December 5, 2023, Class Update: Beginning Advent

Advent Greetings!

We began a new liturgical year with the start of Advent on Sunday, December 3.

Advent Wreath lit for the First Sunday of Advent at the Guardian Angel Cathedral in Las Vegas, NV

During this class, we focused more on what Advent is about: We wait for the celebration of Christ's first coming at His birth in Bethlehem, for His second coming at the End of Time, and to welcome Him into our hearts each day.

We began class with the song "Even So, Come".

We did two activities during class to explore themes of Advent.

There are four candles on the Advent wreath, one for each of the four Sundays before Christmas/Nativity Day.  One interpretation is that the first candle represents hope, the second candle represents peace, the third candle represents joy, and the fourth candle represents love.

We spent time pondering how Christ can bring us hope, peace, joy, and love.

Our second activity was focused on the Jesse Tree, which uses Bible passages and images that tell stories about the foretelling of Christ's coming.

Also during class, we watched a short Catholic Central video explaining the Immaculate Conception of Mary.  This Feast Day is on December 8, and it is the Patronal Feast Day of the United States, since the bishops declared her the patroness saint of the USA back in the 19th Century.  The Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C., is built in honor of her.  I highly recommend visiting there.  It's my favorite place to visit outside of Chicagoland.



As usual, please feel free to contact me with questions, etc.

We remain connected as One Church, making ourselves ready to welcome Christ our Savior:
All my relations.

God's blessings,
Paul

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

April 23, 2024, Class Update: Our Call to Holiness

Image
Greetings everyone! During this class, we started with the song " God's Not Dead " as our opening prayer.  One phrase in the song says, God is "roaring like a lion".  That image connects to St. Mark, whose feast is April 25, and his symbol is a lion. Then we considered the idea of our universal call to holiness.  In our books, we looked at two important Church councils, Vatican I in the 19th Century, and Vatican II in the 1960's.  The later council made a number of significant changes in the church, including the role of laypeople. The council emphasized that holiness is not just for priests and religious.  All people who are baptized are called to exhibit God's character, and to live like saints. There is a great piece of artwork in the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception that illustrates the "Universal Call to Holiness", and you can read more about it here , and see a picture of it when not being worked on, as is the ...
Read more

October 24, 2023, Class Update: Native Americans and the Roman Catholic Church

Image
Greetings everyone! During our most recent class, the vast majority of our time was spent viewing the documentary Enduring Faith .  It was produced by the Knights of Columbus and focuses on Native American Roman Catholics in North America, mostly in the USA. Our opening prayer was an extended quotation attributed to St. Teresa of Avila, " Christ has no body now but yours ". The closing prayer was from the 1st reading for All Saints' Day Mass, from Revelation 7:9-12.  As we learned about the practice of Roman Catholicism among Native Americans, we see that the Church has expanded to include people from many ethnicities, as this passage of Scripture describes. We are off from class on October 31.  However, we have the opportunity to attend Mass on November 1, which is a Holy Day of Obligation.  Masses at Ascension are at 8:15 AM and 7 PM.  We celebrate the many holy people who have lived lives of faith before us, and remind us of our call to holiness. The activity...
Read more

April 16, 2024, Class Update: The Paschal Candle

Image
Easter Greetings once again! At the 1964 Oscars ceremony, 60 years ago this month, Sidney Poitier became the first African-American to win an Oscar, which was for his role in the movie Lilies of the Field.  During that movie, he played the character Homer Smith, who sang a song about Christ's life. That song, " Amen ", was our opening prayer for class. Pope Benedict XVI was born on April 16, 1927, in Germany.  The end of the first episode of the Catholicism series, hosted by Bishop Barron and Word on Fire, tells a story about Cardinal George at Pope Benedict's election. You can watch it here and go to the 40:00 mark. We are part of a Church that has stood the test of time because God has made us to be His Holy people, and His Holy Spirit continues to guide us in upholding the Truth as we answer the call to live faithfully as His people. Mrs. Monaco stopped by class to encourage everyone to keep practicing their faith as part of Bishop Casey's challenge at Mass to...
Read more