The image that I had prepared for last Sunday’s homily on the vine & branches gospel is the Vine & Branches gold resin windows from Our Lady of Victories Church. The architect, Charles Thomas, wound the vine symbolising Christ through the fourteen windows that stand behind the congregation. From the sanctuary during Mass it is as if the vine surrounds the worshippers, binding us together, and we, the worshipping community, are the branches.

But how easily we cut ourselves off from the vine. We all do this, at least for moments, and every day. But as Jesus reminds us so powerfully, cut off from him, (the vine), we (the branches) can do nothing.

And then on Saturday evening after leaving the 5pm Hanmer Mass and driving to the Culverden for the 7pm I noticed this view from the side of the road. I wasn’t in a hurry and had time to pull over and savour the scene. The moon has no light of it’s own, but because it is in the gaze of the sun it lives. The Waiau river also has no light of its own, and on this May evening at 6.15 it is out of the gaze of the sun. But because the moon is receiving the light of the sun, the moon is able to be a reflector of the sun’s light to the river and the hills…

Let’s make sure that stay in the gaze of the Jesus, that we might reflect his light to everyone we meet.