The Fall 2022 issue of FOCUS was included in all bulletins this weekend and was mailed to all families who receive a bulletin in the mail. This issue has a wealth of information to help you understand the extreme measures that would be put into place if Proposal 3 were approved.

Please click on the image below to download a PDF copy of this issue of FOCUS.

Click on any of the images below to download these PDFs to help you be fully informed about the radical nature of Proposal 3. Consider passing these PDFs along to family and friends.

He’s a lawyer. She's a doctor. Meet Attorney, Daniel S. Hilker, and Dr. Joanne Castillo MD, a family medicine physician.

The Diocese of Lansing asked them to assess some the claims being made by the pro-abortion lobby in the current debate over Proposal 3. That's the proposed 323-word “Right to Reproductive Freedom” Amendment to the Constitution of the State of Michigan which will be voted upon November 8.

Our CSA goal this year is $211,447. Anything raised above the goal will return to the parish, while any shortfalls must be covered by the parish. Thus, your support is greatly needed and appreciated.

You can also easily give by visiting: sja.aodcsa.org or by clicking on the button below.

I am grateful to those who have already contributed to CSA 2022. As of today, we have $187,300 in pledges and gifts toward our $211,447 goal ($180,573 has been paid thus far toward our total pledged amount). This amount represents gifts from 584 families (we have 3,351 families registered). We have thus achieved 88% of our goal!

“As long as Moses kept his hands raised up,

Israel had the better of the fight” (Exodus 17:11)

Reflecting on the readings for the Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Jeff Cavins discusses the significance of not just believing in the Faith but also being faithful to it. The Sunday Readings are:

First Reading: Exodus 17:8-13

Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 121:1-2, 3-4, 5-6, 7-8

Second Reading: 2 Timothy 3:14-4:2

Gospel: Luke 18:1-8

Friends, our first reading for this Sunday is about a battle between Israel and the Amalekites. To many of us today, this appears to be either an irrelevancy of history or an outrageous story about God sanctioning genocide. But Origen of Alexandria helps us to see that it is neither; rather, it is a story about the battle of the spiritual life. And in the soldiers, Moses, and Aaron and Hur, we see the variegated offices and functions within the Church engaged in that battle.

A TOTAL Oops Moment: As you know from reading my little articles each week, technology, especially technology at SJA, has a weird way of functioning … or not functioning. You can’t imagine how often I hear from vendors or repair techs: “It seems to work perfectly EVERYWHERE but at SJA.” I look at it this way, our issues keep the techs on their toes and in business. But then there are times when the issue is a TOTAL “oops moment” on my part.

From the very weekend we had to shut everything down because of COVID in March 2020, we’ve been steadily expanding and improving live streaming technology. The many notes and cards we get from parishioners and non-parishioners, from the homebound or just those who like to watch our liturgies because they’re all done so well, motivate me to keep improving what we have. We’ve added cameras and new mixers. We put up the two large screens in Church to display the songs and prayers. We’ve rewired parts of our network infrastructure to accommodate the extra bandwidth required for all the video. And we’re about to switch over to a new video mixer that will allow us to utilize more cameras and, more importantly, to incorporate cameras in the Gathering Place and in Emmaus Hall into our live streaming system. I’m pretty excited about all this has to offer and am grateful to two families in particular who have been the primary funders of this project.

We are also blessed to have several volunteers who have courageously come forward to help work the cameras and the screens. When we don’t have volunteers to accomplish all of this, when I forget to ask someone, or when I mess up the schedule (yes, that happens, too), I can control the audio system and the cameras from my black iPad. But I’m pretty limited with what I can do on the iPads. For example, I can’t do all the fancy fade-ins and fade-outs like you can on the video mixer. I can only control one camera and have to rely on the camera to move to pre-set spots for a broadcast. But there is one major caveat. I can’t see what’s being broadcast from that iPad; I have to rely on a second device like my phone or another iPad. And then, what I see on those devices is often 30 seconds behind, so if something is wrong, it will be 30 seconds before I can correct a shot.

Now, not too long ago, we had to remount the primary camera under the organ loft. Unfortunately, remounting the camera necessitated redoing all the pre-sets on the iPads. I thought I had them all fixed!

Now dear Maria, who embroiders all of our baptismal bibs with a child’s name and baptism date, decided she would watch this one particular weeknight baptism that popped up on her Facebook feed. She was excited to watch the baptism because she doesn’t often see these, nor does she often get to watch a family receive the baptismal bibs. With this particular baptism, it’s also essential to know that I didn’t have a camera operator, so I handled the live streaming directly from my iPad “down below.”

