Today, the world celebrates Valentine’s Day. Today, Christians mark Ash Wednesday.  It is the first time since the Second World War that Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day are marked on the same day. For many this has raised a peculiar question:  Is it fasting or champagne? Is it ashes or chocolate?  Is it celebration or abstinence?

But if we step back a moment and take the broader view it is probably most appropriate that the beginning of Lent this year is celebrated with the confluence of these two days. Lent after all is about reminding us of the unconditional love of God for all people. Fr. Ben Butler (St Stephen’s Church, Nashville) says, ‘With Lent itself, it’s a constant reminder of how God has been good to us. But also how in our individual lives, we’re called to love God and grow in that love even more.’  That is the journey that every Christian is on – to grow in the love of God. Pope Francis in Amoris Laetitia says, ‘If we accept that God’s love is unconditional…then we will become capable of showing boundless love.’

As Christians we look to Jesus in whom love found its perfect expression. Ash Wednesday sets us on that journey when we reflect on how Jesus lived out the love he experienced from his Father and in turn shared with all humanity to the point of dying on the cross. It is the ultimate expression of love – to give one’s life for another.  It is love that we strive for. A love that is generous and totally self- giving.

Valentine’s Day gives us the opportunity to thank the people in our lives who give us a glimpse into the love of God. It is a time to be grateful for all the people who open us to receive and give love. It is an occasion when we affirm the love that we share with the significant people in our lives.

And no better day to do it than on the day when we are reminded that we were created in the image and likeness of God! It is a day when we rejoice in the fact that we are made of stardust. It is a day when we acknowledge the faltering ways of human love. It is a day when we commit ourselves to journeying towards the perfection of the love shared by Jesus and lavished by God.

So this 14^th of February, while we celebrate the love we share with each other and the significant people in our lives, we also remember that we are created and loved by God and ‘in him we live and move and have our being.’

READ: Eat, Pray, Love: An Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day Dilemma

WATCH: The Joy of Love

CONSIDER: Lectio Divina for Ash Wednesday

Many would see January as the gloomiest month. After the months of build up to the Christmas season, January can leave us feeling quite flat. The most depressing day of the year is supposedly in January, known in recent years as ‘Blue Monday’. The sun sets at 5 o’clock most days, the trees are bare and we are suffering from the winter chill.

Quite a few people at this time of year can be suffering from SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), which can affect people’s sleep patterns and energy levels and leave them feeling depressed, hopeless, worthless or guilty. One in fifteen adults in Ireland will suffer from SAD, with December, January and February being the worst months. For those suffering with SAD, or even for those who aren’t, light can sometimes be the best medicine of all. Something as simple as a few hours’ extra sunlight or seeing the world flooded with sunshine can banish old woes. In these times, it is good to remember that ‘Darkness is to space what silence is to sound; i.e., the interval’ (Marshall McLuhan). There is a Dutch proverb that goes ‘darkness and night are the mothers of thought’. This can be a time to go inward and reflect; to embrace the darkness as a way to gain a perspective on what really matters to us.

January and the new year are times for reflecting on what we want from the coming year, things to change about our lives and the steps we feel we must take in order to correct what we feel is going wrong. That is why many people make New Year’s resolutions; what is wrong and how can I fix it? When it is dark it can feel like a lot is going wrong in our lives, but ‘it is only when it is dark that we can see the stars’ (Martin Luther King). Because while we can feel that there is a lot that we expect from the new year, it is important to take stock of everything you have going into it. Light and new horizons are both on the way for us all in 2018 but for now, while it is dark (and it is a darkness that will pass), take time to embrace it, to reflect inwardly and to count your stars.

Significant days: Martin Luther King (15 January); St Anthony (17 January)

READ: A time to take stock – Sr Stan  and/or A Winter’s Cloak – Joyce Rupp

LISTEN: Beautiful Boy by John Lennon

CONSIDER: Check out the website for Mental Health Ireland

Week Four: Here am I, the servant of the Lord. (Luke 1: 26-38)

Every Christmas is a reminder that we are called to mid wife God into our world. It is a time when we echo the words of Mary, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord.” It is a season when we bring light into darkness, joy where there is sadness, hope to those who despair, peace where there is unrest and love to those who feel alone and isolated.

Many might say, “But how can this be? How can I do this?” This seems beyond me. I am so insignificant and of little means. Fear and doubt cloud our minds. Mary had all these feelings. She was overcome by fear. She doubted the credibility of the angel’s message. She worried about societal misgivings. Yet, reassured by God, Mary said Yes! She let love overcome fear.

