Sometimes we forget things – birthdays, anniversaries, appointments. But we can forget bigger things, like our commitment to God. However, he always remembers his promises to us, and is always faithful. Fr Richard reflects on today’s readings from Mass.

Readings for Friday of week 19 of ordinary time (Memorial of St Maximilian Kolbe, martyr) can be found here.

Have you ever forgotten something? A birthday or anniversary? Where you’ve put your keys? A dentist appointment? These memory lapses are frustrating, and we kick ourselves when they happen, yet the consequences aren’t that devastating. More serious is if we forget our fundamental principles in life, such as keeping promises we have made or treating others with kindness and respect.

In our first reading today God criticises the people of Israel for breaking the covenant they had made with him. They have forgotten to be faithful and have forgotten to serve him as they should. Yet God’s memory is better than his people’s. “I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish for you an everlasting covenant”, God says. This in turn will remind the people of their promises to him.

In the Gospel reading the Pharisees demonstrate they have forgotten God’s purposes in creation. They have come to view marriage as a transaction, where a man can divorce his wife “for any cause”. Jesus must remind them of why God created human beings in the first place. People often use memory aids to stop them forgetting things, like notes left around the house or alerts on their phone. How do we remember God’s promises to us and ours to him? Simply by worshipping, praying, and hearing and meditating on his holy Word.

Mass today is in St Saviour’s at 10am.

If you’d like more resources for daily prayer, check out our Day By Day pages.

Ezekiel prophesies about the people of Israel being taken into exile in Babylon. We can become estranged from God and each other through sin, a form of spiritual exile. God never tires of seeking to bring the lost home, and we should do likewise. Fr Richard reflects on today’s readings from Mass.

Readings for Thursday of week 19 of ordinary time can be found here.

On 23 February 2022, Inna Soldatenko, a Ukrainian doctor, finished work, collected her daughter from school, cooked dinner and went to bed. She had a job she loved, a nice home, and two wonderful children. The next morning she awoke to the sound of explosions as Russia’s invasion had begun. Within days, as fighting intensified, Inna and her family fled from their home with just a few belongings. They drove for more than 26 hours through several countries before reaching safety. 

We can only imagine the trauma of being forced from your home in such circumstances. Several thousand years before, Ezekiel is commanded by God to pack his bag and act out being sent into exile. This was to be a warning to the people of Israel about the disaster that was about to befall their nation. As with Ukraine, Israel was to be invaded by the Babylonians, and the people would be taken away to live in Babylon for many decades. 

In the Gospel we read about a form of spiritual exile, brought about by sin. Wrongdoing puts a distance between us and God, and us and our fellow human beings. It can feel like we are in a distant land, far from home. Yet God is so merciful and loving that he never stops searching for us. He earnestly desires to bring us back home to him, and so is like the king in the parable, willing to write off the enormous debts that we owe. We then should do likewise, never tiring of seeking out the lost and the wayward and bringing to them God’s message of love and mercy. “Not seven, I tell you, but seventy-seven times”, Jesus says in response to Peter’s question about how many times he should forgive another. Biblical scholars reckon Jesus is not giving a numerical limit but actually the opposite – he says we should never count how many times we forgive. 

God showed his faithfulness to the people of Israel and eventually brought them back home from exile. Let us pray that all those who have fled Ukraine will also be able to return to their homes. And let us show that same mercy and faithfulness in seeking to bring home our spiritually lost brothers and sisters.

Mass today is in St Dyfrig & St Samson at 10am.

If you’d like more resources for daily prayer, check out our Day By Day pages.

Jesus acknowledges that relationships may sometimes be strained or even broken. He encourages us to seek reconciliation when this happens. Fr Richard reflects on today’s readings from Mass.

Readings for Wednesday of week 19 of ordinary time can be found here.

The 18th century English poet Alexander Pope famously declared: “To err is human, to forgive, divine”. Surely we have all experienced the first part of Pope’s statement. We can all think of occasions where we have erred, sinned, done the wrong thing. And the times when others have done wrong to us. Our readings today try and take us beyond wrongdoing to the second part of Pope’s saying – forgiveness and restoration.