When Maria saw me the following weekend, she wanted to know what was wrong with the baby at the baptism. I was confused. “What do you mean? There wasn’t anything wrong with the baby,” I said. “Well, everything was going fine until you did the baptism. When you went to pour the water over the child, the camera shot up into the sky, and you could only see the ceiling of the Church at this point. Then, when you were done with the baptism, the camera returned to normal, and I could see again. I assumed something was wrong with the baby and you didn’t want to do any close-ups.” I paused for a moment and tried to process what she said. Then it dawned on me that the pre-set I touched to do a close-up of the baptismal font probably wasn’t changed, which would have caused the camera to focus on something completely random ... like the ceiling of the Church. Then I said, “No Maria, the baby was fine. Monsignor was not. It was his fault. AGAIN! It was another oops moment.” I then told her my theory, and we both laughed. I can’t wait to see the video.

The Spiritual Consequences of Living a Hurried, Busy Life … Part 7: This is a continuation of my reflection on and quoting from an article written by Frank Powell, a young adult minister, entitled, “7 Spiritual Consequences of Living a Hurried, Busy Life.” The full article can be found at http://bit.ly/SpiritualConsequences.

Last week, I reflected on the sixth of the seven spiritual consequences mentioned in the article: “A hurried life increases narrow-mindedness and legalism.” The seventh spiritual consequence is: “A hurried life clouds your purpose and diminishes your passion.”

In this portion of the article, Frank Powell continues, “Many college and young adults consider their life’s purpose in this season because they’re choosing a career. And, in a hurried culture, your life’s purpose is determined by what you do. Your career. It’s all about what you can see. What you can hold.

“But God’s idea of purpose isn’t about DOING. It’s about BECOMING. So, the ultimate question when considering your purpose isn’t, ‘What do you DO?’ Instead, the question is, ‘Who are you BECOMING?

“God is concerned about who you’re BECOMING, not what you’re DOING.

“You can do good things for God. But if those good things don’t flow from a relationship with God, discovering your purpose will feel a lot like looking for a two-legged unicorn.

“So, think about these questions. Are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control increasing in your heart? Are you a man or woman of integrity? Are you trustworthy? Do the people who know you most respect you the most?

“A hurried life looks externally for answers to life’s big questions. But a life at God’s pace looks internally for these answers.”

I think it’s important to emphasize that a vast majority of people today identify themselves solely by what they DO. God is concerned about who you are becoming. He wants you to be a saint and He’s interested in doing everything possible to help you accomplish this goal. Filling our days with endless activity without any introspection or reflection or deepening one’s relationship with God will never give us the time to become the saint God wants us to be! There is a reason the Psalmist says, “BE STILL and KNOW that I am God (Psalm 46:11).” It’s in that STILLNESS not the busyness that we learn to know about God.

Sent-out: On Tuesday the Church will celebrate the Feast day of St. Luke. We are in Year C of the Sunday cycle of readings, so we have been hearing from St. Luke since the Church year began with the season of Advent. St. Luke, along with his fellow gospel writers, carries the title of “Evangelist”. His name means “giving light.” His gospel is rich in Luke’s ability to tell the story of Christ. It was Luke, a Greek gentile who experienced a personal conversion; Luke who recorded Jesus’ words of the cross of true discipleship (Lk 14); Luke who speaks of the mercy of the Father toward those who repent of sin (The Prodigal Son – Lk 15); Luke whose gospel reminds us of the importance of faith over worldly possessions (The Rich Man and Lazarus – Lk 16); Luke whose gospel focuses so much on the mission of Jesus to bring salvation to “outsiders” (today’s gospel - the thankfulness of the Samaritan leper – Lk 17); Luke who recorded the Acts of the Apostles; Luke who committed his life to the point of martyrdom for the Kingdom of God, because nothing else mattered more.

The gospel on St. Luke’s feast day reads: The Lord Jesus appointed seventy-two disciples whom he sent ahead of him in pairs to every town and place he intended to visit. He said to them, "The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few; so ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest.”

We are called to this task together, priests and laity – to discern the direction the Holy Spirit is sending our Church, our parish, our school. “The unleashing of the Gospel is not something we do individually but a common task, a work of the whole mystical body of Christ to which we belong. If we are living as a band of joyful missionary disciples, our communal life is itself a radiant witness to the power of the Gospel.” (Unleash the Gospel, pg.41).

Families are at the very heart of this movement to unleash the gospel, because it’s the first place we’re called to evangelize and live as disciples. How can you help as the Church and our parish moves forward in the coming months and years? Begin at home. Make sure you are spending time every day to pray together. Look after each other’s soul and your own salvation – get to confession and allow God’s mercy to drench you. Make sure Sunday Mass is an unquestionable priority, the anchor of your week that everything else is fixed to. It is the light by which everything else in your week is made visible.

Showing-up: I was talking with someone recently who recognized me from the livestream. Realizing who I was prompted her to say, “Yeah, I need to get my butt back to Mass, but I like watching from my couch.” It’s very disappointing to hear that kind of admission because it shows how this person, who is no doubt not alone, has not understood why we come to Mass.

