From the Pastor

I’m scared of “holy people” yes, they terrify me!

 I don’t mean the real holy people, I mean the ones that are convinced they are holy and everyone else isn’t. I bring this up because on the feast of All Saints I'm suppose to encourage everyone to be a saint, but I want to make sure we are on the same page.
What do we mean by saint, how would you know one?  Well, some are canonized, but most people are called saints because people regard them as saints.
Here is a little test, your notion or idea of what a saint truly is, is probably revealed in who your favorite saints are. Is your saint meek and mild, caring for the poor, or a doctor of the church, or a virgin and martyr, or a great reformer or thinker, or a person of self-denial and poverty? There is probably something in the life of your favorite saint that you equate with holiness. Or maybe you don’t have a favorite saint, maybe you just never heard their story, or you just didn’t see the point, or maybe you just couldn’t relate your life, your story to theirs.
I do sympathize, don’t get me wrong, we have many saints who are approachable and relevant to us but I must admit some of the others we read about, are a little bit scary.
I don’t know if they were really that strange in real life or if their biographers have done them a disfavor, I presume the latter.
Sometime in the lives of the saints, all that remains after centuries of editing are caricatures of real people. People in old garments, speaking a strange language, living an unbalanced life, a life of extremes…most probably not a life you would desire for yourself or your family.
To use popular language, our ideas and image of a saint needs a makeover.
The first thing we need to say is that we have saints of every personality, size, shape, race, culture, and language. Over the centuries and today, they wear every type of clothing. They come from every rank, from servant to king, from pauper to persons of wealth, from the simple to the sophisticated, from the learned to the unlettered and everyone in between. Every person of every time is called to holiness, to sanctity and can achieve it with God’s grace!
In this great diversity, there are a few common elements among saints.
The first, the recognition that God knows them, loves them and calls them. So begins a lifelong relationship of knowing that every moment is lived in the presence of God, that we are significant people, unique, called to be the person he created us to be.
To be the person he calls us to be, to live not an extreme life or half-life or weird life, but to live a life to the full, a life of joy. To choose goodness is to choose life , to choose sin is to choose something less, something false, something not worth of ourselves, we deserve better.
A saint is not someone convinced of his or her own holiness but God’s. 
Some will say, I can’t be a saint because I have a past. So did St. Peter & St. Paul.
I can’t be a saint, I had doubts. So did St Thomas. I can’t be a saint, I sin…Welcome to confession.
If you asked people in recent years to name a living saint, most would have said Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Many regarded her, as living on another level, her praises were sung, and she was mentioned in every second homily. However there was a tendency to romanticize, to create a new caricature.
That why in recent years I was glad that when the diary of Mother Teresa was published, we found a real woman, a real person, who doubted her own worth, her own faith, who wrestled with doubt , but kept praying and serving. Mother Teresa’s struggles only strengthened my belief that she is a true saint of the church.
The life of a disciple is not Hollywood or Disney, it has struggle and pain and sin and failure and conversion and reconversion. We hang onto his garments, to his holiness, because we know we cannot save ourselves. We throw ourselves on the ground and he picks us up from the dust. We ask for forgiveness again and again and he gives it again and again.
We are all sinners in this church, called to be saints, relying on God’s grace and mercy to become the people he calls us to be. It is a blessing to be on the journey with you.

Trenton Monitor

At the beginning of this month the Trenton Monitor Newspaper officially switched to a monthly magazine.

The parish is no longer sponsoring individual subscriptions to be delivered to parishioners' homes. There will be copies in the churches for free as always. If you would like a copy of the New Trenton Monitor Magazine delivered to your home please purchase a subscription HERE

Second Collection Change

The Second Collection on November 16th and 17th will be for Mission of Mercy in Uganda, not the Diocesan Assessment. 

REMINDER