Current Mass Times

Saturday: 5 p.m.

Sunday: 7:30 a.m., 9:30 a.m., 11:30 a.m., 2 p.m. (Spanish), 5 p.m.

Monday-Friday: 9 a.m.

Monday-Wednesday-Friday: 12:10 p.m.

Watch a livestreamed or recorded Mass

Confession

Saturday: 10 a.m.-10:30 a.m. (English)

Sunday: 3 p.m.- 4 p.m. (Spanish)

A Letter From Our Pastor

by Fr. Joe Brennan, OSFS

Dear Friends,

As I write this letter during the Octave of Easter, I have been thinking of the image of the tomb with the stone rolled back and the light shining through as it laid empty. I invite all of us to imagine what we might rediscover at the empty tomb when we replace the darkness of death with the radiating light of new life and embrace the fresh air breathed into us by the hope of Christ's Resurrection.

For those of us who believe in the Resurrection, some areas of our discernment this season center around how we have been transformed and are being called to recommit our lives to serve as instruments of hope and new life. Do we also recognize signs of transformation and hope in other people? On that first Easter Sunday, by the power of God’s love, the stone was rolled away, and shining light flowed into a place believed by many to be one of perpetual darkness. How can you be the light of the Risen Christ in a world that is suffering, yet desires healing and new possibilities?

In the early evening light on Easter Monday, I drove past one of our many beautiful parks here in Reston, on the way to meet a friend for dinner. I was briefly captivated by what appeared to be a father teaching his young daughter how to swing a baseball bat while a young woman sat nearby, holding a baby and cheering them on. The man's face illuminated with the joy of this perfect moment. Continuing to meet me friend for dinner, I pulled into the shopping center where the restaurant was. There my attention was drawn to an elderly woman struggling to transfer her grocery bags from the shopping cart to her car. As I watched, two teenage boys approached to help her. The appreciative relief was written on her face. As they finished, she appeared to offer them a monetary gift, instead they gave her big smiles and walked away waving to her. 

These are just small acts of love and kindness in our complex world, but reflections of joy and hope! Perhaps when we see life with Resurrection eyes, God gives us the strength of hope necessary to witness the pure beauty in the gift of life. For me, encountering these simple, yet profound, scenes truly reflected Easter's hope and the glory of new life for us.

Easter Blessings and Live Jesus,

Fr. Joe



Overall, three years passed from the moment "Preschool" popped in my head until we opened St. John Neumann Catholic Preschool for the 2018-19 school year, with 30 students ages 2-½ to 4 years old. The day we opened, I knew with certainty that it had been God’s idea. God has been able to use me and Anne, with Fr. Tom, Fr. Joe, both the Pastoral and Finance Councils and all the Preschool and Parish staff, who have supported us and worked with dedication and diligence to make this happen. It has been every student and family, with the generosity of parishioners, together on this shared journey.

The journey has not always been easy, but we have found a way to thrive. Through a global pandemic that shut our doors for three months to COVID restrictions and changing guidelines and regulations, we have relied on the voice of God in the moments we couldn’t see our way through. We have watched families grow in faith and celebrated the baptisms of several of our students and their siblings. Fifteen percent of our students are on partial and sometimes full scholarships funded by generous donations from SJN parishioners to our “Tuition Angels" fund. We have prepared so many children for kindergarten and helped our 2-½ and 3-year-olds begin their educational journeys in a safe, nurturing, faith-filled environment. We have fostered community for our families. Every single day, I feel incredibly grateful and blessed to be working a job I adore.

Where are we headed? What’s next? I’m not exactly sure. I am waiting to hear from God on His plan. What I have learned is that when you trust God and faithfully listen to His call, He puts the right people in your path, with the wisdom needed to make His ideas happen.

Remarkable environmental progress has been made since the first Earth Day in 1970, and people of faith have been critical motivators over the decades. While many Earth Day activities planned for April 22 will address physical actions such as stream and road cleanups, faith communities have long incorporated spiritual, moral, and ethical reasons for caring for creation.

Caring for Our Common Home at SJN

When a group of parishioners studied Pope Francis’s 2015 encyclical, “Laudato Si’: On Care for our Common Home,” many felt it was a call to action, and they responded by forming a new parish ministry. The encyclical addresses the state of the environment and how we can respond as people of faith. The Care for our Common Home Ministry shares practical and spiritual suggestions with staff and parishioners on how to live more sustainably on many levels.

Laudato Si’ are the first words of St. Francis of Assisi’s “Canticle of the Creatures” - “praised be you, my Lord, through all your creation.”

First, what is our “common home"?



