CATHOLIC COMMUNITY
Holy Family Area
cover AUGUST 2022
ST. JAMES MUSIC MINISTRY
Some of Trudi’s favorite memories lie in the Christmas and Easter liturgies. Although typically some of the busiest times of the year, that is when the choir learns some of the most chal lenging music to perform. They put in countless hours prepar ing for these liturgies in the hope that the people in the pews are able to draw closer to God during such moments.
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Trudi joined the choir at St. James when she moved to the area, but singing has always been a big part of her life. “I started singing in my church choir when I was in seventh grade and never stopped,” she says. “I loved sing ing with other people for the special liturgies of Christmas and Holy Week every year, and it was a great community of fellow parishioners with a wide variety of ages that I got to know. It wasn’t until about 10 years ago that I started cantoring and eventually played organ, directed the choir, and now am on the Diocesan Worship Committee, where we meet quarterly and help plan diocesan events, but also study and discuss church documents on liturgy. When I moved a couple years ago and started at tending Mass at St. James, it was natural to start singing in the choir.”
The Power and Beauty of Song, Raising Hearts to God
“I believe that God gifts people with their unique talents and strengths for a reason,” Trudi says. “Everyone gets different gifts because He has a plan for how those can be used to further His kingdom here on earth. I have had times when I wanted to quit music ministry, because of the time and energy needed to do that week after week, but each time I’ve gotten close, I feel on back
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Each weekend, St. James is blessed with the talents of many individuals who aid in the celebration of the Mass. Our Music Ministry is a group that works hard week after week to help us all more deeply enter into the sacredness of the Mass. “Music has a way of touching hearts and raising them up to God through beauty,” says choir member Trudi Hen drickson. “The lyrics can express truths of God and His Church that sink deeply into the minds and hearts of the people singing them.”
St. James is blessed with talented singers who are musically trained and are able to lead our parish in song. For Trudi, singing the Psalm during the Liturgy of the Word feels like the most important part of leading singing during the Mass. The focus truly lies in the words and the music is simply complementary since the words of Scripture are so beautiful and perfect.
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The next time you are faced with a moral dilemma, take some quiet time to pray, consult the Catechism and competent people, go to Confession, and listen to the voice of your conscience. By making this a regular practice, you will find that the voice of your conscience will truly help you to do good and avoid evil, which is living according to God’s will.
A s Christians, it is important that we recognize the difference between right and wrong — both morally and ethically. Sometimes, though, this line can become blurred. Many situations we encounter in our lives include variables that can leave us internally conflicted and unsure of how to move forward in accordance with God’sSo,will.how do we work through these moral conundrums? One way is to develop a solid Christian conscience. A moral conscience exists in the heart of every individual. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church states, “Deep within his conscience man discovers a law which he has not laid upon himself, but which he must obey. Its voice, ever calling him to love and to do what is good and to avoid evil, sounds in his heart at the right moment... when he listens to his conscience, the prudent man can hear God speaking. Conscience is a judgment of reason whereby the human person recognizes the moral quali ty of a concrete act that he is going to perform, is in the process of performing, or has already completed” (1776, 1777,While1778).everyone is blessed with a conscience, each individual has a responsibility to develop this conscience from the time they are young. Parents obviously play an important role in developing their children’s consciences. As the primary educators of their children on ethical issues and the Catholic faith, parents have a responsibility to teach what Jesus teaches us through the Catholic Church, and to teach virtue to their children and help them to avoid fear, selfishness and pride. As we grow older, we take on the lifelong challenge of continually forming our own consciences, so that we have a “well-formed conscience that is upright and truthful” (CCC 1798) so that we can make a “right judgment in accordance with reason and the divine law, or, on the contrary, an erroneous judgment that departs from them.” (cf. CCC 1799) The way to ensure we are forming our conscience well is by conforming to the mind of Christ, which we come to know through the Scriptures and the Cate chism of the Catholic Church, which is Jesus’ mouthpiece (Mt.16:18-19). The better we form our conscience with the Scriptures and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, the less likely we are to make an erroneous judgment with our conscience. One valuable tool in forming a conscience is the practice of reflection. “It is important for every person to be sufficiently present to himself in order to hear and follow the voice of his conscience” (CCC 1779). In con temporary society, where there are so many distractions and routines, it is extremely important that we take the time to look inward and truly listen to what our inner voice is telling us. Also, since sin deadens the conscience, it is important to go to Confession on a regular basis (cf. CCC The1865).next time you are faced with a moral dilemma, take some quiet time to pray, consult the Catechism and competent people, go to Confession, and listen to the voice of your conscience. By making this a regular prac tice, you will find that the voice of your conscience will truly help you to do good and avoid evil, which is living according to God’s will.
