Many thanks for the generosity shown to me at Christmas through your prayers, cards and gifts. May the joy of Christ’s birth endure in our hearts throughout the coming New Year. I wish each of you and your families a blessed 2021.

This has been a very difficult year for each of us. As you are aware due to the circumstances of the current epidemic, we have had no choice but to change how we have had to conduct our singing, decorating and sitting arrangements for the safety of all.

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One of the best-loved Advent hymns we sing is "O Come, O Come Emmanuel". The verses of that stirring song are comprised of what the Church calls the Advent "O antiphons".

The O antiphons were composed in the 7th or 8th century by an anonymous monk. These seven, short poetic verses, in today's liturgy, are intoned or recited as the Alleluia verse before the Gospel at Mass, and as the antiphon for the Magnificat at vespers. Each Advent, the Church begins singing the O antiphons on December 17—seven days before Christmas.

“The Eucharist is ‘the source and summit of the Christian life’” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1324). Our worship of our Eucharistic Lord, Jesus — fully and completely present under the consecrated species of bread and wine — con- tinues outside of the celebration of Mass when the Sacred Hosts are reserved in the tabernacle for adoration.

The use of rose vestments during the sacred liturgy of the third Sunday of Advent has been a part of the Church’s tradition for many centuries and is a tradition we must hold onto. Rose gives us joy and a promise of hope; our world is in need of both. The Rose color, which is only used twice in the whole liturgical year, is traditionally associated with a sense of joy amidst a season of penance. On both Sundays (Gaudete in Advent and Laetare in Lent), rose is worn to remind us that the season of preparation is coming to a close and the great feast is swiftly approaching.

Advent is not the the same as Christmas. Advent is a time to praise God for his great gift of his Son, Jesus. It is a time to think about how ready we are to receive Jesus whenever he comes to us: in our daily life; in those who are in need; in the Eucharist at Mass; and at the end of time when Jesus comes in glory. Advent is a time to prepare our hearts and souls to celebrate the birthday of the Messiah.

Christian Charity moves us to pray and offer sacrifices for our family members, friends and benefactors who may still be in Purgatory before they enter the Beatific Vision of God in heaven.

A plenary indulgence may be gained for the Holy Souls by

1. Every day in the month of November, if one makes a visit to a church and recites the Our Father and the Apostles Creed and fulfill the ordinary requirements of Confessions, Communion, prayer for the pope’s intention, and give up all attachment to sin, even the slightest venial sins. (See requirements below)
2. Everyday in the month of November, a plenary indulgence may be granted for the dead, if the Christian faithful devoutly visit a cemetery and pray, if only mentally, for the dead. And also fulfill the ordinary requirements for a plenary indulgence. (See requirements below)
3. The Vatican also said that, because of the health emergency, the elderly, the sick, and others who cannot leave the house for serious reasons can participate in the indulgence from home by reciting prayers for the deceased before an image of Jesus or the Virgin Mary. (These people must have the intention of fulfilling the ordinary conditions as soon as possible. See requirements below)

The rosary is an invitation to experience the grace of Mary’s spiritual motherhood as she leads us to her Son, Jesus. For this reason, it has been an invaluable source of countless spiritual graces for the saints. Remember, every time you pray the rosary you are given the privilege and honor of pronouncing the holy name of Jesus more than 50 times.

The wealth of spiritual graces offered through the rosary comes not from the multiplication of prayers (see Matthew 6:7) but from the imitation of Christ through obedience to the Father’s will, according to the example of the Blessed Mother.

12 Promises of the Sacred Heart

Authored By: St. Margaret Mary

The Promises of the Sacred Heart of Jesus to St. Margaret Mary

1. "I will give them all the graces necessary in their state of life.
2. I will establish peace in their homes.
3. I will comfort them in all their afflictions.
4. I will be their secure refuge during life, and above all, in death.
5. I will bestow abundant blessings upon all their undertakings.
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It is a long-standing Catholic tradition that the month of May be dedicated to honoring the Blessed Virgin Mary.

“For this is the month during which Christians, in their churches and their homes, offer the Virgin Mother more fervent and loving acts of homage and veneration; and it is the month in which a greater abundance of God’s merciful gifts comes down to us from our Mother’s throne”

– Pope Paul VI, Mense Maio, Encyclical on Prayers During May for Preservation of Peace.

In this time of pandemic, where fear and loss cripples our world, where the storm rages and the winds of uncertainty blow – what better time than now that we should turn to our tender-hearted Blessed Mother and invoke her powerful intercession.

The month of May is the "month which the piety of the faithful has especially dedicated to Our Blessed Lady," and it is the occasion for a "moving tribute of faith and love which Catholics in every part of the world [pay] to the Queen of Heaven. During this month Christians, both in church and in the privacy of the home, offer up to Mary from their hearts an especially fervent and loving homage of prayer and veneration. In this month, too, the benefits of God's mercy come down to us from her throne in greater abundance" (Paul VI: Encyclical on the Month of May, no. 1).

One of the best-loved Advent hymns we sing is "O Come, O Come Emmanuel". The verses of that stirring song are comprised of what the Church calls the Advent "O antiphons".

The O antiphons were composed in the 7th or 8th century by an anonymous monk. These seven, short poetic verses, in today's liturgy, are intoned or recited as the Alleluia verse before the Gospel at Mass, and as the antiphon for the Magnificat at vespers. Each Advent, the Church begins singing the O antiphons on December 17—seven days before Christmas.

In structure, each of the O antiphons is made up of three parts. The first part is an invocation of Jesus by way of a title derived from an Old Testament prefiguring of Christ. The second part expands and elaborates on that invocation, at the same time conveying our grateful appreciation of God's providence at work wondrously in Jesus. Finally, each O antiphon closes with a fervent bidding that the Messiah come to us.

Taken together, the awesome O antiphons express our loving humility before God, our hope-filled powerlessness, and our confident trust and faith in God's promises.​