Newsletter- 14th Week of Ordinary Time
Dear Parishioners
Cry out with joy to God! Notice how the readings of this Sunday’s liturgy for the 14th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year C resound with joy and peace. The Opening Prayer, the First Reading and the Psalm all speak of this joy, which has been with us in the liturgy throughout Eastertide, and now overflows here into Ordinary Time as well. It is the joy that the disciples experience when they see the Risen Christ. It is the joy that all Christians experience when we come together as a community to celebrate the Eucharist.
The First Reading speaks of peace flowing ‘like a river’; a peace that also accompanies the disciples in the Gospel as they travel through the different towns, curing the sick and announcing the Good News. The Psalm encourages us to ‘cry out with joy’ and echoes the rejoicing we see in the other readings. Though St. Paul does not mention joy in the Second Reading, he reflects on the peace and mercy experienced by those who are part of ‘the new creation’.
As Pilgrims of Hope in this Jubilee Year, let us pray this week that we as Christ’s modern-day disciples in the world in which we live may like the ‘Seventy two others’ sent out in the Gospel today, take the joy of the Good News of Christ to all the people we encounter in our daily lives and especially to those who have yet to meet Christ for themselves. We also pray for those who cannot find joy and peace in their lives at this present time, that they may be given a new sense of hope and a belief in the love, mercy and compassion of Christ and come to understand for themselves all he seeks to be and do for them.
10th Anniversary of Ordination to the Presbyterate: This Friday I shall have been ordained to the presbyterate for 10 years! I am not quite sure where the time or the years have gone! But I continue to be very grateful for this precious gift from God to me! I ask for your prayers as I journey forwards into the future, and as we prepare to keep the Feast of St Benedict, this Friday, the Feast day of my ordination to the presbyterate, by Bishop Patrick, in the Cathedral of St Barnabas, on 11th July 2015. St Benedict and Our Blessed Lady have played an important part in my faith journey to date, and especially since I was ordained for the diocesan priesthood. As I celebrate with great joy the anniversary of my ordination this coming week, I would like to thank each of you for your great kindness, support, love and great generosity to me since I came to St. Mary’s as your Parish Priest. May Our Lady and St Benedict continue to support each of us with their prayers and may the love of Christ, and his merciful kindness and compassion continue to be the hall mark of all we seek to be and do in life.
With my warmest best wishes to each of you,
Your parish priest and friend,
Fr Jonathan
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