Thanksgiving 2007

Dear Friends at Christ the Redeemer,

Thanksgiving is a wonderful time of year, when we have events and happenings that allow us the opportunity to say thank you. That thanks is expressed on many and varied levels to people around us and whom we love and who fill our lives with good things.

At Sunday Eucharist, we gather week after week, and year after year. We gather around the two tables of God’s presence. First, we are fed at the table of God’s Word, where we bless God for all the good things he has done in the history of his people. Then, we are called to the Eucharistic Table, where we are fed and nourished as God’s people in Christ. Let us be thankful for the diversity of God’s actions in the many faces, languages, and cultures where we encounter our common Father at CTR.

We are thankful for the ministries which feed us: readers, extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist, music ministers, servers, ushers. Each allows us to encounter God-with-us. As we look around we see the liturgical Assembly which ministers to the all and the many within it. Let us be thankful for those who serve. We are blessed with three priests in addition to me. God has blessed us in our shared priesthood.

Our hallways are filled with people seeking to learn about the faith and the ways of the gospel. Children on all levels fill our buildings with their excitement. Catechists and catechetical ministers along with parents and other volunteers share their faith journey. Others come to learn English as a second language. They are taught by wonderful guides into a new culture and life. We might well be thankful for them.

Others serve in ordinary ways in the parish: our parish administration, our secretaries, our janitors, our religious education and outreach personnel. We can be grateful for the expected and ordinary guidance in our daily life. Thanks for your kindness.

Others reach out to our parish family or to our local communities: LINK volunteers, Blood Drive workers, Parish Nurses, Doughnut Ministry folks, Work campers, Volunteers with our homeless and job-seekers, and our sandwich makers. They draw us outward to find Christ in others. A word of thanks to and for them.

As Pastor let me give all of you a big thanks for what you do, for who you are, and for what we all believe together. What a joy to head-up Christ the Redeemer Parish, where Christ lives and works among us.

Sincerely,

(Fr.) C. Donald Howard, SA
Pastor