Historic St. James at Sag Bridge Church 10600 S. Archer Avenue | Lemont, Illinois 60439-9344

(Ph) 630.257.7000 | (Fx) 630.257.7912 | Email: stjames1833@att.net Website: www.historicstjames.org Facebook: https://Facebook.com/Saint James At Sag Bridge

October 15, 2017 Twenty-Eighth Ordinary Sunday Mass Schedule

WEEKENDS: Saturdays: 5:00pm Sundays: 8:00, 9:30 & 11:30am

HOLY DAYS: 8:15am & 7:00pm

WEEKDAYS: Monday, Tuesday, Thursday 8:15am & Fridays 6:00pm

Wednesday: Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at 5:00-7:00pm, w/Confessions at 6:30pm & Mass at 7:00pm.

CONFESSION SCHEDULE:

Saturdays, 9:30am-10:00am Wednesdays, 6:30pm Otherwise by appointment

BAPTISMS, WEDDINGS & FUNERALS:

Contact the rectory office (630.257.7000).

SICK & HOMEBOUND PASTORAL CARE:

Please notify rectory.

RECTORY OFFICE HOURS:

Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu & Fri: 9:30am to 1:00pm.

Register with www.formed.org & use our St. James’ code: KFWMDB (ALL CAPS)

Friday, October 20th ST. JAMES AT SAG BRIDGE

5:00-8:15pm (doors open @ 5:30) $15.00/per ticket, includes 3-games

of BUNCO, Raffle Prizes & Refreshments Contact: Dottie 708.403.0805 or dotv@att.net

Sponsored by the ALTAR & ROSARY SOCIETY

CCD CORNER- OCTOBER RESPECT LIFE MONTH: DON’T FORGET TO FILL YOUR BABY BOTTLES FOR CRISIS PREGNANCY CENTERS!! Our school year is off to a great start!!! We would like to welcome back all of our families and are so excited to have many new faces joining us! We want to thank all of the parents and families that joined us for our opening CCD mass and the CCD Parent Meeting! OPPORTUNITIES TO ENGAGE October 16- FAMILY ENRICHMENT FOR PARENTS- 6:30PM AT SAG

HALL November 1- Holy Day of Obligation- 7PM MASS

@ St. James IMPORTANT DATES TO REMEMBER October 31st- Halloween- All Hallow’s Eve November 1st- All Saint’s Day ***HOLY DAY OF OBLIGATION*** BRING IT HOME: Try some of these activities during dinner or pray-er time! HALLOWEEN (10/31): Take time to teach children the meaning of Halloween or “All Hallow’s Eve”. Halloween is the the night before All Saints Day and should be used as an opportunity for us to prepare, think about and pray for all of the Saints and those that have died that we will remember during the month of November. ALL SAINT’S DAY (11/1): All Saint’s Day is a Holy Day of Obligation. Attend mass as a family. Empathize that children should view saints as examples of how we should live our lives and that they should use saints as role models. Encourage students to research and learn about different states (maybe the saint they are named after).

Page Two October 15, 2017

FROM THE DESK OF THE PASTOR, FR. THOMAS KOYS, M.A.,S.T.L.

Today, Sunday, October 15 has been designated, the ST. JAMES AT SAG BRIDGE KICK OFF SUN-DAY for our 185th anniversary celebration year. Please consider joining your St. James’ friends at White Fence Farm restaurant (1376 Joliet Rd, Romeoville, IL) today (Sunday Oct 15th) at 4:00pm. The cost varies according to you entre choice, chicken and shrimp are $23, broiled fish is $25 and steak is $29. Discussion and anniversary event assignments will be on the table, along with White Fence Farm’s delicious corn fritters. Fr. Koys will also make a presentation on the 10 paintings pro-posed for the renovated Sag Hall. If you’ve been to White Fence Farm, you’ll love their old country atmos-phere as well as their famous chicken.

