Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
To be a vibrant Catholic Community
unified in its commitment
to growing disciples for Christ
Parish Priest: Fr Mike Delaney
Mob: 0417 279 437
Mob: 0417 279 437
Priest in Residence: Fr Phil McCormack
Mob: 0437 521 257
Mob: 0437 521 257
ssm77097@bigpond.com
Postal Address: PO Box 362
Parish Office: 90 Stewart Street
(Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday 10am - 3pm)
Office Phone: 6424 2783 Fax: 6423 5160
Email: merseyleven@aohtas.org.au
Secretary: Annie Davies / Anne Fisher
Pastoral Council Chair: Jenny Garnsey
Parish Mass times for the Month: mlcpmasstimes.blogspot.com.au
Weekly Homily Podcast: mikedelaney.podomatic.com
Our Parish Sacramental Life
Baptism: Parents are asked to contact the Parish Office to make arrangements for attending a Baptismal Preparation Session and booking a Baptism date.
Reconciliation, Confirmation and Eucharist: Are received following a Family–centred, Parish-based, School-supported Preparation Program.
Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults: prepares adults for reception into the Catholic community.
Marriage: arrangements are made by contacting one of our priests - couples attend a Pre-marriage Program
Anointing of the Sick: please contact one of our priests
Reconciliation: Ulverstone - Fridays (10am - 10:30am)
Devonport - Saturday (5:15pm – 5:45pm)
Care and Concern: If you are aware of anyone who is sick or in need of assistance in the Parish please visit them. Then, if they are willing and give permission, could you please pass on their names to the Parish Office. We have a group of parishioners who are part of the Care and Concern Group who are willing and able to provide some backup and support to them. Unfortunately, because of privacy issues, the Parish Office is not able to give out details unless prior permission has been given.
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Eucharistic Adoration - Devonport: Every Friday 10am - 12noon, concluding with Stations of the Cross and Angelus
Benediction with Adoration Devonport: First Friday of each month.
Legion of Mary: Wednesdays 11am Sacred Heart Church Community Room, Ulverstone
Prayer Group: Charismatic Renewal – In Recess until Monday 15TH January, 2018
Healing Mass sponsored by CCR will be held at St Mary’s Church Penguin on Thursday 8th February, 2018
Archdiocesan Website: www.hobart.catholic.org.au for news, information and details of other Parishes.
Parish Prayer
Heavenly Father,
and calling us to serve as your disciples.
as we use our gifts to serve you.
as we strive to bear witness
to the Gospel and build an amazing parish.
Amen.
Weekday Masses: 19th - 22nd December, 2017
Tuesday: 9:30am Penguin
Wednesday: 9:30am Latrobe
Thursday: 10:00am Karingal Nursing Home
Friday: 9:30am Ulverstone
Next Weekend 23rd & 24th December, 2017
Saturday Vigil: 6:00pm Penguin
Devonport
Sunday Mass: 8:30am Port Sorell
9:00am Ulverstone
10:30am Devonport
11:00am Sheffield
No Evening Mass Latrobe (Christmas Eve)
Christmas Eve Masses
6:00pm Devonport
Ulverstone
8:00pm Devonport
Penguin
Christmas Day Masses
8:00am Port Sorell
9:30am Latrobe
Shefffield
Ministry Rosters 23rd & 24th December, 2017
Devonport:
Readers: Vigil: C Kiely-Hoye, K Pearce, A Stegmann 10:30am: C
Kiely-Hoye, K Pearce
Ulverstone:
Penguin:
Port Sorell:
Readings this week – Third Sunday of Advent – Year B
PREGO REFLECTION:
Readings next week – Fourth Sunday of Advent – Year B
Your prayers
are asked for the sick:
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Let us pray for those whose anniversary occurs about this time: 13th
– 19th December
As we
enter into this last week of our Advent Season there will be more and more
things that need to ‘get done’. As I have mentioned frequently over these weeks
I hope that you have had some time to be still before the Lord, and especially
hope that you have been able to make use of the Chosen booklet. All reports
have been that people have found it particularly useful.
