Sunday Newsletter
Masses Today
6.30: (Vigil) Desmond Donovan, (Anniv).
11.00: Mary & John Lovett, Eva Daly, (Anniv).
6.30: Philip Carberry, (Anniv).
- Masses for Sunday, April 12th: 11.00: Christina O'Holloran.
- COLLECTION LAST SUNDAY: €1,578.00.
- TROCAIRE BOX: Don't forget to bring you Family Fast Box (filled!) to the Church on Easter morning.
- MINISTERS OF THE EUCHARIST: All current Eucharistic Ministers are requested to attend Holy Thursday Mass as they are to be 'recommissioned' into the Ministry. All are requested to be at the church for 7.30pm as they are expected to process with the priests in the entrance procession. Eucharistic Ministers are also requested to attend a one-evening session to be run after Easter. This talk is essential to all involved in the ministry and will be given by Ciaran Doyle from the 'Bish' and Fr. Niall. We will keep you informed on the proposed date in this Newsletter. So keep your eyes peeled!
- READERS OF THE WORD: We are also in the process of organising a short course for Church Readers. It will be an 'in house' course and it will take place in mid-April. I will keep you informed of developments.
- ADORATION OF THE BLESSED SACRAMENT: After the Mass on Holy Thursday night, the Blessed Sacrament is moved to the Altar of Repose. There follows a period of Adoration. We are drawing up a rota of those willing 'to keep watch'. The rota is available in the sacristy after Masses this weekend. The timespan is between 9.00pm and 12 midnight. We have organised it into half-hour slots. If you would like to spend a half hour in the Church that night, please put you name down opposite the desired slot.
- REHEARSAL FOR EASTER VIGIL: Those involved in the Easter Vigil will meet on Tuesday night next, April 7th at 7.30 for a full rehearsal. It is imperative that all those who are involved should be present at this. In fact we will probably need a second rehearsal. If so, we will gather for that on Saturday morning next at 12.00 noon.
As I Was Saying...
You may wonder why the sheep are climbing up the wall in the Augustinian Church this Palm Sunday morning? And the other seemingly unseasonal props? Well, the First Communion class of 2009 from St. Patrick's School were preparing for their 'Big Day' during the week. And the most important act of preparation was their 'First Confession', taught through a programme called 'Lets Celebrate Together.'
There are 40 boys involved. Wouldn't you think that 40 young fellows (or girls for that matter! See picture right!) in a church at the one time would be a recipe for either unintended chaos or deliberate mayhem. Far from it. They were prepared for the 'ordeal' by three wonderful young women teachers, Hildegarde Naughton, Marian Barrett and Riona O'Connor. And how brilliantly and thoroughly the preparation is now done! It is quite impossible to convey here the excitement, the frenetic activity, and exuberance involved in the celebration. The Service contained song, dance, drama, mime and silence, all skillfully co-ordinated by the three women and knit together imaginatively around the central image of The Good Shepherd. The children entered into the celebration with rare abandon!
I have mentioned the sacramental preparation of the children to make three simple points:
- I could not help but contrast the preparation of these children with my own preparation for First Holy Communion almost 50 years ago! (Of course distance creates a certain haze, but the broad outline of my recollections will find an echo with many of my vintage!) The stress then was on 'getting everything right', having your prayers off by rote and ready for inspection at any hour of the day! The school had more in common with an army barracks than with a place of learning. We were regarded as performing fleas, being rigorously coached to negotiate a particularly arduous course! It was all very serious stuff. There wasn't even a whiff of celebration anywhere to be found. It is a great joy to see today's First Communion children actually enjoying themselves in church.
- Contemporary catechetical programmes in the schools have suffered severe muggings at the hands of right-wing, disgruntled Catholics, the old 'religion is not being taught in the schools anymore' brigade. But, like the Prodigal's elder brother, some people just don't 'do celebration'. They are much more at home with misery! They have been conditioned to misery. They will always be miserable. The notion of a joyful religion is a contradiction to them. In a nut-shell, they are a Good Friday people. They are strangers to Easter Sunday!
