Click on any of the images below to download these PDFs to help you be fully informed about the radical nature of Proposal 3. Consider passing these PDFs along to family and friends.

From Detroit Catholic: The proposed “Right to Reproductive Freedom” amendment to Michigan’s Constitution is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. The proposal was circulated and sponsored by Planned Parenthood, and it threatens to change Michigan’s Constitution to make abortion legal until birth and allow for abortions and sterilizations for minors without parental consent. The proposal would render ineffective dozens of laws and provisions of our Constitution that are already in place to protect women, protect unborn children, and prevent taxpayer-funded abortions.

The ballot proposal rides on the violent swell of progressive reaction to the Supreme Court’s Dobb’s decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, and decades of federal court restrictions on state law regulating abortion.

You may have heard some of the claimed benefits of the amendment: “Protect miscarriage care!” “Protect women!” “Don’t take away the right to choose!” “My body, my choice!” “Save Roe!”

If you read nothing else in this article, know that the amendment does not restore the Roe status quo, rather it unwinds nearly all of Michigan’s Roe and Casey compliant abortion regulations and leaves Michigan legislators virtually powerless to regulate abortion, sterilization, and gender transition therapy. Under Roe and Casey, Michigan’s laws required parental consent for minors, required safe care, and limited elective abortion to “pre-viability.” The amendment changes all this and more.

This Amendment was written by the largest abortion provider in the United States. It was not written by you, your friends, or your lawyer. You must read the amendment’s full text in advance. The text of the amendment will not be written on the ballot in November. Only a “summary” will be shown on the ballot, but the summary does not inform voters of the grave legal and medical issues raised in this article.

Our Constitution is the bedrock of law. All state laws in Michigan must comply with the text of our Constitution. By the amendment drafter’s own admission, this ballot initiative changes seven separate articles of the Constitution and “alters or abrogates” more than 2,200 words of Michigan’s Constitution. Please, before you vote, be 100% certain of what you are signing into law.

He’s a lawyer. She's a doctor. Meet Attorney, Daniel S. Hilker, and Dr. Joanne Castillo MD, a family medicine physician.

The Diocese of Lansing asked them to assess some the claims being made by the pro-abortion lobby in the current debate over Proposal 3. That's the proposed 323-word “Right to Reproductive Freedom” Amendment to the Constitution of the State of Michigan which will be voted upon November 8.

What is the Gala? It is the school’s largest fundraiser, with ALL proceeds benefiting our wonderful school! This is the 16^th year!

Our CSA goal this year is $211,447. Anything raised above the goal will return to the parish, while any shortfalls must be covered by the parish. Thus, your support is greatly needed and appreciated.

You can also easily give by visiting: sja.aodcsa.org or by clicking on the button below.

I am grateful to those who have already contributed to CSA 2022. As of today, we have $187,270 in pledges and gifts toward our $211,447 goal ($177,405 has been paid thus far toward our total pledged amount). This amount represents gifts from 583 families (we have 3,349 families registered). We have thus achieved 88% of our goal!

“And one of them, realizing he had been healed, returned, glorifying God in a loud voice; and he fell at the feet of Jesus and thanked him” (Luke 17:15).

Jeff Cavins asks the question alluded to in this Sunday’s Gospel about the ten lepers, “Are you grateful for what God has given you.”

The Readings are:

First Reading: 2 Kings 5:14-17

Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 98:1, 2-3, 3-4

Second Reading: 2 Timothy 2:8-13

Alleluia: 1 Thessalonians 5:18

Gospel: Luke 17:11-19

Friends, our first reading for this Sunday is a section of the marvelous story of Naaman the Syrian from the Second Book of Kings. The spiritual lesson is this: where you stumble, dig for treasure. We all have some leprosy—some ailment or struggle or weakness that embarrasses us or makes us suffer. Precisely because it leads us on the path of humility, this leprosy, this debility, leads us to God.

The Accomplice: Every once in a while, our mom likes to surprise us. She claims her children (especially THIS one) are worse than helicopter parents … or helicopter kids in this case. My comeback is that we’re just concerned, and often that concern is because she will push the envelope of doing things but then hurts for days to come just because she wanted to do something herself. We’ll often get the “OH, all you guys are so busy. I can do this myself; I don’t want to bother you” song and dance. Sound familiar?

