Presentation of the Lord

Hi, everyone.

Today we're gonna be talking about the presentation of the

Lord, which is a feast day that is celebrated this

week on February 2nd.

But before we do that, we're going to begin with

a Hail Mary in the name of the Father and

the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with

thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the

fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now

and at the hour of our death.

Amen. Name of the Father and the Son and the

Holy Spirit.

Amen. All right.

So the presentation of the Lord is celebrated on February

2nd, which is Tuesday of this week.

It's not a holy day of obligation, but it is

kind of important in the life of Jesus.

Which is why we're going to talk about it today.

Um, can kind of see in this picture.

So Mary and Joseph brought Baby Jesus to the temple,

which is their place of worship.

Kind of like way worship God in churches today, Um,

they brought Baby Jesus to the temple, uh, to dedicate

him to the Lord, and and this was a common

practice for Jewish people.

Are for newborn, uh, baby boys that 40 days after

they were born, they would be dedicated to God in

the temple.

And there was also ah, prayer for the mother, a

ZX part of the Jewish ritual to to purify her.

Um, you will notice there are two other people in

this picture, along with Mary and Joseph and Baby Jesus.

And those are important characters in this story.

Uh, the man's name is Simeon, and the woman's name

is Anna.

And I said, this is an important event in the

life of Jesus.

We actually, um, consider it one of the joyful mysteries

of the rosary.

So you can see here the five joyful mysteries, uh,

the enunciation.

When Mary found out that she was going to be

the mother of Jesus, the visitation when she visited her

cousin Elizabeth, Um, and Elizabeth's baby left in her womb.

When when she saw Mary knowing that Mary was carrying

Baby Jesus.

The birth of Jesus at Christmas.

We all know that story.

The presentation of the Lord, which we're going to talk

about today.

And then the finding of the child Jesus in the

temple, which I'm gonna mention right at the end of

this This video eso those are the mysteries of the

rosary for the joyful mysteries.

Um, and I hope that each of you has seen

a rosary before and perhaps maybe even have one at

your house.

Um, so, uh, the mysteries of the rosary are what

we're supposed to be thinking about as we pray the

rosary. So as we pray, the rosary were actually reflecting

on the life of Mary and Jesus, a ZX We

pray the prayers.

And then every 10 Hail Marys, we pray an our

father and we announced another mystery.

So the presentation of the Lord is the fourth joyful

mystery. Um, today, since we know that you have a

Bible and we've learned how to look things up in

our Bible, I'm gonna ask your family to look up

this Bible verse.

So it's in the gospel of Luke.

That's the New Testament.

So this will be towards the back of your book.

It will be chapter two versus 22 to 40.

So together, find this verse and read it together.

We're also going to have you answer a few questions

about this story?

Right. Um, I want to point out the very last

verse. Ah, of this story says the child grew and

became strong, filled with wisdom, and the favor of God

was upon him.

We hear one more story about Jesus childhood when he's

12 years old.

And that would be the fifth joyful mystery where they

find Jesus in the temple.

So Mary and Joseph had traveled to Jerusalem, and then

they started to go back home.

Both realized we don't have Jesus with us.

I thought it was with you.

I thought he was with you.

So they went back and found Jesus in the temple.

Jesus was about 12 years old at that time.

So from the time that Jesus was a baby until

he was 12 years old those the Onley stories we

have about him and then we don't hear about him

again until he's 30 years old.

And when I was a kid, I was always thinking

I would love to know what Jesus was like is

a kid.

Why don't we have more stories from that?

Or even like as a young adult?

Why don't We have stories about what Jesus was like

and what he did or what he said during those

times of his life.

Instead, we only hear about him again when he's 30

years old and, um is baptized by John the Baptist.

That's that's where the story picks up again.

But I will tell you, as an adult, I actually

love what are called these hidden years of Jesus most

of his childhood and then growing up is a teenager

and into adulthood that we don't have these stories of

Jesus. They're called the hidden years of Jesus.

And you know what Jesus did during those years Exactly

what you're doing, exactly what your parents are doing.

He lived a normal life.

He lived a normal life in the home with Mary

and Joseph.

He probably studied.

Um, he learned how to do carpentry from his from

his foster father, Joseph, and he worked.

