Dear Friends in Christ,             
                                                                 A Tiny Whispering Sound
 
Following the dismissal at the memorial Mass of the Dedication of the Basilica of St. Mary Major on Wednesday, August 5, there was a sudden eruption of voices of happy worshipers as they make their exit from the historical church. I have noticed similar occurrences at Sunday masses at the main parish church. Movement and sound in the church have always engaged my attention. As a trained actor, I think of the stage in terms of proper movement of actors and props; the effective utilization of stage space is dependent on the appropriate movement and actions of actors. I bring this imagination to bear upon the sacred space of the church from time to time. I feel like doing so this week. What is the proper mode of behavior in the church space? Maybe the right place to begin is to seek an understanding of what the church space is all about.
 
 The church is a dwelling place for the Lord, a sacred place filled with his presence, a holy place where his words are proclaimed and the sacraments are celebrated. It is true, God dwells in all places and people, yet the Sacred Scriptures show times without number that there are places dedicated especially to God's service and designed for his worship (see the preface of Dedication of a Church). The Lord says in 2 Chronicles 7: 16 concerning the mystery of God's temple: "I have chosen and consecrated this house that my name may be there forever." Hence, the church is a consecrated house where God's name is exalted. It is where his divine presence subsists for all time, a place of prayer, an image on earth of new Jerusalem, his heavenly city, its "Mount Zion and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem" (Hebrews 12:22-24).
 
 If, therefore, the church is a sacred place where God's people gather to celebrate the holy mysteries of salvation and the sacraments, if indeed it is where the Gospel of peace is proclaimed, what sorts of movement and voice are proper to it? My answer comes in the following related attributive words: silence, reverence, awe, joy, solemnity, grace, dignity, and beauty. As "members of the household of God” ( Eph. 2: 20), are we conscious of what and who we approach when we enter the church? Do we carry ourselves properly and present ourselves accordingly when we enter the sacred space, the church? Elijah heard the voice of God and felt his presence on the mountain of God in Horeb in "a tiny whispering sound (1 Kg. 19:12).
 How do we present ourselves in the church to hear better God's "tiny whispering sound"? The Psalmist says, "I wait for the Lord; my soul waits for his word" (130: 5).  As we enter his dwelling place, our church, to wait for his saving word, can we all strive to do so by following the decorum and modesty of the sacred space?

 In the Immaculate Heart of Mary,
​
 Fr. Bernard Oniwe, OP

Congratulations to Elizabeth Gober and Chad Shank who received the Sacraments of Initiation and Jessica Schwanger who is received into full communion with the Catholic Church this Sunday. May they continue to grow in the knowledge of Christ.

 
Dear Friends in Christ,                                     Feed Us, Jesus

​
Jesus knows about our hunger, and he wants to feed us. In the Gospel according to Matthew, Jesus, the compassionate Lord, feeds the hungry crowd.  In the miracle of the loaves and fish, Jesus demonstrates his power to satisfy any deep hunger in human life (cf. Mt. 14: 13-21). We are hungry and thirsty people, and it is Jesus alone who meets our needs through the divine bread from his hands and the sacred word from his mouth (Mt. 4:4).
 
Life is sometimes like a desert where we find ourselves isolated, thirsty, hungry, and exhausted. Jesus, in his deep love, comes to us to nourish us with his bread and word. Jesus never leaves us unprovided for spiritually. Even in our most difficult moments, in our neediness and weakness, Jesus in his providence reaches out to satisfy our needs; "the hand of the Lord feeds us; he answers all our needs," the Psalmist says ( Ps. 145).
 
The eucharistic figure in this Sunday's Gospel is apparent. At every Mass, Jesus nourishes our body and soul from the tables of word and bread, and he says, "Heed me, and you shall eat well" (Is.55:1-3). As we begin the feast-full month of August, we must avail ourselves of its many servings of liturgical feasts. I, in particular, look forward to being divinely fed, especially at the celebration of the memorial of St. John Vianney, the feast of the Transfiguration, and the feast of St. Dominic during this week. I hope all of you, too, will look up to Jesus to feed you from his abundance this week and the coming weeks in the month. Feed us, Jesus. And having been satisfied by the Lord, we, too, must, in turn, strive to feed others in material and spiritual ways.
 
