Today, May 24th, four deacons of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter will be ordained to the sacred priesthood by His Excellency the Most Reverend Fabian Bruskewitz at St. Thomas Aquinas Church in Lincoln, Nebraska. All are welcome to attend, but if you can’t make it there in person, you can tune in to the live broadcast on LiveMass, our online apostolate, at 10 a.m. Central Time, 11 a.m. Eastern, 8 a.m. Pacific. You can watch on the LiveMass site or download our app, iMass.

Please pray for today’s ordinandi and for the Rev. Mr. Luc Poirier, who will be ordained in Ottawa on Friday, May 31st.

If you are planning to attend the Fraternity’s ordinations at St. Thomas Aquinas Church in Lincoln this Friday, May 24th, we have important information for you. The parking is very limited near the church, but the University is allowing us to use their parking garage on 17th Street between Q and R Streets. It is directly east of the block where the church is located (see the church on the left and the garage on the right in the satellite image). The garage is unattended and you can pay only with a credit card on the way out.

The ordinations are at 10 a.m. and the address is 320 N. 16th St., Lincoln, NE 68508. Remember, if you can’t make it to the ordinations in person, you can always follow the live broadcast at LiveMass, either online or on the iMass app. +

With St. Joseph the Worker’s feast day recently occurring on May 1st, we invite you to take a look back at a wonderful tradition celebrated on the March feast of this great saint.

Every year around March 19th, many parishes celebrate the tradition of St. Joseph’s Table. Perhaps your own parish or one near you hosts this event in honor of the foster-father of Our Lord, which usually entails preparing a beautiful table of special dishes and treats arranged before a statue or image of St. Joseph. The Table has its origins in Sicily in the Middle Ages, when, according to legend, a great famine struck the land and the people prayed to St. Joseph for relief, promising a special celebration in his honor in return. When the rains came, the people prepared tables of food in thanksgiving, and la tavola di San Giuseppe became an annual celebration. Held at the time of St. Joseph’s Day, the centerpiece of the festival is a table of beautiful pastries and breads to be shared with one’s family and friends, strangers and the poor. The offerings are not only tasty but are also rich with meaning, such as the breads which might be shaped like St. Joseph’s staff or a crown of thorns. The table traditionally lacks any meat dishes in commemoration of the season of Lent during which St. Joseph’s Day falls. Often included in the festivities is the “Tupa Tupa” tradition (see photo above from FSSP Chesapeake), in which children re-enact Joseph and Mary’s search for food and shelter in Bethlehem and are welcomed to the Table as the guests of honor.

The tradition of honoring St. Joseph in a special way on his feast day is, of course, not only an Italian tradition; different countries have their own traditions in honor of this great saint, including our very own United States! While the US has also adopted the traditions of its immigrant nations, something unique to our side of the pond is the combined celebration of St. Joseph’s feast and the return of the swallows to the mission church of San Juan Capistrano, California. The celebration was started by one of the pastors of the mission, which is a favorite nesting spot of the swallows and holds the festival every year on St. Joseph’s Day (from what we can gather, the Table is included as part of the celebrations). Incidentally, St. John of Capistrano’s feast day falls nearby, on March 28th!

Perhaps St. Joseph’s Table is a tradition you’d like to start in your own homes and parishes. Here is some inspiration from those in the FSSP community who celebrate this beautiful tradition. +

Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary

Denton, Nebraska

FSSP Dallas

Mater Dei Parish

FSSP Chesapeake

Take a great tradition and multiply it by 3! FSSP Chesapeake celebrates the Table by way of a “Triduum of Feasts” that includes St. Joseph, St. Patrick and their patron, St. Benedict.

FSSP Houston

Regina Caeli Parish

Spots are still available for FSSP Los Angeles’ annual Sacred Music Symposium this summer! The conference runs from June 24th – 28th and features seminars and clinics on a variety of choral topics, instruction from leading composers and conductors, and the opportunity to sing at the first Mass of a newly-ordained FSSP priest. The cost is just $275, and that includes meals! For more information and to sign up, visit www.ccwatershed.org/symposium.

A happy and most blessed Mother’s Day to all mothers! Let us take time today to thank God for the natural, adopted and spiritual mothers in our lives, for their love towards us and for the sacrifices they have made for us. For so many of us, our mothers were the first to teach us the Faith and to instill the love of God in us, and so today we give thanks for both the physical and spiritual care they gave us. This day on which we honor our earthly mothers providentially falls in the month of May dedicated to Our Lady, who is the Mother of Christ and of us, the members of His Mystical Body.

One of the most enduring Marian traditions during this time is that of the May crowning, where children of the parish carry flowers to Our Lady and adorn her statue with a crown or a wreath of flowers to honor her as “Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May”, as a beloved old hymn goes. Some of our parishes celebrated the Crowning last Sunday, some today, and certainly this beautiful tradition is a most fitting way to honor our Blessed Mother around the time of Mother’s Day.

And so, let us pray for our mothers today, let us honor them and entrust them to the care of Our Lady, the Queen and model of all mothers. Let us also entrust ourselves to the care of this dear Mother, and approach her daily with the same trust and love as the children who crown her with blossoms in May. +

Ego quasi vitis fructificávi suavitátem odóris: et flores mei, fructus honóris et honestátis. Ego mater pulchræ dilectiónis, et timóris, et agnitiónis, et sanctæ spei.

