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St. Joseph’s Church Notre Dame-Visitation 36 Bleecker Street, Greenwich, New York 12834 18 Pearl Street, Schuylerville, NY 12871 Parish phone: 518-692-2159 Parish phone: 518-695-3391 Fax: 518-695-3391 [email protected] (St. Joseph office) [email protected] (ND-V office)

MASS FOR ST. JOSEPH’S MASSES FOR NOTRE DAME-VISITATION Sunday: 10:00 a.m. Saturday Vigil: 4:00 p.m. • Sunday: 11:15 a.m.

CLUSTER PASTORAL STAFF CLUSTER LITURGIES St. Joseph’s, Greenwich Interim Priest: Fr. Ed Kacerguis St. Joseph’s Trustees: Bob Jeffords & Peter Pitkin Sunday Mass: 10:00 a.m. Interim Administrator: Stephen Mawn Weekday Mass – Tuesday & Thursday 8:30 a.m. Faith Formation Coordinator: Maryann Kelleher Notre Dame-Visitation Notre Dame-Visitation, Schuylerville Sunday Mass: 11:15 a.m. Interim Priest: Fr. Ed Kacerguis Saturday Vigil Mass: 4:00 p.m. Trustees: Anne Cadwallader & Bob Thompson Weekday Mass – Monday & Wednesday 8:30 a.m. Interim Administrator: Stephen Mawn Faith Formation Facilitator: Stephanie Andrejcak Holy Cross Holy Cross, Salem Sunday Mass: 8:30 a.m. Parish Life Director: Jeff Peck Saturday Vigil Mass: 4:30 p.m. (May-October) Sacramental Minister: Fr. Ed Kacerguis E-Mail: [email protected] St. Patrick’s Director of Faith Formation: Kim Gariepy Sunday Mass: 11:00 a.m. St. Patrick’s Cambridge Saturday Vigil Mass: 4:00 p.m. (November-April) Parish Life Director: Jeff Peck Morning Prayer – Monday: 8:30 a.m. Sacramental Minister: Fr. Tom Zelker Weekday Mass – **Wednesday: 8:30 a.m. Phone: 518-677-2757 (**Communion Service during July-August) E-Mail: [email protected] Director of Faith Formation: Mary Rosmus

BAPTISM Call the Parish Office for information and scheduling MARRIAGE Call the Parish Office at least six months in advance to participate in the Marriage Preparation Program RECONCILIATION Sacrament of Reconciliation is available during seasonal Reconciliation Services or by appointment. Reconciliation is available 3:30 - 3:50 p.m. before the Vigil Masses FOURTH SUNDAY OF DECEMBER 20, 2020 ST. JOSEPH‘S CATHOLIC PARISH GREENWICH, NY

Christmas December 24 & 25 Dec 24 - 2:00 p.m. Lectors: Kate McMahon, Laura Chutua Ministers of Communion: Jeannie Pemrick, Ron Derway 6:00 p.m. Lectors: Paul Mays, John Wescott Ministers of Communion: Emma Wescott, Mary Ann Spiezio Dec. 25 – 10 a.m. Lectors: John Wescott, Tony Brower Ministers of Communion: Mic Hendrickson, Donna

Our Mass intentions this week: Jennings Sunday December 27 For Clayton Aldous Lectors: Jim Alheim, Tony Brower Req. by Janet and the Girls Ministers of Communion: Sandy Hall, Barb Simoneau For James Darling Req. by Ingrid For Terry Butler Readings for the Week Req. by Evelyn Hoffman Dec 21 – Song of Songs & Luke 1:39-45 For Elena Bruning Dec 22 – Samuel 1:24-28 & Luke 46-56 Req. by Kathryn Bruning and Siblings Dec 23 – Malachi 3:1-4, 23-24 & Luke 1: 57-66 Dec 24 – Isaiah 9:1-6 & Luke 2:1-14 Intentions for Masses Dec 25 – Isaiah 52:7-10 & John 1:1-18 Dec 26 – 6:8-10; 7:54-59, 24-25a & John 1:1-18 2:00 p.m.: For The Children of the Parish Sun Dec 27 – Sirach 3:2-6,12-14; Psalm 128:1-2, 6:00 p.m.: For Brady Waite 3, 4-5; Colossians: 3:12-21; Luke 2:22-40 Req. by His Family Christmas Day 10:00 a.m.: For The People of the Parish

The Mass Readings for Sunday, December 20th

1st Reading: The Second Book of Samuel 7:1-5, 8a-12, 14a, 16 Responsorial Psalm: 89:2-3, 4-5, 27, 29 “Forever I will sing the goodness of the Lord.” 2nd Reading: First Letter of Paul to the Romans: 16:25-27 Gospel: Luke 1:26-38 Fr. Ed, our Trustees – Bob Jeffords and Peter Pitkin - and the staff of St. Joseph’s Catholic Last Sunday’s Attendance: Parish send you our prayers and best wishes for a peaceful and blessed Christmas, and a joyous Total attendance: 64 and healthy New Year. As we celebrate this wonderful season, may each of you find the CALL IN FOR RESERVATIONS FOR MASS, love, the peace, and the joy that the shepherds Monday-Thursday 9 a.m. – 2 p.m. found on that first Christmas in , Parish Office Phone Number is 518-692-2159 knowing that He is Emmanuel – God with us.