We clearly understand that if we don’t take care of ourselves or our homes, we suffer the consequences. Pope Francis highlights that everything is connected and we gradually realize that our common home is much bigger than our little worlds. Our impacts, positive or negative, have a large ripple effect. Being a responsible member of a global community strengthens our ties to the mystical body of Christ and allows us to hear the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor, and then to respond with love.

Our body is our home – we are temples of the Holy Spirit and all of us make up the mystical body of Christ. How do we take care of our body?

Our house, apartment, or dormitory is our common home. How do we pitch in to keep it running smoothly?

Our parish is our common home. Do we treat our facility and grounds as members who care or simply as guests who assume someone else will keep them in order?

Our community, state, and country are our common home. How do we act as informed, caring citizens?

And, ultimately, our planet is our common home. How do we live, work, and play in balance with nature and in ways that ensure dignity for all, including future generations?

The answer to these questions, we discovered, is to live in right relationship with God, with others, and with creation. It’s simple, but not easy. At what level of our common home, listed above, are you most “in right relationship” with God, others, or creation? Where are you most in need of growth?

And second, what does it mean to care? We are called to be stewards of the earth. A steward cares out of concern and love, not out of selfish desires. How do we change our hearts to truly care? In order to learn how to live in right relationship with God, others, and creation, we have to be willing to have a conversion of heart. 

“Many things have to change course, but it is we human beings above all who need to change.” (LS #202)

Our ministry concentrates on four areas to bring about this conversion:

 Prayer – to change our hearts

Sometimes we just have to “be” and let the still, small voice of God be heard. Praying in and learning from creation, God’s first Bible, enhances all of our other ways of worshiping.

“The best antidote against the misuse of our common home is contemplation,” (Pope Francis, Sept 2020)

 Education – to change our understanding

There is so much to learn in the area of sustainability! We research various topics and share our knowledge with others at our meetings, in the bulletin, on the bulletin board in the Narthex, and on our website. If you have an area of expertise to share, we welcome your knowledge.

Sustainability – to change our habits

We educate and model ways for parishioners to live that bring us into right relationship with creation. See here for some stories of what parishioners from SJN are doing. We’d love to know what you are doing. Send us your story at saintjn.cch@gmail.com so we can continue to expand this document.

Advocacy – to change our culture

While changing our hearts and lifestyles to live more sustainably with the earth and more justly with others has great spiritual and ecological benefits, systemic changes happen at higher levels. It is critical to share our informed voices with our elected officials. 

SJN is now an official “Laudato Si’ Parish

St. John Neumann has become a Laudato Si’ Parish, which means we are an official participant in the global, Vatican-led program to becoming fully sustainable in the following areas of parish life over the next five years:

What we do as a parish and how we do it:

Hear the cry of the poor:

We see the needs of the community and respond.

Hear the cry of the earth:

We operate our facility efficiently in terms of energy and landscaping.

Educate parishioners:

We show how lifestyles can have a positive impact on the environment.

Make financial decisions:

We take into account external costs, not just the bottom line.

Live sustainably:

We encourage all to reduce energy use and material consumption.

Worship:

We offer ways to praise God through His gift of creation.

Advocate:

We ask for better systemic policies locally, regionally and nationally.

See our parish action plans for year 1 (2023) and year 2 here. These plans have been submitted to the Vatican, as have plans from thousands of other parishes around the globe.

At the Diocesan Level

There are many parishes in the Arlington Diocese that also have Care for Creation ministries, and we gather quarterly to share ideas and encourage each other. Caring for creation is one of the seven themes of Catholic Social Teaching, and Bishop Burbidge gives full support to these ministries that guide us to live out our faith by hearing the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor.

How you can get involved:

Join our email list to stay informed of our ministry’s activities. We typically send two to three emails per month; to sign up, just send an email to saintjn.cch@gmail.com.

Peruse our website. Notice our mission statement on the home page and past activities under the Events tab.

Join our meetings. We meet on the second Tuesday of the month at 7 p.m. Most meetings are hybrid, so join us in-person or by Zoom (details are sent via email).

Join our dishwashing ministry. Many of our parish events, including funerals, are nearly zero-waste. By using reusable plates, tumblers, and flatware, we avoid the purchasing and disposal of single-use items. Our dishwashing crew makes this possible. If you want to join this fun group, email us to add your name to the distribution list. We will let you know when an event is planned and share the SignUpGenius link. If the time and date is convenient for you, sign up for a slot, and if not, there is no need to respond.

Become a Laudato Si’ Family/Household. Commit to becoming sustainable in the same seven areas listed above. It’s an opportunity to develop a personal mission statement and action plan to put your faith into action by living an authentic, compassionate, mindful lifestyle. Keep your eye out for an invitation to be part of the second cohort of LSi households at SJN.

Hopefully you now have a better understanding of what the Care for Our Common Home Ministry is all about. We welcome your ideas and participation at any level. Truly, we do celebrate Earth Day every day!

