Pastor’s Corner — September 14th, 2025
Preaching Series #2: Vision for Small Groups
Last weekend, I preached on why small groups are a game changer for having the humility, courage, and perseverance necessary to follow Jesus to heaven. This was part one of our preaching series on small group discipleship, which is a major part of my vision for the parish. This weekend we will continue our preaching and share our vision for small groups and how we are going about forming them at St Pat’s.
To this end, mark your calendars for Thursday, September 25th at 7pm in O’Kelly Hall, where we will host a special gathering for parishioners who want to be in a small group but aren’t already in one.
Parish Council Fall Kickoff Meeting
This past Tuesday, we had our fall Parish Council meeting, in which we welcomed our new parish council members Leti Rastigue, Derrick Frailing, and Nicole Micunek. (They join Jesse Godsey, Phil Baumforth, Lisa Spitler, Sally Belian, Joe Serwach, Noah Struppa and George Poretta on the council). We also thanked Sandy Doud and Jordan Knepper for their years of service to the parish. Their terms ended in May.
St Pat’s Parish Council is a consultative body of parishioners that provides critical input and feedback both on how we are fulfilling our mission and on other key projects and initiatives. In addition to attending quarterly council meetings, each council member seeks input from the parish on how we are fulfilling our mission and brings that feedback to everyone on the council. The parish council assists me in making good decisions for the parish. The council, in my mind, is one of the key ways that I get a pulse of how things are going in the parish and get input on what direction to take the parish.
I’m thankful that George Porretta agreed to become the next Chair of the Parish Council. Just a reminder that in the back of the bulletin each week, you can find the email address of the Chair of the Parish Council, in the event that parishioners want the Council to discuss something in particular. I’ll repost the email here: parishcouncil@stpatchurch.org.
“How God Can Bring Good out of Divorce” Talk Here at September 13th
The more I come to know about the love of God the more I am amazed by how gentle and good he is to us in our woundedness and pain. The gospel is healing. Our Father wants to meet us in our pain to love us, save us, and to heal us.
I’m very proud of the fact our parish offers so many opportunities for God to meet us and heal us in our pain: the number of confessions we offer, healing services, the Anointing of the Sick Mass, (one is coming up), our Sunday Healing Room (physical healing ministry), our inner healing and deliverance ministry, our widow group, our divorce ministry (Renew) and more. This Saturday I’m giving a talk at Renew on how God can bring good out of divorce. Many of you know that I’m a child of divorce, but maybe not everyone knows how God has brought good out of my parents’ divorce and how he can bring good out of anyone else’s. There is hope. If you’re divorced or know someone who is, please consider inviting them to come to this talk. This event will be held in Formation House A on Saturday, September 13th following the 5pm Mass.
Avoiding the Extremes in the Church: Progressivism and Radical Traditionalism
Over the years, I’ve written (and preached) that we need to avoid two extreme positions in the Church that depart from Catholic doctrine: progressivism and radical traditionalism (or Catholic fundamentalism). I wrote about this about a year ago: The Errors of Catholic Fundamentalism (AKA Radical Traditionalism). Even if these terms seem overly broad and imprecise, these terms more or less accurately describe positions of Catholics who, in the name of trying to hold onto some parts of doctrine or practice, ironically end up rejecting Catholic doctrine. Holding Catholic truths in tension is actually difficult and some people really struggle.
On the one hand, as Catholics we know there is legitimate theological diversity in the Church. There are different spiritualities and preferences in the Church and that’s a good thing. We have a long and big tradition as Catholics-there’s a lot there. As long as everything is in keeping with the authentic teaching authority of the Church (the magisterium), then we should not be so sure to condemn people who disagree with us.
On the other hand, it’s not helpful when otherwise devout Catholics unwittingly (or intentionally) sow confusion in the Church by emphasizing one part of a Church’s teaching that it obscures and distorts what the Church teaches on another aspect of the faith. On the one hand, Catholics who succumb to progressivism may legitimately emphasize the Church’s social teachings around serving the poor while falsely denying the Church’s teachings on sexual morality. A Catholic who succumbs to radical traditionalism may rightly emphasize one’s preference for the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM), while falsely teaching that the TLM is objectively superior to the Novus Ordo. Or worse he may reject the authority of the Second Vatican Council altogether.
With the fast-paced spread of the slick marketing, catchy graphics, and memes on the internet, bad ideas can spread fast. To be a Catholic and to stay faithful to authentic Catholic tradition, we’ve always had to discern well with the Church the counterfeit interpretations of the faith. At the root we Catholics are traditional, not progressive. But neither are we radical in our traditionalism either. We are traditional Catholics.
In this National Catholic Register article, “How Catholics Can Regain A Proper Sense of Tradition” Professor Larry Chapp outlines a proper understanding of what it means to be Catholic so as to avoid us falling prey to the temptations of Catholic progressivism and radical traditionalism.
Your servant in the Lord,
Fr. Mathias