this world as single adults.  For more information about World Day of Prayer for Vocations, contact Fr. Steve.

Also on the same weekend is a great chance for all of us to pray.  “Fill These Hearts”, Pope John Paul II’s work on the Theology of the Body is being presented.  See the poster at the back of the church, read the insert in the bulletin, or ask Fr. Steve about this great opportunity to learn more about who we are and God’s love for all of us, tickets are going fast, GET YOURS!

Check out the information poster at the church entrance about Blackstrap camp this summer, it is a great place for faith to grow!

Altar servers, the end of June/end of school camp weekend is not that far away keep looking here for more details.  Permission forms will soon be in your hands, servers talk about it!

 Mass Intentions

Monday, April 23  9:00 a.m  †Jose Resendes

Tuesday, April 24  9:00 a.m  †Fernand Ethier

Wednesday, April 25    9:00 a.m  †William Hsu

7:15 p.m  †Frank Eufemia

Thursday, April 26    9:00 a.m  †Steve Lalonde

Friday, April 27  9:00 a.m  †Natalie Melo & †Joe Moreira

Saturday, April 28    9:00 a.m  †Lauren Rice

7:00 p.m  †Vlasta Zalesak

Sunday, April 29  9:00 a.m  †Henry Boire

11:00 a.m  For the parish

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