Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
Parish Priest: Fr Mike Delaney mob: 0417 279 437
email: mike.delaney@catholicpriest.org.au
Assistant Priest:
Fr Alexander Obiorah Mob: 0447 478 297
email: alexchuksobi@yahoo.co.uk
email: alexchuksobi@yahoo.co.uk
Postal Address: PO Box 362, Devonport 7310
Parish Office: 90 Stewart Street, Devonport 7310
Office Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday,Thursday 10am-3pm
Office Phone: 6424 2783 Fax: 6423 5160
FaceBook: Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
Weekly Newsletter: mlcathparish.blogspot.com.au
Weekly Homily Podcast: podomatic.com/mikedelaney
Parish Mass Times: mlcpmasstimes.blogspot.com.au
Parish Magazine: mlcathparishnewsletter.blogspot.com.au
Secretary: Annie Davies/Anne Fisher Pastoral Council Chair: Mary Davies
Archdiocesan Website: www.hobart.catholic.org.au for news, information and details of other Parishes.
Weekday Masses 3rd - 7th February, 2015
Tuesday: 9:30am Penguin
Wednesday: 9:30am Latrobe
Thursday: 12noon Devonport
Friday: 9:30am Ulverstone & Devonport
Saturday: 9:00am Ulverstone
Next Weekend 7 & 8th February, 2015
Saturday Vigil: 6:00pm Penguin & Devonport
Sunday Mass: 8:30am Port Sorell 9am Ulverstone,
10:30am Devonport, 11am Sheffield (LWC)
5pm Latrobe
Eucharistic Adoration:
Devonport: Every Friday 10am - 12noon, concluding with Stations of the Cross and Angelus
Devonport: Benediction with Adoration - first Friday of each month.
Prayer Groups:
Charismatic Renewal - Devonport (Emmaus House) Thursdays - 7:30pm Recommences 5th February 2015
Christian Meditation - Devonport, Emmaus House - Wednesdays 7pm. Recommences 4th February 2015
Ministry Rosters 7th & 8th
February, 2015
Devonport:
Readers:
Vigil: M Gaffney, M Gerrand, H Lim 10.30am: A
Hughes, T Barrientos, P Piccolo
Ministers of
Communion: Vigil B & B Windebank, T bird, J Kelly, T Muir, Beau
Windebank
10.30am: J DiPietro, S Riley, B Schrader, F Sly, M Mahoney, M
Sherriff
Cleaners 6th Feb: M.W.C. 13th Feb: P & T Douglas
Piety Shop 7th Feb: H Thompson 8th Feb: M Doyle Flowers: S O'Rourke
Ulverstone:
Reader: R Locket Ministers of Communion: P Steyn, E Cox, C Singline, J
Landford
Cleaners: M Swain, M
Bryan
Penguin:
Greeters: A Landers, P Ravaillion Commentator: J Barker
Readers: M Murray, E
Standring Procession: A Landers, A Hyland
Ministers of Communion: M Hiscutt,
A Guest
Liturgy: Sulphur Creek J Setting Up: T Clayton Care of Church: Y & R Downes
Port Sorell:
Readers: M Badcock, G Duff Ministers of Communion: B Lee, V Duff
Clean /Prepare/Flowers: G Bellchambers, M Gillard
Latrobe:
Reader: H Lim Ministers of Communion: Z Smith, M Mackey Procession: M Clark & Co Music: Jenny & May
Your prayers
are asked for the sick: Peter Bolster, Ted Dolliver, Tim Hancock, Tony
Wesley, Helen Williams, Eva Zvatora, Adrian Brennan, Candida
Tenaglia, Peg Leary, Yvonne Harvey, Shirley White,
Tom Knaap, Kath Smith & ...
