One Small Child

Bulletin Letter, Advent Sunday 2A

The theme of the 18^th Christmas on the Prairie Concert: One Small Child, calls to mind both the very ordinary circumstances of our Savior’s birth and the extraordinary impact this event has had on all of human history. First, we might consider how startlingly humble are our Lord’s first breaths upon this earth that He Himself had made. Like us, He is born of a human mother, nursed at her breasts, held, kissed, and caressed in her arms. Like us, this God—upon whom everything in existence constantly depends—Himself chooses to be born in utter need and dependency. Wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger, to be kept warm by the breath of ox and ass. Watched and protected by Joseph, a carpenter and son of David. We are left to marvel at why God the Almighty, who is able to do whatever He wills, would choose to enter our world so seemingly powerless and fragile as to need so much from His own creation.

At the same, we recall how very strange and extraordinary are the other aspects of His birth. That very same night, shepherds come to worship Him after seeing a vision of resplendent angels in the sky above their pastures, angels singing of glory to God and peace to men of good will. Three magi from the East come seeking the newborn King of the Jews, whose birth had been foretold. Isaiah had spoken of the Virgin conceiving and bearing a Son who would be Emmanuel, “God-with-us.” And when the magi question the authorities in Jerusalem about where the Messiah was to be born, the scholars answer readily with another prophecy from Micah: “But you, Bethlehem-Ephrathah, small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come forth for Me the One who is to be ruler over Israel, One whose origins are from of old, from everlasting.”

And from the birth of this One Small Child, the world would never be the same, forever changed by One so seemingly ordinary, destined to rule all the nations of the earth. The Child laid upon the wood of a manger amidst the food of beasts of burden, destined to lay His sacred arms upon the wood of a Cross, to bear our burdens and heal our wounds. To give His Flesh for the life of the world and to become our Food for the nourishment of our souls.

May this One Small Child guide you as we prepare to celebrate His Nativity and throughout your lives until we reach His eternal dwellings.

All Out of Time

Homily, Advent Sunday 1A

Every year or so, we get another shipment of these little blue books, The Catholic Devotional. I remember these from my home parish as I was growing up. I don’t think I used them all that much, but on one of the pages, at least in earlier printings, there was sort of a clever poem that has come to mind again recently. The poem is titled, “No Time”: I knelt to pray but not for long. / I had too much to do. / I had to hurry and get to work / For bills would soon be due. // So I knelt and said a hurried prayer / And jumped up off my knees. / My Christian duty was now done. / My soul could rest at ease. // Now all day long I had no time / To spread a word of cheer. / No time to speak of Christ to friends. / They’d laugh at me I’d fear. // “No time. No time. Too much to do.” / That was my constant cry. / No time to give to souls in need. / At last the time to die. // I went before the Lord, I came, / I stood with downcast eyes. / For in his hands God held a book. / It was the book of life. // God looked into his book and said, / “Your name I cannot find. / I once was going to write it down / But never found the time.” 

It’s popular today in our culture to be always busy, to be filling our time with all sorts of activities, and to convey to the people around us that we’re really busy. I’ve fallen into this habit myself when someone asks me how things are going or how I’m doing, the easy and standard reply is, “It’s been busy, lots of meetings and funerals this year,” or something to that effect, and maybe it has been busy, but each of us is given the same 24 hours each day, and we always seem to find the time for things we really want to do.  

This Advent season is a great opportunity to ask ourselves, Are we really spending our time wisely, on the things of lasting importance in life? And how much do we really invest in that relationship with God that is meant to last for ever? The Catechism quotes St. Alphonsus Liguori as saying, “Those who pray are certainly saved. Those who do not pray are certainly damned.” Now if any of us are too busy to pray, we really are too busy, and something urgently needs to change. As the Gospel tells us, if we are too busy—or too lazy—to keep watch for the Lord’s return, we risk our entire eternity. Nothing else in this short life is of greater importance.  

