The bishop asked all the priests of the diocese to celebrate one of the votive Masses of the Holy Spirit this weekend. That, by itself, would be no big deal; in fact, given that this was my first weekend at the parish, I welcomed the idea. It certainly seemed like a good way to start.

But then we were told that we still had to use the readings for the 29th Sunday of Ordinary Time. Kind of a rough way to start, but I would have found a way to make it work, I think…

But then we were told to try to preach about the Synod that was recently opened in Rome. That’s just kind of a strange thing to have to preach about – I mean, the synod’s just starting, so there’s not much yet to say about it. I must admit, though, that the preparatory document did have some interesting things to say. It may garner it’s own post later on; we’ll see. I’m still settling in here, and there are a couple funerals coming in this week.

So, all that said, here’s this week’s Mass. Again, no idea on timestamps for the beginning and end of the homily, but you’ll find it.