Author: St. Charles Borromeo

Messages from the PPC

Parish Pastoral Council Statement on Inequity

| St. Charles Borromeo

The following Parish Pastoral Council statement was announced at today’s Online Community Mass:

Transcript:
Thanks Donna. Good Afternoon. I’m Francis Chin, one of the parish trustees, and I am speaking today on behalf of the Parish Pastoral Council. We would like to take this moment to reflect together on what is going on in our country today.

Today at Pentecost, we celebrate God, the Holy Spirit – the breath of life and the founding of the Church, a community commissioned to spread the Good News of God’s love, to serve God’s people everywhere, speaking to them in every language.

So let us say this plainly. George Floyd’s killing was unjustified. Breonna Taylor’s killing was unjustified. The 100,000 Americans killed by COVID-19 were unjustified. They were denied their breath of life because of racial, social, and economic inequality. They were denied their breath of life because there are those who believe that to enrich and advance themselves, others must suffer. The daily bad news cycle of demeaning words and anonymous deaths has made us numb to the fact that this is wrong.

We believe that to love God we must love each other as ourselves.  We call upon all of us to raise our voices to build up a more just society that serves everyone with dignity, rather than one that oppresses and tears people down.

Let us value each other more than we value our accounts. Let us redouble our efforts to care for each other and to be concerned for our world.

This Pentecost, let us speak each other’s language.

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Messages from Parishioners

Walking Before We Fly (Pt. I) – Joe Genova

| St. Charles Borromeo

I was struck by the sharpness and zeal of what last week’s readings say about what Christians will face. As we end the Easter season and prepare to reenter Ordinary Time, I’d like to reflect on fostering spiritual growth and strength based upon my experience raising two sons here in Brooklyn Heights and in St. Charles Borromeo parish. Today, in what I have boldly called Part I, I want to talk about faith formation—the groundwork that creates Christians strong enough to face fires. Part II will be based on Laudato Si, Pope Francis’ encyclical on the environment. Continue reading “Walking Before We Fly (Pt. I) – Joe Genova” →

Events

Online Community Mass – Pentecost Sunday 5/31 11:15 AM EDT

| St. Charles Borromeo

View the mass for Pentecost Sunday here:

Please join us for our Online Community Mass for Pentecost Sunday on May 31 at 11:15 AM EDT. We congratulate Msgr. LoPinto and his seminary classmates on the 50th anniversary of their ordination to the priesthood.  We will properly celebrate this in the Fall when we are able to reunite with each other. Ad multos annos!

Instructions to view the Mass are available here.

 

Messages from the Pastor

Pentecost Sunday – First Reading Commentary

| St. Charles Borromeo

Why the geese?
Wild geese were the ancient Celtic symbol for the Holy Spirit .
(click here for more info)
(Photo by Bahram Bayat on Unsplash)

Acts 2:1–11

The celebration of Feast of Pentecost brings together the literary brilliance of St. Luke and the ancient wisdom of Israel. The last element perhaps of more contemporary relevance than we might immediately think.

Luke understood himself to be writing a work of history. He did not follow the same conventions as a modern historian but his were clear and, once understood, could give a deep insight into the people and situations of the day. Luke’s work is in two parts: the “Gospel” and the “Acts.” The coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, at the beginning of Acts, is the hinge. Luke, like a good historian of his day, would be very careful to have many links between the two works and indeed between the beginning of Acts and further sections. Continue reading “Pentecost Sunday – First Reading Commentary” →

Homilies

7th Sunday of Easter – Homily (Fr. Gribowich)

| St. Charles Borromeo

Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE with license #A-730437.

Transcript:

Morning, everyone! It’s so great to be with you all again here today on such a beautiful Sunday. I think that today is this special day where we can really appreciate the beauty of creation – something I want to touch upon, especially as we reflect upon our readings today.

You know, I’m sure many of us have been able to spend a lot of time in our apartments and our homes catching up on different movies that maybe we wanted to watch, or TV shows. And one movie that I had every intention of watching but I just never got around to was the one called A Hidden Life and it came out last December, I believe in the movie theaters. And I know that some people here at the parish actually have seen it, and they had a very favorable impression of it. But for those you may not know what the movie’s about. It’s a true story of a man named Franz Jägerstätter, who was an Austrian during World War 2 who refused to swear an oath – pledge an oath of loyalty – to Hitler, and because of that, he was essentially persecuted, but then eventually executed. Continue reading “7th Sunday of Easter – Homily (Fr. Gribowich)” →