22nd SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TME

The congregation welcomed Father Martin and Jan back from their holiday. Both look thoroughly refreshed after enjoying the sunshine in Spain for several weeks. The evening they arrived back it was really vile; the rain wasn’t just falling, it was pouring down and to add to the misery of leaving Spain at 38 degrees it was quite cold and they had to make the journey into Stansted Airport by foot as there was no transport available from the plane.

Father Martin celebrated and preached at the Parish Mass this morning. The number attending Mass today was up with several new people in the congregation.

The Saturday Shop re-opens next Saturday after being closed for the August Bank Holiday Weekend. Father Mervyn and Ann came from St. Mary’s Ilford where Father had been the Celebrant at the Solemn Mass; they came to join us for coffee and Father Martin presented Ann with a “Get Well” card and a beautiful bouquet. The entrance to St. Augustine’s Church Hall is all flat so Ann had no difficulty on her crutches.

A PRAYER FOR BUSY PEOPLE

Lord Jesus,
have pity on me.

With Martha
I was busy all day long.

Allow me now
with Mary
to sit at your feet
simply to look at you.

(source unknown)

21st Sunday in Ordinary Time

Father Mervyn presided and preached at today’s Parish Mass. Father Martin will return from his holiday in time for next Sunday’s Mass whilst Father Mervyn will be presiding at the Parish Mass at St. Mary’s Ilford for the next two Sundays.
Father Mervyn preached on the Church’s Healing Ministry and pointed out that Jesus was the great healer who continued to offer his healing today. He worked through the Church’s Healing Ministry, through the Mass and through doctors, nurses and paramedics.
The Saturday Shop will be closed next Saturday 28^th August as it’s the Bank Holiday week-end.
After Mass we celebrated two birthdays at coffee, one of 89 years and the other a mere 60!

A Meditation by Cardinal Newman

God has created me
to do him some definite service;
He has committed some work to me
which He has not committed to another.
I have my mission -
I may never know it in this life,
but I shall be told of it in the next.

I am a link in a chain,
a bond of connection between persons.
He has not created me for naught,
I shall do good,
I shall do his work.
I shall be an angel of peace,
a preacher of truth
in my own place
while not intending it -
if I do but keep
His Commandments.

Therefore, I will trust Him.
Whatever, wherever I am,
I can never be thrown away.
If I am in sickness,
my sickness may serve Him;
in perplexity,
my perplexity may serve Him;
if I am in sorry,
my sorrow may serve Him.
He does nothing in vain.
He knows what He is about.
He may take away my friends.
He may throw me among strangers.
He may make me feel desolate,
make my spirits sink,
hide my future from me -
still He knows
what He is about.

THE ASSUMPTION OF OUR LADY 2010

Father Mervyn at the Statue of our Lady

Let us rejoice and celebrate this feast in honour of the Virgin Mary, at whose assumption the angels rejoice, giving praise to the Son of God.

Today we celebrated the Assumption of Our Blessed Lady Mary, Mother of God and Mother of us all. In his sermon Father Mervyn quoted the Theologian John Macquarrie who in his book “Mary for all Christians, he mentioned how, in 1946 whilst doing National Service, he visited the church in Jerusalem Called the Dormition or the Falling Asleep of Our Lady. He found it very gloomy, "just about the last place that would make one think of a glorious assumption". Having visited this church a few years ago Father Mervyn said it was still gloomy but moving. Never-the-less Macquarrie felt he must kneel and pray, despite mocking comments from his comrades. "Dimly," he says, "I sensed that the Assumption was part of the very fabric of Christian faith." When four years later, in 1950 the doctrine of the Assumption was solemnly defined by Pius XII, Macquarrie liked the way the pope put it: Mary, "on completing the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul" not simply to heaven (as though she were merely transferred to another place), but rather "to heavenly glory", which suggests a transformation of her human condition, from its earthly state to a state in which she enjoys the glory of a new relationship with God. He noted too that the pope had linked the Assumption with the intimate union existing between Mary and Jesus, between Mother and Child: she had conceived him, borne him, nourished him, done what every mother does for her child. Such an association surely could not come to an end when her earthly life was over. Father Mervyn said that John Macquarrie was absolutely right when more than forty years ago he sensed that the Assumption was "part of the very fabric of Christian faith".

Our Lay Reader led the Intercessions this morning. We were joined again today by several people who came for the first time last week. We learnt that the Saturday Shop had taken over £240 the previous Saturday and over £170 yesterday. At the end of the Mass we recited the Angelus.

 

Farewell, at the end of Mass at St. Augustines but see you at coffee in the Church Hall

From the Internet

I found this whilst trawling the net the other day. I liked it so much I’m reproducing it here

Happy moments, PRAISE GOD.
Difficult moments, SEEK GOD.
Quiet moments, WORSHIP GOD.
Painful moments, TRUST GOD.
Every moment, THANK GOD.

A PRAYER OF CARDINAL NEWMAN

 

Dear Jesus,
help me to spread Thy fragrance everywhere I go.
Flood my soul with Thy spirit and life.
Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly
that all my life may only be a radiance of Thine.
Shine through me,
and be so in me that every soul I come in contact with
may feel Thy presence in my soul.
Let them look up and see no longer me
but only Jesus!
Stay with me,
and then I shall begin to shine
as Thou shinest,
so to shine as to be a light to others;
the light, O Jesus, will be all from Thee;
none of it will be mine;
it will be Thou shining on others through me.
Let me thus praise Thee in the way Thou dost love best
by shining on those around me.
Let me preach Thee without preaching,
not by words but by my example,
by the catching force of the sympathetic influence
of what I do,
the evident fullness of the love my heart bears to Thee.
Amen.

19th Sunday in Ordinary Time

This morning Father Mervyn presided at the Parish Mass and preached. He recalled the story of how Blondin had walked a tight rope across the Niagara Falls several times, at first solo and then with a wheel barrow full of earth. When one of the bystanders said to him that he thought Blondin could do it all day, he emptied the wheel barrow and invited the man to get in instead. He declined. He did not have the faith he would need in Blondin. Father Mervyn pointed out how Abraham and Sara by faith had been prepared to set off to find the Promised Land and how they had faith that despite their ages, an heir would be given to them and how, when God asked for the sacrifice of their only son and heir they had been prepared to sacrifice him if that was what required.

The Israelites had put their faith in God when they left Egypt .They showed that faith when they came to the Red Sea believing that God would protect them when they crossed it and they found that the waters parted for them. He said we all have times when we need to put our faith in God and sometimes we may be called to set out ourselves on a journey without any idea where it might lead just as the Israelites had set out on a journey putting their faith in God. Jesus reminded us that he would come again and we must put our faith in all that he promised. What is God calling us to do or to undertake? We must have faith and then we will be prepared to demonstrate that faith and get into the wheel barrow.

Next Sunday we will celebrate The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary at the Parish Mass at 10.00 a.m. when again Father Mervyn will preside and preach

18th Sunday in Ordinary Time

At this morning Parish Mass Father Martin presided and Father Mervyn preached on the Gospel of the day (Luke 12.13-24). We noted that the Saturday Shop’s takings had been enhanced by our trading on EBay which has raised £700 so far this year. During August Father Mervyn will be presiding and preaching at the Parish Mass also, please note, Evening Prayer is suspended and will resume again in September.