As the vine I have brought forth a pleasant odor, and my flowers are the fruit of honor and riches. I am the mother of fair love, and of fear, and of knowledge, and of holy hope.
Ecclesiasticus 24:17-18

From Thursday, April 18th, through Sunday, April 21st, the Church celebrated the holiest days of the liturgical year. Here we bring you the celebrations of the Sacred Triduum, as it was commemorated by our apostolates in the United States, Canada and beyond. Click on a picture to see where it is from, or, if you are up for a challenge, try to name the apostolate without looking at the caption! We hope your own Triduum was fruitful and blessed. +

Holy Thursday

Good Friday

Easter Vigil

Easter Sunday

If you missed the deadline for our annual boys’ camp in Elmhurst, Pennsylvania, you’ve got another chance to sign up! The deadline has been extended to Friday, May 24th. The camp, run by priests and seminarians from the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, is scheduled for July 15th – 25th, 2019 and is open to boys ages 13 – 15. Visit the camp’s website here for more information and to download the signup form.

You can keep up with all our camps and events by bookmarking our events page: www.fssp.com/events.

Last June, Mater Dei Parish, our apostolate in Dallas, Texas, sponsored a hugely successful young adults’ weekend. Over 90 young men and women attended the event that we covered at the Missive (read the post here), and we said to stay tuned for information about future events. Well, summer is on the horizon in 2019 and true to our word, we bring you the 2nd Annual FSSP Southwest Region Young Adult Weekend, scheduled for the weekend of June 14th!

The conference includes the traditional Latin Mass, the Rosary, talks on Catholic culture, recreational activities and a Saturday evening contra dance. Single young adults in their 20s and 30s are welcome and the cost is a mere $25, which includes meals. See the flyer below for more information and register here by June 1st!

We ask your prayers for the five deacons of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter who will be ordained to the sacred priesthood this month. Four will be ordained in Lincoln, NE by the Most Reverend Fabian Bruskewitz, Bishop Emeritus of the Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska, and one in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada by the Most Reverend Terrence Prendergast, Archbishop of Ottawa. All are welcome to attend, and the Lincoln ordinations will also be broadcast live on LiveMass.

will be ordained on Friday, May 24th, 2019 at 10 a.m. at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church, 320 N. 16th St., Lincoln, NE 68508.

Rev. Mr. Luc Poirier, FSSP of Irishtown, New Brunswick, Canada will be ordained on Friday, May 31st, 2019 at 7 p.m. at Notre Dame Cathedral Basilica, 56 Guigues Avenue, Ottawa, ON K1N 5H5.

Please keep in prayer also the two German and four French deacons from our Wigratzbad seminary who will be ordained on June 29th in Heimenkirch, Germany by the Most Reverend Czesław Kozon, Bishop of Copenhagen. +

What is święconka, you ask? You may actually know already. Perhaps your parish celebrates this Polish tradition – many of our apostolates do, such as Holy Cross Chaplaincy in Fresno, CA, St. Benedict in Chesapeake, VA and St. Mary in Philadelphia, PA (a parish with strong Polish roots), just to name a few. Since the Middle Ages in Poland, families have brought carefully prepared and decorated baskets of Easter victuals to be blessed at the church on Holy Saturday. A traditional basket might be created by lining it with fine cloth or lace, filling it with foodstuffs such as eggs, bread, bacon and sweets, covering it all in linen and decorating it with sprigs of boxwood, or bukszpan, the Easter evergreen. Everything in the basket has a particular meaning relating to the Passion and Resurrection of Our Lord. Here’s just a few of the treats and their symbolism:

Eggs – new life and Christ’s Resurrection
Horseradish – the bitterness of Christ’s Passion
Easter Bread (babka) – a traditional bread symbolizing the risen Christ
Lamb – signifies the Paschal Lamb and is usually made from the same yeast cake as babka
Bacon – the superabundance of God’s goodness (validation for all the bacon-lovers out there)
Sweets – Heaven and the good things to come
Salt – immortality

Many other things might be included, such as butter, symbolizing the richness of our salvation and the end of Lent, and kiełbasa links that illustrate the chains of death broken by Christ. The linen covering itself represents the shroud of Christ.

Of course, no one is more knowledgeable about a country’s traditions than a bona fide native. Fr. Andrzej Komorowski, Superior General of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, hails from Poland, and he told us a bit about how the święconka tradition is celebrated in his home country.

“In many families there would be children (with the parents/grandparents) who go and bring the basket,” he said. “It is also an occasion to visit and pray at the tomb of Christ (the Blessed Sacrament is transferred to the tomb for adoration on Good Friday).”

Though the baskets are blessed on Holy Saturday, they must of course remain untouched until Easter.

“This blessed food will be used at the Easter Sunday breakfast which will start after the morning Mass,” said Fr. Komorowski. “We start the breakfast with wishes and sharing of this blessed food.”

A mighty penance indeed to see all the wonderful goodies but to remain disciplined until Easter morning! The longing itself typifies the great anticipation we feel during the final hours of the Triduum as we await Christ’s glorious Resurrection and the promise of new life that He brings. On Easter morning, the shroud is laid aside and we partake with joy in the blessings of the risen Christ. We certainly hope that your Easter is overflowing with the blessings of God, so richly symbolized by this enduring tradition. Happy Easter, or as they say in Poland, Wesołych Świąt Wielkanocnych! +