As part of
our ongoing planning we will be encouraging Lenten small group discussions
based on a similarly prepared program – Surrender – also from the Diocese of
Wollongong. Material will be available early in the New Year.
Another
response arising of the Parish Forum – Next Steps from a fortnight ago was the
decision that there would be some training for the ministry of Hospitality.
This ministry is more than just a cuppa after Mass or welcoming people at the
door – we will be looking at how hospitality is offered in all our parish
ministries. More details will be found in the Dates For Your Diary as soon as
possible.
Several
other issues raised at the Forum will be responded to next weekend – apologies
for the delay.
Reminder
that there will not be Mass at Latrobe on Christmas Eve – all other Masses for
the Fourth Sunday of Advent are as normal.
Again, if
you are able to inform family and friends about the Christmas Mass times – ie
no morning Mass at either OLOL or Sacred Heart – that would be appreciated.
Please take care on the roads and
in your homes,
EMPTY STABLE OUR LADY OF LOURDES CHURCH:
Parishioners are invited to place gifts, non-perishable
goods in the empty stable at Our Lady of Lourdes Church. The items donated will
be placed in the many Christmas Hampers St Vincent de Paul Society will be
distributing in the communities. Your kindness and generosity is appreciated
and will make life a little more joyful for families and isolated people.
SACRED
HEART CHURCH CHRISTMAS EVE MASS:
‘Calling all children’ you are very welcome to participate
in the nativity play at the 6pm Christmas Eve Mass at Sacred Heart Church
Ulverstone. Practise will take place this
Sunday
17th December during 9am Mass at Sacred Heart Church.
THE JOURNEY CATHOLIC RADIO PROGRAM – AIRS 24
December 2017
DATES FOR YOUR DIARY
21st Dec: Advent Program with Clare Kiely-Hoye: Parish House Devonport 10am – 11:30am.
1st Jan: Mass 12noon Devonport
Contemplative, Active, and Prophetic Nonviolence
Prophets are nonpartisan and thus their work never ends.
Throughout history, they have spoken truth to power, regardless of the ruler’s
political persuasion. They are able to lovingly criticize their own group,
recognizing their own complicity in a violent system.
We still need courageous, humble people to speak up for
justice and peace. For Christians, John Dear says, the great question is: “How
do we follow the nonviolent Jesus more faithfully in this culture of violence
and war?” He offers three basic steps: contemplative, active, and prophetic
nonviolence.
More than ever . . . we have to dig deeper spiritual roots
and that means practicing contemplative nonviolence. We have to take time for
quiet meditation with the God of peace every day. . . . It’s hard to change the
world; we can barely change ourselves. But God can change us and the world if
we allow the God of peace to touch us, disarm us, heal us, and send us out as
instruments of God’s peace. . . .
Second, we need to be public activists of nonviolence. It
does not serve anyone to sit around and complain . . . about the Republicans or
the Democrats. We need to take action, and not just private action but public
action for justice, disarmament, and peace.
[Now] is a good time to reflect on our public lives as
active peacemakers, to investigate the quality of our loving kindness and
peaceableness behind our activism, as well as the boldness and derring-do of
our work. . .
Third, we need to be prophets of nonviolence, that is, we
need to speak out publicly . . . and lend our voice to the grassroots movement
calling for an end to war, racism, nuclear weapons, poverty, corporate greed
and environmental destruction, and for a new culture of peace and nonviolence.
In effect, like the nonviolent Jesus, we are announcing the
coming of God’s reign of peace and nonviolence, here and now, right in our
midst, despite what we hear on TV or Twitter. . . .
Don’t be afraid to be bold! Let’s not give in to fear, but
practice fearlessness and herald a bold vision of a new culture of peace and
nonviolence.
This is what it means for me to follow the nonviolent [and
prophetic] Jesus these days. We may get pushed back, dismissed, ostracized, or
harassed for our stand, but he endured far worse and remained meticulously nonviolent,
loving and faithful. He set the example, and we want to follow him.
