Reflections

Families Huh? Today's first reading is absolutely stonkering. It’s not just stonkering in its content but chiefly because of its authenticity. It is about a family who makes the most understandable and repeatable mistakes. The story is also about the consequences of those mistakes and the pain that must follow and must be felt. Israel...Continue reading→

It’s not about the cuppa “I got your letter, thanks Fr. David. I appreciate you writing so quickly. Come for tea and buns on Tuesday at 2:30 pm”. So feeling pretty chuffed with myself for my super efficiency and knowing that the tea and buns were going to be of very fine quality, I  gleefully trotted...Continue reading→

What’s a furlough? Most of you will know that I have a close family member who works with computers and does things I will never understand. This family member is incredibly bright but never smarmy or pretentious. At the end of the first year of COVID, the firm he worked for did something wise and...Continue reading→

Anticipation is part of the joy A kazillion years ago, when I was a youngster, I wasn’t very good at waiting for Christmass. It seemed to take forever to get here and then it was swiftly gone. The ache and yearning leading up to this great feast was unbearable. I just wished that it was...Continue reading→

Of Hiddenness Today's Parables and the story of Jesus’ thwarted ministry are all about hiddenness. Parable 1 is all about the treasure which lies dormant and hidden in a field until the prospector finds it. Apparently by accident. The treasure is so fantastic that he hides it again, sells everything, absolutely everything, and buys the...Continue reading→

It doesn’t matter what you believe… or does it? The trailer for the film looked great. Lots of fast-moving action and ‘how are they ever going to get out of this’ type of agility. There were lashings of special effects, impossibly gorgeous people and the rugged strong jawline of a masculine hero. Hec, what’s not...Continue reading→

The less said the better These words are an echo from a childhood memory that I can barely recall. Certainly, the context and place are lost to me now. But, I can still hear my mother saying, rather firmly as I recall… ‘And as for that other matter, the less said the better’! At the...Continue reading→

A different voice. Satara Uthayakumaran Since childhood, my liberal parents taught me that the pursuit of justice, human rights and compassion for the marginalised were all integrated with a loving divine being who created everyone equally. However, as I came to study analytical subjects such as English, history and ethics, and involved myself in human...Continue reading→

Three cheers for the Farmer. I was trying to explain to our very patient confirmation candidates the significance of the different colours that we use in church. Purple is our getting-ready colour. We use it to show that we are preparing for something special. So we wear purple for the 6 weeks of Lent when...Continue reading→

Embracing Our Imperfections It is a well-known fact that I am not articulate at tricky meetings. I always think of the diplomatic and soothing words many hours later. If only I had said this instead of that, then everything would have turned out far better. If we are honest, when we look in the mirror...Continue reading→

When you’re weary… “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”  I...Continue reading→

Meet Bellabot It was a convivial evening at a restaurant. You scanned in the QR code and ordered the food on your phone. Then, in a very short time, Bellabot came and delivered your food, right to your table. Bellabot is of course a robot. It has big charming eye’s, glides easily around and is...Continue reading→

Who did you help today? It was just a line from a novel. Hidden there, waiting for me to extricate it from page 256. Asking me to wrench it out of the paragraph and to exploit it mercilessly. To offer it to you dear reader for your consumption and enjoyment. Hoping that it might give...Continue reading→

The Righteous, The Prophets and the Children. While we are called to welcome absolutely everyone, in today’s gospel there are three groups of people that we are specifically asked to look out for. They are prophets, the righteous and little ones. In this day and age these words aren’t familiar to us and I wonder...Continue reading→

“The quieter you pray, the further you go.” It happened on the show ‘The antiques roadshow. Someone had proudly brought in a chair, a family heirloom. It had a few knocks and scratches but it was clearly loved and had been enjoyed by many bottoms over the decades. The chair had an inscription carved across...Continue reading→

Fear … our new opiate Mr Marx used to say that ‘Religion was the opiate of the people.’ That is, religion is a facile drug used to calm and placate us when the going got a bit boisterous. He would argue that Religion gave us illusory happiness, a bit like smoking something you shouldn’t or...Continue reading→

Compassion enfleshed. Today’s gospel is thrilling and action-packed. There is a lot going on. While Jesus travels, he teaches, proclaims, and heals and that’s just the ministry we’re told about. Whew! That’s enough you would have thought but no... Matthew tells us that there is more to do. Jesus sees the crowds, feels compassion and...Continue reading→

The sweetness of doing nothing It was a simple line really. Something I heard in passing from the lips of Julia Roberts in the film Eat, love, pray. It’s also a book by Sophie Minchilli. The words have kind of lingered close to me ever since. The sweetness of doing nothing. On the surface of it,...Continue reading→

The first edition of the 10 commandments. In last week’s homily I hinted that God had to have two goes at writing the 10 commandments. The first lot met a catastrophic end and this is how they came to be destroyed. Moses goes up the mountain to get the 10 commandments and leaves Aaron his...Continue reading→

Of Kate and Doug In the Adelaide Botanic Gardens, we chanced upon a bamboo plantation. Pretty much every trunk had some names, dates and love hearts carved into it. One of them proudly announced that Kate and Doug were absolutely smitten with each other. Well… at least they were on 1/2/18. That was five years...Continue reading→