Let me conclude this message on a thankful note. Your generous contribution toward the Dominican Fathers and Brothers of the Province of Nigeria this past week did not go unnoticed. I am grateful to all who contributed to our mission appeal. The brothers will remember you all at our Dominican conventual masses. E seun gan (Thank you so much in the Yoruba language).
 
In Christ, the Living Bread,
Fr. Bernard Oniwe, OP
Pastor
 

Dear friends,
                                                                  Faith Seeks Understanding
 
By the time you pick up this hard copy of the bulletin to read this Saturday/Sunday, fifteen of our parish youths must have received the Sacrament of Confirmation. They must have heard a version of my homily for the seventeenth Sunday of the ordinary time. The topic of my homily at confirmation this Saturday morning is the gifts of the Holy Spirit with emphasis on understanding, knowledge and wisdom. I made a case for the necessity of these gifts to the confirmandi. They will need them as they embark on lifelong efforts to make sense of the mystery of the Kingdom of God, the mystery of faith.
I told them they would have a lot of questions regarding the faith they have embraced totally in freedom. They would sometimes have doubts about God and the Church along the way, and they would ask pertinent and intelligent questions about the experience of evil and struggle with sin. But I made it clear to them that the Bible, Catholic Tradition and the Magisterium of the Church are a sure guarantee that our Catholic faith is a gift and a reasonable way to navigate the questions regarding mysteries of life. There will be questions, but the Holy Spirit will strengthen them in the moments of weakness and enlighten them when they are in the dark. The spiritual gifts of understanding, knowledge and wisdom are vital to responding meaningfully to questions related to Christian faith; ours is a faith seeking understanding.
The 11th-century Christian philosopher and theologian, St. Anselm of Canterbury taught us the principle of strengthening our faith by continually seeking a more profound knowledge of God who loves us. He penned the famous quote, "fides quaerens intellectum/faith seeking understanding". The gifts of the Holy Spirit would help us respond to questions about the kingdom of heaven, questions about Christian faith; it will help us make sense of the vicissitudes of life and answer the question of what is morally right or wrong. Just like Solomon, let us ask God for the gift of wisdom and understanding so that we "may know what is right" and what his commandments mean (1 Kg 3:10; Ps.119:130). Gifts of wisdom, knowledge and understanding help us to see and accept the gift of faith as a path to eternal happiness and the willingness to give up all other life-pursuits to have this "pearl of great price" ( Mathew 13:46).
Join me in congratulating and praying for our parish's newly confirmed boys and girls who received these gifts of the Holy Spirit to strengthen them to bear witness boldly to the kingdom of heaven, the greatest treasure they would ever possess. May the Holy Spirit always lead and guide you: Bailey Elizabeth, Maximilian Patrick, Trevor Adjutor, Gillia Cosmos, Emma Cecilia, Annabelle Cecilia, Reagan Elizabeth, Liana Cecilia, Mason Michael, Morgan Dymphna, Samuel Bernard, Rose Agnes, Joseph Sebastian, Mary Therese, Gabriel Blaise and Kendall Mary.
 In Christ,                          
Fr. Bernard Oniwe, OP
 

Dear friends in Christ,
                                                          The Church of Weed and Wheat
 
