After offering encouragement (and I hope, inspiration) in last week's Pastor's Column to invite people you know in the Village who are not going to church, to go with you to our Mass (and activities like the Chicken Bake and Fall Fest), I thought I would give you a few talking points to use to entice people to come.  I found these points in an article by Marie Snider in the Sentinel Record this last Saturday.  In this article she says that hundreds of studies confirm that people of faith are healthier and less likely to die prematurely from any cause.  (I think of some of the nuns I have known, including my fifth grade teacher, Sister Laurene, who is still with us at 98 years of age.)

A study at the California Public Health foundation followed 5,000 people for 28 years and found that women who went to church at least once a week had a one-third less risk of dying prematurely than women who did not attend church. In addition, researchers at John Hopkins Hospital found that weekly churchgoers died 50% less frequently from heart disease.  The research continues to show that religion and spirituality can help us stay healthy.

I hope we all strive to be living witnesses of the blessings that come from our "lived faith" fo us and especially for those we touch with Christ-like love, mercy and hope.