10/9/2022

In two weeks Bishop Johnston will be here to confirm our youth. This will happen at an extra Mass at 1:30 PM, not 2 PM as I wrote last week. We will have students from St. Peter’s in Stanberry as well as our youth, so it should be full. We will have Masses at the usual times, 5 PM Saturday, 8 AM and 10:30 AM Sunday.
The following weekend, October 29-30, is the Blessing of the Child in the Womb for expectant mothers. Please remember to let us know if you plan on receiving the blessing so that we can have a rose for each expectant mother. It would also be good to have the father and family there, as they are included in the blessing. We don’t have to know which Mass you are coming to, just how many of you there are.
This Sunday we have many of the football team from the high school coming to 10:30 AM Mass, with chili and cinnamon rolls served afterwards. The K. of C. is organizing the food after Mass – they do so much to help the parish, such as organizing the parish mission a few weeks ago. I want to personally thank them for their efforts, generosity, and dependability.
This week is the 4th installment of “The Search” which will again be shown at The Hangar at 6:30 PM on Tuesday. This one is entitled, “What’s Our Story.” Come and visit this important question with a room full of others.
Fr. Peter and I are with the priests of the diocese this week for our Assembly Days. The title is “Caring for the Gift of our Humanity.” One of our speakers, a surgeon and Deacon, talked to me about the origin of hospitals in Western civilization. The first hospitals arose from the effort of Christians to do works of mercy. This happened shortly after the Edict of Milan (which legitimized Christianity in the Roman Empire) in the 4th Century as bishops sought to establish places to help those in need. It was an effort to show these people God’s mercy. He cited the book Dominion by Tom Holland. He mentioned that Julian the Apostate tried to establish pagan hospitals, but without success – apparently the motives of mercy and the practice of almsgiving were key factors in making Christian hospitals work. The motive of almsgiving in the founding of hospitals manifested itself in a practice which still existed as recently as my lifetime: medical doctors who wanted to practice in a city would have to take on a shift to help the poor/disadvantaged in the town. It was done without pay, as part of the expectations put on all medical doctors. When Medicare came into being, the doctors got paid for all their work, charity included. So began the move of medical institutions from instruments of mercy to instruments of profit. We are seeing the results of this today. I have to wonder if someday we Christians will have to re-found hospitals once again.
It is a joy to be pastor of this busy and blessed parish!

Fr. Albert Bruecken, OSB