So what is the quality of our prayer, and how many hours of practice have we really devoted to it? Is prayer a skill we’ve actually worked at to develop? Is it enough just to be present for maybe an hour each week, as prayer is going on around us? Or do we speak to God personally, from our own hearts? Do we surrender ourselves into God’s hands, each day and in each moment, not just paying lip service, but really striving to open our hearts and minds to God, to give Him our full attention and sincere concerns? God is not a thing, but we often seem to treat Him more like something rather than treating Him like Someone. He isn’t just some force that we rely on or perform a certain set of tasks or say certain words to get Him to do what we want Him to. God is a Trinity of Persons. Do we talk to God, to the Father, to Jesus, to the Holy Spirit, as we would talk to the person next to us, someone that we can see and hear? Or do we more often relate to God as if He’s not really real? 

Many of us have things that we do or give up during the season of Lent, but how many of us make a similar commitment for Advent? Disciplines that would be appropriate for Advent would include things like a media fast, shutting off the TV and social media, or really limiting ourselves to just a short amount of time each day for these activities, our “screen time,” and leave ourselves more time to pray, to “be watchful,” to “be alert” for the Lord, to read Scripture and the Catechism, to spend time listening to all that God has said to us, to what God continues to say to His holy people.  

God doesn’t want this to be just another December for us, another missed opportunity that we could end up regretting for the rest of eternity. How is God calling you to grow in prayer and vigilance this Advent season, and in the virtue of hope? What spiritual exercises have we neglected for a while, as we’ve made ourselves too busy and grown spiritually out of shape? Advent is an opportunity to recommit ourselves to the daily Rosary, daily meditation, the morning offering, night prayer. We do not know the day or the hour when the Lord will call us from this life. “Be watchful! Be alert!” Be ready at all times for your Lord’s return.

Three Advents of Christ

Bulletin Letter, Advent Sunday 1A

Advent was the last liturgical season to develop in the Church’s history, as a penitential season leading up to the full joy of Christmas, just as Lent is meant to prepare us for Easter. The name Advent simply means ‘coming,’ or ‘arrival’ and the season focuses on three moments when Christ comes to meet us.  

What’s usually referred to as the First Advent of Christ was at the First Christmas, when He first became visible as a Baby in Bethlehem, born in weakness and poverty. What we call the Second Coming of Christ refers to His return in power and glory at the end of the world, for the Judgment of the Nations. We might also include in our consideration of His Second Coming the particular judgment each of us will face at the end of our lives. The third moment that Christ comes to us is in the present, today, through grace and the Sacraments. God’s work in our world and history is not just a thing of the past (as at that First Christmas) or of the future (at the end of the world or of our lives), but God wants to transform us today, and in every present moment through the Advent of His Messiah into our lives. 

Because Advent focuses on the fulfillment of God’s promises, His promises to the people of Israel long ago, Christ’s promise to return at the end of time, and His promise to give us new life here and now, the virtue that we should especially foster during this season is hope. Christian hope desires and obtains what God promises to give. There are many things that we hope for, even on a natural level, and God is generous in pouring out His blessings upon us, even if we do have to suffer or wait from time to time. Even more than the blessings of health, food, shelter, education, or any other good thing, God especially wants to give us Himself, in the Eucharist, in the communion of prayer, and ultimately in the eternal life of heaven.  

How do we exercise our desire for God and His gifts during this Advent season to grow in the virtue of hope? We all know the Lenten practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, and most Catholics try to give something up or do something extra throughout Lent, but do we ever commit ourselves to anything special throughout the season of Advent? During Advent, the focus is not so much on fasting or almsgiving, but we are called to “Stay awake!” “Be sober and alert.” To keep watch and pray. Vigils in the darkness of early morning or of the night hours are especially appropriate “as we await the blessed hope and the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ.” 

Enthroned Upon the Cross

Homily, Christ the King Sunday C

The Catholic faith is full of paradoxes, things that at first glance seem like a contradiction. “Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it.” “Unless a grain of wheat falls to ground and dies, it remains just a single grain. But if it dies, it produces a rich harvest.” Today we celebrate the Solemnity of our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, but in the Gospel we just heard, what is the throne that Jesus chose for His coronation? He reigns as King from the Cross, an instrument of torture and public execution. He is crowned, not with silver or gold, but with thorns that tear into His skull. Christ’s execution and debasement is, at the same time, His exaltation and glory. In John’s Gospel, Jesus says, “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself” (12:32). Every crucifix continues to proclaim the love of God and the sovereignty of Christ that has the power to conquer and rule over human hearts more surely than any emperor or president or any other king throughout the history of the world.

