Message of Abbot Paul - Monday 26th December 2022

​It was a great joy to welcome so many worshippers at our Christmas Masses this year. We pray for all those who were able to join us, but also for those who, through ill-health or lack of transport, were unable to do so. May the Christ Child, Emmanuel, God-with-us, bless you abundantly and bestow on you the Father’s love.

Today I attach a Christmas card for you all. The artwork comes from Peru.

 

We were blessed in having so many celebrations of Mass, however I couldn’t help but think back to my days in Peru. For the first five years, from 1981 to 1986, I was parish priest of the rural parish of Tambogrande, with an area of over 5,000sq miles and a population of over 100,000 souls, served by 127 churches and chapels. There were times I would have to celebrate up to eight Sunday Masses, travelling either on horseback or by 4WD. There were years when I was also the administrator at of a number of other neighbouring parishes. I was young and energetic and had the help of Fr Luke and Fr David as well as that of a community of amazing SND sisters, who did so much of the pastoral work in the area. I vividly remember going to a large village, Olivares San Fernando, about 50km from Tambogrande, for the first time on the Sunday after the Ascension in 1982. The vast, if primitive church was heaving with human life. The catechist, Don Santiago García, explained that there would be over fifty baptisms after Mass, then a procession through the village. I noticed that the altar was covered and surrounded by statues of the baby Jesus, Niño Dios. I asked why. He replied, “But father, it’s Christmas day! You see, we only have Mass once a year, and as the church is dedicated to the Child Jesus, whichever day we have Mass is Christmas day for us.” Imagine that, one Mass a year, and it was a similar story all over the parish. Eventually, we were able to organise a monthly Mass in each village and fiestas nearer the appropriate date.

 

​Today is the feast of St Stephen, the first Christian martyr and one of the first seven deacons of the Church. As the early Christians faced persecution and martyrdom, they would have remembered the words of Jesus in today’s Gospel from Matthew, (Mt 10: 17-22).

“Beware of men: they will hand you over to Sanhedrins and scourge you in their synagogues. You will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them and the pagans. But when they hand you over, do not worry about how to speak or what to say; what you are to say will be given to you when the time comes; because it is not you who will be speaking; the Spirit of your Father will be speaking in you.

  “Brother will betray brother to death, and the father his child; children will rise against their parents and have them put to death. You will be hated by all men on account of my name; but the man who stands firm to the end will be saved.