Cathedral of the Annunciation and St. Nathy

150^th Anniversary Mass of Thanksgiving

November 3, 2861 – November 3, 2011

Intro:

Tá áthas orm sibh ar fad a fháiltiú anseo tráthnóna chuig an Aifreann buíochais seo…150 bliain ó coisriceadh an Ardeaglais seo.

I’m very happy to be welcoming you all this evening to this Mass of thanksgiving, and I thank all, people of this parish, and people and priests from all over the diocese, for coming.

This is your Cathedral, symbol of our unity as a Diocese, and symbol too of our unity with the Universal, Catholic Church, right from the time of Jesus and the Apostles, his successors, down to this day.

In so many ways a Cathedral reminds us we are not alone, we are a communion of people, united in faith as members of the very Body of Christ.

In times of threat, and fear and great uncertainty, this great, strong and sacred edifice stands as a reminder to us of the deeper truths about where our greatest strength lies, and all our hope, truths for which our patron St. Nathy stood, and at the beginning of the Christian era, the young girl Mary, the Mother of our Saviour.

So, Lord, as we go on our knees, we acknowledge our faith can be weak, and our many sins, and we entrust ourselves to your great mercy, that, forgiven, we may celebrate this Holy Eucharist with deep joy. 

Homily:

“(The angel) went in and said to her, ‘Rejoice, so highly favoured! The Lord is with you. (Mary) was deeply disturbed by these words, and asked herself what this greeting could mean…”

And this evening, I’d like us to ask what this Cathedral could mean?

I had finished my first year as a young student for the priesthood in 1965 when I attended the dedication of the youngest Cathedral in Europe in Galway on the 15^th of August 1965. The thing I remember most from that day was the way Cardinal Richard Cushing of Boston preached. In his sermon, he asked over and over again the question: Why did you build this Cathedral? It’s a question worth pondering for us this day when we are celebrating, modestly, the dedication of this Cathedral 150 years ago.

Some details of what happened on that day are given in the mass booklet we have in our hands this evening. Patrick Durcan, a native of Tourlestrane was the bishop. The Cathedral took six years to build. When you consider that Galway cathedral, built a hundred years later, took seven years (1958-1965) to complete, the building of this Cathedral in far poorer times, admittedly without the spire, was an extraordinary achievement for the people of Ballaghaderreen and of this small, rural and largely impoverished Diocese. And on top of that, when you consider that six other churches were built in the Diocese during that same decade (1860-1870) and four during the previous decade (1850-1860), it’s an even more remarkable achievement.

Clearly, this building stands as a monument to the faith of the people. It is an expression of that faith. Every Church building is. The Cathedral could not have been built without the people of this Diocese working together as a community, and not just here at home but in communion with the people of the diocese spread all over the world, particularly in the United States and in England. This building proclaims that our faith is a communal reality and a universal reality. Christians believe in Communion, and in community. We know the importance of working together, of depending on each other and helping each other. We know that if we believe in God we cannot but build community. Loving our neighbour is the first principle of the Christian faith along with loving God. That’s what Jesus did, to the point of giving his life, and that’s what we celebrate in the Mass, and that’s what making communion, that’s what building the church can entail.

And a Cathedral, like any church, is basically a Mass house: where the people of God gather in prayer to hear the saving Word of God and to celebrate the Eucharist, for we are poor in spirit, we know our need of God. We know our coming together is an imperative if we say we are Christian and Catholic. There is literally no choice. We come together because we want to be in communion, and are called to be in communion; we come together because we know we fail precisely in this area of being one and together. We so easily hurt, injure, neglect and fail each other, the very ones we profess to love, so we are together to seek forgiveness, and to celebrate our oneness in faith, and our dependence on God, our need of a Saviour, of Jesus. This is a place where we can be on our knees together in sorrow and prayer, stand up together in praise and rejoicing, sit together in rest and reflection. Together, together, together… and together with God, and Jesus, and the whole family of the mystical Body of Christ from the beginning. This is our house.

And then, like St. Paul does in words in the second reading today, this church and every church brings home to us powerfully and beautifully who we are, our deepest identity. “You are God’s building… didn’t you realise you are God’s temple and that the Spirit of God was living among you? If anybody should destroy the temple of God, God will destroy him, because the temple of God is sacred; and you are that temple.” These words of St. Paul describe who each one of us is as an individual man or woman: there is a sacred dignity about each one of us, regardless of our station in life. Let this come home to us in the reception of the Eucharist.

But even more than talking to the people of Corinth as individuals, St. Paul was speaking to them as a community, and it is as a community, together in faith, with Jesus our head, that we are nothing less than the Temple of the Living God on earth. Therefore the work of building unity, of being Church in other words, is the great work for us: ensuring that we are in a real and concrete way a people who love one another. Therein lies our hope in these difficult times, as our ancestors knew 150 years ago when they built this great symbol of unity. And every time we come into this church, or any church, we are reminded of who I am, and who we are, and what I am called to be, and what we are called to be – as individuals and together. That’s why we maintain our churches and keep them beautiful! They remind us of who we are and the dignity and beauty of every human person – that the most beautiful thing is that we be together before God in Communion – that we be Church in other words. So being Church is vital, with all the structures that that demands if we are to be truly human, truly incarnational. We may be aware acutely today of our failures, our wounds as Church, as Communion, but that should call us to greater effort to build unity, never to do the opposite.

And talking, finally, of being incarnational: this Cathedral is the Cathedral of the Annunciation, the moment when the Son of God became incarnate in the Temple of Mary’s body, the central mystery of our faith. There’s nothing notional about Christian faith. It has very real, human, everyday-living implications. Mary is the first Christian. The first of our Church to say ‘yes’ to what God asks, in an absolute and total way. Every time we enter a church, and especially a church dedicated to the Annunciation, like this one, we are reminded that like Mary we too are Temples of God’s Holy Spirit, made holy as she was, by the fact that we are the dwelling place of God’s Holy Spirit. That’s what receiving Eucharist reminds us of and proclaims. We really are, like Mary, God-bearers to all we meet and to all creation.