Those who try to rule by superior strength, by military might, or economic influence, these have always come and gone, and their kingdoms rise and fall in every age. Jesus conquers, not by demonstrating His superior strength, but by laying down His life for us, being wounded for us, stretching out His arms and having His heart pierced, pouring out the last drops of His Precious Blood for us. When Jesus, lifted up on the Cross or raised up in this Eucharist upon the altar, when He draws us to Himself, we are faced with a choice, the same choice as those who witnessed the crucifixion 2000 years ago. Will we place our faith in this mysterious power of Christ, power that is “made perfect in weakness,” in trial, in persecution and suffering (2 Corinthians 12:9)? Will we freely take up our own cross and follow after Christ as His disciples? Or, will we rebel against that sort of King? Do we revile Jesus with the crowds, with one of the criminals saying, “‘Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us.’ Jesus, can’t you see that the world is spinning out of control? With natural disasters, with acts of terrorism, with incompetent and corrupt political and religious leaders? Jesus, what are you waiting for? Intervene. We’ve had enough of God’s weakness already. Come down from the Cross. It’s time for God to show His strength.”

Even in our personal lives we might become frustrated and impatient with God’s gentleness. There might be a sin or several sins that we’ve struggled with for years, keeping us as slaves, or we see a family member or close friend enslaved by sin and wonder, “‘Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us.’ Take control. Force us to be good.” But in freeing us from the slavery of sin, God refuses to make us slaves of His own goodness. God always invites. He does not force His way in. Jesus stands at the door and knocks (Revelation 3:20). He waits for us to respond, to open ourselves to Him. God wants us as His children and His friends, not as His slaves.

Now imagine the faith of that other criminal in today’s Gospel, whom tradition gives the name of St. Dismas. It’s fairly easy to acknowledge Jesus as King when He feeds the five thousand or when He enters Jerusalem on Palm Sunday to shouts of “Hosanna in the highest,” or when our life and our world is going according to plan, but imagine seeing this King crucified and you yourself suffering and dying next to Him on a cross of your own, and somehow, you have the audacity, the foolishness in the eyes of the world, you have the faith to say to this dying Messiah, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” How many of us would be prepared to say that in those circumstances? To acknowledge the coming kingdom of a God so seemingly powerless in the face of all the evil in the world as to be killed by His very own people? And then to believe Him when He replies, “Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”

This is the same faith that on November 23, 1927, allowed the martyr Bl. Miguel Pro to stretch out his own arms in the form of a cross in front of the firing squad, and to proclaim with his final words “¡Viva Cristo Rey!” Long live Christ the King! even as he had seen his beloved Mexico ravaged by civil war and by corrupt and anti-Catholic governments and dictators over the course of the previous 10 or 20 years. Put to death when he was only 36 years old, and just two years into his priesthood, Miguel Pro had probably hoped and planned on many more years to serve God and His people here on earth. When life doesn’t go according to plan, when we suffer injustice and tragedy, when God seems to ask too much from us, or when He seems silent in the face of great evil, do we still have the faith to proclaim that Christ reigns as King over all?

Long after every other human power has passed away, long after every earthly kingdom or empire has risen and fallen again, one kingdom of heaven will still endure. God grant us the grace today to transform the questioning in our hearts, “Are you not the Christ?” into the confession of our faith, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” “¡Viva Cristo Rey!” Long live Christ the King!

Ablaze with Thanksgiving

Bulletin Letter, Christ the King Sunday C

This Monday, November 21, is the deadline for providing feedback to the Bishop about the configuration of the new pastorates or parish clusters that will take effect next July. Hopefully you’ve been able to review the information and share any thoughts you have on setablazesf.org. One related consideration that’s come to my attention recently involves the Masses and Mass intentions scheduled for next July and beyond. We can’t assume that the same number of Masses or Mass times will be maintained after the implementation of the new pastorates. Much of that will need to be worked out in consultation with the priests and other parishes as they will then be grouped together. 