Let us pray for those who
have died recently:
Noreen Sheehan, Peter Burton, Dorothy Bell, Allan
Conroy, Barry Lyons, Jamie Fahey, Jim Saltmarsh, Max Anderson, Virginia Miller,
Kevin Barry, Elizabeth Mazey, Joan Blumenberg, Vonda Parker, George Witbreuk,
Peggy & Eamon D'Alton, Aimon &
Eileen Murdoch and David Windridge.
Let us pray
for those whose anniversary occurs about this time:
Bruce Smith, Paula & Aileen
Banim, George Windridge, Justin Hutchinson; also Sheila, David & Donald
Poole.
May they rest in peace
First Reading : Job 7:1-4. 6-7
RESPONSORIAL PSALM (R.) If today, you hear his voice, harden not your hearts
Second Reading
GOSPEL ACCLAMATION
Alleluia, alleluia! A people in darkness have seen a great light:
A radiant dawn shines on those lost in death. Alleluia!
Gospel: Mark 1:29-39
PREGO REFLECTION ON THE GOSPEL
As I settle to my prayer, I reflect on my mood today. How
am I feeling as I prepare to spend some time with the Lord?
I acknowledge my frame of mind and tell the Lord about it.
When I am ready, I read this passage from Mark’s gospel. Is
there a line which strikes me immediately? I ponder.
Maybe I imagine myself as one of the followers of Jesus,
going with him into the Synagogue, hearing him teach, watching the effect he
has on the other worshippers. Am I surprised by their reaction?
Suddenly, I hear the commotion, the shouting; I watch Jesus
deal with the man possessed by a spirit. What goes through my mind?
How do I feel when I realise the people are impressed by
Jesus’ authority, seeing in him a true prophet?
Perhaps, I meet up with Jesus after the event and speak to
him, going over what happened, sharing with him what I thought and felt. I
listen to him as he tells me how he saw this incident.
What insights does he share with me?
I treasure that moment and eventually, I conclude my time
with the Lord thanking him in my own words for being with me during this time
of prayer.
BAPTISM:
We
welcome and congratulate
Liam Edillo
who is being baptised this
weekend.
Congratulations to Kieran
Rimmelzwaan and Gemma Hunt on their Wedding
Saturday 31st January, 2015 at Sacred Heart Church
Michelle Wootton Sacred Heart
Ulverstone, Clynton Sharvi Our Lady of Lourdes Frank Pisano St Brendan Shaw College
OLOL CHURCH
MacKillop Hill Spirituality Centre William St Forth
GETTING READY FOR LENT: An invitation to reflect and prepare for Lent.
SACRAMENTAL PROGRAM:
WEEKLY
RAMBLINGS:
As mentioned last week there are copies of the follow-up
Document from the Synod on the Family available from the Parish Office for
anyone who wishes to participate in the Diocesan Response – details as follows https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/AOHSynod2015
- please note that the survey is only available until February 10th so having a
look now is important.
A reminder that the 1st Open House for 2015 will be held at
the Parish House, 90 Stewart St, Devonport, on Friday 6th February from 7.00pm.
This is just a chance for members of various centres within the Parish to come
together to meet each other in a friendly atmosphere. A reminder that wine,
soft drink and nibbles are all provided – please feel free to bring any other
drink you prefer.
This last week has been interesting as various parts of
Parish Life have come back to life – the Office is open and people have been
dropping in and the phone has been ringing as things begin to start up again.
Next week we have the first of the Baptismal Preparation Sessions on Tuesday
evening, the Parish Pastoral Council on Wednesday evening and Open House on
Friday.
Next weekend we will have the celebration for the Patron of
the Devonport at Masses prior to the Feast Day on Wednesday 11th. As well we will have a prayer of blessing for
the many volunteers who are part of the Devonport Community as a thanksgiving
for all their efforts during the year. After Mass we will have a cuppa so
please come prepared to stay for a few minutes and chat.
Until next week take care in your homes and on the roads
BAPTISMAL PREPARATION SESSION: Tuesday 3rd
February 7:30pm at Parish House, 90
Stewart Street
Are you yearning for some moments of quiet in the midst of
the busyness of your week?
