Coupled with the tears of joy that came from those who had communion for the first time since March, the first full choir we have had in months, and the wonderful socially distanced picnic we had after partaking of the Body and Blood of God…it was truly a Sunday to remember (at least for this simple village priest).

We have been dealing with a lot this past year, ranging from a worldwide pandemic, to political infighting, to other bad pieces of news that have been cropping upon a weekly basis. I would argue, that if we kept St. Paul’s 5 directives in our hearts, in our minds, and at the for-front of EVERYTHING that we do this year, we would become (and I love this word because it carries a powerful connotation with it) INVINCIBLE to the World.

“I once heard a priest give the image of a highway to describe our spiritual journey towards God. All of the moral laws and commandments that we practice as Christians are what makes up the guard rails. Fasting rules, canon laws, the “do nots” are all of the practices we put into our lives that protect us from falling off of the road and down a cliff. They are put there for a reason and are extremely important! But what happens if they become the sole purpose of our life?”

How quickly we forget the mercy, love and kindness that is shown to us by our Heavenly Father. Maybe if we would take a few minutes throughout the day to reflect on the multitude of blessings we receive from God, we just might not be so quick to seek retribution.

I think that sometimes, we fall into this trap of thinking that our faith is a kind of Western Moralism. “Do the Right thing, don’t sin…pray every once in a while…and you will get into heaven.” But there is a depth of our faith and our relationship with God that goes SO MUCH deeper than that.