And we recognize in this Cathedral too St. Nathy as the first of those God-bearers in our midst in Achonry, so he shares the dedication with Mary of the Annunciation; this is what we are remembering today in this Mass and celebrating, our hearts full of gratitude.

So we pray: Lord, may this great edifice, this cathedral of the Annunciation and St Nathy, be renewed for us in our time as a symbol and sacrament in our midst of who we, the people of Achonry diocese are:  God-bearers to our world, called to build unity, to forgive and to welcome each other for your sake, so that love may be real, and holy communion alive in our diocese in this 21^st Century,  Amen.

Bishop Brendan Kelly

Bishop of Achonry

3 November 2011

50^th
Anniversary Mass

Sat. 1 Oct 2011

HOMILY:

“Let me sing to my friend the song of his love for his vineyard.”

The vineyard is an image of God’s people. Look how he tended and cared for it.

But those into whose care he entrusted the vineyard were not always so caring.

A Catholic school is a  vineyard, too, and we are its minders and keepers, and it is so good today to be celebrating St. Joseph’s School – the vineyard of this Christian and Catholic community.

First of all, I want to thank you for inviting me to preside at this Sunday Eucharist. We are celebrating 50 years of St. Joseph’s Secondary School. The Eucharist always calls us to gratitude, and today we are giving thanks to God for 50 years of blessings on St. Joseph’s.

The school was founded in 1961 by the Sisters of Charity. The Sisters’ contribution to the welfare of  this town and its people over long decades was extraordinary, and their spirit lives on even if the Sisters are long since departed.  In an era of far greater poverty and far less opportunity than anything we are experiencing today, the Sisters of Charity trusted in Providence – the Providence of God – as they sought to live out their vocation to be, in deeply practical ways, what they said they were: Sisters, to each other and to everyone, in the hard, unrelenting work of Charity or Love  – after the heart and life of Jesus. There is nothing soft about the Love of
Jesus! Rather it is tough and demanding. In their trust in God’s Providence and  the example of their charity in action they have left a heritage to this town  and to St. Joseph’s School that is precious and necessary – now as much as it ever was if not more –for the sake of the people and especially the young  people of this town and its hinterland.

The great gift of the 50^th Anniversary Celebration is that it makes us look again at the founding spirit and motivation in 1961 of the Sisters and their co-workers. The school was an enterprise entirely founded by the Sisters of this community. They received no state aid. What group would dare today attempt such an undertaking without state finance? Have we disabled ourselves in looking always so much to the state? But that’s what real faith does! And trust in God’s Providence! It enables us – gives us faith in ourselves, in what we can achieve together – pooling our resources. Far from being old-fashioned or passé, we need such faith in God and His Providence now as never before. And there is no point in this Celebration without an honest acknowledgment that without the Faith – in God – and from that a belief in our own capabilities – this school might never have been born.

“Caritas Christi urget nos” – “the Charity (the Love) of Christ urges us on” was the motto of the Sisters and is now the school motto. The Love of Christ it was that urged them and their helpers on against many odds – or made them disregard the odds – to establish the work of the Love of Christ that is a Catholic School at its best,
that is St. Joseph’s, and ever will be, please God.

For that is what Catholic Education is about. It is about truly loving our young people! A school is a true community where young people discover and experience the amazing truth about themselves – as men and women – that they are Children of God, loved with an everlasting love, possessing a dignity that is nothing short
of sacred and destined for life in all its fullness. You don’t need to be famous or lauded by the fickle crowds when you know in your heart of hearts that you are precious to God and have a unique contribution to make on this earth. Love, dignity, the sacredness of life, life in all its fullness: wondrous words applicable to every boy and every girl, to every woman and every man.

This Sunday is the Day for Life – calling us to ‘solidarity and to hope in these difficult times’.
Isn’t that a fine description of a Catholic School – Giving Life, Solidarity with each other, and Hope in difficult times? The fact is money, no more than fame, is not the source of either hope or happiness. We’re always in danger of losing our way on that one. Hope and happiness are born of solidarity, love, and good relationships – in marriage, in the family, in the parish, in the school. Good relationships demand hard work, self-sacrifice, fidelity and forgiveness. Now who wants to forgive today? Or to promote fidelity of self-sacrifice? Listen to how the voices of anger, ingratitude, blame, and fault finding,  so fill our airwaves and are often so lauded. That is not the spirit that gave Foxford its Mill or its School. That is not the spirit on which St. Joseph’s was founded. It’s not the spirit that inspires you today, or brought you together for this celebration.
You are here, we are here, at the Eucharist, because we need each other and we need God. And because we are so grateful, looking back, and so much in awe, of the selflessness and sacrifice on which this school is built. And yes, we can look back in anger, too – Catholic bishops, priests and people, are sinful and failing – but we cannot stay there. We can rise to forgiveness; we do not and will not succumb to any culture of blame and
bitterness, for it offers neither hope nor future. We embrace a culture of Life and a culture of Love, a culture of forgiveness and solidarity with one another, and with all who are in need. We are Catholic and we stand for Life,
for Love, for living in Communion and trust in God’s Providence. That is the basis on which St. Joseph’s was founded, continues to grow, and takes its stand today.

So, on this Day for Life, we salute all those who have contributed – as founders, teachers, students, parents – over 50 years to St. Joseph’s School. We thank God for them and ask His blessing upon them. And we face the future with confidence for we trust in the Providence of God and the Love of Christ, which continues to urge
us on and inspire us, that we and our young people will bear the good fruit of which they are so capable, and that we, the Catholic community, may be true labourers in His vineyard, “people who will produce its fruit.”

Bishop Brendan Kelly

Saturday  October 1, 2011

John 6: 51-58

“The Eucharist: Communion with Christ, Communion with each other”

Somewhere very deep and very dominant in our human hearts is the longing for Communion.

We dread the opposite: loneliness, isolation.  We make a big fuss about 1^st Holy Communion. No wonder. We do not want our children to be alone, cut off, out in the cold. Even people whose connection with Church is very tenuous feel it is their right.

