Today is the Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time: “When Jesus saw the crowds he felt sorry for them because they were harassed and dejected, like sheep without a shepherd” (Luke 9:36). These words are the opening lines in today’s Gospel. Jesus is a man of compassion. The person in misery does not need a look that judges and criticises but a comforting presence. Jesus looked at ordinary people and seeing how needy they were, He had compassion on them, and began to minister to them.
Compassion means that I suffer with you; I accept into my heart the misery in yours; I become one with you in your pain. I may not be able to relieve that pain but by understanding it and sharing it I make it possible for you to bear it. Today we see in the Gospel the inner force that drives Jesus in his threefold work of teaching, healing and overcoming evil. It is compassion. This is the Latinised form of a much more graphic Greek word whose nearest modern equivalent would be something like a “gut feeling.” In Hebrew compassion is the feeling that a mother has for the child within her womb. When Jesus looked upon the crowd he was moved to the depths of his being. We read in today’s second reading “When we were still helpless when at the appointed time Christ died for us” (Romans 5:6). Can we hear that that same note of compassion reverberating in this reading? Jesus died for us while we were still sinners. God carries and hears the pain of the world in a way that we cannot comprehend with a knowledge so vast in comparison to ours that there are no words big enough to try and encapsulate it. We are not God and our hands are small. How then do we remember those who are “harassed and dejected” without being overwhelmed? We can become numb to the images that we see every day. We no longer react to stories of extreme suffering or natural disasters! Poverty, inequality, violence, abuse…we shut it off, unable to deal with it or even feel the need to address it. We fall prey to compassion fatigue. Today we pray for the gift of “loving compassion” May this gift allows us to stand with and act on behalf of those who suffer. A reporter covering the tragic conflict in the middle of Sarajevo saw a little girl shot by a sniper. He threw down his note pad and pencil, rushed to the man holding the child, and helped them both into his car. As the reporter stepped on the accelerator, racing to the hospital, the man holding the bleeding child said: “Hurry, friend, my child is still alive.” A moment or two later he said: “Hurry, friend, my child is still breathing.” A moment later he said: “Hurry, friend, my child is still warm.” Finally, he cried: “Hurry, oh God, my child is getting cold.” When they got to the hospital, the little girl had died. Later, as the two men washed the blood off their hands and clothes, the man turned to the reporter and said: “There is a terrible task waiting for me. I must go and tell her father that his child is dead. He will be heartbroken.” The reporter was amazed. He looked at the grieving man and said: “I thought she was your child.” The man looked back and said: “They are all our children.” Lord, give us warm and generous hearts so that we may be agents of your compassion to others.
Feasts of the Week: Tuesday: The Irish Martyrs: Seventeen Irish martyrs, men and women, cleric and lay, were put to their death for the Catholic faith between 1579 and 1654. They were beatified by Pope John Paul 11 in 1992. Wednesday: St. Aloysius Gonzaga a Jesuit Novice who died after working in a plague at the age of twenty-three in 1591. He is one of the patrons of youth. Saturday: The Nativity of John the Baptist. This feast relates to the summer solstice when the days begin to grow shorter, recalling John’s word: “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30)
Thanks for the collection last week. It came to £1935
Thank you for your support of our mission here at the Graan. Thanks to all who helped in our liturgies last weekend.
Happy Father’s Day to all fathers on this their special day. At the rite of baptism of their child the church prays: “May he bless the father of this child. He and his wife will be the first teachers of their child in the ways of faith. May they be also the best of teachers, bearing witness to the faith by what they say and do, in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
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Exposition: Continues each Friday from 10am – 2pm.
Shop: Monday to Saturday – 9.30 – 7pm. Sun 9.30pm – 4pm.
Guild Mass Cards: Our selection includes Deceased, Get Well, Wedding, Birthday, Exams, etc. Cost £2.
Sun & Mon no duty. Mass Mon 19th June @ 7pm – Brian. Confessions: Tues to Fri 2pm – 5pm. Sat 5pm – 6pm.
Mass: Tues – Fri @ 7pm. Tues – Brian. Wed – Victor. Thurs – Arthur. Fri – Anthony & Sat – Anthony.
Gluten-Free Hosts: If you are Coeliac and you wish to receive communion please come up to the altar and stand beside the Eucharistic Minsters where you will receive the gluten-free host.
Recently Deceased
Mairead O’Dolan, Station Rd, Belcoo
Clare Flanagan, Cornagrade, Enniskillen
Mrs. Maureen Maguire,Tullnagowan, Brookeborough.
Sean(John) McDermott, Ballyreagh. Brookeborough.
Fintan Callaghan, Burt, Co Donegal
Anniversaries
Frank & Mae Mc Conway & Kevin Mc Conway, Old Rossorry, Enniskillen
Stephen & Susan Mc Teggart, Newtown, Derrygonnelly
Tom & May Lunney, Drumee, Enniskillen
Aiden Mc Guinness, Irvinestown
Patrick & Mary-Catherine Mc Quaid, Glen, Tempo
Brendan, Catherine & Liam Sheridan, Scotland
Annie &Tommy Lenehan, Athboy.
Rosie Lenehan, Girley. Co . Meath.
Anthony Barkey, Irvinestown.
Kathleen Brady, Belcoo / Enniskillen
Frances &Betty Lambe, Aghadrumsee
Sarah & James Woods Moneymore Co Derry.
Dolly & Aiden Moohan, Drumlyon, Enniskillen