Using a series of parables, Jesus speaks about the kingdom of heaven in this Sunday's Gospel according to Matthew. What is the kingdom of heaven? It is called the kingdom of God in Mark and Luke; it is the same thing as the kingdom of heaven. In simple terms, it means the reign of God. We can get an understanding of the kingdom of heaven by referring to the parallelism that Jesus used in describing it in the prayer he taught his disciples: "…thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."  The kingdom of heaven is where God's will is done, where God rules or reigns. That is what the Church, the assembly of Christians should be, people among whom God's will reigns supreme. But this is not always the case. As the first of the parables illustrates, the Church, as we know it, is made up of the wheat and the weed, the good and evil ones. The two are intertwined to the extent that we don't usually recognize the presence of the good, the reign of God in the Church and the world.
Is it possible then to see a visible presence of God in the Church despite the mixing of evil with good?  Yes, if we look deeply. Like the mustard seed and the yeast mentioned in the other two short parables, there is a hidden and quiet presence and growth of good seed in the Church and human world often exposed for its scandals, hypocrisy, greed, lies, falsehood, racism, hate and other sins. Think of the presence and growth of the good seed in terms of the excellence and budding faith in the children of our parish. This week, I concelebrated the 8th-grade graduation Mass at Seven Sorrows, Middletown, and had the honor of presenting awards to deserving children from our church: Mary Bolesky, Joseph  Barb, Benjamin Heckman and Brynne McDevitt. Thanks to the Men's Club for sponsoring a scholarship given to our children at Seven Sorrows who continue on to Catholic High Schools. On Tuesday and Wednesday, I concelebrated baccalaureate Mass and attended graduation at Lancaster Catholic High School, respectively. Our children again distinguished themselves by their excellent performance. I congratulate Hope, Nicholas, Jillian, Gabrielle, Kathryn, Aaron, Zygmunt, Tyla and Ian.  God is generous in spreading the good seeds in our parish by giving the body of his Son, Jesus Christ, the Holy Eucharist, to Celia, Gabriella, Helen, Kate, Sophia, Alyssa, Ella, Kara, Gage, Aubrey, Malina, Juliana, Nora and Arria. It was a privilege to give them their first Holy Communion. These are some of the good seeds growing in our imperfect Church and world.
Indeed, the kingdom of God, the Church that exists in the human world, is a mixed collection of saints and sinners, and it will remain that way until judgment time. God is the ultimate judge. We are called to respond to all the evil present within the Church with patience, tolerance, forbearance, and Spirit-led prayers of intercession (Romans 8:26 ).  That is not to say we should resign ourselves to passive indifference to the presence of evil, to assume nothing can be done. We must still strive to keep evil at bay even if we cannot completely exterminate it at this age. If we don't work to tame the growth of evil, it will end up choking the good. Yes, we have to resist the growth of evil, but we are not to sit in judgment over others, that is to be left to God, the ultimate judgment at the end of time, we surrender that role to God who will "judge with clemency" and govern with "much leniency" (Wisdom 12: 18).
 
In Christ, the Merciful Judge,
 
Fr. Bernard Oniwe, OP
 

                                                                         When Words Work

          As a preacher of the word of God, I sometimes wonder if the Sacred Word I proclaim every day from the pulpit fall on good ground, that is, if they are received and responded to by those I address them to. I am always confident in the authority of the words of the Sacred Scripture. I hold it to be true that as Prophet Isaiah says, God's word shall not return to Him void but shall achieve the end for which it was sent (55:11). I have an absolute belief that the words of The kingdom that Jesus commands us to proclaim will fall on different grounds but surely will fall on good soil, on receptive ears and hearts, and ultimately yield abundant fruits. God has always been faithful to his promises. Yet, sometimes I wonder if the word of redemption I proclaim is appropriately channeled and received with clear understanding and responded to by those who hear them. Do the Words proclaimed every day from our church pulpit work? Yes, they do.
 Many factors must be in place for the generously given Word of God to work and to produce fruits. The word must be heard, understood, and appropriately acted upon. Our disposition and response must match the intent of the word, as William Shakespeare Hamlet's monologue suggests to actors' interpretation of their roles in stage plays, "Suit the action to the word, the word to the action" (Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 2). God intends that the word yield fruit. We hear the word proclaimed, we listen with understanding as much as the Holy Spirit opens our minds and hearts, and we act in response to the word, through the movement of God's grace in us. The response must match the proclamation.
 Last Sunday, I proclaimed the word of Christ concerning the burden of sin that we all carry and the need to unburden ourselves of them and so find rest for our soul by frequent reception of the Sacrament of Confession. It made my day as a preacher and pastor that some responded to God's word by making an appointment for confession. The Boleskys family is an example of a good disposition and fruitful response to the Word of Jesus that I proclaimed last Sunday. The Word indeed works! Praise God!! The Word proclaimed from the pulpit and in the Sacraments work. The word will bear fruits in "a hundred or sixty or thirtyfold," Jesus promised in the Gospel according to Matthew.
                           What is our response to the Word of God spoken to us this Sunday?
Responding to the demands of the Word will set us free, but are we willing to make the appropriate response? May the Boleskys' exemplar response to the spoken Word of Christ inspire all of us to let proper action flow from God's Word spoken to us today. 
In Christ's Healing Words,
 

