Author: Father Albert

Daily Collection: Catherine of Siena

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Collect taken from the Memorial of St. Catherine of Siena Collect: O God, who set Saint Catherine of Siena on fire with divine love in her contemplation of the Lord's Passion and her service of your Church, grant, through her intercession, that your people, participating in the mystery of Christ, may ever exult in the revelation of his glory. Who lives and reigns... "O God, who set Saint Catherine of Siena on fire with divine love in her contemplation of the Lord's Passion and her service or your Church" - To be "on fire with divine love" is our ultimate destiny and...Read More

Are You Saved?

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Divine Mercy Sunday Fr. Albert St. Peter Catholic Church, New Iberia [audio wav="http://box5246.temp.domains/~alberuc3/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Are-You-Saved.wav"][/audio] Are you saved? What a question! So, short and direct… perhaps a bit… existential. Maybe you’ve been asked this before, maybe not. When you hear those three words, it might suggest some kind of ultimate reality. To answer the question presupposes so many things, it’s actually pretty surprising that people answer it all.  “Are you saved?” Is there something I need to be saved from? Why do I need to be saved from it? What does it take to be saved? What does being saved mean for...Read More

Christmas vs. Easter: Which is your favorite?

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Easter Sunday Fr. Albert St. Peter Catholic Church, New Iberia [audio wav="http://box5246.temp.domains/~alberuc3/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Christmas-vs-Easter.wav"][/audio] Christmas or Easter? Which is your favorite? I think most people generally prefer Christmas. Decorations, all kinds of great foods and desserts, and, of course, presents! Plus, Christmas is all about family and the Baby Jesus, and who doesn’t love the baby Jesus? And, really, that’s great. Christmas is about the Incarnation, about God becoming man. Now every human being has a new dignity, a new value, a new hope because God became one of us. Imagine – it’s impossible, but still, imagine – that we found a...Read More

Why Did You Kill Him?

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Good Friday Fr. Albert St. Peter Catholic Church, New Iberia [audio wav="http://box5246.temp.domains/~alberuc3/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Why-Did-You-Kill-Him.wav"][/audio] Why did Jesus die? Ambushed in a garden, dragged before the authorities in the middle of the night, wrongly imprisoned until morning, and handed over to Pilate to be judged, scourged, and brutally, publicly executed. Why did we do it? Was Jesus crucified because he taught us to love our neighbor? Or because he healed the sick, cast out demons, and answered the prayers of those who came to him? Did we crucify him because he was kind and gentle, because he liked to spend time with the poor...Read More

Nothing I Can Say

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Palm Sunday Fr. Albert St. Peter Catholic Church, New Iberia [audio m4a="http://box5246.temp.domains/~alberuc3/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Nothing-I-Can-Say.m4a"][/audio] What can I tell you to illuminate what we have just experienced? What eloquence could possibly add to this? There is nothing more to say other than that, just 30 minutes after welcoming our God with palms, we cry out for his crucifixion. No, there is nothing more to do than this: to sit and consider the ugly reality that you just killed your God.

Why Suffering?

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5th Sun Lent, Year A Fr. Albert St. Peter Catholic Church, New Iberia [audio wav="http://box5246.temp.domains/~alberuc3/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Why-Suffering.wav"][/audio]   Why do bad things happen to good people? It is a perennial question, a nagging uncertainty that clouds our hearts and seems to darken our faith in an all-powerful, all-loving God. It is the classic argument against God and a favorite of most atheists. If he were really all loving, all-good, and all-powerful, why does he not intervene and stop all the suffering? If you or I saw a child drowning and did nothing to help them, people would consider us cowardly and cruel....Read More

Light and Laetare

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4th Sun Lent, Year A March 26, 2017 Fr. Albert St. Peter Catholic Church, New Iberia [audio wav="http://box5246.temp.domains/~alberuc3/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Light-and-Laetare.wav"][/audio]   Isn’t Jesus being a bigot!? He assumes that blindness is something bad. But, that man’s blindness is part of who he is… it’s not a disorder, it’s an identity! Just because other people can see, it doesn’t mean that not seeing, that being blind is something unnatural or wrong. Isn’t it judgmental to say otherwise? But Jesus does heal this man, and he does it in a rather strange way. Using spit and dirt to make clay and smear it on...Read More

Horror or Humility?

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Solemnity of Joseph, Husband of Mary Fr. Albert St. Peter Catholic Church, New Iberia [audio wav="http://box5246.temp.domains/~alberuc3/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Horror-or-Humility.wav"][/audio]   Mary “was found with child through the Holy Spirit. Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame, decided to divorce her quietly.” We have much to learn from St. Joseph as a model man, husband, and Christian, but what exactly does this verse mean? How is he just, why does he make that decision? Joseph is righteous, meaning he knows and follows the law of God given to Moses and the Jews. The law required...Read More

Will You Marry Me?

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3rd Sun Lent, Year A March 19, 2017 Fr. Albert St. Peter Catholic Church, New Iberia [audio wav="http://box5246.temp.domains/~alberuc3/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Will-You-Marry-Me.wav"][/audio] Will you marry me? This is the question that Jesus asks the woman at the well today. Jesus sits by Jacob’s well and talks to a woman. The last time scripture shows a man talking to a woman at a well is Moses talking to his future wife. Before that is Jacob talking to his future wife by a well. Before that, is Abraham’s servant who goes to a well to looks for a wife for Isaac. When Scripture shows a man...Read More