FROM THE PASTOR’S DESK
Dear St. Mary’s Parishioners:
On Saturday morning, August 28th, Bishop Jaime Soto visited our parish to confer the Sacrament of Confirmation on 65 of our younger parishioners. A year ago, when we planned for this celebration, we made a request to the Bishop’s Office to schedule the Confirmation Mass later in the summer rather than in the spring. The thinking was that the later in the year we had the Mass, there would be better chance that the pandemic would have subsided. Well, as we know, the pandemic is still with us. But that did not stop us from having a worthy and beautiful celebration. Thanks to our livestream team of Don Krch and Deven Eaton, we were able to livestream the Mass. The video recording of the Mass can be seen on our “St Mary’s Vacaville” YouTube channel.
As I mentioned at the end of the Confirmation Mass, there is much to give thanks to God for this year. The pandemic made it challenging for everyone involved in our religious education program. I express my gratefulness to our Director of Religious Education, Martha Batres-Martin and to her helpers on our religious ed staff: Sr Laura, Sr. Adriana, Sr. Eileen and Flor Hernandez. Also, I am most grateful to all of our volunteer catechists who give so much of their time and energy to share their love and knowledge of the faith with our children and youth. And, I am especially grateful to God for all of our parents and for their children. This year, on account of the COVID restrictions, much of the catechesis took place in the home. Parents attended monthly meetings at the parish and were given support from the catechists and formation from the Sisters, Fr. Steven, volunteers and myself. I think for a number of the parents that it was not only an opportunity to teach the faith to their children, but also to themselves. And, I know it was not always easy.
As you’ve heard me mention before, the Church has always taught that parents are the primary educators of their children, not only when it comes to passing on the faith, but in many important matters. We read in the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
Parents have the first responsibility for the education of their children. They bear witness to this responsibility first by creating a home where tenderness, forgiveness, respect, fidelity, and disinterested service are the rule. The home is well suited for education in the virtues. This requires an apprenticeship in self-denial, sound judgment, and self-mastery---the preconditions of all true freedom. Parents should teach their children to subordinate the ‘material and instinctual dimensions to interior and spiritual ones.’ Parents have a grave responsibility to give good example to their children. By knowing how to acknowledge their own failings to their children, parents will be better able to guide and correct them. (CCC, 2223)….Family catechesis precedes, accompanies, and enriches other forms of instruction
in the faith. Parents have the mission of teaching their children to pray and to discover their vocation as children of God. The parish is the Eucharistic community and the heart of the liturgical life of Christian families; it is a privileged place for the catechesis of children and parents.” (CCC, 2226)
Thus, while the parish is “privileged place” for the catechesis of children and parents, the family is “primary place”. At the end of the Confirmation Mass, I reminded the newly anointed confirmandi that being confirmed does not mean that one has “graduated” from the Catholic faith. Growing in the faith takes a lifetime. It takes hard work, perseverance and commitment. I encouraged the youth to participate in youth group. (Some of them already are.) Andreya Arevalo, St. Mary’s Youth Minister, likes to remind us that active religious teens are less likely to participate in high-risk activities. They are more likely to volunteer more, have more social connections, get and stay married and have larger families. Moreover, they live longer, earn more money, experience less depression, and are happier and more fulfilled in their lives than teens who are not active in the practice of their faith. I pray that our confirmandi continue to practice their faith, grow closer to Jesus and continue grow in virtue and holiness.
May you have a blessed week!
In Christ,
Father Berg