Other concerns that will need to be addressed in the coming months are related to Bowdle and Hoven being assigned to different pastorates. For many years, we have shared expenses and office duties, including bookkeeping, recording sacraments, scheduling Masses, counting collections, and preparing a shared bulletin. Most likely, many of these tasks will eventually be pooled among the parishes grouped together in the new pastorates. But leading up to next July, I’d like to be confident that at least someone in each parish is prepared to handle some of these tasks when the time comes for the split, until coordination within the new pastorates becomes well-established. As I’ve mentioned previously, having more than one sacristan and choir director in each parish should be a goal as well. 

With everything going on in our country and in our diocese, it’s more important than ever to focus on what we are truly thankful for: family, friends, good food, heated houses, peace, the beauty of God’s creation, and the gift of each new day. Thanksgiving is what we owe to God above all else, since we receive every grace and blessing through His loving providence.  

One Preface of the Mass confesses, “It is truly right and just, our duty and salvation, always and everywhere to give you thanks… For, although you have no need of our praise, yet our thanksgiving is itself your gift, since our praises add nothing to your greatness but profit us for salvation, through Christ our Lord.” The word Eucharist itself comes from the Greek word for Thanksgiving. Beyond any other gift, God gives us His own Flesh and Blood, Soul and Divinity, as Christ continues to pour Himself out for us and for the entire world. All praise and honor, glory and thanksgiving, belong to Him. 

No World Without Worship

Homily, Ordinary Sunday 33C

Every generation throughout history has had some people convinced that the end of the world was going to take place within their own lifetimes. Even today’s climate alarmists who claim that we’re on our way towards mass extinction around the end of each decade due to climate change are just the latest in a long line of doomsday “prophets.” I was able to find a list of the different dates and years that have been predicted as the end of the world, many of which were even proposed by Christians over the centuries. One hundred and fifty-seven predictions that have come and gone, and the world keeps spinning. No doubt there have been many, many other predictions that are not found on that list that have also not come true.

The signs that Jesus talks about in the Gospel, “wars and insurrections,” nation rising “against nation, and kingdom against kingdom” … “powerful earthquakes, famines, and plagues from place to place, and awesome sights and mighty signs” from the sky, we know that all these things Jesus mentions have been part of every age in human history, and our own is not all that unique. “No one knows the day or the hour.” One thing that Jesus does seem to guarantee is that persecution and trial are in store for those who choose to truly follow Him.

One of the other difficulties in trying to understand the meaning of these passages in Scripture that speak of the end times is that, in the days of Jesus, many related events and concepts were joined together in the Jewish mind. So, just as we might think of the end of the United States of America or the closing of parishes or the death of a loved one as the end of the world in some sense, the Jews and early Christians associated the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem with the end of time, the end of the heavens and the earth, and the return of the Messiah in glory.

So it’s not always clear which prophecies were meant for the destruction of the Temple and the end of the Jewish world, and which prophecies apply to the end of the world in general. The destruction of the Temple took place in the year 70, just one Biblical generation after the death of Jesus on the Cross. It might be difficult for us in the modern era to understand why the Temple in Jerusalem was so important to the Jews. We tend to think it doesn’t make any difference, where you pray to God, whether it’s here at the church, or in your pajamas at home. God is everywhere. But what was special about the Temple? Even in the time of Jesus, there were lots of synagogues where Jews would meet to reflect upon the Scriptures, not just in Jerusalem, but in almost every town that had a Jewish population.

So what was different about the Temple? The Temple in Jerusalem was the only place in the world where Jews were allowed to offer sacrifice to God, and in the ancient mindset, sacrifice and worship were basically seen as the same thing. Without sacrifice, worship of God in the full sense was no longer possible. You could still pray, and praise, and read Scripture as they did in the synagogues, but you really wouldn’t be able to worship God. That’s why Jews saw the destruction of the Temple as the end of the world, because then sacrifice and worship of the one true God would cease from the earth, or so they thought. This is the same reason that shortly after Jesus foretells the destruction of the Temple, He institutes a New and Eternal Covenant at the Last Supper, a new Sacrifice to God of His own Body and Blood, a new worship of the one true God, in Spirit and in truth, not just in Jerusalem, but throughout the world at the hands of His Apostles and their successors.

