Pray for Unity

Our family Christmas tree had many typical ornaments (the use of tinsel was an annual debate), but there was one chubby Santa that had been my mother’s mother’s from her own childhood, made of thin and very fragile blown glass. Because of its age, its heritage, and its delicate construction, we always treated it with special caution and gentle hands. It was put on last to avoid bumping it or knocking it off a branch.

Our communion in Jesus Christ goes back over 2,000 years. It is a heritage given to us that we share with our ancestors and all the saints, whose legacy we honor this weekend. It has been fractured many times over the centuries, but the power of God’s love and mercy can still heal our divisions and draw us anew into the unity entrusted to us by the one, Triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Our ACC name, “One in Christ,” speaks to us daily not only of the gift of unity but also its responsibility. We do not of ourselves create unity in the Church. God does this through our one Baptism into Christ, professing one Faith in the Church’s Creed, becoming ever more fully one Body in Christ in the Eucharist, being shepherded as one flock by the same Pope, and more. Unity is God’s gift to us. Our part is to seek to deepen that unity in our local communities and perhaps even more, to prevent fracturing it.

Bishop Neary has asked each church in the Diocese of Saint Cloud to celebrate a common Mass of Unity on the weekend of November 14-15. Each church will use the same prayers, hear the same homily from Bishop, and select from the same menu of appropriate music for this theme. Bishop wrote:

Over the past several years, our Diocese has walked a challenging yet hope-filled journey through the All Things New pastoral planning process. Together, we have experienced change, uncertainty, grief, discernment, and renewal. Some communities have merged. Others have entered new relationships. Many parishioners continue to navigate feelings of loss, concern and anxiety about the future.

At the same time, we are living in a culture increasingly marked by division. Political tensions, social media conflicts, polarization within families and communities and differing visions for theChurch can all make it difficult to recognize one another first as brothers and sisters in Christ.

For these reasons, I am asking every parish and Area Catholic Community in our Diocese to celebrate a Mass of Unity on the weekend of November 14-15, 2026.

The Mass of Unity Weekend will provide an opportunity for our diocesan family to pray intentionally for:

- Healing where there has been hurt or misunderstanding

- Reconciliation where relationships have become strained

- Unity among our parishes, Area Catholic Communities and diocesan ministries

- An openness to the Holy Spirit as we continue implementing All Things New

- A renewed commitment to our shared mission of evangelization and discipleship

Fr. Patrick and I invite you to pray for these intentions already today, and to continue to hold the goal of our unity in Christ in prayer. Particularly, bring your personal concerns, doubts, anxieties, and hopes for All Things New to the Lord’s wisdom and peace in your own life of prayer. As Psalm 62:8 encourages us: “Trust in him at all times… pour out your heart before him; God is a refuge for us.”

At the Last Supper, Jesus prayed precisely for this unity among all his disciples:

“I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me. And I have given them the glory you gave me, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may be brought to perfection as one, that the world may know that you sent me, and that you loved them even as you loved me.”

We are among those who have believed through the word of the Saints. May God make us ever one with them in the Lord.