Ash Wednesday last week marked the beginning of the Holy Season of Lent. This is the time every year when we make a special effort to fast, do penance, reflect on our faith and perform acts of charity. In this way we prepare for the great celebrations of Holy Week; the Passion, Death and Resurrection…
On Sunday this weekend we celebrate the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes. The reason for this is that on the 11th February, 1858 Our Lady appeared to Saint Bernadette for the first time.
The feast of Our Lady of Lourdes is famous for a number of other reasons: On this date since 1993 we…
Outside a Metro Station in Washington, DC, on a cold January morning in 2007, a man with a violin played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. The man playing the Bach pieces was Joshua Bell, playing incognito as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and people’s priorities, organized by the Washington Post.
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“We sing a song to Brigid, Brigid brings the Spring,
Awakens all the fields and flowers, and calls the birds to sing”.
We celebrate Saint Brigid’s Day on Thursday, 1st February, traditionally, the first day of Springtime. We have noticed the lengthening evenings and the increase of light in recent mornings. The old people used…
In mid-winter as we are now, only the barest signs of Spring are visible. But we have no doubt that Spring is just around the corner even though the ground still carries many of the dead leaves of last Summer.
We continue to live in a time of change, in society, in political life, in…
Bro Richard Hendrick OFM Cap has written a beautiful poem about how to enjoy a winter walk in nature and especially in the woods. The following is an extract from that poem and I hope you find it enjoyable:
A Meditation:
When you walk in the woods, do so at their pace. Not yours.
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Thanks again to all who have returned gifts. Could those outstanding be returned please by Sunday 7th at the latest.
One hundred and seventy-eight years ago the world was plagued by the cholera epidemic. In his poem In Memoriam, Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote “Ring out old shapes of foul disease”. Could he ever have guessed that his words would ring true again for our time of Covid. The human spirit is strong and now again,…
Over the centuries there have been many powerful leaders in our world. In the last 100 years we have had Tzar in Russia, Hitler in Germany, Mugabe in Zimbabwe, Idi Amin in Uganda and Mussolini in Italy. Some of these leaders seize power but many of them were elected and were popular in their own…
On Monday 25th December we celebrate the Feast of the Nativity. We are celebrating how the Son of God came among us as one of us. In a humble stable a fragile child, the promised Messiah, came among us. In time the light of the Risen Christ would overcome the darkness and fear of the…