 

Our mom has been back at the condo for about five months now. We’re still working through boxes that need to be unpacked and small projects that need to be done, but I would say she is almost completely settled in. We’ve told her that if she wanted to have her friends over to tour the newly renovated space or if she wanted to have a family “game day,” as we like to call them, we’d be happy to do all the work and get the meals or snacks together so she wouldn’t have to do all of it herself. Of course, like most parents up there in age, they smile and nod and pretend they’re listening to their adult children, but you know full well they have an alternate plan already cooked up in their mind. Such was the case with our mom with having her grade school gals over to the condo.

 

Not too long ago, I heard a ping on my phone from the condo’s front door Ring doorbell. I usually don’t pay much attention to it unless I know my mom is expecting some delivery. When I do pay attention to it, I typically see my mom greet whoever was at the door and either let them into the house or talk to them at the front door. This particular afternoon, I glanced at the video and saw my mom greet a lady at the front door and let her in. I went about my day and didn’t notice that this scene repeated itself a few times.

 

Later that evening, on our family Zoom call as we yapped about what we did during the day, our mom announced, “HA. HA. I had my grade school gals over for lunch today, and I did it all myself. And, NONE of you knew about it. See, I can do these things myself without you constantly worrying about me.” She then told us how the whole event unfolded.

She had this planned for a week. She ordered Jets Pizza and salad and had the gals pick the stuff up on the way to the house. Now my mom’s accomplice was, well, for the sake of this article, let’s say her name was Kristy. Now Kristy is a parishioner and is the daughter of an SJA staff member; let’s say, for the sake of this story, this staff member’s name is Mary, and Mary works up in Faith Formation as well as handles all of our catered events at the parish. Kristy cleans my mom’s condo, and a plan was concocted for Kristy to clean the condo before the grade school gals’ gathering.

 

Kristy initially didn’t know about the plan and wanted to switch her day around, which would have been in the middle of the gals’ gathering. The text exchange between my mom and Kristy was priceless. It starts with Kristy. “I’ll be at Jane’s tomorrow. Would you like your cleaning tomorrow? If not, we can do Wednesday.” My mom replies, “Oh no! I have my grade school friends over for lunch. Unless you want to come early. They will be here between 12:00 and 1:00 and leave around 6:00 as it turns into a gabfest. But no word to your mom as my kids don’t know I’m doing this as it just came up. Mike and Jackie don’t want me doing stuff like this and would insist to help and take time off to help me. I’m trying to be as independent as I can.” Kristy replies, “Ohhhh, sounds like fun!!! No worries, my lips are sealed! Unplug the cameras so they don’t see you! See u Wednesday!”

 

We all laughed hard on our Zoom call as our mom told the whole story. See, take that, you helicopter kids. Mom had an accomplice! Now don’t get any ideas you more advanced in years parents!

 

The Spiritual Consequences of Living a Hurried, Busy Life … Part 6: This is a continuation of my reflection on and quoting from an article written by Frank Powell, a young adult minister, entitled, “7 Spiritual Consequences of Living a Hurried, Busy Life.” The full article can be found at http://bit.ly/SpiritualConsequences.

 

Last week, I reflected on the fifth of the seven spiritual consequences mentioned in the article: “A hurried life numbs you to injustices that break God’s heart.” The sixth spiritual consequence is: “A hurried life increases narrow-mindedness and legalism.”

 

In this portion of the article, Frank Powell begins by quoting Richard Foster: “Superficiality is the curse of our age.”

 

Frank Powell continues, “A hurried life promotes a shallow, narrow-minded understanding of God. Information is at your fingertips. Any podcast from almost any preacher can be accessed with a few clicks. You can purchase books with your phone. Type in any question, Google will answer it in seconds.

 

“With all this information, you would think Christians would know more about God than ever. But that’s just the problem. Information teaches you ABOUT God. Information increases knowledge. But knowledge alone leads to legalism.

 

“Truly knowing God requires discernment and wisdom. These grow incrementally through reflection, solitude, prayer and Christ-centered community. The difference between knowledge and wisdom is the difference between ‘God can’t work that way,’ and ‘I can’t believe God worked that way.’ It’s the difference between ‘either/or’ and ‘both/and.’ It’s the difference between the disciples, having minimal knowledge about God but recognizing Jesus when he approached them, and the Pharisees, having a wealth of knowledge but crucifying Jesus when he approached.