And we talk of ‘Communion’ – not just ‘union’!

It allows for difference and individuality, is not about being swallowed up in another – or any loss of individual identity, but rather the affirmation of each one’s unique individuality.

So the Eucharist, Holy Communion, celebrates the fact that this is how God made us, wants us to be: We are made for Communion – with God, with each other.

But words are easy, talk can be cheap. The Gospel today, especially the reaction of the Jews whom Jesus is addressing reveal that communion involves a demanding and costly journey.

There is no easy and cheap way to ‘True’ or ‘Holy’ Communion,
and to the fullness of life for us humans that this brings.  Jesus says “Anyone who eats this bread (my flesh) will live forever…” and “If you do not eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will not have life in you.”

The Preface of today’s mass tells us that Jesus “offered himself as a victim for our deliverance and taught us to make this offering in his memory.”

The Eucharist is an invitation to self-giving, to personal sacrifice, that is total.

No wonder the disciples, who understood that, found it “intolerable”
and quite a few walked away. But this is the heart of love and Christianity
always, a very practical, down-to-earth faith.

Communion is a deep human longing, but its realisation in practice is often extremely expensive: in terms of asking for forgiveness, of being prepared to grant forgiveness, to be men and women of reconciliation. The temptation to walk away remains strong. But where will we, or our families, and our world be without forgiveness, reconciliation. Do we have a choice?

When President Kennedy became President of the United States in the early 60s, the ideal he put before people was, “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask rather what you can do for your country.”

The Feast of Corpus Christi issues a similar challenge and call: to a life of service, and of seeking no personal reward, of deep responsibility for how things are in our world, and all so that that holiest and most sacred of all things might be realised: men and women in Communion with our God, in Communion with each other.

We will ponder and reflect on this together as a Diocese, please God, in the course of the coming year, as we walk together towards the 50^th International Eucharistic Congress.

May your Holy Spirit transform us into one body,

and lead us to walk humbly on the earth in justice and love,

as witnesses of your resurrection,

in communion with Jesus, with Mary, and with each other.

Amen.

Intro:

Bhúr gcéad fáilte. I want to welcome you all to this celebration of the Sacrament of Confirmation. Particularly the 55 young people who are coming forward today to receive this Sacrament.

It is Saturday, always the day of Mary in the tradition of the church. And the Gospel story we will hear shortly captures the child of Mary and Joseph, Jesus, entering adulthood.

So as I welcome each one of you young people who are soon to begin the journey into adulthood, I welcome each of your parents too in a very special way. This is a significant moment in the life of each family here.

The family is the place where our best comes out, yes, but can also be the place where the worst comes out. So we need to be forgiven…and at the start of every mass we are reminded to acknowledge our sins, that God forgives, and that we must forgive each other. 

HOMILY

‘Did you not know I must be busy with my Father’s affairs?’

‘But they did not understand what he meant’…and that on top of ‘how worried your father and I have been, looking for you’.

Today 55 of you have come here with your families, and this story brings home to us a very important fact. The family we call ‘the Holy Family’ was the kind of family we can all identify with.

Jesus at the age of twelve, about to enter the teenage stage, becomes a source of major anxiety and worry for his parents. I doubt if there’s any parent of a teenager or young adult here who cannot identify with Mary’s ‘My child, why have you done this to us? See how worried your father and I have been, looking for you…’! Parenthood doesn’t get easier when children grow older and become more independent.

And then there’s the calm response of the precocious 12 year old: ‘Why were you looking for me? Did you not know I must be busy with my Father’s affairs?’

The matter-of-factness, the confidence of it! What’s extraordinary is that these parents make no response! Why I wonder? Because the child is telling the truth, his own truth yes, but isn’t it also the truth for every child moving into adulthood: Each one is a child of God first, each one on this earth to be busy with our Fathers affairs: each one has a task from God to do, a vocation or call that is unique to her or him, just as each parent here has been given this unique child to nurture as your unique task and call from God. It is not the task of the parent to decide what the child’s vocation is, but to stand back a bit and so help/enable the child become themselves, and discover for him or herself what ‘affair’ of the Father they are being called to busy themselves with for life.

During the past year, the Holy Father came to England to beatify John Henry Cardinal Newman. In the context of today, and ‘being busy with the Father’s affairs’, I’d like to read for you all, but especially for you who are being Confirmed, something Cardinal Newman wrote as part of a personal prayer that is very relevant to you this day- and to all of us-:

‘I am created to do something or to be something for which no one else has been created; I have a place in God’s counsels (plans), in God’s world, which no one else has; whether I be rich or poor, despised or esteemed by people(man), God knows me and calls me by my name’.   

[‘God has created me to do him some definite service; He has committed some work to me which he has not committed to another. I have my mission – I may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next. Somehow I am necessary for his purposes…. I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created me for naught. I shall do good, I shall do his work; I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place, while not intending it, if I do but keep his commandments and serve him in my calling’.]

‘God knows me and calls me by my name’. You matter to God. It is so important to know this, and Confirmation is about the fact that you matter to Him and to His plan for the world at this time. He gives his very own Spirit to you, and today you say yes to that Spirit and to that Sprit working in and through you…Each person is called, has a vocation from God, a task to do, a mission nobody else can carry out…

Mary and Joseph did not answer their child, not to mention get into an argument with him, but rather listened to him…and lived with not understanding him at that moment. [This is worth noticing. They respect the mystery of their own child. Every child needs their mystery respected] They could do that because they were people of faith…which means they trusted God, and because they trusted God, they could trust their own child. What a gift for a child it is to have parents who are people of faith! So today we adults are called very much to be renewed in faith, to be renewed in our own Confirmation.

And what a gift for parents to have a child today who is going to take her/his stand with them for Jesus, for Christ, for God, young people who have come to be Confirmed in their Catholic faith. You will stand up in front of us all and profess the faith of the Church, of God’s people. And then the whole congregation will join in prayer with me and the priests as we hold out our hands out over you in the gesture that we call the ‘laying on of hands’, all of us together with you praying confidently that the Holy Spirit come upon you and fill you with his Gifts, that your lives may bear the very best fruits…love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

This is then a day of great hope for the future, which is very much in the hands of people who, please God, will bear these fruits. That’s why it is right to celebrate you this day, and that this be a day of celebration for this whole community and parish.

