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Our Lady of Peace Parish Also Serving Our Lady of the Smile parish, Waterhen Lake and St. Jude’s Parish, Green Lake Office Hours: Closed Monday Tuesday - Friday 1-4:00 pm Office Phone: 306-236-5122 Cell Phone: 306-304-7271 Parish Email: [email protected] Pastor Email: [email protected] Facebook: Catholic Church Meadow Lake Website: https://www.meadowlakecatholicchurch.com/ Address: 504-3rd Ave. East, Meadow Lake, SK S9X 1H5 Lord, you are good and forgiving. Psalm 86 Refrain Our Vision: A Community of Disciples Our Mission We commit to form disciples who joyfully and faithfully live out the mission of Jesus Christ by enriching our relationship with God and neighbour through the intercession of Our Lady of Peace. Pastor: Fr. Doug Jeffrey, OMI Parish Secretary: Pat Bencharski Masses Intentions When there is a funeral, the daily mass will normally be cancelled. Check Facebook for the most up-to-date information. On Tuesday to Friday and on Sunday, Our Lady of Peace masses will be livestreamed on Facebook. Mon., July 24 – No mass Tues., July 25 – 10:00 am Liturgy with Communion at the Lodge Tues., July 25 – 6:30 pm (Our Lady of Peace Church & Facebook) -Fr. Doug Jeffrey by Marcel Sergent Wed., July 26 – 6:30 pm (Our Lady of Peace Church & Facebook) - +Jim Sergent by Marcel Sergent Thurs., July 27 – 9:30 am (Our Lady of Peace Church & Facebook) - +Edward Michel by Elsie Michel & Family Fri., July 28 – 9:30 am (Our Lady of Peace Church & Facebook) - +Edward Michel by Darcy, Dustin & Jim Thomas & Kelty Esau Sat., July 29 – 5:00 pm - (St. Jude’s, Green Lake) - People of God Sun., July 30 – 10:00 am – (Our Lady of Peace Church & Facebook) - People of God Sun., July 30 - 3:00 pm - (Our Lady of the Smile, Waterhen) - People of God THIS WEEK IN THE PARISH
Sunday Collection – July 16: Meadow Lake $935.25 Green Lake – No collection The Pope’s Prayer Intention for July – For a Eucharistic life – We pray that Catholics may place the celebration of the Eucharist at the heart of their lives, transforming human relationships in a very deep way and opening to the encounter with God and all their brothers and sisters. Old Greeting Cards – If you have any old greeting cards (birthday, Christmas, etc.) please don’t throw them away. I will take them off of your hands and put them to good use. You may drop them off at 302 7th Ave East or phone 306-236-5217. Thank you. Renee Scherr Purchase of Our Lady of Peace Statue – If you would like to make a donation to help cover the cost of the purchase of the Statue of Our Lady of Peace, please drop your donation into an envelope with the word STATUE on the envelope or on the memo line of your cheque. Please note your name and/or envelope number so you can receive credit for your donation. Thanks in advance for your generosity. So far, $2900.00 has been donated to cover the cost of the Statue. World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly July 23 – Pope Francis instituted the World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly on January 31, 2021 to highlight the importance of providing adequate pastoral and spiritual attention to the elderly and to call upon communities to manifest the closeness of the Church to them (especially in this time of pandemic). It is to be celebrated annually on the fourth Sunday of July, close to the memorial of Saints Joachim and Anne, the grandparents of Jesus. Taken from Ordo 2022 – 2023 page 303 Scripture Insights – Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Taken from Source Book for Sundays, Seasons and Weekdays 2023: The Almanac for Pastoral Liturgy, LTP Liturgy Training Publications Copyright 2022, 3949 South Racine Avenue, Chicago, IL 60609, pg. 280. Today’s readings highlight the mystery of kindness. Most of us think we know what kindness is so why call it a mystery? We tend to think of a mystery as something hidden or unknowable. But, in the biblical sense, a mystery is something that is hidden until God chooses to reveal it. In the first reading, the sage, or wise person, praises God for his response to the sinner. Although God could respond with wrath, the sage says, God judges with clemency and treats the sinner with mercy. Why? To teach God’s people that those who wish to be righteous must be kind. The Greek word is philanthropos, meaning “humane or tenderhearted.” When applied to God, it means “people-loving.” If we want to be just, the sage says, we must act in kindness as God has done. This is no ordinary kindness. It is a kindness deeply rooted in the life of God. Paul echoes a similar theme in the second reading. God is a people lover who recognizes humanity’s struggle to pray and responds with compassion, sending the Spirit to intercede for us. In today’s Gospel, Matthew provides several parables that talk about the mystery of divine kindness. As is typical of parables, these are fictional stories with a surprising twist. The hearers of the first parable probably thought, “That master is not very smart about farming,” because he told his servants to wait until the harvest to separate weeds from the good grain. But the interpretation of the parable (Mt 13:36 – 42) makes it clear that God does not behave as humans do. Rather, God is people-loving and will act in patience and restraint even to the end of time.
