It is so good to be home after a week of planned vacation and in time to recover from a recent bad fall. I know the power of prayer and I am so very grateful for all the prayers sent my way as I recover from an injury to my right knee. I have been and continue to heal slowly but surely, but I do miss praying and celebrating with you. Thank you for all the loving prayers and support these past few days. I have been praying for you as well.
 
Prayer is a wonderful gift to us, a sacred conversation with our God and Father through Jesus His Son guided by the Holy Spirit. We ask, at times, the Saints of God, to join us in our prayer as they intercede for us. We not only speak to our God, but we take time to listen to Him as well in the silence of our hearts.
 
As Jesus tells us to ask, seek and to knock in prayer, I ask that our parish families pray for and with each other as we begin the process of becoming one family this year. Though we will have two sites, we must strive to become one parish family with a common vision and mission. I am confident that we can and will do this. Prayer will be our constant conversation with God that He will give us the wisdom we need to grow as one family of faith. There will be some changes, but we will still be a family facing those changes together. There will be adjustments made, but we will handle them as one family of faith, hope and love. There will be a blending of traditions as well as new programs and projects and we will carry them out as one family in Christ Jesus.
 
Let us begin to pray today and every day that God will give success to the work of our hands and our hearts. Let us pray for and with each other. Let us ask our patrons, John Capistran and Thomas More, to pray with us and for us. Let us ask, seek and knock together.
 
We are one family.