Looking back at the weekly messages of Father Paul Counce, first published in The Carpenter, our weekly Parish Bulletin
Published: October 14, 2018
As I mentioned in last week’s issue of The Carpenter, this Sunday I hope you come to church hungry! After our 8:30 am Mass, our Knights of Columbus Council No. 13632 will serve a free Pancake Breakfast to everyone. And after the 10:30 am Mass our Development Committee is offering you and your family a free pasta lunch! Plan on staying after Mass for this Cathedral hospitality: both your soul and your stomach will thank you for it!
You’ve already got Sunday, October 28 on your calendar, right? That’s our special annual celebration, GRAND Day! At our 10:30 am Sunday Mass we’ll honor and pray for everyone who’s ever been a grandchild! And then afterwards in the Parish Hall and outside we’ll have a party! So plan to come! I especially invite children and their parents and grandparents to attend together! We’ll have lots of hamburgers, hot dogs, chips, ice cream, and soft drinks for everyone, and music, a petting zoo, pony rides, face painting, caricatures, balloons, our “round the block train,” and much more also!
In last week’s column I mentioned the Solemnity of All Saints (Thursday, November 1) and that it’s a Holy Day of Obligation. We’ll have Mass here at 7:30 am and 12 noon. I forgot to mention that I’ll be blessing our two cemeteries later that day as well: at 4 pm at St. Joseph Catholic Cemetery on Main Street (behind the old Goudchaux store!) and at 7 pm at historic Highland Cemetery on Oxford Street near the south gates of LSU. Everyone is invited to those brief but grace-filled times of prayer.
One final word about the end of October: There will be no 4 pm Vigil Mass on Saturday, October 27. Organizers of the annual downtown Hallowe’en Parade have decided to start it also at 4 pm that day, and the route takes it on Main Street next to Cathedral Square. We learned a long time ago it’s best not to compete with parade-goers for parking and quiet time in church! Fortunately, GRAND Day the next day for us offers us a really enjoyable reason to skip the Saturday Mass that week!
Now one additional word about the ongoing scandalous revelations of child sexual abuse by clergy and the similarly horrible reports of efforts of Church authorities deliberately keeping parents from finding out about known abusers. Fortunately, most all of this has occurred elsewhere, but no one should cease being vigilant about such crimes anywhere. So in addition to gratitude for your prayers, it remains important to remember: should you ever become aware of abuse, both civil law and canon law in our diocese require that civil authorities be told first. This means call the police or child protection services; the easiest way to do this is call toll free 1-855-4LA-KIDS (1-855-452-5437). This way there can be no attempt at cover-ups or delay. Then, if clergy or other Church employees or volunteers seem involved, telephone our diocesan hotline 225-242-0250 so that we can offer assistance to victims and properly determine how best to ensure continued safety and justice for all concerned. No bishop can or should do this alone: surely the Lord Jesus Himself wishes all of us protect the most vulnerable and innocent among us.
Sincerely yours in Christ,
Fr. Paul D. Counce