We are united in prayer

In keeping with Alberta Health Services’ directives, and to protect seniors and those with pre-existing health conditions against the spread of COVID-19, the Diocese of Calgary has suspended all public Masses for an unspecified period of time. 

You can participate with in all the celebrations by clicking the link below:
Triduum and Easter live stream from Diocese of Calgary

Here is the schedule of all the celebrations that will be streamed:
Chrism Mass, Holy Thursday, April 9, 2020 at 10:00 am
The evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper, Holy Thursday – April 9, 2020 at 7:00 pm
Good Friday, April 10, 2020 at 3:00 pm
Easter Vigil, Holy Saturday, April 11, 2020 at 9:30 pm
Easter Sunday, April 12, 2020 at 10:00 am

Other links/ information you may find by clicking the links below:

Bishop’s Letter to Faithful re: Holy Week and Triduum
Decree of Dispensation from Sunday Obligation
https://www.catholicyyc.ca/blog/covid19

This is a difficult decision. Let us remember that we are united in Christ through prayer and a common spirit of love and trust in Him. 

​Our Lady, Health of the Sick, pray for us. 
St. Joseph, pray for us.

Taken from the website of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Calgary

Friends, on this Palm Sunday, Matthew’s magnificent Gospel of the Passion bids us to reflect on the seriousness of sin.

To be sure, the Gospel proclaimed by the first Christians involves the glorious Resurrection, but those initial evangelists never let their hearers forget that the one who had been raised was none other than the one who had been crucified.

So the question was—and remains—why would God’s salvation of the human race have to include something as horrifying as the Crucifixion of the Son of God?

Here’s the point. The Scriptural authors understand sin not so much as a series of acts as a condition in which we are stuck. No amount of merely human effort could possibly solve the problem. Something awful had to be done on our behalf in order to offset the awfulness of sin.

With this biblical realism in mind, we can begin to comprehend why the Crucifixion of the Son of God was necessary. The just rapport between God and human beings could not be reestablished either through our moral effort or with simply a word of forgiveness. Something had to be done—and God alone could do it.

Reflect: Meditate on one of Christianity’s most mysterious truths: that the Crucifixion of the Son of God was necessary.

Reflection taken from the Daily Meditations from Bishop Robert Barron

Nourish your family spiritually during the pandemic. Let us take advantage of this somewhat strange time to welcome and live the Spirit in our homes and rediscover the wealth and the gift of our domestic Churches together with Jesus, who lives with us. (Card. Farrell, March 19, 2020). 

Livestream Masses and other resources 
https://www.catholicyyc.ca/livestreammass.html
https://www.catholicyyc.ca/blog/keeping-the-lords-day-holy

JOHN 11:1-45

Today’s Gospel about the raising of Lazarus has a pointed message for us. Everyone reading this is, to a degree, spiritually dead. Maybe you’re like Lazarus—four days in your tomb. Maybe you feel there is just no hope for the likes of you. I don’t care how far you’ve fallen. I don’t care how dead you are. The voice of Jesus can call you back to life, can pull you out of the tomb. Martha, the dead man’s sister, said to him, “Lord, by now there will be a stench; he has been dead for four days.” Maybe you’re sunk in an addiction. Maybe you’ve done things that you are so ashamed of that you can’t even bring yourself to speak of them. Maybe you’ve fallen out of a relationship with the people you love the most. Maybe you’ve been a first-class jerk. Maybe you just feel you’re a failure. Maybe you’re terrified of dying. I don’t care. Listen for the voice! “Untie him and let him go.” Reflect: What are you “tied up” with right now? Who is the only one who can untie you and give you true freedom? This Lenten Gospel Reflection is taken from the Daily Meditations of Bishop Robert Baron.

Everything about this Gospel comes down to who we identify with. As we read, it is so easy to love the blind man in the story, and the blind man in us. We want to be healed and celebrated for God at work in us. But where are the Pharisee corners of our hearts, where we delight in our own privilege and refuse to see the ways that our blessings cause hardship for others? Who do we make fun of, belittle, or feel better than? Whose are the stories we ignore or rewrite to suit our comfort? The truth is that all of us, on this side of heaven, are both the blind man in need of healing, and the Pharisee trying to block the healing work of Jesus. Until we can identify with the Pharisee, we will remain unhealed by our own self-righteous choosing.

Prayer: For the courage and humility to admit we need to be healed, we pray to the Lord.

Healing Jesus, touch our wounds with your healing hands. Help us to see where we need you, and prevent us from restricting the healing work you offer others. Shape us to love your people, sinners and saints. Amen.

#CatholicYYC #SundayReflection
Reflection: CCCB

Taken from the Facebook page of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Calgary