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14 April / 15 APRIL Saint Joseph Parish Saint Francis deSales Parish |
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6:00 to 7:00 p.m. at St. Joseph's 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. at St. Joseph's 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. at St. Francis deSales' |
| THE SANCTUARY LAMP at St. Joseph Church is offered, during the week of 15 - 21 April, in loving memory of Jane Bower Sciarrone, at the request of her husband, Joseph, and family. |
| THE LOURDES GROTTO CANDLE is offered, during the week of 15 - 21 April, in loving memory of Lillian Cappetta Kevy, at the request of her daughters, Phyllis and Roni. |
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NOTE The following joke is extremely dumb
and juvenile. The pastor must be desperate for material! |
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Danielle Carl Brigade James T. Evans Philip J. Griffin Thomas M. Guastavino Richard C. Cooper Gifford J. Kline Victoria Q. Kline |
Ian R. Getzey Jean Albo Lang Teresa Mercuri Keck Emidio A. Piccioni Susanne V. Wilson Angela DiCello Boulton Elizabeth Mistishen Carestia Amanda M. Mohan Louis C. Tassone Jr. |
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BELATED BIRTHDAYS Doggone it! We did it again. We missed two more birthdays. I may as well tell you the truth: These recent omissions have not been the fault of the secretary. They have been the fault of yours truly (EBC). However, I would like to make a feeble excuse. It all has to do with an error in transferring data from one computer to another. The secretaries and I work from two different computers. I keep the master census (which includes the BD data) up to date on my computer. However, I find that I have been making an error lately when I transfer the data from my computer to the office computer. Apparently, it's not transferring! I have to find out what I'm doing wrong. I shall make sure I correct this error. Meanwhile, HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAYS to Mary Elizabeth Troilo Acker (9 April) and to Keegan Michael Dubé (2 April). Keegan just turned one. Gee whiz, I hope this omission of his first birthday will not cause any deep psychological trauma. |
| FAMILIES ARE NEEDED to care for children of all ages who are in foster care. An Information Meeting to review the rewards and responsibilities of foster parenting will be held on Tuesday, 24 April 2007 at the Schuylkill / Carbon Office of Catholic Charities, 1720 W. Market Street, Pottsville at 6:00 PM. Please call Dolores at 570-628-0466, ext. 305 or e-mail dnovack@allentowndiocese.org. |
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In memory of Ryan A. Walters Dorothy A. Natale Robert and Brenda Cooper |
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We are grateful to you once again for making
the palm crosses for the people to take on Palm Sunday. Thanks
also for the one you made especially for the priest. |
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NEWS FLASH: Exclusive to the
StJosPar / StFdSPar bulletin In view of recent developments, the U.S. Congress has passed a bill that would prohibit Santa Claus from saying "HO-HO-HO"! If the jolly elf wishes to manifest his jolliness, he must substitute some other set of syllables. A companion bill to re-name a certain garden implement will be voted on next week. |
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SIX SIMPLE STRATEGIES by Sol Herzig, Ph.D. The sobering fact is that serenity and joy are natural
states for us all. Fear not. Practiced regularly, these strategies
vastly improve our odds of attaining despair. |
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Remember, if you don't take things personally
no one will do it for you. 3. FOCUS ON PROBLEMS There is really very little sense in having problems if you don't focus on them. It's crucial therefore to keep careful track of all your problems and constantly review them. Nurture the attitude that you can't really move on to anything unless everything is resolved first. Remember also that there is no solution without a problem, if you look closely enough. Always resist the temptation to ponder where problems go when you don't think about them. 4. MAGNIFY Too often people cheat themselves out of misery by maintaining perspective. This is both needless as well as extremely counter productive. Why would anyone ever want to think of themselves as "just human" when "fatally flawed" and "irredeemably warped" are available? Similarly, when recalling past mistakes, why stop at instructive regret when paralyzing guilt is within reach? Sure it requires a bit of effort, but the payoff can be enormous. Just imagine the benefits of eventually believing that your negative thinking actually reflects reality. 5. EXPECT CATASTROPHE It is critical to remember that really terrible things can occur at any moment. Let's start with the body. Begin by paying close attention to changes in bodily sensation, no matter how trivial. Next, let your imagination run wild. Anything involving flesh-eating bacteria or intestinal parasites will |
