Our Lady of Lourdes,Newent
A Community of worship, love and service
Newsletter 27th June 2010
Catholic Parish of Our Lady of
and St Michael’s, Blaisdon
Priest in Charge: Fr Aidan Murray SDB,
Drumlanrig,
Phone/Fax: 01531 821647 aidansdb@newentbb.co.uk
Thirteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Year C 27th June 2010
All nations, clap your hands. Shout with a voice of joy to God.
SECOND COLLECTION PETER’S PENCE
Diocesan Prayer Link: Stroud, Bisley, Brownshill, Painswick,
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Please Pray for the Welfare of our Sick People:- OUR LADY OF
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Peter Drucker American (Austrian-born) management writer (1909 - 2005)
Gospel Reflection for the Thirteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time - Hollow Intentions.
Jesus isn’t short of would-be disciples each eager to accompany him on the road to
Today we are the would-be disciples. Jesus asks us to set about the urgent work of liberating sinners, alleviating the suffering of the poor and the sick, and of spreading God’s love. We are eager to get to work, but there are a few ‘must-do’ jobs we have to do first. We have to pay the television licence, mow the lawn, decorate the spare bedroom, do the tax return, book the car in for it’s MOT, arrange the baby’s second birthday party, take the cat to the vet, catch up with all that admin’ we’ve brought home from work, defrost the freezer, hang out the washing, do the food shopping, fit the children out with new school uniforms, dispute the water bill and change the library books. With so many pressing jobs perhaps discipleship is a job we can squeeze in when we have a spare moment. Perhaps if we can offer the odd donation to an aid agency, or sign an online petition in support of a worthy campaign we will keep God happy. Perhaps the urgent job of creating God’s Kingdom on earth can wait until tomorrow, or the day after ….. or the day after that. Is it any wonder that Jesus can sound a little exasperated? Jesus needs disciples that understand hardship, and can respond with urgency and immediacy. The last thing Jesus wants is good, but hollow intentions.
It would probably be irresponsible to rush off in a bid to save the world without putting any plans in place to pay the bills or care for the children, but today’s gospel demands we prioritise. If it is our plan to be good disciples, the amount of time we spend on our discipleship should reflect our good intentions.
Saints Peter and Paul - 29th June
Peter and Paul represent two strikingly different approaches to discipleship. Peter had to learn slowly, make many mistakes along the way, but always experienced the compassionate forgiveness and encouragement of Jesus . Paul, on the other hand, came to the Faith immediately and never backed away from his zeal for Christ after that. We aim to imitate these two great apostles in our own lives. Like Peter, we know we are likely to fail and to get things wrong, yet like Peter we aim to persevere. Like Paul, we must always be on fire for the Lord, and proclaim Him to everyone and in every situation, no matter how difficult it can sometimes be to do so.
Saint Thomas the Apostle - 3rd July
'Thomas shares the lot of Peter the impetuous, James and John, the “sons of thunder,” Philip and his foolish request to see the Father—indeed all the apostles in their weakness and lack of understanding. We must not exaggerate these facts, however, for Christ did not pick worthless men. But their human weakness again points up the fact that holiness is a gift of God, not a human creation; it is given to ordinary men and women with weaknesses; it is God who gradually transforms the weaknesses into the image of Christ, the courageous, trusting and loving one.' American Catholic
Deaf Awareness Week
28th June - 4th July 2010 is Deaf Awareness Week when organisations working with deaf people across the country are inviting everyone to 'Look At Me'. The theme aims to improve understanding of the different types of deafness by highlighting the many different methods of communication used by deaf, deafened, deafblind and hard of hearing people, such as sign language and lipreading.
Deaf Awareness Week, promotes the positive aspects of deafness, social inclusion and raising awareness of the huge range of local and national organisations that support deaf people and their family and friends."
Join The Blooming Great Tea Party - Support Marie Curie
June 12th - July 12th
Every year thousands of people put the kettle on and hold tea parties to raise money for Marie Curie Cancer Care.ork, school or with your local club. It's really up to you. It can be as simple as having a few friends round for tea and cakes at home to something much bigger - whatever suits you.
