Christmas Day, 25 December 2011, John 1:1-18

The Nativity

I was listening John Moriarty telling a story recently. He had introduced us to his niece, Amanda, earlier on in the story and now he brought her in again. This time it was Good Friday, and while Amanda's granny, John's mother, went to the Good Friday devotions, John and Amanda stayed at home to look after the cow that was calving. When they went out to check on the cow, they discovered that she had already begun to give birth to her calf. Amanda squealed when she saw the little hooves coming out the back of the cow. According to Amanda, this was wrong. The calf was coming out wrong! John enquired why, and Amanda declared that she herself had come out of her Mummy head first!

Eventually, after the calf had been safely born and the cow had carefully cleaned it, Amanda and John retreated back into the house where the story developed. John was curious to find out all that Amanda understood about where babies come from. Amanda told him that she had come from her Mummy's tummy. So, John enquired further: where did Mummy come from? Amanda thought for a minute. "From granny's tummy!" Then, the really hard one. Where did granny come from? Amanda was vexed. What answer could there be to this question? Eventually her furrowed brow changed into a smile. She had an answer: "Granny came from her own tummy!"

John mused for us about this. For Amanda, there was nothing or no-one before granny. Therefore granny was the beginning of everything. John was worried about this; he described Amanda as being vulnerable to experience. Eventually she would discover that her statement of fact was not true.

I think that John's line is a wonderful one. We are all vulnerable to experience. The facts that we hold dear can be demolished very easily and quickly.
Like the children in C.S. Lewis' Narnia series. In "The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe" the children are transported to Narnia where they meet Aslan, the lion. C.S. Lewis is famously known for his conversion to Christianity and the many talks and lectures he gave about Christianity. The children's stories of Narnia are replete with Christian references. Indeed some say that Aslan, the lion, is the figure of Christ in the stories. Aslan features in all the stories of Narnia. In "The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe" the children are suffering persecution and enter Narnia through a wardrobe full of fur-coats. When someone tries to follow them, they cannot. Imagination and wonder are the core values that are needed to make the journey to Narnia. It mimics the gospel where it says in Matthew: "unless you change and  become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 18:3)

This morning's gospel is kind of cryptic. It does not lend itself easily to listening and it is not the gospel story of Christmas and the Nativity that we hold so dear. No, rather this gospel from the beginning of John's gospel is just that: a beginning. Jesus is the Word, and "the Word was made flesh".

How are we to gain access to the Narnia of the gospel message of Christmas? How can we be like the little child and the little children that we celebrate this morning? How can we see beyond the limitations of our crisis-stricken world? We have to be changed. Christmas does not end today. Today is just the beginning. Enter into the joy and celebration of this day. But don't forget to push through the fur coats to tomorrow. Don't allow the 'facts' of your mind quosh the wonder of your imagination. Grant the Lord of all life permission to enter in.

Pope Benedict put it like this last night in St Peter's Basilica:

Today Christmas has become a commercial celebration, whose bright lights hide the mystery of God’s humility, which in turn calls us to humility and simplicity.  Let us ask the Lord to help us see through the superficial glitter of this season, and to discover behind it the child in the stable in Bethlehem, so as to find true joy and true light.

4 Sunday Advent, 18 December 2011, Luke 1:26-38

Tanner's 'Annunciation' (1898)

Homily for 'Do This in Memory' Mass. This is part of the parish's preparation of children who will receive Holy Communion in May 2012.

'Mary's Yes!'
Invite the children to locate a statue of the woman who is mentioned in this Sunday's Gospel.

Why do you think is Mary so important at this time of year?

In the Gospel, Mary said 'Yes' to God.
What would have happened if Mary had said 'No'?

• No Jesus
• No Christmas

But, she didn't say 'No'. Mary said 'Yes'!
And, because Mary said 'Yes', we will soon have a good reason to celebrate. What will that celebration be?

So, today we remember Mary and her 'Yes'.
We say thank you to Mary for saying yes.
We promise to love Mary and to honour her by praying her special prayer and by trying to live like Jesus wants us to.

What is Mary's special prayer?

Perhaps you might take time after Mass to light a candle and to pray the 'Hail Mary'.

3 Sunday Advent, 11 December 2011, John 1:6-8. 19-28

Gaudete Sunday

This Sunday we celebrate Gaudete Sunday. The word Gaudete comes from the Entrance Antiphon to today's Mass, "Rejoice, again I say to you, Rejoice". Today is the one time in the Church's year that the priest can wear rose coloured vestments. This Sunday we light the rose coloured candle on our Advent wreath. This Sunday is a Sunday of joy in the middle of what is otherwise a penitential season, a time of preparation for the feast of Christmas.

My generation, those born after Pope John Paul II visited Ireland, have never really known a Christmas without plenty. Plenty of presents, plenty of alcohol, plenty of food, plenty of money, even if it was borrowed money. There was plenty of everything. Our celebration of Christmas has been tied up with big parties, lots of new clothes, expensive presents handed around.

This Christmas is different though. Many people in our own community are taking a long hard look at their budget for this Christmas. Gone is the spendthrift attitude, gone is some of the festivity of yesteryear.

It is difficult to rejoice in the circumstances we find ourselves in. The places where we have sought the Christmas spirit are no longer open. We find ourselves approaching Christmas in a very different way, approaching Christmas in a new way.

We're challenged this year to dig deeper to answer the question: What is my reason for rejoicing this Advent as we prepare to greet the Christ-child this Christmas. As one phrase goes "Jesus is the reason for the season." Another one goes: "Lets put Christ at the heart of Christ-mas." Listening to the Ryan Tubridy yesterday morning on the radio, I was struck by a caller who rang in to share that he was going in to work to hand back his car, his phone and his laptop. Yesterday was his last day at work. As the conversation went on, I was amazed to hear the same caller tell us all that he was going to go bring his child into town yesterday afternoon to buy a toy for the SVP toy appeal. Here was a man losing his job in the face of Christmas and yet he was still willing to be generous and give. If this is not Christian, I don't know what is. This is putting Christ back into Christmas for me anyway.

This year, more than ever in the past decade and a half, we are being given a delicate opportunity to reflect on the reason for our rejoicing. We do not rejoice in expensive gifts, nice though they are. We do not rejoice in wasted food and drink. We do not rejoice in all the stuff of Christmas. We rejoice in the Emmanuel, in God become one of us.

We can choose to be depressed and blue about the circumstances of our world today. Or we can place our hope and trust in God who cared enough for each one of us to give us his Son.

"Rejoice in the Lord always, again, I say, Rejoice!"

2 Sunday Advent, 4 December 2011, Mark 1:1-8

A good friend of mine began his journey towards priesthood by reading the gospel that we have begun reading today: the gospel of Mark. Somebody handed him a copy of the gospel on it's own, a copy of this one gospel taken out of the rest of the Bible. He often told me about how he carried that gospel up into his bedroom, where no one else could see him, and he gradually read through it.

Good News!

Mark's gospel has been called the disciple's handbook, maybe because it is the shortest of the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. If you wanted to read the whole Bible, beginning with the gospel of Mark isn't a bad idea. You could easily read it in a couple of hours.

Reading the gospel transformed my friend's life. It led him to offering his own life as a priest to share the Good News with other people. In Mark's gospel, my friend encountered what the writer of the gospel intended, "the Good News about Jesus Christ, Son of God."

