Spiritual Reflection

Greetings from Western KS!  The picture is St. Mary’s Queen of Angels Church in Russell, KS.  It is an agricultural area and many of the parishioners are engaged in farming.  They have a mission church about ten miles away in Gorham, KS.  It is a great experience to see their love of the church and priesthood.  They have no interest in power but just want to do what God wants, help each other and come as a family to church to pray.  They work hard, live simply and will do anything to help the pastor and people of the community.

It reminds me of the early church right after Jesus was killed.  There were no resources, no scripture or theology books, no traditions, no structure, just people that wanted to do what Jesus asked.  They came together and did what was necessary to build a church community to honor God.  Here we are over two thousand years later and we still have that church.  So I pray for all our brothers and sisters who don’t pray with us anymore on Sundays that someday they will return so family reunions in church will be complete.   One thing seems to be clear here in the rural area…God and church are first on Sundays.  Everything else is second and it’s a joy to be in their presence.  I pray they will always have priests to serve them.