New Awakenings - Mission Tuesday

Fr Matt and Fr Frank at Our Lady of Lourdes

On the day the Olympic torch is carried past our parish churches Fr Matt said, "The Holy Spirit is our torch, and like the runners we are called to pass it on.", so empowered with the Holy Spirit the mission moves into Tuesday.

Today, starting in Kingswood at Our Lady of Lourdes, we are directed to Prayer and we are shown ACTS as an example.
Prayer of Adoration,
Prayer of Contrition,
Prayer of Thanksgiving and
Prayer of Supplication.

Prayers of Adoration are prayers which express our love for God, Prayers of Contrition are sorrowful prayers expressing our sorrow for things we have done wrong, Prayers of Thanksgiving are a thank you for all that is good in our lives and the world, and Prayers of Supplication are our requests for Gods help.

Another type of prayer Fr Matt talk about was silent prayer. The quiet time you take to listen to God. In a conversation it's hard to hear other people if you are talking all the time. Fr. Matt suggested leaving periods of silence in our prayers, time to listen for Gods response. Silence isn't easy for most of us but when we find it, it is special. I remember when I was back in formation writing a thought for the day about silence, which I have dug out and is presented at the bottom of this post.

After our first Mass at 7am this morning we shared a wonderful breakfast together. There is something very special about breaking bread with your Christian brothers and sisters, particularly when that bread has been home baked. I think there were close to 30 of us at Mass and breakfast this morning from across all our parishes.

Deacon Peter examines the prayer cross

Next it was a quick dash across town to Downend, and St Augustine's. There must have been over 90 of us there, including Year 6 from St Augustine's school next door. The prayer cross was again standing in greeting at the doorway of the church.

Again we were challenged about our prayer lives and called to deepen our prayer over the next few days. This afternoon the mission moved back to Our Lady of Lourdes for a Service of Anointing of the Sick.

Finally, here's the though for the day I mentioned earlier. It was written to be read aloud with a short pause to allow the silence into its reading every time you see the dots.....

Silence

Last week I was sitting in the barbers waiting my turn and enjoying a few minutes of quite time. As I sat there I realised that my quiet time was anything but quiet. I could hear, 


the click of the scissors, 
the buzz of a razor, 
a conversation that I couldn't quite overhear, 
the rustle of newspaper pages, 
the scraping of a leather soled shoe on the lino floor
and a high pitched voice was singing on the radio.


My quiet time was missing something…. it was missing SILENCE.


Real silence… like that found at the top of a mountain… or in mum and dads back bedroom deep in the Irish countryside, that’s something really special… I don’t find it often, but when I do my heart lifts and I can’t help but smile….. Silence is where love creeps into a conversation….. It was silent when I first kissed my wife….. and silent again, when I realised I loved her….. I adore the silence in an empty church….. and the silence between lines of a prayer…..


A famous Frenchman once said, "A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away." So when you can, find yourself a moment of silence, and experience the perfection of a moment shared with God.