06 Feb 2025 – Thursday of Week 4 Memorial: St Paul Miki and Companions, martyred at Nagasaki, Japan in 1597. Six Franciscans, seventeen Franciscan Tertiaries and three Jesuits died suspended on crosses. 1st Reading: Hebrews 12:18-19, 21-24 The sacrificial blood of Jesus opens up a new Covenant You have not come to something that can…
05 Feb 2025 – Wednesday of Week 4 Memorial: St Agatha, martyred in Sicily in the third century. Patron of bell-founders. 1st Reading: Hebrews 12:4-7, 11-15 Trials will come but they yield spiritual fruit In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And you have forgotten…
Presider’s Page for 9 February (Ordinary Time 5) Everyone who believes God’s word is called to pass on the Good News. Like many who have gone before us, including the prophet Isaiah and the apostles Peter and Paul, we may not feel up to the task. But God helps us every day. Penitential Rite We…
04 Feb 2025 – Tuesday of Week 4 1st Reading: Hebrews 12:1-4 Around us a cloud of witnesses, and Jesus himself, to encourage us Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with…
03 Feb 2025 – Monday of Week 4 (Cycle 1) Optional Memorials: St Blaise, died 315, bishop, martyred in Armenia, a physician. Patron of those who suffer disease of the throat. St Ansgar, Frenchman who became AB of Hamburg in ninth century. Apostle of Scandinavia, patron of Denmark. 1st Reading: Hebrews 11:32-40 Great past examples of…
2 February 2025 – The Presentation of Our Lord 1st Reading: Malachi 3:1-4 When God’s Messenger arrives, he will refine the people See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight…
1 February 2025 – Saint Brigid of Kildare 1st Reading: Job 31:16-20; 24-25; 31-32 Job’s generosity towards the needy is reflected in St Brigid’s works of charity I have never withheld anything that the poor desired, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail, or have eaten my morsel alone, and the orphan…
31 Jan 2025 – Friday of Week 3 Memorial: St John Bosco, 1815-88, born in Piedmont, founded the Salesians. Patron saint of youth and Catholic publishers. 1st Reading, Hebrews 10:32-39 Do not abandon hope, but trust in God’s promises Remember those earlier days when, after you had been enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with…
Presider’s Page for 2 February (The Presentation of the Lord – Candlemas) It’s forty days since we celebrated the birth of Jesus at Christmas. Today we remember his Presentation in the Temple. This feast is also called Candlemas; candles are blessed because today Jesus was revealed in the Temple as the light of all peoples….
30 Jan 2025 – Thursday of Week 3 Optional Memorial: St Aidan (Feast, Ferns and Dublin) or Maedoc (Mague),c 550-626, studied in Wales, founded monastery in Ferns. Bl Margaret Ball, imprisoned for teaching Catholicism, harbouring priests and having Mass said in her home. Died in Dublin Castle 1584; and Bl Francis Taylor, born in Swords, Dublin, Mayor…
29 Jan 2025 – Wednesday of Week 3 1st Reading: Hebrews 10:11-18 Jesus offers one sacrifice that sets up a new covenant with God Every priest stands day after day at his service, offering again and again the same sacrifices that can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a…
28 Jan 2025 – Tuesday of Week 3 Memorial: St Thomas Aquinas, 1224-74, Italian theologian. Patron of schools, universities, students and booksellers. 1st Reading: Hebrews 10:1-10 The temple rituals were a type of the new covenant, brought by Jesus for all Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come and…
27 Jan 2025 – Monday of Week 3 Optional Memorial: St Angela Merici, 1474-1540, founder of the Ursulines 1st Reading: Hebrews 9:15, 24-28 Jesus as the mediator of a new covenant Jesus is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, because a death has…
26 Jan 2025 – 3rd Sunday (C) (1) Nehemiah 8:2-6, 8-10 Ezra the Scribe set out to re-instate the Jewish Laws The priest Ezra brought the law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could hear with understanding. This was on the first day of the seventh month. He read from it…
25 Jan 2025 – The Conversion of Saint Paul, Apostle 1st Reading: Acts 22:3-16 Paul’s account of his conversion, to his fellow-Jews, on the steps of the Temple “I am a Jew, born in Tarsus in Cilicia, but brought up in this city at the feet of Gamaliel, educated strictly according to our ancestral law,…
24 Jan 2025 – Friday of Week 2 Memorial: St Francis de Sales, 1567-1622, Bishop of Geneva, founder of the Visitation Sisters. Patron saint of writers, editors and journalists. 1st Reading: Hebrews 8:6-13 Mediator of a new covenant Jesus has now obtained a more excellent ministry, and to that degree he is the mediator of…
23 Jan 2025 – Thursday of Week 2 1st Reading: Hebrews 7:25-8:6 Jesus our high priest serves in the true tabernacle of heaven Jesus he is able for all time to save those who approach God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. For it was fitting that we should have…
22 Jan 2025 – Wednesday of Week 2 Optional Memorial: St Vincent, deacon, martyred in Valencia in 304. 1st Reading: Hebrews 7:1-3, 15-17 The priesthood of Jesus is mysterious and eternal, like Melchisedek’s King Melchizedek of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met Abraham as he was returning from defeating the kings and blessed…
21 Jan 2025 – Tuesday of Week 2 Memorial: St Agnes, martyred in early fourth century in Rome. Patron of betrothed couples, gardeners and young girls. 1st Reading: Hebrews 6:10-20 Abraham’s long-delayed son. A lesson in patience God is not unjust; he will not overlook your work and the love that you showed for his…
Presider’s Page Sunday 26 Jan 2025 The Word of God is the focus this Sunday, read by Ezra the priest in the Old Testament reading, and by Jesus in the Gospel. By his Word, God reassures the people of his closeness, especially in the Word made flesh, Jesus of Nazareth. • Today is the ‘Sunday…
