The evening before we had Holy Hour at Curley and Friar Douglas preached a great reflection on the dignity of all people with a LOT of scriptures references. We had a larger crowd than normal since we encouraged a number of the guys who would be marching to attend. They did and since we were leaving at 6 AM the next day, about 25 of them spent the night in the wrestling room. I can only describe it as an adventure. I got about 2 hours of sleep!

The next morning we drove down to DC to attend the Youth Rally and Mass at the Verizon Center. We arrived by 7:30 and I went up to the restaurant to help hear confessions for a couple hours. I went downstairs to concelebrate. So during the procession in I received a rousing (raucous) welcome from the Curley group from the stands!

The homily was quite good, the preacher spoke about the need for perseverance, purity and prayer in the pro-life movement. When mass ended, we grabbed lunch and headed towards the march. We got to the Supreme Court and after the obligatory group picture and prayer, we headed home. We left Baltimore with 39 students and we came home with the same 39. It’s fair to say it was a quite good day!

1. I attended the ordination of my dear friend Marlon. It was such a grace to lay hands on him and offer him the fraternal embrace. He is a good friend from our time in formation together. He also teaches high school, so there are always plenty of stories to exchange!

2. Coming home from the ordination, I hit the blizzard an was forced to spend a night in Jersey because it was too unsafe to drive.

3. I gave my midterm exams, they were quite difficult and my students did quite well! I was pleased and proud!

4. I returned to Boston for Christmas and presided and preached at Christmas mass at my home parish!

5. Celebrated mass with a group of friends for New Years Eve and enjoyed a wonderful meal with them but even better was their company!

Wow, that’s a lot! It makes me tired, I probably should get to bed, since school begins AGAIN tomorrow!

When mass began I was a bit nervous, but as I began I relaxed. This was the first time that I preached at Curley and I thought this was awesome! I had the privilege to preach on my favorite feast day of the year to a school I loved.

On the feast of the Immaculate Conception we celebrating God giving Mary this special grace to have been redeemed by Jesus from the first moment of her conception. For the homily, I connected Milly Cyrus who covers others peoples songs, Adam and Eve who covered themselves in their sin and Mary who was covered by the Holy Spirit. Somehow it worked

I was pleased how it turned out and even more pleased to receive positive feedback from the friars, my colleagues and the students about the homily.

It was a wonderful and intense experience. I have been to their prayer services before and they are well attended. The music was reflective and we had a really good homily from Msgr. Paul. After a time for reflection and examination of conscience, we had time for individual confessions and absolution. I heard confessions for almost 2 hours. It was beautiful and the confessions were very good especially from the young people. I was impressed by how good these people are how they really want to be good disciples of Jesus. It was such a humbling experience to hear people share with me their joys, griefs and sinfulness and even more humbling to be able to speak a word of God’s mercy and peace. I was the last one hearing them, all I wanted to do was thank the good Lord for that gift.

peace and good,
friar Matt

After school, I drove up to Chesterfield New Jersey to visit the Poor Clares (a home away from home.) I visited with Sr. Claire Andre on Tuesday night and as always I am so grateful for her her love, her insights her friendship and support! The next morning, we celebrated a mass of Thanksgiving and I preached. It was the actual date of their 100th Anniversary of the foundation of their monastery. The readings for the day were tough ones Daniel and the handwriting on the wall and Luke’s persecution discourses. I spoke about the longing those in exile felt for Jerusalem and for the presence of God and about my years long relationship with the sisters the longing I feel, not for the building, but because Christ is there and their foundation. They approved and they said I was very at peace celebrating Eucharist, which I took as a great compliment

Afterwards they gave me beautiful framed copy of Francis’ Canticle of the Creatures. After goodbyes, I drove back to Boston to celebrate with the holiday with my family. My mom is pumped because all my family will be there including my brother who is a US Marine!

The ceremony was simple and I thought I gave a pretty good homily. Mark teaches art at Curley and Jaimie works with brides doing hair for weddings. Both have great eyes and are creative. I tied there story with Genesis’ 2nd creation account and the wedding at Cana.

After the ceremony, I joined the party at the reception. It was beautiful and they both come from such wonderful and welcoming families! May God keep blessing them both!

I was pleased how it turned out and the reception was a lot of fun. I was so glad that my whole family was there even my brother Jeremiah who is a Marine and stationed in NC.

I was privileged to celebrate mass for the first time with Curley students. It was awesome that these were the first students I taught two years ago. I was glad that we used the mass of the day for All Saints. I was pleased with my homily on the saints as those who lived transitions at every moment in their lives and in those moments they chose to love God and neighbor in ways that surprised us.

I had this deep sense of peace while celebrating Eucharist. I still find it awesome that I am blessed to pray in the name of the Christ and the Church!

http://www.franciscans.org/FriarMattFoleysPriestlyOrdination.cfm

It was the a wonderful, beautiful and emotional day. It meant so much that friars, friends and my family from all over the country where there to share it with me. I need some more time to pray about it to put it into words….