“the dust from which God formed the Earthling was paradisal dust, and the dust to which we return is a dust ready for paradise. The ashes are a shout of triumph.”

Fr Colin Carr · “Going Away and Coming Back”

“When John the Baptist calls us to repent, he is asking us to do some new thing for the good of others”

Fr. George Smiga · “Doing Something New”

“Our repentance is not the condition for God’s mercy. It is simply the way we grasp hold of the gifts that God is always holding out to us.”

Fr John Patrick Kenrick · “The Gift of Repentance”

“may I suggest that we preach repentance best by living lives of simplicity and charity? How we do this will differ, depending on our family situations, our responsibilities, our jobs and our temperaments.”

Fr Peter Harries · “Live of Repentance”

“The Kingdom of Heaven proclaimed by Jesus is also the Kingdom of David, just as Jesus is fully God and fully Man”

John Bergsma · “Biblemas!”

“Matthew is NOT having Jesus begin by talking about Eternal Life in heaven. He is talking about living a life WITH GOD here and now.”

Mary Ortwein · “Word of God”

“The very word nonviolence speaks to this discernment: it is not simply non-violence, or the absence of violence. Nonviolence requires that we recognize violence and its root causes in order to resist and transform it.”

Dan Moriarty · “Second Week of Advent”

“Some of my prayer this week led me to consider: who has hurt me deeply, that I might want to be my neighbor in heaven?”

Mary Ortwein · “Love, the Guest”

“if we are going to speak to others of the forgiveness of God, let us first do what Zachaeus did, and ensure that we have made all things right with those we have wronged”

John Bergsma · “Making Things Right”

“Jesus invites us to welcome the lost who repent back into their proper place in the kingdom of God’s grace. We must pray ‘forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us’. The goodies must welcome the repentant baddies, or they will not be goodies at all.”

Fr Peter Harries · “Surprisingly Wide Mercy”

“Let us notice that the Father does not run after the son to the far country and pull him out of the muck. There is an act of repentance and renunciation that we must undertake before we can return to the Father. We do have to leave the pig sty.”

John Bergsma · “Prodigal Son-day”

“One of our most persistent illusions or idolatries in our technocratic society is a kind of magical thinking, an assumption that we can find a solution to all the problems we have generated without much altering our present way of living.”

Fr Gregory Murphy · “How to be Happy”

“One needs first to despair of finding lasting happiness in temporal affairs before a life of self-denial in communion with Jesus Christ makes sense”

John Bergsma · “Oh, Vanity!”

“As a person needs the practices of prayer and repentance to remain spiritually healthy, so likewise a society needs practices, institutions, and systems of justice to create a safe environment for all to flourish”

Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns · “Third Sunday of Lent”

“God does not forget the innocent victim. Injustice and cruelty will not have the last word.”

Fr John O’Connor · “Hope of the Innocents”

“Our practices of self-denial and mortification are ways by which we “crucify the flesh with its passions and desires,” so that we can truly be free to live out those virtues that Scripture identifies as the fruit of the Holy Spirit”

John Bergsma · “The Name of God”

“A truth that applies to every person who has ever been born is that they will meet death”

Archbishop Malcolm McMahon · “Come One, Come All”

“His healing power, and specifically his offer of forgiveness of sin and freedom for those held captive by evil, is still available to us, if we will have faith in Him and in his promises”

John Bergsma · “Sunday of the Word of God!”

“metanoia is a lifetime process. It is the process by which we are divinized–by which we change by change by change come to be like God in our capacity for Truth, Compassion, Fidelity, and relationship”

Mary Ortwein · “What do we do?”

“We are reminded that God’s reign of peace will involve all creation, a reign of right relationship between all created things”

MaryKnoll Office for Global Concerns · “Renewal of All Creation”

Fr. Lawrence Obilor · “Passed from death to a new life”

“the good news is that the kingdom of God is at hand, and believing in it means, among other things, playing our part in making its closeness more manifest in our world, a process that transforms the whole world, us included”

Fr Gregory Pearson · “Repent, Believe, Preach”

“What is the hierarchy of the Church, the leadership, the clergy? They are “ambassadors of Christ” appealing for the world to be reconciled to God.”

John Bergsma · “It’s Ash Wednesday, Everyone!”

“The call to repentance does not require any negotiation. It is a daily commitment to be in harmony with God.”

Fr. Lawrence Obilor · “You too follow Me!”

“Those who are humble are taught by God...The Ninevites, as well as the fishermen of Galilee, were simple common people willing to listen to God’s voice and be instructed. Pride plugs our ears. The proud cannot receive the message to repent and turn toward God. They don’t believe they need to repent.”

John Bergsma · “The Sunday of the Word of God!”

“we often fall into the temptation of thinking God’s punishment of our sins does not represent the idea of him being a merciful and loving Father”

Fr. Lawrence Obilor · “Stick to your yes”

“We have always wandered away, and yet Jesus found us. Oh how often has He travelled far and wide, wallowing in the thick forest in searching of us because we are so precious to Him!”

