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Schedule of Lenten Events in the 4 Parishes

St. Gabriel’s March 4th to 12th Novena of Grace Wednesdays in Lent Taizé Prayer & Reflection 7:30 to 8:30 pm, St. John’s March Sunday 23rd (and Vigil 6pm Saturday 22nd). Br. Richard Hendricks OFM Cap Poet and Writer will address all Masses. Thursday April 3rd and...

IRISH CATHOLIC ARTICLE

Click here for a PDF of an article recently published in the Irish Catholic, by Fr Gareth Byrne, Moderator of the Diocesan Curia and Chairperson of the Building Hope Pastoral Strategy Implementation Group. The introduction to the article, titled Risking a journey that...

Archbishop Farrell’s homily for launch of the Jubilee Year

Launch of the Jubilee Year 2025 “Pilgrims of Hope”  Homily of Archbishop Dermot Farrell St Mary’s Pro-Cathedral Sunday, December 29, 2024 (Also available at https://dublindiocese.ie/jubilee-year-launch/) “Jesus then went down with Mary and Joseph, and came to Nazareth...

BUILDING HOPE PLANNING RESOURCE

The Building Hope Pastoral Strategic Planning Resource 2025–2027, launched at the recent workshops, is now available at https://dublindiocese.ie/planning-resource/.

Reflection on Today’s

Gospel Reading

Tuesday, First Week of Lent

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus says, ‘Your Father knows what you need before you ask him’. Whereas Jesus encourages us to petition God for our needs, he is saying that our prayers of petition are not about making God aware of something God is ignorant of. In that sense, our prayer of petition does not change God, giving information God doesn’t have, prompting God to do something God was not intending to do. Our prayer of petition changes us. It makes us more receptive to what God wants to give us. By naming what we need to God, we become more aware of what we need from God and become more open to what God wants to give us. In the prayer that has become known as the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus names for us what it is we really need. We often pray for what we want, but what we want does not always correspond to what we need. According to Jesus, in the prayer he has given us, we need to acknowledge in our thoughts, words and deeds, the priority of God’s kingdom over all earthly kingdoms. We are to pray for the coming of God’s kingdom, which Jesus identifies with the doing of God’s will, as Jesus reveals it to us in his teaching and by his life. According to Jesus’ prayer, we need ‘daily bread’. We need sustenance for body and soul, and when others are deprived of such sustenance, we need to provide for them out of our own resources. According to Jesus’ prayer, we need to pray for forgiveness for our sins against God and God’s people, while being ready to forgive the sins of others against us. Finally, we need to pray for the grace to remain faithful to the Lord’s way, especially when we are tempted to take a path that is not God’s will for us. We pray this prayer so often that we can fly through it. It is worth praying it slowly and meditatively, because it reflects God’s desire for our lives.

Neighbouring

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