At the moment, we are journeying with a new translation of the Roman Missal, the book of prayer that we use in the Catholic Mass. We could say that we are, at the moment, 'Lost in Translation'. You see, all of the prayers that we use, all of the readings we listen to, are translations.

We might not be aware of it but, for example, the Old Testament was written first of all in Hebrew, the language of the People of Israel. Properly speaking, the Old Testament is called the Hebrew Bible. When the Israelites were expelled from their own land, they journeyed out into the greek speaking world. Eventually, they translated their Bible into greek for all of their people who were gathering to worship & pray in their synagogues.

For that reason, remembering that Jesus was a Jew, the first Christians wrote down the gospels in the primary language of their day: greek. When Christianity spread as far as Rome, and became more or less the State Religion of the Roman Empire in the third century, the Bible, and all the prayers of the Church were translated into Latin, because Latin was the official language of Law, of Business, and of Civic Life in ancient Rome.

It took almost twenty centuries, almost 2,000 years, for the Church to make the big leap to using the language of local people around the world for the Mass. And, so it was in 1965 that the first translations of the Roman Missal in English, Irish, and all the other languages of the world, began to be used at Mass. It would take another ten years, from 1965 to 1975 for a stable translation in English to be developed. This translation was in use up until last weekend when we made the momentous leap to using the newest translation of the Roman Missal in English. The story of translation is a core part of the story of Christianity.

To go back to the gospel of our Mass today. The word 'gospel' in English is a word that we associate with Church. The word gospel is not really used outside of Church, and where it might be used it is automatically associated with all things 'churchy'. The word 'gospel' is a translation of the greek word, 'evangelion'. From evangelion we get the familiar word: 'evangelise'. But the word 'evangelion' in contemporary English means 'good news' or 'glad tidings'. So, to evangelise means to share with others the good news that we have already heard ourselves. The gospel is literally 'good news'.

The story of Jesus is The story of Good News – and this evangelion – this good news, is a story that we cannot put down once we pick it up. It is a story that promises to change and shape our lives in ways that we may wish it didn't.

The 'good news' will evangelise us, but only if we want to be evangelised. And to be evangelised means to be absorbed by the story of Jesus and ultimately to encounter the Lord in a profound and personal way in prayer, in the Sacraments and in the broken Community of Faith that the Church is. Pope Benedict put it like this in his first homily as Pope:

... Only when we meet the living God in Christ do we know what life is. We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us is loved, each of us is necessary. There is nothing more beautiful than to be surprised by the Gospel, by the encounter with Christ. There is nothing more beautiful than to know Him and to speak to others of our friendship with Him. The task of the shepherd, the task of the fisher of men, can often seem wearisome. But it is beautiful and wonderful, because it is truly a service to joy, to God’s joy which longs to break into the world. ...

www.vatican.va

Don't let the good news be lost in translation. Very often we assume that our experience of Church, our experience of faith, our experience of God, is all that there is. Our hearts and our minds are not open to the possibility of being evangelised, not because we are bad, but because we become used to religion in the way that it seems it always has been. We know that religion is no subsitute for the personal encounter with Christ that Pope Benedict speaks about.

It is never too early, and it is never too late to be evangelised. It was as a teenager that I really encountered the good news of Jesus, even though I had been baptised and confirmed and went to Sunday Mass with my family long before that. The real encounter with Jesus led me to where I am today as a happy human being, as a happy priest. And the first task of this priest, and all priests, is not to 'say Mass' but to share "the Good News about Jesus Christ, the Son of God."

Our Lord Jesus Christ, Universal King, 20 November 2011, Matthew 25:31-46

Pantocrator - Christ the ruler of all

This Sunday is the last Sunday in the Church's calendar. Next Sunday is the first Sunday of Advent, and with it comes a new year. On this Sunday, the thirty-fourth Sunday of the Church's year, we always celebrate Our Lord Jesus Christ, Universal King.

This Solemnity was first instituted by Pope Pius XI in 1925. In his encyclical entitled: Quas Prima, the Pope sought to say the things that really matter as he looked out on the post World War I world. He saw the rise of fascism as the result of the economic decline that would culminate in the Wall Street Crash of 1929. As Pope, as Pastor to the world, he could see some of the serious difficulties that the world was heading towards. In our own time, Pope Benedict has presented the beauty of our faith in his first encyclical Deus Caritas Est.

Living now, as we do, at a time of increased uncertainty and anxiety, primarily as a result of the economic recession, we find ourselves once more called to re-evaluate where our deepest allegiances lie. To do this we must first of all take a hard and honest look at what is really happening in our world. Like Pope Pius living in an uncertain time, we find ourselves living in an uncertain time, with the possibility for great good and for great evil.

Having been talked up, hyped up into a frenzy around the Celtic Tiger, we now find ourselves being talked down into an economic depression, a recession. Certainly a recession is no good thing, we need only to think of the 1980s and early 1990s to remind ourselves of the dual-plague of long dole queues and mass-emigration. None of us want to go back to that. However we must be careful to discern the truth, and even if we found ourselves being swept along by the talk of economic certainty and fortune, we must now be careful not to be swept away by the blue talk of economic downturn.

If we are to have some anchors, some stability in this storm of words, then we must first try to wade through the words, or like St Peter, we find ourselves to step out of the boat in faith and to do with seems impossible, to walk on water. Only by placing our trust in God, in Christ Jesus, will we find a firm foundation, free from the stormy waters of economic upturn and economic downturn. This was what Pope Pius XI was attempting to do in 1925 when he inaugurated this feast day. He was attempting to call people to have allegiance to Christ, to make Christ their King.

Sixty years ago this year, the United Nations published the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In this document, intended to be a global document for a global human family, the dignity of the human person is enshrined. As a result of the declaration, human rights have flourished especially in the western world. It is our job, and our duty both as citizens of our country and also as Christians, to uphold the rights of every human being. These include the right to life, the right to shelter, the right to work. The vision that enables these rights is a vision that sees the world as a creation of God, not merely a marketplace where profit can be made or lost.

In our Gospel this Sunday we see that those who will be judged most harshly are those who do not show love for God in and through their love of their neighbour. Our responsibility to others is not dependent on our own financial wellbeing. We have a duty to other human beings that goes beyond simply the minimum they are due in justice. We, as Christians, are called to a much deeper love of our neighbour that reflects the love that God has shown us in our own lives. It is true that the more we have been forgiven, the more we ourselves in turn are called to forgive and to love. An abundance of love is the call of today's Gospel, a love rooted in Christ, Christ who is in the first place in our lives.

Today is a day to ask ourselves about how we have lived up to the demands of the Gospel in our own lives. The bottom line is not about money. The bottom line is about people.

1 Sunday Advent, 27 November 2011, Mark 13:33-37

The First Sunday of Advent

In the summer of 2007, I spent a month in Los Angeles. I was a deacon at the time. Spending a month in America was about killing two birds with one stone; I wanted to get a holiday and I also wanted to pick up some pastoral experience. So I stayed in a parish there. It was a very nice place, I had access to a car most of the time, and there was plenty to see and do.

One night, about two weeks into my stay, I was brushing me teeth before going to bed. Suddenly the bathroom window began to shake and rattle. I didn't know what was going on, and at first I thought that someone was trying to break into the house. Then, I saw the mirror over the sink. It was swaying in and out from the wall. It was then that I realised that I was experiencing my first earthquake! It measure 4.1 on the richter scale and it woke up many people in the neighbourhood.