ACCORDING TO GOD’S WILL Forming a Conscience
MUCH WILL BE REQUIRED OF THE PERSON ENTRUSTED WITH MUCH
Sincerely yours in Christ, Fr. Paul Timmerman, Pastor My Dear Friends in Christ, A Letter From Our Pastor
Amid all these magnificent stewardship mes sages, we celebrate the Assumption of our Bless ed Mother on Aug. 15 — “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant” (Luke 1:46-48). God bless you all!
3 3 N o matter your situation in life, chances are there is someone out there who has more than you. Too often we may hesitate to follow stew ardship as a way of life because we are waiting for someone more blessed than we are to show us the way. You may be aware that the Scrip ture readings we hear at each Mass are part of a three-year cycle. In gen eral, the Gospel passages in Cycle A are from Matthew: Cycle B is princi pally Mark; and Cycle C, the year we are now in, is primarily from Luke. John is mixed in and especially used during Lent. We are in what might be called a “Luke year.” As we hear the Gospels from Luke, we need to be acutely aware of the stewardship messages found there. In one recent Gospel passage from Luke, Jesus uses a parable to remind us of an im portant stewardship lesson. He precedes the para ble by reminding us all, “Take care to guard against all greed, for though one may be rich, one’s life does not consist of possessions” (Luke 12:15). You and I both know that God does not judge us based upon what we may have accumulated during our life times, but based upon how we lived those lives, and especially how we used those gifts — those posses sions.The parable focuses on a “rich man” who builds larger grain bins to store his abundant harvests. God calls the man a fool and reminds him that growing rich for himself is not as important as growing rich in the sight of God. The very next week (the 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time), Luke again tells us how Jesus warns and cautions His disciples — “For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be” (Luke 12:34). The Lord warns them that they do not know what day or what hour He will return and summarizes it all with another import ant insight into what is expected of us — “Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more” (Luke 12:48).You see, we are not “off the hook” if someone else has more gifts but fails to use them well. Stewardship demands that each of us use our gifts, and each of us is gifted whether we want to admit it or not, to serve God and others. Luke’s implied stew ardship messages come full circle in the Gospel reading on Aug. 21 — “For behold, some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last” (Luke 13:30). That admonition from the Lord has always seemed a bit confusing. It more or less says that to be first, we need to be last, and if we are first, we may be last. I think perhaps all of these messages, including the first and last one, are cautions to us that we cannot be complacent and we cannot take salvation and holi ness for granted. We need to work on them. We are not measured by our possessions; God indeed does expect a lot of us, no matter how small or extensive our gifts may be. Regardless of how holy we may strive to be, it is God who will judge; it is by His grace that we will be saved.
The occasion of being presented with this award is one that JoAnn Masters will never forget. E ach year, women of the Council of Catholic Women (CCW) in the Diocese of New Ulm nominate fellow council members whom they consider to be exception al for the award of Woman of the Year. This year, one of our very own parishioners, JoAnn Masters received this great recognition. JoAnn has been involved in CCW at the parish level, the deanery level, and the di ocesan level. She has promoted this group and shared the benefits of being involved with many people. Her dedication to the council was recognized as she gra ciously accepted this award. “I felt so humbled and honored when my friend, Patrice, said that she was going to nominate me for the Woman of the Year award,” JoAnn says. “For me, it was enough of an honor for her to want to do that! I never actually dreamed that I would be chosen!”
When the parish CCW group put out a call saying that they needed officers for the council, JoAnn an
COUNCIL OF CATHOLIC HONORS JOANN MASTERS Seeking the Kingdom of God Through
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“St. John Paul II’s teachings showed me that women have a very special role in the salvation and uplifting of the church,” she says. “After this, I turned to what I call ‘true feminism.’”
Being a part of CCW has truly formed JoAnn into the woman she is today. Every woman in the diocese is automatically a member of CCW. JoAnn was margin ally involved when she was younger, answering calls for help with specific projects and such. But as she got older, she went through what she calls her “feminist stage.” After reading St. John Paul II’s encyclical on the dignity of women, JoAnn found that his teaching on the “feminine genius” touched her heart.
The occasion of being presented with this award is one that JoAnn will never forget. “I was so surprised when they announced my name,” she says. “And as I walked up to the front, I was just shocked to see Patrice there with 16 of my family members. My granddaughter handed me a bouquet of flowers. I had no idea that they knew ahead of time and were secretly hiding at the church so they could be there with me. It was such a special experience!”
