Holy Mass - St Agatha's Celebration - 27/02/2022 - Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time (C)

[Music] do [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] hey [Music] [Music] so so [Music] [Music] shhh [Music] [Music] hmm [Music] so [Music] oh [Music] and everyone [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] and uh me [Music] is [Music] good morning everyone and welcome to the celebration of mass on this special day as we gather to celebrate our parish feasts we offer this mass for mannequin matthews who died recently and for rosario randullah who also passed away recently that god in his love and mercy grant them a happy place in his kingdom let us pray in thanksgiving to god for desiree on her seventh birthday and all those who celebrate their birthdays today that god may bless them and their families we remember in a special way members of our parish whose sacrifice has given us what we have today this this beautiful church we pray in a special way for edward donnelly and all those who have made sacrifices in the past including those who have now gone to heaven that god may reward them with eternal life and for our current members especially those who are making various sacrifices in various ways most importantly those whose sacrifices is not even known that god may bless each and every one of you we gather today as members of one family from different parts of the world here in our parish we have people from over 40 different nationalities if not more than 50 and today is a reminder that even though we have come from different parts of the world we form one body we all are brothers and sisters united by the water of baptism and so in this mass i would like to pray i would like us to pray for the people of ukraine for peace between ukraine and russia that god may touch the hearts of the leaders to know that we all are children of god we are one people made in the image and likeness of god and having gone through all the sadness sufferings and challenges of the pandemic the world cannot afford to lose more people so let us pray that god we restore peace to the troubled parts of the world especially in ukraine and with this in mind i invite you to bring your other petitions together as we begin this mass in the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit the grace of our lord jesus christ and the love of god and the communion of the holy spirit be with you all dear brothers and sisters let us acknowledge our sins and so prepare ourselves to celebrate the sacred mysteries i confess almighty god and to you my brothers and sisters that i have greatly sinned in my thoughts and in my words in what i have done and what i have failed to do through my fault through my fault through my most previous form therefore i ask the blessed man all industry and you my brothers and sisters [Music] may almighty god have mercy on us forgive us our sins and bring us to everlasting life [Music] me oh [Music] um [Music] sweetie [Music] [Music] so [Music] oh [Music] [Music] foreign oh [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh oh [Music] [Music] let us pray grant us o lord we pray that the cause of our word may be directed by your peaceful rule and that your church may rejoice and troubled in her devotion through our lord jesus christ your son who lives and reigns within the unity of the holy spirit god forever and ever please remain standing [Music] [Music] is [Music] oh [Applause] [Music] oh [Music] [Music] a reading from the book of ecclesiastes in a shaken sieve the rubbish is left behind so too the defects of a man appear in his talk the kin tests the work of the potter the test of a man is in his conversation the orchard where the tree grows is judged on the quality of its fruit similarly a man's words betray what he feels do not praise a man before he has spoken since this is the test of men the word of the lord [Music] [Music] lord it is good to give thanks to you [Music] lord it is good to give thanks to you [Music] it is good to give thanks to the lord to make music to your name almost high to proclaim your love in the morning and your truth in the watches of the night lord it is good to give to you [Music] the lord will flourish like a palm tree and grow like a living lord it is good to give to you planted in the house of the lord they will flourish in the courts of heart god still bearing fruit when they are old still full of stop still green to proclaim that the lord is just in him my rock there is no wrong lord it is good to give thanks to you a reading from the first letter of saint paul to the corinthians when this perishable nature has put on imperishability and when this mortal nature has put on immortality then the words of scripture will come true death is swallowed up in victory that where is your victory death where is your sting now the sting of death is sin and sin gets its power from the law so let us thank god for giving us the victory through our lord jesus christ never given then my dear brothers never admit defeat keep on working at the lord's work always knowing that in the lord you cannot be laboring in vain the word of the lord [Music] [Music] how [Music] shine on the world like bright stars you are offering it the word of life [Music] um [Music] the lord be with you a reading from the holy gospel according to luke [Music] jesus told a parable to his disciples can one man can one blind man guide another surely both will fall into a pit the disciple is not superior to his teacher the fully trained disciple will always be like his teacher why do you observe the splinter in your brother's eye and never notice the plank in your own how can you say to your brother brother let me take out the splinter that is in your eye when you cannot see the plank in your own hypocrite take the plant out of your own eye first and then you will see clearly enough to take out the splinter that in your brother's eye there is no sound tree that produces rotten fruit nor again a rotten tree that produces sound fruit for every tree can be told by its own fruit people do not pick figs from thorns nor gather grapes from brambles a