In California earthquakes are commonplace. But, even though I knew that, I just presumed it would never happen while I was there. I presumed wrong. If it had been a more serious quake I wouldn't have been at all prepared, and God only knows what might have happened.

We don't experience extreme weather here in Ireland. We don't have to prepare for any extreme conditions, because they rarely if ever happen here.

The Gospel call on this first Sunday of Advent, is to become prepared, to stay awake because we do not know when the time will come. 'The time', this is God's time. In God's time, not our time.

Advent is not about staying awake to wonder when the end of time will be. Advent is about recovering that which has become hidden in us over time. It is about waking up from our spiritual darkness and assuming a position of waiting, of waiting, fully prepared for the coming of the Lord.

As the economic situation changes in our country, the certainties that we thought we had are now gone. We have no choice but to wake up from our sleep. We must waken to the fundamental and unchanging things, the signs of God's hand in our lives. As once we were talked up into a frenzy about the Celtic Tiger, now we're being talked down into an economic depression. Where is the truth in this news? Where is God in all of this? As Christians, we're called to see God's creative and redeeming action in the world, in our world. We are called to come awake again to the God who has been waiting for us, God who lights up our way.

33 Sunday Ordinary Time, 13 November 2011, Matthew 25:14-30

euro

I remember learning how to cycle a bike – we had stabilisers on for many months – my cousins arrived from Limerick, and one of my older cousins advised me to take off the stabilisers and learn to cycle without them – it was great until I tried to stop and I didn't put my feet down!

Discovering our talents in life is a bit like learning to cycle a bike – you never forget how to do it

The parable of the talents is a fascinating image for the Kingdom of God – it is one that we can all connect with – the primacy of the economic in our national consciousness at the moment is incredible, and unhealthy – the primacy of the economic is forcing us to make decisions at a national level that are not good – we could almost argue that we have talked ourselves into a corner where the only value in life is the economic value – our sovereignty as people has perhaps been eroded by the presence of the troika (EU, IMF, ECB) – but it is the sovereignty of our thinking that has been eroded by the constant barrage of economic analysis

At least this primary viewpoint of the economic allows us access to the parable – a talent was an ancient measure of monetary value – of money – to put it into perspective, one talent was equal to 6,000 days of labour – if you do the maths, one talent is equal to 500,000 eur – on the minimum wage, a person could earn about 1 million eur in a lifetime – this is roughly equal to two talents of money

So, the parable is about money – but not just that, it is a parable about what we do with our money – and, remembering that it is a parable, money is a way of talking about all of our gifts and talents, not just our money – we have more gifts and talents than money – indeed we could argue from an extreme perspective that we don't need money at all to survive – money is a means to an end – it is there to serve the needs of people, not the other way around – our attitude to money has to be re-formed – and this is not the first time; in very recent history, just after World War II, the whole concept of money changed, even though many people did not know it – we could re-imagine and re-form the international financial system to serve the needs of people rather than the needs of the system itself – it is possible, but may be unrealistic to hope for.

There is a much more pressing implication of the gospel for us – and that is in forming our own attitude to money – I met an asylum seeker in Dublin in 2004 – at that time he was receiving 27 eur each week, plus his living accommodation and food – He was sharing a bedroom in a house with three others – each week they kept 7 eur and the four of them put the other 20 eur into a shared fund – every week one of them received the pot – that way they were able to save enough to buy a pair of shoes or a mobile phone – our perception of how much money we have is very important – our perception is formed by our time and place – how much our neighbour earns – how much a top civil servant earns – even how much the President earns – the UN standard of a dollar a day formed the asylum seekers view of money – he could live on 1 eur/day

The choices we make with the money we have, pay off – we reap what we sow – spend unwisely and live poorly – spend wisely and live well – a housekeeper that I had used to volunteer to teach young mothers how to prepare food from scratch – living on social welfare, and with little training, they were kept poor not simply by the relatively small amount of money they received, but rather that they were spending it on convenience foods because they did not know how to prepare fresh food – teaching people how to prepare fresh food is a core way of helping the poor to a better way of life – rather than paying for convenience foods, they can prepare fresh, highly nutritious meals, with very little money.



Poverty is a reality in our world, in contemporary Ireland – changing poverty has much to do with changing our perception of money – we need help to think in ways that are different to the primary thoughts and views of our world – the primacy of the economic as the only value of worth, leads us to accept, uncritically, the decisions made by government and by those who are in power – the example of the closure of various embassies last week by the government because there was no economic gain from them is a hugely distorted view of the world.

East Timor

To give an example, the embassy in Timor Leste was closed along with the Irish embassies to Iran and to the Vatican. The reason given, which we have uncritically accepted, is that these particular missions are of no economic value to us – however, we did not set up our mission in Timor Leste, aka "East Timor", to gain economically – we set it up because of the massive humanitarian crisis that overtook East Timor in 1999 – It was always to benefit East Timor economically that we set up a diplomatic mission there – not that we would benefit, except of course by our interaction with another wonderfully diverse nation, culture and society.

Embassy of Ireland to the Holy See

We are undoubtedly richer for our relationship with East Timor – I propose that we are just as enriched by our diplomatic relations with other states, including the Vatican, no matter what the naysayers say.

The economic is the only value in our society – it is distorting our vision, and clouding our minds – only we can change that fact ourselves by choosing what we think and informing ourselves of other, richer perspectives.

32 Sunday Ordinary Time, 6 November 2011, Matthew 25:1-13

Ambry - Oils of Catechumens, Chrism, Infirmarum

You come here to Holy Hill, whether you are on retreat for a relatively short time, or a person here for a few months gaining an insight into the life of this community, or like me, you may have parachuted in for the day. All of us could have gone some place else. We could have gone somewhere for a 'quick Mass' and a short, to the point, homily.

But, you chose to come here. So, I take it as read that you might like something a bit meatier, something a bit more substantial to chew on this Sunday. So, forgive me if you get a little bit of spiritual indigestion! All I can say is that the antidote to spiritual indigestion is silence!

There are three motifs in today's gospel. They are:

1. Oil
2. Lamp
3. Wick

I want to explore the first & primary motif; oil, in three ways so that we can allow the parable into our lives. Firstly from a contemporary perspective, secondly from the perspective of the New Testament times, and finally what this text might be pointing us towards as engaged followers of Jesus Christ today.

Sensible & Foolish Bridesmaids

The three motifs are drawn together by the active persons in the parable, i.e. the bridesmaids and the bridegroom. And, of course, there is our relationship to the parable as readers or listeners, and finally there is the relationship of Jesus to the parable as the primary storyteller.

Parables are stories that are designed to draw us in, to catch us like a fish on a hook. Our first task as a listener, as one of the active agents in this story, is to listen carefully and to allow ourselves be hooked. I'm sure there hasn't been a fish to date who was hooked who thought the experience was great fun! Where the parable, or indeed the homily, creates a response in us: sadness, frustration, joy, anger, tears, laughter; these are all hooks. The point of being hooked by the parable is to allow us to mull over some point of wisdom. As our first reading says: "Wisdom is bright, and does not grow dim."

Back to the gospel motif of oil:

Milford Haven is perhaps the largest oil & gas refinery I have ever seen. It supplies 25% of the motor fuel that Britain consumes, and it is located on the South West Coast of Wales. It was the scene of a huge explosion in June of this year, which created a seismic response!

Milford Haven - Wales

Oil, Natural Gas, and all their derivatives have become central to our lives over the past 150 years or so. This has happened in obvious ways, like transport and heat. But also, in less obvious ways like in our food, because synthetic fertilisers are produced from crude oil.

