Church

Save the Date for HS Youth Group! Are you an incoming freshman-senior student? If so, mark your calendars for our kickoff meeting Sunday August 13, and our Youth Day Away at Camp Awanita on August 19. For most young adults, the time in high school can be a “make or break” period in one’s faith. The Youth Group at Our Lady of the Rosary Parish provides a place where you can ask the difficult questions: what is my purpose? Who and what is God? Should I persevere in Catholicism? Is …

In my last letter, I argued that OLR school offers an education that is fundamentally different from and superior to the pagan education of the public school system. We achieve this through an academic program that is at once Catholic and classical. Those reading these words likely have a good sense of what it means to receive a Catholic education. The doctrines of the Church are clearly taught in the classroom, validated by the words of scripture and the lives of the saints. While this teaching is being received by …

Imagine a planet where a large portion of the population is both highly educated and believed and did patently absurd things. In fact, the more years the inhabitants spent receiving this planet’s education, the more likely they were to become illogical and narcissistic. A visitor to such a planet might reasonably conclude that the “education” in question was the very thing producing these results. In other words, the activity the inhabitants called education was not in fact creating well-educated people. It was creating the exact opposite.  Welcome to Planet Earth, …

It is hard not to notice that Our Lady of the Rosary Church has added many families to the congregation over the last few years. Something is attracting families, not just from within Greenville, but from across the country. I have heard OLR called a “Unicorn.” This term describes a community that combines all desirable traits in one place: reverent liturgy, faithful families, holy clergy, lovely music, charitable ministries, and classical Catholic education, within a livable city and state. And like unicorns, they basically don’t exist in real life. OLR’s …

Last week I shared some highlights from the school year just concluded. In this letter, we look forward to the year to come.  Overall, OLR’s enrollment will increase to over 300 students, nearing the maximum we can support in our existing buildings. The high school will reach 80 students, including 17 seniors! It is hard to believe that, with the 2023-2024 school year, our new Upper School program is already close to capacity.  In fact, many grades now operate on a waiting list. At present we are full at grades, 3, 5, 6, 7, …

Brothers and Sisters, I once again have the pleasure of addressing our parishioners regarding the state of Our Lady of the Rosary School. Over the next month, I will contribute a series of letters detailing how things are going and what we expect for the future. Thank you in advance for celebrating our school with me and praying we may continue doing the Lord’s work for the families we serve.  The 2022-2023 school year culminated in the graduation of six seniors, our second graduating class since the founding of the …

Dear Brothers and Sisters, In the light of recent blasphemies and displays of anti-Catholic bigotry and immorality in our country, the bishops have asked Catholics to pray the Litany of the Sacred Heart tomorrow on the Feast of the Sacred Heart. The Litany can be found HERE and we ask you to pray the litany in your homes if you are not able to attend Mass tomorrow at 10 am. Fr. LongeneckerThe bishops’ invitation to the faithful follows:“Catholic Christians traditionally recognize June as the month of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. During …

Dear Brothers and Sisters, On this feast of Corpus Christi it is important for us to re-affirm our belief in the Real Sacramental Presence of Our Lord Jesus Christ’s Body Blood Soul and Divinity in the Most Blessed Sacrament, and to distinguish our belief from the opinions held by our non Catholic brothers and sisters. Many Protestants will say they believe in “The Real Presence” but they probably do NOT mean what we mean when we speak of the “Real Presence”. The Catholic Church teaches that at a valid Catholic …

When I wrote about our worship being a “compendium of culture” I mentioned a few things we often take for granted: the sacred vestments and vessels. The church teaches that the sacred vessels must be inviolable and made from precious metals. When a parish is poor “precious metals” may be copper or bronze or even tin. However, glass or pottery vessels are not to be used because they can be broken and the sacrament desecrated. Most of the sacred vessels at Our Lady of the Rosary are antiques that have …

Brothers and Sisters, We are blessed at Our Lady of the Rosary to have a fine young organist and choir master. Benjamin Philips loves his work and has done a great job developing our choral music program. We now have four choirs with over a hundred participants: Senior girls, junior girls, junior boys and the adult schola. The documents of the Second Vatican Council teach clearly about church music. The pipe organ is to be given pride of place and Gregorian chant and sacred polyphony are to be the primary …

Brothers and Sisters, One of the components of culture is language and literature. Our Catholic faith has produced the greatest literature in the world and the liturgy reflects this great heritage. We may not read sections of the great novels of Dostoevsky, Tolstoy or Tolkien at Mass. We may not read the poetry of Dante or Shakespeare, but we do hear the great sagas and stories of Sacred Scripture. We hear the parables and preaching of Jesus in the gospel. These stories are the foundation of Western culture, and if …