Pastor’s Column

A BLESSED PENTECOST TO YOU & YOUR FAMILY

“A fiery sword, barred of old,
the gates of Paradise,
a fiery tongue, which brought salvation, restored the gift.”

St Cyril of Jerusalem

“O Holy Spirit, descend plentifully into my heart. Enlighten the dark corners of this neglected dwelling and scatter there, Your cheerful beams.”

St Augustine

“‘And my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.’ My friends, consider the greatness of this solemn feast that commemorates God’s coming as a guest into our hearts! If some rich and influential friend were to come to your home, you would promptly put it all in order for fear something there might offend your friend’s eyes when he came in. Let all of us then who are preparing our inner homes for God cleanse them of anything our wrongdoing has brought into them.”

St Gregory the Great

“Through the Holy Spirit comes our restoration to paradise, our ascension into the kingdom of heaven, our return to the adoption of sons, our liberty to call God our Father, our being made partakers of the grace of Christ, our being called children of light, our sharing in eternal glory, and, in a word, our being brought into a state of all “fulness of blessing,” both in this world and in the world to come, of all the good gifts that are in store for us, by promise hereof, through faith, beholding the reflection of their grace as though they were already present, we await the full enjoyment.”

St. Basil the Great

AGES FOR CAMPS

A clarification: We are opening Camp Immaculate Heart up to girls ages ten and up; Camp Sacred Heart is as usual for boys ages nine and up. I had the impression that the sisters wanted the age for the girls to be a little higher; they had the impression that I wanted the age a little higher; Tish had the impression that I wanted the age for the boys to be a little higher! So there has been some miscommunication.

Given the confusion, I am opening camp registration to boys ages nine to eleven, and to girls ages ten to eleven, until this Sunday, June 5.

P.S. We have about eighty boys and sixty girls signed up for camp so far. Outside of some very narrow circumstances (families that used to belong to our parish but have moved away from Sacramento, families that attend Mass elsewhere but are well known to a priest that is well known to me), I am not taking children from outside the parish.

PIG ROAST

Mark your calendars for the St. Stephen’s Pig Roast: Sat, Aug 6. If you wish to volunteer for this long awaited celebration, please contact Gloria Santana at (916) 832-2811.

(We’re hosting the pig roast on a Saturday because the Sunday schedule has so many Masses now. The schedule will be forthcoming.)