Dear friends in Christ,
                                                          Jesus' Yoke Will Liberate US

We are living through a period of unrest and anxiety, not only in America but worldwide. The ongoing social upheavals and the pandemic restrictions are taking their tolls on our psyche and perspectives to life. We are all feeling the crushing weight of the crisis, some more than others. Amidst all these Hard Times, to borrow the title of Charles Dickens 19th century novel, I find comfort and solace in Jesus' words of invitation in the Gospel of this Sunday's Mass: "Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest" (Mt.11:28).
Jesus, however, promises to replace the yoke and burden that oppress us with his own when we respond to his call. He offers us freedom from our overwhelming burdens by replacing them with easy yoke and light burden of his Gospel. He makes for us fitting crosses to carry and follow him. "This burden," St. Augustines says in his sermon, "is not a weight at all, it is wings to fly with." His yoke is a sweet one, and his light burden liberates us to live a truly happy life. He reveals this mystery to the little ones who see things with the humble heart of Jesus, but are hidden from the proud who are obsessed with themselves. We need the meek and gentle perspective of Jesus to find freedom from our stress and anxiety. The priest offers this prayer after the Lord's Prayer at Mass: "protect us from all anxiety (distress) as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ."
When we embrace the yoke of the New Covenant, the Gospel of Jesus, we become truly free of destructive stress and anxiety. Jesus invites us to take on his yoke and bear his burden to free us from the burden of sin and stress. St. Peter tells us to cast all our anxiety on Jesus because He cares for us (1 Peter 5:7). What are the burdens we carry? Whatever they are, "let us cast them upon the Lord," and he will sustain us (Ps. 55:22). He will give us rest.
On this Fourth of July weekend, I recall the liberating words from the preamble to the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of happiness." These are reassuring words to hear in this time of turmoil. Our founding fathers declared independence from King Goerge III because of the burden of inequality, misrule, and exploitation; they had a list of 27 grievances to highlight the fact of their oppression and the need for freedom. We are still struggling to realize the divine ideals of equality in human dignity and rights, of God-given right to Life, Liberty and Pursuit of happiness. Could it be that we are yet to honor the invitation of the Lord of Life and Liberty, who says, "come to me, …and I will give you rest"?  St. Augustine is right when he says in his famous words, "Thou hast formed us for thyself, and our hearts are restless till they rest in thee." To find true freedom from the burden of personal and social sin, we have to accept the yoke and burden of Christ's commandments of sacrificial love; it's the only way we can find lasting rest and true freedom.                       
                                                                 Happy Independence Day!
In the Meek and Humble Jesus,
Fr. Bernard Oniwe, OP
 
 

Dear friends in Christ,              
                                                                On the Ladder of Love