“I treasure CCW as it has offered me an excellent opportunity to walk with my sisters in Christ as we seek the Kingdom of God through prayer, service, and study,” she adds. “And I am very humbled and honored to be added to the list of amazing women who have won this award.”
The women are also at the “beck and call” of Fr. Paul. As a group, there is a little bit of everything for the women “Sometimesinvolved.weget requests to provide lunches for different events that are going on, such as Vacation Bible School or a blood drive,” JoAnn says.
CATHOLIC WOMEN AS WOMAN OF THE YEAR Through Prayer, Service and Study
If you would like to get more involved in the Council of Catholic Women, please contact Patrice Schulte at jet07@mvtvwireless.com or call 507-430-8303. swered the call and has been deeply involved in the group ever since.
The women support the area of study through the operation of St. Andrew’s Parish Library, which makes available a variety of books, CDs, and DVDs. “We have gifted the parishioners books, as well,” JoAnn says. “Our deanery also has a spring and fall gathering that has various speakers. We have truly had some wonderful speakers over the years.”
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“We were created for community,” she says. “So much of our vocation as women is isolated. We need to gather our community around us as we work, raise children, and support the church. And CCW is where I found my community — I found the companionship of these other women striving for holiness in their everyday lives.”
“Shush!”... don’t spoil the surprise! JoAnn Masters’ family is ready to celebrate before she is presented with the Woman of the Year award.
Finally, for the area of service, the CCW works to support the mission parish in Guatemala with their Mission of Love celebration. They also coordinate the Fall “WeFair. do not charge the women of the group dues,” JoAnn says. “So these fundraisers pay our dues as well as give us the funds to provide the church with different gifts. We had one of the chalices regilded and then bought pieces to match. We purchased a vo tive candle holder and a beautiful confessional divid er. The council also purchased the corpus for the new crucifix and one of the very talented gentlemen in the parish made the cross. It is such a joy for the group to be able to provide these items for our parish.”
The Council of Catholic Women has three specific areas of focus — prayer, study, and service. “We really work to keep the balance between these three areas,” JoAnn says. “We begin and end every meeting with prayer. We have Masses offered for the deceased of our parish, our council members, and for the active and retired priests. “Since we are a rural community, there wasn’t really anywhere locally that you could buy religious goods,” she adds. “So years ago, we started selling religious goods at cost. I don’t think anyone expected us to sell as much as we have!”
On Aug. 21, the Church commemorates the feast of a great saint — St. Pius X, the peasant boy who became the Vicar of Christ. St. Pius X is a wonderful saint for our times because he effectively and definitively worked for a balance between upholding the Tradition and Faith of the Church and adapting to the Modern Age.
Already in Europe, secular governments, social institutions, and the mass media were driving the faith out of public life and education, all the while upholding individ ual freedom — understood as unlimited license — as the ultimate good. Worst of all, these philosophies had made their way into the minds of many clergy and Catholic laity, who claimed that modern science had discredited many dogmas of the Church. They proposed a new Chris tianity based what they called the “religious experience,” a continually changing and evolving human experience that would in turn continually transform the meaning of Catholic teachings. The problem was that the new teach ings proposed by these modernists contradicted the very foundations of the faith established by Jesus Christ.
POPE ST. PIUS X: A Modern Traditionalist
Fortunately, the Holy Father saw through the mod ern theories immediately and exposed the false doc trines, all the while acting with extreme discretion and pastoral charity. Pope Pius X reminded us that God, the Author of both faith and reason, and in Whom there is no contradiction, cannot allow science and true religion to contradict. Moreover, he declared that all the essential teachings of the Catholic faith and of Scripture could be defended rationally, and he encouraged the faithful to study the faith and read the Scriptures daily. While Pius X spent much of his pontificate defending Catholic dogma from the threat of Modernism, he rec ognized the need for legitimate modern reforms within the Church. For instance, he initiated the codification of Canon Law, because the laws of the Church had little or ganization up to that time. He reformed the administra tive offices of the Church. He also reformed the Liturgical Calendar, giving precedence back to the Sunday liturgies, which were too often being trumped by celebration of the daily saint’s feast. Pius X initiated a renewal in liturgical music, as well, bringing back Gregorian chant and sacred polyphony to their primary place within the liturgy.Two of this saint’s most noted acts are reassigning the time of First Communion of children to the age of reason (about 7 years), and advising and promoting daily Communion, saying, “Holy Communion is the shortest and safest way to heaven.”
