Pastor’s Column

The Law of the Church for Lent 1. Abstinence. All persons, 14 years and older, are obliged to abstain from meat on Ash Wednesday and all Fridays of Lent. 2. Fasting. Everyone from ages 18 to 59 is obliged to fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. Fasting is generally understood to mean that one full meal may be eaten. Two other small meals (collations) may be eaten, but together they should not equal a...

Change to Lenten Mission   Fr. Daniel Heenan, FSSP, the pastor of our parish in Guadalajara, has agreed to come to give our parish Lenten mission this year. The dates and length of the mission have been adjusted to fit his schedule: Monday, March 16 to Wednesday, March 18. There will be two conferences every day – one in Spanish after the noon Mass, another in English after the evening Mass. More details will...

Confessions for the Altar Guild   An old custom at St. Stephen’s, that has probably not been communicated to the younger generation of guild members or to the parish in some time, is a privilege for altar servers to “cut the line” for confessions before Mass. This is to allow them the opportunity for confession, which otherwise might not be possible for them, as usually the confessors have left the box by the...

Assisted Listening System   All of the parts have arrived and we are waiting on the installation of an assisted listening sytem, which will be available for sermons and conferences delivered from the pulpit, anywhere on parish grounds. The system makes use of Sennheiser’s MobileConnect, which is an app-based solution that will allow parishioners to make use of their own hearing aids or other Bluetooth-enabled headphones or earbuds. More details should be forthcoming...