Knock Pilgrimage
On May 15th, I had the privilege of preaching at our Diocesan Pilgrimage to Knock. We joined with the dioceses of Clonfert and Galway.
Sharing the homily here (courtesy of Knock Shrine’s YouTube channel)
Masshill Stations of The Cross
On Good Friday we gatherered at Masshill to pray the Stations of The Cross. I was not sure what to expect but was totally taken away by the turnout of people and we were blessed with a beautiful evening. We set off from the home of the Late Molly Lang and walked to Masshill. Maybe a mile or so. We prayed the Stations along the way and I used the text of The Stations Of The Cross (Messenger Publications).
Thanks to Sinéad Gavigan for the video below.
Holy Week 2022
Lent has almost run its course. Palm Sunday approaches and, on its heels, Holy Week.
This is intended to be the highpoint of the Church’s liturgy; the recalling of those sacred events of more than two thousand years ago. We will journey with Jesus into Jerusalem on a donkey’s back, see him betrayed, we will receive the gift that is Eucharist from the table in the upper room, listen as he cries out in Good Friday anguish: “It is accomplished” and share in the carrying of his lifeless body to a borrowed tomb. On Easter Sunday, with the women, amongst his closest and most loyal friends, we will stand before an emptied tomb and hear again those life-giving words: “He is not here. He is risen.”
My mother, God rest her, used to say she preferred Easter to Christmas. As a child, maybe even as a man, I could not fully grasp that. Christmas seems to bring out the best in people. Goodwill abounds and there is literally music in the air. There is a sense of the world wanting to be right, even when its not, around Christmas and huge efforts are made to ensure families are together, nobody is left alone and that sharing at every level takes place.
The baby in the borrowed stable is a lovable image. Joseph, Mary, the shepherds, the animals and kings, combine to give us a sense of Walton’s Mountain. All is well. A saviour is born and Chris Rea is driving home again (though it will be a more expensive trip now with the way fuel prices are going!!) The Infant seems far removed from the man falling beneath the weight of the cross. The infant’s cries are not mentioned in the gospel, but the cries of Good Friday are well and truly documented.
In fairness to my mother, she spoke the truth and chances are it is a truth we struggle with. Easter is essential if we are to make any sense of suffering, to find any hope in death and any semblance of reassurance for our own journey. Everything about the days to come speaks to us of God’s abiding love for our world and sadly too that the world is an impoverished place when people either don’t hear or choose not to hear God’s call, God’s message – God’s plan.
I remember as a child looking at a test card on television on Good Friday as the station did not broadcast. I am not sure if that was for all Good Friday or just around 3.00pm to mark the hour that is linked with Jesus’ death on the cross. I recall the starkness of the day, the reading of the “long Gospel” and maybe Stations of The Cross in the evening. Fasting too and the length that added to the day remain memories for me. Perhaps there was something in this collective sense of this being a day unlike any other. It was easy to get caught up in the moment, to be moved by it and to recognise it for what it was – special. That is more difficult to do now, as Good Friday morphs into every other day and can all too easily be bypassed or ignored. I am not saying that TV channels should fall silent but somewhere, within what we call SOUL, there remains a call to mark this day and the days that follow. There is a need to see them as days set apart, story-telling days, remembrance days and, with the dawning of Easter Day, hope filled days.
A few months ago, a funeral left the church in the parish where I work, to go to the cemetery. It was a small funeral, just a handful of cars. I noticed a man on a motorbike. He was in the line of cars. As the hearse moved into the right lane for the cemetery, he stopped in the left lane, bowed his head, and held the traffic behind him. I knew then that he was not in the funeral. I lowered the window and said: “Thank you, that was a kind thing to do”. He looked at me and said: “It was the right thing to do”.
Maybe we are being asked now to mark these days in a way that reflects our faith. Remembering Christmas, its songs and joys, its giving and receiving and the birth of the Saviour; we are called to recognise that saviour now and give gratitude for all he said and did in the name of God’s love. It is a call to show respect, to give thanks and to be truly Christian – it is the right thing to do.
February
Hello there,
Once again I want to make a start on keeping this blog up to date! It is my space and I have enjoyed sharing it with you over the years. In more recent times, I find myself using Facebook a lot more and that surprises me because, those of you who know me, are aware that I was not always a fan:)
I want however to keep this space alive and will do my best to keep it updated.
Perhaps the beginning of February, the step in to Spring and the spring in our step is the way to go.
So, please be patient with me but keep in touch.
