Dear brothers and sisters,

Word of God for the week: 1 Co 10:31
Whatever you eat, whatever you drink, whatever you do at all, do it for the glory of God.

Q&A: Why does every human being have a desire for God?
In creating man in his own image, God has made the desire to see him part of every human heart.  Even if this desire is often ignored, God never ceases to draw each person to himself, because only in God will a human being find and live the fullness of truth and happiness for which he or she never stops searching.  By the very fact he or she is a human being, and by the fact each of us is called by God, every human being is a religious being, capable of entering into communion with God.  It is this intimate and vital bond with God that gives us our human dignity.

A challenge to men this Lent!
Men can join Fr Josh in the Exodus program this Lent.  It includes meeting as a group once a week, fasting on Wednesdays and Fridays, giving up desserts, alcohol, tv and video games, a daily holy hour, exercise of some kind 3 times a week – and brief cold showers.  The point is not to earn salvation, but to help us open up to God’s grace, grow in fraternity, and grow in personal freedom.  Sign up by emailing Fr at: [email protected]

An opportunity for women this Lent.
Women can join a similar program – with no cold showers – with the Dominican sisters in the Magnify program this Lent.  Please register with the sisters via: [email protected].

Stations of the Cross during Lent
Stations of the cross will be prayed every Friday in Lent at 7:00pm. On Good Friday, the stations will be at 10am.

Change in use of the screens during mass
Something we are trying this year is keeping the screens in the church just for the hymns.  There are many good reasons for this.  One reason is: why do the words of the mass need to be on a screen at all?  For what reason?  Secondly, because it’s not required by the liturgy – even the latest Instruction of the Roman Missal makes no mention of them.   A third reason is to increase actual participation in the Mass as Vatican II asked for: in this way, most of our attention will be focused back to our unity with each other in the sanctuary – not absorbed most of the Mass, as screens are made to do, by the screens. A fourth reason is this will help free up the time for our parish secretary to work on more important things which are waiting to be done.  Another is to embrace Pope Francis’ teaching about how screens are an obstacle to our relationships with God and each other.  There are other important reasons.  This doesn’t mean that on the rare occasions we have non-Catholic visitors to the church they don’t have access to the responses – the mass cards are available: and this is a good opportunity for us to welcome people, not with a screen but personally, by offering them a card with a warm smile and making them feel welcome, which is very important.

Welcoming the cross for a week
During Lent three parishes – Auburn, Berala and Lidcombe – will be taking turns welcoming a big wooden cross for the week.  On Sunday afternoon 10 March whoever wishes will be processing with the cross (including stations of the cross) from Lidcombe to Auburn, then on 17 March from Auburn to Berala, and then 24 March from Berala to Lidcombe.  For the week of 17 March Berala will be having special activities based around the cross every day until the cross leaves us to go to Lidcombe.  Details soon.

Yours in Our Lord,

J+