Welcoming new members into the family through a birth, a marriage, or a baptism is a happy time that fills a family with hope and new possibilities for the future.  One sad reality of the age demographics of this wonderful parish, is the fact that we rarely have infant baptisms and in most years, we have no young person or adult to baptize at the Easter Vigil.  I wish there were some way that we could borrow someone from one of the local parishes who is to be baptized at the Easter Vigil and let him or her by Baptized, Confirmed and receive First Communion on that holy night here.  After all, each person who is baptized in the Catholic Church is becoming a part of God's family of Catholics around the world.  It would be a visible reminder to us that not only did Christ rise from the dead on the "third day" to live forever, so all the newly-baptized rise (out of the waters of Baptism) to a new life that is destined to eternal life with the Lord.  At the Easter Vigil, ALL Catholics are given the opportunity to renew their baptismal promises and recommit themselves to live in and with the Lord and bring Him to others, both believers and unbelievers, ever rejoicing in the Lord's gift of eternal life for all who believe in Him as the Resurrection of the Life.

Please consider participating in the whole of the Triduum (starting Holy Thursday night, March 24, at 6:30 p.m. and Good Friday, March 25, at 3:00 p.m., and the Easter Vigil, March 26, at 8:00 p.m.  I know that the Vigil starts late (as it MUST begin after nightfall) and is the longest liturgy of the year, but it is also the most different, beautiful and meaningful liturgy of the year and well worth the time, energy and faith that we put into it.  PLEASE won't you come. Pray about it, and I will be praying, not only that we have someone for Baptism at next year's Vigil, but that more of the already baptized here and throughout the world will discover or rediscover the lasting blessings that flow to those who live in the "Light of Christ" all year long.