good man draws what is good from the stores of goodness in his heart a bad man draws what is bad from the stores of badness for a man's words flow out of what fills his heart the gospel of the lord [Music] today we gather to celebrate our oneness our the what binds us together as a family this family of the nagatas we see today we got was established many many years ago over 160 years ago and for some of us here you might not know this is the third church of senegas the first one was built when i was not even born and maybe some of us here as well and then there was a second one which many of you may now know the one on the high street on the other side of the shopping center which has now become amazing something amazing grace and this is the third one but this beautiful church which you see was made possible as a result of the generosity of so many people but most importantly of one person called edward donnelly he bequeathed his land to the church which was sold and the proceeds was used to build this church today we have gathered from different parts of the world to become members of this one family of senators which is great and as we gather here today we enjoy the sacrifices of all these wonderful men and women who have toyed and labeled day and night whose sacrifice has made what we have today possible so the next question is what sacrifice am i going to make towards this church for the future generation because there are many people who come to mass in this parish including those who participate in our mass online who have never been here but have we ever asked ourselves what can i do for the future generation that we come maybe hundreds of years from now a lot of us today come to mass we just go and then we we come attend mass and we walk away have we have you ever thought of what you can do to make this parish your family just think of it in our own houses in our own families if you are a member of a family you don't care about how food is placed on the table who pays for the water bill who does this who does that your job is just to eat leave the dishes on the table and then you walk away can you call yourself a very good family member but i think what some of us do are a little bit close to that and there are some others who make tremendous sacrifices i'm saying this because each time we call out for volunteers or for people to assist is the same people all the time and then the question is where are the rest we have so many young people here in this parish but if you go to our youth meeting it's only a handful of people you find what's happening where are the young people who are the leaders of the church today and tomorrow so i want to challenge you today to make this parish your own it is your parish it is your family it doesn't belong to the priests there have been many parish priests here before many assistant priests today father stanley and i are here tomorrow will be gone other people will come priests will always come and go but parishioners will remain some of you were baptized in this church you were confirmed here you made your first communion here you did your wedding here your children are baptized here you'll be buried from here so this is your home why not just make it your home and i on this note i want to thank all those who have been making a lot of sacrifices each time we ask people to come for help each time we need someone to do something may god bless each and every one of you today's reading have some blessings for us that you can tell a person the quality of a person by the pro by the uh by the content of that person's heart and in the first reading written by ben sirak about a hundred years before the birth of christ says the lips is the window or the door through which you can see the heart the what someone says can tell you who they are many years later about 100 years later in our gospel reading today jesus came and said the same thing that a bad tree cannot bear good fruit neither can a good tree bear bad fruit the gospel reading today was a summary the climax of his teaching on the plane which he taught in our gospel reading in the past few sundays you remember last sunday he came up with that hard and difficult teaching about love of enemy praying for those who persecute you and so on and so forth and we saw the example in the life of david and saul in our first reading how david forgave saul his enemy and so today jesus is telling his disciple that to become leaders in the christian community even in our families we require an insight or a foresight we need to have our inner eyes open because there is no way one blind man can lead the order the boat will fall into a pit remember the time of jesus blind people need people to guide them unlike today when modern technologies have made life easier for people with disabilities that even blind people now can go to anywhere in the world they wish to go to at the time of jesus it was impossible like that to be able to guide others to give good example we must have our inner eyes wide open we cannot be spiritually blind if we have to lead people in a spiritual way and as parents we are the spiritual leaders of our families just like the bishop the priests the deacons and other religious leaders are the spiritual leaders of the family of god's people so to become a leader to guide people spiritually you must have your spiritual eyes wide open and in our second in that same god's puritan jesus also sent a notice in a message of warning to us that as we live together in a christian family like in a parish setting we must be careful about quick being quick to judge others because sometimes it is very easy to sit back and pass judgment on people on a personal note i love sports but my favorite sport is soccer and when i sit down to watch soccer match i can tell when a player makes a mistake and you know when you are watching you play better than the person on the pitch when they take the ball towards one side and they didn't score you say oh if i were him i would have gone the other way until you get into the pitch and then you know how difficult it is to to do it so it's very easy to sit