Dear friends,

I do not like Garfield… the cat. I do not really like cats in general, but on a personal level, I hold disdain for the lazy, lasagna-loving feline. I grew up reading comic strips in the Sunday paper and was always disappointed when I read Garfield. In many ways, humor is subjective, but I never found Garfield amusing. Over time, I grew to resent Garfield.

This will be a brief overview of the roles of the various people you may see ministering at the altar at OLMC.

Starting with the one in the middle seat whom everyone should recognize is the priest. The priest, during the celebration of the Mass, wears a chasuble, which matches the liturgical color of the Mass and often contains a single vertical stripe down the middle, sometimes splitting into three branches at the top of the chest. During the Mass, the priest is responsible for offering the Sacrifice and confecting the Eucharist. Only a priest (bishops are also priests) is capable of doing this, and the other ministers assist him in properly celebrating the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

Every Sunday after the homily at Mass, along with Catholics all over the world, we recite the Profession of Faith, known as the Nicene Creed. During this Jubilee Year 2025, we celebrate the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, which is the basis of the Creed we still use today. Just imagine 17 centuries during which, using these same words, billions of Christians have expressed their belief in God as the One who loves, the One who is beloved, and the One who is the Love between them. The First Council of Nicaea was a council of Christian bishops convened in the city of Nicaea, now Iznik, in the country of Türkiye (Turkey). Around 220 bishops attended, mostly from the Eastern churches.

Dear friends,

One of the most misunderstood sacraments in the Catholic Church is the anointing of the sick. In the past the sacrament was known as extreme unction, or “the last anointing.” The Church changed the name from extreme unction to anointing of the sick in the 1970s to better represent the purpose of the sacrament. This is because the anointing of the sick, as a sacrament, makes visible the healing mercy of God. In this the healing ministry of our Lord experienced throughout the gospels continues through Christ’s Bride, the Church.

Why do we use candles at the altar? One basic explanation is an appeal to fittingness. Imagine a fancy dinner, a wedding feast. It’s natural to solemnize the occasion with candles on the tables. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the greatest of nuptial feasts, so it makes sense we burn candles.

There’s also a prosaic explanation. The priest needs to see the text in the missal. In the days before electric light, stone church buildings without large, clear windows to admit natural light remained dim even on the brightest days. There’s also a more subtle explanation for the candles, which is that they are symbolic of Christ and His sacrificial nature.

Dear friends,

In the Catholic Church, we recognize two sources of authority: the written, inspired word of God (Sacred Scripture) and the living tradition of Christ's Bride, the Church. In this, there are two "fonts' that lead the faithful and protect the truth from being usurped by error. However, it isn't so clean-cut since tradition and scripture are intertwined. Going back to the Abrahamic tribe, the Word of God was passed on orally. In this sense, Scripture has its roots in the oral tradition of those who encountered the Lord and were inspired by God to write it down.

Each year on February 2nd is the Feast of the Presentation of our Lord in the Temple, also known as Candlemas. The shortest and darkest day of the year in the northern hemisphere is the winter solstice, usually around December 21. From that day on, the daylight grows until matching the darkness and night at the spring equinox, roughly around March 21. The midpoint between winter solstice and spring equinox revolves around—you guessed it—February 2.

Even before Christ’s coming and long after his ascension, nature knew of him—indeed, the sun, moon, stars, and earth announce his mystery in concert, as it were. Today’s liturgical calendar thus incorporates not only the historical facts of Christ’s life—such as his incarnation in the womb of Mary, his birth in Bethlehem, his presentation in the Temple, and his Paschal Mystery—but also elements of God’s own creation.

Dear friends,

This past Tuesday, we celebrated the memorial of Saint Thomas Aquinas, one of the most influential and well-known doctors of the Church. A medieval scholar and Dominican priest, Aquinas is known for many titles, such as the Angelic Doctor, the Dumb Ox, and the Universal Doctor. He is most well known for his compendium of theological teachings known as the Summa Theologica, which can be translated from Latin as the Summary of all Theology. This, along with Aquinas’ other works and prayers, make up a treasure trove of writings that have served as building blocks in defining and understanding Church Dogma, the core teachings of the Catholic faith.

The past two weeks, I’ve highlighted some small changes to our masses that will begin next week, February 2, in conjunction with the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, also known as Candlemas. Here, I’ll recap those changes in case you missed their announcements and provide some additional information and context to them.

At all masses beginning on the 2nd, the priest’s chalice will be vested, like the priest himself. The chalice will be “wearing” vestments in the corresponding liturgical color, in the form of the chalice veil and burse. The chalice veil in the Mass represents the veil of the Temple that was torn open as well as the metaphysical veil that hides Heaven from us until we are granted entry to it. The veil stays in place, hiding the full beauty of the chalice during the course of the Mass until that moment when it is time for it to be revealed and put to use. It is a symbol of “almost, but not yet” as we await the fullness of the joy of Heaven but experience a bit of it in the Holy Mass.

Dear friends,

As we continue on with the new year, many of us may have already taken time to reflect on our lives, on our priorities, and our relationships. We may have made some resolutions based on those. For instance, we may have made resolutions to improve ourselves, our health, our finances, our connections with others or to break bad habits. Those are all great, but for our parish, I want to call you to something more, something deeper: I want to call upon you to make a resolution to nurture a deeper relationship with our God this year.

Dear Parishioners of Our Lady of Mount Carmel,

I am excited to invite you to participate in the first Our Lady of Mount Carmel Parish and School Endowment Drive!

With your support, we plan to raise $25,000, and with the dollar-for-dollar matching opportunity with our trusted partners at the Catholic Community Foundation, the total can double to $50,000.

Like most liturgical vestments, the chalice veil is a mysterious garment. We may be tempted to dismiss it as a kind of decoration. However, the chalice and the veil not only have a function during the celebration of Mass, but they also remind us of a dignity that is too often veiled.

Beginning February 2, the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple, a Veil, with its accompanying Burse, will be used to cover the chalice when it is carried to and from the altar during the celebration of Mass.

Dear Friends,

I continue to wish you all a Happy and Prosperous New Year 2025. We are already two weeks into the new year. BUT, as I reflected on the events of the past couple of weeks, I found myself going back to the Christmas we have just celebrated. As I did so, I realized that it has been years since this month of January found me in the country, and perhaps that is what triggered this reflection. For many years, I celebrated the first of January in Uganda with my family and friends. So, I found myself thinking about the events surrounding Christmas and my past experiences of it in my village. Hence, the title of this article.

We are excited to announce that beginning on February 2nd, the Sunday 5pm Mass will be the host of a beautiful and prayerful monthly candle-lit Mass!

Forty days after Christmas, February 2nd, the Church celebrates the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple, which is also referred to as Candlemas, as it is traditionally the day in which candles are blessed. This feast is one of the oldest in the history of the Church, with details of its celebration from even as far back as the year 380. This feast, and its association with candles, stems from Luke 2:25-32:

Today, the Church celebrates the Feast of the Epiphany, when we celebrate the arrival of the Magi to adore the Christ child, bringing Him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, representing, respectively, the kingship, divinity, and death of the Christ. As part of the Epiphany festivities, there is an annual custom in the church of blessing homes, marking this blessing with chalk on the lintel above the main door of the house.

Dear Friends,

We are now in the midst of the Christmas season and we recognize, during this time, the presence of the living Word of God in his creation by his miraculous incarnation. In this incarnation (taking on human flesh), Jesus maintains his divinity as consubstantial (of the same substance) with the Father and the Holy Spirit while also taking on human nature in the flesh in all ways but sin: a human will, a human intellect.