There is a legitimate place for taking advantage of livestream Masses. It is a wonderful tool for those who are prevented by age or health from participating in the communal celebration of the Mass. Throughout Covid and even still, it has allowed many of the homebound to stay connected to their home parish and that is a great blessing. But when the only reason is “I like watching from my couch” that strays into the category of serious sin when Sunday Mass attendance is being replaced digitally. It is choosing comfort over effort. It is choosing self over the community. It is putting yourself before God, which could always be a definition of sin.

Livestreamed Mass is not an “alternative option” to fulfil your Sunday Mass obligation. It’s meant for when it is your ONLY reasonable way to participate, for a serious reason. (Daily mass is not an obligation, so livestream is an option).

We have parishioners who watch mass daily online. Some attend family parties, some come to have their pets blessed, others I run into at Kroger or the hardware store. But in my two years at St. Joan, there are some parishioners I have never met because they’re not coming to pray with us. It’s the job of the community to reach-out and invite them back if they could, and should, be here. And more than invite, to let them know that we need them to come and pray with us. And it’s the job of all of us to care about the souls of our brothers and sisters enough to make that invitation.

If you struggle to make it to Mass every weekend, perhaps it’s time to take your calendar to prayer and ask God to review it with you, and then avail yourself of His mercy in the Sacrament of Confession for any times you missed. This community misses you. This community needs you.

Mass is a communal action. We do this together and without each other the Body of Christ is weaker. I have no doubt that every week there are people in our pews who this week lost a loved one and it was a struggle to show up this Sunday. We show up to pray with and for you. I have no doubt that there are people in the pews struggling with anxiety or depression and even getting out of bed was difficult—but you did. We are here to pray with and for you. I have no doubt that there are people in the pews today who are in a marriage that has run aground and in danger of breaking-up in the storm. We come to pray with and for you. It doesn’t matter whether or not we know the details of what you’re struggling with. Everyone one comes to mass with something on their heart, something going on in their lives, something they are asking God’s help with, something they want to thank Him for. You know the details, God knows the details and we show-up and join our prayer to yours.

Never underestimate what it means to each person at Mass that there are other people praying for them. That’s why “I don’t get anything out of coming to mass,” is such an irrelevant reason for someone not coming to Mass. As we say together at the beginning of Mass, “…I ask blessed Mary ever-Virgin,all the Angels and Saints, and you, my brothers and sisters, to pray for me to the Lord our God.” Then we make a communal offering of our prayers and the gifts God has given and place them on the altar as a sacrifice to Him, that He will turn them into something holy and offer them back to us imbued with His grace. Then we are sent out into the community to take the grace and the presence of God to others, to be His presence in the world. But when I didn’t receive Him in the Eucharist, I didn’t receive that grace to take to anyone, and the community is weaker because of that.

We receive the prayers and support of others and we have a duty to do the same for each other. When we want to support someone we care about, we show-up. We show-up to a birthday party, we show-up to their wedding, we show-up to the soccer game, we show-up to the hospital, we show-up at the funeral home….. We show-up to Mass. At this time in our world, we NEED each other.

adawson@sjascs.org 

You’re with a group of friends and they start gossiping about another friend; what do you say? You’re with a co-worker and he or she takes the Lord’s name in name and blasphemes the Catholic Church; how do you respond?

Today Fr. Mike challenges us to speak up for the truth and explains how you and I might overcome these spiritual defects: lacking in wisdom, courage, or love.

That’s it! You’re in. Now you can get the free FORMED app for your phone by searching FORMED Catholic in your app store.

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To get started, simply click the button above/below to activate your free account on the Hallow website. Make sure to select “Sign Up with Email” when registering. For step-by-step instructions, you can visit this process guide. Enter the code stjoanofarcmi to obtain a discount on individual pro plans.

7:00 a.m., Mary Ann Mecha

7:00 a.m., Ron Infantino

7:00 a.m., Barbara Gaines and Casey Zaranek

7:00 a.m., Michael Gray

7:00 a.m., Mary & Virgil Medley, Crescenzo Fazi

4:00 p.m., Gerald Ellar, Mr. & Mrs. Victor Siegel, Patrick Urso, Courtney Jurek, Bonnie Batche, Melvin Dries, Donald Strobbe, Phil D’Agostino, the deceased members of the Gore Family, Frank Nagy, Gary Foley, Wayne Morgan, Mary Stolarski, Alfred Blind, and Special Intentions for the Thomas Family, for the J. Champine Family, and for Richard Bosler

6:00 p.m., The Intentions of the Presbyterate and Deaconate of the Archdiocese of Detroit

8:00 a.m., For the Intentions of Saint Joan of Arc Parishioners

10:00 a.m., A Special Intention for the Family of Joyce Daenzer

12:00 p.m., Sr. Jane Maison, CSJ, Ron and Joanne Ryber, and a Special Intention for Dolores Acosta

10:00 AM - Funeral for Peter Doheny (View Obituary HERE)

12:00 PM - Funeral for Joseph Molitor (View Obituary HERE)

Thursday (October 20)