What would you like to see included here?  Commemnts and sugestions welcome.

Canon Jim Finan and Fr Pat Lynch

Some of the congregation

Congregation gathered for celebration

A packed church heard Bishop Brendan Kelly speak of the faith of the community of 200 years ago who, in hard times, rose above their own personal worries and needs to build a House for God and, in so doing, a house for themselves “Pobal Dé”.  He wondered “Why did they build this church?” and the only answer is FAITH.  They lived their Faith and expressed their hope and love in the builiding of a place of worship.

Bishop Kelly preaching to a packed church during Mass

Bishop Brendan acknowledged the contribution of £40 (a huge sum of money at that time) by the Protestant community to help with the building fund.  He said this clearly demonstrated that, at heart, we are a people united in our wish to serve God and find a place and time for prayer.  This, he said, remains the way and of this we should be proud and for this thankful.

Padraig Duffy spoke on behalf of the community.  He traced the history of the Church in Keash and of other places of worship that preceded St Kevin’s.  With emotion he recounted the place of gathering that St Kevin’s is – from baptisms to weddings, First Holy Communions, Confirmation days and of course funerals.  The church is central to all a community is.

Padraig Duffy speaks on behalf of the community

Bishop Brendan and Fr Padraig Devine SMA listen to Padraig Duffy

The Liturgy involved many parishioners in singing, reading the Word of God, prayers of the faithful etc.

Imelda Brehony

William Henry

Mass Servers

Parishioners lead the Prayer of The Faithful

The Offertory Procession included a selection of Prayer Books reflecting the prayers of people down through the years, a Lectionary reminding us of God’s word read and preached for 200 years in this church, flowers and plants symbolising growth and new life, the original Altar Stone from the Church, a 200 year old Chalice and of course bread and wine.

Prayer books presented to Bishop Kelly

Lectionary presented

Original Altar Stone

Flowers brought by one of the younger parishioners

Gifts offered and accepted

Following Mass, Bishop Brendan unveiled a plaque recalling the Bi-Centenary of the Church.

Bishop Brendan and Canon Jim with unveiled plaque

The plaque

Gathered outside for unveling of commerorative plaque

After Mass we were all welcomed to the local hall for a lovely celebration and plenty food.  A “Jubilee Cake”, baked for the occasion, was cut by Bishop Brendan.

Jubilee Cake

Keash Hospitality enjoyed and appreciated

Fr Dermot Meehan, Canon Jim Finan and Fr Padraig Devine

Fr Padraig Devine (nephew of Fr Ricky Devine who celebrated his First Mass in Keash Church) with Bishop Brendan outside Parish Hall

Well done to all involved in this special celebration and thanks to all who made us all feel so welcome.

“Hope in a time of Recession” 

Homily: 

‘When Pentecost day came round, the apostles had all met in one room….’

The banks, those bastions of trustworthiness, were shaking; even beginning to crumble it seemed before our eyes. Along with them and their shares peoples’ money was disappearing like dust. Jobs were becoming insecure and many people found themselves unemployed. Houses were being re-possessed, building sites went silent, and the future was beginning to look very bleak for our young people. The traditional safety valve of emigration was closed, for this recession is worldwide, and the same things are happening to peoples’ lives in the USA, England, Australia and all over Europe.

We were all being plunged into a new vulnerability over which we seemed to have no control. The very foundations of all our prosperity were disappearing, and we had no preparation…

Now that the day has finally come and I am here, – and glad to be here and to be back home in Galway…I stand before you not just under the long lingering shadow of the Recession, but more immediately under the great dark cloud of the Ryan Report. As people of faith, we find ourselves caught in another sort of recession as it were: disillusion, questions, anger, another sure ground creaking and cracking under our feet.

As a Catholic and a follower of Jesus, as well as an Irishman, not to mention as a priest and a bishop, (go bhfóire Dia orainn), I am mortified, and I am groping for words….and would prefer to escape and not to have to face this appalling revelation. Not for the first time in the past almost 20 years now, there’s a wish the ground might open up and swallow me, especially since we are far from being finished yet. 

What can one say?  Facts, truths spoken, written down in black and white, speak for themselves. The naked reality of what went on under the watch of a church so sure of itself, at the pinnacle of its triumph, along with the State, after centuries of persecution. We had become proud as church and nation, it now seems… we all know what the proverb says. ‘After pride comes…fall’

We are on our knees and much of our presumed glorious history of the years following liberation is in tatters, and must be re-written. 

What we cannot do now, though, is allow the ground swallow us up. We have to say ‘Yes’. This is a terrible truth. And we are sorry. And our hearts are broken. And if you are amongst those unseen, unheard, stifled, broken children, we are so sorry. And we want to listen, we want to hear, to support and to cherish you. Even at this late stage. 

Moreover, if you are amongst those many many others who were not in institutions, but who knew terrible abuse as a child, and for whom there is no public forum and no redress, we will listen to you too, and that’s a promise, and we will do all we can to bring healing, for we cherish you too. 

The economic recession brings a terrible vulnerability for many families and individuals at one level. But now this Report brings an even deeper vulnerability, and shame.

We have come together this evening to celebrate the Mass. The Holy Eucharist. The Breaking of Bread. The Breaking of the Body of Christ. The pouring out of His Blood. The redemption wrought, we believe, by that forced nakedness and cruel exposure, bleeding and bloodied, on the cross of ridicule from which there was no escape, for he was nailed to it. Totally defenceless, entirely vulnerable.

We have come together as we do at every mass to remember and to celebrate this appalling event, because he asked us to do it, he obliged us. “Do this in memory of me” Jesus said, his last admonition to us.

Never allow yourselves forget: the vulnerability of Jesus, the defenselessness of your God. Your capacity to crucify the most innocent one.

