Christmas is a time to reflect upon the great love of our heavenly Father, and a time for thanking God for offering Jesus to us. There is no greater gift that anyone could give than the gift of one’s only child.  The celebration of the birth of Jesus is therefore a celebration of the infinite love of our heavenly Father. As we experience this love let us pray that we may have love for one another, be reconciled with each other and accept one another. Our Holy Father, Pope Francis has given us this wonderful opportunity by announcing the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy. Let this Christmas be special – let us try to experience deep within us that Love our Heavenly Father has for us and try to share it with others.

 Christmas is also a most appropriate time to express our gratitude to family and friends. I take this opportunity to thank each one of you personally for your constant prayerful support, encouragement, your words of appreciation and love. It has been a great joy for us to serve each one of you for the past two years. Thanks to all those who make our job easy, especially those in the Parish Office, the school staff, and all those who give so much of your time through various ministries and commissions including the many volunteers and all our Parish members and friends. Thank you for your talents freely given, your financial sacrifices generously shared and most of all for your prayers. Be assured of my special prayers for you during this season.

On behalf of Fr. Henry and our parish staff I wish you a Christmas full of peace, gratitude, joy and love. May Jesus hold you close to His heart during this Blessed Christmas Season and throughout the New Year- 2016. And may the blessings of this holy season descend on all of you in abundance.  

My prayer for you is the same as Paul’s prayer for the believers in Ephesians 3:17,18: “may Christ dwell in your hearts through faith; may you be rooted and grounded in love, so that you may understand with all the holy ones the width, the length, the height and the depth of His love you may be filled and reach the fullness of God.”

 Happy Birthday Jesus and Merry Christmas to all.

Dear St. Valentine Parishioners,

 On our last day of school before the Christmas break, just before we went out the door to spend two weeks with our families, the students and the faculty of St. Valentine School we were able to pray together. We prayed “that God will bless us and our families during the coming holy days. That each of us will help to make our home a place of joy, love, peace and safety.”  We also prayed that the St. Valentine School children will “be generous and considerate, not thinking only about ourselves, but of helping others enjoy the blessings of Christmas.”

  In a world that is so much about the “getting” of the season and not enough about giving to others and sharing Christ’s love– THANK YOU for being a parish that supports a Catholic School, a place where we children can pray about these things together and teachers can share the lessons of Christ’s love daily. The world needs Catholic Schools and we are proud at St. Valentine to help fill that need. Thank you, dear St. Valentine parishioners, for your continued prayers and support for our school.  The St. Valentine School community wishes you and your family a blessed Christmas season full of joy, love and peace. Merry Christmas and prayers for a blessed 2016!

Mrs. Rachel Damuth
Principal

This Sunday is traditionally called “Gaudete”, a Latin expression meaning “rejoice”. Besides the priest’s rose vestments we will also light the rose candle in the Advent wreath. All of these point to the nature of Advent itself, that is, a time of joyful expectation of the Lord. The whole liturgy is presented in a song taken from the letter of St. Paul to the Philippians: “Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again, rejoice!” (Phil 4:4). Why must we rejoice? We have so many reasons to rejoice. The principal one, however, is because the Lord is near. (Phil 4:5). The Old Testament people, who did not even witness the first coming of Christ, rejoiced. They rejoiced in the hope of the promise of God. Today’s first reading from the prophet Zephaniah came as a message of hope to the people of Israel. Christians are a people of hope. As the Bible says that Christ is our Hope and our Hope will never fail us (cf Rom. 5:5). Hope is what leads us from one day to another.

The Lord Jesus came into this world to bring glad tidings, or good news, to human kind and he has given us the mandate to proclaim this “Good News” to the whole world. But how can we give what we don’t have? We must be filled with joy so that we may share it with others. Thus, today’s liturgy does not give us room to celebrate a “pity party”. It simply says: REJOICE!

As we approach the celebration of Christmas, today’s liturgy also challenges you and me to share whatever we have with others. Sharing can bring smiles on the faces of the poor. It would be good if you and I could put a smile on someone’s face these coming days. “The crowds asked John the Baptist, ‘What should we do?’ He said to them in reply, ‘Whoever has two cloaks should share with the person who has none. And whoever has food should do likewise.’ (Luke 3:10-11)

The answer to the question, “what should we do?” is simple – SHARE. Sharing from the abundances we are given from God is especially meaningful in this Holy Year of Mercy.

God’s Blessings!

Fr. Socorro

Christmas Collection

On Christmas we take a special collection, and this collection is different from all of the other collections during the year. As you know we get to keep 100% of this collection whereas we only keep 93% of the regular collection. This creates a wonderful opportunity for each of you, and you will get the biggest bang for your buck. You can serve and honor God with a special gift for the Christmas collection, and I ask you to be as generous as your situation allows. Know for sure that every dollar you contribute will be used for the good and betterment of St. Valentine Parish community. Thank you in advance.

You may recall, in his homily for the first Vespers of Divine Mercy Sunday, Saturday April 11, 2015, Pope Francis explained the reason for the Jubilee, “Here, then, is the reason for the Jubilee: because this is the time for mercy. It is the favorable time to heal wounds, a time now to be weary of meeting all those who are waiting to see and to touch with their hands the signs of the closeness of God, a time to offer everyone the way of forgiveness and reconciliation.”

