Weekend of June 1-2, 2024

Dear Friends,

We celebrate this weekend the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, known also by its traditional Latin name, Corpus Christi. This great feast is an opportunity for us to focus on the great gift we have been given of the Eucharist, and to celebrate our Eucharistic Lord, who is the source and strength of our lives.

As Catholics, we hopefully are always aware of the importance of the Eucharist in our lives, and of the need we have to thank God each day for the presence of the Eucharist in our hearts and in our world. The Eucharist is the quintessential reminder to us of the fact that, no matter what happens within us and around us, our good and loving God will never abandon us; the presence of his Son, Jesus, in the Eucharistic species is a guarantee of that. More than that, however, the Eucharist, as Saint Thomas Aquinas puts it so perfectly, is the “foretaste and promise of that which is to come,” that is, the life that will be ours for ever in eternity.

 Let us thank God on this wonderful feast for the gift of the Eucharist, and commit ourselves to become more like the One who shares his life with us in this gift, so that we can share his life-giving presence to everyone we meet.  

We find ourselves beginning, with this great feast day, the beginning of our third year of the three year National Eucharistic Revival which the bishops of the United States initiated two years ago. The first year had as its focus the Eucharistic revival on the diocesan level; the second year had as its focus the Eucharistic revival on the parish level; and this third year, which begins today, is the Year of the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage and Congress and Missionary Sending.

The National Eucharistic Pilgrimage is a unique event that is going on right now. Beginning on May 17-19, four groups have begun journeying across our country with the Blessed Sacrament in procession, each group setting out from a different part of the country (North, South, East, and West). Each route will walk with Jesus across the country for approximately two months. All four groups will meet in Indianapolis on July 16 to attend the National Eucharistic Congress from July 17–July 21, 2024. The Indianapolis Congress is the first National Eucharistic Congress to be held in our country for 90 years.

While all of us are obviously not able to travel in pilgrimage or to even attend the great Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis, we are able to join this landmark event in spirit and, most especially, in prayer. I ask you to please unite in prayer with all believers throughout our great country and our world, that this Eucharistic Revival will not only be a success, but, even more so, that faith in the Eucharistic Lord will continue to grow within the hearts of all who believe, and, through the way we live our lives as missionary disciples, this broken world in which we live might be transformed in the Name of Jesus. For more information o0n the Eucharistic Revival, as well as the Pilgrimage and the Congress, please go to the excellent interactive website www.eucharisticrevival.org.

 Because the final weekend here for Father Lane and myself is Father’s Day weekend, we will be having our farewell Mass and reception next Sunday, June 9, at 12:00 Noon in Saint Timothy’s upper church. I hope you can join us as we celebrate our many blessings and look forward, in hope, to the future.

Know that you and those you love are daily remembered in my Mass and my prayers.

                                                                                    Love and prayers,
                                                                                    Father Olivere