DIOCESAN NEWS & BEYOND Fr. Doug’s Contact Information Effective July 24th and following: Phone: (306) 480 2536 Email: [email protected] Address: Doug Jeffrey, OMI c/o St. Philip Neri Parish 1902 Monroe Ave Saskatoon, SK S7J 1R8 OUR LADY OF LOURDES SHRINE Plan to attend the August Pilgrimage at Our Lady of Lourdes Shrine, St. Laurent, SK (northeast of Duck Lake) which will be held on the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary into Heaven – Tuesday, August 15th. Adoration, Divine Mercy Chaplet, Reconciliation: 6:30 pm, Marian Prayer and Rosary 7:00 pm, Celebration of Eucharist and Candlelight Procession 8:00 pm. A Farewell Message It is hard for me to write this message and yet the time has come for me to write a word to you and to say goodbye to all of you who call Our Lady of the Smile, St. Jude’s, and Our Lady of Peace your parish. As you know I am being transferred by my Oblate Community to St. Philip Neri Parish in Saskatoon. Please drop in if you find yourself in Saskatoon. I would love to see you! This Sunday, July 23rd is my last Sunday praying with you here in God’s country. After the last liturgy on Sunday, I will make my way to Saskatoon. When I arrived in Meadow Lake and area, I remember telling you that I had never really been to Meadow Lake before. I had driven through it but never really stopped! I had no idea what to expect. My one desire was to serve you to the best of my ability. You welcomed me so generously. As I was getting to know you the Covid 19 pandemic came, and we were required to make changes to the way we encountered one another. I am so grateful for your generosity, your kindness and your prayer. As I take leave of you, I want to share two thoughts: I want to ask you for your forgiveness. Forgive me for the times I have not served you as Jesus Christ would serve you. I acknowledge my limitations and my sin, and I ask you to forgive me and pray for me that I might become more and more Christ like as I encounter God’s holy people. Secondly, remember that you are made in the image and likeness of God, that the Holy Spirit dwells in you and that God is always waiting to forgive you. When God looks at you, God sees you as you are – God sees how you sin and how you bless the world with your goodness. As I leave Meadow Lake, Green Lake and Waterhen Lake I take with me so many precious memories. I shall leave a part of myself here and I shall take a part of you with me. If, down the road, our paths cross, please stop and say hello. I would love to see you and hear from you. I will be focused on the new people I am being called to serve but I will not forget you and your needs. I shall remember you in my prayer. Fr. Mike and I will pray the Liturgy of the Hours every day. Fr. Mike told me that his practice is to light a candle as we pray, and he said that the candle will burn for all those people who have asked us for prayer. That candle will burn for you and your family. May you continue to believe in the God who loves you and may you see that God reflected in the face of your sisters and brothers. May the Peace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the friendship of the Holy Spirit and the love of God our Father come upon you and remain with you forever! Fr. Doug Jeffrey, OMI Message of His Holiness Pope Francis for the Third World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly July 23 2023 Dear brothers and sisters! “His mercy is from age to age” (Lk 1:50). This is the theme of the Third World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly, and it takes us back to the joyful meeting between the young Mary and her elderly relative Elizabeth (cf. Lk 1: 39 – 56). Filled with the Holy Spirit, Elizabeth addressed the Mother of God with words that, millennia later, continue to echo in our daily prayer: “Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb” (v. 42). The Holy Spirit, who had earler descended upon Mary, prompted her to respond with the Magnificat, in which she proclaimed that the Lord’s mercy is from generation to generation. That same Spirit blesses and accompanies every fruitful encounter between different generations: between grandparents and grandchildren, between young and old. God wants young people to bring joy to the hearts of the elderly, as Mary did to Elizabeth, and gain wisdom from their experiences. Yet, above all, the Lord wants us not to abandon the elderly or to push them to the margins of life, as tragically happens all too often in our time. This year, the World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly takes place close to World Youth Day. Both celebrations remind us of the “haste” (cf. v. 39) with which Mary set out to visit Elizabeth. In this way, they invite us to reflect