Year of Faith - To Do List

Here are a few simple things we can do during this Year of Faith:

• Pray the Rosary. The Holy Father asked us to pray each day the Nicene Creed. Why stop there? We  an do the entire Rosary; it will take us twelve minutes, and we will be all the better for it.

• Do something good for your marriage. If you are not married, do something good for someone else's

marriage. Live true to your state in life and find God's presence there.

• Read Saint Ephrem: Get to know better your Maronite liturgy, history and tradition and the valuable

contribution our Church continues to make in the Middle East and throughout the world.

• Go to Confession. Attend daily Liturgy once a week. Forgive someone who hurt you. Reach out to someone who is estranged from you. Volunteer for something at Church.

• Read the Catechism of the Catholic Church or YouCat or the Compodium. Know better your faith. Read our eparchial website (www.stmaron.org). Talk to those around you about the importance and

meaning of faith.

(Taken from a letter of His Excellency, Bishop Gregory J. Mansour)

 

The Maronite Music Website

www.maronitemusic.org

by Fr. Geoffrey Abdallah, Director

This new website is provided by the Inter-Eparchial Music Commission as an official resource for the Maronite Catholic Church. The Commission was established in March 2008 by the four Maronite Bishops of the English speaking eparchies (dioceses) - Bishops Gregory Mansour and Robert Shaheen (USA), Bishop Ad Abikaram (Australia) and Bishop Joseph Khoury (Canada) - in response to the decision at the annual Maronite Bishops' Synod at Bkerke (Lebanon) to establish an inter-eparchial committee to work on one English translation of the Maronite Liturgical texts.

 

The demanding task of accurately translating and adapting over 250 Maronite Chants of the Qorbono (Mass) into singable English, while remaining faithful to the original Syriac melody, is now omplete. The Entrance Hymns, Qoleh, and Mazmooreh for the whole Liturgical year are available on this website. The hymns for the Proper of the Mass, such as Glory to God, Pre-Anaphora Hymns, Peace Hymns, Fraction Hymns, Communion Hymns, etc., have also been placed on this website. This will allow parish choirs time to begin learning the new texts/hymns prior to the arrival of the new Mass Books.
 

The new English translation of the Book of Offering (Mass Book) has been approved by the Maronite Bishops of the English speaking eparchies and has been promulgated by the Maronite Patriarch, His Beatitude Bechara Peter Rai. It is in the process of publication. Since the work of any Music  commission is always a "work in progress," this website will be constantly updated. It will provide Maronite Hymns in English, articles about Maronite Music, recordings and other resources to make the richness of our authentic Antiochian Syriac Maronite tradition available to future generations in the English speaking world.

 

Nurturing faith in MYO - Rhode Island

“ If you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, Move from here to there; and it will move; and nothing will be impossible to you.”(Mt 17:20)

We presented on Growing our Faith to the MYO on Sunday November 11 at St. George Maronite Catholic Church, Rhode Island. We shared with them what faith is (utilizing the YouCat), and how we can practically grow it, especially in this Year of Faith. We gave each of the teens a copy of the Creed and encouraged them to pray this often, as our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI recommends that this be our daily prayer during this year.

The main ideas that we shared are:

-We need to know our faith and understand what believe, to better live it and appreciate it.

- The Creed helps us to learn our Christian beliefs and the Youth Catechism or YouCat is an excellent tool in aiding our understanding of the faith.

- Faith is a precious gift from God given to us at Baptism and increased when we ask for it in prayer.

- Faith is having knowledge and a trusting love in God’s promise of salvation.

- Faith grows more when we listen and read the Word of God, and live out the Gospel values of love, forgiveness and service.

- Faith is absolutely certain, because Jesus guarantees it!

OLOP Bazaar- New Bedford

On Saturday November 10, we attended the Our Lady of Purgatory annual bazaar in New Bedford, M.A. The children of the parish are pictured singing Christmas carols and entertaining the crowd with Abouna Jack Morrison, pastor of Our Lady of Purgatory Church and Matt Thomas, music director. It was an enjoyable and successful family event, thanks to the goodness and efforts of many volunteers coming together in the parish.