Vincent
News not shared
The text from a friend – a classmate – said that he wasn’t sending Christmas Cards but wanted to wish me peace and blessings at this special time. I called him back and asked if he was getting mean in his old age. I continued to joke with him for a little while and then he said, “you mustn’t have heard that my mother died”. I hadn’t. He went on to say she died at the beginning of December. He told me his mother had been diagnosed with cancer and died shortly after the diagnosis was given. Needless to say, I was sorry for him.
I told him I’d not heard and of course he knew that because, had I heard, I’d have been there for him over those December days. The reality was the news never reached my ears and I was sorry about that too.
As we enter the final days of Advent, maybe we could remember him and how easy it is not to hear news. Gossip is all around us and seems to blow easily on the wind – easily and dangerously – but often the news we need to hear passes by unheard or untold. I wondered does God feel that way sometimes, not least around Christmas and wonder how it is that this Story, this very sacred story, can remain unheard and untold.
It’s the choice of this Season in many ways; to hear and be shaped by the news or to settle for gossip. I know which we’re called to and I know how easily we can ignore or park that call. We need to be people of the Good News, tuned in to what is real and important in life, otherwise we miss opportunities to be better people, to be with people when they most need us.
Share the news. Avoid the gossip ….
A MOMENT TO PRAY
Lord,
We were never closer to news – internet, smartphones, 24 hour news channels, local radio and so many more outlets and yet we can miss what we most need to hear. Place in me a deep desire to keep in contact with people so that in their time of need, I may be there for them. Help me to avoid, at all costs, the terror that is gossip for it is amongst the most destructive of weapons and leaves scars that run deep into the soul and long into the memory. May my words, thoughts and actions be aligned with yours, that I might cause no deliberate hurt to another.
Amen.
From Eloise to Bonaventure
I’ve been meaning to write this for a while!
Just over a week ago, as I got ready for daily Mass in Kilmovee, I noticed Brother Bonaventure coming into the church. He’s a native of the parish, Michael Frain from Rusheens, and is a Religious Brother. He taught for many years in Sligo and is now living in Dublin. He had been home for a few days, and joined us for Mass on Sunday when we prayed for his brother and sister-in-law and remembered them around an anniversary.
I remember many years ago, when his brother died, Bishop Christy Jones spoke to me about Bonaventure and held him in very high regard, as do I. He’s a likeable and good man who has served the Lord without holding back for all of his life.
As he came into church that day for morning Mass, I was struck by the slowness of his walk and that the years have told their story. The energetic young teaching Brother is in there somewhere but not visible to the naked eye. That side of his life is well and fondly remembered and, more than once, I have met people through the years who connect Kilmovee with Brother Bonaventure and the best of their school memories, in which he holds a central and pivotal role. I was always proud to hear his name so mentioned.
He took his place in church, reverently greeting the Lord and, I have no doubt, looked forward to encountering him in Eucharist.
In the seat just behind him, there sat a mother and her two young daughters. A few days earlier, the younger of the two daughters had received her First Holy Communion in another parish. Her mother had stopped in to see me on their way to the church and I was happy to see Eloise in her First Holy Communion dress. The one she wore that day was her own and special to the day and the celebration that was about to take place. It was not the first time she had worn a First Holy Communion dress though! She wore her sister’s last year!
She wore it and ran in it – 10K – to raise money for the Hospice and in memory of her daddy who died nine years ago when she was just a baby. She ran with her mother and sister that day and, even at the height of COVID restrictions, people supported from a distance and as close as circumstances would allow to wish her well, let her know we were proud and to support a worthy cause. She raised more than €30,000.00. Incredible. She could not have done it without her mother and sister and the support of a community and family. She ran in her sister’s First Holy Communion Dress to commemorate the day she should have worn her own and received her First Holy Communion, cancelled, like so many other things, because of COVID.
In recent weeks she wore her own dress, joined her classmates and friends and said “Amen” to the Body of Christ. I was happy for her and thankful that her mammy took a moment to stop with me on their way to the church.
Now she and Brother Bonaventure sat a seat apart at a daily Mass and I admired both, was thankful for both and had the chance to share Eucharist with both. I thought of how quickly she ran, in contrast to Bonaventure’s measured steps and of how faithful he has been to that day when he, for the first time said “Amen” on his own First Holy Communion Day.
I thought they had much in common and hoped that Eloise will continue to be a light (her sister Lucia’s name means LIGHT) and that she will make a difference in life as Bonaventure has in his. I hoped that in years to come, on a day scarcely imaginable to young Eloise, she might walk slowly into a church, take her place and maybe notice the young mother and children in the seat behind her and that, on that day, she will give thanks for the difference she has made in life and that there will be someone to say thanks to her for that difference.
Between Eloise and Bonaventure – there is a lot of good to be done and much good has been done.
