All Souls Day Masses
There is an envelope in your packet for All Souls Masses. Please list your intentions on the back and return it as soon as possible. All the deceased members of the parishes from the past year will be honored. Masses will be at 8:00am at St Joseph Church and 7:00pm (Spanish) at St Mary Church on Nov. 2. Mass will be at 8:00am on Sunday, Nov. 4 at St Mary Church. A form for candles is in the back of the church. You may purchase a candle in memory of other deceased loved ones.
PLEASE HAVE YOUR ORDER WITH PAYMENT TURNED IN BY OCTOBER 21.
NIH Spends $13.5 Million on Aborted Baby Parts to Transplant Their Brain Tissue Into Mice
A new government contract uncovered by CNS News shows the federal government continues to spend taxpayer dollars on research using aborted baby body parts.
The National Institute of Health contract is with University of California- San Francisco. The contract provides money for fetal body parts to conduct experiments involving “humanized mice,” according to the report. NIH is an agency under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. …
NIH Spends $13.5 Million on Aborted Baby Parts to Transplant Their Brain Tissue Into Mice
Synod Father: Teach Life Issues With Greater Clarity Than Ever
In his latest dispatch from the synod hall Oct. 17, Archbishop Anthony Fisher OP of Sydney, Australia, says the Africans are making “quite a splash” at this Synod.
“Cardinal Napier [archbishop of Durban, South Africa] spoke directly and with passion about how international governments, agencies and aid organisations continue to colonise Africa, by imposing conditions on aid and by cultural interference regarding sexuality, marriage, contraception, abortion right up to birth, and so on. We must teach the young with greater clarity than ever, rather than collaborating by our inaction in a culture that encourages multiple abortions and more in young people’s lives. With St Paul VI interceding for us, we can form young people as apostles for life and love. …
http://www.ncregister.com/blog/edward-pentin/youth-synod-teach-life-issues-with-greater-clarity-than-ever
Is It Morally Licit to Smoke Pot?
This is a very informative article that I am sure many have questions about. I hope it helps. Though it does suggest Yoga to relax at the end, I do not suggest Yoga because of it’s attachment to an entirely other religion. Stretching would be fine.
Q. Pot smoking is legal in my state. I know pot is a bridge drug to other worse drugs. But I was wondering if occasionally smoking it is okay. My parish priest says there’s nothing wrong with it, so long as I don’t get dependent. What do you think? Thanks, Rahl.
A. I think your priest’s advice is misguided. The simple answer to the title question is: Although it is sometimes morally licit to smoke pot for purposes of healing, it is never licit to smoke it to get high?
“Brain Altering Substances” (BAS)
Medicine uses the term “therapeutic” to refer to something related to facilitating good physical or psychological functioning. Using BAS for therapeutic reasons is using them to obtain real human goods. But most BAS also have harmful effects, which mustn’t be the reason we choose them. In the words of moral theology, we mustn’t intend those effects as ends or means.
We all use BAS sometimes for therapeutic reasons, and many of us use them daily. We drink a cup of coffee or cola for an energy boost; we have a glass of wine to calm feelings of stress after a long day at work; we take antidepressants to ameliorate blue mood, or melatonin or Ambien to help quiet the sleep centers in our brain; we take analgesics to assist with back pain; and occasionally we take very powerful narcotics such as morphine to help relieve severe pain. Each of these can be done quite innocently, as each can be a way of realizing genuine human goods.
Marijuana is a BAS, which too, doctors tell us, can have therapeutic effects. Physicians sometimes prescribe it to…
http://www.ncregister.com/blog/christianbrugger/is-it-morally-licit-to-smoke-pot
The Great Adventure Catholic Bible

Many people will ask me which Bible should I get? Get this one!
Gosnell Movie Challenges Us All
The movie “Gosnell” challenges us to rethink the idea of “Pro-choice”. Have I seen the movie yet? No, but I know the story. You may remember some of the news covering the most prolific abortionist of the last twenty years, Kermit Gosnell. It was mostly covered by Pro-life advocates and totally ignored by mainstream media.
http://prolifecorner.com/gosnell-on-trial-for-running-a-house-of-horrors/
Here is an explanation of another place that did similar things. It seems the issue of Gosnell is not so rare as we would like to think. The witness accounts are disturbing by themselves, children should use parents discretion for this web site. https://www.lifenews.com/2013/05/15/another-gosnell-report-shows-texas-abortion-doc-kills-babies-born-alive/
Gosnell is now in jail for many crimes. The movie tells the shocking story of an abortionist who killed babies outside the womb and was responsible for the deaths of many women under his care due to the abortions he provided. The movie is rated PG13. It will be showing at 7:10pm this Thursday, October 18 in the AMC Showplace Rockford 16. I, Father Barr, plan on attending this movie and welcome all parishioners to join me. If you cannot make this time, I encourage you to watch this movie set on the trail of Dr Gosnell. Weather you are pro-life or pro-choice, it will challenge you of the depth of this huge social sin. It has been so engrained into our sense of identity, like that of slavery, that we must look at the consequences of our culture and to make a willed decision to change and get rid of any such atrocities in our time and in times to come.
GENERAL AUDIENCE: On the 5th Commandment ‘Thou Shall Not Kill’ (II) (FULL TEXT)
This morning’s General Audience was held at 9:30 in St. Peter’s Square, where the Holy Father Francis met with groups of pilgrims and faithful from Italy and from all over the world.
Continuing with the series of catecheses on the Commandments, in his address in Italian the Pope focused his meditation on: “Do not kill” according to Jesus (Biblical passage from the Gospel according to Matthew 5:21-24). …
https://zenit.org/articles/general-audience-on-the-5th-commandment-thou-shall-not-kill-ii-full-text/
MEALS ON WHEELS COORDINATOR NEEDED
We are in need of a new coordinator for the St Joseph/ St Mary Meals on Wheels. This would involve scheduling the deliveries four times a year, beginning in January. –
Pro-Life Corner
“The state has an interest (responsibility) in protecting the poor, the elderly and disabled persons. The lives of the disabled and elderly must be no less valuable than the lives of young and healthy … The difficulty in defining terminal illness and the risk that a dying patient’s request for assistance in ending his or her life might not be truly voluntary justifies the prohibitions on assisted suicide we uphold here.” – Chief Justice William Rehnquist