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usually do the trick. People sometimes protest
that their bodies feel perfectly fine. Not to worry! Think "Silent
Killers." Feeling perfectly fine places you squarely at
risk for these. Of course, there is no reason to stop at personal
health issues. The range of potential catastrophe is vast. For
example, there are suitcase bombs, encroaching asteroids, global
recession, pandemics, the prospect of Hillary Clinton as President
of the USA, killer bees, and so on. Simply use your imagination
to craft a realistic sense of impending doom. Savor the pride
you'll feel on your death bed knowing that nothing ever caught
you by surprise. 6. JUST SAY "NO THANKS" TO GRATITUDE Gratitude is to misery what Kryptonite is to Superman. All the hard work you've invested in misery will go down the drain if you start fiddling around with gratitude. A zero tolerance policy is very much in order. This is very challenging, however, as life runs rampant with opportunities for gratefulness. Begin, therefore, by thoroughly discounting all the good in your life as a "given." Next, focus your mind on the many ways in which life continues to disappoint you. At an advanced level, you can even learn to see the bad in the good. For instance, should you get a big raise you could immediately focus on the tax implications. Eliminate gratitude from your life and misery will be right around the corner. A final word. The beauty of misery is that the more you share it with others, the more you wind up having. So share generously. After all, misery loves company. |
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CHILDREN OUT OF WEDLOCK In the 12 April edition of The Republican, on page 20, I saw a listing of recent BIRTHS in the Pottsville Hospital. I scanned the list to see if there were any names I might recognize. I counted a total of twenty babies listed as born between 28 Feb and 6 April. After scanning the names, I decided to count how many of these children were born to married couples as opposed to how many were born to unmarried couples. Believe it or not - and you are free to double-check my count - five of the twenty were born to married couples and fifteen were born out of wedlock. That's 25% within wedlock and 75% out of wedlock. I think this is amazing! In a certain way, I hesitate to bring this up because (a) I am very much pro-baby and (b) I don't want anyone to think that I am suggesting that abortion or artificial contraception would in any way be preferable to openness to conception and childbirth. God knows, abortion is homicide and artificial contraception stinks to high heaven. However, if two persons who are not married to one another absolutely insist on having intercourse with one another and if nothing I or anyone else can say is going to prevent them, then I say to them: For God's sake, if a pregnancy results, let the child live. Bring him or her to term! If you need financial help in order to do this, ask for it. It will be given. But, whatever you do, don't have an abortion! For God's sake, don't have an abortion! And please - if you insist on having sex outside of marriage - please don't make your situation worse by using artificial contraception, whether it be condoms or "the pill" or "the patch" or any kind of chemical contraceptive! Having said all that, I want to say the obvious, which is obviously not as obvious as it obviously used to be. Are you ready? Here goes: Contrary to anything you may have heard from anyone else, God does not want unmarried people to have sexual intercourse with one another. In fact, God forbids unmarried people to have sexual intercourse. Having sexual intercourse outside of the marriage state is a very great sin. If you have committed this sin, repent, go to Confession and resolve, with God's help, to stay away from this sin in the future. |
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THANK YOU, SENATOR CASEY! [We are referring, of course, to Senator Bob Casey (D-PA)] You had the courage to buck the leadership of your party in order to vote your correctly formed conscience on the matter of allocating money for expansion of stem-cell research. Even though you came out on the losing side (63 to 34), you may be certain that you will come out on the winning side. Now, would you do us another good deed? Would you please take my congressman, Tim Holden (D-PA), out for lunch and explain the matter to him? I'll pay for the lunch if you send me the check! Tim has let us down big time on this issue. Tell him that he votes to sustain President Bush's veto, we'll forgive him his momentary lapse! Oh, by the way, the Pottsville Republican ran an editorial on 12 April in which they called your vote "flawed". One of the main things in Pottsville that is flawed is the Pottsville Republican. They have fallen upon evil days. They used to be a newspaper that we could be proud of. Now they have come under the ownership of that Times-Shamrock cartel. Please don't dance to their pathetic tune, Senator! |