If so, you would be most welcome to join a small group of
people who meet for Meditation each Wednesday evening at 7pm at 88 Stewart Street
If you would like further information, you could visit www.wccm.org.au
or talk with Sr Carmel or just turn up at 7pm, starting from this Wednesday,
February 4th.
The next meeting of the liturgy committee will be held on Thursday
5th February at Emmaus House at 4:15pm. If you have any items that you
would like the committee to discuss, please contact Kath Pearce (chair)
6424:6504 or Felicity Sly (secretary) 6424:1933.
LITURGY PREPARATION GROUP:
You are very warmly invited to join interested
parishioners and members of local liturgical and musical groups to assist in
the preparation of all of our parish Lenten/Holy Week liturgies. Meetings
will be held at Emmaus House as set out below:
For Lent: Sunday 8 February from 2.00 pm - 3.30 pm
For Holy Week: Sunday 8 March from 2.00 pm - 3.30 pm
For further information contact: Peter Douglas on 0419 302 435
GETTING READY FOR LENT: An invitation to reflect and prepare for Lent.
Presented by Richard and Belinda Chapman. Don’t miss the Lent boat! Now is the chance to take time and prepare
to put all good intentions into action.
See what Lent will give up for you in 2015!
Thursday 12th February
7.30pm – 9.00pm Cost: Donation
Bookings: Phone 6428:3095 Email: mackillophill.forth@sosj.org.au
“LIFE TO THE FULL” Creation and New Creation in
John’s Gospel.
Presented by Associate Professor Mary Coloe pbvm, a
Presentation Sister who teaches Scripture at the University
of Divinity in Melbourne
Friday 27th February
6.00pm – 9.00pm Cost:
$20.00 Bookings essential.
Bookings: Phone 6428:3095 Email: mackillophill.forth@sosj.org.au
CWL ULVERSTONE MEETING: Friday 13th February, 2pm Community Room Sacred Heart Church
LENTEN PROGRAM 2015:
Would you like to attend a Lenten Program?
When: 6
Thursday mornings beginning 19th February
Time: 10am -
11:30am
Where: Emmaus
House Stewart Street
How: You
are invited to add your name to the list in the foyer at OLOL Church
SACRAMENTAL PROGRAM:
Families with children in Grade 3 or above are warmly
invited to participate in our family-centred, parish-based and school-supported
Sacramental Program to prepare to celebrate the sacraments of RECONCILIATION,
CONFIRMATION and EUCHARIST this year.
Information sessions to explain the preparation program
will be held on:
Monday 23rd February, 7.00pm
at Our Lady of Lourdes
Church Stewart Street
or
Tuesday 24th February 7.00pm
at Sacred Heart Church Alexandra Road
For further information please contact the Parish Office
6424:2783 or email: sacra@eftel.net.au
URGENT HELP REQUIRED WITH FLOWER ROSTER
OLOL CHURCH
If you are able to assist with this
roster please phone the Parish Office 6424:2783 as soon as possible.
Thursday Nights - OLOL Hall,
Devonport. Eyes down 7.30pm!
Callers for Thursday 5th February are Jon
Halley & Rod Clark
NEWS FROM
THE ARCHDIOCESE:
Rachel's
Vineyard Retreats
- Provides a chance to step back in safety, to lift hurts of abortion to God,
knowing that the promise of forgiveness and healing is there. If you or someone
you know has been touched by abortion please phone the confidential phone line
62298739 or 0478599241 or email rachelsvineyardtas@aapt.net.au The
next retreat will be held on the May 22nd to 23rd 2015.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
Evangelii Gaudium
"We incarnate
the duty of hearing the cry of the poor when we are deeply moved by the
suffering of others. Let us listen to what God’s word teaches us about mercy,
and allow that word to resound in the life of the Church."
Par 193 from Evangelii Gaudium, Pope Francis, Nov.
