Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Church

Did you know that priests are required by Church law to get away every year for a minimum 5-day retreat? Why? “The apostles gathered together with Jesus and reported all they had done and taught. He said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.” (Mk 6:30)

Or as described by Pope Francis, “Indeed, we Christians live in the world, fully integrated into the social and cultural reality of our time, and rightly so; but this brings with it the risk that we might become “worldly”, that “the salt might lose its taste,” (cf. Mt 5:13)….This is why it is necessary to renew oneself by continually drawing sap from the Gospel.”

Why am I thinking of this? Because my retreat begins this Sunday; if you are reading this at the 5pm Mass, I am already checking in at the retreat house in southern Maryland! I will try to ignore email, and stay off my phone, that seems to get harder ever year.

However, Pope Francis directed these words to all Christians, not just priests. I have often suggested to all of the faithful that they need to likewise make such a retreat if they want to be serious about the spiritual care of their souls.

If you have two weeks of vacation from your job every year, why not tithe? Take one of those 10 days and give it to the Lord by spending a day in prayer at the National Shrine, or at St. Mary’s. Alternatively, give more. I know folks who have stored up leave and face every year a ‘use or lose’ situation. How about giving one of those weeks to be with Jesus?

In order to make this week-long priest retreat happen, I had to block it off in my calendar back in February. Sometimes plans change because of parish, family, or worldwide circumstances like a pandemic. But I am only useful to you as a pastor, as far as I give you Jesus. Hence, I thank God for this annual retreat!

Are you salt of the earth that has lost its taste? You and I can only be restored by Jesus. I’ll be sitting with Jesus all week to let him restore me. When will you give Him the same chance?

pax,

Father John Mosimann

Great news! This past Tuesday, the Fredericksburg City Council voted 6-1 to approve our Special Use Permit allowing us to use the houses we own for meetings, and small groups. This has been 2.5 years of hard work for Chris Lanzarone, our facilities manager; so if he looks like the weight of the world has been lifted from his shoulders, you will know why!

A great thanks to the many parishioners who wrote to city council, and packed the council chamber as a sign of support. I absolutely believe that your presence had an impact on the vote for approval!!

The next step is to get the proper ‘certificate of occupancy’ for the homes which can then be used
as needed. Work is underway to see that all code requirements are met, and once that is done, we will be able to move some meetings, bible studies, and such to the new spaces. We agreed to some limits on the time we could have public assembly in those spaces, in order to lessen the impact on our neighbors.

Once the new spaces are in use and we meet our Capital Campaign goals, we will then be able to begin work on our adoration chapel! This will be of great benefit to the spiritual life of the parish!

One of the principles of how we are trying to organize the uses on our campus, is to move lower impact meetings to the properties on the Northwestern side of our campus (the ‘homes’ facing Stafford, Royston, and Augustine streets). Thus, we will keep our Masses and higher volume uses, like the pre-school and adoration chapel on the interior / Williams Street side of campus, and in doing so, will alleviate the impact on private residences bordering our parish.