Category: Fr John’s Weekly
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Prayer Life
One of the blessings of being housebound has been to share world news in greater detail than I normally can – the floods, hurricanes, suffering and loss, wars, threats of wars, injustice, hatreds, prejudices, refugees and asylum seekers. It has been hard. Why do people hate others on account of religion or racial or national…
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Down’s Syndrome Eliminated!
The headline was surprising, claiming that Downs’ Syndrome had almost been eliminated in Iceland. A medical advance? No. As I read on I discovered that with improved screening of children in the womb it is now possible to identify Downs’ Syndrome babies and atermination offered. That’s what elimination meant: babies being eliminated. I remembered the…
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Our Blessings
How good to welcome our pilgrims home from Stresa and Lake Maggiore. They had a wonderful week in a beautiful setting. Photographs and messages during the week showed how happy they were, good as a group, excellent hotel, fascinating days out. Almost all said how ready they would be to go there again. We shall,…
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The Greatest Human Attribute
Just three weeks since the operation. Now I can walk without pain, can manage the stairscomfortably but slowly and look forward to seeing the surgeon for a reassuring report. I am grateful for all that has happened for me, at the hospital and at home in the parish where Sister Mary and Alison have been…
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Rev. Fr. Peter Coyle RIP
Fr Peter Coyle died a short while ago. He was one of my saints. I was the privileged one who said the prayer for the dying for him at the General Hospital. Just that afternoon he had been transferred from the Glenfield. Deacon John Parker brought him Holy Communion and then phoned me to ask…
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Kindness, Care and Prayer
Thank you. It has been a wonderful week. The skills and kindness at the hospital brought me through a difficult operation. The hip joint had almost disintegrated and when the nurses saw how Mr Kershaw had rebuilt it they were full of admiration. I needed a general anaesthetic rather than the planned epidural and my…
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Come Celebrate – 160years
Last week Sister Mary Campion celebrated her 100th birthday and Sister Mary Coen celebrated 60 years of religious life. Here in the parish and at the convent in Rearsby were joyful celebrations. From the Rearsby Mass leaflet we learn: Mary Campion was born 22nd July 1917 and although her birth certificate names her as Evelene…
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Your Kindness
I have been surrounded by kindness and help in these recent weeks. I am very grateful. I am now moving around the house and across to the church in a wheelchair, each day a little weaker. As I look back only three weeks to my Golden Jubilee weekend I am grateful I was able to…
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Golden Memories and Possessions!
At 6 o’clock last Saturday evening began the most bewildering 24 hours of my life. As I looked up from the book at the end of the first hymn I saw friends from around the country, some of whom I had said goodbye to only a few hours before with the hopes of seeing each…