Let's talk about love and levels of love. Love is so central to Christian identity that it becomes inconceivable to identify oneself as a Christian without visible marks of love as a testimony to the claim. God created us in love and for love, and He is the source of that love. As St. Bernard of Clairvaux, a 13th-century great lover of God and the last of the Church Father, once said, "Love is the fountain of life, and the soul which does not drink from it cannot be called alive." But we ought to love God above all things and with all our life. There is a hierarchy of love. The goal of everyone created in the image and likeness of God is to prioritize their love for the author and source of love above other subjects of legitimate love. It is of utmost importance and highest priority that we love God first to love others rightly. Jesus calls us to love him more than we love our family. He teaches us to order priorities right when it comes to who we love most. To love God as He should be loved is a process and implies lifetime perseverance and progress.
St. Bernard wrote about four categories of the love of God that serves as a helpful guide as it throws light on the perfection of love.
The first degree is selfish love, that is, loving yourself for your own sake. Despite our awareness that God called us to love Him first and above all, the natural impulse is to love self first over God. This selfish love is a consequence of Original sin. It is part of our flawed human nature to self indulge in love for oneself to the detriment of our neighbors; hence we have to strive to overcome this excessive love of self to the expense of the love of God and neighbor. We are called to let this self-love overflow to others and not limited to oneself alone. We have to love God first to love ourselves rightly.
The second degree of love involves loving God for your own blessing- dependence on God. At this stage, you now love God but primarily for your own sake, the love of God for our benefits. At this level of love, a Christian only give thanks to God on account of His goodness to him. It is similar to what people in the secular world call friends with benefits. This type of lover tends to give thanks to God only when he or she receives blessings from Him. This form of love is not yet perfected, though an improvement over the first degree of love.
The third degree of love implies loving God for God's own sake. At this degree of love, a Christian begins to have intimacy with God. This kind of love is love without self-interest. It is a love that develops from intimacy with God and the discovery of his incredible goodness. It comes from actually having an experiential knowledge of his kindness and mercy. During this stage of love, we love for love's sake, a pure and spontaneous love, not love purely for self-interest.
The fourth degree of love is self-love for God's sake; it is a profound union with God's love. This stage of love at first appears contradictory because we know that self-love is a lower form of love, but when we ponder on it, it is the highest form of love that can only be attained momentarily here on earth and fully in heaven. At this height of love, the lover of God loses himself in God's love. To reach this stage of love is to be truly Christ-like, to be totally immersed in his grace. You decrease and Christ increase to the extent that he is the only one that exists. This highest level of love can be attained only permanently in heavenly as a reward for loving God alone and always.
As people who profess the love of Jesus above all others, let us consider the practice of love and make progress in St. Bernard's proposal on the love of God. 1 John 4:8 tells us that "God is love…we cannot say we know God without love" To love as God wants us to love, Jesus tells us in this Sunday's Gospel, we must take up our cross and follow Him, we must lose our lives in him to gain our lives. The only way to make progress from selfish love to agape love is to die to sin and live "for God in Christ Jesus" (Romans 6:11).
St. Bernard of Clairvaux is not only a lover of God but a troubadour of agape love and you will derive spiritual benefits from singing or frequently meditating on his love lyrics that follow:

 Jesus, our only joy be Thou.  As Thou our prize wilt be; Jesus, be Thou our glory now and thru eternity.         
                                                               
