Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Church

“Confess-a-Palooza” “OctoberConfessOfest” “Clean Sweep” or “Fall Out of Sin” Huh?

For many Catholics, we think of confessing at Christmas and Easter. But the time gap between Easter and Christmas is much longer than the other. So this year we are going to offer you a chance for a fall tune up.

Next weekend, we will offer confessions BEFORE every Mass!
In the Church, 2 priests will be available beginning 15 minutes before each Mass, and will stay as long as they have customers, even into the Mass! Because of people being seated for Masses, the line will need to form along the wall nearest the confessional. (We have been doing this occasionally at the Spanish Masses, and it has worked well). Over at HCA, the priest will hear confessions between the Masses.

We want to help you celebrate this amazing sacrament! Be ready for a fall tune up!

Picnic!! Thank you to Paul Scott and the many, many volunteers who worked so hard! The Knights of Columbus, the CCW, Youth Group, and the TMIY crew all stepped up big-time! The weather was perfect, the Saturday timing seemed to allow families to linger longer, and the September picnic date was celebrated

by all with whom I spoke! Let’s count on doing this again next September!

Sometimes you take a chance by doing things differently, and with the picnic it worked out amazingly! I hope the Sunday confessions might be likewise be a success!

Also, a reminder that the Religious Education registration is coming to a close! Please don’t miss a year of instruction in the faith for your children.

Pax,

Father John Mosimann

Again writing this note on the bus in Germany! Today is our last full day, leaving Munich, visiting Rothenberg on the way to Frankfurt where we will catch a flight home.

One more reflection on The Passion Play, having now seen it! The ‘difficulties’ in it were in the written text. It was often jarring to see things portrayed and said that just aren’t in the gospel. The ‘world’ presumes that the whole account of the gospels is fiction, and thus has no problem re-writing it to fit the modern world. Of course that makes sense, IF you accept their presumption!

The staging, singing, and production are truly first rate! I am so glad that I came with this bus full of pilgrims. The production included many connections to Old Testament accounts fulfilled in the passion narrative. For example, the friends of Job, accusing him, was connected to the trial of our Lord, and Joseph before the Pharaoh was connected to our Lord before Pilate!

When we consider the passion of our Lord, it should invoke the reflection, “look what our Lord did for me” or “look what my sins did to Jesus.” (The former is better, but the latter is good for repentance)! If our response is “look what they did to Jesus,” then our reflections on the passion have missed the mark badly.

St. Theresa of Avila, in her great work on prayer The Interior Castle, speaks of the necessity of meditation on the sacred humanity and passion of our Lord:

“Let us begin by considering the mercy of God showed us by giving us His only son…. [R]eflect upon all of the mysteries
of His glorious life… then allow them to continue the subject until they reach the crucifixion…. This is meritorious kind of prayer…. [Don’t] forget these precious proofs of His love which are living sparks to inflame the heart with a greater love of our Lord.”

All right, the bus is pulling in for a pit stop, and I am going to go grab a cup of delicious coffee!

Pax,

Fr. Mosimann

As you read this….I am in Oberammergau!

Ever since I heard of The Passion Play in Oberammergau, I have wanted to see it. I must have imagined a dramatic and faith filled production of
art and culture from a time long gone when people believed in stopping plagues by prayer and promises to the Lord.

But in 1990, my parents went, and I remember my father coming back and saying, “that was disappointing.”

In 2020, the newest plague canceled The Passion Play, and this pilgrimage was pushed back two years. Pilgrims who couldn’t wait two years lost deposits labeled ‘unrefundable’ in the fine print of the registration.

Last month, I watched a video, and found that The Passion Play has been even further updated for modern times. Jesus is portrayed as interested in political reform, and social issues, but a little fuzzy on who he is! And the last supper? Stripped of distinctively Catholic elements, the words of institution are gone and replaced with, “Here, eat this and remember me.” The director said that “religious themes must recede to the background and social come to the fore.”

Expectations, yes, those are diminished! But doesn’t life often bring such?

Our Hope is not for or of this world. The fulfillment we seek cannot be found in this world. “Seek first the kingdom of God, and all other things will be added unto you!”

But I will also enjoy all that is good, true and beautiful in The Passion Play! The spectacle, music, the reenactment of the passion itself, and the script still brings forward many scriptural images of the Old Testament fulfilled in the passion. Not to mention the Bavarian countryside, German beer, and beautiful woodcarvings!

With realistic expectations, I will let the Lord surprise me with whatever gifts He should desire to give. Blessed be the Lord!

Pax,

Father John Mosimann