St. Joseph the Worker

Dear Parishioners of SJW:

Welcome to ORDINARY TIME on the weekends!  We have finished with Pentecost, Most Holy Trinity, and Corpus Christi Sundays, and now we continue our liturgical calendar in Ordinary Time until the beginning of Advent.  So, we have a long stretch of being “ordinary.” 

BUT, maybe not in the way you are thinking.  When we use the word “ordinary” many times, it denotes something that is possibly not exciting, or not memorable, or not noteworthy.  However, in the Catholic Church, it doesn’t mean that.

Ordinary Time gets its name and meaning because of the naming of each week.  From now until Advent, our weekend celebrations will be named with ORDINAL numbers---13^th, 18^th, 21^st, etc.  These Masses aren’t dull or plain or whatever.  No, the weekend celebrations derive their name from the succession of ordinal numbers.  So, this weekend, June 25/26, we celebrate the 13^th Sunday in Ordinary Time, with next weekend being the 14^th Sunday, and so on. 

Which brings me to ask:  Do we ever see our faith and the celebration of it as ordinary---dull, plain, etc.?  Or do we see each weekend Mass as an EXTRAORDINARY event?  The Mass is never boring or dull.  We receive THE Body and THE Blood of Christ.  We hear the LIVING Word of God.  We experience the Lord’s RISEN PRESENCE in the faith community gathered.  How could these things be considered ordinary?

Our faith is a gift to be celebrated and deepened each week of Ordinary Time in an extraordinary way.  How fortunate we are over the next months to gather as ordinary people at such an extraordinary event as the Mass!!

Your Pastor,

Father Joe