Without oil there would be no such thing as modern warfare, because war needs oil to power tanks, and planes, and even to create the synthetic explosives that high-tech munitions are made from. Oil is very often the reason for war as countries fight to secure the sources of oil, but without oil there could be no war on the level that we see in our own time.
Forgive the pun, but oil is very slippery and contradictory when we try to understand our current worldwide love affair and, dare I say, addiction to oil.

Oil in our world has a lot of negative connotations. Many people argue that we should learn to live without oil, and at the very least become less dependent on it.

But oil in gospel terms has huge positive value. Olive oil was used in the baking of bread to give it taste. It was used in religious ceremonies. Oil in New Testament times was a very precious, at times sacred commodity. When you consider that it takes approximately 1,400 olives to make a litre of olive oil, not to mention the manual labour involved in pressing the oil, you can see that this gave oil huge value. For this reason oil is the primary motif in the parable. It is by running out of oil for their lamps that the foolish bridesmaids are shown to be foolish.

Olive Oil

Our term 'oil' comes from the term 'olive'. In ancient times, oil was synonymous with the olive. There was no such thing as crude oil drilled out of the ground. And, in the east, the olive tree was held up as a sacred plant because of it's fruit.

In Matthew's gospel, the motif of oil is brought to its zenith in the word 'gethsemane', which we recognise as the place where Jesus prayed on the night before his crucifixion. The term 'gethsemane' means 'olive press'. Here, the place where olive oil is made, here is the place that Jesus chooses to pray. This associates the source of oil with the intense, passionate, prayer of Jesus before his crucifixion. The intense, real, heartfelt, prayer of Jesus takes place in an 'olive press'. For the followers of Jesus, i.e. you and I, to follow Christ means to enter into 'gethsemane', to enter the 'olive press' of prayer, so that we might have enough oil for our lamps.

(Olive) Oil Press

Psalm 119 says: "Your word is a lamp for my steps, and a light for my path." God's Word is the lamp. The world is the olive press and prayer is the means to enter the world in the most real way. Christ is the one who enters Gethsemane, the olive press, the world. He is the incarnate One, Emmanuel, God-with-us. Our task is not to leave the world, but to enter into the world passionately, intensely and willingly. It is only true relationship with Christ, in prayer, that we gain oil to light our way in this bravest of pilgrimages.

29 Sunday Ordinary Time, 15 October 2011, Matthew 22:15-21

"Do This in Memory"

Today is one of those lovely Sundays during the year when we give a special welcome to all the children preparing for their first holy Communion, and who are here with their Mums and Dads, sisters and brothers, and maybe even grannies and granddads.

You are here, and you're gathered here in the special place around the altar, because you're preparing for your first holy Communion. Isn't that right?

I'm sure that your parents and your Teacher in school have been teaching you to say "Thank You", haven't they? Why do we say "Thank You"?

We say "Thank You" when we are given a present. When we sit down for dinner, we thank the person who prepared the meal, and the person who laid the table. We say "Thank You" when a person does something nice for us, or when they give us something nice. Isn't that what we have been taught to do? We always thank somebody, don't we?

Who can you think of that you say "Thank You" to? Our Mums. Of course. And our Dads? Yes. To Granny and Grandad. If we have sisters and brothers and they show us something, or give us something, or do something nice for us. Our friends and neighbours, on the football pitch, in the school yard or at the playground. No matter where we are, we always say "Thanks", don't we?

There's someone else that we say "Thank You" to very often, but its easy to forget. Who is that, do you think? I'll give you a hint: we come here to Church to say this special "Thank You".

That's right, we come to Church to say "Thank You" to God. But, what do we have to say "Thanks" to God for? God doesn't give us things like our Mum & Dad do, or even the extra nice things that Granny and Grandad might give us sometimes. No, God gave us something far more important than nice things. God gave us life itself. God also gave us the earth to live in and to share with other people. And finally, God loved us so much that he asked his own Son, Jesus, to die for us. He asked Jesus to die on the Cross, so that all of us could live forever.

So we come here to Church to say "Thank You" to God for all the things that God has done for us, especially for giving us his Son, Jesus. Can you imagine what God must feel like when we come to Church to say thanks to him? To say thanks to God for giving us his Son? I'm sure that it makes him very happy when we come to Church, to give thanks.

Does anyone know what we call the time that we come to Church every week? I'll give you a hint, it begins with M...

Mass! That's right!

There's another word that we can use instead of 'Mass'. It's kind of a fancy word. I don't expect you to know it. It is a word that a lot of the adults here will have heard before, but they might forget what it means. This other word that we use for Mass is "Eucharist". Spell it with me: E-U-C-H-A-R-I-S-T = Eucharist. It's a greek word. Greek was a very important language when Jesus walked on the earth, so the Greek language is very important in the family of Jesus. Its probably even more important than the English and Irish language that we use all the time.

So, this fancy greek word: "Eucharist" means "Thanksgiving" in English. "Eucharist" then is a word that we can use instead of "Mass", and "Eucharist" is a word that also means "Communion". So, when we come to Mass, we are coming to celebrate the "Eucharist", which is the most important way that we have of saying "Thank You" to God. This way of saying "Thank You" means that we become really big buddies with God. And God becomes really big buddies with us. That is what "Communion" means: we become thankful friends of God, thankful friends of Jesus.

Have you ever forgot to say "Thank You" to somebody? What happened? So, just like that, we try to remember to say "Thank You" to God. And, just in case we might forget, God asks us to say "Thank You" in this special way, once a week, every Sunday, here in the Church. We call this "Sunday Mass" or "Sunday Eucharist", or even "Sunday Thanksgiving", and that is what we're doing here, right now.

So, now I want you to go back to where your parents are because we're going to continue on with our Sunday Thanksgiving to God.

24 Sunday Ordinary Time, 11 September 2011, Matthew 18:21-35

The Cross at Ground Zero

Where were you? Do you remember? 1:46pm on Tuesday September 11, 2001. I was coming to the end of my first month in St Patrick's College, Maynooth. It was called a spiritual month. We didn't leave the college. We were asked not to use our mobile phones or email. And, of course, we didn't watch any television.

A few of us were gathered in the Common Room. I still remember it well. The television was unplugged, and was turned into the wall, lest we would be tempted to turn it around and plug it in. As we sat there, we could here panicked footsteps running down the long corridor towards us. Suddenly, Fr Enda, the priest in charge of us, rushed into the room. We had no idea what was going on.

He didn't say a word. He just walked to the television, turned it around and plugged it in. Then, turning it on, he flicked over to Sky News and told those of us gathered: 'You better watch this.' And then he disappeared out of the room. And then we joined with the rest of the world, watching in horror as well known cityscape of New York City seemed to be taken over by a kind of Armageddon.

That day shaped our consciousness in these times in a way that no other day since has managed to do. And that is one of the saddest aspects of acts of violence and terror. They don't get us to focus on the needs of the communities and groups that carry them out; terror doesn't solve the injustices that can cause it to spring up. Instead, the experience created fear, violence, an excuse to reign down war on huge populations of innocent people.

One of the questions that has taken up acres of ink and hours of TV time is the question: What were they thinking? What was on the mind of the men who committed these terrible acts of violence?

We want to get inside their heads, to see if we can understand what was going on. And, there is no answer to that question.