and judge other people and jesus said before we pass judgment on others we should make an inward journey back into ourselves and see what we are judging others for whether we have something like that in our life he gave a parable of someone with a plank in their eyes and they are trying who is trying to take the splinter from another person's eye because sometimes we judge wrongly because we've got this plank in our eyes we can't see clearly by the time you remove the plank from your eyes then you can see clearly and what you think was a splinter may be nothing at all so in a christian community what we say should encourage others to make them feel uplifted and not putting them down but most of the times we gossip we give people bad names we say all sorts of things about them behind their back sometimes this happened in the carriage in the parish car part two thank god catholics don't gossip isn't it catholics don't gossip today do today gossip i didn't say it it's you who said it jesus is telling us that we should always try to make an inward journey back into our life the season of lent which begins this wednesday is a golden opportunity for us to be able to sit every day and to re-examine our conscience it was socrates who once said unexamined life is not worth living we need to constantly re-examine our conscience think positive about ourselves and then we can think positive about others because what we say about others is a pro product of our heart and that is why jesus said a bad tree cannot produce good fruit so for you to be able to say good things about others you must be able to first of all think good about them but how can you think good about people when you don't even think good about yourself because many people today what they see about themselves is all negative we don't see anything good about ourselves we forgot the fact that god made us wonderfully and fearfully according to the psalms and when he made us he knows that all everything was good there was no mistake about your making so why do you think why do you always see the negative side of your life even though you may not be the person you want to be you may not even be the person god has designed you to be but like i always say to you has god told you that he has finished with you has god told you that he has given up on you he has accepted you the way you are so accept yourself ask for more grace to work on yourself so let us not be quick to pass judgment on people because judging people will make us to be subject to the same amount of judgment ourselves so my dear brothers and sisters today we thank god for this family of god senators that has grown so much over the last many years and today also we thank god that as a parish we are able to give birth to another church the church of saint thomas the apostle it has taken this parish almost 150 years to give back to one church just imagine a woman who can only give back after 150 years that's not a wonderful thing isn't it so let us try our best work together as a parish as a family and see how we can multiply from what we are now i want to thank you for all your sacrifices especially those of you who despite the difficult challenges and economic crises in the last few years have been able to make financial contributions to the parish and those who even though cannot contribute financially have given so much time to doing work here in the parish i am very grateful to all of you and i also thank those of you who have given us your leaders moral support those who have encouraged us in many ways through your prayers through your generosity and your kind words we are very grateful to you too i also want to thank all our volunteers the choirs the letters extraordinary ministers alter savers counters collectors cleaners and all of you who have been working in this parish day at night just to make things become what it is today we are very grateful to you we pray god to bless each and every one of you and for those of you who are coming new into our parish you are welcome you know i've always said to people there are only two parishes in australia isn't it santa gatas and the rest isn't it so if you are a senator then you are one of the best parishes in the world and what makes it the best is you it is the best parish because you are here so we pray god to bless you all our newcomers to be able to find your way to become part of this wonderful family once again thank you for all your generosities and your sacrifices may god bless you yes [Music] check so so please stand as we profess our faith i believe in god almighty death creator father and in jesus christ must conceive of the spirit of the virgin memory whatever conscious mind is crucified by the spirit [Music] dear brothers and sisters saint paul reminds us today that labor in laboring in the lord's vineyard is not in vain in this spirit we present our petitions before god the father we pray for we pray for pope francis bishop greek and the leaders of our church through their words may we be strengthened in our faith lord hear us [Music] we pray may ameritus pope benedict who resigned as bishop of rome nine years ago tomorrow find in his life of prayer peace and tranquility and offer his sufferings for the good of the church lord hear us lord hear amen we pray for all those whose lives have been upended and and scarred by war and especially today for the people of ukraine as they contemplate a frightening uncertain future may they find places of refuge and safety and may they be sustained by god's peace and comfort lord hear us we pray for the leaders of our world may they act with wisdom courage and unity to find a way towards peace lord hear us [Music] we pray for our community of sanegatha as we interact with others may we take care that our words do not wound or discourage lord hear us [Music] we pray for those who have died in hope of immortality especially priscilla vasquez rose stevenson monica matthews rosario ronaldo granada and sheila anthony recently deceased and we pray for those whose anniversary of death occur about this time and whose names appear in this week's bulletin lord hear us [Music] for the peace in our world and particularly for the ends to the war between russia and ukraine let us in into let us invoke the intercession of mary the queen of peace to intercede for us as we say hail mary full of grace the lord is with thee blessed are the among women and blesses the fruit of thy womb jesus holy mary mother of god pray for us sinners lord god by the grace of your son may we flourish in our christian faith and bear the fruit of good works for he lives and reigns forever and ever amen please be seated [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] pray my dear brothers and sisters that our sacrifice may be acceptable to god the almighty father we bring you these sacrificial gifts o lord to commemorate blessed agatha humbly and treating that she may bestow on us both pardon and salvation through christ our lord the lord be with you lift up your hearts let us give thanks to the lord our god it is truly right and just our duty and our salvation always and everywhere to give you thanks lord holy father almighty and eternal god for you lay the foundations of the world and have arranged the changing of times and seasons you formed man in your own image and set humanity over the whole world in all its wonder to rule in your name over all you have made and forever praise you in your mighty works through christ our lord and so with all the angels we praise you as in joyful celebration we acclaim [Music] [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] you are indeed holy o lord the fount of all holiness make holy therefore these gifts we pray by sending down your spirit upon them like the dewfall so that they may become for us the body and blood of our lord jesus christ at the time he was betrayed and entered willingly into his passion he took bread and giving thanks broke it gave it to his disciples saying take this all of you and eat of it for this is my body which will be giving up for you in a similar way when supper was ended he took the chalice and once more giving thanks gave it to his disciples saying take this all of you and drink from it for this is the chalice of my blood the blood of the new and eternal covenant which will be poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins do this in memory of me they missed harry of faith [Music] oh [Music] therefore as we celebrate the memorial of his death and resurrection we offer you lord the bread of life and the chalice of salvation giving thanks that you have held us worthy to be your presence and minister to you humbly we pray that partaking of the body and blood of christ we may be gathered into one by the holy spirit remember lord your church spread throughout the world and bring her to the fullness of charity together with francis our pope gregory our bishop and all the clergy remember also our brothers and sisters who have fallen asleep in the hope of resurrection and all who have died in your mercy welcome them into the light of your face have mercy on us all we pray that with the blessed virgin mary mother of god with the blessed joseph her spouse with the blessed apostles and all the saints especially saint agatha whose feast day we celebrate today who have pleased to you throughout the ages we may merit to be choice to eternal life and may praise and glorify you through your son jesus christ through him and with him and in him o god almighty father in the unity of the holy spirit all gloria no norrisos forever [Music] [Applause] [Music] at the savior's command and formed by the divine teaching we dare to say our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation deliver us lord we pray from every evil graciously grant peace in our days that by the help of your mercy we may be always free from sin and safe from all distress as we await the blessed hope and the coming of our savior jesus christ [Music] lord jesus christ you say to your apostles peace i leave you my peace i give you look not on our sins but on the faith of your church graciously grant her peace and unity in accordance with your will who live and reign forever and ever may the peace of the lord be with you always and let us offer each other the sign of peace [Music] is [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] behold the lamb of god behold him who takes away the sins of the world blessed are those called to the supper of the lamb i'm not worthy that you should enter under my roof but only say a word on my social hmm so so [Music] so [Music] called oh [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] so [Music] oh [Music] please [Applause] [Music] my every day [Music] is [Music] now [Music] now [Music] is [Music] um [Music] so [Music] so [Music] [Music] um [Music] [Music] me [Music] oh [Music] [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh my god oh let us pray nourished by your saving gifts we beseech your mercy lord that by this same sacrament which with which you feed us in the present age you may make us partakers of life eternal through christ our lord please be seated i would like to invite the children preparing for first reconciliation to now proceed to the back and place their form in the basket on the offer tree table today the celebration of our parish feast will be marked in a very low key and i guess you all know why due to the covet and its restrictions though a lot of restrictions have been lifted but we still have to be cautious about how we go about things and so there is a last minute change of plans the procession after the mass will be accompanied by the flag bearers the candle bearers the altar savers the priests and anyone who wish to join but we encourage you to stay back if you can't stay back while the choir will remain in the church and continue to sing is going to be a very short procession we will go out through the main entrance and walk around they run about and then we come back to the church after that we give the final blessing normally what we do we go all of us god in procession to the school hall where we continue with the rest of the celebration but all that has been cut out this year hopefully by next year when things get better