Weekend of March 12-13th

PASTOR’S LETTER FOR WEEKEND OF MARCH 12-13, 2022

Dear Friends,

We will be celebrating this week our annual Triduum in Honor of Saint Joseph. The Triduum will be celebrated from this coming Monday, March 14^th through Wednesday, March 16^th at 7:00 P.M. Each evening’s services include the Triduum prayers, a reading from Sacred Scripture, a homily, and Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament. Our homilist each evening will be Father Eric Banecker, Pastor of Saint Francis De Sales Parish in the University City section of West Philadelphia. Father Banecker was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese in 2018, and is an engaging and powerful speaker. I am thrilled that he can be with us during these sacred days.

I think it is especially significant that we are honoring Saint Joseph and asking his intercession while our world is being torn apart by this terrible conflict in Ukraine. We are desperately in need of God’s help, and Saint Joseph, the great intercessor, will certainly hear our prayers and plead with God on our behalf. Joseph is a powerful saint, which is why we go to him with many different needs always. Please join us this week, as we collectively petition Saint Joseph to ask God to stop this terrible conflict in the Ukraine, to change the hearts of world leaders, and to allow real and lasting peace to blanket our world for good.  
           
I remind you that we are working with Catholic Leadership Institute to implement the Disciple Maker Index (DMI) survey at every parish in the Archdiocese from March 2 to April 4, 2022. The DMI survey is a nationally recognized survey administered at parishes around the United States and Canada since 2013 by The Catholic Leadership Institute. The survey will ask you to reflect on your own spiritual growth and will enable you to provide feedback on our parish’s efforts to help you grow. All responses are confidential and the parish will only receive information on the community as a whole. Maximum participation in the DMI is encouraged to involve the greatest number of people as possible. I ask everyone to please take the time to participate in the DMI. It will take about ten minutes of your time, and will greatly assist us in pastoral planning both here at Saint Timothy’s and on the archdiocesan level. We will receive the results this spring/summer at which time I will share what we have learned with the entire parish.

To take the Disciple Maker Index survey, please use the link below:
https://www.catholicleaders.org/phila-dmi
PLEASE NOTE:  When you open the link you will see a list of all the parishes in the Archdiocese. Please select our parish (Saint Timothy, Philadelphia) to complete the Disciple Maker Index survey.

If you prefer a paper copy of the survey, you may pick up a paper copy after daily or Sunday Mass. The paper copies of the survey are located in both the upper and lower churches. A printable version of the survey (in multiple languages) is also available at https://portal.catholicleaders.org/d/yd170y

To submit the completed paper survey, please drop it off at the rectory or in the special folder on the table where the surveys are located. To make special arrangements for getting a paper copy, please contact Annmarie or Tom at (215) 624-6188.

I call your attention to a few Lenten highlights:
 

• In addition to our regularly-scheduled daily Masses, there will be an extra Mass celebrated each week on Wednesday at 7:00 P.M., followed by confessions;

 

• Stations of the Cross every Friday evening at 7:00;

 

• our Lenten adult faith formation program, which will be held every Monday of Lent at 7:00 P.M. in the Rectory. This year’s topic is Catholicism: The Pivotal Players, Part III. We will once again be using the acclaimed series of the same name by Bishop Robert Barron as our starting-point for discussion each week, as we discover more about several important figures in Church history and their importance to the Church today; 

-           we will, once again, be participating as a parish family in 24 Hours for the Lord, an initiative called for by Pope Francis, with Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament beginning on Friday, March 25^th at 4:00 P.M. until Saturday, March 26^th at 4:00 P.M. in our lower church; confessions will be heard on Saturday, March 26^thfrom 9:00 A.M. - 10:00 A.M., from 12:00 Noon - 2:00 P.M., and from 3:15 - 4:15 P.M.; there will be a chart in the church for you to sign up, in half-hour increments, for periods of adoration; our goal is for the Blessed Sacrament not to be left alone during this twenty-four hour period.

            Please remember your Little Black Books, your Lenten quarter folders, and your Rice Bowls, all of which are available at the church entrances.
           
            Know that you and those you love are daily remembered in my Mass and my prayers.

                                                                                    Love and prayers,