The readings have something striking in common. In each, the issue of sin is confronted head-on. In the first reading God deals brutally with those who have abandoned him, while sparing the righteous. In the Gospel, Jesus says that we should not ignore wrongdoing within the church. But neither should we condemn the sinner outright. Instead we should make every effort to bring about reconciliation.

People outside the Christian faith often get the wrong idea about forgiveness. They think it means sweeping things under the carpet, saying whatever has been done wrong doesn’t really matter. Jesus’ words today show us that couldn’t be further from the truth. For sin to be forgiven, it needs to be named. The sinner needs to realise what they’ve done is wrong. This takes courage on both sides! But the effort is worth it if we can indeed repair what has been broken and model that divine quality of forgiveness spoken about by Pope.

Mass today is in St Paul’s at 10am and St Mary’s at 11am.

If you’d like more resources for daily prayer, check out our Day By Day pages.

Jesus challenges popular ideas of what it means to be “great”. Fr Richard reflects on today’s readings from Mass.

Readings for Tuesday of week 19 of ordinary time (memorial of St Clare) can be found here.

“Who is the greatest?” It’s a question asked today by the disciples, and it’s a question that’s been asked down the centuries. In the ancient world the greatest was the king with the biggest empire and the most riches. Nowadays it’s the businessperson who has made the most money, the social media influencer with the most followers, the pop star who has sold most records, even the church with the biggest congregation.

As ever, Jesus flips these notions of greatness on their head. He uses the example of a child to illustrate his conception of greatness. In his society children were not given much respect. They could not earn any money to support the family, so people were impatient for them to grow up. Yet Jesus sees their value just as they are. The parable of the lost sheep emphasises the point: God sees great worth in those who are often overlooked. Where might we find greatness in our society today?

In the reading from Ezekiel we have a dramatic image of the prophet eating the word of God, which is sweet to the taste. It is a reminder to all of us that merely hearing or reading the Scriptures is not enough. We must allow them to enter into us and transform us, so that we might view the world and its people – especially the overlooked – with the same love that God does.

Mass today is in St Mary’s at 6.30pm.

If you’d like more resources for daily prayer, check out our Day By Day pages.

Seeds are no good if they stay in the packet. They must be surrendered to the earth to be of any use. It is the same with us and our life – we are called to give it up in service, just as St Laurence did in his witness of martyrdom. Fr Richard reflects on today’s readings from Mass.

Readings for the Feast of St Laurence can be found here.

Imagine that someone gives you a packet of seeds. As they hand them over, they say “these seeds are amazing … they will produce something wonderful”. “Great”, you think to yourself. “I better look after these special seeds”. And so you put the packet carefully in a cupboard, which you lock. Weeks go by and nothing happens. “They don’t seem so special”, you think, so you open the packet and pour the seeds into a dish. You leave them there, occasionally spending a while gazing on them and their specialness. Still nothing happens. You end up quite disappointed with the gift.

The mistake in that scenario was of course wanting to hoard the gift. The seeds will only produce something amazing if they are given away, buried in the ground. Hidden from sight, they soon cease to be what they once were. No longer mere seeds, they start to grow into that amazing thing promised by the giver. This is the essence of Jesus’ words in the Gospel, and the example of St Laurence whom we honour today. The human instinct is to hoard and protect things. We see this with the wealth of the world’s millionaires and billionaires. It is tied up in bank accounts, property or other assets, and just sits there, of no use to anyone. Instead, it is the act of giving something away which makes it useful. Jesus applies this to our very life. When we give it away to others in service, or even in martyrdom, it suddenly becomes worth so much more than if it was kept locked away in a cupboard. Like the seed planted in the ground, we cease to be what we once were and are transformed into the likeness of Jesus.

Jesus, of course, is the supreme example of giving himself away so that something amazing might happen. This occurs every time we celebrate the Mass, as he gives us his very self, his body and blood. We adore the host and the chalice at the moment of consecration, but soon these sacred elements disappear as they are consumed. Within us, they enable something extraordinary to occur. They give us the grace which enables us to follow Our Lord, Laurence and all the saints in giving ourselves to him and to one another.

Mass today is in St Dyfrig & St Samson at 6.30pm (preceded by Eucharistic Adoration at 5.45pm).

If you’d like more resources for daily prayer, check out our Day By Day pages.