Were we able to gather this coming Wednesday evening for our special Lenten prayer and reflection, we would focus on the words of Jesus found in John 19:28: “I thirst.”

     In these days of a serious and widespread public health crisis, the reality of “being thirsty” is not so hard to imagine. And while the soldiers around the foot of the cross responded, if sarcastically, to his words, Jesus thirst was at a level that nothing on a piece of hyssop could address. In all of creation, the only the repentant human heart can do so. Only the unity of a mind, body and spirit that knows the wounds of life given and received, only that which knows the turned back of rejection and the outstretched arms of reconciliation, only that which has spoken or heard the harsh words of judgment and hopefully the gentler words of forgiveness can satisfy this cry of Our Lord from the Cross.

     I will continue to share with the team at St. Patrick’s in Whitinsville for the celebration of the Church’s Liturgy for you and with you in your homes, just as I celebrate the Mass in private each day I am at St. Peter’s. I pray that the sound and images conveyed on television or on line conveyed from St Patrick’s will be a source of grace satisfying a thirst that you are experiencing. I pray each time that I celebrate Mass in our parish in Rockdale that this, too, will be a source of grace for you and those whose lives are one with yours. We don’t know yet what is in store for us during the grace-filled week that will begin on Palm Sunday.

      We don’t know yet what is in store for us during the grace-filled week that will begin on Palm Sunday. We do know that, if it is necessary, blessed Palms will be available in St. Peter’s Church following the conclusion of the 4:30pm Mass at St. Patrick’s. Just as you are welcome to visit and pray in the church at your convenience, you will be able to pick up palms then and during the morning of Palm Sunday. God's grace to you, now as always!