‘Do this in memory of me’ not, then, for my sake but for your own, because you will need to do it. You will need to do it over and over, century after century. Sunday after Sunday 

‘Blessed are the poor in spirit’ Jesus said too. But do we really believe it? Did we really believe it? Did we even have a clue what it meant?

Maybe now that humility, that humiliation of soul and heart that Jesus said was blessed, maybe now we feel it, in all its pain….

For we thought we were doing great…we never had it so good! Never more money in our pockets ! The scourge of emigration solved and left behind! And earlier before that as Catholics, never so many vocations, missionaries, a truly Golden age.

Now we acknowledge it was not all golden and the economic boom was not all boom.

‘Do this in memory of me’ Jesus said, lest you forget….and we did, forget.

Lest you grow proud, and we did grow proud.. 

So where are we and what can we do?

Well, here we are, gathered together.

To do this in memory of him. This Eucharistic prayer. Prayer –now there’s a word!

Prayer is something that rises from the heart. Often the broken heart. Never a mere obligation, a law imposed from without. We are here because we want to be. Like Peter ‘Lord, to whom shall we go?’.

Prayer is a cry of our own hearts. In face of pain, and the unknown future, and the poor fragility that is so much part of our human reality.

A cry to the God who is Father of Jesus and our father. 

And always at such a gathering the Holy Spirit comes. For he cannot come into pride or power.

‘When Pentecost Day came round, the Apostles had all met in one room…’ as we do tonight. They were still reeling from disappointment and the disaster of Jesus’ death.

If we really do meet and do come together, without judgement or blame, but acknowledging our humanity , our need of each other and of God, hearts crying out together in prayer…then hope is born 

The truth for us now in time of recession surely, is, at so many levels, where go if not to each other, and together to God?

The old structures, from the outside so strong they looked: Cut stone, banks, schools, asylums, they were all so strong and impregnable it seemed

But already for many tears so many elegant bank buildings have been sold off, all the great mental and other asylums, where are they? And the great schools and houses of religious groups

All changing hands, disappearing from view. 

It is a new time, a new beginning. A Pentecost moment in the deepest sense.

 A time not to be afraid of letting the trappings, the accretions go and all they represent. The Apostles had to let go of so many of their assumptions and presumptions. So must we.

That’s why we confess at the beginning of every mass. We always begin with repentance with sorrow. Not because the law says so, but because we have to and there is no other place from which we can authentically pray 

And we can do this, and we must.

and that’s Hope, in the deepest and best sense.

Born of letting go. No more self-justification. Born of trusting God anew and always.

Born to the poor in Spirit who know their own limitations and sin, and who have no choice but to rely on God’s love and mercy.

And on that love and mercy reflected in our brothers and sisters gathered with us.

So there is a future and we can trust the future, and not fear it,

not because we can secure it,  but because God will, and we

are people of repentance.

We repent for the past

And we are not afraid of the cost. 

When the Advocate comes whom I will send from the Father…

he will lead you to the complete truth…

And he will tell you the things to come.

The Holy Spirit of God is working and is with us…

For we are a people of repentance and we pray -

Together.

And the Holy Spirit in us, binding us, is our Hope.

A number of journalists came to my house on Friday last.  In the subsequent television coverage of the event, I was very glad to see that the flowers in the garden featured prominently.  TV crews and their editors have a keen eye for beauty. 

Driving here today I was struck by the sheer beauty of the countryside.  There is new life everywhere – flowers in full bloom in the gardens, blossoming shrubs and trees in the hedges and young lambs, calves and foals in the fields.  I sometimes wonder do we sometimes take it all for granted. 

Many of the great scientists never lost their amazement at the marvels that are daily with us.  They compared themselves, and their knowledge, to children picking up pebbles on the ocean shore.  This legacy of wonder is the source of prayer.  Without this radical amazement there is no prayer or praise of God.  The surest way to lose our desire to pray is to take things for granted. 

The servant of God and cherished son of this parish of Attymass, in whose honour we gather today, Father Patrick Peyton, did not take things for granted.  In the opening words of his autobiography All For Her Father Peyton refers to the “picturesque beauty of Attymass” – set as it is between the Ox Mountains and the Atlantic Ocean. 

Today I realise how blessed he and all of you were, and are, to grow up amidst such wonderful natural beauty of rivers, lakes and mountains.  All of that beauty must have helped to form his prayerful character for he tells us that the most important inspiration in his early life was the practice of praying together each day as a family – “Because of the daily family Rosary” he wrote “my home was for me a cradle, a school, a university, a library and most of all a church”. 

In the year 2002 another man who did not take things for granted testified to the importance of prayer in his life.  In that year Pope John Paul II wrote a letter on the Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  He said:

From my youthful years this prayer has held an important place in my life.  It has accompanied me in moments of joy and in moments of difficulty.  To it I have entrusted any number of concerns; in it I have always found comfort….The Rosary is my favourite prayer.  A marvellous prayer – marvellous in its simplicity and in its depth”.

Pope John Paul went on to say: “The family that prays together stays together”.  I think that we have all heard that somewhere before.  This is exactly the message that Father Peyton had been preaching all his life.

It is wonderful that you have taken such care to remember Fr Peyton in his home parish. You have ensured that the man renowned across the world for preaching the importance of family prayer will always be remembered in the Parish of his family home.

I congratulate all involved in keeping alive the memory of Fr Peyton.  I am honoured to have been invited to celebrate this Mass and to unveil the Fr Peyton statue. It is a joy to be here and I thank Bishop Brendan Kelly and Fr Mulligan for their warm welcome and hospitality.

TRY PRAYER – IT WORKS

One of Father Peyton’s wonderful phrases was: Try prayer – it works.  Obviously, Father Peyton had asked himself the question:  Does prayer make any difference?  It is a question asked by many people.  In prayer we talk directly to God.  For example, in this Mass we said “God our Father, you have made us your sons and daughters and restored the joy of our youth; may we look forward with hope to our resurrection”.  When we address God in this way we are actually responding personally to a God who has already personally addressed us.

