Serving the People of Chicago and River North Since 1881

ASSUMPTION CATHOLIC CHURCH 323 WEST ILLINOIS STREET CHICAGO, IL 60654

www.assumption-chgo.org 312-644-0036

September 5, 2021

COMPLAINING ABOUT COMPLAINING There is an old joke about a Jewish mother who buys her son two shirts. When he shows up at dinner wearing one, she says, “What’s the matter? You don’t like the other one?” Jokes are only funny when there is an element of truth to them, and there is no question that we love to complain. We can always find justification for complaining because there is so much to complain about, from the state of the world all the way down to our neighborhood, our church, and our relatives. Last Sunday in his weekly message, though, our plain-spoken Pope offered a stern repri-mand to all of us who love to complain: “How often we blame others, society, the world, for everything that hap-pens to us! It is always the fault of others: it is the fault of people, of those who govern, of misfortune, and so on . . . . but spending time blaming others is a waste of time. Complaining poisons. It leads you to anger, to resent-ment, and to sadness, which closes the door to God . . . . If we look inside, we will find almost all that we despise outside; and if we ask God to purify our heart, that is when we will start making the world cleaner . . . . Start to conquer evil by starting to conquer it within yourself. . . . May the Virgin Mary, who changed history through the purity of her heart, help us to purify our own, by overcoming first and foremost the vice of blaming others and com-plaining about everything.”

Embedded in the Pope’s remarks are some time-tested human truths. Psychologists, going back to Sigmund Freud, have talked about projection, attributing what is unacceptable in us onto another person. A bully, for exam-ple, may be struggling with his own self-esteem; a man attracted to a female coworker, rather than acknowledging his feelings, may accuse her of flirting. An important component in 12-step spirituality is to make a list of all our broken relationships and then identify the role we played in breaking them. In other words, some of our complain-ing and blaming is a way for us (consciously or unconsciously) to sidestep our own inner demons.

My sense is that complaining has increased significantly since the start of the pandemic, and I think that is be-cause the pandemic has brought to light a sense of entitlement that many of us have enjoyed. We assumed that as long as we stayed healthy, everything would stay basically the same. We could live our life however we wanted. We could spend our money however we wanted; we could go wherever we wanted whenever we wanted; and we could do whatever we wanted when we got there. We have taken for granted a sense of freedom that most people in the world never had. Although there are people with deep religious convictions who are resisting the Covid vac-cine, I believe that a lot of those flailing away at mask mandates and vaccine ultimatums and other restrictions are grasping at anything that will enable them to hold on to a way of life that has been yanked out from under us. All this has to be somebody’s fault, and so we must find someone to blame. But the reality is we are living in a differ-ent world. We have been dumped into a boat with a lot of unfamiliar people; and hopefully the boat we are now in is not a lifeboat from the Titanic. Hopefully we will regain much of our former freedom, but maybe with a little more humility and with a little less presumption.

Back in 2009, Missouri Representative Emmanuel Cleaver (who is also a Methodist Minister) introduced a bill in Congress to make the Wednesday before Thanksgiving “Complaint Free Wednesday.” It would be a day to pre-pare ourselves for Thanksgiving by focusing on our blessings. The bill did not pass, even though bills establishing National Ice Cream Month and Free Comic Book Day sailed through Congress that year. Pastor Cleaver’s bill, on the other hand, drew lots of complaints, many of them asserting that complaining and calling attention to deficien-cies is patriotic. But Pastor Cleaver was really trying to make the same point as Pope Francis: “Complaint Free is not about asking people to just ‘shut up and suck up’ whatever comes their way. Complaining is pointing out prob-lems, and pointing out problems is easy. Looking for solutions takes effort.”

Fr. Joe

Twenty-Third Sunday In Ordinary Time

Lectors Eucharistic Ministers Sept 11-12, 2021 G. Herrera 5:00 P. Burke J. Dion K. Pomroy 7:30 D. Tevonian M. Fedele 9:00 C. Gimbar D. Sutherland G. Bjurman 10:30 Dea. K. Zajdel A. Lopez 12:15 P. Anderson K. Salasblancas 5:00 J. Choromanski

A SEASON OF CREATION During the ecumenical Season of Creation, which lasts from September 1 through October 4, the Feast of St. Francis, thousands of Christians on six continents will be exploring ways to heal our relationship with creation and with one another, taking time to pray, to learn, to hope, and to discover radically new ways of living. This weekend Fr. John Pawlikowski, OSM, will speak to us at the 5:00 p.m. Vigil Mass and the 10:30 a.m. Sun-day Mass about Pope Francis’ groundbreaking encycli-cal On Care for Our Common Home, Laudato Si’.

TEXT TO GIVE: Another way to make your Sunday offering: text the phrase Sundaycoll to 312-900-8747. You will receive a link to GiveCentral Text-to-Give. Click on your link to enter your payment information.

OUR VIDEO MASS CONTINUES For those who have not yet returned to church, Sunday Mass from Assumption is uploaded on our website (www.assumption-chgo.org) at 4:00 p.m. Saturday. Sunday Mass from Assumption is also available on our Facebook page and our YouTube channel.

LABOR DAY The Catholic Church has a long history of supporting the rights of working people, beginning with Pope Leo XIII 1891 encyclical defending the rights of laborers to form unions, rejecting both socialism and unrestricted capital-ism, and calling for an end to the oppression of the working classes. Exploitation of working people may be more subtle today, but it has not disappeared. Come to church and pray for justice for all. Mass on Labor Day, Monday, September 6, will be at 7:30 and 10:30.