Reference:
THE REAL TRAGEDY OF SIN
This article is taken from the archives of Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. You can find the original article here
The real tragedy of sin is that often the one who is sinned against eventually becomes a sinner, inflicting on others what was first inflected upon him or her. There’s something perverse within us whereby when we are sinned against we tend to take in the sin, complete with the sickness from which it emanated, and then struggle not to act out in that same sick way. The ultimate triumph of sin is that first being sinned against, we often become sinners.
We see this, in an elementary form, in the effects that certain sadistic hazing rituals have on those who undergo them. From high school football teams to college sororities to certain schools of military training, we see sadistic hazing rituals used as forms of initiation. The interesting thing is that those who undergo them generally can’t wait for their turn to inflict them upon someone else. Having undergone some sadism something sadistic arises within them.
There’s an axiom within certain schools of psychology which submits that every abuser was first abused. Mostly that’s true. The bully was himself first bullied, the sadist was himself first victimized, and the bitter alienated outsider (whom in arrogance we label “a loser”) was himself first unfairly excluded. What produces an outsider? What produces a sadistic person? Indeed, what produces a mass killer? What must have happened to the heart of a man for him to put on military fatigues, take up an assault rifle, and begin to shoot helpless school children?
Mental illness, no doubt, is often the factor, but there are other factors too, most of which we don’t have the courage to honestly face. Our spontaneous judgment on the perpetrator of a mass shooting or terrorist bombing most naturally expresses itself this way: “I hope he fries in hell!” What’s wrong with that reaction is its failure to understand that this person was already frying in some private hell and this terrible acting-out is an attempt to get out of hell or at least to take as many people as he can to hell with him. What perpetrators of violence mostly want to do is to ruin heaven for others since they themselves feel unfairly deprived of it. This isn’t everywhere true of course since mental illness and the mystery of human freedom also play in, but it’s true enough to challenge us towards a better understanding of why some people have bitter, sadistic hearts while others have gracious, loving ones. What shapes a heart? What makes someone bitter or gracious?
Sin and blessing shape a heart, the former deforming it and the latter healing it. Sin, our own not less than anyone else’s, wounds others and shields us from having to own what’s sick inside us because we have now inflicted our sickness onto someone else where it works at making that person ill. Blessing does opposite. It relieves others of the sickness that was unfairly inflicted on them, helps turn their bitterness into graciousness, and soothes the very root of their wounds.
And so we need to stop classifying people as “winners” and “losers”, as if they alone were responsible for their success or failure. They aren’t. Not many Mother Teresas, I suspect, were traumatically abused as children. Not many Saint Francises suffered debilitating ridicule as young children, were bullied on Facebook, or shamed for their appearance. Cruelty and grace, as Leonard Cohen submits, both come upon us undeserved. And then they imprint themselves into our psyches and even our bodies. How we carry ourselves, our bodily posture, how we radiate spiritually, our self-confidence, our shame, our big-heartedness, our pettiness, our ability to express love, our resistance of love, how much we bless and how much we curse, is very much contingent on how much we ourselves have been undeservedly blessed or cursed, that is, the various undeserved graces and cruelties we have undergone.
Admittedly, this is still colored by the mystery of human freedom. Some Mother Teresas do come from abusive backgrounds and some St. Francises did suffer cruelty and bullying as a child and yet became one-in-million wounded healers, turning the very sin against them into a powerful healing grace. Unfortunately, they’re the exception, not the rule, and their greatness, more than anything else, lies in that exact achievement.
There are many challenges for us in this: First, we must not let our emotions sway us into making the kind of judgements where we would like to see someone “fry in hell”. Second, we should be much less smug and arrogant about those whom we label as “losers”. Next, we need to learn that perhaps the ultimate human and spiritual challenge is to not let what we suffer from the sins and failings of others turn us bitter so that we in turn begin to inflict that same sin onto others. Finally, and not least, understanding more deeply what’s undeserved in our lives should lead us to a deeper gratitude towards God and towards all who have so, undeservedly, loved and gifted us.