Hey, did normal stuff.

So when you are going about your normal day, Jesus

knows exactly what that's like, because that's exactly what he

did for his life.

There's something else that we do on the feast of

the presentation of the Lord eso you noticed that Simeon

and Anna in the story recognized who Jesus was, in

fact, Simeon new that Jesus was the Messiah and could

have, like, new so much that he could have called

him the Messiah, though he doesn't in this story.

Ah, lot of people come to recognize who Jesus was

in the Bible.

But some people are given that, um, special hint and

Simeon and Anna to those people because of their life

of prayer.

And they're there.

It even says fasting in the story, uh, their life

of loving God, um, that they were so close to

God that God helped him to recognize who Jesus was

long before a lot of other people, um S o

they recognized Jesus was the Messiah.

And we also talk about Jesus being the light of

the world.

It's one of the reasons that we use a lot

of candles in our worship and in our prayer.

Um, you'll notice that every time we celebrate mass, we

light candles every single time.

We also use a lot of we like candles during

prayer. Think about like the Advent wreath, how we like

candles during during advent as we like the advent candles.

Um, a lot of times we use candles in our

prayer because it reminds us that Jesus is the light

of the world.

He brings light into our dark world, Um, and that

you can come into our hearts and bring light into

our the dark places in our lives too.

Um, So because we use candles in our worship, we

will also bless candles, because when you bless something, you

set it aside for a holy purpose.

We choose to do this on February 2nd as part

of the presentation of Lord, um I think in part

because Simeon and Anna recognized Jesus, um, for the light

that he was bringing.

But in another way, February 2nd is exactly between the

winter solstice, the first day of winter, and the vernal

equinox, which is the first day of spring.

So February is this smack dab center of winter.

And so normally, by this point, at least, your parents

are probably kind of done with winter.

I know kids aren't always.

I'm a snow lover myself.

I could hack a little bit more winter, but, uh,

we are in the middle of the cold in, you

know, it's still not, although our days are getting a

little bit lighter.

There's still a lot of darkness and still get start

kind of early.

But this is the smack dab center of winter.

And so we blessed candles on this day as a

way of reminding ourselves that God is still with us.

We can get through the darkness of winter and anything

else that life throws at us.

Um, but also that the light is coming, not just

the light returning to our days as the days get

longer, but also the light that God brings to our

our darkness and arson.

Um, some of the candles that we bless on the

presentation of Lord, which is also sometimes called Candle, Miss

Day. Because we blessed candles on this day will be

used the very next day for a blessing of throats.

So on February 2nd, we bless the candles.

On February 3rd, we celebrate the feast of ST Blaise

and we take two of these candles and you'll see

that a lot of times they're tied with a red

ribbon. Not always, but sometimes they are because red is

the color of martyrdom, Um, or giving up our lives

for the faith and ST Blaze was a martyr, and

we will use them for blessing of throats.

Eso se blazes feast days, February 3rd, but our parish

because a lot of people can't get to Mass during

weekdays. We also do a blessing of throats on the

Sunday closest eso.

This coming Sunday, February 6th and seventh will be the

blessing of throats at all of our masses at Divine

Mercy Church and everyone will have a chance to go

up and a priest or deacon, we'll put the candles

on either side of your neck.

It doesn't hurt, I promise.

And we'll do a special blessing of the throat because

ST Blazes, the patron saint of Throw Ammons, we're gonna

watch a video about ST Blaise and, um, kind of

why he is the patron saint of throats.

Uh, this this last thing is just kind of a

funny, um, anecdote.

But we also know that February 2nd is Groundhog Day,

right where the grund tells us whether we're gonna have

an early spring or have six more weeks of winter.

But even older than Groundhog Day is this poem about

candle? This day it's actually where groundhog day comes from

it is a candlemas day.

Be fair and bright Winter will have another flight.

But if it But if it be dark with clouds

and rain, winter is gone and will not come again.

So even our traditional Groundhog's Day is based on Candlemas

Day, which I think is pretty funny.

So enjoy the video about state place.

And, um, I encourage you as a family to find

your rosaries and maybe say a decades of the rosary.

Sometime. Maybe we need to do a video on that

as well.

On the rosary.

Thank you.

Presentation of the Lord

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