However, there is a question that we hardly ever ask. That question is: what did the experience of watching those planes go into the Twin Towers do to me? What did it do to us? What did it do to you?

There is no doubt in my mind that that mind formed our hearts and minds. That moment was fuel for fear, fuel for vengeance, fuel for hatred, fuel for violence and fuel for racism and prejudice.

How do we address these dark forces and emotions in ourselves? Because, we must address them. Or else, they eat us up inside and come out as anger, as anxiety, as depression, as fear.

How does Scripture address this? Listen again to the words from our first reading: "Remember the last things, and stop hating, remember dissolution and death, and live by the commandments."

My friends, in Scripture we have a treasure trove of faith, a treasure trove of hope, a treasure trove of love. By looking to the future – to the sure reality of the end of our own life on this earth and the beginning of our life in eternity – as we look to the future of eternal life, our life here is placed into perspective.

Realising this spiritual fact was one of the core reasons that I was able to respond to God's call to be a priest. Realising that our life here on earth is short, is tiny and miniscule by comparison with the life to come. That allowed me to be in Maynooth on September 11, 2001.

22 Sunday Ordinary Time, 28 August 2011, Matthew 16:21-27

The World Youth Day logo - 2011

Just under two weeks ago, 12 days to be exact, I began the pilgrimage to World Youth Day with 24 others. We were led by our Elphin Youth Ministry director, Mr Frank McGuinness, and our spiritual director was Fr Michael Duignan. Members of the inspirational Church music group: Elation Ministries, were among our number as well.

Emblazoned on the front of our group T-Shirts was the World Youth Day logo, as well as the theme of this year's World Youth Day: "Planted and built up in Jesus Christ, firm in the faith" coming from St Paul's letter to the Colossians. (Col 2:7)

The first big gathering was with the Cardinal Archbishop of Madrid to celebrate Mass outside at Cibeles Square. There, encouraged by the huge gathering of young people and the vibrancy of the celebration, we were let in on what may be a closely guarded secret here in Ireland: World Youth Day would be one big party from the beginning to the end.

After Mass, as the crowds moved towards the Underground, our group made its way to a local cafe/bar. The musicians in our group got out their instruments and treated us to a feast of traditional Irish music on the fiddle accompanied by African drums. Some other pilgrims from London heard the sound of our music and asked to join with us.

A request came from the owner/manager of the cafe, a young, heavily pregnant woman. She came in to share with us that the child in her womb was dancing along with us in our joy! I was reminded of John the Baptist jumping for joy in Elizabeth's womb at the sight and sound of Our Lady.

The whole experience of World Youth Day in Madrid was refreshing, uplifting, full of life, and simply great fun. Gathering with at least a million others, in the blistering heat & sunshine, as the Pope was given the keys of the City by the Mayor, we danced and sang and got to know one another. There, I met a young couple from Italy – Magdalena and Samuel. We exchanged badges – they giving me one from their home diocese of Alba, me giving them a badge for the International Eucharistic Congress to be held in Dublin next summer and encouraging them to come along.

That evening, the Pope told us, English-speaking pilgrims, to make "these days of prayer, friendship and celebration bring us closer to each other and to the Lord Jesus. ... so that we may be joyful witnesses to Christ, today and always." In these words the Pope encouraged us to be full of joy, to be full of prayer and to be jubilant in our celebrating. In this place we were to encounter the joy of meeting other young people of faith, to sing and to dance, to pray and be rooted in our relationship with Jesus. And, we were to bring that joy home! Not to leave it in Madrid! But to share it with everyone – that the Good News is not dreary, bad or sad, but vital, singing, dancing: full of life and joy.

The highlight of our pilgrimage was the gathering at Cuatro Vientos, a military airport on the southwest of Madrid. There, with what turned out to be some 2 million young people, we waited for, and kept vigil with, the Holy Father.

It was the toughest part of the pilgrimage, walking almost 41/2 hours to the site in the midday sun with temperatures hovering around 40C.

As the vigil began around 10pm, a storm blew up with heavy rain and high winds. Neither of these extremes could keep our spirits down. Shortly after, the vigil continued – the Pope smiling, even as he got soaked by the rain and lost the small, white, zucchetto that he normally wears on his head. His hair tousled, the Pope continued to smile, beginning again – "Queridos jóvenes amigos" – My dear young friends – delighting in the patient joy among the gathered pilgrims.

After a short night's sleep outside in our sleeping bags, we gathered ourselves once more at one of the large flat screens and tuned in our small FM radios to the translation in English. This was what we had kept vigil for, the Papal Mass with the biggest open-air Church on earth, for that moment at least.

During his homily, the Holy Father told us: "Christ cannot be separated from the Church any more than the head can be separated from the body (cf. 1 Cor 12:12)."

He then went on to say: "Make Christ, the Son of God, the centre of your life. But let me also remind you that following Jesus in faith means walking at his side in the communion of the Church. We cannot follow Jesus on our own. Anyone who would be tempted to do so “on his own”, or to approach the life of faith with that kind of individualism so prevalent today, will risk never truly encountering Jesus, or will end up following a counterfeit Jesus."

This was especially important for us young Irish pilgrims to hear – conscious as we are of the brokenness and sinfulness of our Church. That Christ is fundamentally connected to the broken and sinful Church is something that we may find hard to take in and accept.

The Pope encouraged us: "Having faith means drawing support from the faith of your brothers and sisters, even as your own faith serves as a support for the faith of others."

He advised us that: "Growing in friendship with Christ necessarily means recognizing the importance of joyful participation in the life of your parishes, communities and movements, as well as the celebration of Sunday Mass, frequent reception of the sacrament of Reconciliation, and the cultivation of personal prayer and meditation on God’s word."

My experience of World Youth Day was an upbuilding of my own personal faith, and the common faith I share with you, and with millions of other people throughout the world. It opened my eyes, once more, to the great truths of Christianity and the wonderful diversity of cultures that make up our universal Catholic Church. The joy-filled memory of those days will help me to persevere and endure the testing moments that we are living through in the present time.

20 Sunday Ordinary Time, 14 August 2011, Matthew 15:21-28

The Canaanite Woman and Jesus

Four years ago, I had the privilege of visiting the Cathedral of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. It is called the "Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels". Almost brand new, it was opened in 2002 after the previous Cathedral of St. Vibiana was badly damaged in the 1994 Northridge Earthquake.

The Archbishop of Los Angeles at the time was Cardinal Roger Mahoney. The fundraising for the Cathedral, which cost something in the region of $250m, was a huge project in itself. The archdiocese managed to secure a large amount of finance from the Walt Disney company, and from other such notaries as Arnold Schwarzenegger. I mention these two because neither one is rooted in Roman Catholicism. And yet, both contributed sizeable sums of money, in the millions, to the project.

The Cathedral is dedicated to Our Lady of the Angels, citing a piece of Scripture that we have just heard proclaimed today – the last line of the first reading from the prophet Isaiah: "My house will be called a house of prayer for all the peoples."

Nowadays, when we consider the mission of the Church to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ to the ends of the earth, we become afraid that we are, somehow, not being respectful to Christians of other denominations, churches or ecclesial communities; to people of other faiths; or to people of no faith.

We wonder if it is politically correct to tell other people about our faith. The place of faith in the workplace, in school and in third-level is hugely challenged. The implications of our shared faith, for political, cultural, social and moral life, rarely gets a mention these days. We have witnessed the privatisation of faith. Far from bringing the gospel to the public market place, we are tempted to carefully secure it's powerful message within the walls of the Church buildings our communities have inherited.