The O Antiphons in Advent
The O Antiphons shape the Church’s liturgy in the days leading up to Christmas. Liturgist Andrew Cameron-Mowat SJ explains how the antiphons function during Evening Prayer and as Gospel Acclamations, and introduces the ancient texts that Thinking Faith will explore over the coming weeks.
The O Antiphons, as they are commonly called, are the chants of ancient origin sung or recited at the beginning and end of the Magnificat during the service of Evening Prayer on each of the days leading up to Christmas Day, from 17-23 December. (There is no need for an O Antiphon on Christmas Eve as Evening Prayer for that date is the ‘Evening Prayer I of Christmastide’.)
With the reform of the Lectionary and Divine Office after the Second Vatican Council, it was decided to introduce the O Antiphons into the Liturgy of the Word as the Gospel Acclamation during Mass, choosing an antiphon that was related to some aspect of the scripture assigned to the Mass for that day. On some of the days there is a choice of O Antiphon, which is left to the discretion of the cantor.
You can continue to read this article by going to the Thinking Faith website by clicking here
St John of the Cross
On Friday there was a Webcast from the Center for Action and Contemplation presented by Jim Finley on the Dark Night of the Soul.
It was interesting and informative - if anyone wishes to view the event please contact me by clicking mike.delaney@aohtas.org.au
and calling us to serve as your disciples.
as we use our gifts to serve you.
as we strive to bear witness
Amen.
Weekday Masses: 19th - 22nd December, 2017
Tuesday: 9:30am Penguin
Wednesday: 9:30am Latrobe
Thursday: 10:00am Karingal Nursing Home
Friday: 9:30am Ulverstone
Next Weekend 23rd & 24th December, 2017
Saturday Vigil: 6:00pm Penguin
Devonport
Sunday Mass: 8:30am Port Sorell
9:00am Ulverstone
10:30am Devonport
11:00am Sheffield
No Evening Mass Latrobe (Christmas Eve)
Christmas Eve Masses
6:00pm Devonport
Ulverstone
8:00pm Devonport
Penguin
Christmas Day Masses
8:00am Port Sorell
9:30am Latrobe
Shefffield
Ministry Rosters 23rd & 24th December, 2017
Devonport:
Readers: Vigil: C Kiely-Hoye, K Pearce, A Stegmann 10:30am: C
Kiely-Hoye, K Pearce
Ministers of Communion: Vigil:
M Heazlewood, B Suckling, M O’Brien-Evans, G Lee-Archer, M
Kelly, P Shelverton
10:30am: M Sherriff, T & S Ryan, D
Barrientos, M Barrientos, M O’Brien-Evans
Cleaners 22nd
Dec: K.S.C 29th Dec: M & R Youd
Piety Shop: Closed Lawns
at Parish House: T
Davies
Ulverstone:
Reader/s: E Cox Ministers of Communion: P Steyn, E Cox, C Singline, M Barry
Cleaners: G & M Seen, C Roberts Flowers: M Webb
Hospitality: T Good Team
Penguin:
Greeters: A Landers, P Ravaillion Commentator: J Barker Readers: A Landers, J Garnsey
Ministers of
Communion: M
Murray, T Clayton Liturgy: Sulphur Creek J Setting Up: T Clayton
Care of Church: M Murray, E Nickols
Port Sorell:
Readers: E Holloway Minister of Communion: L Post Clean/Flowers/Prepare: A Holloway
Readings this week – Third Sunday of Advent – Year B
First Reading: Isaiah 61:1-2. 10-11
Second Reading: 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24
Gospel: John 1:6-8. 19-28
PREGO REFLECTION:
I come to my place of prayer.
I may light a candle, and
slowly become aware of God's presence in and around me.
When I am ready, I read
the Gospel passage slowly a couple of times.
I consider John the Baptist.
Perhaps I try to be in the scene, looking and listening.
How does he witness to
the light?
Even a small candle lights up the darkness.
In the darkness of our
world, am I able to believe and trust in God’s light?
I speak to the Lord,
maybe asking him to shed his light in me.
I watch John, and listen to him
refusing to accept any title or category – he is a voice in the wilderness.
