Season of Growth

Sunday 4, Year C, Season of Lent (Laetare Sunday)First Reading ‡ Joshua 5:9-12The people of God went to the promised land and there kept the passover.Responsorial ‡ Psalm 33:2-7Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.Second Reading ‡ 2 Corinthians 5:17-21God reconciled us to himself through Christ.Gospel ‡ Luke 15:1-3.11-32Your brother here was dead and…

Third Sunday in Lent, C. First Reading ‡ Exodus 3:1-8.13-15 This is what you must say to the children of Israel: I Am has sent me to youResponsorial ‡ Psalm 102:1-4.6-8.11 The Lord is kind and merciful.Second Reading ‡ 1 Corinthians 10:1-6.10-12 All this that happened to the people of Moses in the desert was written for our…

Second Sunday in Lent, Year C. First Reading ‡ Genesis 15:5-12.17-18 God made a covenant with Abraham, his faithful servant. Responsorial ‡ Psalm 26:1.7-9.13-14 The Lord is my light and my salvation. Second Reading ‡ Philippians 3:17-4:1 Christ will transfigure these bodies of ours into copies of his glorious body. Gospel ‡ Luke 9:28-36 As…

First Sunday in Lent, Year C First Reading ‡ Deuteronomy 26:4-10The confession of faith of the elect.Responsorial ‡ Psalm 90:1-2.10-15Be with me, Lord, when I am in trouble.Second Reading ‡ Romans 10:8-13The confession of faith of the believers in Christ.Gospel ‡ Luke 4:1-13Filled with the Holy Spirit, Jesus was led by the Spirit through the…

First Reading ‡ Sirach 27:4-7 Do not praise someone before they have spoken.Responsorial ‡ Psalm 91:2-3.13-16 Lord, it is good to give thanks to you.Second Reading ‡ 1 Corinthians 15:54-58 Victory has been given to us through Jesus Christ.Gospel ‡ Luke 6:39-45 A person speaks from what is in their heart.Play MP3Watch Video This gospel is really hard, I…

Who is the worst person that you know? Who is the person who is causing you the most grief right now? Who is your greatest enemy? Or the person who causes you to lose sleep at night…?It’s probably better to be someone that we know well – a friend, partner, neighbour, colleague. But it could…

Blessing is a very Christian-ese kind of word. We don’t really ever hear the word outside of a Christian- and church-context; but in church, we hear the word frequently. When people sneeze, we might still say to them “God bless you.” (Which actually comes from the middle ages and the horrible experience of the Black…

Sunday 05, Year C. First Reading ‡ Isaiah 6:1-8Responsorial ‡ Psalm 138:1-8 In the sight of the angels I will sing your praises, Lord.Second Reading ‡ 1 Corinthians 15:1-11Gospel ‡ Luke 5:1-11Play MP3Watch video I’m sure that every single one of us here can identify at least one particular thing in life that we think I’m pretty…

Tom Wright, the former Anglican bishop of Durham in England notes, that when Jesus preached, people tried to stone him or throw him off 400m high cliffs. When Tom preaches, the church ladies might offer to make him cups of tea! I join Tom in wondering what I’m doing wrong. when no one even offers…

Sunday of the Word of GodThird Sunday in the Year, C. First Reading ‡ Nehemiah 8:2-6.8-10 – They read from the book of Law and they understood what was read. Responsorial ‡ Psalm 18:8-10.15 – Your words, Lord, are spirit and life. Second Reading ‡ 1 Corinthians 12:12-30 – Together you are Christ’s body; but each…

Have you ever experienced a treasure hunt? The kind where you have to go hunting for clues – and when you have found the first clue you can then hopefully solve it so that you can continue to find the second one and on and on. It seems that the author of John’s gospel would…

Baptism of Jesus We transition today with a feast that both closes the Season of Christmas, and launches us into the new season of the yearIn the Baptism, all of the Gospel accounts agree that this was the moment when the adult Jesus begins his public ministry.Jesus spent the first 90% of his life growing…

Advent 3, Year C Zephaniah 3:14-18.Philippians 4:4-7Luke 3:10-18Play MP3 Generated Transcript (9.30am Mass)Generated Transcript00:00:00If we read the first reading today without any kind of sense or understanding of the history or the background, we might think that the Prophet Zephaniah is just this naturally happy, bubbly kind of a person.00:00:16I mean, someone who is able…