24, 2013
Feast Day of the Week – St Paul Miki and companions, martyrs (Feb 6)
On February 6, the Catholic Church honours the 26 Martyrs of Nagasaki, a group of Japanese Catholics and foreign missionaries who suffered death for their faith in the year 1597.
Three
of the best-known martyrs of
Paul
Miki offered an especially strong witness to his faith during the group's
month-long march to Nagasaki, as he joined one of the captive Franciscan
priests in preaching to the crowds who came to mock the prisoners.
The
son of a wealthy military leader, Miki was born in 1562 and entered the Church
along with the rest of his family. He joined the Jesuits as a young man and
helped many Buddhists to embrace Christianity. His last act of evangelism took
place as he hung on his cross, preaching to the crowds:
“The
only reason for my being killed is that I have taught the doctrine of Christ,”
he announced. “I thank God it is for this reason that I die. I believe that I
am telling the truth before I die.
“After
Christ's example, I forgive my persecutors. I do not hate them. I ask God to
have pity on all, and I hope my blood will fall on my fellow men as a fruitful
rain.”
St
Paul Miki and his 25 companions were stabbed to death with lances on February
5, 1597, at the site that became known as Martyrs' Hill. Pope Pius IX canonised
the Martyrs of Nagasaki in 1862.
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/saint.php?n=139
Words of Wisdom – Prayer to St Francis of Assisi
On November 29,
2013, Pope Francis announced that this year (2015) would be dedicated to
consecrated life, specifically its mission and identity. For the next few
editions of Bulletin Notes, we will
share some prayers from those who have helped shape communities of people
living a consecrated life. This week, it is a prayer for discerners, which has
been adapted from the Message on the 51st World Day of Prayer for
Vocations.
“Bless young people with the gift of courage to respond to your call. Open their hearts to great ideals, to great things.
“Inspire all of your disciples to mutual love and giving - for vocations blossom in the good soil of faithful people.
“Instill those in religious life, parish ministries, and families with the confidence and grace to invite others to embrace the bold and noble path of a life consecrated to you.
“Unite us to Jesus through
prayer and sacrament, so that we may cooperate with you in building your
reign of mercy and truth, of justice and peace.
Amen.”
Morgan Freeman is one of
those actors who was born to play God.
THE POSITIVE SIDE OF MELANCHOLY
An article by Fr Ron Rolheiser. The original can be found at http://ronrolheiser.com/the-positive-side-of-melancholy/#.VMsVOmiUfAY
Normally none of us like feeling sad, heavy, or depressed. Generally we prefer sunshine to darkness, lightheartedness to melancholy. That’s why, most of the time, we do everything we canto distract ourselves from melancholy, to keep heaviness and sadness at bay. We tend to run from those feelings inside us that sadden or frighten u
That’s why, for the most part, we think of melancholy and her children (sadness, gloomy nostalgia, loneliness, depression, feelings of loss, feelings of regret, intimations of our own morality, a sense of missing out on life, fear of what lies in the dark corners of our minds, and heaviness of soul) as negative. But these feelings have their positive sides. Simply put, they help keep us in touch with those parts of our soul to which we are normally not attentive. Our souls are deep and complex, and trying to hear what they are saying involves listening to them inside of every mood within our lives, including, and sometimes especially, when we feel sad and out of sorts. In sadness, melancholy, and fear, the soul tells us things that we normally refuse to hear. Hence, it’s important to examine the positive side of melancholy.
Unfortunately, today it is common to see sadness and heaviness of soul as a loss of health, as a deficiency in our vibrancy, as an unhealthy condition. That’s both unfortunate and shortsighted. For instance, in many medieval and renaissance medical books melancholy was seen as a gift to the soul, something that one needed to pass through, at certain points in his or her life, in order to come to deeper health and wholeness. This, of course, doesn’t refer to clinical depression, a true loss of health, but to all those other depressions that draw us inward and downward. Why do we need to pass through melancholy in order to come to wholeness?
