Mailing Address: 1320 Johnson Street, Coquitlam, BC V3B 4T5

Street Address: 2888 Delahaye Drive, Coquitlam, BC

Phone: (604)941-4800

Greetings!

As we prepare to celebrate the Feast of St. Clare, we warmly invite all parishioners, families, and friends to join us on Sunday, August 9. We will gather for a joyful celebration of our patron saint during the 11:00 AM Mass, followed by a festive parish BBQ on the grounds.

This is a wonderful opportunity to come together as a community, enjoy good food, reconnect with one another, and give thanks for the gift of St. Clare’s inspiring witness of faith.

We look forward to celebrating with you. All are welcome!

Fr. Maciej

MONDAY, AUGUST 3

Parish Office Closed

PROJECT ADVANCE 2026

This year’s campaign is especially exciting as the money we raise after making our diocese goal of $63,300 will be used to pay down our mortgage as well as help “build our new rectory”. We have ‘exceeded’ our diocese goal and have now raised $98,290.60 !!

Our target this year is $250,000 because of the new rectory project…..Remember, every gift regardless of its size make a difference. Every gift counts.

If you are new to the parish or have not received your pledge form and letter in the mail, there are extra pledge forms in the lobby.

To read the letter from Archbishop Richard Smith, see this year’s video or donate online please go to projectadvance.ca. 

Our way forward begins with your generosity in growing our parish and local Catholic community. We’re very grateful for your support.

Food for Thought . . . and for the Soul

Overcoming Anxiety

(This is something we all need . . .so here it is,

courtesy of our old friend Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI)





Anxiety, like all tensions, eats at us at various levels. More superficially, we worry about many things. Deep down though we are anxious in a way that colors most everything we do. So much of what motivates and drives us is an unconscious attempt to free ourselves from anxiety. We are forever nursing the hope that we can free ourselves from anxiety through achievement, success, financial security, fame, leaving a mark, and through power and sex. We nurse the secret belief that if we have the right combination of these our lives we will have the substance we need to feel secure and non-anxious.

But experience soon teaches us that these things, though good in themselves, are not our cure. Indeed they can, and often do, make us more anxious: As soon as we have financial security, we become anxious about protecting it; and as soon as we have power, we are constantly looking over our shoulders in fear about losing it. As well, success can quickly become a cancer because we have a congenital propensity to identify our self-worth with our achievements and this pressures us always to be doing something of importance for fear of no longer feeling worthwhile. And sex, unless it is experienced inside a truly committed and unconditional relationship, becomes a drug, with the same addictive quality and ineffectiveness as any other drug. Sex, like achievement and fame, will not quell the deep demons inside us.

We are forever trying to give ourselves wholeness, but we cannot. We cannot self-justify. We cannot make ourselves immortal. We cannot write our own names into heaven. Only love casts out anxiety and, indeed, only a certain kind of love can give us substance. Only God’s love can write our names into heaven. What’s the algebra here?

Some years ago, I went on a weeklong retreat directed by Fr. Robert Michel, a French-Canadian, Oblate missionary. He began the retreat with these words: “I want to make this a very simple retreat for you. I want to teach you how to pray in a particular way. I want to teach you how to pray so that in your prayer, sometime, perhaps not this week, perhaps not even this year, but sometime, you will open yourself so that in your deepest self you will hear God say to you: ‘I love you!’ Because before you hear this inside you, nothing will be enough for you. You’ll be searching for this and for that, running here and running there, trying every kind of thing, but nothing will ever be quite right. After you hear this from God, you will have substance; you will have found the thing you’ve been looking for so long. Only after you have heard these words will you finally be free of your anxiety.

In a culture too-easily given to false-sophistication, it can be tempting to dismiss his words as naïve, or over-pious, or sentimental; but what these words are inviting us to is, in essence, what Jesus invites us to in John’s Gospel.

As we know, in the Gospel of John, Jesus exhibits very little humanity. John’s Gospel depicts him as divine from the first page to the last. And, in that Gospel, the first words out of Jesus’ mouth are an invitation: “What are you looking for?” The entire Gospel of John then tries to answer that question: What are we looking for? Throughout John’s Gospel, Jesus tells us that we are looking for many things: Living-water which quenches our deepest thirst and never needs to be drunk again, a truth that sets us free, a rebirth to something above, a light that shines eternally. But these images can seem abstract. What’s the real kernel inside them?