Every tea party, big or small, will help to provide vital nursing care for terminally ill people in your area.
Knit a Tea Cosy
Enter the Marie Curie tea party inspired knitting competition run in conjunction with Simply Knitting. For donation details and knitting competition details visit
www.mariecurie.org.uk/supportus/fundraising/blooming_great_tea_party
Taking Pain to the Heart
by Ronald Rolheiser
Writing in his journal during a time of bitter heartbreak, Henri Nouwen wrote these words: “The great challenge is living your wounds through instead of thinking them through. It is better to cry than to worry, better to feel your wounds than to understand them, better to let them enter into your silence than to talk about them. The choice you face constantly is whether you are taking your wounds to your head or your heart.”
Part of us understands exactly what he is saying here, even as another part of us congenitally resists his advice: There’s place in us that doesn’t want to cry, doesn’t want to feel our hurt, doesn’t want to take our pain to a place of silence, and doesn’t want to take our wounds to our heart. And so instead, in our heartaches and wounds, we grow anxious and obsessive, we struggle to understand, we talk endlessly to others, and we try to sort things out with our heads rather than letting ourselves simply feel them with our hearts.
And that isn’t always a bad thing. Nouwen’s counsel, for all its wisdom, needs some qualification: It is important that we also take our wounds to our heads. Our hearts and heads need to be in sync. But what Nouwen points to here is something that he, a man blessed with an extraordinary sensitivity to the things of the heart, learned only through crushing heartache and breakdown, namely, that we more easily take things to the head than to the heart, even when we think we aren’t doing this.
The way we take pain to our heads and block healing tears in our hearts is by denial, by rationalization, by blaming, by not simply and honestly admitting and owning our own pain, our own helplessness, our own weakness, and our own inadequacy.
And we all have plenty of occasions to do this: The more alive and sensitive we are the more we will experience excruciating heartaches.
The more honest we are the more we will be aware of our own limits and inadequacies. And the more generous and pure we are the more we will be aware of our own sin and betrayals.
And so Nouwen’s counsel contains a healthy challenge: When we are brought to our knees by heartache and pain, we shouldn’t try to deny that pain, deny its bitter strength, or deny our helplessness in dealing with it. To do so is to risk becoming hard and bitter. But if we give our deep pains and heartaches their honest due they will induce the kind of tears that soften and stretch the heart. It is helpful to remember that tears are salt-water, of one substance with the waters of the original oceans from which we sprung. Tears connect us to our origins and allow the primal water of life to again flow through us.
Moreover, when we take our pain to our hearts, when we honestly admit our weaknesses and helplessness, God can finally begin to fill us with strength. Why? Because it is only when we are brought to our knees in utter helplessness, only when we finally give up on our own strength, that God can send an angel to strengthen us, like God send an angel to strengthen Jesus during his agony in the garden.
One night, some months before his death, Martin Luther King received a death-threat on the phone. It had happened before but, on this particular night, it left him frightened and weakened to the core. All his fears came down on him at once. Here are his words as to what happened next:
“I got out of bed and began to walk the floor. Finally I went to the kitchen and heated a pot of coffee. I was ready to give up. With my cup of coffee sitting untouched before me, I tried to think of a way to move out of the picture without appearing a coward. In this state of exhaustion, when my courage had all but gone, I decided to take my problem to God. With my head in my hands, I bowed over the kitchen table and prayed aloud. The words I spoke to God that midnight are still vivid in my memory.”
“I am here taking a stand for what I believe is right. But now I am afraid. The people are looking to me for leadership and if stand before them without strength and courage, they too will falter. I am at the end of my powers. I have nothing left. I have come to the point where I can’t face it alone.” At that moment I experienced the presence of the Divine as I had never experienced Him before.”
It is only after the desert has done its work on us, says Trevor Herriot, that an angel can come and strengthen us. That is why it is better to feel our wounds than to understand them and why it is better to cry than to worry.