ST. JOSEPH’S CHURCH GREENWICH, NEW YORK

Just a Word to Carry with The obligation to attend Mass on Sunday and Holy You Days remains suspended. Thoughts on Prayer from the St. Joseph's Parish will continue to post Sunday and Dominican Retreat & Conference Holy Day Mass on YouTube. Fr. Ed Kacerguis will be Center the celebrant with Maureen Cossey serving as music minister. Mass will be available at 10 AM on Sunday morning and later. It can be accessed at YouTube The holiday season means we get channel is named "St. Joseph's Church in Greenwich, inundated with ads to "buy this, buy more". But gifts NY". are so much more than items! As mentioned last The link is www.tinyurl.com/SJG-liturgies week, small acts of kindness can be a prayer - a gift to another. Parish Office Closed December 23 – 3 The Rectory Office at St. Joseph’s, and the Diocese’s Pastoral Center in Albany will be closed from Thursday, Here are some more ways to pray with gifts: December 24th until Monday January 3rd. If there is an emergency, call the rectory leave a message or call the Ask God to show you who needs the gift of phone number given on the answering machine your time – your undivided attention. Spend recording. time with that person physically (if they are someone you live with), on the phone, or on Facetime or Zoom.

Spend some time in prayer reflecting on the gifts God has given you – are you a good baker? are you good at organizing? are you good at making people feel comfortable? do you have a good sense of humor? do you knit or build things out of wood? How can the gift God has given you become a prayer and a gift for someone else?

Are there people in your life who do not need one more thing? Honor them with a donation in their A Christmas Eve Prayer name to a cause that speaks to who they are. Allow it to be a prayer both for those who you are Lord, on this holy night of prayer and song honoring and those you are helping. and laughter, we praise you for the great wonders you have sent us: for the shining May the gift of who you are be exactly the star and the angel's song, for the infant's cry prayer someone needs to receive this day! in a lowly manger. We praise you for the Be well and be at peace! Word made flesh in a little Child. We behold his glory and are bathed in his radiance.

Be with us as we sing the songs of Christmas, as we hear the story retold - the story of the helpless Babe who came into the world to be with us.

We kneel before you like the shepherds, the innkeeper, the wise men. Help us to rise, to know you, to love you, and to follow you.

Amen

FOURTH SUNDAY OF ADVENT DECEMBER 20, 2020 ST. JOSEPH‘S CATHOLIC PARISH GREENWICH, NY

APOSTOLIC LETTER END-OF-YEAR DONATION STATEMENTS In order to PATRIS CORDE save the parish a few pennies, Our Sunday Visitor, our OF THE HOLY FATHER FRANCIS envelope provider, will not be mailing out your end-of- ON THE 150th ANNIVERSARY OF THE year statements as they have in the past. If you’d like your 2020 statement, the parish office will able to print it PROCLAMATION OF out for you. You can pick it up at the office or it can be AS PATRON OF THE UNIVERSAL CHURCH mailed to you. Just give the office a call a call. (Pope Francis has re-dedicated the Universal Church to St. Joseph in 2021. Here is a portion of his Apostolic Letter) The Holy Father writes: Diocesan Appeal Update As of the last report, on December 10th, we see that our “Matthew and Luke, the two Evangelists who speak parishioners have continued to donate or pledge to this most of Joseph, tell us very little, yet enough for us year’s Diocesan Appeal, reaching $15,231.00. St. Joseph’s total has increased to just over 75% of our goal of to appreciate what sort of father he was, and the $20,162.00. During this season of giving, please mission entrusted to him by God’s providence.” remember the Diocesan Appeal. Our Diocesan offices and agencies are out front every day helping those who are “Now, one hundred and fifty years after his hungry, need housing or warm clothes, providing care to proclamation as Patron of the Catholic Church by the sick and the elderly. Your donation doesn’t go into Blessed Pius IX (8 December 1870), I would like to the pocket of the Bishop! No, it goes into the mouth of share some personal reflections on this the hungry, into the warm coat for the cold, into heating extraordinary figure, so close to our own human for a family out of work because of shutdowns, in addition experience. For, as says, “out of the it funds programs for our priest and seminarians, our abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” religious men and women, our Catholic schools and many (Mt 12:34). My desire to do so increased during others. You are the personification of the Good Samaritan these months of pandemic, when we experienced, helping the injured man/the needy, not just walking by and ignoring him/them. Thanks! amid the crisis, how “our lives are woven together and sustained by ordinary people, people often overlooked. People who do not appear in newspaper Your Gifts of Treasure and magazine headlines, or on the latest television Mailed in or Drop off to the Rectory show, yet in these very days are surely shaping the Our mailbox has become our Collection Basket! decisive events of our history. Doctors, nurses, Offertory totals for December 13th, and this weekend, storekeepers and supermarket workers, cleaning December 20th, will be listed in next week’s bulletin. personnel, caregivers, transport workers, men and As Always, we say -Thank You women working to provide essential services and public safety, volunteers, priests, men and women religious, and so very many others. They understood that no one is saved alone… How many people daily exercise patience and offer hope, taking care to spread not panic, but shared responsibility. How many fathers, mothers, grandparents and teachers are showing our children, in small everyday ways, how to accept and deal with a crisis by adjusting their routines, looking ahead and encouraging the practice of prayer. How many are praying, making sacrifices and interceding for the good of all”.[6] Each of us can discover in Joseph – the man who goes unnoticed, a daily, discreet and hidden presence – an intercessor, a support and a guide in times of trouble. Saint Joseph reminds us that those who appear hidden or in the shadows can play an incomparable role in the history of salvation. A word of recognition and of gratitude is due to them all.”

