Posts by Fr Jay Scott Newman

Dear Friends in Christ, The 40 Days of Lent begin on Ash Wednesday, which falls this year on 5 March — two weeks from this Wednesday. In the service of keeping a holy Lent, it is time to make a Plan of Life which should include the three pillars of lenten discipline: fasting, prayer, and…

Dear Friends in Christ, I want to share some good financial news and ask for your continuing support, both for the parish and for the ministry of our diocesan bishop. Our stewardship guidelines recommend that each household in the parish divide its tithe in this way: 5% to the parish in the primary offertory; 1%…

Dear Friends in Christ, Christmas was 40 days ago, and that is why today is the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord. According to Jewish custom, described in Chapter 12 of Leviticus, every woman who gave birth required a ritual purification from her flow of blood, and a sacrifice was to be offered to…

Dear Friends in Christ, “Be still and know that I am God.” Thus does the LORD instruct us in Psalm 46, verse 10. The stillness to which we are called in Holy Scripture is a letting go of actions and words that yields silence, both interior and exterior, and such silence is essential for every disciple of…

Dear Friends in Christ, This Saturday, 25 January, is the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, the Church’s annual celebration of the day when Saul of Tarsus met the Lord Jesus on the Damascus Road — an event that changed Saul’s life and the history of the world. 25 January is also each year…

Dear Friends in Christ, The vast majority of Christians, including almost all Catholics, are baptized when they are infants, and this is most fitting. The sacraments are instruments of God’s grace, and even newborn babies need the grace of God. Moreover, as the Catechism of the Catholic Church puts it, “The sheer gratuitousness of the…