Parish of Lismore and Ballysaggart

Welcome to the Easter season. We will celebrate Easter for the next 40 days leading up to Pentecost. Next Sunday is Divine Mercy Sunday. It is our sincere hope that you all will in some way be graced by the presence of the Risen Lord in your life.

What shape that experience may take will be special to you. As I write this I hope and pray that in my own life I may be equally blessed. It has to be for God, the Most Blessed Trinity is ever beyond us, yet ever close to us.

Pope Francis is writing again. His book available from Veristas Publications titled ‘ Let us dream: The Path to a better future. It is written in readable English. Pope Francis who was locked down like the rest of the world saw the glimmerings of a new empathy born out of sudden isolation and restricted movements.

He makes the case for the forgotten, the excluded and the mistreated. He cites the ‘pandemics’ of hunger, violence and climate change. In a memorable quote he writes, ‘we have to let ourselves be touched by the other’s pain’. It is a book of prophecy and hope, rather than an analysis of the pandemic and its effects. He writes that the pandemic has thought us that ‘no one is saved alone. Without the ‘ we’ of people, of family of institutions, of a society that rises above the ‘I’ of individual interests, we are left with a battle for supremacy between factions and interest.

Sincere thanks to all who took part in the celebration of the Easter liturgies, both those at home and those who were privileged to be in either church. We can only hope that in the near future we can safely gather for Mass and for other events. In the meantime, we must be both patient and respectful of public health guidelines. Children don’t like waiting, neither do adults for rewards. Easter water is available in both churches. You can bring a bottle and leave it there and take the water already bottled.

It is much appreciated that many dropped in their weekly contributions along with their donations for clergy Easter collection, for the holy places and for Trócaire. Your loyalty to your parish is what holds the parish together. Each generation either buys into that loyalty or they just walk away. In walking away where are they going? When Jesus asked the apostles if they wished to walk away like others, it was Peter who said ‘Lord to whom can we go, you have the words of eternal life.’

Mass continues each morning at 10am on Radio 103.9fm, with Liturgy of the Word on Tuesdays as I will be in St Carthage’s Rest Home for Mass. It will be wonderful to be back.

Lastly, we hope and pray that all will go well for the full reopening of schools after the Easter holidays. By linking into Facebook St Mary’s Ballysaggart, or Lismore and Ballysaggart you may access Mass online.

PRAYERS OF THE FAITHFUL FOR EASTER

Lord, help us to see signs of Easter and of new hope in the hearts of all people as they learn that the Risen Christ is the hope for all, even those who do not know the Lord Lord hear us. Send down your blessings on the Church, the Easter people that they may come across as people whose lives are grounded in true hope and not a kind of vague optimism.

Lord hear us. Lord, may those adults who will be baptised find in the Church a true community of faith, hope and love as they find there, their new spiritual home. Lord hear us.

We pray for all who serve in public office, that they may rejoice in the Risen Lord, call for peace, for truth and for justice in all the world. Lord hear us. With great love, we humbly pray for all who are sick at this time, that through the professional care they receive, may be well again, but should the Lord have other plans, may they welcome them. Lord hear us.

It is in the face of death that our hope in the triumph of life through death can be sorely tested, so Lord, have mercy on all who have died and grant healing and peace to those who grieve.

Lord hear us.