Dear St. Pius X Parishioners:
Well, this is the weekend that I have been praying for over the past two months. The blessed opportunity to celebrate the Holy Mass with my new parish family. It has been an eventful few months, not only did I have some health issues with which to contend, but I had to say goodbye to the dear people of my previous assignment. This was only made easier by the anticipation of coming to the parish community of St. Pius X. I truly feel blessed and fortunate.

As we continue the summer, we have many things to feel blessed and fortunate about. I am not just thinking of the warm weather, which is so much better than the cold (in my opinion). Nor the stellar season the Detroit Tigers have given us so far this baseball season. Nor the anticipation of the promise of the new Detroit Lions season and the Detroit Red Wings, which are just around the corner. But the summer is always an opportunity to kick back and praise the Lord for all his many blessings.

The liturgical calendar is filled with some marvelous celebrations in the final weeks of July. The feast of St. Mary Magdelene is this coming Tuesday. She is often known by the epitaph “equal to the Apostles,” because she announced the resurrection to the Apostles. (John 20:11-18) This coming Friday is the Feast of St. James. This is rather special to me, because last fall I served as a spiritual director for a pilgrimage, which included visiting his shrine in Santiago de Compostella in Spain. I even walked part of the famous Camino. We have some wonderful memorials of Saints this coming month. We celebrate St. Sharbel (the Lebanese mystic), Sts. Ann and Joachim (parents of Holy Mary), and St. Ignatius of Loyola. Also, the church celebrates a fellow Michiganian Blessed Solanus Casey, the Capuchin Friar, who might soon be “raised to the glory of the altars”.

Let us go forth and praise the Lord together. In Jesus and Mary!!
Fr. Douglas