So what can we learn from the faith of the Jews when it comes to the Sacrifice of the Mass that we celebrate? Are we convinced, as they were, that there is nothing in the world more important than the proper worship of God? Do we recognize and believe that this Sacrifice of Christ’s Body and Blood is what actually sustains the whole world, and that if it were to cease, if the Eucharist would no longer be celebrated, the whole world may as well come to an end? There could be many other things that we think we cannot live without, things we might associate with the end of our world, for example, if the United States ceased to be a nation, or closer to home, if I no longer had control of my own life, or lacked the resources to do what I want when I want. What is it that you cannot live without? And if the Eucharist is truly “the source and summit” of the Christian life, as the Church teaches, where in our own world do we place the worship of God and the Sacrifice of Christ in this Sacrament? What are our priorities?

Even if none of us is still around on the day of Christ’s final return at the end of time, each of us will meet Christ on an unexpected day and at an unknown hour, at the end of our life. Will we be ready for the Day of the Lord when he returns for us? Will we fear that Day, as a day of fire and destruction for the wicked, or will we be able to welcome the Sun of Justice, who brings healing and mercy in His radiance? May God prepare us to meet the Lord today in this Eucharist and at the end of our world.

The Days Grow Short

Bulletin Letter, Ordinary Sunday 33C

When I was growing up I always remember winter being my favorite season. I loved snow, sledding, hot chocolate. The cold still doesn’t bother me much. You can always wear more clothes or grab a blanket. One thing that has changed over the years, though, is how much I dislike these shorter days and lack of sunlight. Really makes me wonder at what it must have been like for people long ago when they couldn’t just flip a switch to have the whole room light up. We take a lot for granted.

Plants depend on light, especially the sun’s rays, to provide food and energy to everything else that eats and makes use of them. Almost all energy on earth originates from the sun. In humans especially in areas farther from the equator, lack of sunlight in winter has even been linked to depression and seasonal affective disorder. Be sure to get plenty of vitamin D in these darker months.

Much of our Catholic faith uses the analogy of light as well. Another name for baptism was the sacrament of illumination, when we receive the gift of faith, “a lamp to my feet, a light to my path,” helping us to walk without stumbling (Ps. 119:105). The Easter Vigil, in the holiest night of the year, begins with a blessing of fire, praise of the Paschal candle, and lighting candles throughout the church in honor of the dazzling light of Christ’s Resurrection. Scripture also talks about living in the light, knowing that all our actions are seen by God. Sins and crimes are most often carried out under cover of darkness and secrecy.

Jesus is the Sun that never sets. As the days grow shorter and darker, all the more need for us to turn more fervently to Christ our Light, “the Sun of righteousness, with healing in His wings” (Mal. 4:2). Do not be found among those who “loved the darkness rather than the Light because their deeds were evil” (Jn. 3:19). The world today is all too full of darkness without Catholics and Christians adding to it. Instead, we are to be light to the world, salt of the earth, a city set on a hill (Cf. Mt. 5:13-14). “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light, for the fruit of the light is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth” (Eph. 5:8-9). As Christ is Light for us, so we must be light for the world.

Who You Live For

Homily, Ordinary Sunday 32C

What would you be willing to die for? Maybe a better question would be: Who would you willing to die for? Who are you willing to live for? Two plus three equals five. That’s a true statement. But even though it’s true, and we can have a certain appreciation for mathematics, I don’t think there have been many people willing to die for “two plus three equals five.” But millions of Christians have been willing and have actually died for statements like, “Jesus Christ is Lord,” or “Jesus is risen from the dead,” and, “there exists only one God in three Divine Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” For the martyrs, these statements of faith are not merely true in an abstract and impersonal way—like we might consider the truths of mathematics—but they had come to know Jesus personally and to experience God, not just as a nice idea, but as a reality, significant for every aspect of their daily lives.

Even the martyrs that we hear about in our first reading from Maccabees died not so much for the Jewish law that forbade them from eating pork, but they had courage to die because they knew and trusted personally the God who had given the law. They knew that all life is in His hands, and through the course of their own lives they had experienced God’s power and His providence for them. They knew that the One who had first given life to their souls and bodies would give life to them again in the resurrection, if they remained faithful to His commandments.

