This weekend we remember the dead of the two world wars of the twentieth century. Those wars increasingly recede in our memories. Most (but not all) of us in church today will have no memory of the second world war, which ended 67 years ago. But many of us will have had relatives who were killed in that conflict, some at a very early age. And with love, we remember them.
However a crucial part of our remembering must be penitence. Whatever the rights or wrongs of particular armed conflicts, the violence of war is a stark testimony to the failure of the entire human community to live with itself in peace and security. It is a terrible example of what the Bible calls SIN.
Adam and Eve still disobey God and go their own way - and sin enters the world.
Cain still kills his brother Abel - and violence continues to disrupt the human community.
So the true spirit of Remembrance Sunday should be a recognition that ‘we are all in this together’- or as St Paul wrote in his Letter to the Romans ‘All have sinned and have come short of the glory of God.’ We all have the potential for violence within us - in our attitudes, our speech and in our relationships. We can all cause so much damage. And, if we are honest, we do.
The world (that includes you and me) needs to be ‘redeemed’. There is something very wrong or distorted about our lives, and the life of the world. As Catholics we believe that God has given the world (and us) just what it needs. Actually, just who it needs. The God-Man who is able to heal, forgive and restore all that is wrong with us. But we, of course must co-operate.
‘God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not die but have everlasting life. God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world- but that the world, through him, might be saved.’ (John’s Gospel,3.16 ff).
The future of God’s world, and of the human race, must lie in inter-dependence and co-operation, not the futility and havoc of war. And the Catholic Church has a vital role to play in this. It is to be the ‘leaven’ in the life of the world.
“Thus the church, at once ‘a visible organization and a spiritual community’, travels the same journey as all of humanity and shares the same earthly lot with the world: it is to be a leaven and, as it were, the soul of human society in its renewal by Christ and transformation into the family of God.” (Gaudium et Spes 40-).
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Mass attendances last Sunday were 643. |
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Sunday 11/11/12 |
Thirty Second Sunday (B) 6pm – People of the Parish 9.15am – Oliver Groom RIP (Anniversary) (The Muzzelle Family) 11am – Stewart Stanley Lowe RIP (Teresa & Peter Lowe)
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Monday 12/11/12 |
St Josaphat, bishop and martyr 9.30am – Mary Peachey RIP (Teresa West)
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Tuesday 13/11/12 |
Feria 9.30am – Maurice Cantopher RIP (P. Cantopher)
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Wednesday 14/11/12 |
Feria 9.00am – Private Intention Mass in St James’ School
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Thursday 15/11/12 |
Feria 9.30am - John Arundel RIP (Pat & Teresa Troy)
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Friday 16/11/12 |
Feria 9.30am – CWL Members
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Sunday 18/11/12 |
Thirty Third Sunday (B) 6pm – Chris Barrett RIP (Loma Barrett & Family) 9.15am – Deceased members of Lowe & Self families. (K Self) 11am – People of the Parish |