Bulletin Article for the Twenty-fifth Sunday of Ordinary Time (September 24, 2023)

People of the Risen Lord,

Wow! That sounds formal. Please pray for the priests of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester. Sunday through Wednesday we will be at our annual convocation with Bishop Barron in Okoboji. It is a chance for camaraderie, hearing from the bishop directly his vision for ministry, and to slow down and have some extra time for prayer. Don’t worry. For me, that will include some golf.

I am pumped for the Marathon. Sort of. I think I’ll be rollerblading or longboarding instead of running. I ran cross country and track in high school. Came in last in a couple of races. My PR was about 21:45 for a 5K (3.1 miles). So about a 7 minutes/mile average. So my running days are over…unless being chased by a bear.

Also, Hank and Levi (Whitney and Alexander) Hammond are getting Baptized next Saturday (September 30) morning. If you see them, congratulate them and pray for them. It is always a gift and joy to have new souls enter into the Body of Christ, to have their Original Sin washed away.

Today’s Gospel is all about mercy. God just wants us to turn to Him, love Him, and to live life the way He knows is best for us. If we figure this out early in life, all the better. However, if we learn this late in life, He will welcome us with open arms. As Jesus says over and over again, He has not come for the righteous, but for the sinners. We are all sinners. Some days we realize this and some days we don’t. However, until we understand the depths of sin, we will not understand the depth of Jesus’ love for us. God is infinitely generous. May we open our hearts to God’s generosity.

Peace and Love of Christ,

Father Vogel

Homily for the Twenty-fourth Sunday of Ordinary Time (September 17, 2023)

Full Text: Homily for the Twenty-fourth Sunday of Ordinary TimeDownload

Bulletin Article for the Twenty-fourth Sunday of Ordinary Time (September 17, 2023)

Hello,

I went to the girls’ soccer game. It was great being the crowd. However, it was a tough loss to St. Charles. Sports can be a great outlet. Sports can teach great life lessons. Studies show that on average, those who participate in sports tend to be more successful in life. However, we have to remember that sports is temporary. Our relationship with Christ, or lack there of, is eternal.

In the Gospel today, Jesus tells Peter he needs to forgive over and over again. Peter thought he was being generous when he suggested 7 times. In the Bible, 7 is the number of perfection. So Jesus says 77 times, double perfection. So Jesus does not mean exactly 77, but rather as many times as a person offends you. And then Jesus tells a parable about a servant who is forgiven a huge debt is unable to forgive someone else who owes him a small debt. Sometimes I’ve used analogy of a skyscraper. Sometimes someone can hurt us greatly. And it can seem impossible to forgive them. However, we need to remember that Jesus Christ died on the Cross and forgave our sins. And compared to the perfection of God, our sins are like the distance between earth and sun. This distance is so much greater than the distance from the ground to the top of the skyscraper. So it is with our sins to each other compared to our sins against God. So if God is able to forgive us, we should be able to forgive others. And this is what we pray for every time we say the Our Father. “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” It is not easy. We really do some horrible things to each other. But we need to ask for the grace to forgive each other with the supernatural grace and love of God.

Have a blessed week,

Father Vogel 

Bulletin Article for the Twenty-third Sunday of Ordinary Time (September 10, 2023)

Hello, hello,

We had our first meeting with the second and ninth graders. I got to remind them the importance of going to Mass every Sunday. I told them we are the Body of Christ. When we aren’t at Mass, a part of the Body of Christ is missing. We are not meant to live this Christian life on our own. We are meant to be a community of believers walking together in holiness. On maybe more the negative side, there are 168 hours in a week. The Lord just asks for 1 hour. That’s just over a half a percent. But most importantly, we should come to praise and worship God. And if we are in a state of grace (no mortal sin on our soul), we should desire, we should pine to be intimate with Christ by receiving Him into our bodies in the Eucharist, which is Jesus body, blood, soul, and divinity. The Creator of the universe loves us so much He wants to come inside us. What great love and humility. Jesus took on our humanity so that we can take on His divinity.

Just a reminder. Jim Gavin’s funeral service will be next Saturday, September 16 at 11 AM at St. Patrick’s. We will spend some time praying for his soul. If he is Purgatory, our prayers will help purify his soul and prepare his soul for heaven.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells us how to deal with disagreements. Our tendency is to gossip or worse. However, Jesus says we need to do the uncomfortable thing and confront them directly, with charity. If the other person is the wrong, explain it to him one-on-one. Jesus says if he doesn’t listen to you, then grab two or three witnesses. Jesus says to involve others only after they won’t listen to you one-on-one. If they won’t listen to two or three others, then invoke the church, the wider community. If they won’t listen to the church, the community, then we start praying fervently for their conversion to the truth. Remember, this is not about us. This is about their salvation, their understanding of the truth, the Truth of Jesus Christ. We need to be about the salvation of each other’s souls. We need to point others (and ourselves) to the saving grace of the Sacraments, which are the saving grace of Jesus Christ.

I pray you have a blessed week,

Father Vogel 

Bulletin Article for the Twenty-second Sunday of Ordinary Time (September 3, 2023)

Hello, hello,

Please keep Ethan Ducharme and Sophia Augedahl in your prayers as they start their lives together this weekend as husband and wife. As you well know, marriage full of commitment and sacrifice seem to hard to live out these days, so pray for them. Speaking of marriage, I’m going to be gone again next Saturday to marry two former Minnesota State University Newman students. Father Marty Schaffer from the seminary will be celebrating the Mass. So if you have extra prayers, you can also pray for Max and Elizabeth.

This week we hear Jesus talk about sacrifice. He says whoever wishes to come after Him, whoever wants to follow Him, must deny himself and take up his cross. As I have said before, authentic love on this side of heaven requires sacrifice. The world will tell you that you need to assert yourself, you need to take things for yourself. The one with the most things is the one who wins. Christ’s message is the opposite. Whoever loses their life for Jesus’ sake will find it. Those who are humble and put others first will be first in the Kingdom of God. Sometimes the line between meek and humble and weak may seem too thin. However, as long as we stay close to Christ, desire the good of others and especially God, then we can’t go wrong. Sometimes the good of the other is for them to learn how to respect others better. If that is the case, then we need to speak up.

Maybe a good place to start is to ask ourselves where a majority of our time and resources is spent? Is it on things of the world, passing things? Or do we spend our time and resources on things of heaven, eternal things? When I look at my own life, I do spend way too much time and energy on passing things. It would be good for me to reflect on when I was a kid, my goal was to mentioned in history books. I suppose it was my way of wanting to be eternal, to be relevant forever. However, we don’t need history books. We are enteral beings. We will exist for an eternity. The question is are going to spend eternity in heaven or hell? What are we striving for? I pray it is eternal things.

May God bless and keep you.

Your Spiritual Father,

Father Vogel