Message of Abbot Paul - Wednesday - 15th May 2024
Abbot Paul • May 15, 2024
Tonight, we will be celebrating our Annual Torchlight Procession in honour of Our Lady. I hope you are able to join us. It begins at 9.00pm and ends about 10.30pm. It’s always the most uplifting celebration and for me, this year will be my last May Procession as Abbot. In three weeks’ time, Belmont will have a new Abbot. This year we are a week behind schedule, as Ascension Day fell on the second Thursday of the month.
Our Gospel passage today takes us further into our reading of the High Priestly Prayer, that Jesus addressed to his Father in the presence of his disciples at the very end of the Last Supper, before setting off to the Garden of Gethsemane where his Passion would begin. The reading is, in fact, the very same as we heard at Mass on Sunday, (Jn 17: 11-19). If you still have it to hand, you could reread what I wrote then. This intimate prayer of Jesus was meant to be overheard by his disciples and transmitted to the Church and successive generations of disciples, right down to the present day. The words were spoken by Jesus for us. When we hear the Gospel proclaimed at Mass or simply read it at home in our Bibles or Missals, Jesus is addressing us here and now; he is speaking directly to us, for we are the disciples he has called to follow him today. Listening to his voice or hearing of his actions always leads us to question the depth and integrity of our faith. In other words, we are called to conversion and repentance, to return to God and allow him to heal our waywardness and touch our hearts and minds with his redeeming grace, so that we can walk as men and women renewed and transformed. Jesus wishes to share his joy with us to the full and, for this reason, he asks the Father to consecrate us in the truth. Today’s reading ends with these words of Jesus, “for their sake I consecrate myself so that they too may be consecrated in truth.”
If we wish to follow in the footsteps of the great saints, then we must allow our heavenly Father to fulfil the prayer of Jesus, that we be consecrated in the truth. Lord, in your mercy, consecrate us today. Amen.
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