In prayer it is God, not we, who takes the initiative.  But the question remains, does our prayer affect God in any way?  The fact is that God loves us and makes us his sons and daughters.  As a result I think we have to say that praise and thanksgiving really pleases God.  This really rejoices the heart of God for what God intends is coming about.

Love has also led God to promise to hear our prayers.  Surely that promise has made God open to being affected by our prayers.  They are prayers that respond to God’s own invitation to ask and we shall receive.  They are aimed at deepening our friendship with God for God is our loving and powerful God – a God who grants what will improve our union.  God grants what we have asked or something that, in the end, is more beneficial.  All our prayers are answered – perhaps not always in the way we asked or expected but in a way that is more beneficial.

Prayer has often been described as communication or dialogue with the living God.  In that sense the conversations which we have just heard in today’s Gospel could be described as a prayer.  The two dejected, disheartened disciples were on their way home to Emmaus.  Then Jesus draws up alongside them.  He engages them in a very lively discussion.  They end up totally changed people – changed in mood and attitude.  They literally change direction and head back to Jerusalem to join the others.  Who can say prayer is not effective?

Yet there are many people now who resist the idea of praying and certainly resist the idea of praying the Rosary.  Prayer is an answer to the supreme question:  What does God ask of us?  The difficulty is that the very question itself has too often disappeared off our radar screens.  We have learned to listen to every ‘I’ except the ‘I’ of God.  The annoying thing is that this resistance to the idea of praying comes from two dramatically opposed ideas.  Some think that we are too great to be in need of divine help.  Others maintain that we are too small to be worthy of divine guidance.  Others do not pray because they are too busy. As a result they deprive themselves of something which could bring them immense good.

Around our country at the moment there are many people who are reeling in shock at the dramatic turn of events in our economy. There are many people who, through no fault of their own, are suffering immense anxiety and distress about their financial situation, often keeping that anxiety carefully hidden from neighbours and friends.

I pray that those who are anxious or distressed about their financial situation will not be too proud to pray or too proud to ask for help. Prayer works. Not always in the way we think it should but – it works. I pray that through the help of God and the help of family, friends and neighbours those in financial distress will find the strength and resources to cope through the difficult months ahead.

In one of the most poignant parts of his autobiography, All for Her, Fr Peyton speaks very movingly of the time when, two years before his ordination, he was stricken with a serious illness. He speaks of how he was at his worst – discouraged, depressed and hopeless. He then goes on to explain how, in his despair, he learned three important lessons. I think the lessons Fr Peyton learned in his illness have something very important to say to our country at this time of economic crisis.

The first lesson was his ‘total dependence on his neighbour.’ In his illness he needed to depend totally on the doctors and nurses and care assistants around him. He had to let go of his pride and to accept their help. He had to admit that he was in need. As he explains: I learned that famous line from literature: “No man is an island.” We are all one family, all one in Christ, all members of His Body. We form with Him a Mystical Body that is closer even than the branches and leaves of a tree are to the trunk that gives them life.’

As Christians we have a family bond with one another and with every person. We have an obligation to help and support one another, especially those who are in need.

Perhaps as a society we need to admit that in recent years all too many of became too proud to ask for help or too preoccupied with our own concerns to offer help to our neighbours and friends. It is often said that as we got wealthier we became less concerned about community and more individualistic. Perhaps we need to rediscover our commitment to one another and to the common good of all. We each need to ask: am I doing enough to help those who are in distress around me? Am I making it possible for people to admit the distress they are in and to ask for help?

The second lesson Fr Peyton learned in his illness, was the importance and power of the gift Jesus gave to us of His mother, a gift given to us with his dying breath on the cross. He explains how a close friend said to him on his sick bed: ‘Mary is alive. She will be as good to you as she thinks she can be. It all depends on you and your faith’.

‘That night’, he says, ‘his words activated my dormant faith. It was like setting a match to a hay stack sprinkled with gasoline. Thanks to the family that always prayed the Rosary, I had come to know who Mary was and that Jesus Christ, her Son, had entrusted me to her.’

No matter how bad things are, we are not alone. Our God has not abandoned us. In fact he has assigned the mother of Jesus to us as Our Mother, our Mother of Perpetual Help.

The third lesson Fr Peyton tells us he learned was that, ‘Without God I can do nothing!’. In John 14, Jesus says: ‘I am the vine, and you are the branches.  ‘He who dwells in me; as I dwell in him, bears much fruit; for apart from me you can do nothing!’ (15: 5)

It is not always easy to pray but it is always worthwhile to pray. In fact, there is an increasing body of research which points to the physical, social and psychological benefits of prayer.  Our society is hungry for prayer.  To meet that hunger  I challenge anyone in Ireland to turn off the TV, switch off the mobile, shut down the computer and pray at some stage every day and tell me that the quality of their life was not better as a result. We need time to chat quietly and intimately with our Creator. We need regular prayer as much as we need regular exercise or a healthy diet.

FAMILY

Pope John Paul II insisted that the Rosary is, and always has been, a prayer of the family and a prayer for the family.  He saw that today the family is threatened by many destructive forces.  He saw the Rosary as a great defence against those destructive forces.  For:

When we contemplate the birth of Christ, we learn of the sanctity of life. 

When we behold the household of Nazareth, we see the truth of the family according to God’s plan.

Following him on the road to Calvary, we learn the true meaning of suffering.

Contemplating Christ and his mother in the glory of Heaven, we see the goal to which each one of us is called. 

At the same time he felt that it is natural to bring to our rosaries all the problems and worries of life.  There we hand them over to the merciful hearts of Christ and Mary.  After 25 years of his life as Bishop of Rome, Pope John Paul assures us that it works.  The Rosary brings us into harmony with the rhythm of God’s own life.  It brings our life’s destiny and deepest longing into union with God. 

Pope John Paul – like Father Peyton – was totally convinced that the family that prays together stays together.  It brings families together but it also gives them the ability to look one another in the eye, to communicate with one another and to forgive one another.  He knew that many of the problems facing families today come from an inability to communicate.

Peace in the Family

Finally, one of my favourite phrases from Fr Peyton’s many talks is the one which straddles the main wall in the Fr Peyton Memorial Centre. It is the  phrase, ‘the world that prays is a world at peace’.

