Daily Archives: April 19, 2019

We adore you, O Christ, and we praise you; because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world. Early in the morning, at 6:30 a.m., the people of Jacmel gather to begin our pilgrimage with the Lord and His holy Cross. It is a spiritual experience to watch and pray.

The journey is like being in Jerusalem, with people even selling things from the market. Others were watching the crowd from rooftops and listening to the singing and prayers as we gave witness to our Christian Faith.

As we participate in these days and know the situation of today, we ask God for mercy and peace. May we see an end to all violence that prevails in this country. As we walked the way, these words came to mind:

“Finally, taking up your cross and being willing to give up your life means living in a faith that believes that nothing is impossible for God. As James Martin puts it, this means accepting that God is greater than the human imagination. Indeed, whenever we succumb to the notion that God cannot offer us a way out of our pain into some kind of newness, it’s precisely because we have reduced God down to the size of our own limited imagination. It’s possible to accept our cross, to live in trust, and to not grow bitter inside pain only if we believe in possibilities beyond what we can imagine; namely, if we believe in the resurrection.”

Excerpt From

The Passion and the Cross

Ronald Rolheiser

Every year on the morning of Holy Thursday, the Diocese of Jacmel has their Chrism Mass. Our new Bishop gathered with all the priests of our diocese. This year, they wanted to gather the priests in our mission complex and to also have their reception after the Mass. Thank God, we were not the ones responsible for the food! This had already been arranged. However, this meant we needed to be here to receive the priests and to help with some of the preparations for the reception. So we had to offer up the fact that we could not participate in the Mass.

It was a blessed sight to see all our priests with their Bishop, getting ready to renew their priestly promises.

The oils were also ready to be brought to the Church for consecration by the Bishop: Oil of The Sick, Oil of Catechumens, and Oil of Chrism.

After the Mass, Bishop Marie Errick and all the priests, deacons, seminarians, and religious returned to our place for the reception.

A Sister of St. Vincent de Paul, who was among the group, wwas from Krakow, Poland. This was a delight for Sr. Inga.

We think our new Bishop likes our place!