
Read the Autumn Parish Magazine here
Fr Hugh’s Homily for 29th Sunday in Ordinary Time
I love the characters in parables that Luke tells us. There is a widow here, at the bottom of society, who needs the judge to give her what she is due, probably just to survive. Picture the scene. A crowded court area, male lawyers milling around with their clients, she is probably the only woman, and she has to push her way forward to be heard and then has to make herself heard…..

DEACON GEORGE’S HOMILY FOR 27th SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME
If we say, “It can’t be done” then it won’t be done. But, if we say, “it must be done” then, it most likely will be done. If God asks us to do something then, it must be done. And if we are doing it for God, then we are not doing it alone. Because, we are doing it with God, and with all his power. And what is this power? It is the Holy Spirit that lives within us, a gift that God gave us at our baptism, and re-affirmed at our confirmation. It is the Spirit of power and love. And with it comes, the gift, of boldness. Our first reading tells us, that the cry of the prophet Habbakuk, is not a scream of despair, but a cry that is deep rooted in faith. His faith in God, gives him the courage to shout and argue with God. Because Habbakuk confidently believes that God will do something, and his faith is proved right. God does do something…..

LANCASTER DIOCESE CENTENARY MASS OF CELEBRATION: SATURDAY 18TH OCTOBER
Please see inside bulletin for details.
https://issuu.com/cathcom/docs/lancaster_oct_2025
Fr Hugh’s Homily for 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Return to Paris on Tuesday was £300. Metro fare 4 euros or so. Notre Dame cathedral was free. Lunch 15 euros. To the guy who begged at my table 4.5 euros in what change I had. 21 euros for presents. Everything had its price. Money is our natural way of exchange for services, or to enable others to get services. Money is simply a factor in our daily lives. But the gospel today is about how an ordinary thing like money can so easily be perverted by our greed, or other temptations…..
DEACON GEORGE’S HOMILY FOR THE EXALTATION OF THE HOLY CROSS
“So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.” When I was 26, someone gave me a cross, with a human figure, crucified, mounted, on the cross. I looked at the crucified figure and lived. God first conversed with Moses, at Horeb, the mountain of God. There, God spoke to him from a burning bush but at a distance because he was standing on holy ground. In those days, only Moses was able to converse with God. And he always had to sanctify himself before he could speak with God. When God decided to descend upon Mount Sinai, in the form of a cloud, all the people had to sanctify themselves, it took two days. But even after their sanctification, they were not allowed to touch the mountain, on pain of death. Only Moses was called, to go up the mountain. The bottom of the mountain was the nearest that the Israelites could come to their God….

NATIVITY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY – 8TH SEPTEMBER
FR HUGH’S HOMILY FOR 23rd SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
I like to buy a little present for those in the house when on holiday and I was in the renovated Battersea Power Station, now a shopping mall, impressive, but just a shopping mall, and I walked by the Rolex shop. What about a watch each for the four of them? One was going for £17,300. Would my Debit card, Apple pay, cover four of them? I guess I might have got away with it for a brief time, but not long. There are things we would love to do, but like the builder of the tower and the king, in the gospel, but we can only give of what we have. Otherwise our cards are rapidly ‘maxed out’ and we end up in the hands of short-term loan sharks, as so many poor people, and others, do today….
