Saint Aidan Catholic Church - Livonia, MI
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  • Discover
    • Schedule >
      • Holy Week
    • Livestream Masses
    • Lent Fish Dinners
    • Contact
    • Register
    • About >
      • Our Patron Saint
      • Church Tour
      • PRES Plan
    • Groups >
      • Women of St. Aidan
      • Men's Club
      • Men's Prayer Group
      • Young(ish) Adults
    • Links
  • Grow
    • March Enrichment
    • Lent '23
    • Families
    • Blog
    • Bible Studies >
      • Exodus
    • Sacrament Prep >
      • Reconciliation & Holy Communion
      • Confirmation
    • Young(ish) Adults
    • Youth Ministry
    • Ongoing Enrichment >
      • Online Studies
      • Sacraments
      • Faith Basics
      • Library Database
    • Children's Liturgy of the Word
    • Become Catholic
    • VBS
  • Service
    • Assistance
    • Pray
    • Vocations
    • Volunteer
  • Give
    • Electronic Donations
    • CSA
    • Endowment

Something Different

9/30/2018

 
Dear St. Aidan Family:
​

Today my “Sing Praise” article space in the Bulletin is dedicated to the story of the death of Fr. Rick Hartmann’s Dad fifty years ago. We will be celebrating that Memorial at the 11:30 Mass on October 7 here at St. Aidan. Since his retirement, Fr. Rick has celebrated various Masses with us here - as he considers this his retirement-church home. He loves our Community and feels welcomed here by us. We hope you can join us to pray and celebrate with Fr. Rick’s family next weekend - or at least come and hear a prelude (before Mass recital) by his grand-cousin Mr. Alex Kinmonth (principal oboist with The Detroit Symphony Orchestra) as part of this remembrance mass. In the meantime - for whatever you may celebrate and remember - keep singing!

Elizabeth Dyc

Kurt Hartmann (Fr. Rick’s Dad) emigrated to the United States in 1929 at the age of 24. He was a young, single man looking for a new life.  He was a baker by trade and an amateur boxer living with the dream of “making his fortune” like Joe Louis and Max Schmelling in the boxing ring.  While working for Stahl's Bakery on the East Side of Detroit, he met Anna Doser, who also immigrated in 1929, and was working as a housemaid and child care worker for a doctor’s family in Grosse Pointe.  Kurt took Anna to a couple of his boxing matches while they were dating; Anna told him if he was interested in her he would go back to baking; or otherwise “no go!”  They married in 1934, living on the East Side and then in 1941 moving to the West Side of Detroit, buying their first bakery on Woodrow Wilson.

Kurt and Anna had five children and lived in the apartment above the bakery until #5 came along. Needing more than the two bedrooms, they moved behind the bakery into a three-bedroom home on Richton.  They expanded the business to three bakeries, also buying an industrial catering company next door on Woodrow Wilson, with trucks going out to factory workers to sell soup, sandwiches and other sundry items.  We all worked in the bakery and catering, and grew up in a happy, hard-working family.  In October, 1968, however, life changed for my family.

On October 4, 1968, at 7am in the morning, a man on drugs came in the back door of the catering bakery with a gun in his hand.  He had my Father Kurt and two other workers lie on the floor and he shot all three of them. He killed my Dad and the other man and wounded the other worker.  At the time, my younger brother Paul and I, were both studying in the Seminary for the priesthood.  My oldest brother, Kurt, had left for one of the truck routes a few minutes before the robber came in; and my sister, Marianne, had already left for work. My other sister, Helen, was married and living with her husband and four children.  During the robbery, my Mom was across the street in our home on Richton, making breakfast for Dad for when he came over from the business.

