Confirmation Robes for the December 7th Celebration have arrived.
Please stop by the RE Office during Religious Education Class hours to pick up your child's Confirmation Robe.
No special care is needed for the Robes (i.e. do not wash or iron them).
Candidates do not have to wear the Robe to the Rehearsal on December 6th, but must wear the Robe during the entire time they are in the church on December 7th.

Confirmation Rehearsal: Friday, Dec. 6th @ 6:30 PM in the Church
Confirmation Celebration: Saturday, Dec. 7th @ 11:00 AM in the Church

To Contact Jay Cuasay, please call 703-430-0811 ext. 112

The Celebration Date for the Confirmation 2013 Group is
Saturday, December 7, at 11:00 AM.
Most Reverend Paul S. Loverde is the celebrant.
Fr. Robert Wagner is the Master of Ceremonies.
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Note: Your child still needs to complete Community Service Hours and the Confirmation Retreat.
He/She will need to sign off on his/her Confirmation Name, Sponsor and give height/weight measurements for the Confirmation Robe.

At our first Parent Confirmation meeting your child was given an assignment to write about the day that they were baptized. We also talked about how Baptism, Confirmation, and Eucharist are the three sacraments of intiation, whose order of celebration and connection is best seen during the Easter Vigil, where all three sacraments are celebrated in the same celebration.

Download the document below to read some of the more interesting sentences from these Baptism Reports and my comments, which are in italics.

NPR just completed a week-long series devoted to the rising number of young people growing up as "the nones", as in those who have no particular faith affiliation. There are also many people who see themselves as "spiritual" but "not religious."
More and more youth and young adults tend to take a more lax attitude to faith and are less connected to traditional, more mainstream religions.
Passing on our faith to our children and doing so through sacraments is no guarantee that they will not drift away for a time, or even for good. Listening to these stories may help us at least understand the cultural context and world that they see. It may give us better language to reach them and let them know they will always be welcome in Church--and more importantly to be clear on what the Church offers them.
The link is here: http://www.npr.org/series/169065270/losing-our-religion

Short History of Confirmation

In the Early Church, it was predominantly adults who first became Christian and celebrated the sacraments of initiation (baptism/confirmation/eucharist). Nevertheless, infant baptism became the norm quite early in the church. But Baptism/Confirmation was still the form of that celebration.

In the West, Bishops retained the right to confer Confirmation while in the East, priests were delegated to continue to celebrate Baptism/Confirmation. In the West, at an appointed time the Bishop would come to celebrate Confirmation. After celebrating Confirmation, the newly Confirmed would receive their first communion as fully initiated members.

Pope Pius X in 1910 lowered the age for the reception of First Communion to the age of reason. The prerequisite for celebrating Communion was still Baptism/Confirmation. However, given the number of infant baptism far outpaced the number of Confirmations a Bishop could do, there was the unintended consequence of Communions taking place before Confirmations had been celebrated. In other words, more children reaching the age of reason and celebrating Communion in the parish before Confirmation when the Bishop visited. The normal order of the sacraments became disrupted and with it the narrative understanding and meaning of the sacraments of initiation.

In an effort to address this unintended consequence, Pope Pius X left it up to the local bishops to decide the age for Confirmation. In some dioceses, the original order of these sacraments has been preserved. If communion is celebrated around the age of reason, then Confirmation is also celebrated prior to the reception of Communion. If Confirmation is postponed to a later age, then communion is also postponed.

As part of the sweeping changes of Vatican II, the catechumenate (i.e. the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults who are unbaptized and wish to become Catholic) was restored and with it the order of sacraments of initiation. But that is a somewhat recent event that still has some generations for this restoration to take full effect in the understanding of the faithful and more importantly in the practices where Confirmation is after communion for those baptized as infants.

What is Confirmation NOT:

Confirmation is not the candidate confirming his/her faith as an adult.
The name Confirmation does not come from this act or the renewal of the candidate’s baptismal vows. Rather, the name comes from the fact that the celebrant, normally the Bishop, as the head of the local church diocese has come to “Confirm” the baptism of the candidate (i.e. complete the other side of the Baptism/Confirmation relationship).

More specifically, just as with other sacraments, the ultimate power and action for the sacraments is not something that resides within the celebrant, but it is God who acts through sacraments (i.e. they are efficacious signs—they do what they are).

Confirmation is not a sacrament of maturity
Again, we should remember that the emphasis in sacraments is on what GOD does and not on what the child is or is not doing. God is not “Confirming” the maturity of your child. Rather, this sacrament, as a sacrament among the three sacraments of initiation, is welcoming your child into full membership in the church with the two-fold action of Baptism/Confirmation marking them as a Christian for a particular purpose. The fullness of this welcome is made complete by the invitation to share in the Eucharist now and from now on as a fully initiated member of the church.

Confirmation is not the third sacrament after communion
Confirmation is one of the 3 sacraments of initiation whose original order is Baptism/Confirmation, Communion. Think of this restored order as entering into the waters of Baptism, coming out of the Baptismsl waters into the embrace of Confirmation (Laying of Hands, Anointing with Chrism, Sharing the Sign of Peace), being welcomed to the table (for Communion). Or in secular terms, like preparing to go out: washing, putting on new clothes and perfume/cologne, and going out to a meal. It is not simply the “next sacrament” in a series of sacraments that count us up from 1 to 7. Although you or your child may have experienced baptism as an infant and the other two sacraments of initiation sometime later, with Communion celebrated before Confirmation, you should still think of these three sacraments as going together to form a fully initiated Catholic, a member who has been washed clean, commissioned in the Spirit as a disciple to act in the world, and sustained by the Eucharist on the way to the Kingdom.

As we prepare for the Baptism of the Lord, the Sunday that brings about the close of the Christmas Season and the start of Ordinary Time, it is fitting to look upon the Christmas Season as a whole as "cradle catholics" to adults in faith.
We accompany our children who we brought to the font at baptism and now journey with them toward Confirmation.

What is the relationship between Baptism and Confirmation?
What is it that we are following? What do we find?
I hope this little song and video help you reflect upon this past season and all that has gone into raising your children in faith, sharing with them the story of Christmas and the rest of our Salvation History.
*Please feel free to offer any thoughts/reflections in the comment section below.

Parent Confirmation Meetings:
By now, every parent has been contacted and has signed up for the four (4) meeting dates that begin in the New Year. Thank you for your attention to that.

Remember that first Parent Confirmation Meeting is in January: TUE JAN 8 or THU JAN 17. Parents have already signed up to attend one of these meeetings.

Note: These meetings are for those families with children in the second year of Confirmation Preparation and are part of the Confirmation 2013 group. They are currently enrolled in Grade 8 or higher and will celebrate Confirmation (or in some cases Confirmation and First Eucharist) in Fall 2013 after completing the RE2012-2013 Year.

To Review the Confirmation Preparation Process click here.

There is a mandatory Parent Orientation Meeting, Monday DEC 3 @ 7:30 PM in Atonement Hall. If you cannot make this meeting, a mandatory Make-Up Meeting is scheduled for MON DEC 10 @ 7:30 PM in Atonement Hall.
You must attend one of these meetings. Please do not bring your child with you.
Please bring your personal calendars because scheduling the remaining dates for upcoming Parent Meetings will be a major part of this meeting.
Also, if you have not provided a copy of your child's baptismal form, please bring a copy to the December Meeting.
Thanks.