Holy Hours & Stations of the CrossIt was the custom in our parish to have a 24 hour prayer vigil during Lent. Due to ongoing COVID restrictions, a 24 hour event is not feasible but instead a number of Holy Hours are being scheduled in our parish during the first two weeks of Lent. These Holy Hours will offer times for both silent prayer and communal devotional prayers such as the Holy Rosary, the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, various Litanies and other devotional prayers both familiar and unknown.
Stations of the Cross take place every Friday during Lent at 9:00am and 7:00pm. Sign up to attend is not required. Participants for Stations of the Cross are to remain in their pews for the duration of the celebration. For an important letter from our Finance Committee concerning our 2020 Financial Results and 2021 Parish Budget, please click here
You will be required to wear a mask upon entering the Shrine Church and wear it at all times. The only time during Mass the mask is temporarily removed is when consuming Holy Communion to the side of the Communion line.
To financially support our parish, please visit the DONATE section of the parish website, mail donations to: Our Lady of the Rockies, 2 Silvertip Trail, Canmore, AB, T1W-2Z7, or bring them to the parish office during regular office hours. Click here for the current parish financials. Please scroll down this home page for spiritual reflections and homilies by Fr. Nathan. PRIVATE PRAYER AND DEVOTIONS The Shrine Church is open for private prayer and devotion Click here for Drop In times. Due to Masses, Weddings and other Sacramental celebrations on the weekends, there are no scheduled times for private prayer and devotion, though if the church doors are open and no celebrations are taking place, you are welcome to visit the church. Out of courtesy to others, please observe reverent silence during these scheduled times of private prayer and devotion. |
ADORATION OF THE BLESSED SACRAMENT
Adoration will take place on Tuesday evenings from 7:00 pm - 8:00 pm with the Holy Rosary and time for silent contemplation. SACRAMENT OF RECONCILIATION Tuesday: 7:00pm-7:45pm Wednesday: 11:00-11:45am Thursday: 11:00am-11:45am Saturday 3:30pm-4:15pm Sunday 3:30-4:15pm Anyone requesting the celebration of the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick and the Last Rites for the dying can contact Fr Nathan via the emergency parish line at 403-675-5044. |
Spiritual Reflections from a Priest in the Rockies
To watch Live-streamed Sunday and Weekday Masses from various parishes and at different times in the Diocese of Calgary, please click here
Homily Notes for the 1st Week of Lent, Year B (2021): Mk 1:12-15
May this Lent be an opportunity for us to continually open our hearts and minds to the musings of that same Creator Spirit to reveal to us if there are any ways the Evil One has subtlety begun to lead us away from the truths of Our Faith and if so, we can be like Jesus in rebuking Satan, trusting in God and finding his angels waiting to assist us on the narrow path of salvat
During these Winter months when we still see more and more visitors, I invite you to please consider assisting our new shrine church by signing up not only to attend Mass but also to offer some of your time in a volunteer position to assure the Masses we have scheduled can take place. These volunteer positions are necessary for Mass to occur in this time to be in accord with the guidelines set forward by the Diocese of Calgary for the celebration of the Holy Mass during Phase 2 of the reopening of our province in the midst of this pandemic. All volunteers are guaranteed a chance to attend the Holy Mass they sign up for.
It will only take a small amount of your day to volunteer in this capacity, for example, helping to clean the church after Mass only takes about 15 minutes. But more than volunteering it is a way to offer an act of charity and service to Our Lord and His Holy Mother in assuring we can offer the Eucharist for the Glory of God and the spiritual nourishment of His People.
I invite you to take time today to make a Spiritual Communion, using the following formula or one of your own choosing:
My Jesus,
I believe that You are present in the Most Holy Sacrament.
I love You above all things, and I desire to receive You into my soul.
Since I cannot at this moment receive You sacramentally,
come at least spiritually into my heart.
I embrace You as if You were already there and unite myself wholly to You.
Never permit me to be separated from You. Amen."
St. Alphonsus di Liguori
In Jesus through Mary, Fr. Nathan
To watch Live-streamed Sunday and Weekday Masses from various parishes and at different times in the Diocese of Calgary, please click here
Homily Notes for the 1st Week of Lent, Year B (2021): Mk 1:12-15
- If you listened carefully to the Opening Collect Prayer this morning (that is the prayer just after we prayed the Lord Have Mercy), you will have noticed that I omitted a single word in the prayer. I prayed the usual conclusion to this prayer that reads “Through Our Lord Jesus Christ your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, but than said God, forever and ever, amen, instead of One God, forever and ever, amen.
