News - July 2024 RSS Feed

This past month, as we have been getting ready for the new Calendar and Liturgical year, we have been asking questions about our operation to stay current and to offer the best services that we can. As part of that effort, we formed a communication committee to address how we communicate and share information within and outside the community. We have various types of media we use to communicate our message. Our Sunday announcements, the bulletin, the screen we use before mass, the website, and social media (Facebook, Instagram, X, etc.), are the usual methods we use. All are part of our attempt to communicate what we are doing and when to people inside and outside of the church. We want to make sure that everyone knows and can participate in events and groups that we have.

It is hard to believe that I am finishing my seventh year here at the parish. Looking back, I remember being overwhelmed when I recognized the challenge of what the Cardinal had asked me to do. There were (are) three things to address: rebuild the community, restore the buildings, and retire the debts.

Today’s first reading reminds us that God does see everything and gets particularly upset by bad pastoring. The patience of God also prompts him to say that he will raise up the final prophet to show exactly what he means to do with us and for us. What he means to show us is the power of his love and the care that comes from that. That prophecy is realized of course in the person of Jesus, who in today’s Gospel recognizes that we are people who need to rest, and yet despite his care for his apostles returning from mission, he is also aware of those who are seeking him for care for their needs too.

Elections Postponed Due to lack of a quorum, we were unable to conduct the officer elections for the 2024 - 2025 Columbian year at our last business meeting on June 24th. It was decided that since most of the members attend Sunday mass on a regular basis that we would have a quick meeting after the 9:00am mass on July 7th in the church hall.

Join us for a 12 day Catholic pilgrimage which includes Lisbon, Fatima, Santiago de Compostella, Burgos, Loyola, Lourdes, Montserrat and Barcelona.

Today’s theme in the scriptures points us toward one of my favorite themes from the Bible, i.e., who and when gets chosen to bring God’s message and power to people. It starts with Exodus, the unlikely character of Moses, and then those who are given part of his spirit in the camp as they are in the desert (EX. 16:14-20). This is what happens to the prophets and certainly to the prophet Amos, who recognizes that he is not a learned man, but it is the Spirit of God in him that will speak. The Pentecost moment is the beginning of the Church and gives the vision that we are sharers in the Spirit of God.

Exploring the theme of BELONGING

The requirements for Virtus's Protecting God's Children have changed and you might have to attend the most up-to-date training version.

Enter into a peaceful space as St. James Church will be open to the public on Tuesdays this Summer. Each Tuesday, starting June 18th, St. James Church will be open from 4-7 pm.

Join us under the Tent!

This week we celebrated the founding of the country. In my seventh year here, I have come to appreciate the fanfare and the events that the city uses to celebrate the courage of the founders and the first citizens. In some ways, they deserved the description of “radical people”. Their ideas were about freedom and the desire to rule themselves using a democratic process of governance by qualified elected people. The final lines of the Declaration of Independence come to my mind when I think of what the founders were hoping for and prepared to do for one another. It reads, “And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”

All volunteers are required by the Archdiocese to complete VIRTUS “Protecting God’s Children” (PCG) training. This is a one-time obligation, unlike the annual CORI process. La Arquidiócesis requiere que todos los voluntarios completen el entrenamiento VIRTUS "Protegiendo a los Niños de Dios" (PCG). Esta es una obligación de una sola vez, a diferencia del proceso anual de CORI.