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11-27-22
Dear Friends at St. Louise,
After the biggest holiday for feasting, Thanksgiving, we begin the season of Advent. “Maranatha, come Lord Jesus” carries both joyful expectation, that Christmas is coming soon, and a reminder that we are still fighting, that the struggles of our lives are not easy. Life is both good and difficult.
It was a great joy to see a young teenage girl gleeful at winning the black-out at the Bingo party on November 5, and also hard to see another young girl sobbing in her mother’s arms because she lost. Even a Bingo party reveals the drama of life. The message of Advent is that The Kingdom of God is already here … but not yet.
I recently met with a couple who were worried and conflicted with their son. On a retreat last year they had heard a priest say, “If we stay close to Jesus, we know that the victory is already won – but the path to that victory is hard!” This couple shared with me how their young adult son has struggled with depression, even more so since the pandemic.
I know that this autumn there have been times that I felt anxious, with the awful smoke in the air. Some are saying it’s almost as if we have five seasons now, the smoky season being the fifth.
We can wonder, for these and many other reasons, where the world is going.
But we as followers of Jesus don’t run away from these struggles. Instead, we try to do what we can to make our lives and our world better, because they reflect the life and the world to come. And we know that this world will pass away – we await a new heaven and a new earth.
Our Advent prayer of Come, Lord Jesus not only asks Jesus to deliver us from our sorrows, but also to help us and show us how to live through them, with the strength and hope that comes from him alone.
Blessings to all of you in this Advent Season!
Fr. Gary Zender
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11-20-2022
Dear Friends at St. Louise,
“The loyal heart must praise the Lord.”
I find these words from Morning Prayer (and based on Psalm 33) to be a source of encouragement and challenge. Encouragement because when I read them, I am praying! They remind me that, in that moment, I am being loyal to my baptismal call to praise God each day. They are challenging because they also remind me that sometimes I am not as loyal as I wish I could be. I too often miss praying Midday Prayer, which I promised to pray on the day of my ordination, and I can find myself praying those prayers at night, instead of at the proper time of day. None of us lives perfectly the call to be loyal to the Lord – but that does not mean that we give up! With the encouragement that Jesus constantly gives us, we can take two steps forward after that one step back.
What does it mean to praise the Lord with a loyal heart? For Catholics, it means first of all to keep holy the sabbath by attending Sunday Mass, the source and summit of all Christian activity. Any community group could put together an event like the wonderful Bingo Night our parish and school held on November 5, where about 250 people enjoyed fellowship and BBQ and raised money for Advocacy and Caring for Children (ACC), to assist children in need. But we do it because we love Jesus – and the best way for us to be one with Jesus is when we eat his body and drink his blood in the Eucharist. The Eucharist is how we become both physically and spiritually one with him who is our salvation.
We can see that people are slowly coming back to Mass here, reestablishing regular attendance at our weekend liturgies after the isolation and danger of COVID these last two years. In fact, based on our annual October Mass count, we are averaging over 200 more people at our Masses each weekend than last year! Yet, we also know that we have not returned to pre-pandemic numbers. While attendance is not everything – engagement is also important – as your pastor I am acutely aware that I need to remind everyone in our community of the importance of living with “loyal hearts” that “must praise the Lord” – which means coming to Mass every week, unless you are unable due to sickness or some other serious reason. It’s at Mass that we truly become one with God’s love incarnate, our savior Jesus Christ – the very best thing that can happen to us, ever.
May the Lord continue to convert our hearts!
Fr. Gary Zender
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11-6-2022
Fr. Gary wanted to share an important article about food shortages and cholera in Haiti. Click here to read more. Click here to give to our sister parish in Haiti.
11-06-2022
Dear Friends at St. Louise,
Brothers and sisters: May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who has loved us and given us everlasting encouragement and good hope through his grace, encourage your hearts and strengthen them in every good deed and word. (2 Thess. 2:16)
When I read these words from the second reading from today’s Mass, I couldn’t help but think of the pilgrimage I was privileged to be on last month. I keep returning to the word “grace,” and how experiencing the wonderful sites in the Holy Land opened up my heart to God’s encouragement to do good in deeds and words. I still experience the grace of the pilgrimage that continues to flow into my heart and out of my heart. In other words, the trip was not just for me and the other pilgrims. It is for all of you as well!
That is the way God’s grace works: it flows freely over us and into our hearts, and then, when it is rightly received, it also flows from us. The current of God’s love is natural and not forced. The person who has truly received the grace of God loses nothing by sharing it. Quite the contrary, the grace only increases.