"My house will be called a house of prayer for all the peoples."

It is interesting to reflect briefly on the terms: 'My house', as understood by the prophetic writer called Isaiah. For him, the house is three things: it is God's house, the Temple; it is the Royal House of Israel and Judah; and it is the Chosen people.

For us Christians, "God's House" is the building that we call the Church, for us it is here, the Church of the Sacred Heart, Roscommon. But that is not all God's House is.

It is also the Royal House, the Family & Lineage that each of us participate in through baptism in Christ Jesus. The House of God is the People of God.

The Church is the people, not the building. Even more, the Church is the People of God, gathered to pray, to worship and to be nourished by the Word we share and the Bread we break.

Isaiah adds another definition – God's House will be a house of prayer. God's house, people first and building second, are the core ways to enter into relationship with God in the conversation we call prayer. And then one more addition – God's House will be for all peoples. This completely redefines the role of the Chosen People in God's plan of salvation. They will, eventually, reach out to welcome all peoples into the Royal House of God, by means of the salvation offered in Christ.

It is interesting that the Canaanite woman, an outsider in Jesus' Hebrew worldview, approaches seeking his healing help. As a Canaanite woman she is entirely opposite to Jesus – she is a woman, not a man; a Canaanite, not a Jew. In terms of gender, religion and politics, she is beyond the pale. So, Jesus does not answer her.

As Jesus walks northwest from the sea of galilee, out towards the edge of Israel as we know it, almost crossing over into modern-day Lebanon, this outsider comes seeking him. He does not go seeking to connect with other people; he does not go seeking to convert. But, she recognises him for who he is – and in her vulnerable moment of need, when her daughter needs God's touch, she appeals beyond her own gender, her own religion and her own politics to the One Master, the One Lord of all.

"My house will be called a house of prayer for all the peoples."

We may be worried about proclaiming the Good News of Jesus to people who may not share our world view. We need not worry. Our task is to simply share, gently, the joy, the hope, the love, the reconciliation, and the fullness of life that we have in Christ. We don't need to worry about the Church, or about the future. All we can offer, is real, genuine and honest witness, to the good things we share in because of our relationship in prayer with Christ. The rest we can leave to God.

19 Sunday Ordinary Time, 7 August 2011, Matthew 14:22-33

Fear

Gathering with you this morning for the first time is a privilege for me. We are, all of us, making a change. I have just moved here yesterday as Fr Kevin moved out to Rooskey. For the past year I have served as chaplain of IT Sligo, and it was with some surprise that I learned that I was to become curate here in Roscommon town. I am glad to be here with you and I pray that our getting to know each other over the time we have together will be mutually beneficial to us all.

I would like to offer you some brief biographical details – I am the youngest priest of the diocese. I was ordained in 2008 in my home parish of Riverstown, at the Church of the Assumption, Sooey, Co. Sligo. Before that, I was in Maynooth for seven years from 2001-2008, preparing for ordination to priesthood. And, before that again, I spent three years at IT Sligo studying Civil Engineering, which I still love.

I was educated at Summerhill College in Sligo, and completed my leaving cert there in 1998.
My hobbies include all things automotive, especially cars. For a number of years I volunteered as a marshall at the Sligo stages of the Circuit of Ireland Rally. And, in my teenage years I was a keen cyclist, winning an All-Ireland medal in the process, even if you wouldn't think it to look at me now!

Fear is an incredible thing. It has both positive and negative effects in our lives. It can save us from falling off a cliff, but it can also paralyse us and even stop us from taking the step that may sometimes be necessary to save ourselves.

Fear is what Mothers and Fathers drill into their children to stop them putting their hand into a fire. And yet, fear of water can paralyse a child trying to learn to swim.

Fear has both positive and negative effects on us.

Fear speaks to the Church that we find ourselves part of today. And, while we feel afraid of what is happening to our Church, we must also not allow our fear to paralyse us from taking the necessary steps to save ourselves.

It seems to me, from our gospel passage today, that the core activity of the Christian, when faced with fear, is to rely on God. And be reliance on God I don't mean that we ignore what is happening around us. What I mean is that we will find it most difficult to interpret the 'signs of the times' with 'eyes of faith' if we are not people of prayer.

Relying on God means placing our trust in God.

Relying on God means trusting that even in the midst of what can seem like a difficult and painful experience of truth, God is there. God is in the painful discoveries that we are making about our Church. And God is the reason that we continue to be people of faith.

Like the disciples out on the lake, we find ourselves afraid and overwrought, even sinking. And yet, all the while, Jesus is saying to us: "Courage! It is I! Do not be afraid."

I look forward to getting to know you all. Please pray for me as I get to know my new parish and community.

17 Sunday Ordinary Time, 24 July 2011, Matthew 13:44-46

Final Doxology - My first Mass

I think that it's fair to say that this week has been a painful week to be a priest. It doesn't compare to the pain of the many victims of abuse. Their pain is much greater and is lifelong.

But, nonetheless, this week has been a painful week to be a priest. The speech by An Taoiseach in the Dáil forced me to ask the question: what is my homily going to be about this Sunday? And, if I am honest, initially I was very angry with Mr Kenny for saying the things he said. Again, I felt ashamed to be a priest, ashamed to be part of the hierarchy of the Church. Ashamed, indeed, to be tarred with the same brush as those who have abused children in their care, and even more to be associated with those who attempted to shield abusers from the justice of the State.

So, back to my question: what is my homily going to be about this Sunday? In being angry with Enda Kenny, I wanted to lash out at him, and at his government. I was tempted to politicise my homily and to criticise him for being populist, and for being somewhat cavalier with the truth.

However, it was in conversations with my priest-colleagues, and with my colleagues in IT Sligo, that I began to hear another side to An Taoiseach's speech in Dáil Éireann. And that side is that Mr Kenny captured the anger and the injustice felt by many of us Irish people, at all that we have discovered about the Church over almost twenty years since the the Brendan Smyth case brought down the government in 1994.

And, while I might be somewhat critical of Mr Kenny on the core issue of truth; I can stand beside him in the anger that he expressed, the anger and rage that many people across our country feel inside.

So, if my homily is not to be a political attack on our Taoiseach, then what is it to be? A homily is supposed to break open the Word of God, for the People of God, in light of the liturgical and sacramental life of the Church, the faith of the community and the preacher and any current issues and affairs, both global and local, that affect the life of the believing community.

The pulpit is not the place for political rhetoric. The pulpit is supposed to be succour and help for the People of God in the living out of their faith.

Another way of saying this is that the preacher is called to form the hearts of the believing People of God in faith, hope and love.

So, where is the hope in these times? To whom can we en-trust our hearts?

A question that I ask myself on a regular basis is: Why do I continue to be a priest? With everything that has come out of the darkness and into the light – why remain? Why give my life to the Church, and be associated with some of the most evil actions that human beings can imagine? When there is no status left for priest or bishop: why stay?

The only answer that satisfies me when I ask this question of myself, is that I didn't become a priest because I wanted to do good things for the Church. I didn't become a priest because other priests asked me to consider being a priest. I didn't become a priest for either bishop or Pope.

I did become a priest, and I remain a priest, because deep in my own heart and soul I have encountered God's love. And, I have heard the call of God to share that encounter with other people. In short, I became a priest to share the Good News with others.

