Saint Luke Roman Catholic Church

5235 South Avenue – Boardman, Ohio – 44512 | (330) 782-9783 | saintlukes@zoominternet.net

Parish Mission Statement

We are members of Saint Luke Parish, a Roman Catholic Community of Faith within the Diocese of Youngstown. We are deeply rooted in both Scripture and tradition.

Born in Baptism and sustained by the celebration of the Eucharist, we embrace our life in Christ through prayer and sacrament, service and outreach, proclamation of the Word and formation in faith. Guided by the Holy Spirit and motivated by our love of God and of all people, we are both a sign and an instrument of the Kingdom of Promise.

Our unique blessing and gift is that we are a parish family which creates a warm and welcoming worship environment and participates fully in the planning and celebration of the Liturgy.

Saint Luke Stewardship Prayer

Heavenly Father, life is your gift to us. You call us to live our lives in service to others.

Guide us as we choose each day to show your presence to all those we meet.

Give us the courage to do whatever we can, with whatever we have, to bring your love to our community, and the world.

Celebrating the Eucharist

Saturday Mass at 4:30pm
Sunday Mass at 10:00am
Monday and Thursday Communion Service at 8:00am
Tuesday and Friday Mass at 8:00am
Wednesday no services
Holy Days, please consult the bulletin

Traveling Catholics

Liturgical Publications Inc WeShare

St. Luke Parish welcomes Catholics who are traveling through our area. The link below lists churches and mass times to aid Catholics on travel.

CatholicMassTime.org

St. Luke Parish Video

Click here to view a video tribute to Saint Luke Church
(Video lasts approximately 1 hour)

Stewardship Reflection for
October 20, 2019

Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time

The four pillars of parish stewardship are hospitality, prayer, formation and service. They are intentionally presented in this order with the idea that we cannot expect people to respond to calls to increase their prayer life, their formation, and their service within and outside the parish, if they do not first feel welcomed and valued through the warmth of hospitality. It just makes good sense.

However, those who are already well versed in the spirituality and practicalities of stewardship know full well that stewardship cannot succeed unless it is steeped in prayer. Today’s readings show us the immense value of prayer and the privileged place it must have in our individual lives and in our parish community.

In our first reading, from Exodus, we find Moses interceding for the Israelites as they engage in a fierce battle against Amalek. As long as Moses keeps his hands raised, the Israelites succeed. But when his hands grow tired and droop, the Israelites begin to lose ground.

In his wisdom, Moses anticipated that he would need support from his community as he engaged in this spiritual battle. He brought Aaron and Hur along with him to support him (quite literally) as he began to grow weary. Moses relied on his friends to hold his hands up so that they remained steady until the battle was won. We modern-day stewards would do well to follow the example of Moses and gather together in our families and as a faith community to support each other in our own spiritual battles, great or small.

In our second reading, from St. Paul’s letter to Timothy, Paul gives wise counsel on a particularly efficacious source of prayer — the Holy Scriptures. He reminds us that “All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for refutation, for correction and for training in righteousness” so that when we truly study it and pray with it, we may be “competent, equipped for every good work” the Lord has for us to do. Paul says that it is not enough to simply study and pray over the Scripture, however. He exhorts us to proclaim it! And to be persistent in proclaiming it “whether it is convenient or inconvenient; convince, reprimand, encourage through all patience and teaching.” Since we cannot give what we do not possess, it is vital that we develop a relationship with God and in a special way through praying over His living Word to us.

Our Lord Himself continues this call to prayer and persistence in the Gospel passage from Luke. He tells the parable of the nagging widow who finally wears down the judge with her unrelenting persistence in her pursuit of a just ruling from him on her behalf. Jesus goes to great lengths to describe this judge, saying he “neither feared God nor respected any human.” Yet, even this corrupt judge responds with a just judgment because of the widow’s persistence.

Jesus uses this outlandish example to draw a vivid contrast between a reluctant, dishonest judge and our loving, all-merciful Father. If even a bad judge will give a good result in response to a persistent request, how much more eagerly and perfectly will our good Father respond to our persistent prayers to Him. If he delays in responding, if he provides a different response than the one we were expecting, we can remain confident and trusting in His goodness, knowing that His response whenever it comes and in whatever form, will be the very best one for us.

Our job then, as Christian stewards, is simply to remain faithful to our relationship with God through prayer. We should prioritize the Scriptures as a source of prayer and we must lean on each other in our communities — family and parish — as we support each other in prayer. A strong pillar of prayer will make all our other stewardship efforts fruitful.