Fourth Sunday of Easter
April 30, 2026 Bulletin Column Father De Celles
Month of May. There are a lot of other special activities in May in the parish. One very important “event” is in May is always First Holy Communion for the 2nd graders. But this year, like last, I’ve decided to allow the children to receive FHC at any Mass in May their parents choose. I do this for many reasons, but the main one is to spread the FHC’s around to various Masses so that all of you can share in this gift—and so not only pray for the children, but be reminded of your own First Communion, and maybe be renewed in that childlike faith and love for the Blessed Sacrament.
Please keep these little ones in your prayers, as this is a huge day in their lives. Pray that they may prepare worthily and understand what they are doing and Who they are receiving. Pray that it will be a truly happy, holy and memorable day for them, and that it will lead them and their families to a long life of intimacy and fidelity with Jesus.
Later in May, on Tuesday the 19th, our 8th graders will receive the Sacrament of Confirmation. I ask you to keep them in your prayers also, as they prepare to be strengthened (“confirmed”) in their baptismal graces and receive the fullness of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Surely they will need these graces as they enter a world that is more and more hostile to Christians. So, pray for them, and encourage them, that they may receive this sacrament worthily and efficaciously.
Mary’s Month. Now, of course, the entire month of May is “Mary’s Month,” dedicated to honoring and renewing our filial devotion to and love for the Mother of Jesus. Some are confused by the way Catholics honor the Blessed Mother. The simplest, clearest response to this is: shouldn’t we all try to love Jesus’s Mother as much as Jesus loves her? After all, on the Cross He gave her to us to be our Mother also: “son, behold your mother.”
So we will mark this month of Marian piety next Sunday, May 3, with the “May Crowning” after the 11am Mass. Our First Communicants and teenagers in the Youth Apostolate will join us to help us with the ceremony paying homage to the Blessed Mother. As the Congregation for Divine Worship wrote of this pious custom in 1987:
“The queen symbol was attributed to Mary because she was a perfect follower of Christ, who is the absolute ‘crown’ of creation. She is the Mother of the Son of God, who is the messianic King. Mary is the Mother of Christ, the Word Incarnate … ‘He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High; the Lord will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of His kingdom there will be no end.’ Elizabeth greeted the Blessed Virgin, pregnant with Jesus, as ‘the mother of my Lord.’ Mary is the perfect follower of Christ. The maid of Nazareth consented to God’s plan; she journeyed on the pilgrimage of faith; she listened to God’s Word and kept it in her heart; she remained steadfastly in close union with her Son, all the way to the foot of the Cross; she persevered in prayer with the Church. Thus, in an eminent way, she won the ‘crown of righteousness,’ ‘the crown of life,’ ‘the crown of glory’ that is promised to those who follow Christ.”
I also encourage all of you to keep this Marian month by praying the Rosary—even every day in May. I especially encourage all families to pray the Rosary together at least once a week. As St. John Paul II once wrote: “The family that recites the Rosary together reproduces something of the atmosphere of the household of Nazareth: its members place Jesus at the centre, they share his joys and sorrows, they place their needs and their plans in his hands, they draw from him the hope and the strength to go on” (Rosarium Virginis Mariae, 41).
Prayer Request! This is the time of year when the Bishop makes his decisions about priest transfers, which he usually announces at the end of the month. Please pray that we keep the priests in our parish for another year. We work well together and I know Fr. Bergida and Fr. Horkan are true blessings to the parish. And of course, I love my parish and hope to retire from here many years from now. So, please pray!
Texas. I was blessed to be able to make a quick trip (for a parishioner’s Wedding) to my home state of Texas last weekend. It was in Galveston, not San Antonio (my old home) but was the first time I’d been to The Great State in 18 years. Yeehah. The Texas told me to say “howdy” to y’all. God bless Texas!
Excerpt from the Homily of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger St. Peter’s Basilica, Holy Saturday, March 26, 2005
“Dear faithful, most of us received Baptism as children….it was our parents who anticipated our faith. They gave us biological life without being able to ask us whether or not we wanted to live, rightly convinced that it is good to be alive and that life is a gift.
“They were equally convinced, however, that biological life is a fragile gift; indeed, in a world marked by so many evils, it is an ambiguous gift that becomes a true gift only if, at the same time, it is possible to administer the antidote to death, communion with invincible life, with Christ.
“Together with the fragile gift of biological life our parents gave us the guarantee of true life in Baptism. It is now up to us to make this gift our own, entering more and more radically into the truth of our Baptism.
“Every year the Easter Vigil invites us once again to immerse ourselves in the waters of Baptism, to pass from death to life, to become true Christians.
“‘Awake O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light,’ says an ancient baptismal hymn that St Paul cited in his Letter to the Ephesians (5: 14). ‘Awake, O sleeper… and Christ shall give you light,’ the Church says to all of us today. Let us awaken from our weary Christianity that lacks dynamism; let us stand and follow Christ the true light and the true life. Amen.”
Oremus pro invicem. Fr. De Celles