Events
May 3, 2024, 1st Friday Mass: Holy Name of Jesus
May 19, 2024 Pentecost Celebration
St. Augustine, So. SF
June 28-29, 2024 NCRC Annual Catholic Charismatic Conference
San Francisco, CA
September 21, 2024 SFSpirit Annual Holy Spirit Conference
St. Mary's Cathedral, SF - SAVE THE DATE!
Recorded Videos Holy Spirit Conference
Holy Spirit Conference Mass Celebrants
Saturday, September 16, 2023
Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption, San Francisco, CA
Left to Right:
Deacon Ernie von Emster: Assisting
Fr. Armando Lopez
Fr. Ray Reyes: Main Celebrant
Fr. Andrew Ibegbulem, OSA
Fr. Ken Barker
CONGRATULATIONS
Congratulations to all the re-elected Executive Officers of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal Board of the Archdiocese of San Francisco for the year 2023-2026 led by Bro. Danny Garza (Chairman), Sis. Sally Yeo (Vice Chair), Sis. Tess Garza (Secretary), Bro. Jose dela Torre (Finance) and Bro. Romy Arellano (Treasurer).
We also would like to acknowledge and compliment all new members of the CCR Board as well. More work to do in the vineyard of our Lord Jesus Christ!
To God be the glory and praise.
Fruitful Corner
REFLECTION FOR THURSDAY,
MAY 2, 2024
By Fr. Andrew Ibegbulem, OSA
LOVE AND OBEDIENCE
“If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love.” Jn. 15:10
Our gospel reference today formed part of Jesus’s teaching on love and the necessity of keeping His commandments. This teaching when taken by itself, can seem burdensome, dictatorial, oppressive, and confining. But it is not as he further explained that the effect of keeping His commandments is that we “remain in His love.”
Jesus is not asking us to do anything that He Himself was not willing to do. He was obedient to the will of the Father, keeping the commandments of the Father to perfection. Therefore, we should hear His command as a dictate flowing from His own freely lived choice to be obedient.
As the Incarnate Son of God, Jesus perfectly obeyed the Father in His human nature. The result was that He remained perfectly filled with the love of the Father. But that is not all. Joy is also experienced in a “complete” way when we imitate Jesus’ perfect obedience.
For Jesus, love is the hallmark and the criterion of Christians. This love leads to obedience. Jesus reminded his disciples that he has chosen them as his friends with a triple mission. First, is for them to love others as he has loved them. Then for them to bear the fruits of the Holy Spirit in their lives. Finally, for them to ask the Father for whatever they need in His name.
As Christians living in our world with too much emphasis on freedom, how much do we love and how much does our love lead to obedience? How do you view obedience to the will of God? Let’s take the Ten Commandments for instance.
Do we struggle with unwavering obedience to them? Do we see them as oppressive and imposed limitations rather than what they truly are? When understood correctly, the Ten Commandments, and every other dictate of the will of God, are exactly what we need and desire in life.
As Christians, we need interior order rather than chaos, integrity rather than fragility, joy rather than sadness, and unity with the love of God rather than the loss of God. The path to the life we so deeply desire is obedience to the commands of the will of God in all things.
Let us remember that true Christian love is costly and painful because it involves sacrifice on our part when we start loving unlovable, ungrateful, and hostile people with Christ’s unconditional, forgiving, sacrificial love. But our Christian call is to love others as Jesus has loved us, and as Jesus loves them.
Reflect, today, upon your immediate interior reaction to Jesus’ teaching on love and obedience. If you do find yourself resistant in any way to this teaching, then that is a good sign that you need this teaching more than you may know. Try to look at obedience in the light of truth. Try to see that, deep down, your soul yearns for obedience and the interior order it brings. Examine, especially, any areas of obedience you struggle with and firmly recommit yourself to unwavering obedience to each and every command of our Lord.
Lord Jesus, You obeyed the will of Your Father in Heaven to perfection. Through this obedience, You not only experienced the full love and joy of the Father in Your human nature, You also set for us a perfect example and model for holiness. Help me to see the areas of my life in which I need to be more obedient, so that I, too, will share in Your holy life and that of the Father’s. Jesus, I trust in You.
Saint of the Day
Mission Statement
As a lay organization, the mission of the Charismatic Renewal is:
- To help all people come to know the love of God in their lives as demonstrated through our Lord, Jesus Christ.
- To help our brothers and sisters respond to God's love by loving God in return through a commitment to serve Christ and His Church.
- To assist them to listen and follow the movement of the Holy Spirit at work in their lives.
- To help our brothers and sisters recognize the ministry that God has called them to, and accept the gifts that God desires to bestow upon them for His work in our Church and in our world.
- To lead them to a New Life offered to us by the Holy Spirit.
