Our Lady of Victory / St-Malachy

THIRD SUNDAY

OF EASTER

CELEBRATION OF THE EUCHARIST

Our Lady of Victory

St. Malachy

Sunday - 9:00 A.M.

Saturday - 7:00 P.M.

F O O D F O R T H O U G H T

Reading I	Acts 3.13 -15, 17-19 You killed the author of life whom God raised from the dead.
Responsorial Psalm	Lord, let your face shine on us.
Reading II	1 John 5.1-6 Jesus Christ is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and for the sins of the whole world.
Gospel	Luke 24.35-48 Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day.

APRIL 30th, 2006

Pastor	William Marrevee s.c.j.
Email	w.marrevee@sympatico.ca
Rectory	490 Charles Street Gatineau, Québec J8L 2K5
Secretary	Monday and Thursday 1:00 - 4:00 p.m.
Telephone	(819) 986-3763
Fax	(819) 986-9889

A sincere welcome to those who are new among us. We hope you find a warm and welcoming faith-home with us. Please introduce yourself after Mass and call the Rectory to register.

MASS SCHEDULE
WED.	May 03rd - 9:00 a.m.	OLV	Hector Gauthier by Diane & Larry Cameron
SAT.	May 06th - 7:00 p.m.	St. Malachy	Drew Dunlop by Ellen & Alvin Butler Frances & James Gaspar by Peter& Cheryl Cameron & family
SUN.	May 07th - 9:00 a.m.	OLV	Kurtis Corrigan by Connie

WE BELIEVE IN THE RESURRECTION:
What does it mean that Jesus is raised from the dead? It is the core of the Christian faith. Not easy to handle or to explain. But still essential. Last year, in Catholic update, Thomas H. Groome tried his hand on reflecting on it in such a way that it may speak to us. It will still take some struggling, but it is worth it. Here follows the third of five installments:

HOW TO DESCRIBE THE CHANGE?
That Jesus had risen was the bedrock on which the disciples launched Christian faith and founded the church. Of course, we must add to their experience of Christ’ resurrection the phenomenal event of Pentecost (Acts 2). Pentecost rounded out their Easter Experience; it still rounds out the Easter season for us today.

At that first Pentecost, the Christian community -- with about 120 of them gathered (Aacts1; 15)—experienced an outpouring of God’s own Spirit “on each one of them” (Acts 2:3); note well. Not just on the apostles. This transformed them from a bunch of scary-cats, afraid to show their faces, into fearless witnesses ready to bring Jesus’ mission to the ends of the earth. Fully convinced of his resurrection and empowered by the Holy Spirit, those first disciples began to proclaim their Jesus as “Lord and Messiah” (Acts 2:36), as the Anointed on of God – The Christ.

Now it began to dawn on the disciples that Jesus’ life, death and resurrection—what we call the paschal event—was a decisive catalyst in God’s ‘’work of salvation.” They began to realize that Jesus Christ had forged a new covenant between God and human kind, that this was the turning point in human history. But how were they to describe the change that God had effected in Jesus?

Well they began to do what we must still do today- to search for metaphors and language, adequate to their time and place, to describe the difference that Jesus Christ makes for all creation. The challenge then and now is to express in meaningful, engaging and life-giving ways what God has done in Jesus and continues forever by the Holy Spirit.

Paul got started offering whole collage of images for the ‘changed utterly’ that God had brought about in the dying and raising of Jesus.

He wrote of it as salvation (Rom1:16), liberation (Gal 5:1) justification (Gal 2:16-21), reconciliation (2Cor 3:16-18), sanctification (1Cor 1:30), forgiveness (Rom3:25), expiration (Rom. 3:25), ransom (Gal 4:5 -6),, new creation (Gal 6:15), new life (1Cor 15:45),divine adoption (Gal 4:4-6)—and the list could go on. Why so many metaphors? Paul was trying to express for the first Christian communities what is inexhaustible and cannot be fully described – the utter change that is ensured by Easter.

FOR THE CHURCH EASTER IS NOT JUST ANOTHER SUNDAY:
It takes the Church no less than 50 days to “get over it”. That may be a bad way of putting it. What it tries to say is that the events we have celebrated in the Three Great days of Holy Thursday evening, Good Friday, Easter Saturday/Sunday are so significant that we need 50 days to let them take hold of us. After all, it took 40 days (Lent) to prepare for it. So it stands to reason that we want to stay with it for an even longer period. Yes, the Easter season comes to a close on the 50th day, the day of Pentecost.

The significance of Easter is well captured in the banners you see up front in the church. They are more than a piece of decoration. In vivid images, they display what as a church we are about in the 50 day Easter Season.

The cross, which on its own is an instrument of torture and shame, has been transformed into the tree of life (----- remember what we sang during Lent!). That is what the Resurrection of Jesus makes possible. The sun of the new creation has dawned and the roots of the cross, of the tree of life, reach into the darkest corners of our human existence to bring life. And the dead piece of wood has even branches with leaves representing us, who are the branches grafted onto the tree of life. Part of that new creation is that the risen Christ shares his life-giving Spirit with us. That is expressed in the red banner with its flames of fire. The lower banner shows us how in the waters of baptism we have got our feet in the new creation and how, in fact, we have been grafted onto the Tree of Life which is for us the risen Christ.

Quite significantly, the banners hang above or serve as backdrop to the two focal points of our celebration of the Eucharist: the lectern from which God’s life-giving word is proclaimed and the altar around which we share the life-giving bread and wine of the new creation, the Body and Blood of Christ. The proclaimed word of God and the Body and Blood of Christ are the two principal means of the Church by which the new life we have received in baptism is nourished and sustained on a regular basis.

All this to say that our Easter faith is on display in those banners.

SUNDAY JUNE 11th - AN INTERESTING PROPOSAL FROM ST. GREGOIRE AND ST. LUC:
The parishes of St. Gregoire and St. Luc are planning to have a joint celebration of the Eucharist followed by a number of social activities on that Sunday. They are inviting us and would be very pleased if our two parishes would join them in such a joint celebration. It would certainly be a beautiful expression of how around His able Jesus Christ brings us together thus transcending our linguistic differences.

Our joint Parish Pastoral Council (PPC) and the two fabriques of our respective parishes have in principle accepted this invitation. Details of the project will follow.

Our Lady of the Annunciation Parish will be holding a Spring Auction on Tuesday, May 9th at the Church Centre, 189 Archambault Street, (Hull Sector) Gatineau. Doors open at 6:00 p.m. for viewing, auction is from 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. Admission is $1.00 and includes refreshments. To donate goods or for additional information, phone 771-4613 or 777-6416.

WEEKLY RECEIPTS

Date	Collection	OLV	St. Malachy

Apr. 23rd	Regular	$ 755	$ 425
	Fuel	240	158