 In the Perfect Love of God,  

Fr. Bernard Oniwe, OP
 

Dear friends in Christ,       

                                                         Fear No One, Speak the Truth

The Gospel of this Sunday's Mass tells us not to be afraid to reveal, make known, speak, and proclaim to the world all that Jesus taught his followers. Jesus taught much about life liberating truths and instructed his Church to do likewise without mincing words or with ambiguity for fear of how the world would respond to radical forms of these sacred truths. It is easy to get intimidated by rejection or hostility from those presented the demanding doctrines of Jesus, but the Lord reminds us that God has got our backs. If God in his providence places value on mere sparrows, how much more human beings created in his image and likeness, God will see to our preservation from dangers that will come on account of the proclamation of divine truth.
We should never compromise these truths out of fear of losing our lives, friendships, family, or any other earthly goods. We ought to proclaim Gospel truths boldly whether the condition is comfortable or not; what is at stake is too vital to begin watering down these truths or shying away from throwing light on them before the world. Like prophet Jeremiah, we must trust in God who "rescued the life of the poor from the power of the wicked" (Jer. 20:13). Whenever we speak the truth about God's plan for humanity, we should be ready to bear insults and face rejections from even our loved ones, and we should have recourse to God, praying for his favor and help (Ps. 69: 8-17).
Pope St. John Paul II said in his famous homily on October 22, 1978, "Do not be afraid….do not be afraid to welcome Christ and accept his power." I say to you, too, do not be afraid to tell the world there is hell, and there is heaven. Do not be afraid to proclaim that Jesus is the Son of God and only He can save the world from despair. Do not be afraid to tell your friends and strangers alike that they need to open wide the doors of their hearts to Jesus, their Savior. Do not be afraid to bear witness to the Gospel truth concerning the dignity of all human life from conception to natural death. Do not be afraid to speak for justice for the poor. Do not be afraid to be a voice on the rooftops condemning racial injustice and senseless violence in our world; do not be afraid to be a prophetic voice for our time like Jeremiah was for his time. Do not be afraid to welcome Christ and his power to save.
As we get into the summer season, please stay safe on your vacations and travels, and do not forget your home parish, St. Peter. Stay in touch and share your summer experiences with us, especially the moments of God's providence and grace, the many instances you acknowledged Jesus and his Gospel before people you encountered. Never miss an opportunity to put into use the abundant graces you receive from the Sacraments and the Word of the Spirit.
I use this opportunity to wish all our fathers-including the "father" writing this message, a blessed Father's Day celebration. Our fathers are like St. Joseph, protecting and caring for their families, please say words of thanks to our fathers this week. We love our fathers, proclaim it on the housetops!

In Christ, our Help,                     

Fr. Bernard Oniwe, O.P.
 
 

Dear friends in Christ,           
                                                         Come, Let Us Adore Him
I have a deep love for Eucharistic hymns because they aid my solemn worship of the Lord Jesus Christ in the sacrament of his body and blood. Adoro Devote Te and Pange Lingua, composed by St. Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century, are my favorites of as many as five Eucharistic hymns he wrote for the celebration of Corpus Christi. These Latin hymns convey the theology of the Real Presence in a poetic and passionate tone; they simplify the essence of the mystery without a pretense of evaporating its complexity. Listening to the Latin text of the hymns set in Gregorian chant does something to my soul.  I don't need to understand every word of it; I just allow the beauty and elegance of the language and music to envelop and uplift my soul, like a man in Christ caught up to the third heaven ( 1 Cor. 12:2). Singing the English translation of the hymns, I must admit, does make the experience of worship more cognitive and impactful. Understanding or lack of it thereof, these hymns aid my worship of the Eucharistic Lord truly present to eyes of faith and adored by a heart made of love.
Let's consider the first verse of  Adoro te Devote briefly to illustrate my point. A typical and traditional translation of the Latin text takes this form: 
                                               "O Godhead hid, devoutly I adore Thee,
                                                Who truly art within the forms before me;
                                               To Thee my heart I bow with bended knee,
                                                As failing quite in contemplating Thee.

The hymn addresses the Eucharist, whether hidden in the tabernacle or exposed in the monstrance for adoration during Corpus Christi procession, as a concealed God worthy of worship and contemplation on bended knee. Capuchin Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, the preacher to the Papal household, captures the theology of Real Presence and call to worship contained in the hymn in the following words:

"In every stanza of the Adoro Te Devote there is a theological affirmation and an invocation which is the prayerful response of the soul to the mystery. The theological truth recalled in the first stanza refers to the manner of the presence of Christ in the Eucharistic species. The Latin expression 'vere latitas' is charged with meaning, it means: he is hidden, but he really is (where the accent is on 'vere,' only the reality of the presence) and it also means: he truly is, but hidden (where the accent is on 'latitas,' on the sacramental character of this presence)."

