Easter Sunday of the Resurrection of the Lord 4/9/2023

Mission Statement

The Roman Catholic Parish of St. Monica-St. Elizabeth of Hungary-St. Stephen of Hungary opens its doors to welcome and embrace all in our community. We strive through worship, hospitality and service to receive those seeking a spiritual home. In the midst of diversity of thought, life style, nationality, economic status & age, we endeavor to live as a community of faith and invite you to join our familya family seeking to know and love Jesus Christ.

Parish Staff

Pastor: Rev. Donald C. Baker ............................ frdcab@stelmo79.org

Rev. Msgr. Leslie J. Ivers ............................... msgrlivers@stelmo79.org

Weekend Associate: .................................... Rev. Anthony Ciorra, IVD

Weekend Associate:...............................................Rev. Edward Beck, CP

Pastoral Associate: Ms. Maryann Tyrer ........ mtyrer@stelmo79.org

Music Director: Mr. John Zupan .................... jzupan@stelmo79.org

Wedding Coordinator: Ms. Debbi Burdett.....dbweddingsnyc@gmail.com

Parish Manager: Jennifer DeSpirito.............................jdespirito@stelmo79.org

Plant Manager: Guillermo Vanegas .......... gvanegas@stelmo79.org

Sacristan: Pedro Pizarro ...................................ppizarro@stelmo79.org

Administrative Assistant: Gladys Tejada ..... gtejada@stelmo79.org

Church Address : 413 East 79th Street, NYC 10075

Parish Center: 406 East 80th Street, NY, NY 10075

Tel: 212-288-6250 Fax: 212- 570-1562

Email: info@stelmo79.org

Our Offices are open:

Monday & Wednesday 9am - 4pm

Tuesday - Thursday ....................................... 9am - 7pm

Friday ....................................................... Closed

Saturday ................................................. 10am - 2pm

Sunday ..................................................... Closed

Closed for Lunch Weekdays..................1pm - 2pm

Mass Intentions

Saturday, April 8th Easter Vigil 8th Easter

7:30pm All Parishioners All Parishioners

Sunday, April 9th 9th

Easter Sunday of the Easter of the Resur r ection of the Lord Resurrection

8:00am Anna Ensign 8:00am Anna

10:00am Josef Tomahatsch 10:00am Tomahatsch

12:00pm All Parishioners All Parishioners

Monday, April 10th 10th

Monday within the Octave of Easter within the Octave of Easter 9am Dr. Vanes Bellevue

Tuesday, April 11th 11th

Tuesday within the Octave of Easter within the Octave of Easter

12pm Walter & Mar y Ferber Walter & Mary Ferber

Wednesday, April 12th 12th

Wednesday within the Octave of Easter within the Octave of Easter

12pm Rober t McCauvic 12pm Robert McCauvic

T hur sday, April 13th Thursday, 13th

T hur sday within the Octave of Easter Thursday within the Octave of Easter

12pm Andrew Lawler 12pm Andrew Lawler

Friday, April 14th Friday, 14th

Friday within the Octave of Easter within the Octave of Easter

12pm Ber nadette Farley Bernadette

Visit us at: www.STELMO79.org

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Mass Schedule

Daily Mass: Mon-Sat, 12 noon Saturday Vigil: 5:30pm

Sunday: 8am, 10am, 12pm & 5pm

Confessions: Saturdays at 5pm or by appointment

Saturday, April 15th Saturday, 15th

Saturday within the Octave of Easter within the Octave of Easter

12pm K athleen Reddington Kathleen

Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament

Every Friday after the Noon Mass until 3pm in the church and live on-line

Devotions

Miraculous Medal on Mondays after Mass in the church and live on-line

Divine Mercy

Prayed every Friday at 3pm in the church and live on-line

Vespers (Evening Prayer)

Every Friday at 5:10pm in the Chapel and live on-line

Sacrament of Reconciliation

Saturdays at 5pm or by appointment

Anointing of the sick

Every third Saturday of the Month after the noon Mass.

Baptisms & Marriages

Please call the rectory office for more information.

Communion for the Homebound:

If you know of anyone who cannot attend church because of illness or age, and would like to have communion brought to them, please contact the Parish office, so that we can arrange for a Eucharistic Minister to bring communion to them.