In this time of year when we take time to take stock of our blessings and the greatness of God’s love, I invite you consider what it means to share what you receive from God and how we lose nothing, and gain everything, when we make God the center of our lives.
The picture below is of me celebrating Mass at Shepherds’ Field. Such a simple place, where the poor and lowly shepherds were the first ones to hear the great news from the heavenly hosts – that a King had been born! Being there reminded me of Pope Francis’ invitation to “take on the smell of the sheep.” We all do that every time we share something of what God has given to us.
Blessings to all of you!
Fr. Gary Zender
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10-30-2022
Dear Friends at St. Louise,
I am writing this column the first full day after my return from the Holy Land Pilgrimage. There were many blessings in visiting the sacred sites where Jesus was born, lived, died, rose again and ascended to the right hand of the Father. One of the most impactful for me personally was the Garden of Gethsemane. Our guide, Johnny explained to us that “The Rock of Agony”, which is venerated as the place where Jesus sweated blood, is almost without a doubt truly the place where he asked his Father that this cup pass him by, but not his own will, but that his Father’s will be done. The rock is now located the base of the altar of the chapel at the Garden of Gethsemane and worn smooth by the many pilgrims who have touch the rock. As I bent down on my knees to do the same, I found that I was moved with profound emotion and gratitude for what Jesus did for me, for you and for the salvation of the entire world. Johnny said that the reasons we can make the claim the rock is authentic is because it is consistent with the description in the bible, the garden is small, and so it would be difficult to confuse it with somewhere else, and the same rock has been venerated by Christians since the earliest times of Christian tradition.
The Garden of Gethsemane is located in the Kidron Valley at the base of the Mount of Olives. The garden is filled with Olive trees, one of which was planted by Pope Paul VI when he visited there more than fifty years ago. That tree looks healthy and strong, and yet, is small compared to several other trees that been there for over 2000 years old and would have been “witnesses” of Jesus’ agony. The Olive tree is considered the tree of life, because it lives almost literally, forever. It needs very little water and can grow almost any kind of soil. In that sense, it takes very little and still gives life in abundance. The name Gethsemane comes for two Hebrew words, Geth shemen, which means “oil press.” The fruit of the olive tree is pressed to produce olive oil. Olive oil gave strength to athletes in competition, healing to those who were injured or sick, and health in nourishment. The Olive tree is a powerful symbol of the life that was “pressed” from Jesus as he gave himself on the tree of the cross. He gave life in abundance without expecting anything in return. His sacrificial love is unconditional. Our stewardship of time (prayer), talent (service) and treasure (financial contributions) is how we express our gratitude to all that God has done for us.
We who strive to follow Jesus with our whole heart seek to imitate him, to live lives of unconditional love. We seek to give as he gave, to love has he loved, with a sacrificial love that is unconditional. This is the spiritual and theological underpinning of sharing our time, talent and treasure. As we continue to focus on our making our annual commitment to sacrificial giving, we do so from much more than to do our part to make sure that we can pay the bills at our parish. We do so to “press out” the love that Jesus has so abundantly given to us. The more we are able to make our commitment in true gratitude to God, the more we will grow in the joy of giving and the more our parish will be able to live the mission of Jesus Christ in abundance.
In deep gratitude to Jesus and for you,
Fr. Gary Zender
Pastor.
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10-23-2022
Dear Friends at St. Louise,
Last month we blessed our school’s new Pre‑K classrooms, in space that served as the school library when the entire school was housed in the original school building, and more recently was the multi-purpose “St. Louise Room” used by both the parish and the school. While it was very exciting to bless these classrooms to meet the growing demand for Pre‑K spots (see the photo below), this is only a temporary solution to our space needs.
As I announced at the blessing – while pointing to the original school building, “As great as this day is, try to imagine the future. Imagine these failing buildings replaced by a beautiful new wing attached to the School and Faith Formation Center, a new Parish Hall, and a new entrance to our church. Imagine this being done by the time these students are eighth graders!” Actually, I hope that we will be completed by the time that they are in fourth or fifth grade. Now is the time to imagine and dream for our future.
You know how much your home is worth to you – not just its monetary value, but its importance in your very life. Public spaces like what we need for both the school and the parish come at a very high monetary cost, but they are worth it for what they mean to the community, and all the ways they serve us. With faith in the Lord, we can do great things, just as St. Louise did when the current School and Faith Formation Center was constructed in 2010. That building was paid for within seven years, a real accomplishment of faith, to the glory of God. It happened because this community, everyone who was part of the parish or school, came together with faith in the Lord.
