Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
I hope you will join us Monday and Tuesday evening at 7:00 p.m. for our parish mission experience. The evenings are designed to help us to encounter the love of the Lord.
At the 9:00 a.m. Mass this weekend and the following two weekends we have the scrutinies for those who are preparing to be baptized (the elect) at the Great Easter Vigil. As they draw closer to promising to reject Satan and to place their faith in Jesus Christ, the enemy sees them slipping away and will try to instill doubts, cause problems, or discourage them. The Church provides these scrutinies so that they are strengthened and can withstand the attacks of the enemy. Each scrutiny has prayers for the elect as well as an exorcism.
The Gospels for these Masses have the account of the woman at the well, the man born blind and the raising of Lazarus. These show elements of baptism: The woman at the well focuses on water, the man born blind focuses on sight/light and the raising of Lazarus on new life. At baptism we are washed clean of our sins by blessed water, are given the light of Christ (the candle we receive) to walk always in Christ’s light and are given the promise of eternal life (see Romans 6).
They also focus on personal sin (the woman at the well was living with man number 6), sinning with others (the judgmentalism of the Pharisees), and the consequence of sin (death). These readings can help us to reflect on where we need the Lord’s healing so that we can live the promises we made in baptism, to reject the temptation to sin, and so walk in the promise of eternal life.
In Christ,
Bishop Tim Freyer
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