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Pádraig McCarthy
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Presider’s Page for 18 May (Fifth Sunday of Easter)
We gather to praise God who raised his son Jesus from the dead. We celebrate this victory over sin and death, and pray for enthusiasm as we try to pass on the Good News.
Fine words and dramatic gestures are not enough!
An edited version of this article by Peter Stanford about the bishops’ meeting in Rome to discuss clerical sexual abuse appeared recently in The Observer.
“It is an appalling moral failure and needs to end now, but that will involve rethinking an entire approach to sexuality in Catholicism that is peculiar, punitive and often plain perverse. The Jesus of the gospels had almost no interest is such matters. Why does the Church leadership? “


Christmas Eve
I stood before plastic faces painted cream
With a touch of red and each head bowed to a dry straw floor
And each face frozen in time. I see wise kings,
Benevolent to children , safe men in bright plastic
Positioned before a child wrapped in straw ,
Tiny arms forever reaching out to whoever calls.
There is a Shepard standing with sheep frozen in time.
They followed from the hills safe in his care
And know nothing of the unfolding story.
It is winter aroud the wooden stable
And silent as the empty cardboard box
Which held the crib, cold as the attic from which it came ;
The dry straw , still yellow in old age is strewn
On the stable floor with stray strands sticking to a tufted carpet.
There is a cow and a donkey whose body heat
And warm breath are reported to bring comfort to the newborn child.
I see now those sleeping in city doorways :
lonely doorways where kings never tread,
where few touch their outstretched hands
and bitter winds wrap broken bodies.
I look again at a plastic child with arms outstretched.
Mary Christmas to all !
Greetings and Blessings from Bavaria, south Germany.
Fr. M. S.
Have a Christ-Filled Christmas and a Grace-Filled New Year
Pray for us – we are now public in support of the global lawsuit ‘youth v. gov’ in a region heavily reliant on the fossil fuel industry so this is heavily political subject matter.
Merry Christmas! In 2019, let’s rise to new levels in this elaborate dream.