Weekend Masses

Dear Brothers and Sisters, You have no doubt watched some news reports, even quite recently, and wished you could have intervened to offer support to someone who is struggling, maybe even intervened to prevent a disaster. Jesus did in fact intervene frequently during his earthly life. A few examples include the man born blind, the women about to be stoned for adultery, another woman with a chronic hemorrhage and the criminal on the cross next to him. These were instances of Jesus applying the mercy of God, the same mercy applied to all of us by virtue of his death and resurrection. The Lord invites us, as his disciples, to join him in the work of mercy today. Making a contribution to the Catholic Ministries Annual Appeal (CMAA) is in many respects one way we can “Extend God’s Mercy “to our brothers and sisters. During my more than four years as your Bishop, I have been truly touched by the generosity and support of the thousands of people throughout the Diocese of Joliet, in particular through the CMAA. The CMAA funds the work of our 28 ministries in the Diocese. Because of your generosity, people throughout the Diocese of Joliet are experiencing the love, compassion, kindness and assistance that are signs of God’s mercy and grace at work among us. This report provides a recap of the 2015 campaign, including your parish’s results. I hope you find this information interesting and informative. As we approach the close of 2015 campaign and prepare to celebrate the Jubilee Year of Mercy, be assured of my ongoing prayers for all the people in the Diocese of Joliet. Please accept my sincere gratitude for your faithfulness and for your generous support of the Diocese of Joliet and its ministries. May the Lord bless you and your family, Most Reverend R. Daniel Conlon Bishop of Joliet  

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, In today’s Gospel Jesus quotes from the prophet Isaiah and set out his mission statement of what he is about. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord. ”Read through it because it could equally be a mission statement for the Jubilee year of mercy. Proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord. Take a look at the images. The Poor Who is the Poor? People can be financially and materially Poor, yet have a rich spirituality and reach out and help others. We also can have those who are financially and materially rich but spiritually and morally poor, The Powerful and influential can sometimes be values poor and merciless. All of these are part of the images that come to mind when Jesus speaks of the Poor. We may not see ourselves as identifying with any one of these images but we too are in need of Jesus’s mercy and compassion Very often we think of captives as prisoners, but they can be people in hospitals or homes with no one to visit trapped by their frailty or fear. They can be people trapped by illness. These are the people that Jesus wants to free. He challenges us to reach out to them through our visits or by joining programs that helps them break free. Many of the images for poor could equally apply to the word blind. There are the physically blind but there are those trapped by other forms of blindness. Where am I trapped? And finally there are the oppressed. We can look at areas of the world and recognize oppression ,but what of ourselves and our world? Can we recognize it in ourselves and in our world and what can we do to free ourselves and our world from it? All of these images are thoughts and reflections for the Year of Mercy and asks us again to take a look at the corporal works of mercy and how they influence us in the living out of our faith. Help us Lord to see you in or brothers and sisters and to treat them with the respect we want to show you. Pray for me as I pray for you, Fr Karl