From the Pastor's Desk | June 8, 2025

40 Hours of Adoration 

THANK YOU to everyone who has generously signed up to spend an hour with our Lord in Eucharistic adoration!  Bishop Boyea is asking each parish to have at least 40 hours of continual adoration leading up the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, otherwise known as the Feast of Corpus Christi, on June 22.  You are all also invited to attend Mass and a Eucharist Procession beginning at Jackson Field (Lansing Lugnuts) culminating at the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Immaculate Conception on Saturday, June 21.  RSVP by using the link at eucharisticmiracles.org or scanning the QR code. 

8th Graders

Our eighth graders celebrated their graduation from St. Martha School on Thursday, June 5.  Please keep them in your prayers as they move on to high school and their future endeavors.  I will miss having them walking the halls of the school and church!  The vast majority of the class is moving on to Lansing Catholic High School, something I am most proud of.  Given the culture, Catholic schools are the best places for our children and youth not only to gain an exceptional education but most importantly to encounter Jesus Christ and be educated in the truth of the Gospel.  We know the Truth to be the person of Jesus Christ himself.  

Thank You, School Faculty and Staff

Thank you to Andrea Patton, Cynthia Farnsworth, and our entire faculty and staff of St. Martha School.  Your dedication to the students and families, faithfulness to Jesus Christ and the Gospel, and all of your hard work is seen.  You are the soul of the school, and I appreciate you all very much!  Please take time this summer to relax before the fall.  You deserve the break!  School officially ends on Wednesday, June 11.

Parish Picnic

Thank you to everyone who helped coordinate and plan the parish picnic, particularly the Council of Catholic Women and the Knights of Columbus.   

Gospel Reflection

In chapter 17 of John’s Gospel, Jesus prays to the Father because His hour of glorification - His Passion - is impending.  He prays that humanity, the people he came to redeem, would know the Father.  He prays, “Now this is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent Jesus Christ (John 17:3).  He continues, “I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me, because they are yours, and everything of mine is yours and everything of yours is mine, and I have been glorified in them.  And now I will no longer be in the world, but they are in the world, while I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one just as we are” (John 17:9-10).  He continues further, “I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me (John 17:20-21). 

He prays that we know the one true God.  He prays for us because he knows he is leaving the world.  He prays that we be truly catholic - universal, or one.  The question then arises, how?  How will we know the one true God?  How will we know Jesus Christ?  How will we be truly one?  How can all of this happen if we can no longer see, hear, or speak to Jesus?

At the Last Supper, Jesus establishes his Apostles (and their successors) as his ordained leaders to carry on his mission - to foster the unity of the church so that we can come to know the one true God and his Son Jesus Christ.  Under the Old Covenant there were twelve tribes leading God’s chosen people.  Under the New Covenant there are twelve Apostles to lead God’s chosen people into unity, belief, and salvation.  The power Jesus gives them to confer the Sacraments - particularly the Eucharist and Reconciliation, flows from the power he gives them to teach, govern, and sanctify the Church.  This is why we believe in both Scripture and Tradition - the Tradition of the Church as handed on to the Apostles. 

On that day of Pentecost the Apostles were together as they received the gift of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus had already ascended to his Father and he knew that both he and the Father would send them the third person of the Trinity - the Holy Spirit - to fulfill the prayer he prayed to his Father.  It is in and through the Holy Spirit that the Church is established and, not only established, but given life.  This life in and through the Holy Spirit allows us to truly be one, holy, catholic, and apostolic.  This life leads us to faith in the one true God.  This life leads us to salvation through the Sacraments of the Church.  This life gives us the Church for our sanctification and holiness in a world that utterly rejects it.  

As we pray today on the Solemnity of Pentecost, let us pray together for a greater outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the Church, upon our families, upon our parish and school, upon the world.  Together we pray: 

Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful
and kindle in them the fire of your love.
Send forth your Spirit and they shall be created,
and you shall renew the face of the earth.

Let us pray. 

O God, who have taught the hearts of the faithful
by the light of the Holy Spirit,
grant that in the same Spirit we may be truly wise
and ever rejoice in his consolation.
Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Know of my prayers for you all! 
Fr. Ryan