- This was no innovation of my part or the desire to change the prayer because I think it sounds better this way but in accordance with a decree from Cardinal Robert Sarah and the Congregation of Divine Worship in Rome that mandated this change take place beginning on Ash Wednesday 2021.
- When I first read about this upcoming change, I wondered why it needed to occur. Back in 2011, The Third Edition of the Roman Missal in English came into use with numerous changes and so I was curious why this change did not occur then?
- From a purely translation rationale of going from the original Latin into English, this change is correct, since the original Latin of this prayer never says Unus Deus, or One God, but simply Deus which is God without the qualification of one before it.
- But we do not believe as Christians in One God, in the three persons of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit so would not praying to the One God not be an affirmation in our belief in who God is?
- But as Winnie the Pooh once advised, sometimes you must think, think, think to understand more clearly certain matters and the important reasons why things must change and be corrected…
- At the heart of the concerns about using the phrase One God in this prayer is that it might somehow give the impression that Jesus, to whom the word God is referring to in the sentence structure of this prayer, is a god all on his own, independent of his relationship to the Father and the Holy Spirit, thus introducing a heretical belief into the Church’s language of prayer.
- The Bishops of English speaking countries like England, Wales and Canada, in their explanation to the faithful why this change was occurring mentioned further that the expression One God in the context of this prayer structure “risks suggesting that Jesus became a god independent of the Blessed Trinity and is one god among many (which is simply not true and so a change was needed since) ... what we pray needs to express what the Church believes, requiring that, in liturgical formulae, we uphold the doctrine of the Blessed Trinity,” free of any expressions that could suggest errors and confusion.
- All this being said, some might still wonder if this is all such a big deal and I am quite sure it will take myself and other priests many months to break the routine of reciting this prayer by mentioning one God!
- One way to understand the need for this important change can be in light of the Gospel reading for this First Sunday of Lent, where we read of how Satan tempted Jesus and are reminded that we too are tempted by the Evil One who is always looking for subtle and seemingly small and insignificant ways to cause confusion and misunderstanding in the Church, most especially in regards to our understanding of the Mystery of God.
- Back in the 4th century AD, debates among the Bishops over whether we believed that Jesus was consubstantial with the Father, that is, of the same divine substance of God, or the innovative suggestion that he was of a similar substance of God, yet still a created being, so deeply divided the Church that divisions remain to this day of Christians who separated themselves from the Catholic Church over their mistaken understandings of the Divine Person of Jesus Christ.
- The devil wants to sow division in the Church and often outright attacks are quickly overcome but more subtle and intrusive attacks that don’t appear to be a big deal at the time are the ones that cause the most devastating and lasting damage.
- This correction to one of the important prayers that is offered during the Holy Mass is an example of the diligence of the Holy Spirit who is alive and working in our Church to inspire our leaders to make what seems like minor corrections to prevent long standing damage to occur regarding our understanding of the doctrines of our Faith.
May this Lent be an opportunity for us to continually open our hearts and minds to the musings of that same Creator Spirit to reveal to us if there are any ways the Evil One has subtlety begun to lead us away from the truths of Our Faith and if so, we can be like Jesus in rebuking Satan, trusting in God and finding his angels waiting to assist us on the narrow path of salvat
During these Winter months when we still see more and more visitors, I invite you to please consider assisting our new shrine church by signing up not only to attend Mass but also to offer some of your time in a volunteer position to assure the Masses we have scheduled can take place. These volunteer positions are necessary for Mass to occur in this time to be in accord with the guidelines set forward by the Diocese of Calgary for the celebration of the Holy Mass during Phase 2 of the reopening of our province in the midst of this pandemic. All volunteers are guaranteed a chance to attend the Holy Mass they sign up for.
It will only take a small amount of your day to volunteer in this capacity, for example, helping to clean the church after Mass only takes about 15 minutes. But more than volunteering it is a way to offer an act of charity and service to Our Lord and His Holy Mother in assuring we can offer the Eucharist for the Glory of God and the spiritual nourishment of His People.
I invite you to take time today to make a Spiritual Communion, using the following formula or one of your own choosing:
My Jesus,
I believe that You are present in the Most Holy Sacrament.
I love You above all things, and I desire to receive You into my soul.
Since I cannot at this moment receive You sacramentally,
come at least spiritually into my heart.
I embrace You as if You were already there and unite myself wholly to You.
Never permit me to be separated from You. Amen."
St. Alphonsus di Liguori
In Jesus through Mary, Fr. Nathan
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Our Lady of the Rockies, Pray for us. |
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