Dear Parishioners,

We are so blessed here in Chewelah that our parish is named in honor of Our Lady under the title of St. Mary of the Rosary. It is a long tradition that a parish or town celebrate its patron’s feast day. In Europe and elsewhere the parish or town would have a procession and celebration on its patron’s feast day. Our parish feast day is Oct. 7, which is the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. This feast is on Friday. I will not be available to celebrate mass that day so we are going to have a rosary prayed at 9 a.m. in the place of mass. We will celebrate our parish feast on Sunday, Oct. 9.

I would like to begin a tradition here of honoring Our Lady and celebrating her feast as a parish. After the 10 a.m. Mass on Oct. 9 we will begin a Rosary Procession directly after mass. We will process a statue of Our Lady outdoors to five different stations on our property and pray a decade of the Rosary at each station. Between each station we will sing as we process. At the end, the parish will provide a luncheon for all those who participate in the Rosary Procession.

The Rosary is a beautiful gift from Mary our mother to us her children. The gift is to reflect and mediate more deeply on the mysteries of Our Lord’s life, death and resurrection by using the twenty mysteries of the Rosary which is summary or compendium of Our Lord’s life. As St. John Paul II said: the Rosary is a mini-Gospel. I would encourage everyone this week, in preparation for our parish feast day, to pray the Rosary or a part of the Rosary, each day. October is the month of the Rosary and Our Lady promises blessings and intercession to those who pray the Rosary.

For many years I have been using and promoting a publication called the Magnificat. It is a monthly publication that follows the church’s daily liturgy. It can be used as a missal at mass but has much more. It highlights saints, has religious art, has morning and evening prayers, daily meditations and much more. I have ordered a limited amount of the Magnificat monthly publication and would like to make it available to those parishioners who would like to go deeper into their devotional and spiritual lives. I will be placing Magnificat publications at the back of all of our churches. Please feel free to take one if you feel you will use it. It is a publication that one can also make a personal subscription too. I have found this publication consistently personally enriching and inspiring and of the highest quality.

I will be away the latter part of this week so therefore there will be no daily masses Wednesday through Friday, Oct. 5-7. Also, Matt Cobb will be presenting at the adult faith formation on Wednesday for Faith Night. Matt will be will be keeping in line with the topic of "pilgrimage" by speaking about "Pilgrimage to . . . The Interior Life."