Peter Blog a few random thoughts

As a Church we have had quite a year. We started of the year under   the leadership of Pope Benedict who would have predicted what happened on the feast of Our lady of Lourdes with is brave announcement and retirement. And how the Church has seemed suddenly to be more open and transparent under the leadership of Francis it is therefore no surprise that the Bishops Conference on this National Youth Sunday are looking at the theme, “Do not be afraid” and to preach the Good News by what we say and do. These are two things that Francis has done with great vigour and enthusiasm we have seen an unprecedented number of things happening. So what a year it has been. So where can we see this enthusiasm? I can especially see it in the young people that we have in this parish. The schools are alive with the faith only this week I witnessed an enthusiasm for the faith in year 9 with many serious and well thought-out questions, we have seen in the parish the enthusiasm that those young pe...

Dear brothers and sisters of Arundel & Brighton,   Next Sunday, 24 November and the Feast of Christ the King, marks the end of the ‘Year of Faith’ announced by Pope Benedict in 2012. The year began on 11 October 2012, the 50 th anniversary of the opening of the Vatican Council.   As a diocese we have not really placed great emphasis on the celebration of this ‘Year of Faith’, mainly because what the pope asked us to do was something we had already committed to; we already had in place our plans for the celebration of our diocesan Jubilee in 2015. These plans gave priority to a four-year programme of renewal, based on our study of the four major documents of the Council. This is what the pope asked people to do during the ‘Year of Faith’. Many people throughout the diocese have joined groups to do this work together.   Studying Church documents can be hard work – the language isn’t always the easiest – and can seem unrewarding if it’s not clear ...

There is a great irony that when I posted this blog originally I had hoped and prayed that the situation in Gaza and the people of Palestine might have got better. And when I wrote this after my trip to the Holy land in 2013 I wanted to tell others what I had seen. But with the original blog below I want to make it quite clear  that things have not got any better as I sit here in 2017 in fact for many things have got progressively worse. I have just been watching a you tube clip about the plight of the Palestinian people to see that in Gaza now 50% of people are out of work. There is no freedom of movement for these people. Hebron is a ghost town. All for the sake of security. People have to be made aware of the injustice that is happening there so I am putting the links on this blog with my original blog.  I think that as you can see these situations and their lives have not changed. To truly understand t...

This Month of November is a special time set by the Church to remember and pray for those who have gone before us. Today we especially remember those people in the armed forces who give up their lives so that we may have freedom. It especially remembers those from the two world wars but there are still members of the armed forces fighting in troubled places of the world. The gospel says at the end that “Now he is God, not of the dead, but of the living; for him all men are in fact alive.” But we can see that there are many places in the world where both men and women and children actually have no life and have very little opportunity to be alive. We must constantly thank God and thank these brave people who have given us the opportunity to live life to the full and have all the benefits of a free and democratic society even if it does not feel like it sometimes.  The word Catholic means universal. We belong to a universal Church by virtue of our baptism we are all pa...

  There was a famous song by Monty Python that was a parody on all things bright and beautiful called “All things dull and ugly” IT was not only poking fun at the well-known hymn but also saying a serious point that God created all things whether we like them a lot. But we read in the wisdom today “for had you hated anything, you would not have formed it.” In the book of Genesis it says that God saw all that he had made at it was good. This theme continues Paul. God’s love of creation extends to us he says “We pray continually that our God will make you worthy of his call.” This goodness of creation extends to us. He formed us each individual and unique because God loves us. Because we have faith in his love and because he created us in love then we can be sure that it is good. Both of these readings for me shed new light on the Gospel reading. It is the famous story of Zacchaeus. Jesus sees him and asks that he come to his house. Those listening and seeing th...