Today we celebrate Columbus Day.  While people argue about whether or not this day should be celebrated as a holiday,  it is safe to say that most people enjoy the day off from work.  For most it is a day to be with their families.  For most children it means “no school on Monday!”  Today’s Gospel tells us that “…there is something greater than Jonah Here.” (See Luke 11: 29 -32.)  This made me think about our society today.  Our society knows how to take a day off.   I enjoy time with family as much as anybody else and a day off as much as anyone else.  Yet, we have an opportunity to take a day off for a reason greater than Columbus every week.  Every Sunday we remember the Life, Death and Resurrection of Jesus.  Jesus is God.  He is greater than Jonah, Columbus and everyone else.  Why don’t we close businesses on Sunday anymore?  I know that the answer is the Almighty Dollar.  We are required and invited to go to Mass by God every Sunday.  The Third Commandment does not say “thou shall keep Holy the Sabbath Day unless you work.”  We Catholics have the power to change things by prayer and by example.  The last job I held before entering the seminary was working Security for Burns Security at the old Yankee Stadium.  One Sunday we were told we had to be on post at a certain time because the Yankees were playing a 1 pm game on a Sunday.  I told my boss I could not be on post at the time he wanted me because the earliest Mass at Saint Joan of Arc was at 8 am.  To his credit he told me everyone had to be on post on time except me.  He told me to go to Mass and that he would hold my post.  My post was a desired one because it was on the third base side, in the front row were many celebrities attended the game.  These were the best seats in the House that Ruth Built.  When I arrived to work that Sunday and every Sunday after that he did not mind that I was late because I was putting God first. You should have seen his reaction when later in the season I gave him my letter stating that I was resigning because I was going to enter the seminary.  He thought it was a joke.  Thank God it was no joke and God gave me the gift of the priesthood.  Here are some suggestions if you are stuck working a job on a Sunday.  Remember, liturgically Sunday begins Saturday at 4 pm.  We can go to any Mass from Saturday at 4 pm until the last Mass on Sunday.  Look around while the last Mass in my parish is at 1:30 pm at Saint Joan of Arc in the Bronx they have a 7 pm Mass.  Also remember that we do not have to go to Mass in a language that we understand we just have to go to Mass.  A final thought is to exchange days off with a pious Muslim.  I know of one Muslim who will exchange his day off with any Catholic.  The Catholic will work his Friday and he will work their Sunday.  The same can be done with the pious Jew.  Their holy day is Saturday.  If you put God first you might suffer greatly but at the end of time when it really matters you will not regret it.

As you may know I will be in Italy for the Canonizations of Blessed John Paul II and Blessed John XXIII.  I leave Monday and return on the 30th.  I'll offer mass for your intentions every time I celebrate Mass in Italy during this trip.  Just send your intentions to me at fatherrosado (at) fatherrosado.com  or tweet them @FatherRosadoNY or send them through the need prayer app (click here to get it).  The Masses will be for multiple intentions.  God Bless You.

This weekend I am preaching about the need of using our gifts in order to bring  Jesus to the people.  In the video above Sister Cristina does just that with her rendition of Alicia Key's "No One."  In today's Gospel the Samaritan woman is not sure of the true identity of Jesus.  In verse 19, she incorrectly calls him a prophet.  In verse 29, she doubts if Jesus is the Christ although Jesus reveals his identity to her in verse 26.  The amazing part of the Gospel is that she goes out tells the Samaritans about Jesus.  The Samaritans respond to the news of Jesus arrival by inviting him to stay for two days with them and he stays!  By virtue of our baptism all Catholics are called to preach Jesus to all the people of the world.  One way to do this is by using the gifts God has given us.  Recently at a retreat I attended I was inspired by a man cleaning toilets.  He was singing and dancing. He informed me that he did not need to be in the kitchen nor in the auditorium listening to the talks.  He stated that he was very content serving God by cleaning toilets.  It was simply amazing!  No gift no matter how small is insignificant.  Use your talents for Jesus.

 The Douay-Rheims version of today's Gospel is below.

 [5] He cometh therefore to a city of Samaria, which is called Sichar, near the land which Jacob gave to his son Joseph.

[6] Now Jacob' s well was there. Jesus therefore being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well. It was about the sixth hour. [7] There cometh a woman of Samaria, to draw water. Jesus saith to her: Give me to drink. [8] For his disciples were gone into the city to buy meats. [9] Then that Samaritan woman saith to him: How dost thou, being a Jew, ask of me to drink, who am a Samaritan woman? For the Jews do not communicate with the Samaritans. [10] Jesus answered, and said to her: If thou didst know the gift of God, and who he is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou perhaps wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.

[11] The woman saith to him: Sir, thou hast nothing wherein to draw, and the well is deep; from whence then hast thou living water? [12] Art thou greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle? [13] Jesus answered, and said to her: Whosoever drinketh of this water, shall thirst again; but he that shall drink of the water that I will give him, shall not thirst for ever: [14] But the water that I will give him, shall become in him a fountain of water, springing up into life everlasting. [15] The woman saith to him: Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come hither to draw.

[16] Jesus saith to her: Go, call thy husband, and come hither. [17] The woman answered, and said: I have no husband. Jesus said to her: Thou hast said well, I have no husband: [18] For thou hast had five husbands: and he whom thou now hast, is not thy husband. This thou hast said truly. [19] The woman saith to him: Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. [20] Our fathers adored on this mountain, and you say, that at Jerusalem is the place where men must adore.

[20] This mountain: Garizim, where the Samaritans had their schismatical temple.

[21] Jesus saith to her: Woman, believe me, that the hour cometh, when you shall neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, adore the Father. [22] You adore that which you know not: we adore that which we know; for salvation is of the Jews. [23] But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true adorers shall adore the Father in spirit and in truth. For the Father also seeketh such to adore him. [24] God is a spirit; and they that adore him, must adore him in spirit and in truth. [25] The woman saith to him: I know that the Messias cometh (who is called Christ). Therefore, when he is come, he will tell us all things.

[26] Jesus saith to her: I am he, who am speaking with thee. [27] And immediately his disciples came; and they wondered that he talked with the woman. Yet no man said: What seekest thou? or, why talkest thou with her? [28] The woman therefore left her waterpot, and went her way into the city, and saith to the men there: [29] Come, and see a man who has told me all things whatsoever I have done. Is not he the Christ? [30] They went therefore out of the city, and came unto him.

[31] In the mean time the disciples prayed him, saying: Rabbi, eat. [32] But he said to them: I have meat to eat, which you know not. [33] The disciples therefore said one to another: Hath any man brought him to eat? [34] Jesus saith to them: My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, that I may perfect his work. [35] Do you not say, There are yet four months, and then the harvest cometh? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes, and see the countries; for they are white already to harvest.

[36] And he that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life everlasting: that both he that soweth, and he that reapeth, may rejoice together. [37] For in this is the saying true: That it is one man that soweth, and it is another that reapeth. [38] I have sent you to reap that in which you did not labour: others have laboured, and you have entered into their labours. [39] Now of that city many of the Samaritans believed in him, for the word of the woman giving testimony: He told me all things whatsoever I have done. [40] So when the Samaritans were come to him, they desired that he would tarry there. And he abode there two days.

[41] And many more believed in him because of his own word. [42] And they said to the woman: We now believe, not for thy saying: for we ourselves have heard him, and know that this is indeed the Saviour of the world.