In his letter on the Rosary, Pope John Paul said he was willingly entrusting to the power of this prayer the cause of peace and the cause of the family.  I would wish today to entrust to the Rosary the cause of peace in the family right across this island.  I am thinking of the very many people who have suffered violence, been attacked, beaten up or abused.  Today I pray fervently for their total healing. 

Many of the problems facing contemporary families result from their increasing difficulty in communicating.  Parents often lament the resistance they encounter when they try to communicate the values of their faith and morals to their children.

I think it is particularly important to reconnect young men with prayer. The popular perception of prayer as a woman’s activity is a relatively new phenomenon in Ireland. It is also a real problem in terms of addressing aggression, violence and immaturity in younger men. It takes sensitivity and humility to pray, qualities which are not always valued or respected among young men but which are essential to maturity and responsible fatherhood.

Pope John Paul was well aware that some families cannot come together often nowadays.  The rare occasions when they do are often taken up with watching television, where scenes of angry violence and bloodshed too often occur.  To return to the recitation of the family Rosary would mean

Filling at least part of daily life with very different images – the image of Jesus, for example who is meek and humble of heart – or the image of his most Blessed Mother.  It would mean reproducing something of the atmosphere that reigned at Nazareth in the home of Mary and Joseph. 

It would involve putting Jesus at the centre of things, sharing our joys and sorrows with him.

It would mean placing all our plans, needs and worries and drawing from him the courage, hope and strength to carry on.

Some will object that what I am proposing wont work.  St Therese – the Little Flower – at one stage found it very difficult to pray the Rosary so she decided to just say one Our Father and one Hail Mary for each decade very slowly.  That worked well and gradually she was able to recite again the full decade.

UP-TO-DATE:  TWITTERS, TEXTS AND E-MAILS

Fr Peyton had a great gift for using the most up-to-date means of social communication. He was pioneering in his use of television to communicate the Gospel and the power of prayer through the Rosary. He attracted the support of many famous film stars along the way. I am sure if there had been mobile phones in his day Fr Peyton would have been big into texting and twitter! He would rejoice in the power of the internet and email to join people together in prayerful solidarity instantaneously and across the world.

In the name of Fr Peyton I would like to make an appeal to every Christian in Ireland today who sends texts, twitters or uses e-mail. I appeal to you to think about setting up groups of prayer between you and your friends using these modern means of communication. I ask young people in particular to think of sending their friends and family an occasional twitter or text to say that you have prayed for them. Make someone the gift of a prayer through text, twitter or e-mail every day. Such a sea of prayer is sure to strengthen our sense of solidarity with one another and remind us those who receive them that others really do care.

ATTYMASS HAS REASON TO BE PROUD

The truths taught by the Servant of God, Fr Patrick Peyton, are worth repeating often:

‘Prayer works – try it!’;

‘The family that prays together, stays together’ and

‘The world that prays is a world at peace!’.

Ireland has every reason to be proud of its world famous but humble countryman who achieved so much good by his life as a priest. Attymass has every reason to be proud of its Servant of God and son of the parish. As we celebrate his memory and unveil the new statue of his image, let us pray that our country will be renewed in faith, hope and love by a return to a culture of prayer and a richer spirit of solidarity with one another.

Mary, Queen of Peace. Pray for us.

Amen.

Knock Shrine, Co. Mayo

Introduction to the Eucharist and Homily preached by Bishop Brendan Kelly at Divine Mercy Sunday 2009 in Knock, Co. Mayo.

Introduction:

Céad fáilte go Cnoc Mhuire ar an lá aoibhinn Cásga seo!

Alleluia is our song, for we are an Easter people!  We know we are saved and our destiny is Life in all its fullness, for Jesus is Risen…by the power of the Father, his power which is his Mercy…He does not hold anything in for us…let us not retain our sins ourselves, or the sin of anyone against us.  Give us the grace to grasp in a new and liberating way the depth of your mercy to us, Lord, that we may in turn be merciful to each other, especially those who have sinned against us.

Homily:

Alleluia Alleluia!

Jesus said: “You believe because you can see me.

Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe”

Alleluia!

When Jesus was on the mountain, at the beginning of his ministry, he sat down with his disciples and a great crowd of people and what he taught them was “Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed those who mourn, blessed are the meek..” The 8 Beatitudes!  We often refer to them as the ‘New Law’ given on the new mountain by the new Moses, or rather the one whom Moses imaged, – but framed in positive terms, unlike the Old Law. (‘Thou shalt not..’)

Here now at the very end of his time on earth, Jesus’ last word to them as Risen Lord, another beatitude, a ninth!  Only this one is not for the disciples who saw him in the flesh, historically.

This beatitude is for US, for you and me specifically today.

“Blessed are YOU he is saying to us, who have never seen and yet believe”

And we do believe!  That’s why we are here!  That is our blessing!  We believe in Easter, in Jesus Risen. We have not seen physically, but we believe!  Just as the disciples who were full of fear and Thomas who was plagued with doubt put their fear and doubt aside and believed, not because our eyes always tell us, but because we have decided in our hearts:  We have chosen belief in Jesus, as risen Lord of our lives!

All around us today there is conflict, greed, selfishness, and death. So much happening that diminishes life that takes it away…

Trócaire in their campaign this year put before us the fact that 26 million people are homeless because of conflict and war… Also the fact that 6 million children will die of starvation this year.

The hard times that have come upon us economically, bringing so much fear and doubt into many lives, have come upon us to a large degree because of greed… and lets not be too quick to point fingers.  We all got caught up maybe to some degree. These are only two very blatant facts of life around us today…I could go on.

In the midst of all this nevertheless, we are believers.  We are an Easter people.  There is a future marked out for us.  Nothing the world can do to us will quench this faith. We are here today celebrating the Passover of the Lord, for that is what the Mass is.  The one who faced condemnation, deprivation of freedom, violence, abuse, scorn, contempt, hatred, most sorrowful passion and death itself is victorious over all these cruel and harsh realities.  He is alive.  Risen.  And we are his risen people.  Our trust    is in the same Father. The Father all-merciful. It’s a concept we can hardly imagine. St. Faustina said “tell the whole world about his inconceivable mercy”.