This Jubilee Year of Mercy will commence on December 8, 2015, Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception and will conclude on Sunday, November 20, 2016, the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe and living face of the Father’s mercy.

What is a Jubilee Year of Mercy?

The Holy See says that, in the Roman Catholic tradition, Holy Year or Jubilee is a great religious event, held roughly every 25 years, for the forgiveness of sins and the punishment due to sin. The Christian Jubilee tradition began with Pope Boniface VIII in 1300. Since that time, the Church has celebrated 26 ordinary and three extraordinary Jubilee Years. A Jubilee is a year of reconciliation between adversaries, conversion, and a time to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Therefore, it’s a time of solidarity, hope, justice, and commitment to serve God with joy and in peace with our brothers and sisters.

How do we celebrate the Jubilee Year of Mercy?

In the papal document officially calling the extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy, Pope Frances called for an array of concrete actions:

1.  Forgive those who have hurt you or have done you wrong. If possible, consider forgiving debts owned you and/ or returning collateral.

2. Read and meditate on the Sacred Scriptures, especially the Gospel of Luke. Sunday readings during Ordinary time of the Holy Year will be taken from the Gospel of Luke, often referred to as “the Gospel of mercy,” which includes well-known parables of mercy such as the parable of the prodigal son ( see Lk 15:1-32).

3. Go to confession regularly – monthly or even weekly. God wants us to approach him, to repent of our sins, and ask him to pour his mercy upon us and upon the whole world. Pope Francis tells us through the Apostle of Divine Mercy, St. Faustina, “I cannot punish even the greater sinner if he makes an appeal to My compassion, but on the contrary, I justify him in My unfathomable and inscrutable mercy.”

4. Perform one or more works of mercy every day.

5. Go on a pilgrimage. The Holy Father spoke of the special place of “the practice of pilgrimage” in the Holy Year. Traditionally, many pilgrims travel to Rome during Jubilee years to take advantage of the Holy Year indulgences to be gained by practices such as passing through the Holy Doors of the Major Basilicas of Rome, which are only open during such Jubilees. We can also gain indulgences by even making a pilgrimage to the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament, Detroit.

6. Share the Good News of God’s mercy through your words and good deeds.

7. Make Stations of the Cross regularly, especially at 3 p.m., the Hour of Great Mercy.

8. Pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy daily, imploring mercy “on us, and on the whole world.”

May God send His Spirit and consecrate every one of us with his anointing, so that the Jubilee of Mercy may be a year of grace for us and for our families.

  From the beginning of civilization, kings or militant groups have ascended who have dreamed of enjoying a world-wide domain, a universal kingdom that would last forever. Some have come close to conquering much of the known world–Alexander, Genghis Khan, Augustus Caesar, Adolf Hitler and canniest among all of them is the present terror group called ISIS which I sure will eventually evaporate. And some kingdoms have lasted a very long time, such as Rome whose Eastern half lingered on for 2000 years.

  But in spite of all their intrigues, the great rulers of the earth all proved temporal like anybody else. Their kingdoms, too, ultimately passed away, leaving abundant ruins for generations of travelers and archeologists to explore.

  There is another thing that these great ones of the earth had in common–they enviously guarded their glory, sharing it with no one. Their ascent to the peak of power was made over the backs of others, and they did not hesitate to eliminate any and all rivals.

  The Solemnity of Christ the King celebrates the fact that there is one who is unusually different. He came to serve all, even His enemies. He truly was a Son of Man, with a vulnerable human nature. But He was also truly Son of God. Not in some mythological sense, like the Pharaohs, or the wishful thinking sense, like the Caesars, but really and truly, the Immortal, the Eternal, taking the form of a mortal man in a specific time in history.

  Rather than executing His opponents, He forgave them. Rather than dominating His subjects, He exalted them. He even called them not servants, but friends, and bestowing on them a share in His priesthood and kingship. Though He died, like other kings, it was for a different purpose than Augustus in his bed or Hitler in his bunker. He died willingly to save His people, and His death was not a result of a battle lost or a plan gone awry, but of a glorious victory planned before the world began.

  He rose in glory, which can’t be said for the rest of them. And at His heavenly coronation, when He ascended to His Father, He was given what all the rest lusted for–a universal dominion that will not pass away. But the world goes on unmindful, with corporate executives and statesmen still riding for position, elevating themselves at the expense of others.

 The true King, however, is biding His time. He will return and suddenly things will be seen as they truly are. His coming will sweep away ambition, vanity, and pretensions, and much of what now appears important will look very empty. No longer will oppression be allowed to stand; the innocent will finally be liberated from those who victimize them.

  This dominion will truly be universal–there will be nowhere left where He is not recognized as Who He is, though in some quarters, that acknowledgment will be made with consternation and gloom.

  This judgment, this kingdom, will have the last word. No election will overturn it in four years or four million years. There is no one stronger who can rest the dominion from his Almighty hand.

He’ll be here soon. How soon no one knows.

 Fr. Henry Rebello SAC