OF YOU MY HEART HAS SPOKEN

  Homily for July 19,2026

There is a small stone church on top of a hill about 10 km from the beautiful city of Salta in Argentina. It is the shrine of the Immaculate Mother of the Divine Eucharistic Heart of Jesus. I call her Our Lady of Salta. About twenty years ago, while on visitation as Provincial to the community in Mercedes, a man from the parish told me about the apparitions of Our Lady that were taking place in Salta and insisted that I should go. He was very sincere, but I didn’t want to get caught up in the hype of something that might not be true. I wanted no false visions, no false hope, no false religious experience. A second person in Mercedes — Marta, a friend of Derry — also spoke to me about it and was equally insistent. I had experienced her as a forthright, honest person. At that time, two challenging situations in Argentina were causing me great distress — encounters that had previously gone very badly wrong, harsh words spoken, hurt inflicted. The thought of facing them again was stressing...

In the early hours of July 4th 1976, five members of the Pallottine community at San Patricio, Belgrano, were taken from their beds and executed in the living room of their presbytery. It was during the era of military dictatorship in Argentina. +++ Everything that is now covered will be uncovered, and everything that is now hidden will be made clear. Jesus spoke these words to us a few weeks ago, reminding us that God scrutinises the heart and soul, uncovering what is hidden within us and revealing what is truly there. There are times when what God reveals to us about ourselves calls us to be converted, to change and to try to improve certain areas of our lives. But the scrutiny of God also seeks to uncover what is authentic within us: who we truly are, who I truly am, in my authentic self, deep within my heart and my soul. To uncover and to use it in His plan of salvation. I was walking in the garden at Pallotti House in Dublin, and I found an old statue of Our Lady propped up agains...

According to Your word I have laid bare my wound And have not disguised my sin With vague expressions of sorrow But named it for what it is So that Grace may find and heal And still Lord Nothing changes We go round and round The same circle Hoping against hope With despondency Kept at bay Is it thus that Pride is humbled? That I must learn again That Your Power Is at its best in weakness And Grace itself is enough? +++ ... a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses... For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:7-10)

A bold boy sitting at the back of an empty church when he should be at school. A complex, troubled boy who is threatened with the industrial school because he mitches and doesn’t do his homework. The teacher said he was a house angel and street devil. But to himself he was simply afraid and didn’t know how to explain it. So, he took daily refuge in the empty church, feeling that Jesus hidden in the Tabernacle somehow understood what no one else did, the thing that could not be put into words. That was me when I was ten years old. It is not me now, but I still possess the gift that was given me in adversity, a strong relationship with the hidden life of Jesus in the Tabernacle. St. Vincent Pallotti places great emphasis on the hidden life of Jesus in Nazareth, the life he lived away from public view from the age of twelve until He began His public ministry. The Tabernacle is my Nazareth. Forty years ago during a thirty-day Ignatian retreat, while praying before the Tabernacle in ...

O night O night You come to fight With me again And I take flight Into the wandering Avenues of my phone And hide And hide From all that assails The mind The body The soul O night O night That I might recognize The gate of heaven That you are And be a Jacob Wrestling For the injury And the blessing

“You have veiled the Godhead in a cloud, in the clay of our humanity” (St. Catherine Of Siena) The Image of God That you seek In the mirror Might not be The beauty you require Of yourself It may be more The Hidden wounds Of your heart Scars of your illness Sickness of soul Or perhaps you behold The bloodshot eyes of Christ Afflicted with addiction Jesus weeping harrowed tears Over the loss of a child An unspeakable grief It is the Face of God In you.

  I can’t stop writing in my head. It’s like everything I experience; I’m thinking about how I will write it. Or take a photo of it. And so, it is now, here in Our Lady of Silence Abbey where I’m spending two nights. The thought came to me in the chapel in Dundrum the other day when I was finding my mind to be rather frazzled and in need of some release. The time here is also an opportunity for me to say a personal farewell to a place that has blessed me for more than fifty years. We would come here occasionally on Sundays when we were students in Thurles in the 1970’s. I’ve always been attracted to the monastic and also to the fabulous brown bread that they used to bake here. We came here for our diaconate and ordination retreats in 1979 and 1980. The former took place during Holy Week when we had our feet washed by the then Prior Father Laurence who is still here in his nineties. A pillar of this community. At the washing of the feet he kissed our feet, something I had never ...

Jesus invites us  To consider the birds of the air To look at the flowers of the field To learn from them Gaze Consider Contemplate Listen to the beautiful song Of the blackbird and the robin Observe the flight of the swallow The soaring of the seagull In the blue blue sky I am inspired I am lifted up I am filled with their freedom Look at the variety of flowers in the garden The wild flowers of the field The majesty of the trees The beauty of a simple bush I am filled with their beauty  And their majesty And the wonder of the sun rising As it dissolves the darkness of the night And warms the cold of the morning And the sheer sheer beauty The majesty of the setting sun And I look at your face And there I behold a beauty like no other It is the beauty of love In all its shapes and forms and sizes Only you can love like you do  And that is your beauty Consider the love that you feel In your heart and in your body And your soul Consider that this is a reflection Of wha...

  Prayers for Healing offered at Mass in St. Patrick's Church, Corduff, Dublin on May 1, 2026 "Heal me Lord and I shall be healed, save me and I shall be saved, for You are my praise "  Jeremiah 17:14

Silence of Pallotti House Chapel "O sounding Song whose depth is sounding me...come to me disguised as everything"  (Malcolm Guite) A state of acute unworthiness! This is how I felt as I entered the chapel for morning prayer. Alone. Alone with the One, such is the definition of what a monk is. A man who is alone with the One. I am a monk then in that sense. It has been a lifelong fantasy of mine, to be a Cistercian monk in a monastery with all the Trappist trappings. I even asked Chatgpt to paint me a picture of me as a monk and that is what you have above. A fantasy. Not meant to be in the physical sense but it is there spiritually within me and I am living it now in that way. Thank God. In the chapel on the morning in question, there came to me again that silence, that incredible, absolute silence that is physical as well as everything; physical in that it inhabits the place, enfolding and filling me, so that I can only think that it is the Divine Silence, the Silence of Me...

Yesterday's Manna Is gone Its joy consumed A hunger Somewhat sated Enough Something similar Is given for today Not for tomorrow What seems the same Is new Enough Sufficient Unto the day I seek Nothing other Nothing more

  Homily for Good Shepherd Sunday 

Carve it In my bone Inscribe it In my heart Imprint it In my mind Shape it In my soul Breathe it In my every breath Your Name Lord Jesus Christ Son of God

Melifont Abbey: February 18-20, 2000 In 1999 I became spiritual director to “Ruah”, a small group of lay evangelizers, and in December of last year I suggested to them that it would be good for us to go to a monastery in order to experience a silence in which we could listen more attentively to God. It’s my constant belief that there is too much talking and not enough silence. So it was arranged that we would go to Melifont Abbey for this weekend. Six of the group travelled and as Brendan was here I decided to ask him to come along to keep me company. The two of us set off on a dirty Friday evening after what was a very hassled day for me. We arrived at the Abbey after dark, at 7.00 p.m., and were well received, though the reception was manic and extremely draining in many ways. Fr. William showed us to our rooms, gave us tea and talked to us for a long time. The guesthouse is lovely and old with all sorts of nooks and crannies. Dan, Pat and Louise were the first to arrive and after a...