5th Sunday of Lent

Dear Parishioners, 
We received our ashes this past March 5th, and here we are on the weekend of April 5th & 6th, a month later, on the Sunday before Palm Sunday. Holy Week starts after that, and soon it will be April 20th Easter Sunday for 2025! Sometimes it’s not easy to observe Lent in our world today, because our world is not exclusively Christian or Catholic today – not that our world ever was exclusively Christian or Catholic – but the overall observance of religion, Christian or non-Christian, is not very prevalent in this 21st century. Yet if we who are Catholic Christians want to experience the whole tone of what Lent is, then it’s totally up to us to observe and practice those things that are characteristic of this early-spring liturgical season. We are responsible for abstaining from meat and fasting as best we can on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday as well as abstaining from meat on the other Fridays of Lent. We are responsible for doing different spiritual things such as going to weekday Mass as our schedule allows, as well as attending Stations of the Cross, or planning a time of Eucharistic Adoration or saying a daily Rosary if we don’t already do these. Just like believing and having faith, no one can do these things for us, for us to “get credit” for them. We have to put forth the effort, and when we do, we will find the fruits of our efforts will lift us up and bring us to an awareness of God and of ourselves – that’s what a relationship with Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and the Church can do!