then we can celebrate the feast day proper please bear with us this is a way to keep all of us safe and to keep you safe as well we i would like i'm pleased to announce to you that we have had two successful applicants for the position of the assistant secretary of the parish which now has gone been given to nona mata to moa so she is now our new assistant secretary and john mcdonald is our new gardener and maintenance man so they are members of our parish we thank all those who apply for the position and we thank even those from the archdiocese and other parishes as well we receive a lot of applicants but we are happy that god has granted us to these people please make them feel welcome to the parish and to the parish staff members whenever you see them one of our parishioners who now is a seminarian of this diocese mark hughes will be raised to the order of diaconate here in our parish on saturday the 12th of march the ceremony will be conducted by the bishop and all the clergy members of the diocese it will be a big day for our parish here that we are given the opportunity to witness the accurate nation the ceremony will begin at 11 o'clock in the morning and we are expecting at least 20 priests to be in attendance so we encourage you parishioners to please join us and his family to pray for him as we raise him to the order of diaconate and so mark has invited you also to join him after the ceremony in the parish hall for some receptions wednesday is ash wednesday and that marks the beginning of lengthening season pope francis have asked all catholics and christians across the world to pray and fast for ukraine that might be the only opportunity we can make sacrifice for the peace of the world and so we have four masses [Music] that will be celebrated here on that day the first mass will be at 9 30 in the morning which will also be live stream to those who may not be able to attend mass on that day there will be midday mercy at 12 noon 5 p.m and 7 p.m respectively ashes will be given to those who are not able to come to church to their family members to take home and administer to them which means if you have members of your family in a nursing home or cannot come to church the sacrifice is a christian or the sisters will be available in the in the sacristy to give you an ash to take home with you but if you can come to mass please attend mass here on that day or any nearest church to your place of work it is a holiday of obligation and we are required to fast if you have not celebrated your 60th birthday but have already celebrated your 18th birthday those outside this egg bracket are required to abstain from meat 60 16. sixteen and eight okay so if you don't if you even if you fall within this age bracket and for some medical reasons you cannot fast please don't fast so we encourage you to please make use the bet the best use of that day of holy holiday of obligation and as you know in the season of lent we have stations of the cross here at 7 p.m every friday which begins on this friday but because this friday is first friday of the month there will be a mass at 7 30 after the sessions of the cross we also encourage you to please grab a box for the project compassion which was organized by caritas australia the last two years we have not been able to support those who i need through them but this year we have the boxes in the foyer for you to take home and to be returned before or on good friday so if you wish to take home there are boxes available on the foyer table letters and extraordinary ministers are reminded of their new training session this thursday and the parents of the children making their first reconciliation are reminded of their parent-child workshop which will take place on the on march the 9th at 5 p.m and 7 p.m and on thursday the 10th of march at 7 pm here in the church respectively there are other important information in the bulletin please check for your updates and so once again i would like to thank all of you thanks father stanley for his wonderful work while i was on holiday and for all the work he has been doing in this parish in the last few years since he has been with us and we thank all our alter savers and all those who helped with today's mass so after the this now we are going to commence with a uh procession and then when we come back from there i'll give the final blessing we invite those who will be carrying the flag to please come forward and grab your flag and then those who be carrying are the statue of saint agatha to please come forward as well as we begin the procession from the church altar savers can you please take your candle and the crucifix and lead us in this procession thank you like i said if you want to join the procession feel free to join us otherwise stay in the church while the choir continue to sing we go around at the roundabout here and then we return back to the church for the final blessing thank you [Music] is [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] ah [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] [Music] oh oh [Music] oh [Music] once again thank you very much for your participation this year we are very grateful to you and we pray that things will get better next year when we can have better celebration i would like to thank all those who came in their native hotel you all look beautiful and great and we thank all of you for especially those who volunteered to join us with a parish with their national flags the lord be with you may almighty god bless you the father the son and the holy spirit go in the peace of christ and glorify the lord by your life [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] uh [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] see [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: St Agathas Parish, Cranbourne

Views: 1,657

Keywords: homily, catholic homily, word of god, scriptures, sermon, catholic sermon, catholic preaching, catholic word of god, catholic scriptures, catholic study, catholic theology, theology, scripture study

Id: B2LG0DyCIss

Length: 87min 36sec (5256 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 26 2022