Laudato Si’ mi signore – Praised be you my Lord through all your creation! 

While there are literally thousands of canonized saints, in two millennia of Church history, we have just 36 Doctors of the Church. Like all else in the Catholic Church, the act of declaring a saint a Doctor of the Church is not done with haste. On average, the declaration comes about 800 years after their death. 



The first Doctors of the Church were designated by Pope Boniface VIII in 1298; he named St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, and St. Gregory the Great. In order to be named a Doctor of the Church, after canonization, of course, three criteria must be met. First, the saint must be of exemplary holiness—not just holy, but the holiest of holy people! Secondly and significantly, the saint must have made substantial contributions to the Church’s theology and understanding through writing, research, or speaking, providing insights into Catholic doctrine that was applicable and necessary to their own time as well as timeless. The final criterion to be declared a Doctor of the Church is to be granted a papal decree.  

It wasn’t until 1970 that the first women were declared Doctors of the Church by Pope Paul VI. The honor first went to St. Teresa of Ávila and then St. Catherine of Siena, following just one week later. In 1997, upon the centennial of her death, Pope John Paul II bestowed the title on St. Thérèse of Lisieux, and in 2012, Pope Benedict XVI declared St. Hildegard of Bingen a Doctor of the Church. Who are these four women and what are their contributions to our Catholic faith? 

St. Teresa of Ávila 

St. Teresa of Ávila was born Teresa Sanchez de Cepeda y Ahumada into a family of Spanish nobility on March 28, 1515. Raised in a family devoted to the saints, Teresa joined the Carmelite convent at 20 years old. She spent the next 20 years wrestling with the worldly and divine trying to navigate her way. At the age of 40, she experienced a full conversion that became the catalyst to lead a restoration of the Carmelite order and found a new branch called the Discalced Carmelites. Her mission was met with significant resistance from within the order and outside, but she persevered in reforming the order and returning to an intimate focus on contemplative prayer. Before her death, she founded sixteen new convents. Teresa wrote extensively to nurture her sisters in intimacy with God. Her most notable writing is the spiritual guide, “The Interior Castle," which leads the reader on the journey a soul takes to reach Christ. This work is remarkable for both its depth in revealing theological truths, as well as its relatability, which makes it inviting and engaging for the ordinary reader. Teresa died at the age of 67 in 1582. Just 40 years later, Pope Gregory canonized her. 

St. Catherine of Siena 

Born Caterina Benincasa in Siena, Italy, on March 25, 1347, she was the 24th of 25 children. Catherine demonstrated early signs of being a mystic, blessed with visions and a sensitivity to the divine. After a vision of Christ Jesus seated in glory reaching out for her at six years old, she made a private vow consecrating her virginity to God a year later. Confining herself to fasting and prayer for much of her early life, at the age of 18, Catherine became a Third Order Dominican, which is a lay person devoted to the charism of the Dominican order. In fact, St. Catherine is the only Doctor of the Church who was a lay person. Throughout the 1374 bubonic plague pandemic, she ministered to the sick and buried the dead. By this time in her life, Catherine was also leading mission trips and was one of only a few women engaged in public ministry.

St. Catherine of Siena notably served as a devoted advocate and ambassador of our faith, navigating Church leaders through worldly abuses and division. She was a severe critic of the abuses, writing many letters to members of the clergy and church hierarchy, condemning religious who chose luxury and vanity over the embrace of poverty and humility. In 1376, St. Catherine met with Pope Gregory XI in Avignon, France, where the papacy had been banished since 1309, and urged him to return to Rome. In one letter to the pope, she encouraged him to be “courageous,” not a “coward.” Ultimately, he conceded to her suggestion, returning to Rome in 1377. 

After Gregory’s death the following year, the Papal Schism ensued upon the election of Pope Urban VI. For the next 39 years, there would be at least two claimants to the papacy, between Rome and Avignon, and sometimes three. Catherine wrote several letters during this time advising Urban VI and supporting him as the legitimate successor to the Chair of Saint Peter. 

Although a prolific producer of correspondence (over 400 of her letters survive yet today), St. Catherine of Siena did not learn how to write until just before her death. All her letters were dictated to secretaries. Her most famous writing, “Dialogue,” is a soul's conversation with God. At more than 400 pages, it is said to have been dictated to secretaries while St. Catherine was in a state of spiritual ecstasy between 1377 and 1378.

In 1380, even though she was sick, Catherine traveled to Rome. This time, her mission was to help restore the rightful Pope Urban VI with Rome (against the anti-pope, Clement VII). There she is believed to have suffered a stroke and died on April 29 at the age of 33. She was canonized in 1461.  

