Dear Parish Family,
It is with great sadness that we mourn the death of our beloved "Coach" Mare Von Lindern who passed away unexpectedly on May 2. Coach Von Lindern loved St. Mary School and Parish. She was with our school community for 35 years. We all benefited from her supportive spirit and generous nature. Even the parents of some of our current students remember having Coach when they were in school at St. Mary's! As a parish family, we offer our heartfelt prayers for Coach Von Lindern, for her family and friends, for her current and former students, and for all individuals and families whose lives Coach impacted. Her Funeral Mass will be at St. Mary Parish on Thursday, May 18 at 10:00 am. The Mass will be livestreamed for those out of town or unable to come in person.

I invite you to pray for our transitional deacons as they go on retreat this week in preparation for their ordination to the priesthood. Priesthood Ordination is on Saturday, May 20 at 10:00 am at St. John the Evangelist Cathedral in downtown Cleveland. We have received one of the newly ordained to be our next Parochial Vicar! Soon-to-be "Father" Fabian Duckhyun Han will begin his priestly ministry with us the weekend of June 24-25. A few of you have expressed interest in coming to the Cathedral to celebrate this special day with the newly ordained priests. With six ordinandi, I expect it will be packed. I would advise arriving between 8 and 8:30 am to get a pew. Bring a rosary or spiritual reading book and enjoy a morning holy hour!

I would encourage you to livestream the Ordination Mass on Saturday from the Diocese of Cleveland website or Facebook page, or follow the link https://www.dioceseofcleveland.org/events/2023/05/20/ordination-of-priests. We will also post the link to the livestream on our Facebook page.

I am yours in Christ,
Fr. Scott Goodfellow

Reflection from Sacred Heart Counseling: 
In order to know and understand the people around us, including Jesus, we need to spend time listening to them and getting to know their hearts.  For God, this is spending time in prayer and getting to know Him and His work in our lives.  With couples and friendships, this is spending quality time together.  Too often, I hear from couples in therapy that they have lost sight of each other and feel like strangers.  When I ask about the quality time that they spend together in the form of date nights, they often say, “What date nights?”  The quality of a date night is not in the food that we eat or the glamor of the restaurant but in the quality of conversation that takes place.  For this same reason, a date night can happen at home with a pot of mac and cheese!  Whether it is a date night with a spouse, a donut run with a child, or a night out with a friend, we need to engage in intentional conversation with each other.  It is easy to think that we fully know someone and we stop asking questions like, “What do you want to accomplish in this upcoming year?” or “When have you been the happiest in the last week?”  While I love talking about the Browns on occasion, we need to engage in intentional conversations about what is going on in the hearts of the people closest to us.  This week, consider having a few intentional conversations with your loved ones with the goal of learning more about the deeper areas of their heart!
-Luke Brown LPCC