on the bond that unites young and old. The Lord trusts that young people, through their relationships with the elderly, will realize that they are called to cultivate memory and recognize the beauty of being part of a much larger history. Friendship with an older person can help the young to see life not only in terms of the present and realize that not everything depends on them and their abilities. For the elderly, the presence of a young person in their loves can give them hope that their experience will not be lost and that their dreams can find fulfillment. Mary’s visit to Elizabeth and their shared awareness that the Lord’s mercy is from generation to generation remind us that, alone, we cannot move forward, much less save ourselves, and that God’s presence and activity are always part of something greater, the history of a people. Mary herself said this in the Magnificat, as she rejoiced in God, who, in fidelity to the promise he had made to Abraham, had worled new and unexpected wonders (cf. vv. 51-55). To better appreciate God’s way of acting, let us remember that our life is meant to be loved to the full, and that our greatest hopes and dreams are not achieved instantly but through a process of growth and maturation, in dialogue and in relationship with others. Those who focus only on the here and now, on money and possessions, on “having it all now”, are blind to the way God works. His loving plan spans past, present and future; it embraces and connects the generations. It is greater than we are, yet includes each of us and calls us at every moment to keep pressing forward. For the young, this means being ready to break free from the fleeting present in which virtual reality can entrap us, preventing us from doing something productive. For the elderly, it means not dwelling on the loss of physical strength and thinking with regret about missed opportunities. Let us look ahead! And allow ourselves to be shaped by God’s grace, which from generation to generation frees us from inertia and from dwelling on the past! In the meeting between Mary and Elizabeth, between young and old, God points us towards the future that he is opening up before us. Indeed, Mary’s visit and Elizabeth’s greeting open our eyes to the dawn of salvation: in their embrace, God’s mercy quietly breaks into human history amid abundant joy. I encourage everyone to reflect on that meeting, to picture, like a snapshot, that embrace between the young Mother of God and the elderly mother of Saint John the Baptist, and to frame it in their minds and hearts as a radiant icon. Next, I would invite you to make a concrete gesture that would include grandparents and the elderly. Let us not abandon them. Their presence in families and communities is a precious one, for it reminds us that we share the same heritage and are part of a people committed to preserving its roots. From the elderly we received the gift of belonging to God’s holy people. The Church, as well as society, needs them, for they entrust to the present the past that is needed to build the future. Let us honor them, neither depriving ourselves of their company nor depriving them of ours. May we never allow the elderly to be cast aside! The World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly is meant to be a small but precious sign of hope for them and for the whole Church. I renew my invitation to everyone – dioceses, parishes, associations and communities – to celebrate this Day and to make it the occasion of a joyful and renewed encounter between young and old. To you, the young who are preparing to meet in Lisbon or to celebrate World Youth Day in your own countries, I would ask: before you set out on your journey, visit your grandparents or an elderly person who lives alone! Their prayers will protect you and you will carry in your heart the blessing of that encounter. I ask you, the elderly among us, to accompany by your prayers the young people about to celebrate World Youth Day. Those young people are God’s answer to your prayers, the fruits of all that you have sown, the sign that God does not abandon his people, but always rejuvenates them with the creativity of the Holy Spirit. Dear grandparents, dear elderly brothers and sisters, may the blessing of the embrace between Mary and Elizabeth come upon you and fill your hearts with peace. With great affection, I give you my blessing. And I ask you, please, to pray for me. Rome, Saint John Lateran, 31 May 2023, Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. POPE FRANCIS
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Parish BulletinThis bulletin is prepared by the Parish Secretary and the Pastor Archives
January 2025
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