ST. JOSEPH’S CHURCH GREENWICH, NEW YORK

FROM THE INTERIM PARISH ADMINISTRATOR friends or because we simply ran out of seats.

Three “Staves” for Christmas While people these days seem to think that the 12 Days Many of us are at least acquainted with Charles Dickens’ of Christmas are before Christmas, they are the 12 days A – in prose – Being a Ghost Story of following the celebration of Jesus’ birth, ending with Christmas (more commonly called “”) . And because Christmas is such an important during which the miserly protagonist, , solemnity in the life of the Church, we cannot contain our is visited by a different ghost in each of the first four celebration in a single day; instead, we celebrate for an chapters, or “staves”, before embracing the spirit of octave or eight full days. Thus, our celebration will Christmas in the fifth stave. While not a ghost story, I continue into 2021 so if you are unable to attend offer for your consideration and reflection the following “Christmas” Mass, please feel free to join us the weekend three items: of December 26 & 27 (the feast of the ) or on New Year’s Day for the Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of Stave One: Ring those Christmas bells… God. Or you can join us for “Little Christmas” when the Church will celebrate the Epiphany on Sunday, January 3. While socially popular or politically correct Christmas If you cannot join in person (or if, God forbid, a spike in songs and carols refer to Santa, Frosty and Rudolph, the the virus forces us to close our doors once again), Fr. more traditional ones include Baby Jesus, Mary and Kacerguis’ masses will be broadcast via YouTube at Joseph, angels, shepherds and wise men or kings. But it www.tinyurl.com/SJG-liturgies or you can go to Notre is interesting the number of songs that mention “bells”. Dame-Visitation’s website at www.tinyurl.com/ndvmass1 Think about it. “Jingle Bells”, “Carol of the Bells”, “Ring for links to a variety of Masses that are being livestreamed those Christmas Bells”, “Silver Bells”, and “I Heard the and/or recorded. NDV’s website also has a page full of Bells on Christmas Day”. And I am sure there are more of resources – videos, articles and activities – to help make them. Carol of the Bells, for example goes “Hark how the the season bright. bells, sweet silver bells, all seem to say throw cares away. Christmas is here, brining good cheer… One seems to Stave Three: Until you feel the Spirit of Christmas hear words of good cheer, from everywhere, filling the air.” I started this week’s piece talking about Ebenezer Scrooge and him undergoing a change of heart after the ghostly On Christmas Eve at 6pm it has been suggested visitors showed him the error of his ways. So, it is fitting that we all go outside to our doorsteps and ring a that I return to the “spirit of Christmas” to conclude this bell for two minutes to spread Christmas spirit week’s reflection. (and for little ones to help Santa fly his sleigh). After a tough year it would be an amazing memory Take Christ out of Christmas, and December becomes the for the kids and communities: ending 2020 with a bleakest and most colorless month of the year. So, we will sparkle of magic, hope and togetherness. not “spend” Christmas… nor “observe” Christmas. We will “keep” Christmas – keep it as it is… in all the loveliness of Even if we cannot celebrate Christmas together – either its ancient traditions. May we keep it in our hearts, that as a parish family or even our own flesh-and-blood we may be kept in its hope. families – because of the Covonavirus, we can not let COVID-19 steal or Christmas like the tried to do. Until you feel the spirit of Christmas – there is no Let’s spread that Christmas joy by ringing our Christmas Christmas. All else is outward display – so much tinsel and bells Thursday evening at 6pm! decoration. For it isn’t the holly, it isn’t the snow. It isn’t the tree, nor the firelight’s glow. It’s the warmth that Stave Two: Even if there is no room in the inn (church) comes to the hearts of men when the Christmas spirit this Christmas… returns again.

Since St. Joseph's reopened back in late June our seating May you and your family have a joyous and blessed has been limited due to social distancing requirements. and may the spirit of Christmas be with you With these restrictions still in place seating at our throughout the coming new year. Christmas masses are scarce. As I write this Wednesday morning, our Christmas Eve Mass is full, but we have - Stephen Mawn, Interim Parish Administrator some seats available for our Christmas morning Mass (call the church office at 518-692-2159 for details). This means, unfortunately, that many who might like to attend Mass this Christmas may be unable to do so, either due to the risk to their own health or that of their relatives and

FOURTH SUNDAY OF ADVENT DECEMBER 20, 2020 ST. JOSEPH‘S CATHOLIC PARISH GREENWICH, NY