Madeleine L’Engle, expresses this in her poem After Annunciation

This is the irrational season
when love blooms bright and wild.
Had Mary been filled with reason
there’d have been no room for the child.

This Christmas may your love bloom bright and wild, may your love conquer fear, may you mid-wife God into our expectant world, and may you proclaim to all around you:

Do not be afraid; for see – I am bringing you good news of great joy…
The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light…
For the people who sat in the shadow of death a light has dawned…
Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace…
For a child has been born for us, a son given to us…
He is Christ the Lord.

We wish you a very happy Christmas and every blessing for the New Year, 2018

LISTEN: Oh Holy Night – featuring Maile, Seumanu, Haretuku, Lealaitafea, and Matt Nickle

REFLECT: Imaginative Prayer Exercise and/or Making Space for Tenderness

CONSIDER: Join Trócaire Christmas campaign “Until Love Conquers Fear”

Week Three: Among you stands one whom you do not know (John 1:19-28)

I was a stranger and you welcomed me! Many of us forget that Joseph, Mary and Jesus had to flee their homeland and become refugees in Egypt for a period of time (Mt 2:1-15). They experienced the dread of travelling under cover of darkness. They lived the chaos of a hurried departure. They felt the anxiety and fear of uncertainty. They travelled a journey of risk, fraught with danger. They understood the pain of leaving a place they called home.

Among us today stand the many people who have undertaken similar journeys not because they wanted to but because they were compelled to. There are over 65 million forcibly displaced people worldwide. This week we are invited to become aware of the migrant population of the world and to stand in solidarity with all those who appear to be different to us because of, among other things, race, skin colour, creed, belief, political affiliation, sexual orientation or economic opportunity.

Scott Peck tells a story of a monastery that had fallen upon hard times – the spirit had gone out of the people. The concerned abbot seeks the advice of a rabbi. They spend considerable time together in conversation with no apparent solution emerging to resolve the issue. Just as the abbot is leaving, the rabbi says to him, ‘I have no advice to give. The only thing I can tell you is that the Messiah is one of you’. The abbot returns to his monastery with this cryptic message. As the days and weeks go by there is a palpable transformation among the monks in the monastery for they had started ‘to treat each other with extraordinary respect on the off chance that one among them might be the Messiah. And on the off chance that each monk himself might be the Messiah, they began to treat themselves with extraordinary respect’.

Let us take that as our invitation and recognise that among us stands one whom we do not know, among us stands the stranger, and among us stands the one who is the Messiah.  And, in this week when we celebrate the winter solstice let us pray with the words of Edward Hays:

We are mindful that the darkness of greed, exploitation, and hatred
also lengthens its shadow over our small planet Earth.
As our ancestors feared death and evil and all the dark powers of winter,
we fear that the darkness of war, discrimination, and selfishness
may doom us and our planet to an eternal winter.
May we find hope in the lights we have kindled on this sacred night,
hope in one another and in all who form the web-work of peace and justice
that spans the world.
In the heart of every person on this Earth burns the spark of luminous goodness;
in no heart is there total darkness.
May we who have celebrated this winter solstice,
by our lives and service, by our prayers and love,
call forth from one another the light and the love
that is hidden in every heart. Amen.

Significant days this week: International Migrants Day (18 Dec); International Human Solidarity Day (20 Dec); Winter Solstice (21 Dec)

LISTEN: Believe by Josh Groban OR Sea Prayer by Khaled Hosseini

REFLECT: Imaginative Prayer Exercise and/or Making Space for Tenderness

CONSIDER: Get involved with Together

Week Two: Prepare the way of the Lord… (Mark 1:1-8)

In Mark’s Gospel, John the Baptist, is presented to us as the ‘voice crying out in the wilderness’ heralding the arrival of the ‘one who is more powerful than I’ and he who will baptize with the Holy Spirit. John echoes the words of the Prophet Isaiah, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.’ Advent is that time of preparation for us as it is a time of patient waiting.

St John of the Cross, whose feast we celebrate this week, asks us to be in a state of preparedness,

The Virgin, weighed
With the Word of God,
Comes down the road:
if only you will shelter her!

How does one prepare for the coming of Jesus? How does one, as it were, make space to become the womb ‘weighed with the Word of God’?

We look to Mary for this. She, who was open to the word of God and accepted the invitation to mother Jesus. She put aside her fears, trusted in the Spirit and believed that it would be done to her according to the Word. ‘Every valley will be lifted up, and every hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level.’ We share in Mary’s experience as she travels the hill country to visit Elizabeth and there glimpse Mary’s delight when she says, ‘My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God.’