- Lay teachers are quite capable of FAITHFULLY handing on the faith. They have a vitality and a professionalism that is not always obvious in the lives of the clergy. The faith is in safe hands indeed!
-Dick Lyng
HAPPENINGS
- LITURGY MEETING: We had a very large attendance at our Holy Week liturgy meeting in the Priory on Tuesday night last. Over 20 people attended. We went through the Holy Week and Easter Programme and secured volunteers for the many and various roles and parts. This week is 'rehearsal week'! Incidentally, when Easter is over we plan to keep a liturgy group alive and active throughout the year.
- SUE STANDBURY: Susan Standbury will be received into the Church at the Easter Vigil next Saturday. Sue comes from a Methodist background. In fact her late father, The Rev'd John Stanbury was an ordained Minister in the Methodist Church in Dorset and Oxfordshire. Sue will celebrate her marriage to her boyfriend Luke Murphy in St. Augustine's here on Easter Saturday, April 18th. We wish Luke and Sue every blessing and great happiness together.
- OSA LENTEN PROGRAMME: Our final session on Mark's Gospel will be held on Tuesday next, April 7th at 7.45. This last Lenten Session for 2009 is titled: "Jesus and the Disciples: The Way of the Cross."
Seder Meal
We seated forty-six people for the Seder Meal in the Priory here on Thursday last. (The Seder Meal is the first meal of the Jewish Passover.) The guests included some Church of Ireland parishioners. Rev'd Patrick Towers presided over the occasion with great dignity and aplomb! Sr. Majella, ably assisted by Des Foley, provided the music. Pictured in the pdf version of this newsletter at the Seder meal are mother and daughter team, Georgia and Rosemarie Ryan. Georgia is renegotiating her contract with the Augustinian Altar Servers here. She is watching too much football. We will keep you informed!
Holy Week and Easter, 2009
Holy Week begins today, Palm Sunday. It is of course the busiest week of the entire year. Apart from confessions, we have seven public ceremonies in the Church. So any assistance you can give here will be very welcome indeed. In the list below, I have included the name of the priest leading the particular Service. He would appreciate your offer of assistance.
| Penitential Services: | |
| Spy Wednesday | 8.00 |
| Holy Saturday | 4.00 |
| Confessions: | |
| Holy Thursday | 11-12.30; 4-6.00 |
| Good Friday | 11-12.00; 6.30-8.00 |
| Holy Saturday | 11-1.00; 2-3.30; 5-6.00 |
| Easter Ceremonies | |
| Holy Thursday: | The Lord's Supper: 8.00 (Fr. Coghlan) |
| Good Friday | Stations of the Cross: 12.00. |
| The Lord's Passion: 3.00 (Fr. Whelan) | |
| Tenebrae: 8.00 (Fr. Foley) | |
| Holy Saturday: | Easter Vigil: 9.00. (Fr. Lyng) |
| Easter Sunday: | Easter Mass: 11.00 & 6.30 |
Since Monday, April 13th is a Public Holiday, there will be no 8.30 Mass and the Priory Office will remain closed all day.
Leadership
Good leadership is vital in our world today. There is an important distinction to be made between leadership and those roles in life which can be adequately fulfilled by acquiring necessary skills. Leadership is about who you are, not what you know or what skills you have; because leadership is about trust first of all, and then it is about power.
A leader leads people from one place where they are currently, to another: a goal. Thus out of the known, and often safe, into the unknown. To do this he or she needs to be trustworthy with selfless power, with what we call "moral authority". This is a long way from the leadership of coercive power, a long way from the Hitlers, Stalins and Pol Pots of this world. It is rather leadership of consensus. In fact what power the leader has is used to enable and educate others, not dominate and oppress them. Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Gandhi are good examples of this model of leadership others.
All these inspired others with their visions and were not concerned with self aggrandizement. But the most obvious example of this type of leadership is Jesus Christ; his leadership was based on integrity, service and love, and ultimately the giving of himself in death. He would be a fine example not only for our G20 leaders in London this week, but for us all at every level, for, as Francis of Assisi said "it is in giving that we receive."
-Dom Antony Sutch