 

“The Spirit’s upside-down ways are foreign to people living a hurried life.

 

“Wisdom is slow. It can’t be microwaved or manufactured. Don’t expect to understand the upside-down movements of the Spirit if you move at the world’s speed.”

 

I love those final few lines, as they are all so true. Wisdom is slow! And wisdom cannot be microwaved or manufactured. Unfortunately, we want everything fast and now. However, our relationship with Christ can’t be superficial; nor can it be “microwaved.” It takes time. And, that relationship will only take hold and lead to greater things when we take time … make the time … to pray, no matter how busy we are or claim to be!

Wisdom of the Sages: Lest anyone think that last week I was suggesting that only the youngest students are a cause for entertainment, let me put the kiboshes on that notion. This week (and every week) I had plenty of opportunities to be entertained by the 7th grade, unknown to them. My school door in the morning is the place to be if you ever want to enter into the strange mind of a 7th grader…. if you dare….

A friend who used to teach middle school told me that she was happy she switched to kindergarten, but I told her that I think middle schoolers are fun. And I recounted the best piece of advice a priest gave me about ministering to people with severe dementia. Respectfully, he said, “they’re not coming back into your world, so enter into theirs.” I recounted this to my teacher friend and remarked that I feel 7th graders require pretty much the same approach sometimes! Especially at 8am.

Oh, the conversations we have! Sometimes I’m just thankful if they can string words together at that time of the day and if that ability comes to them on a morning where they have energy to push those words out of their mouths, vaguely in my direction. Maybe they even manage to raise their eyes and smile… sometimes... or roll them.

Another friend who taught 7th grade for about 20 years used to call me on his way home from school pretty frequently to recount some incident that “you just wouldn't believe.” He always said he wanted to write a book filled with these moments.

This week there was a number of chances to enter into the 7th grade mind. One student walked-up to my door at drop-off time and without prompting told me, “I think you guys need a different cone arrangement because I keep tripping over them.”

“Is that right?” I replied. I have been convinced for a while that some parents deliberately stop their vehicles in the drop-off lane right next to a cone, in order to give me the entertainment value of watching their student open the door and try to navigate the perils of the traffic cone by the door. If that’s true, thank you parents… much appreciated. Thank you for making my mornings brighter!

Two days later, another 7th grader parked herself at my door and wanted to tell me a fun fact. “Did you know that on this day in 1399, King Richard III... King Richard II did… like… like he did, I don’t know what, but, like he did something special, kinda… like...I’m not sure what it was but I memorized it….”

Well, wow…! I was blown away by this fun non-fact. That’s right, fun non-facts brought to you by the mind of a 7th grader. Maybe King Richard III or II tripped over a traffic cone on this day in 1399? I can’t wait for the next one!

I was writing this article early, just to get it started, knowing that I would be attending a funeral on Monday and I reached this point and let it sit over the weekend, but I also thought it only fair to allow the 7th graders to have some input. So on Monday morning, at the door and started asking, “Supposing you were writing a bulletin article about 7th graders, what would you want the parishioners to know about you all?” Now I realize that shifting a 7th grader’s mind into gear is a challenge at any time, of the day so Monday morning might not have produced a fair control sample, but still, I thought it was worth sharing. (And for the record, I think it may well be a fair sample!)

The first answer: “They’re nice.” Profound.

Next student...

“So what would YOU want parishioners to know about the thoughts of a 7th grader.” He looks off into the distance and thinks deeply and says, “We wake-up in the morning and say, ‘I love Jesus. And now I want to learn.’” Hmmm… raised eyebrow. By the time he’d deposited this revelation and small crowd was gathering and adding to the polling. I asked a 6th grader…

“What is a 7th grader like? What do they do and say?”

“I don’t know.” Well, this caused consternation in the crowd…

“What do you mean you ‘don’t know’?! I just told you!!”

Moving on, the next student…

“Nice.” … “’Nice?’ That’s your final word?”

“Yes.”

“You realize your final word is literally only one word, right?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, then I guess we’ll go with ‘nice.’”