We too are invited on that same journey of setting aside our fears and boldly mothering God into our world. What is the Good News I can bring to a world so troubled by war and fear? What is the hope I can bring to people who are weighed down by despair? What is the joy I can bring to those who mourn? What is the light I can bring to those who walk in the shadow of darkness?

This week the Jewish community begins to light the candles of Hanukkah. It is a timely reminder to let the light of God shine in our lives and our world; to reach out to those who are in need; to encourage us to stand up for what is just and right; to be undaunted in the face of seeming adversity; and, to rejoice in the goodness of God in our lives.

Significant days this week:  Hanukkah (12 -20 Dec); Our Lady of Guadalupe (12 Dec); St John of the Cross (14 Dec)

LISTEN: Breath of Heaven by Amy Grant

REFLECT: Imaginative Prayer Exercise and/or Making Space for Tenderness

CONSIDER: Spend a moment with this Advent poem penned by St John of the Cross

Week One: Keep Alert …  Keep Awake… (Mark 13:33-37)

We begin our journey into Advent with the call to be attentive. What are we being called to be attentive to? Is it not the call to be attentive to the presence of God in all that we encounter? Is it not the call to recognise God in the person I meet at home and on the street, the neighbour and the stranger, the citizen and the refugee? Is it not the call to be conscious of God in the fragile flutter of the butterflies wings, the hum of the bumble bee, the touch of the soil, the smell of the winter leaves on the ground, the sound of the running stream, or the gentle whisper of the cool breeze?

Indeed, “The world is charged with the grandeur of God” (G M Hopkins). All around us God awaits to be encountered for “everything is a matter for sacrament” (Rolheiser). Elizabeth Browning says,

Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God,
But only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round and pluck blackberries.

During this first week of Advent we have ample opportunity to be aware of the world around us; when we mark World Soil day, the Prevention of Genocide day and world Human Rights Day. Each of these days invites us to engage with our contemporary world and pleads for our response.

Jesus comes proclaiming a message of hope, freedom, new vision and liberation:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free. (Luke 4: 18)

Jesus addresses us when he says,

I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me. (Matthew 25:35-36)

This Advent we are urged to encounter God in the ordinary humdrum of our lives. We are encouraged to be actively conscious of God in all of creation. It is an invitation to acknowledge God as Emmanuel (God with us). So, as we journey towards Christmas let us genuinely “take off our shoes” each time we recognise “every common bush” and every single person, including ourselves, as “afire with God.”

Significant days this week: World Soil Day (5 Dec); The Immaculate Conception (8 Dec); Prevention of Genocide (9 Dec); World Human Rights Day (10 Dec)

LISTEN: A Hallelujah Christmas by Cloverton

REFLECT: Imaginative Prayer Exercise and/or Making Space for Tenderness

CONSIDER: Create your own Advent Wreath and/or Jesse Tree 

CONSIDER: : An Advent calendar

Sunday, 19 November

Extracts from the message of Pope Francis and a reflection by Fr Sean Healy SMA

‘Let us love, not with words, but with deeds.’

‘This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him’ (Ps 34:6). The Church has always understood the importance of this cry. We possess an outstanding testimony to this in the very first pages of the Acts of the Apostles, where Peter asks that seven men, ‘full of the Spirit and of wisdom’ (6:3), be chosen for the ministry of caring for the poor. This is certainly one of the first signs of the entrance of the Christian community upon the world’s stage: the service of the poor.

We may think of the poor simply as the beneficiaries of our occasional volunteer work, or of impromptu acts of generosity that appease our conscience. However good and useful such acts may be for making us sensitive to people’s needs and the injustices that are often their cause, they ought to lead to a true encounter with the poor and a sharing that becomes a way of life.

Saint John Chrysostom’s admonition remains ever timely: ‘do not honour the Eucharistic Christ with silk vestments, and then, leaving the church, neglect the other Christ suffering from cold and nakedness.’

This Day is meant, above all, to encourage believers to react against a culture of discard and waste, and to embrace the culture of encounter. At the same time, everyone, independent of religious affiliation, is invited to openness and sharing with the poor through concrete signs of solidarity and fraternity.

This Sunday, if there are poor people where we live who seek protection and assistance, let us draw close to them: it will be a favourable moment to encounter the God we seek. Following the teaching of scripture (cf. Gen 18:3-5; Heb 13:2), let us welcome them as honoured guests at our table; they can be teachers who help us live the faith more consistently.

This new World Day, therefore, should become a powerful appeal to our consciences as believers, allowing us to grow in the conviction that sharing with the poor enables us to understand the deepest truth of the gospel. The poor are not a problem: they are a resource from which to draw as we strive to accept and practise in our lives the essence of the gospel.

