OF YOU MY HEART HAS SPOKEN

It’s funny where a reading can take you. Moses on the west side of the wilderness brings my mind to a kind of wilderness of the West of Ireland. The Bog. Not that it’s confined to the West but that’s where I have known it, this very Irish reality. Bogland has yielded up turf to generations of Irish people, gift of the earth to us, this God-given gift that has warmed the homes of countless families when there was little or nothing else to keep them warm. Turf has given us the fire on which the kettle was boiled for the tea. On it bread was baked and dinners cooked. It gave our homes an unparalled atmosphere, feeding the contemplative spirit by which we gazed in long silence upon its flame, learning our own lessons there. It facilitated companionship, the gathering of people around the open fire in night-time conversations and music. The Rosary and other prayers prayed there. The harvesting of turf speaks of good neighbourliness, people out working together, helping each other out. ...

The noble face of a Brazilian Pallottine, taken in Vale Veneto 2008 Frangled is what I feel. Like every nerve in my body is frazzled and jangled. Thought frangled was a non-word but discovered it does in fact exist in the Urban dictionary where it is defined as, “Mixed up or lightly tossed; a cross between frizzle and mangled ” Lightly tossed is what I am not. Mangled maybe! I feel hemmed in, trapped in a traffic jam in my car and it seems like Hastings is besieged on all sides by endless roadworks and there is no escape. My frustration boils over within the confines of my own space and I feel demeaned by it, ashamed. So I force my mind back to something more noble. My encounter with Colm in St. Raphael’s ward at St. Anne’s Mental Health Centre. Interesting that a secular place of healing should be dedicated to two Saints. Colm is seated on a chair in the corridor, head bowed, cap shading his eyes, faced in the direction of the locked door. He is surely hemmed in – within this physica...

Young Jack Six or seven years ago I spotted Jack sitting against the windowsill by the back door of my house. He was dressed in his signature black tracksuit, and he looked at me sideways with a very shy kind of a smile. He didn't ask for anything, but something in me said that he would at some point. That he would make his way into my life and that is exactly what he did. He became part of our life here, mostly looking for help in whatever way he could get it.  Over the years, I came to like him. Came to love him. A bond of friendship developed between us, and I must confess that my helping him was not always the best. He knew how to get out of me what I shouldn't have given him, but we were connected. We did come in some way to belong to each other, and he saw me as a father. It was surprising a couple of years ago as we stood in the centre aisle of the church he said to me, "I want my funeral to take place here and I want you to do it", and of course, I said th...

    “From the womb before the dawn I begot you…” (Psalm 110)   Maura Monson, Andrew Molloy, Eamonn Monson, Rosaleen Monson & Noreen Carr A Sunday morning sky of two parts. To the West an ominous deep blue grey, to the East the astonishing unfolding of dawn. Hundreds of screeching, swirling seagulls are black against the emerging light and strangely luminous against the dark clouds. I’ve been up since shortly after 3am, waking as I often do now in the fourth watch of the night – that period between 3 and 6am that’s spoken of in the Bible. It was during this watch that Jacob wrestled with God and during this watch that Jesus walked on water. I was born during this watch at 3.30am and for many years I could not sleep until after that time, my nights being a constant battle, a time of conflict and injury. Now I tend to sleep early and wake up during the fourth watch and it is a quiet, peaceful, blessed experience. Perhaps I am being brought to new birth. We’re told that i...

Home alone in the tranquility of Ceannt Avenue on a cold, early January morning.  Spotify spontaneously throws up George Michael singing Jesus to a Child, a song that Maura loved. It’s immediately followed by Françoise Hardy with whom Maura is associated in our family. It's all about Maura.  And going through an old diary from 20 years ago I came on this poem (below) that I wrote in stages following her death.  Divine Providence brings all these things to my attention right now for some reason. Perhaps one person who needs it will stumble upon this post. And though the thought of her still brings tears of love to my eyes,  I bear no sorrow for myself but pray for anyone struggling long with grief. i Some people are great At telling you how To grieve  Or not Not this long anyway  Only the Swan Of the damaged wing And attentive eye Would ever allow this Length of time  These years But she allows it This ageing grief That will not Let go completely  ...

“You have been trusted to look after something precious. Guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.” (2 Timothy 1:14) The Miraculous Icon of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa is very precious to the people of Poland where it has been venerated for about 600 years. One theory about its origin says that it was painted by St. Luke on a pine tabletop that came from the house of the Holy Family in Nazareth. Since today is their feast day, I’m staying with this connection to their home. In early November my friend of almost 50 years, Father John Fitzpatrick entrusted his precious copy of the famous icon to me and in his honour I have brought it lovingly back to my home in Hastings where I pray before it every day. It’s not a print but has been painted onto a piece of timber that resembles a small door. It is signed and dated 1979 which is the year after St. John Paul II became Pope. Like millions of Poles he went on pilgrimage to the original Icon, even doing so secretly durin...