There are many ways to give glory to God and to show our trust in Him. One way is to be good stewards of the gifts of time, talent and treasure that God generously gives us. The morning I was writing this column I happened to read this text, in 1 Timothy, 6:17-18, “Tell those who are rich in this world’s goods not to be proud, and not to rely on so uncertain a thing as wealth. Let them trust in the God who provides us richly with all things for our use.” So in obedience to God’s word, I am telling you, The amount of trust in we place in God is directly evidenced by our use of money!
To realize the dreams that we have for the future of our parish and school, we all need to truly come together in new ways – in faith, in hope, in love, in prayer, and in the scriptural meaning of being good stewards of the monetary gifts that God gives us. Remember our watchword is equal sacrifice, not equal gifts. If everyone takes this message to heart we can, with God’s help, do what otherwise seemed impossible. With God, all things are possible!
With faith, hope and love,
Fr. Gary Zender
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10-16-2022
Dear Friends of St. Louise,
As you read this, I will be in the Holy Land with 42 parishioners. More precisely, our group of pilgrims will be in Bethlehem and the Mount of Olives on Saturday, so we will experience the holy places of Jesus’ birth and his death. That alone is quite a summary of the Christian life.
Our life is a constant cycle of life and death and, with Jesus, rising to new life. For me personally, I recently lost my oldest uncle, Uncle John, at 95 years of age and a cousin, Laurie, on the very same day. Two weeks later I learned that my nephew, Drew, and his wife Johnna are expecting their first child in early April. Life, and death, and life.
We at St. Louise and, really, the whole Archdiocese of Seattle are committed to finding the path to new life in our local Church following the impact that COVID had on our lives. In many ways, patterns of decline were visible long before the pandemic. We have seen a drop in Mass attendance and participation in parish life for quite a number of years. Lower numbers at Mass has a ripple effect throughout our ministries – it means for instance, that it’s more difficult to keep the St. Vincent de Paul food bank stocked.
On the other hand, pre-COVID, I had numerous conversations about whether we were going to be able to maintain two classrooms for each grade in our school due to drops in enrollment. As it turned out, COVID served Catholic schools well across the Archdiocese. Our St. Louise School enrollment is up, with the exception of only a few grades; and as you know, we were able to add a second classroom for Pre-K for the first time in our school’s history. Could that be a sign of hope for renewal for the entire Church in Western Washington?
Both Pope Francis and Archbishop Etienne want us all to be attentive to how the Holy Spirit will use something like a world-wide pandemic to do something new. This time we live in is challenging, for everyone, but in a special way for people of faith. Our society as a whole is becoming more secular and less focused on God – we can see this throughout the United States in the dramatic drop in attendance of any faith community, both Christian and non-Christian, and the increase in those who say they do not believe in God. But the more that we can be attentive to the movement of the Holy Spirit, the more we will see this time as really a time to be renewed and ignited in our faith, to witness to God’s love in the world. We might have fewer in numbers, but could we in turn actually be stronger in our faith?
Archbishop Etienne wants every Catholic, every person of faith, to grow stronger in our experience of Jesus Christ. That is number one. Closely following that is the strategic plan called Partners in the Gospel, which will touch the life of every Catholic in the Archdiocese. It will be a five-year process of looking at our limited personnel resources, both priests and lay staff, and at our parish and school facilities. Many of these are structures that were built in the 1940s‑1960s, during a time of great growth and expansion; and now the maintenance of too many aging buildings is becoming a burden to living the mission of the Gospel. You will hear much more about this in 2023 as the plan is formalized. For now, I want every council and commission, all staff members, and all our parishioners to be aware that this is coming. I invite you all to read, either for the first time or again, Archbishop Etienne’s article from the April/May edition of Northwest Catholic (you can find it here on our parish website, stlouise.org/ptg).
This is a message of life, death, and resurrection. It is message of our faith. Faith. When we live intentionally, is not easy, but it is always about the hope that the Lord alone can give us!
You are daily in my prayers as we pilgrims walk the path of Jesus in the Holy Land.
Fr. Gary Zender
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10-09-2022
Dear Friends of St. Louise,
People of faith are, by definition, people who are on the search for truth, and most especially the truth that comes from God. As we search for the truth from God, who is Truth itself, we also are on the search for God’s mercy. We are all God’s children and we are all sinners – we all need God’s forgiveness.
