We welcome the guests and visitors who join us this Sunday afternoon for First Holy Communion. This is a beautiful day in the lives of our children and a beautiful day in the life of the parish.
Another beautiful event takes place at St. Charles on Monday. Join us at 1:30 on May 5 for our annual May crowning and rosary. Our second-graders and 8th graders will lead a procession with hymns and flowers, asking for Mary’s intercession during the month of May.
As we are finishing the octave of prayer following the funeral of Pope Francis, we are now ready to watch a conclave begin. For those who are reading this bulletin on Saturday, we have an exciting opportunity on Saturday evening. Don Clemmer, a parishioner who has worked for the US Catholic Bishop’s Conference and writes for various Catholic magazines, will give a presentation here in the church at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday evening, May 4. He will talk about the history and process of conclaves and he will give us some biographies and interesting facts about well-known cardinals whose names are often mentioned as likely candidates for the papacy. It should be a fascinating evening, preparing us for the conclave. (I apologize for not having this in the bulletin in time for our Sunday Mass people; we are scrambling to organize this event before the conclave begins.)
I will be in Chicago most of the coming week for another round of classes training pastors to supervise transitional deacons. I’ll return in time for a Friday wedding.
We received a gracious note of thanks from the Christ Child Society in Fort Wayne. Our parish contributed over $8,000 in the baby bottle fundraiser. That is a lot of nickels and dimes!
We received also a very gracious note from Beacon Heights Church, offering their condolences and prayers on the loss of Pope Francis, “a faithful, compassionate, committed leader.”
As we look forward to summer, we will be blessed to have a seminarian assigned to our parish for ten weeks. Michael Florin will join us in mid-May.
