Registrations for the Jan 2015 Hearts Aflame gathering close early December. This ten-day formation session for young (18-35 year-old) Catholics has become a...
john oconnor
the murder house
It wouldn't happen today. I was a five year old boy at St. Joseph's school in Oamaru and when the dental nurse got up to the "o's" Â I had to leave school (alone) to...
church building
This weekend's feast of the Dedication of the Roman basilica of St. John Lateran might seem like a strange focus for a Sunday. It’s not very often we get to celebrate...
Pike River
In the early 1990′s I lived for four years in the small West Coast township of Ngahere. It was a privilege to serve as the priest for the people of the Grey Valley, on...
fireworks
There’s nothing like a good fireworks display to bring crowds together with ‘ooh’s’ and ‘aah’s’ in an atmosphere of celebration. I really enjoy a spectacular display...
still close
Today, November 2, the Church celebrates the Feast of All Souls. The month of November is marked as the month of Holy Souls. In this month we take pause to remember...
horizon shifting
Perhaps the most common daily ailment in citizens of the western world is stress. Most mornings many of us wake with the sense that the things we have to do today...
happy feast day
502 years ago today Michaelangelo‘s Sistine Chapel ceiling frescoes were ‘completed’. I am sure that there was no coincidence in the date: the feast of All Saints was a...
saints interview
An interview for the November feasts of All Saints and All Souls at this link.
Halloween
People have always had a need for annual moments in a year that are highly ritualised around social gatherings with food and drink. Halloween has relatively recently...
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good enough
And then I was reminded at my uncle’s 90th birthday party last month of the priest who married my grandparents telling them at their 1927 wedding: “Do your best, and leave the rest to God.”
all is well
While we say that fear is an emotion we don’t like and seek to avoid, many people seem irrationally attracted to what instills and aggravates fear.
how much more
I know that I, sinful and unforgiving as I can be, if given charge of the gates of heaven for an hour, would throw them wide open, even to those who hate me and create problems for me.
labyrinthine ways
I like Jonah because he’s a bit like me. I like the way that he recognises the call of God for him, then gets a bit scared and runs in the opposite direction
our
The word OUR is a powerful reminder that when I pray I am not alone. Not only am I in active relationship with God, but I am united with all who share OUR faith in Jesus Christ.