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NICHOLAS M. DeSTEFANO, a member of St. Joseph Parish, died today, Saturday, 14 April - the final day of the Divine Mercy novena. Born on 30 September 1920, he was 86 years of age. Nicholas is one of the six children of the late Nicholas and Antoinette (DiPauli) DeStefano. Nick was baptized in St. Barbara Church, Minersville, on 31 October 1920. On 16 September 1951, Nick married Angelina Maccarone in St. Joseph Church, in the presence of Fr. Peter J. Cruise. Nick and Angie were married for more than 55 years. We give thanks to God for their steadfastness and for their devotion to one another throughout the years. Two of Nicholas's brothers are deceased: Anthony DeStefano and Cammy DeStefano. Nick is survived by his wife, Angelina, and by three of his siblings: Joseph DeStefano; Michael DeStefano; Edith DeStefano Belecanech. The Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated in St. Joseph Church on Tuesday, 17 April, at 10:00 a.m. There will be a viewing at the Robert J. Evans Jr. Funeral Home in Port Carbon on Tuesday, from 8:00 to 9:30 a.m. There will not be a viewing on Monday evening. The interment will take place in the parish cemetery. We entrust Nicholas to our heavenly Father. May the Divine Mercy envelop him and may he rest peacefully in the Heart of Jesus. Eternal rest grant unto Nicholas, O Lord, and let the perpetual light shine upon him. May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen. |
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KATHLEEN KENNEDY TOWNSEND is the eldest child of Ethel (Skakel) Kennedy and
the late, great Robert F. Kennedy. Other than the fame that accrues
to her from being a member of the best known family in the USA,
Kathleen's principal claim to our attention is that she served
two terms as Lieutenant Governor of Maryland. She ran for Governor
of that state in 2002, but lost. Since then, she has been involved
in non-government work. I saw her this past week on TV being interviewed by Greta Van Susteren. The interview - quite brief, Greta didn't give Kathleen much time, which was a mercy - revolved around Kathleen's recent book entitled Failing America's Faithful: How Today's Churches are Mixing God with Politics and Losing Their Way. Kathleen wishes that the Catholic Church would cease being so involved in the politics of abortion and stem cells and homosexuality and would get more involved in peace-and-justice and immigration and health care and the environment, etc., etc. All we are saying is give peace a chance or something like that. Kathleen identifies herself as a Catholic, but she explicitly endorses abortion, homosexual rights, ordination of women and, needless to say, artificial contraception. I don't want to rain on Kathleen Kennedy Townsend's parade, but I would like to inform her - delicately, respectfully, but unambiguously - that her public opposition to the teachings of the Catholic Church makes her a former Catholic. I encourage her and others like her to formalize their status and apply for membership in the Episcopal Church. Meanwhile, I ask her - in the Name of God - not to come forward to receive Holy Communion in St. Joseph Church or in St. Francis deSales Church. I don't, of course, mean to imply that Kathleen has been frequenting either church. However, I think it is good to anticipate all eventualities. One never knows when Kathleen Kennedy Townsend might take it into her head to visit Pottsville, perhaps to peddle her new book. |
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HONOR ROLL Angela M. Cairns / 12th grade / PAHS / 1st Honors Vincent J. Baiocco Jr. / 8th grade / All Saints / 2nd Honors Cody A. Blankenhorn / 8th grade / All Saints / 2nd Honors Dominic J. Chiplonia / 7th grade / All Saints / 1st Honors Ian R. Getzey / 7th grade / All Saints / 2nd Honors Albert J. Yackenchick Jr. / 7th grade / All Saints / 1st Honors Travis A. Blankenhorn / 6th grade / All Saints / 2nd Honors Alexander Koinski / 6th grade / All Saints / 1st Honors
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Saturday, 14 AprilVigil of 2nd Sunday of Easter: Feast of the Divine Mercy 6:00 p.m. - FRANCES MAZZUCA GARDNER by her mother, Julia
Sunday, 15 April2nd Sunday of Easter: Feast of the Divine Mercy 9:15 a.m. - PASQUAL F. CHILLEMI (month's mind) by his family 12:15 p.m. - ARTHUR B. WHITNEY by Michael and Catherine Whitney
Monday, 16 AprilEaster Weekday 10:00 a.m. - God's Blessings on SISTER MARY RAYMOND OP by her sister, Carolyn
Wednesday, 18 AprilEaster Weekday 10:00 a.m. - CHILDREN OF THE WORLD by Shirley Losch Recla
Friday, 20 AprilEaster Weekday 10:00 a.m. - ELANORE FOLINO TEGANO by her husband, Jack
Saturday, 21 AprilVigil of Sunday 6:00 p.m. - PARISHIONERS: StJosPar / StFdSPar by EBC
Sunday, 22 April3rd Sunday of Easter 9:15 a.m. - GILDA APPOLLONI MADEIRA by Joseph T. Cescon and family 12:15 p.m. - WILLIAM E. BRENNAN by his sister, Anne, and his brother, Vincent |