1936 -2022Funeral Liturgy - Cremains
Friday, April 22, 10:00 am Padre Serra Parish 1957 - 2022Funeral Liturgy
Tuesday, April 26 10:00 am Padre Serra Parish Mortuary Joshua Mortuary Palmdale 1923 - 2022Funeral Liturgy - Cremains
Tuesday, April 19 10:00 am Padre Serra Parish Burial following Mass Assumption Cemetery 1380 Fitzgerald Rd., Simi Valley, CA 93065  Dear Friends, When we as Church come together to celebrate the liturgy, there is a need for dedicated ministers to take charge of certain responsibilities so that the presider can give his attention to leading the assembly in prayer. These dedicated ministers are called altar servers. At Padre Serra we have 65 dedicated young ministers, ranging in age from 10 to 19. Half are high school students and there is an equal mix of girls and boys. The altar server is an icon of service and dedication. Each altar server functions as a model of what it means to have full, conscious and active participation in our liturgies, in essence to stay focused on the Paschal Mystery. Invitation to Serve: Boys and girls currently in the 5th grade and up (at least 10 years old) are invited to join this truly special ministry. Altar server training will be on Thursday, 31 March 2022 at 4:30 P.M. in the Church. All parents must attend this session. If you are interested, please contact Bob Shadduck at 377-3527 (Cell) or Robert_Shadduck@msn.com. During the training period, the servers learn the order of the liturgy so well that they can anticipate each action and need of the presider. Each server has special roles and responsibilities. They are taught to understand what their roles are and how to perform them. They know how to move, carry things, and keep stillness and silence. The altar servers can influence the atmosphere of prayer by their presence in the assembly around the altar of Our Lord. Rest assured that the assembly definitely admires the altar servers. This is a ministry that goes all the way back to the early church
Dear Friends, Today’s scripture readings (Exodus 3:1-81, 13;15; 1 Corinthians 10:1-6, 1012; Luke 13:1-9 and Psalm 103: 1- 2, 3-4, 6-7, 8, 11) are full of messages from God to his people. Moses’ message to the Israelites is one of deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Paul’s message to the Corinthians, and Jesus’ to his disciples is one of repentance and accountability. “Whoever thinks he is standing secure should take care not to fall.” Paul looks back at the followers of Moses who were struck down in the desert because God was not pleased with “most of them.” Jesus cautions his disciples not to think that victims of tragedies (Galileans whose blood Pilate mixed with their sacrifices and eighteen people killed by a falling tower in Siloam) are somehow guiltier than everybody else: “By no means! But if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did.” Jesus continues by telling of a gardener who pleads with an orchard owner to spare a non producing fig tree: “Sir, leave it for this year also, and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it; it may bear fruit in the future. If not, you can cut it down.” Who is the orchard owner? Who is the gardener? Could both be Jesus? One the King of the universe who comes to judge the living and the dead and the other the loving, patient, pleading Savior and advocate, who sends the Spirit to make us fruitful? Inevitably, we will fail. Repeatedly. But Psalm 103 reassures us: The Lord is kind and merciful. He pardons all our iniquities, heals all our ills, redeems our life from destruction, and crowns us with kindness and compassion. I read this crowning with kindness and compassion two ways: 1. The Lord’s kindness and compassion to us, redeeming us from destruction and 2. The Spirit working within us to make us ever more kind and more compassionate. The scriptures are clear. It isn’t enough just to be members of the tribe, or of the “club.” We are accountable to God for being fruitful where we are planted.
Dear Parish Family, If you are anything like me, it’s so easy to get sidetracked on our many tasks and can lose track of time. Even more so when we may be doing something you really enjoy, such as reading a good book, binging on Netflix or sleeping in the morning. My alarm clock is my best tool to make sure I am up in the morning and where I need to be on time. To help me manage my time on my busy days when I have time sensitive tasks, I recently started to use the alarms on my cell. Since I have begun this new habit, I get my most important tasks done on time, and on occasions I surprise myself that I may have some time to spare. I bring this up only because I think that at times we need tools to help us, to make sure we are awake and alert to what comes next. In our Gospel today, Peter and John and James went with Jesus to the mountain to pray. Yet while Jesus prayed, his disciples fell asleep. Had they not woken up on time, they would have missed seeing Jesus in his Glory. They would not have heard God’s voice say, “This is my chosen Son; Listen to him.” It was through God’s grace they did wake up on time, and were able to experience Jesus’ Transfiguration. They were given the opportunity to see his divinity. Our lives can be like this, where we too fall asleep, letting everything else distract us and not keep us from recognizing Jesus is always with us. God desires us to see him, but we must be willing to see. During the season of Lent, through the practices of Fasting from food and habits, Prayer and Almsgiving, can be like our alarm clocks to “wake up.” Through these practices they can lead us to see and feel Jesus more clearly and to listen to what he tells us. As we fast, and experience hunger, it awakens our awareness of the hunger and needs of others. As we pray, especially with the scriptures, we learn to hear God’s voice and his desires for us. We learn to see Jesus in our brothers and sisters; through almsgiving we seek to meet their needs. “What you do for the least of your brothers, you do for me.” God gave us the Transfiguration to let us know what we have to look forward to at the end of our lives. We know that after we’ve done our best down here on earth — at the bottom of the mountain — and if we die in a state of grace, we can look forward to seeing Christ in all His glory, as He was at the Transfiguration. Only after we go through this difficult life, can we enjoy the glory of Easter.
My Dear Parish Family, Welcome to Lent! You may have already decided what you are doing for the next 40 days in the way of prayer, self-denial, and charitable works (the three “pillars” of Lent) to prepare for the great feast of Easter. Some of us are still deciding, but I am going to suggest that whatever we do for Lent, we put it all into the context of baptismal spirituality. Let me explain by way of a little historical background. In the early centuries of the Church, becoming a Christian was a gradual process of apprenticeship in a counter-cultural way of life. The season we now call Lent was the final and intense period when the seekers were prepared to be immersed into the waters of baptism at the Easter Vigil. When infant baptism became the norm by the fifth century, Lent became only a penitential time for the baptized to prepare for the celebration of Easter. The pre-baptismal character of Lent was forgotten until it was revived by the Second Vatican Council in the twentieth century. Today Lent has two strands, baptismal and penitential, woven together. It is again a time when we journey with the Elect (see “Becoming Catholic” on page 9) to the baptismal font at the Easter Vigil. As we encourage and pray for them during Lent, we reflect on the meaning of our own baptism when we ourselves "put on Christ.” Our Lenten penitential practices can help us to examine our lives in the context of baptismal mission: are we living as disciples of Jesus, being His heart and hands in the world today? For 40 days we ponder this, through our Lenten practices, so we can authentically renew our own baptismal promises at Easter. I'd like to suggest that you and your families do something at the beginning of Lent that I did recently with the adult Confirmation candidates. Single people could do this with a small group of friends. Gather mementos of each person's baptism: the certificate, candle, white garment, photos, and stories remembered by those who attended. Share all these memories with the group. What should emerge, as it did with our Confirmation candidates, is a sense of the importance placed on this day by our families. Hopefully this will lead to a discussion of the meaning of baptism and the difference it makes in our lives and in the life of the world.  May Lent 2022 be fruitful for all of us, marked by an increased awareness and understanding of the great gift of baptism.
Lenten Blessings, Catherine Shadduck Initiation Coordinator |
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