Download Bulletin 26th September 2021

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Fr Hugh’s Homily for 26th Sunday

Every so often we get a gospel that is not a story or parable but a set of sayings that the writer has put together.  In today’s collection we have one of the hardest of those to understand.  Cutting off hands and plucking out eyes.  What is Jesus up to here?  It is all to do with holiness. Who is holy?  So let’s start with the Temple, which was the holiest of places for Jews,  where God was most present to his people.  It was a massive building for the time with high walls.  Even today just the remaining base is high enough and the Temple rose up on top of that. When people travelled to it for the three major pilgrimages of the year from the different parts of Israel or further afield they were amazed by its grandeur.  Compared to their villages and homes it really spoke to them of the power of God.  But the Temple was a complicated place.  At the heart of it was the Holy of Holies where only the High Priest could enter.  Then there was a series of courtyards through which you passed, and how far you could go depended on your state of holiness…..

Complete Homily for 26th Sunday

Readings for 26th Sunday

Daily Prayers Week 26

Download Bulletin 19th September 2021

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Fr Hugh’s Homily for 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time

When I tried to picture the disciples arguing among themselves on the road as to who is the greatest among them, somehow my mind moved to the recent government reshuffle.  Wondering what all the chatter was like among them, or about each other, as they waited, clutching their mobiles, for a call from the Prime Minister.  As he sacked someone did the Prime Minister say something equivalent to: ‘Anyone who wants to be first, must make themselves last of all and servant of all,’ as they headed for the back benches?  To be fair to our MPs I do think that a great many of them do want to serve, and the question of power is a tricky one for them, as their party needs to be ‘in power’ to put into effect what they want to do, but the temptation to personal power must be great for some, to go off the straight path.  As human beings most of us know what it is to lose our way at some time.  How we can begin well and then get diverted.  How jealousy can be, envy can be what ignites this in us, so we get the early story of Cain and Abel. How we can seek an escape from facing the world at times, which takes us into a world we never thought we would find ourselves in. How then do we then find our way back? …………

Complete Homily for 25th Sunday

Readings for 25th Sunday

Daily Prayers Week 25

Download Bulletin 12th September 2021

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Fr Hugh’s Homily for 24th Sunday

There is a devil, Screwtape, who is high up in the bureaucracy of Hell, and his nephew, Wormwood, a very young and naive devil, is just beginning his training in the satanic civil service.  So Screwtape writes a set of letters to his nephew (as edited, or rather written, by C.S. Lewis) to advise him on how he needs to approach humans in order to coax as many as possible into Hell.  One of his best lessons is about complacency. He says: It is just when the human thinks he or she is really becoming holy, starting to feel they are living as God wants, have done enough to earn heaven, then that is a great time to strike.  Their guard is down.  It is those who think they are doing well who are easiest to tempt into sin via complacency.  I am not sure that we can accuse St.Peter of complacency exactly here, but after his great declaration of who Jesus is, which he gets right, he then takes it upon himself, for the best of motives as he sees it as a human, to persuade Jesus against the very thing he has come here to do…….

Complete Homily for 24th Sunday

Readings for 24th Sunday

Daily Prayers Week 24

Read the September Catholic Voice here

Download Bulletin 5th September 2021

Fr Hugh’s Homily for 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

This gospel would have been called ‘Jesus heals the deaf and dumb man’ in the old days, or something like that.  But if you have watched the film ‘The Sound of Metal,’ (sorry to get back to films so soon but this one just seemed to fit in) where the drummer in a band increasingly loses his hearing, you start to understand the complexity of the community that has hearing challenges, and speaking ones.  At one point the drummer enters a community of those who mainly use sign language and they have a pride in this.  At one scene the signing moves so fast the subtitles for hearing people cannot keep up.   There is no desire to get help to hear, and when he chooses to have an implant the community rejects him, (and in fact he finds the results of the implant problematic too)…….

Complete Homily for 23rd Sunday

Readings for 23rd Sunday

Daily Prayers Week 23

Download Bulletin 29th August 2021

Prayer for the Opening of the Season of Creation, 1^st September.

