Last week we sent out letters to all our fellow brother and sisters parishioners who are willing to contribute to pay our parish debt.  Fr. Henry and I, along with our parish and finance council, embarked in a campaign with a common goal: to be a debt-free parish.  As you may know, to finish pay our new John Paul II building, our parish debt is a little over 600 thousand dollars.

Something that caught my attention from our pastor, Fr. Henry, is that he signed by his own handwriting thousands of letters.  I cannot imagine how many hours he spent by signing each one of these letters by his own handwriting.

In my prayers, I was asking myself: How can I contribute to this campaign?  Fr. Henry has done a lot.  What I am doing to help out? My prayers were answered quite soon.  A few days after, I entered our conference room where our mail was stockpiled; I was asked to bless the mail before we sent it. As I always do, I close my eyes and I invoked the Holy Spirit.  I remember that my words without thinking were:  “Along with this blessing, I am also blessing every single family that is receiving these letters through the mail”.

Again, I did not think about these words for a minute and as soon as I finished saying this prayer, I started reflecting in those words. Yes, I came to the conclusion that the Lord was asking me to bless all those envelopes that encourage us to be generous and good stewards of the Lord.  At the same time, I was aware that I was praying for our entire community.  I was blessing thousand of families, not only the envelopes.  My prayer is to have hope for the future.  I know that I give my life for what I believe and the People of God is making an effort to join us in this communal prayer.  As we prepare for this Lenten season that is coming up soon, we are called to pray, to fast, and almsgiving.

Through this appeal, I want to let you know that is my compromise to keep praying for you, the community of St Peter and St Paul, to fast more often and to give more of my time to take care of the needy, the rejected and the abandoned. This is a testimony of what just happened a short while ago.

To enrich ourselves and to be prepared for this special season in the Church, I invite you to check out Lenten wonderful quotes in the following link: https://lifeteen.com/blog/40-quotes-for-40-days/

My favorite quote at the moment is: “Fasting and almsgiving are ‘the two wings of prayer’ which enable it to gain momentum and more easily reach even to God.”

St Augustine

Our mail was sent, and when you receive it, remember that there is a blessing included. May the Lord multiply what you are giving out…