\u201cFather Stanley Rother followed the example of Christ,
\nand gave his life for the glory of your name.
\nHis death reveals your power shining through our human weakness.
\nYou choose the weak and make them strong in bearing witness to you,
\nthrough Jesus Christ our Lord.\u201d<\/p>\n
Last summer in 2016, I was in Santiago Atitl\u00e1n on the 35th<\/sup> anniversary of Fr. Rother\u2019s death.\u00a0 I had made similar visits on other anniversaries, starting with the 10th anniversary.\u00a0 The huge number of people gathered for the outdoor Mass in 2016 was remarkable, much bigger than any other anniversary.\u00a0 Many of these people at Mass were not even alive when Fr. Rother was killed.\u00a0 The love of Father Rother and devotion among the local people has continued to grow in the new generations that have come after Rother\u2019s death.<\/p>\n For the last several months, I have been working with many others to prepare for the Beatification Mass which will be held at the Cox Convention Center Arena, a venue holding about 14,000.\u00a0\u00a0 The Beatification Choir will be made up of 178 musicians from 27 parishes.\u00a0 There will several other choirs.\u00a0 A Hispanic choir, Vietnamese choir, and a Gospel choir will sing before the Mass, along with the Mount St. Mary Seminary Schola.\u00a0 As a way to unify the assembly, we have invited parishes to prepare for the Mass by learning a bilingual English\/Spanish setting of the \u201cHoly, Holy,\u201d the \u201cMemorial Acclamation,\u201d and the \u201cAmen,\u201d all taken from Peter Kolar\u2019s Misa Luna<\/em>. \u00a0Even in my parish which does not offer a Spanish Mass, the acclamations were learned quickly by our congregation and choirs.\u00a0 We hope to continue to use the acclamations with some regularity.<\/p>\n We are very excited as we prepare for the Beatification.\u00a0 Please keep all involved in your prayers.\u00a0 May the life and death of Blessed Stanley Rother draw many others to a deeper love for Christ and for their neighbor.<\/p>\n Father Rother wrote: \u201cThe shepherd cannot run at the first sign of danger.\u201d Nevertheless, as conditions worsened, he came back to Oklahoma. After a short time, despite the danger, he returned to the mission because of his love for the people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":37921,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[3116,362],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-new-ws","category-saints-mary"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/Father-Stephen-Bird.jpg\")
Rev. Stephen Bird is director of the Office of Worship and Spiritual Life of the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and is pastor of the Church of the Epiphany of the Lord in Oklahoma City.\u00a0 He is a graduate of St. John\u2019s University \/ School of Theology and Seminary.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"