St. Thérèse of Lisieux 

Born the youngest of nine children to Sts. Louis and Zelie Martin in 1873. After her mother’s death at the age of four, Thérèse felt a calling to religious life and was determined to follow her older sisters in the Carmelite order. She requested that the bishop allow her to join religious life early but was denied. Nevertheless, at the age of 15, she petitioned Pope Leo XII and was granted permission to join the Carmelites. Thérèse maintained her childlike faith in God, which became apparent in her compete trust and surrender to holiness in her only book, the doctrine of faith, “Story of the Soul.” St. Thérèse is commonly known as the “Little Flower.” This moniker was derived from a holy card given to her by her sister, Pauline. On the card, Jesus is depicted as a prisoner waiting (in the Tabernacle), his hand is reaching through the bars to a flower growing through the stone. In “Story of the Soul, Thérèse writes that she reflected often on the image: “I offered myself to Our Lord to be His Little Flower; I longed to console Him, to draw as near as possible to the Tabernacle, to be looked on, cared for, and gathered by Him.”  After her premature death from tuberculosis at just 24 years old, her “little ways” to holiness touched countless lives, making “Story of the Soul” a bestseller. St. Thérèse was canonized in 1925, and declared a Doctor of the Church in 1997, becoming the youngest of all the Doctors of the Church.  

St. Hildegard of Bingen 

St. Hildegard of Bingen was born to a noble family in West Franconia (Germany) in the year 1098. As early as three years old, she had mystical visions of the Lord. The tenth child of her parents, she was sent for care in a Benedictine community outside Bingen at eight years old. At the age of 15, St. Hildegard began wearing the Benedictine habit, and by 38 years old, she had become the Mother Superior of the Benedictine convent. At the age of 43, she sought the advice of her spiritual director about her visions, and their authenticity was declared by a committee of Church theologians. After this, she recorded her visions and meanings in a mystical work called “The Scivias.” She followed "The Scivias" with "Book of the Merits of Life" and "Book of Divine Works." Her work focuses on the ability to find God using our senses. Around 1147, inspired by a vision, she moved the convent to the nearby town of Rupertsberg, a decision that riled other religious in vigorous protest.

Although a woman of many talents, St. Hildegard did not know how to write and relied on others to transcribe her works. This did not preclude her from any accomplishment, written or otherwise. Interestingly, St. Hildegard even created her own language. St. Hildegard was also the equivalent of a medical doctor for her time, writing two treatises on medicine, and she remains renowned as a composer of orchestra music. Believing music to be the highest form of praising God, she compiled 77 of her lyrical poems into compositions in Symphonia Armonie Celestium Revelationum ("The Symphony of the Harmony of the Heavenly Revelations"). Her music is still enjoyed and highly regarded today.

Clearly an extraordinary person, St. Hildegard had a large following and traveled throughout Germany to evangelize, a practice rarely allowed for women of this time. St Hildegard died in 1179 and was canonized and declared a Doctor of the Church in the same year: 2012.

The lives of these four holy women were truly exemplary, each in its unique way, contributing to the history, strength, and faith of our Church. But why just four women? Surely, there were others who bestowed our faith with substantial insights, teaching, and theology. It is important to remember that a woman’s role in the Church for centuries was quite limited. Of these four Doctors of the Church, only Thérèse's life resembles the "expected role” of a woman in her time. Catherine, Hildegard, and Teresa were not viewed by many of their contemporaries as the "ideal" of femininity; they were boldly filling roles that were believed to be reserved for men. They regularly met opposition; St. Catherine’s life was threatened and in 1374, her presence was demanded by the General Chapter of the Dominicans to be interrogated for her work. Hildegard also met strong opposition, even from other religious.

Also, recall that one of the criteria to be declared a Doctor of the Church is to make a significant contribution to the understanding of the teaching of the Church. Due to the simple fact that for centuries women were denied educational pursuits virtually prohibited them from making this contribution. Catherine of Siena and Hildegard, who overcame their inability to physically write by utilizing secretaries, were the exception. Even with an education, however, women struggled to be regarded as equals even, and sometimes especially, in the Church. It was not until 1967 that the thought of naming a woman a Doctor of the Church was considered as a possibility. Of course, it is certainly likely there are other women deserving of this honor, who have been overlooked. One that has been petitioned for the honor of Church Doctor is St. Faustina Kowalska. This weekend the Church celebrates Divine Mercy Sunday, and this devotion exists through her extraordinary writing at the outbreak of World War II. Her inspiration endures today as a message of God’s infinite mercy. 

Despite the path women have overcome to this point, we celebrate the great Women Doctors of our Church. Add any of their significant writings to your reading list today. April 29 is the feast day of the brave and bold St. Catherine of Siena, and the best way to celebrate this remarkable saint is by honoring her famous quote (which is just a little fiercer than our beloved gentleman saint’s quote): “Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.”