Advent 3, Year C Zephaniah 3:14-18.Philippians 4:4-7Luke 3:10-18Play MP3Watch video Key points: Take time to imagine God delighting in you, rejoicing over you! He renews you in his love. It is wonderful to be in a good mood – to be happy, cheerful, joyful. We don’t live in a joy fest – the world is…

As we move through the season of Advent, there can be so many themes and ideas thrown in our direction, it can be difficult to keep up.There is the movement through the four Sundays, which is fairly consistent across the three-year-cycle of readings: Sunday 1 focusses on the ‘end times’; Sunday 2 and 3 on…

The Gospel today has always tended to set a note of fear within me. It seems like God is waiting to spring out and catch me in a trap. The way that I have heard this has often instilled a very unhealthy spiritual sense. As I prayed with the readings the notes played within the…

The Feast of “Christ the King” is relatively new in Catholic terms, being established by Pope Pius XI only in 1925. That it was during the political battle for the sovereignty of the Papal States and the fight against modernism colours the nature of the celebration. Originally celebrated on the last Sunday in October (still…

Sunday 33, Year B.Daniel 12:1-3; Mark 13:24-32Play MP3Watch video Our final reading from the Gospel of Mark for the year (next week – John 18).Mark 13 is challenging. Filled with references from the Hebrew Bible. If you don’t get those, you will be confused and probably get the meaning wrong. In our culture ‘apocalyptic’ means…

1 Kings 17:10-16 The widow made a little scone from her flour meal and brought it to Elijah.Mark 12:38-44 This poor widow has put more in than all who contributed.Play MP3Watch video Generated Transcript So we are in November and this is the 32nd Sunday in the year, so we’re definitely getting towards the pointy end of…

When you are caught in an emergency situation and you have to evacuate your house – what would you grab in the 60 seconds that you have available to you? Would it be a photo album, a piece of jewellery, device or memento? Sometimes it is good to be forced to boil things down to…

We have emerged from extraordinary period. After the relative freedom which we enjoyed for about a year after our first lock-down, to be plunged back into a serious lockdown crisis was jarring. Our period of isolation from the worst effects of Covid-19 also came to an end, with the disease not only affecting people in…

Once again we meet foolish disciples who screw up the simple and easy job of being faithful disciples. What unfolds is even more terrible when you read the section of Mark’s gospel that comes immediately before the section we read this Sunday (Mark 10:35-45).  32 They were on the road, going up to Jerusalem. Jesus was…

The man in today’s gospel is eager – he runs to Jesus full of desire – yet also caught up in self-centredness. He wants ‘eternal life’ — that is a life that knows no bounds, a life that is not limited by space and time, but that keeps on filling his heart from the fount…

Divorce is one of the sad realities of our world. There are very few families that have not been touched by the heartache of separation and divorce. I suspect that my immediate family where my parents and my four siblings are all in multi-decade first marriages makes us rather unusual. The reality is that making…

Oh hell!  This passage is the only one where Mark mentions ‘hell’ – 3 times in total.  Luke only mentions it once (Luke 12:5); Matthew 7 times. Never in John’s gospel or the writings of Paul. Once in James 3 and once in 2 Peter 2. Total of 13 mentions – always the word ‘Gehenna’ …

Sunday 25, Year B. Mark 9:30-37 Play MP3Watch video Generated Transcript As I have grown older, my fondness for the gospel of Mark has also grown, and one of the things I really like about this gospel is the humanity of Jesus, but especially the humanity of the disciples. Yeah, they are in so many…

The story so far. Mark begins with a simple introduction: The beginning of the Good News about Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of God. We’re then told a little about John the baptiser, the baptism of Jesus and then the temptation in the wilderness with angels and wild beasts. Jesus begins his ministry in Galilee….

One of the (many) cruel outcomes of Christian history is the unwarranted neglect of the Gospel of Mark. It was not until the sixth century that the first known commentary on the Gospel was written. It seems that the fact that it was the first of the gospels to be written was unknown, and so…

Mark 7:1-23 (Sunday 22, Year B) – full NRSV Gospel, not the strange shorter/edited form as in the lectionary. Play MP3Watch videoRead Gospel (red-letter / colour-coded edition)Read Social Justice Statement 2021-2022 An Englishman, an Irishman and an Australian go into a bar and they notice, sitting over at one of the tables, a pastor, a priest…

Sunday 21B (Joshua 24:1-2,15-18 & John 6:60-69) Joshua today invites the people to renew the covenant. He gathers the people in the very centre of the promised land, at Shechem, and retells the story of salvation so far. He reminds the people of all that God has accomplished within their history. He reminds them of…