For me, that is the treasure hidden in the field, it is the one thing that is worth giving everything up for – status, power and wealth – even wife and family for the sake of the Kingdom of God, as the Gospel says.

I am a priest to share the Good News with others. In spite of all the brokenness and abuse, the sinfulness and the hopelessness of these moments, still the Good News is worth it. It is the Pearl of Great Price.

And the Church is, today and always, the broken vessel in which that Pearl is stored. The Church is the field in which the Treasure is hidden. Here, where never more in our lifetime has there been more dirt and mess and chaos covering it up. Here is where we find our resting place, here we encounter the One who searches for us until He finds us. Here we encounter Him who gave up all He had for us; for you and for me.

That is why I am a priest of Jesus Christ, and that is why I remain so.

16 Sunday Ordinary Time, 17 July 2011, Matthew 13:24-43

Darnel

During Easter week, as some of you know, I was in Lourdes with the IHCPT – the Irish Pilgrimage Trust, which brings children and young people with special needs to Lourdes each year for a "Pilgrimage – Holiday". Many of you here will know Mary Clancy who is very involved with the IHCPT, and is now a trustee in the organisation as well as being leader of group 164.

This year I travelled as the chaplain with group 306. Our group leader was a lady called Patricia Galvin, who comes from nearby Carraroe, and the deputy leader was a man called Ruairi McAteer who hails from Castlederg in Co. Tyrone. Ruairi is a young man of 24 years of age, and he entertained us for hours with his tomfoolery. While there, he told me all about his sister Maura, who recently joined the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal in New York. He invited me to come to Castlederg to meet his sister during the summer when she was home for a family wedding.

About a month ago, we journeyed to Castlederg to meet Ruairi, his parents, and his sister, Sr Bernadette.
What happened around the dinner table that evening was nothing short of incredible. Sr Bernadette told me all about her life, and why she had become a Nun. She exuded joy into the room with her radiant smile, and we connected over a mutual acquaintance, an Austrian sister called Sr Christina whom I had met in the Holy Land in 1998, and who has been working in Letterkenny for many years. Then Sr Bernadette really astounded me when she talked about a core experience in her vocation journey at a Festival of Prayer for young people that happened in St Angela's College here in Sligo almost ten years ago. She shared about a particular priest who had helped her, through his preaching, to offer her life to God willingly. For her, this festival of prayer, and her encounter with God there, had helped her to answer the call of religious consecration.

The amazing thing for me was that I had been involved with the organisation and execution of that festival of prayer. I had spoken in Churches and encouraged young people to come along and try it out. The St Michael's Youth Prayer Group, of which I was an active member, had been instrumental in organising the event. Sr Bernadette went on to amaze me by producing an album of photographs from the festival itself!

I couldn't believe it! I think what I couldn't believe most of all was that something so good could have happened through that festival of prayer. That it could have been the catalyst moment in Sr Bernadette's vocation story really amazed me. In short, I was amazed that something so good could have happened.

Like most people, I am culturally conditioned by the negative. We cope with negativity, with bad news almost every day of the week. This week has been exceptionally negative for us who are attempting to answer God's call to ministry. It has been a shameful week, a week when the Church is forced to accept it's corporate wrongdoing in the face of immensely evil acts.

In short, we find it very difficult to see the good amidst what can seem like a sea of bad. The gospel today calls us to give time to the process of discovering the good and the bad, the saints and the sinners. We have to try to take time to give a correct perspective to all that has happened, not ignoring the bad and the sinful, but not allowing it to define all that the Church is.

Perhaps it is time that we could be amazed by a good news story – a story of the good in the midst of all the bad.

The Most Holy Trinity, Year A, John 3:16-18

Where to start?

"I don't know where to begin." When we are faced with something new; a relationship, a problem at work or at home, we find ourselves right back at square one. We must go back to the drawing board and think about how we are going to move on.

Our life as a Christian begins when we are baptised in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The journey that we start when we are baptised is a journey alongside the Trinity and really the journey is about constantly deepening our relationship with this beginning, the Trinity.

For most of us, even 'professional religion people', the idea of the Trinity is difficult to understand. The Trinity is a frustrating mystery; nobody seems to be able to explain it. We are often tempted to overtake the problem and move on to things that are easier to solve, like fixing the roof, putting down tarmac on the car park, or fund-raising for the school. All of these are noble and necessary for the good of our community, but they can take away from the very necessary task of sitting still and thinking about something as fundamental to our faith as the Trinity. "I don't know where to begin."!

My Dad comes from Cork. There is something quite particular in the Cork psyche that must advertise itself, especially on All-Ireland Sunday. Cork people wear red and white football jerseys, wave red and white flags, paint their faces red and white, and I'm sure if Guinness brewed a red version of its famous stout, they would heartily drink it. I can see the various flags that the Cork fans use from the basic red and white, to the more elaborate Maple leaf of the Canadian flag, to the red sun on a white background of the Japanese flag. All in all, no one could walk down from Drumcondra train station to Croke Park on All-Ireland Sunday and mistake the Cork fans for any other county.

In a very similar way, like Cork people are from Cork, we as Christians are from the Trinity. We speak in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. We are baptised, confirmed, married, sent to preach the Gospel in the name of the Trinity, and we end our lives in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. When we pray, we begin in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. This is the identifying mark of what it is to be a Christian. We pray and act in the name of the Trinity.

Each person of the Trinity has a specific role in the life of the Church. The Father calls us to himself, the Son redeems us in the name of the Father, and the Holy Spirit gives us the ability to respond in love to the Father and to the Son. The Trinity then is not removed from our lives, we are called into the life of joy that is in the Trinity, living the covenant call of the Father, the salvation of the Son, and the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Pentecost Sunday, Year A, John 20:19-23

There are many things in our world that we cannot see. Many things that we fail to understand fully. Some of us have the privilege of learning about a particular part of our world and hopefully sharing it with other people.

Things like, electricity for example. You can google the image "Earth at Night" which is a composite image of the whole planet taken at night-time. All that you can see are the outlines of the countries and the clusters of civilisation where people have constructed large cities and small villages, all with one thing in common. Light. They are all lit up by electricity.

And yet, we cannot see electricity. In a way it is the purest form of energy. We cannot see it, and yet we can see it's effects. We flick a switch and the light comes on. Indeed, if we are really fancy we clap our hands and light comes on!

Even though we cannot see it, we have a good idea what electricity feels like when we touch it! And, if we stand near a high-voltage power line, or at the side of a sub-station, at times we can hear the buzz that large amounts of electricity make.

In the Bible, the Holy Spirit is spoken of as wind or breath, as a dove, as fire and as other natural phenomena. Wind is a good image for the Spirit of God because again we cannot see it clearly, but we can see it's effects. The dove as a bird that symbolises the peace that exists between God and man is another great symbol for the Holy Spirit. The Spirit as fire tells us something about the burning zeal in our hearts that can come about in us because of the Spirit of God dwelling within us.

The Holy Spirit is like the electricity that keeps the Church alive. The Holy Spirit has sustained the Church for 2,000 years through triumph and tribulation, through sin and grace. It is by the grace of the Holy Spirit that others shared with us the Good News of Jesus Christ, and it is by the same grace of the Holy Spirit that we share the Good News by passing it on.

What is the Holy Spirit? Theologians tell us that it is the love that is shared between God the Father and God the Son. They tell us that we share in that love – that love is the electricity that drives our participation in the life of God.

