Dear parish family and friends of St. Julia,

Count our Blessings.  Our community of St. Julia has been blessed in endless ways.  The gift of our children first comes to mind.  The children, and in a special way the Kindergarten children of St. Peter Catholic Elementary School first come to mind.  Last Sunday, they so beautifully led us in our ministries at our 9:00 a.m. mass, and again at our end of school year mass this past Wednesday.  These children are a gift to our community.  Graduations take place next week, with St. Peter on Monday and Denis Morris Catholic High School on Tuesday.  For the blessings of these young people, our graduates, we count our blessings.  For the gift of our families, and the love we share, we count our blessings.  For the opportunity to gather as a parish family for our BBQ this Sunday, we count our blessings.  For the gift of this community that we call home, we count our blessings.  For the freedom we enjoy to practice and live out our faith, we count our blessings.  For the wonderful things taking place in our parish, as we continue to care for this church dedicated to St. Julia, we count our blessings, and for your continued generosity to our parish.  The endless list of things to count our blessings for, we give thanks.

And for the most precious gift of all, the gift of our faith, we count our blessings.

All of these blessings we count come from God.

And for each of you, my parish family, a blessing in my life, I count my blessings.

May God continue to bless each of you and those that you love, and I wish you a safe and blessed summer season.  I look forward to us gathering for mass this weekend.
 
Fr. Greg

Dear parish family and friends of St. Julia,

This Wednesday, June 21, marks the first day of summer, and next Saturday, June 24, we celebrate the feast of John the Baptist, one of the greatest saints.
John understood that his role was to prepare the way for Christ, and then to step aside: “He must increase, I must decrease” (John 3:30). The birth of Jesus is celebrated at Christmas in December—at the Winter Solstice, as the sun begins to “increase” in day light and the day light grows longer each day.  The Bible indicates that John was born six months before Jesus (Luke 1:26), so his birth is celebrated during the Summer Solstice, as the sun begins to “decrease” in day light and day light becomes shorter.  Summer Solstice has the longest day light and Winter Solstice has the shortest day light.  Thus, what St. John the Baptist says of his mission – is even reflected in nature – days become shorter after  the feast of John the Baptist and days become longer after Christ’s birth – He must increase, I must decrease.

There is a great deal of activity taking place in our parish community this past week and in the upcoming weeks as we progress through the month of June.  End of school year masses and graduations.  Our family mass this Sunday morning, with the ministries provided by our kindergarden children of St. Peter Catholic Elementary School.  Our Parish Family BBQ next Sunday, June 25.  Our regrading and landscaping project at the lower entrance.  Our hydragenes are getting ready to bloom with literally hundreds of blooms.  All wonderful things as we celebrate the gift of this community of St. Julia.  All gifts from God.
May God bless each of you and those that you love.
 
Fr. Greg

Dear parish family and friends of St. Julia,
  
The Mass is the “source and summit” of our faith.  It is what makes us who we are as Catholics and to receive the Eucharist.  The Eucharist – the Body and Blood of Christ.  No where else can we find this.  We gather as a parish family, a community of believers, not to be seen, but to be fed by the Word of God and the Body and Blood of Christ.  This is what our sisters and brothers, children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews, students and teachers, neighbours, colleagues, friends – everyone needs to hear.
 
In 2009, Pope Benedict XVI remarked at Mass for the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ that “the Eucharist has the power to unite people, strengthen them and remind them that only God is worthy of worship.”  He would go on to say "to adore the body of Christ means to believe that there, in that piece of bread, there really is Christ who gives meaning to our lives, to the immense universe as well as to the smallest creature and to all of human history as well as to the briefest existence."
 
The power to unite and strengthen. 
 
What is it that brings us together?  That is what this Sunday is all about.  The Eucharist.  It is what unites us.  It is the spiritual food that we need.  With all that is going on around us, and what appears to be pulling us apart, what we need is that which unites and strengthens us all the more.  And that is the Eucharist.  To be present and still in a sacred place.  To come together, and know from the very depths of our soul that we are all loved by our creator and God.
 
