The past few days

This past weekend was filled with several events. Saturday was relatively quiet except for going to the liturgy at the archdiocesan men’s conference. Sunday was quite busy because of our annual Friend’s Mass. It is a great time (except for the torrential downpour of rain) for seminarians and supporters of the seminary to gather for Mass and share a meal together at the Binz refectory.

Right after the meal finished, I got in my car to go to Lakeville, MN. This year each of the seminarians has been “adopted” by a family. One of the children from my adoptive family received her first Holy Communion. I went to their house for a while to share in the festivities. I then hopped back in the car to get back to St. Paul to have a meal with the other seminarians from my diocese. We finished our Sunday with the usual holy hour and night prayer.

Yesterday was more or less normal save for a couple of special events. Archbishop-designate (Archdiocese of St. Louis, MO) Robert Carlson celebrated Mass for us. After evening prayer a local artist, Christopher Santer, was on hand for a blessing of images that he has produced over the past few months. One of the images will be placed outside of each of the seminarians rooms. Last night I was able to go to the church of St. Helena in Minneapolis for a benefit dinner for the Catholic Servant. The Catholic Servant is a monthly publication featuring articles on contemporary Catholic culture, Church teaching, news, Sacred Scripture, etc. Archbishop-designate Carlson gave the keynote address, which was focused on peace. He gave many examples where peace has been ruptured. The month of April is filled with many sad memories in our society: Waco, the Oklahoma City bombing, Columbine, the Virginia Tech shooting, etc. We were urged to spend more and more time in our prayer focusing on peace and connecting the work of social justice to Eucharistic adoration and the gospel.