Father, Lord of all creation,
we praise you with all your creatures
and the whole universe that comes forth from the work of Your hands.  We acknowledge the privilege and responsibility that You give us as stewards of Your creation.  In our ignorance we have done damage to our common home and our brothers and sisters are suffering.  Through faithfully following your Son guide and direct us to prepare for a better future.  Teach us to contemplate You in the beauty of the universe, for all things speak of You.  Give us the grace to recognise, respect and protect all You have created,
using wisely all that you have entrusted to us.  Holy Spirit, who first hovered over the dawn of creation and drew order out of the chaos help us to build your kingdom of justice, love, peace and beauty where the poor of the earth are crying out.  You, who live and reign, world without end, Amen.

Readings for 22nd Sunday

Daily Prayers Week 22 

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Bishop Daniel Comboni

This weekend we welcome Fr Franco Mastromauro from the Verona Fathers who will be visiting the parish and celebrating mass.  The Comboni Missionaries (Verona Fathers) was founded by Bishop Daniel Comboni in Verona (Italy) in 1867.  Their activities largely consist of visiting Catholic Parishes to appeal for funds to support some of the most unfortunate and disadvantaged communities in the world, including the Central African Republic, South Sudan and the Republic of Congo.

Readings for 21st Sunday

Daily Prayers Week 21

Download Bulletin 15th August 2021

Who is she ascends so high, next the heav’nly King…    Every feast of Mary is a feast of Jesus.  Every privilege given to Mary was given to her by God because she is the Mother of the Word made flesh.  She is Queen of Heaven, because she was destined, from the beginning, to be that human mother of Jesus, the Word made flesh.  The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us:  The Assumption … is a singular participation in her Son’s Resurrection and an anticipation of the resurrection of other Christians.  In other words, where Jesus has gone, He has invited His Mother, and indeed all people, to follow.  This feast gives witness to the glory which God means for us all; the enjoyment, one day, of heaven with Jesus and Mary.  But therein lays the challenge: if we want to share their glory, we must strive to imitate their example; that of prayerfulness, faithfulness, humility, and trusting obedience in God’s will.  Let us rejoice with Mary in her glory, and ask her to pray for us, that we might follow her example and so, one day, come to share with her in our own heavenly destiny.   …Round about whom angels fly, and her praises sing?

Readings for The Assumption

Daily Prayers Week 20

AUGUST WEEKEND MASS TIMES

Download Bulletin 1st & 8th August 2021

Fr Hugh’s Homily for 18th Sunday

I don’t know how many of you have done some teaching, but there are definite pro’s and con’s.  On Tuesday nights at the Education Centre down in Lancaster I used to be part of the team teaching teachers, students and qualified, and others, the Catholic Certificate. Tuesday evening after a day’s teaching or studying was not the best time, but there it was.  I was probably not the best of teachers myself, but used to give it my all, hoping that some of those undoubted gems of wisdom would land on fertile ground, which is the teacher’s perennial hope.  I don’t know if you have done any teaching but if you have spent half an hour say, explaining something, very clearly you think, and then ask for questions.  And then a hand goes up and asks something which shows they have understood nothing of what you have said, it is rather disappointing.  (I used to wonder sometimes whether they did it deliberately to show they hated being there.)  I did not leave exactly crushed, but sort of dispirited much of the time, and vowed never to try teaching teachers again…..

Complete Homily for 18th Sunday

Readings for 18th Sunday

Daily Prayers Week 18

From Monday 26th July the church will be open to the public all day

Download Bulletin 25th July 2021

Deacon Philip’s Homily for 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time

“Impressed by the signs, a large crowd followed him.”  John’s Gospel overflows with symbols, images and signs that whisper, hint, or glimpse at a reality that is so real we cannot always understand, these signs are in order to deepen our awareness and widen our experiences.  Today’s miracle story has characteristics to other miracles in John’s Gospel, like the Wedding at Cana.  It shows the unlimited divine abundance of God’s power.  At the wedding feast Jesus did not change one, but six stone water jars into wine, which was more than enough, and it was the best wine the people had tasted.  In today’s gospel five loaves and two fish where a little boy sacrificed his meal were shared abundantly between 5000 men, which is not even counting the women and children.  And all were completely satisfied, and all had their fill….

Complete Homily for 17th Sunday

Readings for 17th Sunday

Daily Prayers Week 17