Double Major Feast: Beheading of St. John the Baptist.

Dear Faithful adherents of Saint Michael's Lent,

Today we celebrate a great feast day, The Beheading of Saint John the Baptist.

On Double Major feasts, we shall retain the abstinence from meat - it is a Friday after all - but optionally be relieved from fasting.

It can sometimes be difficult to give up our established penances, which have been going so much better just now. We, however, give ourselves a pause in the spirit of fasting and feasting that even Holy Mother Church proposes, and then with Catholic resilience, once the feast is over, we pick them up again. This is, in microcosm, what happens when we sin, and confess, and start again. We aim to get quickly back to the established patterns of Catholic living.

So please enjoy this feast day and let us be grateful for the penances we have offered to God with such devotion, and celebrate the life of this wonderful Saint who allows us to enjoy a little break from our disciplines.

St. John the Baptist…pray for us.

In Our Blessed Lord and Our Blessed Lady,

Fr. Withoos

Chaplain