* * *

Fr Sean Healy, director of Social Justice Ireland, reflects on the challenges of poverty in Ireland today

Ireland’s economy is growing and there are improvements on many fronts. Employment is rising, unemployment is falling and the population is growing, with the likelihood that the country will have more than five million people within a decade.

However, a quarter of Ireland’s population (1.2 million people) are experiencing poverty or social exclusion. Of these, 308,000 are children under 16. Ireland also faces other major challenges; the most significant being the serious deficits in infrastructure and services, and the urgent need to address climate change on the scale required. These challenges are exacerbated by threats associated with Brexit.

There is an urgent need for increased investment in social housing, affordable childcare, rural broadband, climate change mitigation, education and healthcare services, regional development, and employment, among many other areas.

These challenges are of such a scale that they cannot be resolved during a single term of office of Government. They highlight the need for Government to set out a long-range plan on what is to be achieved in these areas over the coming ten-year period and to get agreement on sequencing these developments, as they cannot all be delivered in the short-term.

It would be very important to engage with civil society in this process as societal acceptance of decisions on issues such as the prioritising and sequencing of developments is critical if they are to be implemented successfully.

The key fact that needs to be noted here is that Ireland is not a poor country. We are among the richest nations in the world. All the challenges facing Irish society could be addressed effectively. World Day of the Poor provides an opportunity for all Irish people to reflect on the kind of society that is emerging and of what needs to be done to provide a fairer future for all.

Social Justice Ireland sets out viable solutions to all of these challenges on its website: www.socialjustice.ie.

(This article appeared in the November 2017 issue of Intercom. Intercom is a Catholic pastoral and liturgical resource magazine published by Veritas Group, an agency of the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Commission on Communications.)

Today, 24 October, we celebrate the seventy-second anniversary of the United Nations. The United Nations evolved out of the aftermath of two horrendous world wars that brought untold suffering and loss of life. The purpose of the UN was to save ‘succeeding generations from the scourge of war’, to ‘reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights’, to ‘establish conditions under which justice … can be maintained’, ‘to promote social progress’, and ‘to better standards of life’ for all people of all nations.

It would be fair to say that the UN has achieved only a fragment of what it set out to do. Wars continue to scourge the planet, human rights are blatantly abused in some parts of the world, injustice still plagues sections of society and the struggle to better the living conditions of people is ongoing.

This is an opportunity to pause, to reflect, to take the pulse of the earth. Let us consider at this time the plight of the suffering Rohingya people from Rakhine in Myanmar. They are a people forgotten, unwanted, displaced, tortured and persecuted. Men, women and children subjected to brutality and untold violence. And yet much of the world closes their eyes and ears to their plight. You can reach out.

Let us also consider the state of the planet.  In the recent past we have been confronted by unusual atmospheric occurrences across the globe bringing the issue of the climate crisis to our doorsteps. Islands nations and coastal belts of countries have felt the fury of hurricanes and cyclones. Parts of Asia have experienced severe flooding affecting millions of people. Forests fires have raged on various continents devastating forests, hurting local economies and claiming many lives. And yet some people and leaders deliberately choose to put their own interests and the interests of their economy-driven countries ahead of the greater interest of the suffering planet and people and generations to follow.

In today’s world the message of Jesus needs to be proclaimed with greater fervour and lived with deeper commitment. Jesus said, ‘I come to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives, to bring new sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim the year of Lord’s favour’. Jesus proclaimed the Reign of God, where justice will flourish, where the rights of the widow and orphan are upheld, and where the love of neighbour and God are central to the lives of all people.

As Christians, we are invited to walk in the shoes of the “other.” Jesus constantly brought to the fore the forgotten and unwanted, be they Samaritan or Syro-Phoenician, leper or widow, adulteress or tax collector, child or woman. Jesus highlighted the plight of each of these and demanded that they be treated with the respect and love that was their due as children of God. No one was excluded and no one was turned away. It is obligatory of us as Christians to hear the cry of the poor and the cry of the earth.

Jesus’ invitation to walk in the shoes of the other is taken up today by many different organisations, the United Nations being just one example. We are all invited to be part of that global movement which echoes the cry of the prophet Micah to act justly, to love tenderly and to walk humbly with our God.

READ: The Guardian view on the Rohingya in Myanmar: the Lady’s failings, the military’s crimes

WATCH: UN Day Message by Mr. António Guterres, United Nations Secretary-General

CONSIDER: Explore the Global Oneness Project

This week culminates with the celebration of World Mission Sunday. It is a day when all Christians are reminded of their missionary nature and commitment to ‘Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation’ (Mark 16:15).

Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation begins with the words, ‘The joy of the gospel fills the hearts and lives of all who encounter Jesus’. It is the same joy that sent Mary hurrying across the hill country of Judah to visit Elizabeth. It is the same joy that made Elizabeth exclaim, ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb’ (Luke 1:42). It is the joy experienced by Zacchaeus, the tax collector and Nicodemus, the Pharisee. It is the joy of the Samaritan woman at the well and it is the joy of Bartimaeus, whose sight was restored. It is the joy of Mary Magdalene at the empty tomb and it is the joy of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus after they had recognised Jesus in the breaking of the bread. It is the joy the frightened disciples experienced in the upper room on the day of Pentecost. It is the joy that makes our hearts burn within us. It is the joy that makes people exclaim, ‘They are filled with new wine’ (Acts 1:13). It is the joy of having a personal encounter with Jesus. The encountered Jesus is made known to all, fearlessly.

Where in my life have I encountered Jesus? What is my personal experience of Jesus? Who is the Jesus that I make known to the world?  I was once asked, ‘What do you know about Jesus that you did not read in a book or that someone did not tell you?’

In the Gospel according to Matthew, Jesus says, ‘You are the light of the world … let your light shine before others’. Each of us has a light to shine upon this earth. This week the Hindu community celebrates the festival of Diwali. It is the festival of light that commemorates the triumph of good over evil, of light over darkness, and of truth over untruth.

Let this festival be a reminder to us to let our light shine –  the light that flows from our encounter with Jesus, the light that makes known the glory of God, the light that reaches out to everyone, especially the poor and needy of the world.

SIGNIFICANT DAYS THIS WEEK: World Food Day (Oct 16); Overcome Extreme Poverty (Oct 17); St Luke, Evangelist (Oct 18); Diwali (Oct 19); World Mission Sunday (Oct 22)

READ: Pope Francis’ Message for World Mission Sunday 2017

WATCH: The Story of Diwali; Listen to this ancient Hindu prayer (The Pavamana Mantra)

CONSIDER: A Reflection on World Mission Sunday

The autumn equinox on 22 September is one of two days in the year when almost the whole planet experiences a roughly equal day and night. It brings us into that beautiful transitional season of autumn. There is a noticeable shift in the weather. The nights get longer and the air begins to cool. The leaves change colour and trees begin to shed their leaves. Autumn is at once a season of harvest and celebrating abundance and of growing darkness and apparent death.

Autumn, a season of light and darkness, of transition and letting go, reminds us that everything is transitory and nothing is permanent. There is so much to learn from this season if we stop and reflect.

The equinox calls us to reflect on balance in our lives. It invites us to ponder that which is bright and that which is shadow. If we look around us today we might see a lot of the shadow – the destructive trails of hurricanes, the devastation of earthquakes, the threat of war, economic uncertainty and so much more. But as cooler weather brings us to wrap ourselves in warm clothing, we are reminded that we are wrapped always in the cloak of God. The changing colours and falling of leaves remind us of the importance of change and letting go. This is a time to look inward and introspect. It is time also a time to look ahead.

This week the Jewish community and the Islamic community celebrate their respective new years. The Jews celebrate Rosh Hashana and the Muslims celebrate Al-Hijra. Rosh Hashana celebrates God as the creator of the universe and especially the creation of Adam and Eve. Al-Hijra is the first day of the Islamic month of Muharram and Muslims celebrate this day as the beginning of Islam as a community inspired by God, obedient to God and bound together by faith. Both celebrations remind all of us to acknowledge God as creator of the universe, to value the community of faith to which we belong and to recommit ourselves to the care of our neighbour.

So, at the beginning of this autumn, let our prayer be:

May the angels of light glisten for us this day.

May the sparks of God’s beauty dance in the eyes of those we love.

May the universe be on fire with Presence for us this day.

May the new sun’s rising grace us with gratitude.

Let earth’s greenness shine

and its waters breathe with Spirit.

Let heaven’s winds stir the soil of our soul

and fresh awakenings rise within us.

May the mighty angels of light glisten in all things this day.

May they summon us to reverence,

may they call us to life.

(Praying with the Earth: A Prayerbook for Peace, J. P. Newell)

SIGNIFICANT DAYS THIS WEEK: Rosh Hashana (Sept 20); St Matthew (Sept 21); International Day of Peace (Sept 21); Islamic New Year (Sept 21); Autumn Equinox (Sept 22); Padre Pio (Sept 23)

READ: The Spirituality of the Autumn Equinox

WATCH: Relax with the music of Vivaldi’s Autumn

CONSIDER: Pray the Autumn Blessing by Joyce Rupp