12 Months Later

It's hard to think that a year has passed since those magical days when our Holy Father came to visit the faithful in Britain. I was there! Here are some highlights from Day One...

World Youth Day success...

An aerial view of the 1.5 million who turned out for the closing Mass of World Youth Day in Madrid.

The 26th World Youth Day has come to an end. What a great success it turned out to be.

There are some lovely video clips of the ceremonies available via our Congregation homepage. Take a look here. If you have the time, take a look at some of Pope Benedict's addresses too. Always well worth reading.

England Prepares for the Pope

Pope Benedict XVI will visit the United Kingdom from Thursday 16th September to Sunday 19th September 2010.

I'm in Reading at the moment and will be back in Ireland at the end of the week for the Youth 2000 Youth Festival at Clonmacnois. While I've been here I've noticed that the parishes and the people are making preparations for the visit of our Holy Father in September.

The official website for the visit has plenty of material including the official programme for the Pope's tour which begins in Scotland on September 16th. The Pope will spend Friday 17th and Saturday 18th September in London and will bring the visit to a climax on Sunday 19th September in Birmingham.

"Start Blogging" - Pope

The late Pope John Paul surfing the net...

Yes, it's official. Pope Benedict XVI has told us to start blogging!

The Holy Father makes the appeal in his message for World Communications Day.

"The world of digital communication, with its almost limitless expressive capacity, makes us appreciate all the more Saint Paul’s exclamation: “Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel” (1 Cor 9:16)," he writes.

Our mission, he says, is to help "the men and women of our digital age to sense the Lord’s presence, to grow in expectation and hope, and to draw near to the Word of God which offers salvation and fosters an integral human development."

"As new technologies create deeper forms of relationship across greater distances, [we] are called to respond pastorally by putting the media ever more effectively at the service of the Word."

You can read the full text of the Pope's message at the Vatican website. Click here.

Asleep in the Hay...

Our Christmas Crib in the Hallway in Glasthule

Well, I'm back in Glasthule again after my Christmas holiday with my family in Cork. I escaped the worst of the weather in Dublin by being down there. The thaw is in full swing and all the snow has melted now in front of our house here.

Our crib is still up and I thought I'd share a pic of it with you. And while we're thinking of cribs, here's a meditation on the shepherds from Pope Benedict's Christmas Eve homily...



"The first thing we are told about the shepherds is that they were on the watch – they could hear the message precisely because they were awake. We must be awake, so that we can hear the message. We must become truly vigilant people. What does this mean? The principal difference between someone dreaming and someone awake is that the dreamer is in a world of his own. His “self” is locked into this dreamworld that is his alone and does not connect him with others. To wake up means to leave that private world of one’s own and to enter the common reality, the truth that alone can unite all people."



Are you awake to what Christ might be calling you to in 2010?