Celebrating the Christmas Season as a Priest

Holy Spirit Province

Bejamin Ripley, OFM

On November 4th, I was ordained to the ministerial priesthood with a beautiful and joyous ordination mass. I was deeply touched to celebrate this significant event in my religious life with my Franciscan brothers, family members and the local community of Trois-Rivières.

My ordination to the priesthood has also renewed and strengthened my appreciation for the reason and meaning of the Christmas season.

I am now reflecting more on the mystery of Christ’s incarnation. It is perhaps one of the most challenging aspects of our Catholic faith to understand and believe that God is close to us as He is. Before Christ’s birth, God was often thought of as a far-away spirit, having little to do with the flesh. But the mystery of Christ’s incarnation brings God into directly into the human condition, demonstrating his great love and desire to be with us. The incarnation broke down the barrier between God and humanity. Through God’s grace, “we have been made sharers in the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity” (from the Catechism).

As a new priest, I am getting a greater appreciation of the incarnation, and I can reflect on it more profoundly when I celebrate the Eucharist. The words during Mass speak to me more clearly—God’s promise of redemption has been made real through Jesus Christ. This experience of the divine will transfer to my other activities and interactions with others I meet every day and when I visit family during the holidays.

Celebrating Christmas as a priest also leads me to reflect more on the nature of Christ during his earthly ministry. From the Scripture and Gospel readings, I can reflect and preach on the beauty and goodness of God’s love, made flesh in the infant Jesus.

Through my service to others as a priest—especially during the Advent and Christmas season—I understand more completely God’s love for me and reflect on it. In my personal reflections before my ordination, which Bishop Martin Laliberté included in his homily during the ordination mass, I have realized that love must be the foundation of my priesthood. If I don’t have love when I serve as a priest, how can I reflect God’s love to others? Everything I do will be useless without love.

God’s love made flesh in the incarnation of Jesus is reflected in human love; when I experience love from family and friends, I come to know more fully God’s love and presence within me.

May you know and spread God’s love and blessings during this Christmas season and always.

Benjamin Ripley, OFM
Sanctuaire de Bon Père Frédéric
Trois-Rivières, QC

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We are the Franciscans of Canada and on this page, we share news from the whole province. You will find here information about friars or ministries that we want you to introduce to you. Friars who only occasionally contribute to the website also post their writings here.

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Last updated: November 22, 2021

This Privacy Policy describes Our policies and procedures on the collection, use and disclosure of Your information when You use the Service and tells You about Your privacy rights and how the law protects You.

We use Your Personal data to provide and improve the Service. By using the Service, You agree to the collection and use of information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

Interpretation and Definitions

Interpretation

The words of which the initial letter is capitalized have meanings defined under the following conditions. The following definitions shall have the same meaning regardless of whether they appear in singular or in plural.

Definitions

For the purposes of this Privacy Policy:

  • Account means a unique account created for You to access our Service or parts of our Service.
  • Company (referred to as either “the Company”, “We”, “Us” or “Our” in this Agreement) refers to Franciscans of Canada, 5870 Boulevard Rosemont.
  • Cookies are small files that are placed on Your computer, mobile device or any other device by a website, containing the details of Your browsing history on that website among its many uses.
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  • Service refers to the Website.
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Collecting and Using Your Personal Data

Types of Data Collected

Personal Data

While using Our Service, We may ask You to provide Us with certain personally identifiable information that can be used to contact or identify You. Personally identifiable information may include, but is not limited to:

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  • Usage Data

Usage Data

Usage Data is collected automatically when using the Service.

Usage Data may include information such as Your Device’s Internet Protocol address (e.g. IP address), browser type, browser version, the pages of our Service that You visit, the time and date of Your visit, the time spent on those pages, unique device identifiers and other diagnostic data.

When You access the Service by or through a mobile device, We may collect certain information automatically, including, but not limited to, the type of mobile device You use, Your mobile device unique ID, the IP address of Your mobile device, Your mobile operating system, the type of mobile Internet browser You use, unique device identifiers and other diagnostic data.

We may also collect information that Your browser sends whenever You visit our Service or when You access the Service by or through a mobile device.

Tracking Technologies and Cookies

We use Cookies and similar tracking technologies to track the activity on Our Service and store certain information. Tracking technologies used are beacons, tags, and scripts to collect and track information and to improve and analyze Our Service. The technologies We use may include:

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Cookies can be “Persistent” or “Session” Cookies. Persistent Cookies remain on Your personal computer or mobile device when You go offline, while Session Cookies are deleted as soon as You close Your web browser. You can learn more about cookies here: Cookies by TermsFeed Generator.

We use both Session and Persistent Cookies for the purposes set out below:

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  • Tracking and Performance Cookies

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For more information about the cookies we use and your choices regarding cookies, please visit our Cookies Policy or the Cookies section of our Privacy Policy.

Use of Your Personal Data

The Company may use Personal Data for the following purposes:

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  • To contact You: To contact You by email, telephone calls, SMS, or other equivalent forms of electronic communication, such as a mobile application’s push notifications regarding updates or informative communications related to the functionalities, products or contracted services, including the security updates, when necessary or reasonable for their implementation.
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  • For business transfers: We may use Your information to evaluate or conduct a merger, divestiture, restructuring, reorganization, dissolution, or other sale or transfer of some or all of Our assets, whether as a going concern or as part of bankruptcy, liquidation, or similar proceeding, in which Personal Data held by Us about our Service users is among the assets transferred.
  • For other purposes: We may use Your information for other purposes, such as data analysis, identifying usage trends, determining the effectiveness of our promotional campaigns and to evaluate and improve our Service, products, services, marketing and your experience.