Life would never be the same for any of us. Paul and I both talked about quitting the Seminary and coming home to help our brother Kurt run the business; but Mother insisted that Dad would want us to go back to what we were doing rather than change our lives… both of us obediently went back to St. John's Seminary, Paul in his second year of Theology and me, in my first year.  But of course, life changed anyway; our Dad was gone because in a moment of desperation, this person took him from us. In the past, from my priests’ pulpit, I have told this story of my own struggle for letting go of the anger and my search for forgiveness of this perpetrator of sad. It never fails that other people would approach me afterward and tell their own stories of loss and grief. All of our lives are a journey of love and faith; seeking the comfort of God and each other. Thanks for letting me share my story with you! Dad, you are still missed.

Yours in Christ,

Fr. Rick

We Are Growing

9/24/2018

 
Last year we set out to respond to the needs of our busy families in faith formation and, in the process, answered the Archbishop’s call to make families the foundation for Christian Formation.  #UnleashTheGospel  We went from a weekly classroom experience for the children only, to a monthly family experience where the parents and the children are growing at the same time.

It was new, there were some wrinkles that had to be ironed out, but by the end of the year we were offering a phenomenal experience every month. For years, the trend had been a shrinking program.  This year, we welcomed seven new families and over a dozen new children to our family faith formation program.  Most of them came from neighboring parishes because they heard about it from one of our families.  #Evangelization   Despite a larger eighth grade class leaving us, we were able to grow our enrollment by five.  As I write this, another family just signed up. 

Exactly a year ago, we were hopeful, but still uncertain, that our bold stroke was the right one.  Our families giving witnesses to peers is more than enough evidence that we absolutely hit the mark.  In previous years, we did not often (or ever) experience families telling their friends, “You should come to St. Aidan, the experience is so much better.”  Again, I am thankful to Fr. Kevin and the community for supporting our vision.  St. Aidan pours its resources into formation of the next generation.  Those dollars and volunteer hours have never been more wisely spent. 

Paul Pyrkosz
Coordinator of Youth Ministry   

Ambition for a Righteous Life

9/24/2018

 
I think that today’s reading from St. James is one that should be published everywhere, carved on buildings and inscribed on our hearts. He writes us a letter containing a very clear description of how we humans operate against God’s plans for us: “Where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder and every foul practice.” All that you need to do is turn on the news and you will see this observation is very true.

St. James also gives us the antidote to this poison of our sin: he gives us the wisdom we need to live the Word and be saved. He reminds us of the wisdom that comes from above: it is pure, peaceable, gentle, compliant and merciful. Wisdom is always consistent and sincere; and a life lived in this wisdom is a life of righteousness and peace, war and conflict are fruitless pursuits.

St. James warns us: “You covet but do not possess. You kill and envy but you cannot obtain…You ask but do not receive…” (Sounds fruitless to me…) It is our passion in ambition and in jealousy that foment conflict among us. As disciples we are called to strive for righteousness, to use the wisdom from above to guide our lives and choices. I saw a bumper sticker recently that says it succinctly: “No Jesus, No Peace. Know Jesus, Know Peace.”

Today in the Gospel Jesus teaches the disciples (and us) a lesson of living in God’s wisdom: He gives us directions to avoid ambition and jealousy—and thereby living a life of true service in Christ. He says: “If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all.” Jesus goes on: “Whoever receives one child… in my name, receives me…” Children of Jesus’ day were the most powerless of people (and in our day too, for all intents and purposes). To receive a child is to give assistance to someone, to anyone, who may be helpless⎯and is usually unable to ever return your support in kind.  This is the opposite of ambition and jealousy. To live a life in service of the helpless and powerless is to live a righteous life, to know Jesus and know His peace. Now that’s the ambition I want!

Keep singing!

Elizabeth Dyc

Enlisting Witnesses for Jesus Christ

9/17/2018

 
This year, September 16 has been designated Catechetical Sunday. The theme is “Enlisting Eyewitnesses for Jesus Christ.”  Catechetical Sunday is a wonderful opportunity to reflect on the role that each of us plays, by virtue of our Baptism, in handing on the faith and being a witness of Jesus.  It is also a chance for all of us to rededicate ourselves to this mission as a community of faith.

