Sunday of the Man Born Blind
Christ is Risen! Indeed He is Risen!
6th Sunday of the Man Born Blind
May 25, 2025
Sat 5/24/25 4:00pm Vigil Divine Liturgy +Souls in Purgatory by Marian Luther
Sun 5/25/25 9:30am Divine Liturgy +Francis Lipp by Carol Fizer
Wed 5/28/25 7:00pm Vigil Divine Liturgy of Ascension Carol Fudoli by Cindy Hills
Thu 5/29/25 9:30am Divine Liturgy - Deceased members of the Pocchiari and Fantozzi Families by Pocchiari Family
Fri 5/30/25 7:00pm Akatist to the Theotokos
Sat 5/31/25 4:00pm Vigil Divine Liturgy +Philip Bray by Tina Soley
Sun 6/1/25 9:30am Divine Liturgy Anna Olen by Cindy Hills
Variable Parts Sunday of the Man Born Blind - Festal Tone Pages 189 - 191
Epistle Acts 16:16-34
Gospel John 9:1-38
Epistle Readers 24-May John Baycura/Mary Motko 25-May Eva Babick 31-May Mary Troyan 1-Jun Liz/John Pocchiari
Memorial Candle Request - Rene Dancisin Koppleman - by her father Michael Dancisin
Please Pray for: Sharon King, Ole J. Bergh, Erik Bergh, Liz Moyta, Fr. Michael Huszti, Fr. Laska, Susie Curcio, Teresa Milkovich, Robert Saper, Anna Habil, Martha Sapar, Mike Dancisin, Karen Smaretsky Vavro, Diane Sotak, Anna Pocchiari, Larry Hamil, Beverly Jones, Marilyn Book, Maryann Russin Schyvers, Nick Russin and Ken Konchan
Attendance: 5/17-20 5/18 — 88 Collection: 5/17 & 5/18 $1,350.00
Flag Day Celebration: Save the date, June 8th, for our Flag Day Celebration after Sunday Liturgy. Lunch will be served in the church hall after a program at the Lyndora Post Office.
4th Metropolitan Assembly — taking place July 16-20, 2025, at St. Mary Byzantine Catholic Church in Whiting, Indiana. This gathering serves as a cornerstone for unity, reflection, and spiritual renewal, bringing together clergy and laity info: Email: byzantineassembly@gmail.corn WEB: www.byzantineassembly.org
It's not hard to understand why we celebrate Good Friday and Easter Sunday. But Ascension Thursday? Why, from the perspective of one of those "left behind" on Earth, is that something to celebrate? It's easy to misunderstand the Ascension, as if Christ were abandoning his disciples. But he promised that this wouldn't happen, saying "I will not leave you desolate" (John 14:18) and "l am with you always, to the close of the age" (Matt. 28:20). Similarly, we misunderstand the Ascension if we imagine that Jesus is returning to heaven, as if he ever left heaven in the first place. As St. Augustine points out, Jesus "did not leave heaven when he came down to us; nor did he withdraw from us when he went up again into heaven." Instead, Christ's ascension is really his enthronement in heaven.
One of the final prophecies Jesus makes before his death is that "from now on the Son of Man shall be seated at the right hand of the power of God" (Luke 22:69). That prophecy remained unfulfilled on Easter morning, as we know from his words to Mary Magdalene: "I have not yet ascended to the Father, but go to my brethren and say to them, l am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God" (John 20:17). Instead, the prophecy is fulfilled in the Ascension, which is how St. Stephen, "full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God" (Acts 7:55), and why St. Paul says that this is now "where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God' (Col. 3:1). If Jesus, in his divinity, was in heaven the whole time, what is it that ascended? His humanity. And this is near the heart of why the Ascension matters. For many people, Christianity has become too disembodied—that we think of it as good news for our souls, but not for our bodies.
In America, a 2006 poll found that self-described Christians overwhelmingly rejected the idea of bodily resurrection after death: only 38 percent of Catholics answered "yes." The word resurrection, is treated by many as a mere synonym for 'life after death'. That's a problem, because Christianity makes little sense if the body doesn't have dignity, or isn't made to last forever. After all, why does the Church care about a "theology of the body," or about tending to the bodies of even the dead? Because Christianity is good news for the body as well as for the soul. The Catechism quotes Tertullian "We believe in God who is creator of the flesh; we believe in the Word made flesh in order to redeem the flesh; we believe in the resurrection of the flesh, the fulfillment of both the creation and the redemption of the flesh" (CCC 1015).
In Eden, there was an intimate union between God and earthly creation, symbolized by "the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day" (Gen. 3:8). This union between heaven and earth was ruptured in sin. And that rupture was healed first through the Incarnation (in which the heavenly God took body) and then the Cross (in which he offered his flesh), and then the Resurrection (rose again with a glorified body), and then the Ascension (in which he is physically to be enthroned at the right hand of the Father in Heaven). Prior to the Ascension, heaven was a purely spiritual realm. And so Ascension Thursday is only the beginning. It's why the angel's message on Ascension Thursday is forward-looking: "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven" (Acts 1:11). The union between heaven and earth has begun, and it is irrevocable. Our journey now is to prepare for that union to be completed within us.
In his letter to the Romans, St. Paul reminds his faithful brethren that: "The Word of God is near you and on your lips and in your heart. ... If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." St. Paul's direct communication to his fellow brethren reminds them of the importance of confessing their faith in Jesus as revealed through His Word. This important narrative is the foundation of our assent to proclaim belief in the Trinity with the words, "I believe" that initiate our Profession of Faith, the Nicene Creed recited every Lord's Day. This Tuesday, May 20, 2025, marked 1700 anniversary of the institution of the Nicene Creed at the Council of Nicaea, 325 A.D., the first ecumenical council of the Catholic Church.
The significance of the council should not be understated as merely addressing the Arianism-heresy where a priest named Arius taught that the Father and Son were not of one substance, thus denying the divinity of Christ. The singular nature of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit (Trinity) forms the basis of our Christian identity. This formula of faith is derived from the Word of God and thus is meant to echo the Word of God understood as the deposit of faith.
In the Creed, we announce our intention to follow Christ and proclaim our love for him in word and deed. The fact that we are children created in the image and likeness of God brings to reality the significance of the Nicene Creed every time we profess our faith at Mass, beginning with the words "I believe," as an important spiritual facet of our relationship with Christ. In describing the nature and purpose of a creed, St. Cyril of Jerusalem tells us: This synthesis of faith was not made to accord with human opinions, but rather what was of the greatest importance was gathered from all the Scriptures, to present the one teaching of the faith in its entirety. And just as the mustard seed contains a great number of branches in a tiny grain, so too this summary of faith encompassed in a few words the whole knowledge of the true religion contained in the Old and the New Testaments.