So, since this is 185th anniversary KICK OFF SUN-DAY, allow me to retell one of my favorite stories about the founding St. James. All of us can and should be proud of the heritage of this “Jewel of the archdio-cese”. I must confess, as one of the many pastors who have worked this little church on the hill, I’m very hum-bled. I’m humbled especially because I realize so well that the life and “health” of a parish rises and sinks in relation to the nature, character and spirituality of the pastor. In fact, I think it is fair to say that little St. James is a micro-cosmism of the somewhat humorous pro-Catholic principle regarding the longevity of the two thousand year old Catholic religion. This somewhat hu-morous principle was captured in a dialogue between Napoleon III and a certain French bishop during the height of the French Revolution. Napoleon informs the bishop that the Revolution will destroy the Catholic reli-gion. The bishop laughs and responds, “Ha, we’ve been messing up the church for over a thousand years and haven’t destroyed the Catholic faith, you and the whole army of France won’t be able to do it either.” That being said, my favorite story of St. James’ early days is about a letter that our first pastor Fr. Irenaeus St. Cyr. After Fr. Irenaeus’ time in the soon to be bustling village of Sag Bridge, he lived his “retirement” years in Minnesota. There is a letter he wrote to his bishop back

in St. Louis that should delight our little Catholic hearts. The bishop asked Fr. Irenaeus if in his travels back and forth between Chicago and St. Louis, he ever met the Lincoln family. Since this was in the 1880’s the assas-sination of Abraham was still a recent memory. Fr. Ire-naeus relates the fact that he did meet the Lincolns on a number of occasions. He further mentions that “the Lin-colns” (meaning Abraham’s biological father and step mother) “were rather devout Catholics. However, the young Abraham wasn’t much interested in our religion. However, he did act as my altar boy for a few Masses.” I hope this story will peak your interest in learning as much as you can about the parish you like to call “home”. I look forward to any and all, simple or grand events we can offer during this anniversary year. Also, SAVE THE DATE: Saturday, Nov. 4, 7pm, Catholic Professionals of Illinois’s monthly talk and discussion will be presented by a “dynamic duo”. Fr. Koys will be teaming up with the marvelous Loyola University student and son of CPI’s founder, Daniel Sutkowski. The topic will be “The Reformation, a Clos-er Look”. Come see how Fr. Koys will compare Em-peror Charles V. to President Donald Trump and hear how the “X’ generation views such major events in world history. Zarzycki Manor Chapels, Ltd. is hosting a Fall Book Drive for Operation Paperback. THE DRIVE WILL BE OCTOBER 1-31, 2017. OPERATION PAPER-BACK provides books to wounded warrior programs and veterans hospitals located within the United States, as well as USO centers at U.S. Airport transit points. As well, they offer free shipment of books to any military family. Books can be dropped off at Zarzycki Manor Chap-els, Ltd. in Chicago and Willow Springs, as well at St. Richard School and Willow Springs School located at 8345 Archer Avenue, Willow Springs. The Zarzycki Family will be mailing the books to the troops and mili-tary families so that they can enjoy for the holiday sea-son.

Twenty-Eighth Ordinary Sunday

THROUGH HIM, WITH HIM, AND IN HIM By Deborah Burton

The October 6th edition of the Magnificat has a meditation from Blessed Henry Suso, Living our Repentance Daily and one sentence jumped out at me this morning before Mass: "Do not be sur-prised if everything does not turn out according to your expectations." This made me smile because that was the focus on yesterday's article, Best of Plans Sometimes Do Not Turn Out As Expected. Today, I "expected" to go to Mass at the oldest church in Paris, Saint Germain des Pres and one of the oldest Romanesque churches in France. According to Travel France Online, the Basilica, dedicated in 558AD, was previously called Saint-Vincent-Sainte-Croix Basilica, and built on the ruins of a Roman temple, and renamed Saint-Germain-des-Prés in 754AD. It was destroyed by the Normans in 885AD and restored again in the 17th century and the 19th century.

However, instead of going to Mass in this beautiful church this morning, which was again undergoing an interior reconstruction, Mass was held in the small primitive chapel as you en-tered the church and turned in the small gate to the right. The very close and intimate surround-ings made the experience even more beautiful than in the immense church adorned with stained glass, and statues, and king's tombs and huge murals painted by Flandrin in the 1840s.