BAPTISM PREPARATION Our next preparation session for parents (and, if possi-ble, godparents) of infants to be baptized will be Mon-day, September 13 from 7:00 to 8:15 p.m. at the Rec-tory. This session is for first-time parents and for those who have never before attended a preparation session. Call the parish office to register. It is not necessary to wait for the baby to be born to attend a preparation ses-sion. Baptisms normally take place on the second and fourth Sundays of the month at 1:15 p.m. and on the first weekend of the month during Mass.

MINISTERS NEEDED Although communion from the cup is not likely to re-turn in the near future, the number of ministers of the Eucharist on the active roster is still low. If you would like to learn more about that ministry, contact ebun-zol@hm-mech.com. If you have a good speaking voice and would like to learn more about the ministry of lec-tor, contact elizabeth.a.kabacinski@gmail.com.

RENEW MY CHURCH: Our grouping (Holy Name Cathedral, Assumption, St. Peter, St. Patrick, St. Mary, and St. James) will be part of the final wave of parishes to be activated by the Archdiocese. Sometime later this year, we will enter a process to discover how the Catho-lic Church in this area can better fulfill the mission that Jesus left us.

RCIA BEGINS NEXT SUNDAY RCIA (The Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults) be-gins next Sunday, September 12. It is for those who were never baptized, were baptized Catholic but never made first communion and confirmation, or were bap-tized in another Christian religion and would like to ex-plore becoming Catholic. Those who choose to continue with the process would receive the Sacraments of Initia-tion at the first Mass of Easter. Contact Fr. Joe this week for more information.

FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT IN UNCERTAIN TIMES Holy Name Cathedral Career Networking Ministry is offering a presentation by Teresa Moran, a financial ad-visor with Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, on Thursday, September 16 from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. on Zoom. Teresa will offer strategies for dealing with debt and reduced income. She will address various emotional issues surrounding money, and offer action steps one can take to feel more confident about one’s financial situation. Registration is required to attend this program, and the registration link will be available on Holy Name’s website.

MASS INTENTIONS FOR THE WEEK OF SEPTEMBER 4, 2021 Sat. 4th 5:00 Dorothy Brennan (RIP) Sun. 5th 7:30 Art & Carm Pastorello (RIP) 9:00 Michael & Rose Marie Sopko (RIP) Helen Morris (RIP) Deceased of Sopko, Morris, Pfiester & Jenkins Families 10:30 Charles & Marion Joachim (RIP) 12:15 Officer Ella French (RIP) 5:00 Brian Jenkins (RIP) Mon. 6th 7:30 Dan & Lee Garvey (Anniversary) Tues. 7th 7:00 Gregoria Villareal (RIP)

PRAY FOR THEM Sick: Annette Russo, Bill Hjorth, Nancy Alfano, Rosemary Reeves, Kevin Atwood, Terrie Stevens, Maripat Nellis, Craig Mitchell and Terry Hufnagel

WEDDINGS NICHOLAS WEBER & SEAN BELL MCDERMOTT

KHALED ABUNIJMEH & ALICE RAAD JOHN RIORDAN & ELIZABETH CANNON

MICHAEL GLADSON & ALEXANDRA ARGUELLO WILLIAM FOSTER & CAROLINE TINLEY MICHAEL KOMALA & KATHLEEN LEE MARTIN MOORE & MICHELLE VENCI

CHRISTOPHER BRADT & MARIA MARQUES MEJIAS GUSTAVO LOPEZ & ASHLEY MALIGRANDA

MICHAEL HUDAK & ASHLEY NICKEL

MASKING IS BACK Although we wish it were over, “It ain’t over till it’s over.” With the resurgence of the virus due to the Delta Variant, the City of Chicago as well as the Archdiocese of Chicago now requires everyone, vaccinated or unvac-cinated, to be masked while in church or at other indoor church gatherings. The Archdiocesan COVID-19 Task Force wrote in part: “We will continue to monitor the situation and will re-evaluate our policy if conditions and public health guid-ance warrants it. It is our hope and our prayer that meas-ures taken now and scrupulously applied will enable us to adopt a mask-optional policy for vaccinated persons in the future. Certainly we are disappointed and sad-dened that infection and serious illness rates have again surged. We must do our part to bring the pandemic un-der control and the suffering to an end. This is both our civic and Christian duty. Thank you for all you have done and continue to do to keep each other safe and well.”

Assumption Church

Founded and Staffed by Members of the

Order of Friar Servants of Mary (Servites) Rev. Joseph Chamblain, O.S.M., Pastor Dr. Kevin Zajdel, Deacon

In Residence:

Rev. Michael Doyle, O.S.M. Rev. John Fontana, O.S.M. Rev. John T. Pawlikowski, O.S.M Bro. Arnaldo M. Sanchez, O.S.M. Rev. Eugene Smith, O.S.M. MASSES: Monday - Friday: 7:00, 12:10 PM

Saturday: 7:30, 5:00 PM (for Sunday)

Sunday: 7:30, 9:00, 10:30, 12:15, 5:00 PM

CONFESSION: Friday: 11:35 –12:05 PM

Daily after all Masses (on request)

ST. PEREGRINE DEVOTION: Monday following the 12:10 Mass EUCHARISTIC ADORATION: Third Monday of the Month: 6:00 - 8:00 PM WEDDINGS: You do not have to be a member of

Assumption to get married at Assumption. Contact

the Parish Office for more information. BAPTISMS: Second and fourth Sundays of the

month at 1:15 and the first weekend of the month

during Mass. NIGHT EMERGENCIES: 312-661-3466

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