In Sunday’s Gospel the disciples experience a miraculous catch of fish
and then share a meal with the risen Lord. When Jesus asked them to bring some of the fish they have just caught, Simon Peter went out and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred fifty-three of them. I always wondered how Simon Peter counted the fish and why their number was precisely 153. St. Jerome in his commentaries on Scripture gives us an interesting explanation of this number. He states that ancient zoologists calculated the species of fish at exactly 153. The meaning, then, would refer to all the kinds of men and women for whom the disciples will cast the net. The net symbolizes the Church created of the disciples and fishing refers to their apostolic mission. We can agree or disagree with St. Jerome’s interpretation; however, it reminds us of a true nature of the Christ’s Church and its mission: everyone is invited to be its member and the apostolic mission embraces all people. That truth brings to mind that I can and I should find my own place in the Church. It is the will of God that I can have a share in all the fruits that the risen Lord brings to people: love, hope, peace, victory over the evil, forgiveness of sins, and compassion. All of them are at hand exactly in the Church.
A few days ago, we began the month of May. This month is called a Marian
month because of our special devotion at that time to Our Lady. Mary, the
Blessed Virgin, perfectly fulfilled the will of the Father and she became a model for us in how we should respond to God’s call. Next Sunday the members of the Catholic Women League of our parish will crown the statue of the Blessed Virgin in our church.
The Holy Father asks the faithful throughout the world to pray during the
month of May for the following intention: “That the Church in Africa, through the commitment of its members, may be the seed of unity among her peoples and a sign of hope for this continent”.
This Sunday during the 2 o’clock Mass the students of St. Lawrence School will receive Holy Communion for the very first time. Let us pray for them and their families!
This Monday, May 6th , we observe a memorial of Saint François de Laval, Bishop, who is a Patron of the Bishops of Canada. He was born in 1623 in France and became the first Roman Catholic Bishop of Quebec. He was beatified by Pope St. John Paul II in 1980 and made saint by Pope Francis in 2014 by equipollent canonization. The pope may permit the veneration as a saint without executing the ordinary judicial process of canonization described by ecclesiastical law the cult of one long venerated as such locally. This act of a pope is denominated either “equipollent” or “equivalent canonization” or “confirmation of cultus”. According to the rules instituted by Pope Benedict XIV, there are three conditions for an equipollent canonization: (1) existence of an ancient cultus of the person, (2) a general and constant attestation to the virtues or martyrdom of the person by credible historians, and (3) uninterrupted fame of the person as a worker of miracles. Let us keep our bishops in our prayers!
God bless,
Fr. Peter