Am
I able to witness in simplicity and honesty, allowing God’s light to shine
rather than my own?
Can I move out into the wilderness, into the margins?
Or is
the Lord asking something else of me?
Quietly, I listen ... John says, ‘I am not’.
Jesus is the ‘I am’.
Am I able to see Jesus – the one who is – in everyone and
in everything around me?
Or do I feel at times that he is still ‘unknown’ to me
in my life?
I spend some time in gratitude to the Lord who is always coming and
is always present, known or unknown.
I end my prayer with a slow Glory be ...
Readings next week – Fourth Sunday of Advent – Year B
First Reading: 2 Samuel 7:1-5, 8-12, 14,16
Second Reading: Romans 16:25-27
Gospel:Luke 1:26-38
Your prayers
are asked for the sick:
Vic Slavin, Rex Bates, Joseph Kiely, David Welch & …
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Margaret Brown, Zoe Duncan, Kieran Hofer,
Ken Lowry, Margaret Kenney, Kelvin Green, Margaret Devine, Ken Denison.
Let us pray for those whose anniversary occurs about this time: 13th
– 19th December
Kath Last,
Paul Rech, Fr. Bill Egan, Mark Marshall, Jim Rogers, Thomas Last, Audrey
Cassidy, Beau Reynolds, Sr. Marlene Binns ssj, Marie Williams, Kevin Robertson.
Also Ray Breen and deceased members of Ravaillion, Roberts & Proctor
Families.
Weekly
Ramblings
As we
enter into this last week of our Advent Season there will be more and more
things that need to ‘get done’. As I have mentioned frequently over these weeks
I hope that you have had some time to be still before the Lord, and especially
hope that you have been able to make use of the Chosen booklet. All reports
have been that people have found it particularly useful.
As part of
our ongoing planning we will be encouraging Lenten small group discussions
based on a similarly prepared program – Surrender – also from the Diocese of
Wollongong. Material will be available early in the New Year.
Another
response arising of the Parish Forum – Next Steps from a fortnight ago was the
decision that there would be some training for the ministry of Hospitality.
This ministry is more than just a cuppa after Mass or welcoming people at the
door – we will be looking at how hospitality is offered in all our parish
ministries. More details will be found in the Dates For Your Diary as soon as
possible.
Several
other issues raised at the Forum will be responded to next weekend – apologies
for the delay.
Reminder
that there will not be Mass at Latrobe on Christmas Eve – all other Masses for
the Fourth Sunday of Advent are as normal.
Again, if
you are able to inform family and friends about the Christmas Mass times – ie
no morning Mass at either OLOL or Sacred Heart – that would be appreciated.
Please take care on the roads and
in your homes,
EMPTY STABLE OUR LADY OF LOURDES CHURCH:
Parishioners are invited to place gifts, non-perishable
goods in the empty stable at Our Lady of Lourdes Church. The items donated will
be placed in the many Christmas Hampers St Vincent de Paul Society will be
distributing in the communities. Your kindness and generosity is appreciated
and will make life a little more joyful for families and isolated people.
SACRED
HEART CHURCH CHRISTMAS EVE MASS:
‘Calling all children’ you are very welcome to participate
in the nativity play at the 6pm Christmas Eve Mass at Sacred Heart Church
Ulverstone. Practise will take place this
Sunday
17th December during 9am Mass at Sacred Heart Church.
THE JOURNEY CATHOLIC RADIO PROGRAM – AIRS 24
December 2017
This week on the Journey, our Christmas Eve edition, we
have our very own Bishop Peter Ingham sharing his Christmas message with us, Sr
Hilda shares her Wisdom and wishes us Happy Christmas from the Nuns at Jamberoo
Abbey, and during this very busy yet very Holy time, Marilyn Rodrigues, The
Peaceful Parent, reminds us to Pray, Hope and Don’t worry. It has been
our pleasure to bring you Journey Catholic radio this year, and look forward to
2018. God Bless and Merry Christmas. Go to www.jcr.org.au or www.itunes.jcr.org.au where you can
listen anytime and subscribe to weekly shows by email.
