Dear parishioners and visitors;
“Very truly, I tell you, unless the grain of wheat falls into earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit (Jn.12: 2O-24”).
Jesus, using the image and example of a grain falling and dying, teaches us that his suffering and death will bring new life to all and that we, his followers, must die to sins in order to rise to a new life with Him. We will be transformed and carried into a new life if we firmly die to sins and willingly lose our life for God and in His name for others. This process of dying to sins and giving of ourselves to God and for others is a slow process happening daily in different ways; such as an act of giving involves an act of dying to selfishness. “It is in giving that we are received and it is by dying that we are born to eternal life”. (St. Francis of Assisi).
Being a Catholic today, we must be like “a wheat of grain” willingly and firmly, out of love, dying to sins in order to bear much fruit and then to rise to a new life.
We are now in the 5th and the final week of Lent, then entering into the Holy Week, so I would like to ask all of you, please invite members of your family, your friends and neighbours to our Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Vigil (Called Triduum ) and Easter Sunday’s Celebrations.
Have a blessed weekend. Fr. Peter Hoan Nguyen.