Browsing Father Stephen's Columns
St. Stephen, Witness of Love (12/15/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 12/04/24
St. Stephen, Witness of Love While St. Stephen’s ministry of worship and works offended no one, his ministry of proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ ran into trouble early on. Like his Master and Lord Jesus Christ, Stephen took to speaking in the city of Jerusalem about the ... Read More »
St. Stephen, Steward of Divine Worship (12/8/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 12/04/24
St. Stephen, Steward of Divine Worship Of the three responsibilities that St. Stephen the deacon undertook (ministry of works, word, and worship), the latter is the least visible in the Scriptures. There is no mention of St. Stephen assisting in the early Church’s Eucharistic worship alongside the apostles. ... Read More »
St. Stephen, Proclaimer of the Word (12/1/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 11/29/24
St. Stephen, Proclaimer of the Word As I noted in last week’s column, St. Stephen was ordained as a deacon along with six others to provide for the widows of the early Church. His only prerequisite for ordination was fullness of the Holy Spirit and wisdom in order ... Read More »
St. Stephen, Minister of Good Works (11/24/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 11/19/24
St. Stephen, Minister of Good Works This is the second in a five-part series on the ministry of St. Stephen, our parish patron. Our parish patron St. Stephen is uniquely situated within salvation history as the first generation of disciples who were not apostles but chosen to ... Read More »
Heavenly Patronage (11/17/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 11/13/24
Heavenly Patronage This is the first in a five-part series on the ministry of St. Stephen, our parish patron. God’s providence guides all the events of human history, and so we can be certain that nothing occurs without his permission or desire (even the most seemingly random ... Read More »
Five Precepts #5 (11/10/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 11/07/24
Using God's Gifts Wisely One of the Lord Jesus’ most well-known parables is the Parable of the Talents (Mt. 25:14-30, Lk. 19:12-27), in which three servants are entrusted with various financial sums and asked to steward these resources wisely so they increase. We all know how the ... Read More »
Five Precepts #4 (11/3/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 10/29/24
Fasting and Abstinence Fasting is the worst! No matter how much I learn of its physical and spiritual benefits, I have had a bear of a time getting myself to enjoy the process of fasting and abstinence. Now that you’re sufficiently scandalized by my laxness, let me explain what ... Read More »
Five Precepts #3 (10/27/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 10/29/24
Communion with God This next precept will strike modern Catholics as the strangest of the bunch. The Church requires that all Catholics receive Holy Communion at least once during the year sometime during the Lenten or Easter seasons. To those of us accustomed to receiving Communion far more frequently, ... Read More »
Five Precepts #2 (10/20/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 10/29/24
The Grace of Forgiveness No one enjoys admitting they’ve messed up. It’s a feature, not a bug, of humanity to run away from coming clean. Remember what Adam and Eve did after they had eaten the forbidden fruit? “the man and his wife hid themselves from the Lord God ... Read More »
Five Precepts #1 (10/13/24)
Posted by Gail Schlicht on 10/29/24
The Gift of Sunday In 2021, Archbishop Jerome Listecki published a document entitled ‘The Gift of Sunday’ (https://shorturl.at/c0xY0). It explored the various reasons why Sunday is a gift from God to humanity and how we in turn are called to give it back to God. This reflection was all ... Read More »