I was very happy to join Women Affirming Life for their annual Advent brunch and gathering at the Pastoral Center on Saturday morning.

I celebrated Mass for them in our Bethany Chapel, and afterward, we gathered upstairs to hear a talk by Ester Munt-Brooks of the Catholic women's organization Fe, Valor y Alegria.

It was an excellent talk that, in a way, dovetailed with my homily. I had spoken about the fact that people welcome children when they have hope, and she continued the theme, addressing what the nature of hope is.

We also had the opportunity to watch this wonderful video designed to help parishes promote our upcoming January Holy Hours for Life. It was prepared by three seminarians from Pope St. John XXIII National Seminary -- Giris Azize, Greg Zingler, and Greg Dougherty -- as part of their field education with the Pro-Life Office. I think they did a fabulous job with it.



Christmas concert

That evening, I went to the TD Garden to attend a Christmas concert by Andrea Bocelli, who was joined in the performance by his son, Matteo, and his daughter, Virginia. Needless to say, their voices were as beautiful as their father's.

Afterward, I had an opportunity to greet them.

When I got home, I went online to learn a little bit more about Andrea Bocelli's story. Among the things I found is that his strong pro-life commitment comes from the fact that doctors urged his mother to have an abortion when it was realized that he was going to be born with "some disability." I thought to myself: If those doctors had prevailed, that concert attended by 40,000 people, that beautiful music, and those lovely children who were singing with him would never have happened. What a tragedy that would have been!



Mass at St. Benedict Parish

Sunday afternoon, I went to St. Benedict's Parish in Somerville for a Mass at which we blessed the recent renovations to the parish. Celebrating with me were Father Alejandro and Father Nicanor.

The church looks beautiful, and they have made many improvements, including new floors, and a new pulpit and confessional.

It was a joy to be with the parishioners as they celebrated this very impressive achievement.



Cristo Rey Boston High School

Monday, I visited Cristo Rey Boston High School for a prayer service for the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. I hadn't been to Cristo Rey since before the pandemic, so it was very good to be back.

At the prayer service, they had students from different countries pray the Hail Mary in their own language. Then, one of the teachers gave an explanation of the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Spanish.

I also gave a talk about how Mary has made herself present to different peoples and cultures throughout history.

We are blessed to have two Cristo Rey model high schools in our archdiocese, Notre Dame Cristo Rey in Lawrence and, of course, Cristo Rey Boston.

As part of this model, the students attend class four days a week and then spend one day a week working at a local business. This not only helps them fund their education, but it's also an excellent way of preparing these young men and women for life, teaching them how to act in the workplace. The success of this model is shown in the very high percentage of students who go on to graduate from college.