The bare chapel with simple wooden chairs and one tiny statue of Blessed Mother became more magnificent as Mass began and we became one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church, with some of the local members responding in French and we

responded in English. At the end of the Mass, the priest and the French parishioners turned to the tiny statue of Our Blessed Mother holding Jesus and sang the Hail Mary in French. The melodic voices reverberated off the stone walls and filled the chapel with love, devotion and joy.

Sometimes we have such high expectations of peak experiences and are extremely disappoint-ed when those expectations are not met, but then we must remember that the first chapel was a stable area for animals, where shepherds gath-ered, and the choir was a host of heavenly an-gels above the fields of Bethlehem.

Thank you, Lord for the little things and for the privilege of being able to attend Mass in this tiny little chapel.

My second Aha! moment of the day was in stand-ing in the original cellars where wine was bottled and distributed for King Louis XIV and learning about the wines of France. Our guide said some-thing that stopped me in my tracks. He explained the special qualities of the dirt, sand or even rocks in the different regions and then harvesting, making and bottling the wines and how they cre-ated the corks as stoppers. And then he said, "The wine never stops developing in the bottle; The wine is alive."

I immediately thought of the priest who conse-crated the host and the wine at Mass this morn-ing. The wine was alive, and after the consecra-tion, it became even more alive when trans-formed into the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ. It was given to us to bring us alive in Christ and it is forever changing and developing us through Him, with Him and in Him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit.

Our Weekly Offertory collection from the

weekend of October 8, 2017 was $3,540.00. The number of envelopes used was 109.

OUR MANY THANKS TO OUR REGISTERED FAMILIES USING ENVELOPES & THE

CASH-AND-CARRY FOLKS.

Our CHURCH CLEANERS FOR FRIDAY 10/20/17 Are Irene, Barbara & Bronislawa & volunteer. If you

are interested in volunteering, please contact the rectory office at 630.257.7000.

29TH ORDINARY SUNDAY

10/21 & 10/22

Celebrant

Altar Servers

Lectors

8:00 AM Fr. Tom Koys

F. Casiple Dillenburg Dillenburg

C. Slowik

9:30 AM Fr. Tom Koys

N. Akroush J.P. Colarelli M. Colarelli

R. Augustyn

11:30 AM Fr. Ed Gleeson

D. & G. Estrada E. & L. Glenn S. Imbarrato

G. Imbarrato

5:00 PM Fr. Tom Koys

Dooley J. Szarzynski T. Szarzynski

L. Pieprzyca

VOTIVE OFFERINGS FORTHE WEEK OF10/15/17

St. James Altar & Rosary Society In Loving Memory of Charles W. Poss II

& the Poss/Wilkinson Family Special int. for Margaret Rossi

In memory of Lillian Simanavicius

Our beautiful bouquets of flowers surrounding our altar were made available by the generosity of

LINDA & MIKE ALAGNO & CLARENCE & MARYANN ZIMA

Monday October 16th–Sts. Hedwig & Margaret Mary Alacoque 8:15 AM Favorable Decision on Asphalt Plant

Tuesday October 17th–St. Ignatius of Antioch 8:15 AM Patricia M. Carpino

Wednesday October 18th–St. Luke, the Evangelist 7:00 PM Wedding Anniversary of Carol & Jim Ruzich & Favorable Decision on Asphalt Plant

Thursday October 19th–Sts. John De. Brébeuf & Isaac Jogues 8:15 AM Favorable Decision on Asphalt Plant

Friday October 20th–St. Paul of the Cross 6:00 PM Joseph Dziaba TWENTY-NINTH ORDINARY SUNDAY

Saturday October 21st–Blessed Virgin Mary 5:00 PM Barbara & John Pieprzyca

Sunday October 22nd 8:00 AM Favorable Decision on Asphalt Plant 9:30 AM All the Poor Souls in Purgatory 11:30 AM Favorable Decision on Asphalt Plant