For the last three months, most Catholics have been without direct access to his Real Presence, to Jesus hidden in the Eucharistic species. He was hidden (using the word in a different sense here) from us because we shut the doors to the church, but he was nevertheless always present in the church. Did we for once stop by the church entrance when we drove by to genuflect or reverence Eucharistic Lord hidden in the tabernacles of our church? Were our faith fledging and our heart pulse low in love for Jesus in the Eucharist just because the closed-door hid him from our sights? I invite you on this solemnity of Corpus Christi to renew your faith and ignite in your heart the fire of love for Eucharistic Jesus by worshiping him, the hidden Godhead.

I would like to invite you to spend an hour of public worship of Jesus exposed in the monstrance this Sunday evening from 6:30 -7:30 PM. Come in your cars, bring your chairs along and come, let us adore him devoutly, the second person of the Holy Trinity.          
                                
In His Real Presence,       

Fr. Bernard Oniwe, OP
 

Dear friends in Christ,             
                                                     Grace, Love, and Fellowship

The concluding verse of 2nd Corinthians is one of the most evident Trinitarian passages of the entire New Testament: "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all" (2 Cor. 13:13). The verse expresses a divine blessing from St. Paul to his Christian brethren in Corinthians. This scriptural blessing is composed of three inter-related God attributes bestowed on all believers. The preposition "of" in verse 13 is used as a function word to specify qualities of relationship and possession among the three divine persons of the Holy Trinity, the central mystery of Christian faith. The one and only God reveal himself to us in terms of relationship and specific attributes of each divine person. Each time we bless ourselves with the sign of the Cross, we not only recall our Trinitarian baptism but also invoke and release attributes of this divine blessing on ourselves, that is, grace, love, and fellowship. These blessings should mark our lives and be with us always, especially as we reopen our Church to Mass with the congregation.
May the grace of God be with us at this time and always because it is only his super-abundance favor that sustains us through the experience of tragedies in this "vale of tears." It is only by our participation in the life of God through grace that we can live victoriously in our world full of sorrows, tears and blood brought about by the pandemic, as well as the murder, violence, and injustice overshadowing our country in the past week. May the love of God be with us always as we strive to make present in our community the self-giving love attribute of Jesus Christ.  Non-Christians recognized the early Christians by their demonstration of sacrificial love for one another and strangers alike. May the fellowship of God be with us as we try to build up a community of charity. We are to build a culture of solidarity with the oppressed and marginalized by being attentive to their cry as Jesus did. As the U.S. Catholic Bishop's statement of May 21, 2020, says to us, "we should be doing a lot of listening right now" to the cry for justice. Our Christian faith calls us to identify with the pains and mourning of every person created in the image of Christ. We are to build a fellowship of equals though different in experiences, just like the equality though distinctness between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. We have to be trinitarian in our approach to life.
"May the force be with you. Always" is a catchphrase made famous by Obi-Wan Kenobi character in George Lucas's Star Wars films. I believe the writer of the phrase was drawing inspiration from the Trinitarian blessings in 2 Corinthians 13:13. Could I borrow the format by saying, May the grace be with you always. May the love be with you always. May the fellowship be with you always. In our ongoing battle against the pandemics and injustice and violence in our world, may the example of the Holy Trinity inspire and guide us.
In conclusion, I must admit that I am filled with joy as I welcome you back to Mass with the congregation. We are going to move back gradually into our regular schedule. Please be patient with me as I navigate these new waters with you. Things are going to be done differently, including mass schedules and location. In the coming weeks, I will come out with plans for Adult Initiation, First Holy Communion and Confirmation. Visit our parish website regularly for updates. Thanks to all of you, you have been gracious and supportive. I pray for you always and know you pray for me as well. Let us continue practicing social distancing and wearing face masks. We are victorious in Christ Jesus.
 
In the Joy of the Lord,     

 Fr. Bernard Oniwe, OP