Fifth Sunday of Easter
Pastor
~ This year is the Bicentennial of the Archdiocese of St. Louis, and we are giving praise and thanks to God for all the blessings and graces we have received over these 200 years of faith in this local Church. All are invited and encouraged to celebrate this milestone at the Archdiocesan Bicentennial Jubilee Mass on Saturday, July 18, at 10:00am at the Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis. Archbishop Rozanski will preside at the Mass and Cardinal Timothy Dolan will preach.
As part of the Bicentennial celebration, all the faithful of the Archdiocese are invited to participate in an Archdiocesan-wide, prayerful and unifying initiative called the Prayer of the People. In these months leading up to the Jubilee Mass, you are invited to submit personal prayer intentions, which will be gathered from across the Archdiocese and symbolically presented during the entrance procession. Through the Prayer of the People, the faithful of every parish community will be represented in this historic moment. By bringing our prayer intentions together, we express our communion as one Church and entrust our prayers, hope, and gratitude to our Lord Jesus Christ.
You are invited to submit your own prayer intentions for this initiative. These might be prayers for peace in our world, for an end to gun violence, for protection against natural disasters, for vocations to the priesthood and religious life, for the sanctity of human life, and for the promotion of human rights and human dignity in our nation and our world. They might also be more personal intentions like healing from illness or injury, family members to return to the Catholic Church, or for knowing and following God’s will in your life.
You can submit your prayers petitions in two ways. First, you can submit them online by scanning the QR code on this page and following those directions; these petitions submitted online will be collected and compiled by the Archdiocese. Or you can write your prayer petitions on one of the small papers on the radiators in the back of Church and putting them in the marked box near the front door. We have repurposed the wooden box that we used for a money-collection box during Covid time to collect these prayer petitions. We will collect all the prayer petitions submitted at St. Margaret of Scotland and put them in a box provided by the Archdiocese that will be presented at the Bicentennial Jubilee Mass on July 18.
Finally, we need a representative from the parish to be part of the procession at the Mass to carry and present our box with petitions. If you are planning to attend the Mass and would like to be considered for this, please send me an email as soon as possible. I will select our representative and be in touch with more details.
Finally, please note that we always have a place available in Church where you can write and share your petitions and needs. There is a book on a podium near the altar of St. Joseph where you are always free to write your prayers and petitions. You are welcome to write in this book anytime, knowing that your needs will stay in our Church to be remembered by all who are here praying at the Mass. Jesus encouraged us to bring our prayers and needs to our heavenly Father, so we have confidence that our loving God always hears and answers our prayers.
Let us renew this confidence as we celebrate our Archdiocesan Bicentennial!