(Three years before St Faustina was canonised, St Therese, the Little Flower, was declared in 1997 ‘Doctor of the Merciful love of God”… because she spoke continuously of the power of God’s mercy to restore and heal even the most hardened sinners. “Were I to commit all possible crimes”, she said, “it would be only like a drop of water in the ocean of God’s mercy”)

We don’t experience mercy often from the world.  We are so easily hurt, grievously, we find it impossible to forgive.  We are a hugely fragile and vulnerable people and

we build all sorts of protections around ourselves, even religious protections.

We do not expect mercy in our world…in a sense the world seems incapable of mercy or forgiveness ‘to err is human, to forgive divine’, the proverb says.  We believe in the mercy of God, because we know Jesus who was condemned and suffered and died has risen and destroyed death and all death’s children… by the power of God’s mercy.

Clearly the Church is telling us, at the end of the old millennium and the beginning of the new, to announce God’s mercy in our own day… not out of fear, but with deep peace in our hearts: peace, the gift of our risen Lord in today’s gospel and his ultimate

blessing upon us.

~~~~~~~~~

The word Mercy is a wonderful word.

In Latin the word is ‘misericordia’ made up of two words:  the word ‘miser’ meaning ‘misery’ and “cordia” which comes from the word for ‘heart’.

So mercy or misericordia means

Having a heart for the misery of mankind, of  the world.

That’s what Jesus came to reveal to us and to show us in his life, in his word above all in suffering the sorrow and passion of Calvary: That God has a heart for the misery of the world, for you and I in our misery. Jesus took on himself that misery, in all its depth. This is his mission from the Father.

St Paul says so eloquently, in the letter to the Philippians: 

“He emptied himself,

taking the form of a servant…

He was humbler yet and became obedient unto death even death on a cross”- the cruellest most abject suffering, identified thus with the most despised criminal,

shamefully exposed, despised, jeered at and damned, object of scorn, contempt every possible insult, spat upon. 

Jesus identified with us in our deepest misery and poverty, revealing to us that God is not absent but profoundly present when we are at the lowest point…

We come to Knock on pilgrimage…carrying our own pain or the pain and misery of others, of people we love and cherish…illness, suffering, approaching death, bad news we have received, breakage in relationships or families, pain and suffering. We come here…to the place where Mary, Jesus, and the Lamb who was sacrificed     appeared in the misery of pouring rain and at a time when hunger and distress was again stalking this part of the country.  They didn’t use the word “recession” in those days. But it was a recession so deep people were starving: it was a time of famine.  Mary and the Lamb silently but really present to the people in their misery; they are not alone, not abandoned.  Neither are we now.

Jesus as the Lamb, utterly approachable, most vulnerable of creatures, reveals the true nature of the Father.  The Lamb reveals the merciful love of the heart of our God for us. Not distant or too ‘holy’ for us but with us in all our misery and failure and sin. We sometimes like to keep God at a distance It can suit us.  The vision of Knock was an act of mercy from God. It was a manifestation of the His mercy for the people of this place in their misery in August 1879. It is still so for us today, lest we be tempted to lose hope.

That’s the whole story of Jesus’ life isn’t it? Over and over, he manifests the mercy of God for his people in their misery.

Remember the woman caught in adultery.  The religious people, the lawyers & Pharisees wanted him to condemn her but he bent down to the ground and eventually said, “He who is without sin cast the first stone”. Jesus casts no stones for he is merciful.  They slowly went away beginning with the eldest, it says, until only Jesus remained and the woman.

“Has nobody condemned you”?  “Nobody”!

“Neither do I. Go and sin no more”.

In this story.. misery and the heart of God meet- MERCY!

And the woman is liberated, set free to new life. 

It’s the same way in the story of the prodigal son.

The son’s misery meets the Father’s heart- MERCY- and there is resurrection and new life, there’s celebration, joy!

There is no condemnation in Jesus.  There is no condemnation in the Father only merciful Love.. that calls us to love in our turn to be merciful. 

~~~~~~~~

When Pope Paul 2 canonised St Faustina on April 30^th 2000 he said “by this act today I pass on the message of Divine Mercy to the new millennium.  I pass it on because I want people to know the better face of God and that of his Divine Mercy and through it, the better face of their brethren”.

Three years before this on Mission Sunday 1997, as I’ve already said, the same Holy Father proclaimed St Therese of Lisieux, the Little Flower, a Doctor of the church and specifically the Doctor of the Merciful Love of God.  It is worth noting that Therese’s full name in religion is St Therese of the Child Jesus and of the Holy Face.  ‘I want people to know the better face of God’, the Holy Father said in 2000. And the Risen Jesus calls on the apostles..to show forth this merciful face of God. In bringing forgiveness. And to be a people who see the better face of God in their brothers and sisters especially the poorest and all whose lives are miserable. People who are sinners.

“As the father sent me so I’m sending you. 

Receive the Holy Spirit,

those whose sins you forgive they are forgiven;

those whose sins you retain they are retained”. 

The church has always seen these words as instituting the Sacrament of Reconciliation.  But they are words first of all for the ordinary everyday life of those who believe in the Risen Christ. We are people who forgive as the Father forgives us; we do not retain, hold on to the sin done to us.

We are people who are merciful as the Father is merciful.

We are people who say to the Father when we turn to him ‘Forgive our sins as we forgive those who sin against us..’

The world very often does not believe in forgiveness: we hear constant demands for retribution, for punishment, for ostracisation. 

But we, like our Father, are merciful.  We forgive. In our families, in our tribes, in our world.  We are all called to be the living face of God’s Mercy. Never despairing of even the most depraved person.

There’s the call of the God who is merciful, the call of the Risen Jesus:

Be merciful as your heavenly Father is merciful.  Show the world his face.  Be that Holy face of the merciful God in the world of 2009. 

We believe!.

Therefore we will, with the help of God, be merciful.