Our Lady of Pompeii Catholic Church
  • Home
  • New Here?
    • Watch Mass Online
    • Staff Directory
    • Pictures of OLP Fellowship
    • Our History
    • Pastoral Administration
  • Sacraments
    • Baptism
    • Confession
    • Holy Eucharist
    • Confirmation
    • Holy Matrimony
    • Holy Orders
    • Anointing of the Sick
  • Get Involved
    • Events
    • BINGO
    • Holy Name Society
    • Holy Rosary Society
    • Liturgical Ministries
    • Altar Serving
    • Music Ministry
    • Respect Life
    • Service and Outreach
  • Faith Formation
    • Family Faith Formation
    • Adult Faith Formation
    • RCIA
    • Other Devotions >
      • Lent 2022 >
        • Stations of the Cross
        • Divine Mercy
      • Lent 2023
    • Resources
  • Give
  • Contact Us
  • Family of Parishes
  • Fr.Tom Reflections
    • Fr. Tom's Archive
  • Funeral Readings

​Reflections from Fr. Tom

 Not all that Glitters is Gold 
 
Imagine you’re on the planet Pitjandjara.  You’re a mutant ant named Blix, the size of a small lion.  Your jet black with fiery orange eyes, big bulbous ones!  You don’t have ears or a voice-box, but you can hear by feeling vibrations in the soil and talk by making noise with a scraper near your abdomen.  You’re at the entrance of a small cave and you put your leg into the soil.  The hairs at the bottom of your legs pick up a strange signal.  It feels like music from a violin channeling through your 500 lb. frame.  You slam your head on the ground to let anything in the cave know what it could be messin’ with.  Then you slash the cave walls with your antennae making a whip-cracking noise.  Still, you cautiously enter the cave. 
When you enter, it is breathtaking.  Rows of stony-icicle shapes sprout up from the ground and others hang from the ceiling.  Some meet forming columns of stone.  Iridescent hues emanate from strange rock formations.  You proceed through the cave which becomes pitch dark but then reach an alcove dimly lit from a distant exit.  The music you can feel now without even submerging your leg in the limestone flooring.  The vibrations twang with a melody something is manipulating chord by chord.  It sounds like it’s vibrating from the cave walls down to the cave floor.  You look up to so see its source.  You wished you hadn’t. 
A domelike structure of webbing can be seen suspended from the roof of the cave.  Two furry legs can be seen scurrying above in the darkness and then everything is a blurred nightmare.  A creature descends from above with unparalleled speed.  In a second, the dark behemoth is upon you, pulling you through its web like dome.  Holding the web between four sticky legs, it spins a hackled band of dry sticky silk.  It stretches the web to many times its size.  You try to use your mandibles to break free or cry with your scraper but it’s no good.  The web is like steel cable and the great spider is clever and quick.  It begins chattering its pincers in anticipation.  
Uh Oh!  What happens?  Well, as it turns out Blix is saved by one of the main characters.  But what’s the moral of the story?  Blix is alive and wants to embrace life passionately.  We do too but sometimes our passions can get the best of us.  Sometimes we can be passionate about wealth, power, beauty and fame.  These gifts aren’t bad in and of themselves, but we can become addicted to them.  When this happens, we can be controlled by the power of addiction or by others who are aware of our addiction.  We need to be wary and prudent.  Let us pray that God can give us crystal clear discernment to recognize a good path from a bad one.  Amen.
                                    
Fr. Toms Archive

Mass times

Weekend
Saturday 4:30 PM (Vigil)
Sunday  10 AM , 11:30 AM
​
Weekdays
Tuesday , Thursday  6:30 PM ​
Saturday 8 AM

Confession

Thursday  6 PM
Saturday  3:30 PM 
​By appointment 716-683-6522 ​

location

Our Lady of Pompeii Church 
129 Laverack Avenue 
Lancaster, NY 14086
​716-683-6522

quick links

Home Page
Contact Us
​
Live Stream
Events
Give
Bulletin
© COPYRIGHT 2020. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • New Here?
    • Watch Mass Online
    • Staff Directory
    • Pictures of OLP Fellowship
    • Our History
    • Pastoral Administration
  • Sacraments
    • Baptism
    • Confession
    • Holy Eucharist
    • Confirmation
    • Holy Matrimony
    • Holy Orders
    • Anointing of the Sick
  • Get Involved
    • Events
    • BINGO
    • Holy Name Society
    • Holy Rosary Society
    • Liturgical Ministries
    • Altar Serving
    • Music Ministry
    • Respect Life
    • Service and Outreach
  • Faith Formation
    • Family Faith Formation
    • Adult Faith Formation
    • RCIA
    • Other Devotions >
      • Lent 2022 >
        • Stations of the Cross
        • Divine Mercy
      • Lent 2023
    • Resources
  • Give
  • Contact Us
  • Family of Parishes
  • Fr.Tom Reflections
    • Fr. Tom's Archive
  • Funeral Readings