And finally, to close out the polls, “So what would you say to shape the opinions of the parishioners as to what’s going on in the mind of a 7th grader?”

“I don’t really know.”

“That’s what you want them to know? You realize that’s shaping their opinions too? That there’s nothing going on in the mind of a 7th grader?”

“Yes.”

I consider that one a spoiled ballot. I have a feeling there is plenty going on in there….What it is?...“I don’t really know.” But there are always signs of hope! On Saturday I was stood in the parking lot and one of last year’s 8th graders approached me on his bike and said “Hi.” I asked how high school was going and he said things were going well and told me about the classes and activities he was busy with. And he asked how things were going here at SJA. It’s amazing to witness the growth and maturity that a few weeks of high school can create. But it’s building on a foundation, built upon the stones laid here in those formative years, those tired Monday mornings, trudging through our doorway and into our halls.

It was so wonderful to see some of our students speak so well after mass last weekend, promoting the Gala next Saturday, Oct 16, celebrating 75 years of our school, and in anticipation of the future. What will those students become? What opportunities lie ahead of them? Will they be the faith leaders of their future? We plant these seeds and this community must continue to help nourish them.

Please help to support our school through the raffle. You may win; you may not. But our students WILL. And as my middle school principal used to say, “Your reward will be in heaven.” God bless our school, our teachers and our students.

adawson@sjascs.org 

Sometimes when we look at the lives of the Saints we can be tempted to think that God singled them out to suffer more than most. But maybe that suffering is actually a gift.

Today Fr. Mike shares with us how we must orient out lives towards the cross and keep Christ’s passion and death always before us so that when we encounter suffering we will have God’s strength to sustain us.

There’s a school of thought that suggests the root cause of all the world’s problems is borders. Do away with city, state, and, most importantly, international borders, this theory’s proponents have said, and the world will be a much more peaceful and stable place. It seems a bit too simplistic to be practical, but, if nothing else, it’s an interesting thought exercise.

And thought – deep, considered, no-nonsense thought on the part of leaders – would seem to be intensely needed at this point in history. Especially as Russia digs deeper into its Ukraine war effort and the rest of the world searches for paths to peace.

Media around the world a few weeks ago reported on meetings at the United Nations, at which the free world spoke forcefully against the Russian leadership.

“Numerous world leaders used their speeches … to denounce Russia’s war,” said one Associated Press story in The Detroit News. “That trend continued (the following days) both in the assembly hall and at the usually deeply divided U.N. Security Council, where, one-by-one, virtually all of the 15 council members served up harsh criticism of Russia – a council member – for aggravating several already severe global crises and imperiling the foundations of the world body.”

How this international crisis is ultimately resolved remains to be seen. Perhaps an end is months away; perhaps years.

One thing we can be assured of is that, ultimately, God will hear the prayers of his people and bring a good end for the faithful.

“The Lord has made his salvation known,” we pray in today’s response from Psalm 98. “In the sight of the nations he has revealed his justice. He has remembered his kindness and his faithfulness toward the house of Israel.

“The Lord has revealed to the nations his saving power.”

That’s it! You’re in. Now you can get the free FORMED app for your phone by searching FORMED Catholic in your app store.

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7:00 a.m., George J. Bugarin and a Special Intention for the Mecha Family

7:00 a.m., Don Kowalewski and a Special Intention for Lori Becker

7:00 a.m., Jerry Brennan and Lawrence & Rosemary Schenden

7:00 a.m., A Special Intention for the Ziolkowski Family

7:00 a.m., The deceased members of the Calisi Family who died in the month of October.

4:00 p.m., Elise Maes. Bonnie Batche, Edward and Henry blind, Robert Barnwell, Melvin Dries, Donald Strobbe, Phil D’Agostino, Paul Everett, Anthony and Ann Zyneal and Special Intentions for the J. Champine Family, for the Thomas Family and for the Zelenek Family.

6:00 p.m., Joan Weber and Dr. Lori Karol

8:00 a.m., For the Intentions of Saint Joan of Arc Parishioners

10:00 a.m., James Forrester

12:00 p.m., Richard M. Barno, Joan Fletcher, Sam Ciaramitaro

Thursday (October 13)

1:00 PM - Wedding of Kelly Cooper and Brad Lempke