I encourage you to invite someone to join us for mass this weekend at St. Julia.  That personal invitation or welcome back just might be what they need to hear and what they have been waiting for.
 
May God bless each of you and those that you love.
 
Fr. Greg

Dear parishioners and friends of St. Julia Parish,

What does it mean to love, to share love, and to be loved?  In his letter to the Romans, St. Paul told the early church and each of us today that: “The love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.”  Love.  The gift of love that Paul described was “poured” into our hearts.  It is like an endless stream.  It is plentiful and life enhancing.  From eternity, God must be self-communicating love.  This in turn means that God possesses his identity only in a distinction within himself between lover and beloved, who are both one in love.  It is here that we have a starting point for the understanding of the Trinity, and one that proceeds not from knowledge in the word but from self-communicating love.
 
The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us: “The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life.  It is the mystery of God in Himself.  It is, therefore, the source of all the other mysteries of faith, the light that enlightens them.  It is the most fundamental and essential teaching in the ‘hierarchy of the truths of faith.”’ (CCC No. 234) This means that the love that exists among the Three Persons in One God should also be present in us.
 
So, what is this love that is shared among the Three Persons of the Trinity?  This love is a movement of giving and receiving, and in this movement there are three distinct relations.  The Father is purely a giver and sender of love; the Son receives life, glory, and power from the Father, which he receives to pass on; in the Spirit the faithful receive the gift of the Father through the Son, so that we may share in this gift.  Thus, in the Father, loves exists as pure source, that pours itself out.
 
Though the three Persons of the Trinity have different roles in the salvation history of humankind, they are equally one and are bound by love.  We may not be able to understand the mystery of the Blessed Trinity, but we can feel the love that is a fruit of their oneness.  The Trinity is the best example of a perfect and loving community.
 
So how do we bring the love of the trinity into our world?  The love of the Trinity must be felt in our families, in our communities, in our country, and in fact the whole world.  The Trinity reveals to us that love is at the essence of each person’s calling and our vocations, whether that is to marriage, the single life or to the priesthood and religious life.  These are the deepest ways of living out that love.  Therefore, we must ask if we are imaging the Trinity in our loves: in our marriages and families; in our places of work; in our schools, in our communities.  Are we becoming persons of communion?  This notion of communion is integral to the Trinity.  If this happens, then the world that the Father has created, and the Son has redeemed, and the Spirit has guided, will be very similar to the Trinity who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
               
Where there is love there is community; there is connectedness.  That’s what Trinity Sunday is all about.  And once again, that is where we fit in.  We can recognize that we are designed for those things, because we are made in the image and likeness of God.  Trinity Sunday reminds us that image, that likeness, finds it’s oneness, it’s wholeness, it’s completeness in the revelation that our God is one God in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
All too often we come to Trinity Sunday looking for an answer to a mystery, as if we are looking for the answer to a riddle.  We come looking for an explanation on how this one God in three persons is possible.  As finite, human beings, we will never arrive at that answer.  We can turn to analogies, such as St. Patrick and the clover, and yet every analogy falls short.
 
Trinity Sunday calls us not to focus on the “how” but rather on the “who” that is revealed today.  Our God, this one God in three persons, tells us their existence is based on being in relationship to one another.  The depth of love uniting Father, Son and Spirit makes it impossible to consider each person independently.
 
We find then that every striving of our souls for union, every reaching for companionship, every urge for a hug and embrace, every act of love gives testimony to the Trinity.  In our world of smart phones, emails, tweeting, and texting, we are still looking for connection and companionship.  We who are made in the image and likeness of God find a need within ourselves to mirror our origins.
               
On this Trinity Sunday, the Church calls us to meditate on the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity.  At the same time, it presents us with an opportunity to gain insight into ourselves, to see what motivates us, and how we were created to live and love.
 
May God continue to bless each of you and those that you love.
 
Fr. Greg