Walk Through Our Storms

02-23-2025Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

I heard a story of a little girl who walked to and from school daily. The weather one morning was questionable and clouds were forming, yet she made her daily trek to the elementary school.

As the afternoon progressed, the winds whipped up, along with thunder and lightning.

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NOT to be

02-16-2025Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

The Bible defines worldliness by centering morality where we intuitively know it should be. Worldliness is the lust of the flesh (a passion for sensual satisfaction), the lust of the eyes (an inordinate desire for the finer things of life), and the pride of life (self-satisfaction in who we are, what we have, and what we have done). Worldliness, then, is a preoccupation with ease and affluence.

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02-09-2025Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

In football they have a "huddle."

The goal of the huddle is to give you thirty seconds to call the play, that is why they give you a huddle.

At a professional football game there may be sixty thousand people watching you huddle, they don’t mind you taking thirty seconds to call the play.

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Live in Present-Tense

02-02-2025Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

Jesus calls us to be people who live in present-tense.

An average person’s anxiety is focused on:
40% -- things that will never happen
30% -- things about the past that can’t be changed
12% -- things about criticism by others, mostly untrue
10% -- about health, which gets worse with stress
8% -- about real problems that will be faced

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3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

01-26-2025Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

Many people turn water into wine. It takes at least six weeks. But with Jesus it took no time at all. And it required no effort: he did it without even a word or a gesture or command; it just turned into wine in his presence, and he instructed the waiters to take it to the table. C.S. Lewis remarked that all the miracles worked by Jesus were in accord with the laws of nature, and not against them.

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2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

01-19-2025Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

The "Coronary and Ulcer Club" lists the following rules for members:

1. Your job comes first. Forget everything else.

2. Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays are fine times to be working at the office. There will be nobody else there to bother you.

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Baptism of the Lord

01-12-2025Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

At a recent gathering of university professors, one teacher reported that at his school the most damaging charge one student can lodge against another is that the person is being "judgmental." He found this pattern very upsetting. "You can't get a good argument going in class anymore," he said.

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Epiphany of the Lord

01-05-2025Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

These are the last New Year's Resolutions of Saint Sir Thomas More who was executed by the English King Henry VIII in 1535 because of his fidelity and loyalty to the Pope. He was the Lord High Chancellor of England. The Church has named him Patron of Statesmen and Politicians.

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Feast of the Holy Family

12-29-2024Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

As we begin a new calendar year let me offer some thoughts about making Christian Service a joy.

An amusing story was told to me by the retired manager of a New York hotel which hosted many large Catholic functions. The great Paderewski occupied a suite there a number of years ago during one of his seasons at Carnegie Hall.

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Fourth Sunday of Advent

12-22-2024Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

Christmas can still arrive when you least expect it, sometimes in the most unexpected manner. A priest friend of mine relates a story of an elderly woman named Stella Thornhope who was struggling with her first Christmas alone. Her husband had died just a few months prior through a slowly developing cancer.

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Third Sunday of Advent

12-15-2024Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

Do you know much about Emperor Penguins? I was not very familiar with these birds until a few years ago when the documentary, March of the Penguins, came out. And as I watched this documentary, I learned many intriguing facts about this largest of the penguin family.

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Second Sunday of Advent

12-08-2024Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

Johann Sebastian Bach was born into the musical family of Bachs in 1685. By the age of ten, both of his parents were dead. Early in his friction-filled life, young Johann determined he would write music … music for the glory of God … and this he did.

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First Sunday of Advent

12-01-2024Weekly ReflectionRev. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.,Pastor

Dear Friend,

Two hundred years ago, in the early 19th Century, as astonishing as it may seem, Christmas in Great Britain had become almost extinct.

The Times newspaper did not mention Christmas once between 1790 and 1835. Not once!

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