Confirmation for 2010:   May 18th

For more information, please contact Jim Clifford or Father Bruce Roby at the Parish Center, 375-5887.

Meaning:

The Sacrament of Confirmation perfects Baptismal grace and through the gifts of the Holy Spirit helps us grow to Christian maturity.By Confirmation the baptized are more perfectly bound to the Lord Jesus and His Church, and they are enriched with a special strength of the Holy Spirit to be witnesses of Christ and the truth of His Gospel.

It roots us more deeply in the divine filiation through the power of the Holy Spirit who makes us cry, “Abba! Father”. It unites us more firmly to Christ. He fills us with His gifts. He strengthens our bond with the Church

Origins:

On several occasions in His preaching, the Lord Jesus promised an outpouring of God the Holy Spirit on His disciples, and this promise was fulfilled first on the Day of Resurrection and then more strikingly at Pentecost. St. Peter declared this outpouring of the Holy Spirit to be the sign of the messianic age. From that time on and in fulfillment of Christ’s command, the Apostles imparted to the newly baptized by the laying on of hands the gift of the Holy Spirit to complete the grace of Baptism.

The imposition of hands, therefore, is the origin of the sacrament of Confirmation which perpetuates the grace of Pentecost in the Church. Very early in the Church’s life this apostolic laying on of hands was accompanied by an anointing with perfumed oil called sacred chrism, the better to signify the gift of the Holy Spirit Who anointed the Lord Jesus at His own Baptism. This anointing highlights the name “Christian,” which derives from the sacred title of Messiah (or Christ from the Greek translation), meaning “the Anointed One.”

Information about our Confirmation program will be sent in December 2008 to parents of teens in grades 9 and up who are registered in our parish and have completed several recent years of catechesis through our religious education program or St. James School.

Contact Jim Clifford or Father Bruce through the Parish Center (375-5887) for information.