In the month of October, we as a Church focus on the great truth that our God, who is Love, has created all humans, no matter who they are, in his own image and likeness. Every human life, at every stage, has equal dignity and value. Without mercy, this truth can become a message of harsh judgment against those who don’t see things as we do. Judgment is different from discernment. Discernment is something we human beings must do – it comes from the Holy Spirit, and is communicated to us through Church teaching. Judgment belongs to God alone; and, while we can be stewards of God’s judgment, seeking to model God’s truth for the world, we must do so with great humility, so that God’s truth – his judgment, his love and his mercy – are not misrepresented. If instead we are arrogant and judgmental to others, we may end up alienating people from the truth or even from God.
Ever since the Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade in June, we have heard a lot about the issue of abortion. Catholics, as much as anyone else, can have conflicting feelings about the decision and what we hear in the news about it. There have even been comments in the news on the Church’s position, that are not always accurate. Taking much of this discussion at face value, many people might wrongly conclude that the Catholic Church is only concerned about the pre-born child and not about the life or the needs of the woman. In truth, the Church is a constant advocate for all people, most especially for the vulnerable. We as Church strive to serve the needs of the woman and the child, both before and after birth. We realize that women who lack resources need support in order to bring children into the world. We are dedicated to providing those resources through programs like Prepares. The Church is there to provide emotional and spiritual healing, without judgment, for women who experience post-abortion trauma, through a ministry of Catholic Community Services called Project Rachel.
There are cases in which the health and even the life of a pregnant woman can be at risk. In the absence of better alternatives, life-threatening maternal health conditions may require interventions that lead to the death of an unborn child, even though that isn’t the intention of the treatment. A clear example are ectopic pregnancies, which result when an embryo implants outside the uterus, often in the fallopian tube. Sadly, such embryos cannot survive, and this condition can pose serious risks to the woman’s life and future fertility. While ectopic pregnancies sometimes resolve naturally, most often, medical interventions are necessary. This procedure should be considered as something different than an abortion. Abortion has the intention of ending a pregnancy, thereby taking the life of an embryo or a fetus. Medical intervention is morally acceptable when the intention is to remove an embryo or fetus that has already died or to otherwise safeguard the life and health of the woman, for example by removing the fallopian tube in which an ectopic pregnancy has implanted. This is what the Church means about truth and mercy, and making judgments not on our own, but with the guidance of the Holy Spirit and in light of the teaching of the Church.
Government laws about the meaning of respecting human life may flip-flop, but the teaching of the Church will remain consistent: that every human life is a gift from God and so deserves our respect and protection, especially the most vulnerable lives among us. Those vulnerable lives include the immigrant, the poor, and people at the end as well as at the beginning of life.
Fr. Gary Zender
Fr. Gary will be away, with 42 parishioners, on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land from October 10-21. The group will remember you at Mass each day!
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10-02-2022
Dear Friends of St. Louise,
Last week I wrote about an important international way that St. Louise parish reaches out to people in need, through Standing with Haiti. (Again, you can check it out on our parish website.) This week I would like to lift up another important ministry our parish supports, the New Bethlehem Projects. New Bethlehem is in Kirkland, and provides a day center and overnight shelter, plus other services, to homeless women and their children. If you use your favorite search engine, you can find more specifics.
The New Bethlehem Projects got its name from the place where Jesus was born, after St. Joseph and the Blessed Virgin Mary had searched desperately for a place to spend the night. This ministry began with the dream of parishioners at Holy Family Parish in Kirkland. They reached out to Catholic Housing Services (CHS) and to St. Louise. Salt Lutheran Church in Kirkland was able to provide space for a day center for homeless woman and children, and now there is 24/7 housing for them. The wrap-around services New Bethlehem supports help the families to get on their feet again and to move into permanent housing. As the effort has progressed, others in the Kirkland community have gotten on board. It is amazing what God will do when people come together. Rachel Nightingale, a St. Louise parishioner and the mom of a St. Louise student and a recent graduate, works for CHS, and has a special love for this project.
As we celebrate Respect for Life month in October, it only makes sense that we would come together to help moms in need, who only want what every parent wants for their children: nourishing food, a warm place to sleep, a safe place to play and do homework.
If you have a heart to help, even in a small way, don’t forget the Spaghetti Feed in the Parish Hall following the 5PM Mass on October 8. Our St. Louise parish and school staffs are putting it on! Proceeds will help support both Standing with Haiti and the New Bethlehem Projects. This is a great way to come together both as a school and a parish to have fun, get to know each other better, and raise money for two important ministries.
Have a blessed week!
Fr. Gary Zender