Pastor’s Corner — March 15th, 2026
Solemnity of St Patrick: Masses, Celebration, and No Penance
This Tuesday, March 17th is our Patronal Feast Day! This means it’s not just a regular feast, but a Solemnity which is the Church’s highest rank of celebration. Here are a few important notes for the day:
• Mass Times for the Solemnity of St Patrick: Tuesday at 8:30am and 5pm.
• While this Mass is not a holy day of obligation, there is a special indulgence offered for those who visit a Church and pray on its patronal feast day. More specifically, a plenary indulgence is granted to the faithful who visit and devoutly recite an Our Father and the Creed at the parish Church, on the solemnity of its Titular (patron feast). Remember to receive this indulgence, one must 1) do the indulgenced act, 2) go to Confession twenty days or so before or after the act, 3) receive Holy Communion, 4) be detached from venial sin and 5) pray for the Holy Father, usually just one Our Father and one Hail Mary.
• Because it’s the highest level of Christian celebration it is not really appropriate for St Pat’s parishioners to be doing much penance on this day. In fact, for parishioners, I encourage you to relax one or more penances on this day in a spirit of celebration of St Patrick the saint. Of course, this is not an invitation to merely reduce St Patrick’s Day to the stereotypical worldly celebrations of beer and Irish food. But it does entail being sincerely grateful to God for the life of St Patrick, his intercession, and the model he is for us.
• Unfortunately, registration for our St Patrick Celebration at 6pm has been completely full for a couple of weeks now.
• I encourage everyone to pray the full version of the Lorica of St Patrick’s.
• Finally, watching this funny video has become a kind of annual tradition on St Patrick’s Day for some :)
Did you Give to DSA Yet? Thanks!....and a Little Reminder
Thank you to all those parishioners who already have given to the Diocesan Services Appeal (DSA)! (If you weren’t here last week, the DSA supports many vital ministries across our Diocese, including, but not limited to, support for the education of our seminarians and caring for the poor). Our goal is simple: we want as many parishioners as possible, those confirmation age and older, to give to the campaign, even if it is as little as $1.00.
If you want to give online, please see the DSA Website to donate. If not please bring back your pledge envelope in the next couple of weeks. Thanks again for your generosity in advancing the gospel in our diocese!
Bring Your Phones to Mass: DMI Survey This Weekend (March 14-15)
Every few years the Diocese works with the Catholic Leadership Institute to conduct the DiscipleMaker Index survey at every parish. This Lent, we’re doing this survey again. The purpose of the anonymous survey is to get an honest snapshot into where people are in their beliefs and habits around discipleship so that parishes can better serve you better in following the Lord. Since we did our survey during Mass the first two times we’ve taken it, I’m asking everyone to bring their smartphones into Mass this weekend. We will do the survey during the homily time. If you do not have a phone or forget, we will have a few paper copies of the survey available.
Encounter Conference in Austria
This weekend I’ll be away at an Encounter Conference in Austria, and I’ll be back on Monday. Please pray for me and the team. Encounter is now in eight languages, and this is our first major conference for the German speaking world.
Your servant in the Lord,
Fr. Mathias