Saturday 6.30pm: Dec’d Parishioers Ellis
Sunday Second of Lent PMB Page 152
8.30am: Maureen Sumner Rec Dec
10am: Linda Udeag RIP
11.30am: Parish
Monday No Mass
Tuesday 10am: Special intention
Ash Wednesday 10am : Holy Souls
Thursday 10am: Holy Souls
Friday 10am: Holy Souls
Saturday 10am: for the sick
6.30pm: Parish
Second Sunday of Lent
8.30am: Union of Catholic Mothers
10am: Cruz and Inicio Baptista RIP
11.30am: TR Family
FOR LENT FROM POPE FRANCIS
FAST FROM HURTING WORDS AND SAY ONLY KIND WORDS
FAST FROM SADNESS AND BE FILLED WITH GRATITUDE
FAST FROM ANGER AND BE FILLED WITH PATIENCE
FAST FROM PESSIMISM AND BE FILLED WITH HOPE
FAST FROM WORRIES AND TRUST IN GOD
FAST FROM COMPLAINTS AND CONTEMPLATE SIMPLICITY
FAST FROM PRESSURES AND BE PRAYERFUL
FAST FROM BITTERNESS AND FILL YOUR HEART WITH JOY
FAST FROM SELFISHNESS AND BE COMPASSIONATE TO OTHERS
FAST FROM GRUDGES AND BE RECONCILED
First Reading Covenants are compassionate contracts between God and his people. Today’s covenant is probably one of the best known from the Old Testament – that of Noah and the ark God wills to save his people and show mercy. He will not desert them, leave them or exclude them from his mercy. A covenant is an unconditional declaration from God. The news cannot get any better! The real covenant is that with Jesus which is celebrated in the Mass.
Second Reading This is about baptism and the call to endure persecution for the sake of God. This text is one of encouragement and hope. Jesus has made all things subject to his power, even death. Noah saved only a few. Christ’s covenant is for all. Peter addresses us saying that belief and baptism lead to resurrection.
The Gospel The temptations of Jesus. This is his final preparation before entering into the war against Satan and the struggle to save humanity. Perhaps we find it hard to believe that Jesus, who after all, was God, was actually tempted to find an easier way of living and winning our salvation. Why such suffering? And his temptation does not end after the forty days in the wilderness. Jesus will be tempted to avoid the road of pain by his own disciples. When Jesus speaks to them about his own future pain he tells them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the chief priests and the elders and the scribes (ie. the religious establishment) and be killed. Peter then takes Jesus aside to protest against this kind of talk, this kind of somewhat bleak future for all of them ! But Jesus says to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind on human things and not on divine things. You are ignoring God’s plan ans substituting your own. Peter is the only person that Jesus calls “Satan”, the accuser. This temptation – to avoid suffering - comes not from the devil in the wilderness, but from Peter on the road to Jerusalem. Jesus has to learn (and we find this difficult to imagine) that loving God does not mean exemption from harm. He teaches us that we will be saved. He does not say that we will always be safe. For Jesus, the radical question is – will he continue to love God when his life is in jeapardy? Will he be able to love God when his body is raised up on the cross and no angel will come to save him? Will he stubbornly love the Lord through suffering, the pain of rejection, a hideously violent death? Jesus had to live with temptation just like we do.
Abdella is shattered, exhausted, physically devastated, but he must keep walking. Abdella lives in an extremely remote and mountainous part of Ethiopia. He spends nearly all his time collecting water just to keep his family alive. He has no time to live the life he wants. “I am wasting my life. I am a young man; I should be doing something else. Meet Abdella CAFOD website and share his journey. CAFOD LENTEN FAST DAY 26TH FEBRUARY. See accompanying sheet from the Parish J & P Group.
Praying to enlarge our capacity to receive the gifts that God wants to give us.
Lent is like a long retreat in which to re-enter oneself and listen to God’s voice in order to overcome the temptations of the Evil One and to find the truth of our existence. It is a time, we may say, of spiritual training in order to live alongside Jesus not with pride and presumption but rather by using the weapons of faith: namely prayer, fasting, almsgiving. In this way we shall succeed in celebrating Easter - in truth the resurrection which alone gives meaning to our lives.
Walk with Me – a Journey of Lenten Prayer for 2021. Available at the back of the Church for only £1. Try it. It will help. It is an excellent publication for Lent and our preparation for Easter
