I am pleased to welcome you to St. Anne Catholic Church and School. Please take a moment to look around the site.
View Virtual Tour of St. Anne Church
You will find a wealth of information such as the numerous ministries available, links to Catholic resources, copies of our bulletin, upcoming events, our history, and much more. Let me extend to you an invitation to come and visit if you are in the area. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me at: fvalone@stanne-tomball.org
Fr. Fred
My Spirituality
As members of Christ’s Body, we have many ways to deepen our relationship with Him; and through Christ, to deepen our relationship with the Father. For me, the Eucharist and time in adoration before the Blessed Sacrament have been instrumental in my faith walk with Christ. As the pastor of St. Anne, this spirituality influences my shepherding of the parish. Let me briefly explain what this type of spirituality means to me.
A "Eucharistic spirituality" means that we gather to give thanks to God, both weekly at Sunday Mass and daily in prayer, in order to center ourselves in Christ. Through, with, and in Christ and under the loving guidance of the Holy Spirit, we offer ourselves as a living and holy sacrifice to the Father. With a spirituality based upon the Eucharist, our liturgical celebrations must strive to assist those gathered to experience transformation; like the bread and wine which become the Body and Blood of Christ, we must come to know the truth that as baptized Catholics we are the Body of Christ. As stated in the anointing following baptism of a child, "as Christ was anointed Priest, Prophet, and Kings, so may you live always as a member of his body, sharing everlasting life."
A "Eucharistic spirituality" cannot stop simply with our liturgical celebrations. The Eucharist is the one celebration, which never ends; it continues as we leave Mass in order to "go in peace to love and serve the Lord." In other words, service must be an essential part of an active Eucharistic spirituality. Service is how we continue our thanksgiving with the Lord. For instance, the phrase the "Mass is ended" which is often said by the priest or deacon at the end of the Eucharistic celebration comes from the Latin and means "She (the Church) is sent." The Church, the Body of Christ, is sent out to build God’s Kingdom through loving service of one another. Jesus tried to instill this idea in his disciples at the Last Supper. As we read in John’s gospel, at the Last Supper, after "he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord--and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you."
Service and worship must be connected with one another. Just as Jesus instructed both by His words and deeds, we too must live and celebrate our faith by words expressed in worship and words expressed by the actions of our lives, which give meaning to our words. As David Philippart states in his book, Savings Signs, Wondrous Deeds, "we become Christ’s body, bread broken for a world that is obese with materialism and still dying of malnutrition. We become a leaven in the world’s bread, an agent of change that helps the reign of God to rise, fragrantly, like a loaf browning in the oven. We become Christ’s blood, wine poured out in sacrifice and in celebration, poured out for the sake of a world drowning in division and still dying of thirst, a thirst for union and communion. We become the brewer’s yeast, the zest that unlocks the extraordinary in the ordinary, the tingle that makes sober people giddy with joy, the sweet smell and taste of the vintage."
In Christ,
Fr. Fred Valone