PRAYERS FOR THE SICK

Alex Greco, Janet Gholfi, Barabara Tummolo, Uriel Cuartas, Teody Zanarias, Susan Bacerra, Michael Reilly, Dorothy Condon, Marcelle Ferrier, Joanna Jack, Cindy Garnica Castro and all those ill with or recovering from the COVID-19 virus and all Victims of Military Activities

PRAYERS FOR THE DECEASED

Susan Lasmier, Chrissy MacDonalds, Luz Soto, Fr. Thomas Fenlon & Godfrey Fantastico

Weekly Readings & Observances

Readings for the week of April 9, 2023

Sunday: Acts 10:34a, 37-43/Ps 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23 (24)/Col 3:1-4 or 1 Cor 5:6b-8/ Jn 20:1-9 or Mt 28:1-10

Monday: Acts 2:14, 22-33/Ps 16:1-2a and 5, 7-8, 9-10, 11/Mt 28:8-15

Tuesday: Acts 2:36-41/Ps 33:4-5, 18-19, 20 and 22/Jn 20:11-18

Wednesday: Acts 3:1-10/Ps 105:1-2, 3-4, 6-7, 8-9/ Lk 24:13-35

Thursday: Acts 3:11-26/Ps 8:2ab and 5, 6-7, 8-9/ Lk 24:35-48

Friday: Acts 4:1-12/Ps 118:1-2 and 4, 22-24, 25-27a/Jn 21:1-14

Saturday: Acts 4:13-21/Ps 118:1 and 14-15ab, 16-18, 19-21/Mk 16:9-15

Next Sunday:Acts 2:42-47/Ps 118:2-4, 13-15, 22-24 (1)/1 Pt 1:3-9/Jn 20:19-31

Observances for the week of April 9, 2023

Sunday: Easter Sunday

Monday:

Tuesday: Wednesday: Thursday: Friday: Saturday: Tax Day

Next Sunday: 2nd Sunday of Easter (Divine Mercy)

©LPi

The St. Stephen of Hungary School community wishes your family a Blessed Easter.

The Cup We Drink

When you grow up in an Italian family as I did, special meals always included wine. Wine meant celebration and gathering in friendship and intimacy. Since drinking wine was often associated with holydays such as Christmas and Easter, wine also symbolized a connection to God.

Numerous stories about vines and the wine made from them are in the Scriptures. The vineyard is a symbol of Israel, God’s Chosen People. In the New Testament, Jesus reveals himself as the true vine and his people as the branches, urging followers to remain in him and bear fruit.

One of the ways to remain in Jesus is to drink from the cup at Mass. At the Last Supper, Jesus took a cup, gave thanks, and offering it to the disciples, said, “Drink from it, all of you.” The offering of the Blood of Christ to communicants was continued for more than a millennium. But the Middle Ages witnessed a decline in the use of the cup. Controversies arose over whether the laity or only the priest should drink from the cup. In the sixteenth century, the Council of Trent affirmed that the cup was to be reserved for the clergy. However, the Second Vatican Council document the Constitution

on the Sacred Liturgy, 55, states that Communion under both kinds may be granted to the laity at the discretion of the bishop. Not long after the Council, the instruction Eucharisticum mysterium explained: Holy Communion, considered as a sign, has a more complete form when it is received under both kinds. For under this form the sign of the Eucharistic banquet appears more perfectly. Moreover, it shows more clearly how the new and eternal Covenant is ratified in the Blood of the Lord, as it also expresses the relation of the Eucharistic banquet to the eschatological banquet in the Kingdom of the Father. (cf. Matt. 26:27–29). (32)

Some people choose only to receive the Body of Christ, and in the reception of one species, Christ is received “whole and entire” (General Instruction of the Roman Missal, 281). Drinking from the cup, though, offers “a more complete form” when received under both kinds. May our reception of the Eucharist propel us to bring Christ to others.

Photo © John Zich. Permission to publish granted by the Archdiocese of Chicago on October 25, 2018.

Drinking from the cup offers a “more complete form” when receiving the Eucharist under both kinds.

Five Minute Jesus

Using the Gospel for Prayer – Second Sunday of Easter April 16, 2023

It’s simple. 1. Read the Gospel for the following Sunday slowly, reflecting on the story it tells. 2. Reflect on the questions assigned for each day. 3. Make some resolution about how what you read can be lived that day. 4. Then thank God for speaking to you through this reflection.

