Fr. Jim's Blog

I enjoyed the retreat I conducted this past weekend. It was also great to see a few faces from my old parish. I came home and found out that one of the pipes in the church broke during the Spanish Mass. It made a huge mess so we had Mass last night in the gymnasium as well as this morning. I sure hope things will be back up and running for Our Lady of Guadalupe celebration on Thursday. I have recorded the homily and it is available here. Have a great day!

Here is a great documentary on Mountain Lions I watched on Monday evening. The last part where the cougar they were tracking stands its ground and hisses is incredible. I wouldn't want to mess with it. Stalking the Mountain Lion | Nat Geo Wild : Casey Anderson sets out to track one of North America’s most elusive predators: the Mountain Lion.

Pope Francis has written a new Apostolic Exhortation titled EVANGELII GAUDIUM. He wastes no time getting to his point which is that the world is turning more and more cold and hardened in heart because people are rejecting God. We will never have a peaceful society where everyone can enjoy his/her rights and where we can look out for the most poor and vulnerable unless we see that our fundamental problem is a God problem. Here are the first three paragraphs of the document:  THE JOY OF THE GOSPEL fills the hearts and lives of all who encounter Jesus. Those who accept his offer of salvation are set free from sin, sorrow, inner emptiness and loneliness. With Christ joy is constantly born anew. In this Exhortation I wish to encourage the Christian faithful to embark upon a new chapter of evangelization marked by this joy, while pointing out new paths for the Church’s journey in years to come. The great danger in today’s world, pervaded as it is by consumerism, is the desolation a...

I have published the homily for Christ the King Sunday. You can listen to an audio format of the homily on my podcast page , or you can watch and listen to a keynote presentation which is posted below.

A Lesson on Fence Building During one of my summers while home from college I worked for a real estate company in landscape maintenance. A friend of mine was the manager and I had told her I had a hard time finding a job for the summer. She graciously offered to put me to work for her company. While I was excited about the pay, which was pretty good, the idea of spending much of the summer working outside wasn’t too appealing. The thermometer usually stays pretty high in the Tri-Cities, Washington during the summer months, and I’ve never been that fond of “outdoor” work. Nonetheless, I was desperate for money for my college expenses so I took the job. That summer I found myself doing a variety of things to fix-up and maintain properties. My favorite job was painting since that usually allowed me to be in an air-conditioned climate. My least favorite work was weeding and mowing lawns. One day while working at an apartment complex, the manager there asked m...

Below is the video answer to one of the question a young adult asked for the "According to Father" series from the Archdiocese of Seattle.

The homily has been posted for the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time. Since I recorded it from my studio at home, it is a little longer than the actual one I delivered because we had a witness speaker after the homily for our Stewardship campaign. I will spend some time tomorrow morning producing a video for the Archdiocese of Seattle. I have agreed to be part of the "According to Father" program for Youth Ministry. There are several other priests who are also participating in the project as you can see from the poster below.  The program consists in having young adults present questions for us to answer via a video. I have 13 questions to answer and some of them require a little homework, which isn't a bad thing:) I will put a link to the video once it is completed if you are interested in viewing it.