A great day of meeting and celebration today (and tomorrow) for priests of the Christchurch diocese with our first clergy AGM with Bishop Paul Martin. Our priests'...
Christchurch Diocese
God’s Dwelling
This week Bishop Barry Jones of the diocese of Christchurch New Zealand has published a substantial document God's Dwelling Place to help parishioners of the diocese to...
ordinations
Today is a day of great celebration for our Catholic Diocese of Christchurch as three young men are ordained deacons at 11.am in St. Mary's pro-Cathedral. Everyone is...
the pointer
My paternal grandfather knew his way around the night sky. In New Zealand, the Southern Cross is the most sought-after constellation. I remember my grandfather showing...
a life of value
When did you last encourage someone to consider that God might be calling them to serve as a priest? This Sunday (“Good Shepherd Sunday”, Fourth Sunday of Easter) is...
Inform
As it nears 100 issues the Inform magazine of the Catholic diocese of Christchurch continues to be popular. Last Sunday Hurunui parishioners were happy to collect the...
Inform (Dec ’13)
The December issues of the Christchurch Diocesan magazine "Inform" arrived this afternoon, so I made a coffee and sat in the garden to savour the Faithfest photos. You...
ChCh Diocese Faithfest
Today the Catholic Diocese of Christchurch celebrated the end of the Year of Faith. These images from this morning's Mass celebrating the Feast of Christ the King speak...
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my word your home
The heart of the home in years past was the hearth.
It was at the hearth that the family gathered for the warmth and light of the flame and the food that was prepared there.
The fire was treated with respect since the same flame which provided energy for the home could just as easily destroy it.
stand up look up
The Israelites in their forty years in the desert were journeying from captivity to freedom, but the struggle of their desert years made them vulnerable to attack from every temptation as today’s first reading continues
confident in God
I’m not sure if children today are told the great story of the Emperor’s New Clothes, but if not let’s make sure that the parable is taught at all schools of higher learning.
the teenagers
A few years ago I discovered the wonderful way that God uses my imagination in my prayer.
Such openness to imagination when seeking God does not take us away from reality into fantasy but instead brings me into what is most real and inescapably personal and intimate.
Annunciation
A couple of thousand years ago, a young Jewish woman was going about her normal morning routines, perhaps with a mixture of house and garden work, chatting with parents and neighbours, aware of the local drought, the sickness of a neighbour and annoyed by the neighbourhood’s lack of sleep caused by the Romans’ noisy party the night before, when God broke into her routine and entered her life in a new and powerful way.