Father Tom O'Donnell Offers Lenten Message

The Season of Lent

Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II has told us that: “Lent is a time of profound truth which brings conversion, restores hope, and by putting everything back in its proper place, brings peace and optimism.”

During the season of Lent we are often reminded in our Mass prayers and readings of the need for repentance and renewal. The repentance envisioned is a change of mind and heart, to the extent that we need it so that we may become more holy, more Christ-like, in our attitudes and life.

Our repentance during Lent calls us to prayer and fasting. I can remember my Dad, who liked to have a little drink now and then, but during Lent he would always give up his shot and beer, except for one day – St. Patrick’s Day. He claimed that since this day was a “holyday”, it was not part of Lent.

Just as at times we need to change directions in our careers and our life endeavors, so in the spiritual realm we need to examine and evaluate our status and perhaps make a change of direction. Sometimes it will have to be a conversion or turning around of our life.

One of the great needs of people today is to return to a religious sense. There is a great need to return to God. Unfortunately, today our concern may be for the material, the secular, the here and now. Such concern may be necessary because God does expect us to take care of ourselves in this life to the extent that we are able and to provide for those who depend on us for material support and sustenance.

However, if material goods are our only concern, to the detriment of our spiritual good, then we stand in need or correction and conversion. Repentance is needed.


Repentance, such as it is preached to us during Lent, is not simply a matter of avoiding sin.

Hopefully we all do this to the best of our ability. True repentance or conversion means doing good for others, letting our faith bear fruit in a harvest of charitable deeds. As Hibernians we do this by our various works of charity and mission work.

Prayer, self-discipline, acts of mercy are the recommended means of making ourselves ready for eternity now.

Make Lent a time of conversion, make Lent a time of good works, make Lent a time in which we truly live out the virtues of Unity, Fraternity and Christian Charity. May the blessings of St. Patrick continue to abide with all of you during the celebrations of our Irish Heritage.

With every blessing and best wish,
-- Father Tom O’Donnell, A.O.H. Allegheny County and Pennsylvania State Chaplain

Fr. Tom O'Donnell's Pre-Lenten Message

The Spirit of Lent

In a few short weeks, Christians will once again be celebrating Ash Wednesday, which signals the beginning of the Lenten Season.

Pope Benedict XVI has told us: “Lent offers us the providential opportunity to deepen the meaning and value of our Christian lives, and it stimulates us to rediscover the mercy of God so that we in turn may become m9ore merciful to our brothers and sisters. In the Lenten period the Church makes it her duty to propose some specific tasks that accompany the faithful concretely in the process of interior renewal, these are prayer, fasting and almsgiving. ”

Our Holy Father is specifically telling us that the Corporal and Spiritual Works or Mercy should be the center of our penitential practice during the holy season of Lent. Penance should be not only inward but also outward and social, being directed towards works of mercy on behalf of our brothers and sisters.

In St. Matthew’s Gospel for Ash Wednesday, Our Lord tells us: “Give alms ... pray to your Father …Fast without a gloomy face …”

Giving alms, Jesus teaches, means making the needs of others our own, especially the needy of the world. The needy are all around us: children and the old, the sick, families and individuals, next-door neighbors and people in lands far away.

Jesus says that giving and looking out for those in need will make you live, and you will receive some blessing from God in return. And what shall we give? Some time, some of our talent, material resources. And almsgiving is not just for the rich. Poor or rich, ourselves.

In deciding, decide generously. After all we have the great example of Jesus: “He loved us, and gave himself up for us .”

We all have something to give. Whatever we give, though should be something of (word missing).

The spirit of Lent also calls us to pray. But prayer, Jesus teaches, is much more than the words: “Go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father in secret.” Before you pray, enter the room of your heart. Shut the door to noise and the countless everyday cares grabbing for attention.

In the quiet of your heart and with your faith as a guide, speak to your God. A gracious Father listens and knows what you need. God helps us pray in this season. For those who have stopped praying or pray without fervor, God gives the grace for praying again.

Usually the grace comes as we turn to prayers and practices already there: the Celebration of Mass, reflective reading of the Bible, simple prayers like the Our Father and Hail Mary and the Psalms, the Rosary of Our Blessed Mother.

As members of the Ancient Order of Hibernians we can find no greater way to fulfill our Lenten obligations than to continue to support and donate our time and gifts to the many Hibernian works of charity which have been the hallmark of our great society for many years.

Father Tom O’Donnell, A.O.H. Division One, Allegheny County Chaplain, Pennsylvania State Chaplain

Father Tom O'Donnell's November Message

All Saints and All Souls Day

It is no accident that All Souls Day follows immediately after the feast of All Saints. After having celebrated the victory and glory of those who are now in heaven, it is only fitting to remember the "poor souls in purgatory," to use the rather quaint but charming language of tradition, and to pray that they too may soon be able to join the saints.

We know that they may be in purgatory because they may still need to be purified, as it were, from any sinful blemishes that may still remain. We don't really know what exactly this purification entails and it may very well be that, in many cases, purgatory is simply the suffering that many experience in their last days on earth.

On November 2, All Souls' Day, the Church encourages us to once again be close to those whom we loved in the past but who no longer grace us with their physical presence. Some Catholics heed this call in a far more direct way than do we Americans. For example, in the Philippines Catholic families spend the night before All Souls' Day at the graveside of their relatives.

I am not about to try to convince American Catholics to "camp out" at a favorite graveside, but we should certainly try to spend part of All Souls' Day once again talking to those who were close to us and are now separated from us by death. There are so many reasons for doing this. First, it gives us the opportunity to enjoy again the enriching company of dear friends. My parents taught me so much when I was a child.

Should their death mark the end of their presence as teachers in my life or should they continue to be my instructors. This feast also provides us with an opportunity to remember those family members and friends who have already died and to whom we owe so much.

To all these good people we owe such a debt of gratitude that we should welcome this opportunity to celebrate their goodness and to ask God to reward them for all the ways in which they have been a blessing in our lives.

This also reminds us of our obligation to be a blessing and a support in the lives of many other people who have not been as fortunate as we have been. In that way, the meaning of the Eucharist will be reflected in our lives and we can then be confident that Jesus will "raise us up on the last day."

As Catholics, we believe in the Communion of Saints. We believe that those who have gone before us have not died in vain and that the tomb is not their final resting place. We believe that those whom we loved are still very much a part of our lives and insofar as the goodness of their lives has brought them to the throne of God, they now stand there pleading for us.

We are often advised that we should look to the future and forget the past. Hard as we might try, however, the past is always a part of us and we ignore it only at our own peril. On November 2, let us heed the encouragement of the Church, and once again unite ourselves in prayer with those who were dear to us in times past and who are close to us in God's love in the present.

Father Tom O’Donnell, AOH Allegheny County and PA State Chaplain