Newsletter - 24th July 2022
Finding God in all things
Dear brothers and sisters,
On the 31st of July we will celebrate the feast of St Ignatius of Loyola, a
spiritual master who brought to the Church a new way of praying and of getting into a relationship with God.
At the very end of the 30-day Spiritual Exercises retreat, Ignatius proposes a final meditation called “the contemplation to attain the love of God”. This
Exercise is considered as the exit door to the long retreat: after 30 days of prayer and meditation, the retreatant is to look for and find God in all things.
After spending 6 months in the parish and being about to meet my family in Mauritius for some time, I decided to pray with this meditation.
St Ignatius invites us to “ask what I desire; here it will be to ask for an intimate knowledge of the many blessings received, that filled with gratitude for all, I
may in all things love and serve the Divine Majesty” . Asking for what I desire implies that I am aware of what I want deeply, what is my own sincere desire
and what I want to bring to the Lord. I also considered the “many blessings received”: I have spent 6 months in the parish and the Lord has given many
blessings that I did not take time to acknowledge. Moreover, the grace asks for an “intimate knowledge” which is different from an external or superficial
knowledge, where one can read or hear things but not appropriate them. An intimate knowledge is personal and deep inside one’s heart, I am certain of it
and nothing can remove it. The second part of the grace is to respond to the blessings received by loving and serving in all things. Shifting from
acknowledging the blessings of God to responding by loving and serving is a challenge and may seem unachievable. But a grace is to be received: the Lord
himself triggers and enables the full response to his blessings, he enables me to love and serve in all things.
We are about to break for summer holidays. Some of us will move for a couple of weeks, children will change class or even school, and for all of us – even for
those who stay here with no apparent change – we will move to something different in August. Even the parish will propose a single Sunday mass in
August for a change. Is it not a right moment to ask for this grace, to thank the Lord for the year ended and to receive from him the gift to love and serve in all things?
Thank you for your warm welcome in the parish throughout these months and for all you have shared with me. This has deepened my understanding of
God’s love for both you and me. I look forward to seeing you soon.
God bless.
Fr Pascal Sullivan, ccn
Focus of the Week
Sunday morning Masses
During August we will be combining the two Sunday morning masses into one mass at 10.00am (tea and coffee will still be provided after this mass).