Holy Family Catholic Church will celebrate All Saints’ Day today, Oct. 31, and Friday, Nov. 1
All Saints’ Day is a solemn holy day of Holy Family Catholic Church, celebrated annually on Nov. 1 to the saints of the Church. The masses will be held today, Oct. 31, 4 p.m., and Friday, Nov. 1, 8:30 a.m. and 11 a.m.
Holy Family Catholic Church invites all LWers to “All Souls Day Mass of Remembrance” on Saturday, Nov. 2, at 10 a.m., for loved ones who departed, especially those this year. Light reception will be provided after Mass.
Holy Family Catholic Church, next to St. Andrews Gate, holds daily masses at 8:30 a.m., Saturdays at 4 p.m. and Sundays 8 a.m., 10 a.m. and noon.
On Oct. 20, the Mother church canonized, among others, Blessed Marie Leonie Paradis (1840-1912), founder of the Little Sisters of the Holy Family. This beloved saint worked in both Canada and the United States, including California. Today more than 2,000 women of the Little Sisters have dedicated their lives to God in support of the ministry of priests. The Little Sisters of the Holy Family now have 67 convents in Canada, the United States, Rome and Honduras. The sisters devote themselves to work in the kitchens, laundries, and sacristies of colleges, seminaries, and episcopal residences.
Mother Marie Leonie personally pursued the work of educating and promoting the welfare of poor illiterate girls, many of whom joined her congregation.
LW’s Holy Family Church feel blessed on this occasion, not only because it shares the name with her religious congregation, but also because her close relative, great-niece Sister Kathy Paradis, lives and ministers among the residents. In addition, Marie Leonie’s father was one of the early gold prospectors in California. Mother Leonie herself had personally visited one of her houses in Menlo Park, California.
Sister Kathie and the Holy Family Community celebrated Mother Marie Leonie’s canonization during Mass with a light reception. Residents met the saint’s great-niece, Kathleen.
“Our mission in the Church is to help the priest on the temporal and spiritual planes,” Mother Leonie wrote, “but what it really demands as a supreme witness is for us to love one another and to love all people, not with just any love, but with all the love that God wants to give them. We must therefore repeat without tiring that our principal work is to give love.”
Blessed Marie Leonie Paradis' great- niece, Kathleen Paradis.