6 Sunday Easter, Year A, John 14:15-21

Russian Dolls

Have you ever seen a set of Russian dolls? They are sometimes known as 'Babushka dolls'. Anyhow, they sit one inside the other. The ones you can pick up on the tourist trail very often have five, but there can be as many as two dozen dolls, all one inside the next.

It's a helpful image for what Jesus tells us in the Gospel today: "I am in my Father and you in me and I in you." Given how close that means God is to us, it is no wonder that very often we wonder where God is. Is he up in the sky? Or in the land? If God is in each one of us and we are present in God, then God is a lot more like real life than the religious images we might have for God from our childhood.

If we are looking for God, then we have to begin by listening to the movements of our own heart because that is where God chooses to dwell by means of his Holy Spirit dwelling in us. It is that same Holy Spirit that prompts us to do right rather than to do wrong in moments of difficulty. It is God's Holy Spirit in us that reveals God's deepest dream for us. Because of God's Holy Spirit dwelling in us the Christian life is known as the 'Spiritual Life'. And this time of the Church that we are living in now since the time of Jesus is known as the time of the Spirit.

So, as Christians we live by the Spirit, rather than simply by the Law. This makes us joyful, because we experience the very presence of God in us.

Living by the Spirit, we are aware that the Spiritual life is not just about not sinning. The Spiritual life is not just about being sorry for what we have done. The person in the life of the Spirit seeks to allow their life to be moulded by the Spirit of God. The life of the Spirit is positive, life-giving and joyful, not simply dwelling on the negative.

Isn't it one of the strange aspects of our experience of Christian life here in Ireland that prayers are often seen as a penance? Whether it's as a penance from the Sacrament of Confession, or going on pilgrimage to Lough Derg; very often we understand our relationship with God in terms of a penance that we have to do. Our gospel today promotes a radically different vision to that; it is the vision of God gently dwelling inside us, encouraging us, calling us, dreaming for us, loving us. Listening to God who dwells in our hearts then we ache to live in relationship with him. Our whole being becomes shaped by the presence of God in our hearts.

Vocation makes sense in this life of the Holy Spirit. Whether we're talking about the vocation of marriage or priesthood, religious life or the monastery. With God these radical, Christian ways of life are possible, but without God they lose their flavour and their essence.

Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love.
V. Send forth your Spirit, and they shall be created.
R. And You shall renew the face of the earth.
Let us pray.
O, God, who by the light of the Holy Spirit, did instruct the hearts of the faithful, grant that by the same Holy Spirit we may be truly wise and ever enjoy His consolations. Through Christ Our Lord. Amen.

Graduation Mass, Coola Post Primary School, 26 May 2011

I’m a fan of the singer “Jessie J”. My favourite song of hers at the moment is “Price Tag”. As you know it’s currently at 25 in the charts. “Price Tag” features B.O.B., also known as Bobby Ray Simmons Jr., whose father is a Pastor in Georgia. Bobby’s father didn’t like what his son was singing about until he realised that it was good for him, and that it was a really good form of expression.
Recently Jessie J tweeted: “Just came off stage at trinity ball. Probably one of the hardest gigs to date. To see so many people so drunk they couldnt even stand. Girls unconcious and them literally trampling on eachother. wasn't easy”

What does freedom really mean? Is freedom simply about ‘having a good time’? Or is there something more to it?

Almost a year ago the journalist John Watters spoke to a gathering of priests all about freedom. John is a most interesting character because like many of us he grew up as a Catholic but then went significantly off the rails as he became an adult. In speaking about freedom he told us that at the age of 19 he made the decision that freedom was drinking as much alcohol as he wanted. He went on to become an alcoholic and today is sober.

For John Waters, alcohol became a prison. It became the ultimate un-freedom. Needless to say, his views on drugs are similar, even though he is not a drug-addict.

Jessie J went on to tweet: “I'm not upset they werent all listening it upset me to see so many young people so not with it. Not used to it. Its hard to sing when i just wanted to go in the crowd and help all the crying girls being squashed.... Can i just clear up that last night was a UNIVERSITY BALL and it was students. I was just shocked at how intoxicated they were and i was genuinely worried for them. im not used to it thats all. And its not just in Ireland its everywhere. As a non drinker. I just wanna spread the msg that binge drinking is dangerous”

So, what is freedom? I think that freedom is to be found inside yourself, in that quiet place where only you and God dwell. The passage from the Gospel that we heard earlier told us that “A good person brings good out of the treasure of good things in his heart.” As Christians we understand that in every human heart, God is there.

I was in Lourdes recently with the IHCPT, the Irish Pilgrimage Trust. The Trust brings people with special needs to Lourdes every Easter for a week of what they call a pilgrimage holiday. There are about 1100 people who travel from Ireland for the week. It’s not a very serious pilgrimage, and the children and young adults with special needs really help us to get in touch with our ‘silly gene’ especially at the big Masses. When we are silly, then we are vulnerable, and when we are vulnerable then we can be deeply touched.
At one of those Masses, Fr Michael McGrath asked us to hold up our hands. He got us to repeat the words: “God Loves Me Very Much”. Maybe, as you step forward on the next step of life, it’s good to remember that: “God Loves Me Very Much”. It's the greatest freedom we have.

5 Sunday Easter, Year A, John 14:1-12

Diakonia - Service

What would our world be like if cars were never invented? Or what about the railway? Or even the steam engine? If there was no such thing as oil, or gold? What would life be like if we didn't have Microwaves and Dishwashers, sewing machines and tumble dryers? Very often we say: How did we ever do without this?

Imagine, if you will for a moment, what our world would be like if Christ had never been revealed to us. Imagine if Jesus had never been born. What would our world be like?

I think that if Jesus had never been born and if we had not ever heard the Good News of the Gospel, then our world would not have as much service in it. Of course other religions and other ways of life have service. But there is a particular essence of service because of Jesus Christ.

This particular essence of service is born of the fact that God became a human being in Jesus Christ. And, because God became a human being, human beings are forever better. Because Jesus became one of us we know that every person, every human being, baptised or unbaptised, born or unborn, alive or dead, free or in prison; every human being is like Jesus. And, because we are like Jesus, we are also like God. Our dignity as human beings was always there, even before Christ. But, because Jesus walked among us as God become man; now we know. We can never go back. We are always challenged to move forward. We can never forget.

There are many examples in our world where the dignity of every human person has not been upheld. Famine, injustice, unemployment, poverty, slavery. In all of these situations people are not respected as the gift of God that they are. Even in our own time and place, the horrible plight of abuse in all it's forms challenges the Christian understanding of the dignity of each person.

It is because of the dignity of human life that Christians everywhere uphold pro-life values, challenging the status quo of abortion, challenging the status quo of war, challenging the status quo of an unequal and divided world.

It is also because of the dignity of every human person that we are touched deeply by the momentous symbolic acts of this past week when the Queen of England made a State visit to our country.

Because of the dignity of human beings, some of us are called into the service of God and of his holy people. Queen Elizabeth is a very obvious example to us all of a lifetime of service to others. And, in our tradition as Catholics we are aware of those who have offered their own lives to service as priests or religious sisters and brothers.

It is hard to imagine what life would be like if we didn't have planes, trains and automobiles. It is even harder to imagine what our world might be like if God had not become one of us. Because of Jesus Christ, our world is changed forever. The vision of life inspired by the Gospel is a vision of service to God and service to all people. It is a vision of love in concrete form. The challenge for each one of us today is to allow our hearts and our lives to be touched by Christ's love and so to offer ourselves in service.