How many of us today, who have the advantage over those Jewish martyrs of all that Jesus reveals for us—and the testimony to the point of death of the Apostles who saw, and spoke, and ate with Jesus after He had risen from the dead—how many of us today would have such faith, such courage, to die for the God who gives us life? To believe so firmly, so personally, in the God who raises from the dead that we have no fear at all of what others might try to take away from us. Or is our faith in God still too abstract and impersonal? Nice ideas, but not really significant in my daily life?

The martyrs were content to have all their property taken away, because God can provide for us a more lasting inheritance in His heavenly kingdom. The martyrs who were sent to prison and put in chains knew that belonging to God, being His children, is a more authentic and lasting freedom than being unrestricted in our movements. And the martyrs who suffered torture and gave their lives gave them gladly, because they knew the love that Jesus has for us, the love that led Him to suffer and die on the Cross, with every last drop of His Precious Blood. To the martyrs, these were not just nice ideas, abstract and impersonal. Instead, the love and promises of God were personally significant realities they had come to know through their daily lives of faith and prayer, and in their experience of God’s presence through the sacraments of His Church.

Some still find it difficult to imagine today that we would ever see Christians martyred here in the United States, but then, if you would have asked me 20 years ago, I never imagined that our country would experience such rapid social and cultural decline, such flight from God and reality, such constant social engineering and manipulation, such a rise in the number of fractured families and mental illness, as what we’ve all witnessed since then. And it hasn’t slowed down. It’s not going to take another 20 years to complete the madness.

So the question is a real question. Who would you be willing to die for? Who would you be willing to live for? To finally die to sin in your life and live for God? To stand and defend the cultural values that you hope will still be around for the next generation, and the one after that? But if you do nothing, if we always just say, That’s someone else’s problem, it’ll reach your own doorstep soon enough. This Tuesday is just one day. What are doing the other 364 days of the year to bring our families, our neighbors, our culture and society back to God, back to reality? Those who want to take our country away from God have been working at it publicly, politically, for a far longer time. And they’ll continue to succeed as long as enough of us just throw up our hands and say, Well, not my problem. Millions are still killed in the womb each year. Millions of my own generation, gone without a trace, silenced from this world forever. I can’t think of any problem bigger or more personal than that. So, who are you willing to die for? Who are you willing to live for? Those who were never given a chance at life? Live for God and live for them on Tuesday and every day of your life.

Foundational Issues

Bulletin Letter, Ordinary Sunday 32C

One discussion during each election season that I’ve never really understood is the criticism leveled against those characterized as single-issue voters. I tend to doubt the accuracy of this characterization to begin with. I don’t think that very many voters actually just look at one issue and ignore the rest, but even if that is how they choose to vote, whether that’s a good, bad, or intelligent thing to do would depend on the relative weight and importance of that single issue. As intelligent voters, we should realize that not all issues or party platform items carry the same weight. Certain issues are much more fundamental and foundational.  

If the single deciding factor I use in my consideration of a candidate is, for example, their favorite color or their favorite fast food, of course this would be ridiculous and a very poor criterion to use when it comes to voting. Other issues and rights, though, can be a necessary condition for anyone to enjoy the rest of the goods of society. The right to life leaps to mind as one such foundational right. Personally, I tend to have very little confidence that a candidate or party will have our best interests at heart in the areas of education, the economy, concern for our military men and women, or any other areas, when this same candidate or party have professed themselves unwilling to defend—or even actively opposed to—the rights to “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness” of a whole class of human beings, namely, the unborn.  

Now I’m not a single-issue voter myself, despite what many might say about it, but I do realize that had I not been born, little else would make much difference to me, so I don’t look down upon others who care enough about life to make it their primary focus when it comes to casting their vote. The overturning of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court—far from finishing the fight for life—makes it more relevant than ever as it leaves the question to legislators in each State. 

In South Dakota, we also have a few ballot measures to vote on, and it is helpful to read about those before being handed your ballot on Tuesday, both to speed the process and to be sure that you understand the measures. You can see a list and read about the South Dakota ballot measures online. Both bishops of the South Dakota Catholic Conference have ruled that Catholics should vote No on Initiated Measure 27. Because of its effects on the gift of human reason, the legalization of recreational use of marijuana is not something that Catholics in good conscience can support. More information is available at sdcatholicconference.org. Please continue to pray for our State and country.