DATES FOR YOUR DIARY
21st Dec: Advent Program with Clare Kiely-Hoye: Parish House Devonport 10am – 11:30am.
1st Jan: Mass 12noon Devonport
Contemplative, Active, and Prophetic Nonviolence
This article is from the daily email series from Fr Richard Rohr OFM. You can subscribe and receive the emails by clicking here
Prophets are nonpartisan and thus their work never ends.
Throughout history, they have spoken truth to power, regardless of the ruler’s
political persuasion. They are able to lovingly criticize their own group,
recognizing their own complicity in a violent system.
We still need courageous, humble people to speak up for
justice and peace. For Christians, John Dear says, the great question is: “How
do we follow the nonviolent Jesus more faithfully in this culture of violence
and war?” He offers three basic steps: contemplative, active, and prophetic
nonviolence.
More than ever . . . we have to dig deeper spiritual roots
and that means practicing contemplative nonviolence. We have to take time for
quiet meditation with the God of peace every day. . . . It’s hard to change the
world; we can barely change ourselves. But God can change us and the world if
we allow the God of peace to touch us, disarm us, heal us, and send us out as
instruments of God’s peace. . . .
Second, we need to be public activists of nonviolence. It
does not serve anyone to sit around and complain . . . about the Republicans or
the Democrats. We need to take action, and not just private action but public
action for justice, disarmament, and peace.
[Now] is a good time to reflect on our public lives as
active peacemakers, to investigate the quality of our loving kindness and
peaceableness behind our activism, as well as the boldness and derring-do of
our work. . .
Third, we need to be prophets of nonviolence, that is, we
need to speak out publicly . . . and lend our voice to the grassroots movement
calling for an end to war, racism, nuclear weapons, poverty, corporate greed
and environmental destruction, and for a new culture of peace and nonviolence.
In effect, like the nonviolent Jesus, we are announcing the
coming of God’s reign of peace and nonviolence, here and now, right in our
midst, despite what we hear on TV or Twitter. . . .
Don’t be afraid to be bold! Let’s not give in to fear, but
practice fearlessness and herald a bold vision of a new culture of peace and
nonviolence.
This is what it means for me to follow the nonviolent [and
prophetic] Jesus these days. We may get pushed back, dismissed, ostracized, or
harassed for our stand, but he endured far worse and remained meticulously nonviolent,
loving and faithful. He set the example, and we want to follow him.
Reference:
John Dear, “The Three Steps of Nonviolence,” July 7, 2017,
http://www.paceebene.org/2017/07/07/the-three-steps-of-nonviolence/.
THE REAL TRAGEDY OF SIN
This article is taken from the archives of Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. You can find the original article here
The real tragedy of sin is that often the one who is sinned against eventually becomes a sinner, inflicting on others what was first inflected upon him or her. There’s something perverse within us whereby when we are sinned against we tend to take in the sin, complete with the sickness from which it emanated, and then struggle not to act out in that same sick way. The ultimate triumph of sin is that first being sinned against, we often become sinners.
We see this, in an elementary form, in the effects that certain sadistic hazing rituals have on those who undergo them. From high school football teams to college sororities to certain schools of military training, we see sadistic hazing rituals used as forms of initiation. The interesting thing is that those who undergo them generally can’t wait for their turn to inflict them upon someone else. Having undergone some sadism something sadistic arises within them.
There’s an axiom within certain schools of psychology which submits that every abuser was first abused. Mostly that’s true. The bully was himself first bullied, the sadist was himself first victimized, and the bitter alienated outsider (whom in arrogance we label “a loser”) was himself first unfairly excluded. What produces an outsider? What produces a sadistic person? Indeed, what produces a mass killer? What must have happened to the heart of a man for him to put on military fatigues, take up an assault rifle, and begin to shoot helpless school children?
