Update 03/17/2020

A blessed St. Patrick’s Day to all of you! As we adjust to this new and disorienting situation, we want to keep you updated. As has been par for the course these past several days, the following is provisional and subject to change. Here’s our plan until further notice:

• The parish office will be closed, but we will be monitoring phone calls, voicemail, and email. The office staff will do their best to respond to your requests as promptly as possible. If you need to come to the office in person, please call ahead first and make sure your need cannot be handled remotely. We are here to help, but we want to curtail all unnecessary in-person visits to the parish office.
• For today, the church will be open for prayer from 11:00 to 2:00. You are welcome to come and make a visit to the Blessed Sacrament. We are working on arranging regular hours for prayer and possibly also for Eucharistic Adoration, pending further directives from the diocese.
• Until further notice, confessions will be offered at the usual time (12:15).
  • If you come for confession, please obey the posted signs and maintain at least 6 feet of distance from one another. (This doesn’t apply to members of the same family, of course.)
  • We will hold confessions in Aquinas Hall and the Library. To reduce the chances of infection from frequently touched surfaces, feel free to stand rather than kneel behind the screen. We also encourage you, without necessarily making it a part of your penance, to wash your hands after confession!
  • If you are feeling sick and have an urgent need for confession, please call the parish office and we will make special arrangements. Please do not come to our regular confession hours if you are feeling unwell.
• As friars, we will be celebrating a daily private community Mass in our house chapel. We hope to begin live-streaming this daily Mass tomorrow at 11:45. We will also record today’s Mass (with Fr. Hayes preaching on St. Patrick), and we hope to post it online sometime today. We will notify you when we post it. A different friar will preach each day.

We are discussing and thinking about more ways of being of service during this difficult time. We will continue to update you. Please know of our prayers.

In Christ,

The Friars