Bulletin: 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, 11/17/24

SAINT CHRISTOPHER’S CATHOLIC CHURCH

39 West 200 South, Kanab UT 84741

Office: (435) 644-3414 [Please leave a message and we will respond as quickly as possible]

parishinfo@kanabcatholicchurch.org

WEBSITE: kanabcatholicchurch.org

Sacramental Minister: Rev. Richard T. Sherman, Kanab, UT

SATURDAY VIGIL MASS  5:30 PM (Suspended Indefinitely)

SUNDAY MASS 9:00 AM

MASS DURING THE WEEK: MONDAY – SATURDAY 8:00 AM

CONFESSIONS BY APPOINTMENT

NOTE: If you have a sacramental emergency after parish office hours, please call 435-673-2604 for assistance.

Social Hour after Sunday Mass – Coffee, juice and bagels or muffins are served up along with some fabulous conversation.

Our next OPEN-DOOR SATURDAY is December 7, 2024 from 10:00 AM-Noon.  If you have friends or relatives that are interested in the Catholic faith, or are thinking of returning to the Church, please tell them about us and have them stop by. We would love to meet with them!  OPEN DOOR is scheduled every first and third Saturday of the month.

FINANCIAL REPORT:  November 10, 2024: Offertory: $1212; R&I: $70; Thank you!

You can also donate on-line at kanabcatholicchurch.org

Diocesan Development Drive (DDD) for 2024. We are over!!  Our goal this year is once again $8800.  We have $400 in unpaid pledges with $9865 paid in!!  Fourteen households have participated.  Thank you all who have already given so generosity.

PRAY FOR HEALING:  Sean McDonald, Bill Kaiser, Michael Neptune, Sergio Olvera, Stan Tuczakov, Hannah Mays, Darlene Wentch, Our Wounded Veterans.  If you have specific prayer requests, please leave us a phone message or send us an email.  We will get your intentions on the list.  We also remember all the sick and infirm at our daily Masses.

Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament: Thursday from 4 to 5:00 PM.

Community Rosary:  After the Monday morning Mass

Religious Items:  While enjoying the fabulous conversation and refreshments during our social hour, take some time and browse our extensive selection of religious gifts including some amazing.  New items on the way!

Safe Environment Requirements

The Diocese of Salt Lake City Office of Safe Environment is committed to the protection of children, youth, and vulnerable adults. All employees and volunteers wishing to work with minors or vulnerable adults must be safe environment certified. For information, please review the Diocese Safe Environment website at: https://www.dioslc.org/offices/office-of-safe-environment. Involvement and communication are important factors in helping to ensure safe environments for all of our children. Please contact the parish/school SEC at (Contact name & Contact Information) or email the Office of Safe Environment at safeenv@dioslc.org with questions.

Word of Life: November 2024  —————————————————

National Adoption Awareness Month – Learn how to accompany women considering adoption:  https://www.respectlife.org/mothers-considering-adoption  (One click on our website bulletin)

National Hospice and Palliative Care Month

“Palliative care and hospice are precious and crucial instruments in the care of patients with serious and complex chronic or terminal illnesses, and they help provide comfort to both the patients and their families. While palliative care cannot entirely eradicate suffering from people’s lives, it provides an authentic expression of human and Christian care—allowing us to ‘remain’ at the side of a suffering person, as the Blessed Mother and the beloved disciple remained at the foot of the Cross…The path of accompaniment until the moment of death must remain open, with appropriate care for body and soul customized to the personal needs of the patient.”

USCCB Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities, “The Witness of the Good Samaritan: Palliative Care and Hospice” 

Endowment:  Did you know that St. Christopher’s has an endowment that has been created to provide funding for future projects?  The endowment is administered by the Utah Catholic Foundation and will help maintain a vital Catholic presence here in SW Utah for years to come.  The fund was instituted in December of 2020 with a principle sum of $5000 and has a current value of $6065 from market gains and interest.  If you’d like to invest in the future of St. Christopher’s, please talk to Fr. Rick.

Envisioning Heaven: “If we can’t imagine Heaven, we won’t desire it; if we don’t desire it then we’re not going to have the energy that we need to meet the demands of Chrisitan life.”  Fr. Michael Niemczak, formation director at Mt. Angel Seminary in St. Benedict, OR.

Homily Reflections – “And then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in the clouds’
with great power and glory, and then he will send out the angels
and gather his elect from the four winds, from the end of the earth to the end of the sky.”  Mk. 13:26-27

As we grow closer to the end of Ordinary Time (two more weeks) we continue our consideration of the end times.  Mark’s Gospel today envisions the end time of judgement when the angels of the Lord will be sent out to gather His elect.  There is a Heaven and there is a Hell.  They are both eternal.

Jesus, whether He understands the specifics or not, also anticipates the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and the temple just a couple decades away in 70 AD.  (Amen, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place.  Mk. 13:30).  In both instances Jesus warns that the people should be able to read the signs of their times and anticipate the end of the old and the coming of the new.  Although the time of judgement is upon them (us), they (we) should not worry about the exact time.  “But of that day or hour, no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.”  Mk. 13:32

But for today, let’s take a clue from Fr. Niemczak above.  Let’s imagine Heaven so we can have something more specific to strive for.  While we are waiting for the ‘end times’ we should be about making the world look more like Heaven than Hell.  Let us capture the spirit of the psalmist from today’s Psalm 16.  “Therefore, my heart is glad and my soul rejoices, my body, too, abides in confidence; because you will not abandon my soul to the netherworld,”

Take a few moments to imagine Heaven.  Ask God for inspiration.

What steps can you take today to make the world look like the Heaven you imagine.  Think big and think small.

How has the world as you’ve known it ended this past year?  Loss of health?  Loss of loved ones or close relationships?  Loss of a career?  Loss of hope in leadership at any level?  Loss of hope for a peaceful world in your lifetime?  How has God been with you during these times?

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“Friendship is the source of the greatest pleasures, and without friends even the most agreeable pursuits become tedious.”            St. Thomas Aquinas