We may share Your personal information in the following situations:

  • With Service Providers: We may share Your personal information with Service Providers to monitor and analyze the use of our Service, to contact You.
  • For business transfers: We may share or transfer Your personal information in connection with, or during negotiations of, any merger, sale of Company assets, financing, or acquisition of all or a portion of Our business to another company.
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  • With business partners: We may share Your information with Our business partners to offer You certain products, services or promotions.
  • With other users: when You share personal information or otherwise interact in the public areas with other users, such information may be viewed by all users and may be publicly distributed outside.
  • With Your consent: We may disclose Your personal information for any other purpose with Your consent.

Retention of Your Personal Data

The Company will retain Your Personal Data only for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy. We will retain and use Your Personal Data to the extent necessary to comply with our legal obligations (for example, if we are required to retain your data to comply with applicable laws), resolve disputes, and enforce our legal agreements and policies.

The Company will also retain Usage Data for internal analysis purposes. Usage Data is generally retained for a shorter period of time, except when this data is used to strengthen the security or to improve the functionality of Our Service, or We are legally obligated to retain this data for longer time periods.

Transfer of Your Personal Data

Your information, including Personal Data, is processed at the Company’s operating offices and in any other places where the parties involved in the processing are located. It means that this information may be transferred to — and maintained on — computers located outside of Your state, province, country or other governmental jurisdiction where the data protection laws may differ than those from Your jurisdiction.

Your consent to this Privacy Policy followed by Your submission of such information represents Your agreement to that transfer.

The Company will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that Your data is treated securely and in accordance with this Privacy Policy and no transfer of Your Personal Data will take place to an organization or a country unless there are adequate controls in place including the security of Your data and other personal information.

Disclosure of Your Personal Data

Business Transactions

If the Company is involved in a merger, acquisition or asset sale, Your Personal Data may be transferred. We will provide notice before Your Personal Data is transferred and becomes subject to a different Privacy Policy.

Law enforcement

Under certain circumstances, the Company may be required to disclose Your Personal Data if required to do so by law or in response to valid requests by public authorities (e.g. a court or a government agency).

Other legal requirements

The Company may disclose Your Personal Data in the good faith belief that such action is necessary to:

  • Comply with a legal obligation
  • Protect and defend the rights or property of the Company
  • Prevent or investigate possible wrongdoing in connection with the Service
  • Protect the personal safety of Users of the Service or the public
  • Protect against legal liability

Security of Your Personal Data

The security of Your Personal Data is important to Us, but remember that no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage is 100% secure. While We strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect Your Personal Data, We cannot guarantee its absolute security.

Detailed Information on the Processing of Your Personal Data

The Service Providers We use may have access to Your Personal Data. These third-party vendors collect, store, use, process and transfer information about Your activity on Our Service in accordance with their Privacy Policies.

Analytics

We may use third-party Service providers to monitor and analyze the use of our Service.

  • Google Analytics

    Google Analytics is a web analytics service offered by Google that tracks and reports website traffic. Google uses the data collected to track and monitor the use of our Service. This data is shared with other Google services. Google may use the collected data to contextualize and personalize the ads of its own advertising network.

    You can opt-out of having made your activity on the Service available to Google Analytics by installing the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on. The add-on prevents the Google Analytics JavaScript (ga.js, analytics.js and dc.js) from sharing information with Google Analytics about visits activity.

    For more information on the privacy practices of Google, please visit the Google Privacy & Terms web page: https://policies.google.com/privacy

Email Marketing

We may use Your Personal Data to contact You with newsletters, marketing or promotional materials and other information that may be of interest to You. You may opt-out of receiving any, or all, of these communications from Us by following the unsubscribe link or instructions provided in any email We send or by contacting Us.

We may use Email Marketing Service Providers to manage and send emails to You.

  • Mailchimp

    Mailchimp is an email marketing sending service provided by The Rocket Science Group LLC.

    For more information on the privacy practices of Mailchimp, please visit their Privacy policy: https://mailchimp.com/legal/privacy/

Usage, Performance and Miscellaneous

We may use third-party Service Providers to provide better improvement of our Service.

  • Invisible reCAPTCHA

    We use an invisible captcha service named reCAPTCHA. reCAPTCHA is operated by Google.

    The reCAPTCHA service may collect information from You and from Your Device for security purposes.

    The information gathered by reCAPTCHA is held in accordance with the Privacy Policy of Google: https://www.google.com/intl/en/policies/privacy/

Children’s Privacy

Our Service does not address anyone under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from anyone under the age of 13. If You are a parent or guardian and You are aware that Your child has provided Us with Personal Data, please contact Us. If We become aware that We have collected Personal Data from anyone under the age of 13 without verification of parental consent, We take steps to remove that information from Our servers.

If We need to rely on consent as a legal basis for processing Your information and Your country requires consent from a parent, We may require Your parent’s consent before We collect and use that information.

Links to Other Websites

Our Service may contain links to other websites that are not operated by Us. If You click on a third party link, You will be directed to that third party’s site. We strongly advise You to review the Privacy Policy of every site You visit.

We have no control over and assume no responsibility for the content, privacy policies or practices of any third party sites or services.

Changes to this Privacy Policy

We may update Our Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify You of any changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on this page.

We will let You know via email and/or a prominent notice on Our Service, prior to the change becoming effective and update the “Last updated” date at the top of this Privacy Policy.

You are advised to review this Privacy Policy periodically for any changes. Changes to this Privacy Policy are effective when they are posted on this page.

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