Gospel John 20:19-31

On the evening of that first day of the week, when the doors were locked, where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Wh ose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.” Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So, the other disciples said to him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.” Now a week later his disciples were again inside, and Thomas was with them. Jesus came, although the doors were locked, and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe.” Thomas answered and said to him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those wh o have not seen and have believed.” Now, Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book. But these are written that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that through this belief you may have life in his name.

Monday April 10th

Was there something in this reading that spoke to me? Comforted me? Challenged me? What was it? Why did it have this effect on me?

Tuesday April 11th

The disciples were in hiding, for fear of “the Jews”. Language like this is everywhere in the Gospel of John. What were they afraid of? It wasn’t that they were Jewish: so were Jesus’ disciples. In this we see reflected the experience of the first generations of Christians, who were still a part of Judaism. They were rejected and persecuted for their belief in Jesus as God’s chosen one. Have I ever been persecuted for being a person of faith? If so, how did I react? If not, why haven’t I been?

Wednesday April 12th

Clearly something has changed. Now not even locked doors can stop the risen Jesus. This is the Gospel writer’s way of saying something about the resurrection: that the resurrected body is different. It is not like our current body. This was important for the first Christians, because they understood Jesus’ resurrection as the promise that one day we will be resurrected. How important is that belief to us as Christians? Why is belief in the resurrection important to me?

Thursday April 13th

In John’s Gospel, “Pentecost”; i.e., the coming of Spirit, happens on Easter Sunday. The coming of the Spirit is linked with forgiveness. For John the spirit gives the community the power to forgive sins! In this John says something about the Christian community being the presence of God in the lives of its members. How important is the parish community for my faith life? Do I think it is unimportant to be part of a community? If so, why? If not, then why not?

Friday April 14th

In this Gospel Thomas makes his famous appearance. He is popularly called “doubting” Thomas, but here in the Gospel he is given another moniker: “Didymus” which means “twin”. Yet there is no indication who the other “twin” was. That has led to two 2,000 years of speculation. Is it you? Is it me? If so, how do we look like Thomas?

Saturday April 15th

The end of this Gospel reads like the end of the book. And here, John seems to be revealing his understanding of the purpose of the Gospel; it is written so that we might come to believe that Jesus is the Christ (that is the Messiah, God’s chosen one) and so that through this belief we might have life “in his name”. Every religion is about “having life” – but in this case it is life through faith in who Jesus is. Does this speak to my faith? Who do I believe Jesus is? What effect does this have on my life?

Dear Friends of St. Monica-St. Elizabeth of Hungary-St. Stephen of Hungary

This past December we had days which seemed more like May than Christmas. It was a year when old terms like “global warming” and “climate change were joined by new ones like “atmospheric river” and “Bomb Cyclone” and became household words. We sailed through a winter with (almost) no snow; meanwhile out west, California’s years-long drought was ended in a deluge of rain and snow that brought death and destruction and is still not ended.

Of course, the growing unpredictability of the weather has really been with us all year; in many ways the whole world has become a cold, dark, unpredictable place with the growing fear of totalitarianism, and the growing cost, both human and economic, of the war in the Ukraine. Scandal, both political and personal seems to have invaded every corner of public life: our politics, our media, and of course, our Church. The Pandemic, though abated, still infects our finances, the economy, and relationships both personal and international.

Because of the way we calculate the date of Easter, its celebration oscillates between March and April, but always remains solidly in the spring. However, although we associate Easter with spring weather and flowers, it began with frightened disciples, death, and a cold dark tomb. Even though Jesus is said to have predicted his resurrection, clearly his disciples didn’t expect it. And yet despite the winter the disciples experienced in the suffering and death of their friend, the resurrection of Jesus was for those first disciples the promise that no winter lasts forever; that sooner or later the spring always comes.

It is the mission of the Church to be that reminder of God’s spring amid the world’s winter. We do it through worship and song, through prayer and preaching and through service in the larger community. Despite the pandemic, the uncertain stock market and all the scandals and divisions that still plague our Church, our parish and our school continue to welcome all people, young and old, faithful members as well as those who have not been here in years, no matter who they are, what language they speak, or lifestyle they lead. Why? Because it is here that we meet Jesus, whose resurrection is God’s promise of spring during this world’s winter.

Happy Easter! Christ is risen! Thank you for being part of our community today and whether you are a regular or just visiting, because of you, no matter what time of year it is, every Sunday is Easter here.

Father Baker