Happy Easter!

Happy Easter! Jesus Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Just as the Jews celebrate Passover for a week or 8 days, so we can say "Happy Easter" for seven weeks! The resurrection of Jesus is the pivotal truth of the Christian faith, As Saint Paul attested, "Our faith is vain, if Christ is not risen!" Since he is risen, he was seen by many after his resurrection, we have reason to hope in life everlasting. In the new movie, "Paul, Apostle of Christ", the Saint Luke character played by Jim Caviezel, gathers a group of imprisoned Christians around him to calm them as they face death by wild beasts. "You will feel pain, but it will not last." He continues, "Then you will see Christ face-to-face." He begins the Lord's Prayer with them and all accept their martyrdom peacefully. Paul who saw the Risen Jesus on his way into Damascus was so convinced that from then on, Christ, Crucified and Risen, was the Center of his life. Try to see this movie to help relate the Letters of St. Paul to our everyday life. Another good movie for the Easter Season is called Risen. It should be on Netflicks and be available at Pauline Books 7 media Centers.

In the last 12 days two Sisters of our community died. On Wednesday, March 28th, we buried our Sister Mary Philomena, who had spent 57 years in the USA evangelizing with the media. One of our Sisters who has been caring for her blood sister, laid her sister to rest last Wednesday. On the same day the brother of another Sister was laid to rest not far away, in Staten Island, NY. Today one of the Auxiliary Bishops of Boston celebrated the funeral Mass for his mother, Mrs. O'Connell. The petite Mrs. O'Connell (Delaney) died at the age of 91. She had three sons and a daughter. The youngest, Mark, became a priest and now a bishop in the Archdiocese of Boston. On Thursday, Bishop Mark O'Connell will be the main celebrant at the Mass of Christian burial for Sister Mary Augusta Biolchini who died at the age of 102. She had been the oldest Sister of our congregation which is in 52 countries! Sister Augusta came from the town of Sestola in the Modena Region of Italy. Now it is famous for its ski slopes. When Sister Augusta was just a young teen, Sestola was crowded in the summer time by vacationers who escaped the sweltering summer heat of Italian cities. Known then as Lea, she and her mother had their own cottage industry of knitting. Lea's mother scrapped up the money to purchase a knitting machine. Lea and her mother kept busy making dresses, hats, scarfs and other items of wool clothing. When Lea entered the Daughters of St. Paul, then a very new religious Congregation, she was often asked to knit new clothing for the Sisters, or to repair sweaters and wool dresses. I still have a knit sweater which I almost threw away. Sister Augusta replaced all the buttons and re-sewed the front of the sweater giving it another ten years of good use! Sister entered the Daughters of St. Paul in 1936 in Alba, Northern Italy. The new Sister loved the mission of the Daughters of St. Paul, walking house-to-house in towns and villages in the hilly region of Gorizia. (Now Gorizia borders Slovenia.) In 1958 Sister was asked to be a missionary in the USA. She went willingly. Her brothers had immigrated to Michigan and had brought their mother with them. For the last approximately 20 years Sister Mary Augusta spent her time in sewing and knitting for the Sisters of our Boston Community. May Sister Mary Augusta rest in the arms of Jesus. She had been very devoted to praying for "the poor souls." May Sister Mary Augusta's friends in who passed before her present her with joy to the Divine Master. Blessing ti all for a grace-filled Easter Season.