Dear Parishioners:
- The Second Sunday of Advent Season every year, we encounter the voice of John the Baptist in the desert echoing the words of the prophet Isaiah: "Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths… …”
John the Baptist taught the people of his day and our day that the Messiah comes to save us from the powers of despair, darkness and death and to put us back to God. John the Baptist’s life and mission remind us how badly we need a Savior to save us, in order that we might be all that we are called to be and do all the we have to do to live in the Light.
- Advent is a mystery that transforms and not simply informs.
- Advent remains with its paradoxical combination of waiting and hastening, suffering and joy, judgment and deliverance; and ultimate HOPE.
- To hope, in the true Advent fashion, is to live with the certainty of unfulfilled desire.
Taking these clues from John the Baptist, the last prophet in the New Testament, each of us and our parish community are preparing the way of the Lord in a “physical and spiritual way”. The many activities are taking place in our lives and in our parish community symbolized this physical process of preparation. I hope that, as you participate in the many activities from our parish community early in this Advent Season, will lead all of us to that special preparation for the Lord coming into our lives and our world.
- Please check the bulletin weekly and the December Calendar (or make sure to check the Advent & Christmas insert in your bulletin last week – some extra copies are available on the entrances). Here are a few examples:
- Please take home an Advent Blue Book to help you in this on-going richness reflection of this Preparation that lead us to celebrate the Christmas Season soon.
- Tree of Love (Christmas Giving Tree) – Take a name tag at the Main Entrance and consider giving a Christmas gift for a person in need.
- Advent Communal Penance Service:
- Wednesday Dec. 11- 7:00 PM at St. Gabriel, with opportunity for individual confession after the Penance Service.
- Tuesday Dec. 10 – 5:00 PM at Prince of Peace, Belfair, with opportunity for individual confession after the Penance Service.
- Individual Reconciliation: Tuesday, Dec 10 from 12:00 - 1:00 PM;
Wednesday, Dec. 11 after the 7 PM Advent Penance and Friday, Dec. 13 from 12:00 – 1:00 PM.
- Simbang Gabi – Novena in preparation for Christmas – Saturday Dec. 21 – at 6:30 PM Mass and Festivities afterward.
- The Calendar Year is coming to the end soon. I’d like to take this opportunity “to thank” for your participation in many different ministries and volunteer opportunities in our parish community. Especially, I’d like to thank for your Stewardship of Time, Talent and Treasure in the year of 2019. Please be aware that “all tax deductible contribution” to the parish has to be done in the last week of December up to December 31 to be included for 2019.
Christ’s Peace,
Fr. Phuong Hoang