In today's Gospel Jesus is asking us to put our own house in order before trying to reform others. This is surely an appropriate invitation to all of us as we are about to begin the Holy season of Lent.

We ask parents/guardians who are planning their child's baptism to read the attached leaflet as preparation for the holy sacrament.

By following the example of Jesus we are asked to offer each other the hand of peace, reconciliation and forgiveness. Somebody has to have the courage to take the first step to stop the violence.

Our vocation as Christians is not to be first in this world, but rather to be first in the eyes of God. We are challenged to examine our present situation in the context of our ultimate horizon, the Kingdom of God.

You, too, are called to commit yourself wholeheartedly to the message of love and forgiveness brought to us by Jesus; you, too, must, in your own heart, leave everything and follow him.”

Jesus said I no longer call you servants, I call you friends.  He understood what friendship means and demands.

Just as Jesus had ‘the power of the Spirit within him’, just as the first apostles had the ‘power of the Spirit’ within them, we too have the ‘power of the Spirit’ within us.

In our present times of suffering, be they Omicron,  Climate change,  Political uncertainty, Poverty, Illness or death; our hope, our certainty rests in the person of Jesus, in his ‘Great Sign’, his ‘Great Hour’, when he died and rose again and is now with us, truly with us, until the end of time.