A missionary is one who is sent to share the Good News of Jesus with others.  We all have been called to do this by reason of our Baptism.  The only way to adequately fulfill this call is to foster our relationship with Jesus - to be His committed disciple.  A disciple is a pupil or follower - and this means much more than just learning about Jesus - it means imitating Him in all things.  Only in doing that can we adequately reflect Jesus to those with whom we engage.  And so on this Catechetical Sunday, let us rededicate ourselves to the task of undergoing development in our understanding of the faith, the faith we have in the Person of Jesus our Savior, who wishes us to share the fruits of our relationship and knowledge of Him with others.  I should like to ask you to pray particularly for our parish catechists, child-care aides, and especially the families who have committed themselves to being the primary educators of the faith to their children by participating in our family formation program.

Prayer for Family Commitment

Loving and merciful Father, who instituted the family as an instrument of your fruitful love and raised it to be a sacrament of the love of your Son for his Church, send forth your Holy Spirit to forgive us for our sinful failures, to heal the personal and social wounds that afflict us, to bring consolation to the vulnerable among us, and to enable us to reach out in compassionate care to all those families in need.

Make possible within us and for us what only you can do. Through Christ our Lord. Amen. 

Prayer for Catechists

O God, our Heavenly Father, you have given us the gift of these catechists to be heralds of the Gospel to our parish family.
​
We lift them up to you in thanksgiving and intercede for them concerning their hopes and needs.

May we be attentive to the presence of your Word in them, a Word that lifts up and affirms, calls forth and challenges, is compassionate and consoles.

We pray that our parish family will always be blessed with those who have responded to the call to share in Christ’s prophetic mission as catechists. May we too be open to the universal call to service that Christ addresses to all of his disciples, contributing our gifts to the communion of faith, the Church.

We ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

David J. Conrad

Deny Yourself

9/17/2018

 
St. James reminds us today that faith without works is dead. We should know that it is not enough to just believe, and to show up for church every Sunday—those actions are not enough to be our best selves and to be part of God’s intentions for us. We must live the Gospel--witness the Gospel in the world—by our loving actions, forgiveness, charity and sacrifice. 

In the Gospel Jesus asks, “Who do you say that I am?” We answer this question by our witness: our actions, our priorities, our service, our love and forgiveness for each other. We are called every day to take up our crosses and lift them high. Our time, talent and treasure are consigned to God and the Kingdom on earth. I once heard a cynic say: “I’d rather see a sermon, than hear one.” 

The hymn “Christ Has No Body Now But Yours” (Missalette #225) has a text by St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582) that fully describes our mission here on earth. The goal of every Christian on this journey of faith is to live in His way and truth, and to teach by our lives⎯always. To paraphrase the “Workbook for Lectors and Gospel Readers,” we must grow up as Christians and step beyond just trying to be good people; we must also be good for people. How to do this? Self-denial and sacrifice. 

This is the always the challenge for us: to be tired but to visit an aged relative anyway; to rise in the night to comfort a terrified child; to go to work and support your family even when the work is soul-killing; to put aside what we enjoy doing and take care of needed chores and tasks…the list is endless. All of our moments are about how we choose to spend them—and they show who we are and what we believe. Jesus in the Gospel today accuses us of “not thinking as God does, but as human beings do.” We are called to “Lift High the Cross” in moments of self-denial that show who we are as His disciples. This is never, ever easy - we must continue to be practicing Christians in all we say and do. 

Keep singing!

Elizabeth Dyc

    Authors

    David J. Conrad, M.A. Theology. Our Director of Faith Formation.

    Paul Pyrkosz. Our Youth Minister & Bookkeeper.

    ​Elizabeth Dyc. Our Director of Music Ministry.

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St. Aidan Catholic Church
17500 Farmington Rd. 
Livonia, MI 48152
Phone: 734-425-5950
office@saintaidanlivonia.org

Weekend Mass Schedule
Saturday Vigil: 5:00 p.m.
Sunday: 7:30, 9:30, 11:30 a.m.

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