St. Pius X — Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto — was born in 1835, one of eight children in an impoverished peasant family. He pursued God’s call on him to the priesthood from an early age. Even as a young priest, he possessed great personal and pastoral skills. In addition to his deep holiness and virtue, St. Pius had a passion for defending and preserving the truth of the faith, which he carried with him into his pontificate. As pope, he gave as his motto: “Instaurare Omnia in Christo” — “to restore all things in Christ” — a mission proclaimed not a moment too soon.
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In addition to serving as a catechist, Ben gives of his time as a lector and Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion, and he is a member of the Knights of Columbus.
W e know that parents are the first teachers when it comes to educating our children about their Catholic faith. However, forming our parish youth in the faith is not just a job for parents. There are dedicated people at our parishes who take on the role of catechists to assist parents in passing on the faith. We are so blessed to have these volunteer catechists at our parishes. Ben Pieh has been teaching Faith Formation for more than 10 years. He first began serving as a cat echist when someone asked him and his wife, Katie, to take over a class. Currently, Ben is teaching fifthgrade and sixth-grade formation classes, but he has taught several grades over the years. “I really enjoy spending time with the youth,” Ben says. “Since I’m not a teacher, I don’t have any other opportunities to be with young people besides my children.”Although the primary goal of Faith Formation is to help youth learn more about the Catholic faith, Ben says one of his favorite parts is getting to know the students in his class. The curriculum is prepared for catechists, and only a small amount of time is required to prepare for the weekly class, which is held on Wednesday nights. There is also lots of support from Ann Voller, Area Coordinator of Faith Formation and Youth Min istry. The program year starts in late September and runs through late April. Ben typically has had eight to 10 students per class. “To teach, you have to know,” he says. “Teaching Faith Formation has helped me to better understand churchBenteaching.”saysthestudents always ask why the Church does things a certain way. If he doesn’t know, he finds the answer. In turn, this has helped him to learn more about the Catholic faith too. Ben was raised Catholic, and he believes most practicing Catholics with a general understanding of the faith could teach Faith“ForFormation.thosewho have a desire to teach but don’t feel qualified, I would say that my lesson isn’t always perfect, but the hour and a half that I teach is a very fulfilling time in my week,” Ben says. Ben is also inspired by his students’ desire to learn more about their faith. “They know more is out there than what they might see at school or from their friends,” Ben says. “They want to know more about God. It’s important for them to be there and be away from the outside world for a little bit.”
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MEET ST. JOSEPH FAITH FORMATION CATECHIST BEN PIEH
Ben Pieh with his wife, Katie, and their children If you would like to learn more about our Faith Formation programs, or if you would like to serve as a catechist, please contact Ann Voller at 320-226-5205 or areaffcoordinator@holyfamilyarea.org.
Teaching Students about Our Faith is a True Reward
8 512 Black Oak Ave. Montevideo, MN www.holyfamilyarea.org56265
ST. JAMES MUSIC MINISTRY
continued from front cover St. James, St. Andrew, and especially St. Joseph invite anyone interested in participating in the Music Ministry to reach out to discuss your talents and how they can be used at the parish — for St. James, please contact Heidi Felton at 320-241-1840; for St. Andrew, please contact Beth Pullan at 320-226-6516; for St. Joseph, please contact Pamela Jacobson at 507-828-1365.
CONFESSION TIMES: 30 minutes before daily Mass Sunday 8 a.m. — St. James, Dawson Saturday 9:30 - 10 a.m. — St. Joseph, Montevideo 5:45 - 6:20 p.m. — St. Joseph, Montevideo
AUGUST 2022
the nudge from God whispering, ‘the Master has need of it’ (Luke 19:31). “I still get nervous singing, even within a choir setting, but I keep going because I know that’s what God wants me to do,” she adds. “And there are blessings that come from rising up and using my gifts even when it’s Parishionerschallenging.”atSt.James, St. Andrew and St. Joseph are all invited to discern their talents and reach out to the Music Ministry in their respec tive parish if they feel called to share their talents and gifts. Participating in the choir is a tremendous gift to the parish. “I think everyone should ask themselves what talents God has given them, whether through natural talent or opportunities given to learn, and how those gifts can be offered back to God,” Trudi says. “Singing in a choir, or finding a way to use a particular musical talent — if appropriate for church use — is usually a matter of talking to people and showing your interest in getting involved.”
MASS TIMES: Sunday 8:30 a.m. — St. James, Dawson 10:30 a.m. — St. Andrew, Granite Falls Tuesday 5 p.m. - St. Andrew, Granite Falls Wednesday 5 p.m. — St. James, Dawson Thursday 5:30 p.m. — St. Joseph, Montevideo Friday 10 a.m. — St. Andrew, Granite Falls Saturday 6:30 p.m. — St. Joseph, Montevideo with elements of Spanish