Congratulations to the parents of Nellie Ferguson who will be baptized this Sunday. May she grow to know, love and serve the Lord in this life so as to be happy now and forever in the life to come.

Congratulations also to John & Irma Zappitelli who have been parishioners at St. Leo’s for a very long time. They will be celebrating 69 years of marriage at the 8am Mass this Sunday! They have both needed to move out the parish but we still consider them part of our parish family and so we pray that they may be filled with God’s blessings as they join us in prayer on this special occasion. I look forward to their 70th Anniversary next year!                                             

     This Friday is the feast of the Annunciation, when we recall the announcement that the angel Gabriel made to Mary that she would be the Mother of God. It takes place on March 25th because that is exactly 9 months until Christmas, the celebration of Christ’s birth. You may be surprised to learn that a Solemnity such as this (a solemnity being a high ranking feast day) is not observed as a penitential day. So since it falls on a Friday of Lent this year, penitential practices like fasting or abstaining from eating meat are not required on this day. So celebrate this great feast by having a juicy hamburger or better yet, come to our Fish Fry & enjoy a great (but meatless) meal.                                                     

     I hope many of you enjoyed the YouTube video about confession that I posted on our website & which I mentioned here in the bulletin & at all of our Masses. It was a good opportunity to see the Sacrament of Reconciliation from the perspective of the priest as Confessor. I’m going to take the liberty to post another YouTube video which I believe is also very timely, though this one may be a bit more challenging. It is done by Fr. Mike Schmitz (no relation to me other than we share both the priestly ministry and a last name). He speaks honestly about whether watching a livestream Mass is still appropriate now, and perhaps even sinful, now that we seem to be looking at the Coronavirus more in the back mirror than through the windshield. During the last couple of years, I have often encouraged people to make use of the livestream technology which we had installed in our church for the sake of those wishing to join in the prayer of the Mass celebrated in their own parish church, without actually being here. Such technology is a godsend when we were told that there would be no public Masses for 3 months during 2020, and even when the bishop continued to give a dispensation from the obligation to attend Mass in recent months for those who have serious health issues and concerns relating to the pandemic (and even regarding their health apart from COVID-19). But Fr. Schmitz also challenges us to recognize that most of us can safely return now to Mass, and to avoid doing so may even be sinful if we are using the technology or the pandemic as an excuse from being physically present at Mass. I’ve pointed out that the main problem with live-streamed Mass is that we are not physically present with each other as the Body of Christ, as the Church, and cannot even receive the Body of Christ in the Eucharist. Just as the Church expects us to make our best effort to attend Mass when on vacation, it also expects that we will not miss Mass when we are still going out in public for other reasons, whether grocery shopping, eating out, or doing whatever we did outside our homes before the pandemic. I find it interesting that we still have close to or well over 200 people watching the livestream video every weekend even now, and fear, along with the bishops, that the pandemic may have opened us up to mis-using the technology that can help us but also hurt us in these strange times. So please take a look at the video & ask yourself prayerfully and honestly, if it’s time to come back to Mass in church where we not only receive the Body of Christ but become the Body of Christ in the community of faith.