RECOMMENDED FILM: (From Rita)
This is a very interesting police story, set in
The structure of the film is to focus on three different policemen and their crises and gradually to bring them together at the finale - with some tragic results. The film opens with a confrontation between one of the police, played by Ethan Hawke, with a dealer and criminal and his killing him and taking his money to help his family.
The film focuses on the ordinary policeman, the possibilities of corruption and violence, yet his love for his family and his Catholic faith. Richard Gere portrays a burnt-out policeman, trying to be a man of integrity but finding it very difficult, especially with his fellow policemen. He is also involved with a friend who is a prostitute. Don Cheadle portrays an investigator, trying to come to terms with the whole range of policing in
The film explores the pressures on police life, on individuals, on the structures and the hierarchy, on the relentless pressures from the criminal world. While the Richard Gere story is familiar, Gere, such a durable presence on screen, makes it convincing. Don Cheadle’s story is a desperate one, making one question why anybody would volunteer to work undercover. The Ethan Hawke story offers the pathos of an ordinary man, genuinely wanting to help his family but overwhelmed by pressures and financial difficulties.
HOW WELL DO YOU KNOW FAMILY LIFE?
The Organisers of National Family Week in
One of the things NFW promotes is family members spending “quality time” together, but its survey shows that British mothers and fathers spend on average only 49 minutes a day with their children and each other—hardly enough time to share a meal. That is despite three quarters of parents saying that family is the most important thing in life.
More than two-thirds of the 3000 parents questioned blamed financial pressures for the lack of time together—they are too busy out at work earning money. A significant amount of that would be spent on what parents said was the highest quality family time: days out and holidays. They said quality time was more important than quantity.
Yet two thirds of children (1000 in the survey) said they would choose quality time at home with their parents over an expensive day out. There was a significant and rather sad gap between
Only 51 per cent of parents agreed that, to have the best opportunities in life, a child needs a father and mother under the same roof,…… but three quarters of children did. Slightly more children (55 per cent) thought it was important that their parents were married than parents in general did (52 per cent).
According to Family Week co-founder Nick Henry; “Families remain the cornerstones of our communities and the bedrock of our lives. The modern family is a product of its relationships rather than labels, and families in the
As the pressures of modern family life increase, our families are still the most important thing to us. So even though the concept of the family appears to be fluid, it’s unlikely that the essential function of the family will change.” MercatorNet. June 3
This Week (Deaf Awareness Week) Psalter 1 Mon. 28th June 9.45am Rosary
10.00am Mass with Morning Prayer …Adoration till 11.00am
Followed by RCIA until 12.30pm
5.30pm Legion of Mary
7.00pm NEWENT: First Mass of St Peter &
Tues. 29th June Feast of Saints Peter & Paul
Patrons of the Diocese
Holyday of Obligation…………………………!
9.40am Rosary
10.00am Mass …
7.30pm Mass in Blaisdon
Wed. 30th June Sorry! Fr Aidan has to attend SAFEGUARDING
Conference in
9.45am Rosary
10.00am Liturgy fo the Word/ Morning Prayer /Communion
Coffee ‘n chat ….
Thurs 1st July 9.45am Rosary
10.00am Mass ……Adoration till 11.00am
Fri. 2nd 6.00pm Adoration/Reconciliation/Prayer
7.00pm Mass
David Matthews at House of the Open Door 7.00pm?
Sat 3rd July Feast of
4.30pm Adoration – Reconciliation – Benediction
5.30pm First Mass of Fourteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time
Sun 4th July Fourteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time Year C
DEANERY SOCIAL EVENT: FROM 1.00PM AT BEECHENHURST
(£3 PARKING)….Shared Picnic….with WALK at 2.30pm
Reminder Sat. 10th July at OLL - 9.30am to 4.00pm
A DAY OF REST & BLESSING FOR WOMEN
With Jenny Baker & Giovanna Payne
PLEASE……Book with Mary F
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THE HOOLEYS LAST FRIDAY lived up to expectations….great music, great entertainment (outstanding violinist)……and we made a profit of £189 for OLLI …..pity you missed it!
Office Address:
"Drumlanrig",
Ross Road,
Newent,
Gloucestershire,
GL18 1BG