March 2021: Prayers and Reflections

The Pope’s Monthly Intentions

Evangelisation: The Sacrament of Reconciliation.

Let us pray that we may experience the Sacrament of Reconciliation with renewed depth to taste the mercy of God.

 

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St David • 1 March

I have seen David with the Gospel and the Altar in his caravan. He brought the Church into our homes,put the sacred vessels on the kitchen table, and he took bread from the pantry and wine from the cellar, and stood behind the altar like a tramp, so as not to hide from us the wonder of the sacrifice.

D. Gwenallt Jones – St David

 

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When the communists load me into the hull of the ship with 1500 prisoners to be transported north, I share their suffering, panic and desperation. I say to myself:

‘In truth, Lord, here is my cathedral.’

Archbishop Nguyen Van Thuan – Five Loaves and Two Fish

 

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Saint Patrick • 17 March

The Book of Armagh tells us that Patrick wished the Irish to have two phrases on their lips, Kyrie Eleison and Deo Gratias; Lord have mercy and Thanks be to God. It is between these two prayers that we will find the fullness of life – trusting in the forgiveness of the One who loves us and eternally grateful for everything.

Early Irish Saints – John J. Ó Riordáin CSsR

 

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St Joseph, husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary • 19 March

‘The virtues of St Joseph have been the object of ecclesial reflection down through the centuries, especially the more recent centuries. Among those virtues the following stand out: faith, with which he fully accepted God’s salvific plan; prompt and silent obedience to the will of God; love for and fulfilment of the law, true piety, fortitude in time of trial; chaste love for the Blessed Virgin Mary, a dutiful exercise of his paternal authority, and fruitful reticence’

Directory of  Popular Piety and the Liturgy, 219

 

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The Age of Anxiety

… this stupid world where

Gadgets are Gods, and we go on talking,

Many about much, but remain alone,

Alive but alone, belonging – where?

Unattached as tumbleweed.

W.H. Auden

 

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The Annunciation of the Lord • 25 March

Lord, within me there is a new spark of life.

With this new life you have given me the gift of motherhood.

You have chosen me to be the mother of this child.

Help me to say, like Mary: ‘Be it done unto me.’

Alethea Hayton – Prayer in Pregnancy

 

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Confessio of Patrick

I am Patrick, a sinner, the most rustic and least of all the faithful, the most contemptible in the eyes of a great many people. My father was Calpornius, a deacon and the son of the presbyter Potitus. He came from the village of Bannaventaberniae where he had a country residence nearby. It was there that I was taken captive. I was almost sixteen at the time and I did not know the true God. I was taken into captivity to Ireland with many thousands of people. We deserved this fate because we had turned away from God; we neither kept his commandments nor obeyed our priests who used to warn us about our salvation. The Lord’s fury bore down on us and he scattered us among many heathen peoples, even to the ends of the earth. This is where I now am, in all my insignificance, among strangers.

taken from Patrick in his Own Words, Bishop Joseph Duffy, Veritas Publications, 2019