Mental illness, no doubt, is often the factor, but there are other factors too, most of which we don’t have the courage to honestly face. Our spontaneous judgment on the perpetrator of a mass shooting or terrorist bombing most naturally expresses itself this way: “I hope he fries in hell!” What’s wrong with that reaction is its failure to understand that this person was already frying in some private hell and this terrible acting-out is an attempt to get out of hell or at least to take as many people as he can to hell with him. What perpetrators of violence mostly want to do is to ruin heaven for others since they themselves feel unfairly deprived of it. This isn’t everywhere true of course since mental illness and the mystery of human freedom also play in, but it’s true enough to challenge us towards a better understanding of why some people have bitter, sadistic hearts while others have gracious, loving ones. What shapes a heart? What makes someone bitter or gracious?
Sin and blessing shape a heart, the former deforming it and the latter healing it. Sin, our own not less than anyone else’s, wounds others and shields us from having to own what’s sick inside us because we have now inflicted our sickness onto someone else where it works at making that person ill. Blessing does opposite. It relieves others of the sickness that was unfairly inflicted on them, helps turn their bitterness into graciousness, and soothes the very root of their wounds.
And so we need to stop classifying people as “winners” and “losers”, as if they alone were responsible for their success or failure. They aren’t. Not many Mother Teresas, I suspect, were traumatically abused as children. Not many Saint Francises suffered debilitating ridicule as young children, were bullied on Facebook, or shamed for their appearance. Cruelty and grace, as Leonard Cohen submits, both come upon us undeserved. And then they imprint themselves into our psyches and even our bodies. How we carry ourselves, our bodily posture, how we radiate spiritually, our self-confidence, our shame, our big-heartedness, our pettiness, our ability to express love, our resistance of love, how much we bless and how much we curse, is very much contingent on how much we ourselves have been undeservedly blessed or cursed, that is, the various undeserved graces and cruelties we have undergone.
Admittedly, this is still colored by the mystery of human freedom. Some Mother Teresas do come from abusive backgrounds and some St. Francises did suffer cruelty and bullying as a child and yet became one-in-million wounded healers, turning the very sin against them into a powerful healing grace. Unfortunately, they’re the exception, not the rule, and their greatness, more than anything else, lies in that exact achievement.
There are many challenges for us in this: First, we must not let our emotions sway us into making the kind of judgements where we would like to see someone “fry in hell”. Second, we should be much less smug and arrogant about those whom we label as “losers”. Next, we need to learn that perhaps the ultimate human and spiritual challenge is to not let what we suffer from the sins and failings of others turn us bitter so that we in turn begin to inflict that same sin onto others. Finally, and not least, understanding more deeply what’s undeserved in our lives should lead us to a deeper gratitude towards God and towards all who have so, undeservedly, loved and gifted us.
The O Antiphons in Advent
The O Antiphons shape the Church’s liturgy in the days leading up to Christmas. Liturgist Andrew Cameron-Mowat SJ explains how the antiphons function during Evening Prayer and as Gospel Acclamations, and introduces the ancient texts that Thinking Faith will explore over the coming weeks.
The O Antiphons, as they are commonly called, are the chants of ancient origin sung or recited at the beginning and end of the Magnificat during the service of Evening Prayer on each of the days leading up to Christmas Day, from 17-23 December. (There is no need for an O Antiphon on Christmas Eve as Evening Prayer for that date is the ‘Evening Prayer I of Christmastide’.)
With the reform of the Lectionary and Divine Office after the Second Vatican Council, it was decided to introduce the O Antiphons into the Liturgy of the Word as the Gospel Acclamation during Mass, choosing an antiphon that was related to some aspect of the scripture assigned to the Mass for that day. On some of the days there is a choice of O Antiphon, which is left to the discretion of the cantor.
You can continue to read this article by going to the Thinking Faith website by clicking here
It was interesting and informative - if anyone wishes to view the event please contact me by clicking mike.delaney@aohtas.org.au
St John of the Cross
On Friday there was a Webcast from the Center for Action and Contemplation presented by Jim Finley on the Dark Night of the Soul.It was interesting and informative - if anyone wishes to view the event please contact me by clicking mike.delaney@aohtas.org.au
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