The Gospel of John eventually answers that a very clear way. Near the end of the Gospel (indeed this was probably the original end of John’s Gospel) we have that poignant, post-resurrection meeting between Jesus and Mary of Magdala. It takes place in a Garden, the archetypal place where love happens: Mary, carrying spices to embalm his dead body, goes searching for Jesus on Easter Sunday morning. She meets him, but doesn’t recognize him. Supposing him to be the gardener, she asks him where she might find the body of the dead Jesus. Jesus replies by repeating the question with which he opened the Gospel: “What are you looking for?” Then, before she can answer, he gives the deepest answer to that question: He pronounces her name in love: “Mary”. In that very-particularized affirmation of love (for which Robert Michel invites us to pray) he writes her name into heaven. He gives her substance, and he cures her of her anxiety.

Since love needs to be mutual, that affirmation has to be responded to in kind. And … in that lies the risk: As Simone Weil puts it: “Inner communion is good for the good and bad for the bad. God invites all the dammed into paradise, but for them it is hell.” God willing, for us it is heaven!

Parish Ministries

If you are asking these questions, or questions like them, the Catholic way of life awaits you. Click here for more information.

Everyone is invited to join us online daily at 7:30pm

Contact

maria.magnusson-cwl@shaw.ca

Please contact the parish office to make arrangements for

baptisms, weddings, funerals and other Sacraments.

If you wish to book a Mass Intention, please send your request via email at stclareofassisi@shaw.ca giving the name of the person, whether it is for a living or deceased person, who it is from and if you have any preferences for the day of the week, a weekend mass or specific date. We will try to book your mass intention as close to the request as possible.  Please note that there may be unforeseen situations when your scheduled date may be changed without notice.

The suggested offering for a mass intention is $10 and can be brought to the office, mailed to 1320 Johnson Street, Coquitlam, V3B 4T5 or dropped in the collection box in the church. Enclose your offering in an envelope clearly marked with the name and date of your Mass intention. Your offering will go to the priest who says the mass, not to the church.

If you are unable to use email, mass intentions may be phoned in at 604-941-4800.

We are able to accept multiple Mass intentions on Fridays. For all other days, the priest can accept one intention only per day.

Please pray for the sick of our Parish

Caroline Bouvier Laprise, Crystal Phung, Allan Thiele, John Seifert, Michael and Carol Berry, Claudia Eberle, Suzanne Davies, Connie Tarling, Matthew Tarling, Valerie Ng, Melvin Anthony, Peter Adamkovics, Aldo de Loza, Mike Van Duynhoven, Bernie & Zeny Perez, Marge Hogan, Jamie Willis,Noah Zanatta, Loni Cain, Brendan Pace, Gracienda Ramos, Brian Stewart, Catherine Dunne, Lucy Chase, Doreen Allyen, Tyson Ward, Nora Arroyal, Christopher Brown, Joan McDonald, Annabella Cirko, Frank Matchett, Kelly Durkin, Jason Kendall, Bill Clendinning, Chris Mah, Lydia Guzman, Angelo Visentin, June Cross, Katelyn Boudewyn, Ramon Montecillo, Janice Caine, Nadine Classen, Leanne Theiss, Sierra Osborne, Sebastien Robillard, Lori Dennis, Mazoe Kaufman, Cindy Mazerolle-Kass, Anna Figura, Ed Garcia, Viray Family, Walter Banke, Terry McDonald,Hari Vijay, Peggy Maas, Chad Galitzky, Al Trotter, Pat Dizy, Brett Lawrence, Norman Schuster, Brenda Haines, John Bergen, Laud Vidal, Rick Empey, Addie Jamieson and all recipients of St. Clare’s Prayer Shawls.

St. Joseph’s Parish, Mission invites you to the historic Fraser River Heritage Park to celebrate the Holy Eucharist in honour of Our Lady at 1:00 PM. The principal celebrant will be the Most Rev. Richard W. Smith, Archbishop of Vancouver. Confessions will be heard on-site starting at 10:00 AM. After the Mass, there will be a procession to the Grotto where the Rosary will be prayed, followed by the Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament. The event will conclude with a picnic and fellowship.  Please bring your picnic baskets and chairs. Do not use charcoal briquettes, only propane can be used as per order of the Mission Parks Board. For bus information, please contact your local parish, or email: info@aquinasinstitute.ca, or call 604-831-1950.

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