Thomas Moore, who writes with deep insight on how we need to learn to listen more carefully to the impulses and needs of our souls, offers this insight: “Depression gives us valuable qualities that we need in order to be fully human. It gives us weight, when we are too light about our lives. It offers a degree of gravitas. It was associated with the metal lead and was said to be heavy. It also ages us so that we grow appropriately and don’t pretend to be younger than we are. It grows us up and gives us the range of human emotion and character that we need in order to deal with the seriousness of life. In classic Renaissance images, found in old medical texts and collections of remedies, depression is an old person wearing a broad-rimmed hat, in the shadows, holding his head in his hands.”
Milan Kundera, the Czech writer, in his classic novel, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, echoes what Moore says. His heroine, Teresa, struggles to be at peace with life when it’s not heavy, when it’s too much lightness, sunshine, and, seemingly, non-mindful; when it’s devoid of the type of anxieties that hint at darkness and mortality. Thus, she feels always the need for gravitas, for some heaviness that signals that life is more than simply the present flourishing of health and comfort. For her, lightness equates with superficiality.
In many cultures, and indeed in all of the great world religions, periods of melancholy and sadness are considered as the necessary path one must travel in order to sustain one’s health and come to wholeness. Indeed, isn’t that part of the very essence of undergoing the paschal mystery within Christianity? Jesus, himself, when preparing to make the ultimate sacrifice for love, had to, painfully, accept that there was no path to Easter Sunday that didn’t involve the darkness of Good Friday. Good Friday was bad, long before it was good; or, at least, so it looks from the outside. Melancholy, sadness, and heaviness of soul mostly look the same.
So how might we look at periods of sadness and heaviness in our lives? How might we deal with melancholy and her children?
First off, it’s important to see melancholy (whatever its form) as something normal and healthy within our lives. Heaviness of soul is not necessarily an indication that there is something wrong inside us. Rather, normally, it’s the soul itself signally for our attention, asking to be heard, trying to ground us in some deeper way, and trying, as Moore puts it, to age us appropriately. But, for this to happen, we need to resist two opposite temptations, namely, to distract ourselves from the sadness or to indulge in it. How do we do that? James Hillman gives us this advice: What to do with heaviness of soul? “Put it into a suitcase and carry it with you.” Keep it close, but contained; make sure it stays available, but don’t let it take you over.
That’s secular wording for Jesus’ challenge: If you wish to be my disciple, take up your cross every day and follow me.
The Word Is Near
An email reflection by Fr Richard Rohr posted on 16th January 2015
We live in a time that can make use of
the unique contribution of every era to enjoy intuitive and body knowledge,
along with rational critique and deeper synthesis, thus encouraging both
intelligent and heartfelt participation "with our whole heart, soul, mind,
and strength," as Jesus puts it (Mark 12:30).
I do not believe the will of God is a theory, an argued
moral theology, or an abstraction in any form; it is seeking the truth of each
situation in that situation as best as we can figure it out. Somehow the True
Self in all humans has natural access to that "hidden" will of
God--if the mind and heart and body are open and undefended (which is always
the spiritual task and not easily achieved). Jeremiah called it "the law
written on your heart" (Jeremiah 31:33).
Moses said it poetically: "This law is not beyond your
strength or beyond your reach. It is not in heaven, so that you need to wonder,
'Who will go up to heaven and bring it down to us so that we may hear it and
keep it?' Nor is it beyond the seas, so that you need to wonder, 'Who will
cross the seas for us so that we might hear it and keep it?' No, the word is
very near to you. It is in your mouth and in your heart" (Deuteronomy
30:11-14).
Jews call this word the Law; Christians call it the Logos or
the blueprint; Taoists call it the Eternal Tao; Buddhists call it Emptiness or
the Great Compassion; Hindus call it Brahman; Sufi Muslims call it the dance;
and science speaks of universal theories. But we are all pointing to one
underlying and universal truth that we all strive toward in ten thousand ways.
Adapted from Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self,
pp. 116, 136-138
