Fr. Luis R. Largaespada
ABCD 2021
MASS SCHEDULE
Daily Mass
Monday-Friday 8 am (Live stream)
Saturday 8 am, 5:30 pm (Vigil Mass)
Sunday
English: 9 am, 10:30 am (Live stream), 5:30 pm
Spanish: 12:30 pm (Live stream), 7 pm
In order to comply with Archdiocesan standards for the COVID-19 pandemic, occupancy of the church is limited to 30% of capacity. This means we can only accommodate a maximum of between 70-100 persons (allowing for families comprised of several members). Please make sure you sign up and arrive early so you don’t forfeit your seat.
A Sunday Reflection
Third Sunday of Lent (Cycle B)
“WHAT SIGN CAN YOU SHOW US FOR DOING THIS?” (JN 2:18).
Signs. We all want them. It seems that we are never satisfied with what we see or hear, and always require more proof to be convinced of something. The sign Jesus offers is His own body: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up”, He answers referring, as the evangelist tells us, to “the temple of His body” (2:21). Yes! The resurrection is the final and greatest sign, as St. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:14, if Christ has not risen, our faith is in vain.
Our world is also looking for signs. And the only sign we can and must offer is Christ crucified: “Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor 1:24). As Pope Benedict XVI said in 2009, let us remember that we “have nothing to propose or give to those we meet, except Christ and the Good News of his cross.” In the words of the Pope emeritus, we “do not pursue economic, social or political objectives; [we] proclaim Christ, certain that the Gospel can move the hearts of all and transform them” (Angelus, March 15, 2009).
As we come to the midpoint of Lent, let us ask the Lord to move us to conversion and to transform our hearts in the pattern of His own Sacred Heart. Again, my thanks to the 144 families who have pledged to the ABCD, and an invitation to those who haven’t to make it part of your Lenten observance. God bless you.
LENTEN CALENDAR
Holy Hour of Adoration
Monday through Thursday
after the 8 am Mass
Stations of the Cross in English
Fridays after the 8 am Mass
Bilingual Stations of the Cross
Fridays 6:30 pm
Traditional Latin Mass
Consecration to St. Joseph
Friday, March 19, 7:00 pm
Reconciliation
Saturdays, 4:30 – 5:15 pm
Also during the 5:30 pm Saturday Mass, and during the 9 am,
10:30 am and 12:30 pm Masses on Sunday.
Bilingual Mass / Consecration to St. Joseph
Friday, March 19, 12 noon
Bilingual Mass for the Solemnity of the Annunciation
Thursday, March 25, 12 noon
Bilingual Stations of the Cross and Taize Prayer Service
Friday, March 28, 6:30 pm
News
Around the Parish
Fr. Luis blesses the new Stations of the Cross outside the church, on the Fri-day after Ash Wednesday. Stations will be prayed every Friday during Lent at 6:30 pm.
SCHOOL VIRTUAL OPEN HOUSE
School News
BOOK PARADE
On Wednesday, February 24th, our 1st and 3rd grade students participated in our annual book parade. A special thank you to Mrs. Gómez, Mrs. Rico, Mrs. Torres and Ms. González for organizing such a wonderful activity for our students.
AUTHOR APPRECIATION DAY
On Wednesday, February, 24th, we celebrated Author Appreciation Day! Students showed their appreciation by working on projects that celebrated their favorite authors.
Lenten Message 2021
“Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem” (Mt 20:18).
LENT: A TIME FOR RENEWING FAITH, HOPE AND LOVE
Jesus was speaking of the future opened up by the Father’s mercy. Hoping with him and because of him means believing that history does not end with our mistakes, our violence and injustice, or the sin that crucifies Love. It means receiving from his open heart the Father’s forgiveness.
Lent is precisely the season of hope, when we turn back to God who patiently continues to care for his creation which we have often mistreated (cf. Laudato Si’, 32-33; 43-44). Saint Paul urges us to place our hope in reconciliation: “Be reconciled to God” (2 Cor 5:20). By receiving forgiveness in the sacrament that lies at the heart of our process of conversion, we in turn can spread forgiveness to others. Having received forgiveness ourselves, we can offer it through our willingness to enter into attentive dialogue with others.
In Lent, may we be increasingly concerned with “speaking words of comfort, strength, consolation and encouragement, and not words that demean, sadden, anger or show scorn” (Fratelli Tutti, 223). In order to give hope to others, it is sometimes enough simply to be kind, to be “willing to set everything else aside in order to show interest, to give the gift of a smile, to speak a word of encouragement, to listen amid general indifference” (ibid., 224)
To experience Lent in hope entails growing in the realization that, in Jesus Christ, we are witnesses of new times, in which God is “making all things new” (cf. Rev 21:1-6). It means receiving the hope of Christ, who gave his life on the cross and was raised by God on the third day, and always being “prepared to make a defense to anyone who calls [us] to account for the hope that is in [us]” (1 Pet 3:15).
