Feb 22, 2024

Greetings,

WELCOME to St. Sebastian Parish The Rev. Thomas Blau, O.P. who will be giving the homily at all the Masses this weekend. Then he will begin our Parish Lenten Mission on Sunday night at 7pm and continue through the next two nights. Fr. Blau has been chosen by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops as one of the priests appointed to preach about the Eucharist during our nation’s Eucharistic Revival. The Parish Mission is free and open to the public and is suitable for persons of all ages. The title of his talk is, “Encountering Jesus in the Eucharist.” It will be good medicine for the soul.

IN OTHER NEWS:

EXTRA OPPORTUNITIES FOR CONFESSION: Consider celebrating your Lenten confession early in the season. Many people like to wait until the last minute and that might well involve additional waiting in lengthy lines! To combat that, there are many hours of confessions available this week outside of our regularly scheduled confessions:

There will be confessions on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday at 6pm leading up to the Parish Mission. Fr. Blau O.P. will be hearing these confessions. Your priests will step in if the lines are long.

There will be confessions on Wednesday night from 5 to 8pm. This is part of the diocesan wide “Night of Confessions.” Not only will your priests be available to celebrate with you on this evening here, but you can also go to any parish in the diocese during these hours for the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

PAINTING ON DISPLAY: The painting of “Christ Placed in the Tomb” will be on display in the St. Padre Pio Chapel at the back of the church until we begin construction on our Tomb Scene. It was painted by Ukrainian artist Litvinov Oleg Arkadievich.

RELIC DISPLAY: Also on display in the same location is a selection of the relics that reside here at the parish. St. Sebastian, St. Maria Goretti and St. Padre Pio are just some of the saints’ relics that you might find there and perhaps be moved to ask for intercession.

CONGRATULATIONS: Those of you who were at 11am Mass last weekend saw all the candidates and catechumens whom we were sending to celebrate the Rite of Enrollment with Bishop Malesic in Cleveland. Please keep all of them in your prayers as they prepare to come into the Church here at the Easter Vigil.

PLASTERING: Work has indeed begun on plastering the church on Monday. Aȅer Mass, several workers came in and began putting down protective covering and assembling scaffolding. Although there is a lot of work to be done on the ceiling where it had regularly rained plaster on the piano, the work should not interfere with Mass or rehearsals for our contemporary choir.

God bless,

Fr. Valencheck