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Pope Francis began the New Year praying the world would demonstrate a marked increase in solidarity and welcome for migrants and refugees.
If you have a special intention and can’t wait for one of these providential incidents to drop a saint into your life, there’s also a way to “make” a saint pick you.
To begin, the “gift of tears” is not a pity party. Neither is it a Debbie-downer idea from a columnist of Swedish lineage (yes, a depressive people, I know), a Hallmark mush of sentiment, a TED-talk call to vulnerability or celebration of emotivism.
Those who recognize the Lord in the baby Jesus in the manger also should recognize his presence in children suffering today because of war, poverty and immigration, Pope Francis said.
Christmas calls believers to see God's presence where he is often perceived as absent, especially in the "unwelcomed visitor, often unrecognizable, who walks through our cities and our neighborhoods, who travels on our buses and knocks on our doors," Pope Francis said.
St. John the Beloved in McLean is unique in that the ancient sounds of Gregorian chant are deeply woven into its fabric, interlaced in every Mass, every choir and the education of the students in the parish school.
Foreign trips, a focus on the rights and needs of migrants and refugees and a Synod of Bishops dedicated to young people all are on the 2018 calendar for Pope Francis.
About 1,400 attend Simbang Gabi Mass with Bishop Burbidge on the eighth of the nine days of Masses leading to Christmas.
Gregorian chant is named for St. Gregory the Great, who was pope from 590 to 604. It's unlikely that Pope Gregory I had any direct involvement in developing Gregorian chant, but he was a building pope who helped reorder the liturgy in a more practical way, creating an artistic environment necessary to establish some form of plain chant, McDonnell said.