Fr. Lawrence Obilor · “The Wounded Shepherd”

“We need to examine our hearts, our conscience, and in true sincerity and sacrifice – return to God”

Joseph LaCombe · “The State of Your Heart”

“The light of God never grows dim. It is the light that has shone to the world and into the darkness of men’s lives. Christ is that light.”

Fr. Lawrence Obilor · “He is our Light”

“That’s all Jesus wants, is our love. He just wants us. He just wants our time. He just wants us to put Him before all else, and He will come back to us as many times as necessary. He comes to us as many times as necessary – to save us, to offer redemption, to make things right.”

Joseph LaCombe · “Jesus Makes Things Right”

“We are not to gloat over disasters happening to others, thinking ourselves exempt from the possibility of facing imminent judgement. No, we are to repent, to orientate our lives towards God and live out his mercy.”

Fr Peter Harries · “God Is.”

“So let us be Ambassadors for Christ. Let us stop blowing our own trumpets and living like hypocrites. Let us put away the gloom and put on our work clothes. Let us put aside ideas of us versus them and start working together. We all belong to one another and we have only one home.”

Susan Nagele · “Ash Wednesday”

“Following the way of the Lord Jesus is to learn to sit lightly to the things of this world, for all their beauty and goodness, to refuse to be trapped into setting our hearts on anything less than the love of God”

Fr Gregory Murphy · “Hoping to Turn”

“The first step towards conversion is becoming conscious of our inordinate desires for transient and perishable things that draw us away from God”

Sr. Elizabeth Zwareva, MM · “Ash Wednesday”

“It’s difficult to change our “all or nothing” mindset, but the effort it takes to do so can go a long way to preserve unity with our brothers and sisters in Christ, and in the communities that we live and work in.”

Laura Kazlas · “The People Who Walked in Darkness Have Seen a Great Light”

“Without Christ we cannot enter into the joy which is the crowning of our salvation”

Fr David Goodill · “Dancing for Joy”

“We may not be able to create ourselves anew, but every time we repent and believe the gospel, we become a new creation”

Fr Anthony Axe · “A New Beginning?”

“they had received from Christ infinitely more than they had given him: they had received the faith that brings with it the promise of a heavenly homeland”

Fr Richard Ounsworth · “A New Way”

“At such points we say yes with our lips, but our hearts do not follow. We may be simply convincing ourselves that we are right, rather than knowing why we should be so sure.”

Fr David Rocks · “Show Your Workings”

“People either place themselves at the centre of things and see others as more or less marginal; or they actually feel themselves to be marginal and profoundly unimportant, even worthless.”

Fr Colin Carr · “To The Ends of the Earth”

“If we are attentive to the guidance of the Spirit which is given to us then our thoughts and actions will come closer to those of Christ and we shall be able to share in his mission of gathering together all peoples in obedience to the one God and bringing hope to a fallen world”

Fr Thomas Skeats · “Of His Kingdom There Will Be No End”

“The reality is that conversion takes time and a lot of grace. It requires us not only to make up our minds that we want to change, but also for us to be willing to work patiently with God’s help to allow the change to happen.”

Fr Robert Gay · “Daily Conversion”

“we are invited just now to step aside, be still, focus on what truly matters. We are to hear and receive the Word that we might bear it. From hearers we are to become doers of the Word, displaying God’s compassion in our lives.”

Fr Gregory Murphy · “Bearing the Word”

“In cutting out the causes of sin, we shouldn’t start with other people – we should start with ourselves.”

Fr Robert Verrill · “Cutting Out the Cause of Sin”

“Are we Christians in name only and not in deed? Do we live out our days in the graced freedom of the children of God? Do we pray as the Spirit guides us? As disciples do we act with courage and hope in our heavenly Father?”

Fr John Farrell · “Getting Into The Flow”

“It’s possible, then, to get distracted or misled on the way to God. It’s possible even to do the terrible thing of rejecting God and his love. We must never think, however, that it’s too late for repentance, in our own or in other’s cases.”

Fr Peter Hunter · “Never Too Late”

“Dare I suggest we can become so confident in our own integrity, righteousness, or decency that it never occurs to us to admit to man or God that we have done wrong? When this is the case, the need to apologize and seek forgiveness from God and man will be far from our minds.”

Fr Peter Clarke · “Me? A Mere Child?”

“It is his unconditional love for each one of us that gives us the confidence to make every day of our lives a day to turn away from sin and back to the Lord, to allow the Holy Spirit to liberate us from that deadly indifference to God’s will for us”

Fr John Patrick Kenrick · “Seize the Day”

“baptism is much more than a sign of repentance, much more even that a simple forgiveness of sins...the love of God is poured into our hearts”

Fr Peter Hunter · “Not Just a Second Chance”

“But perhaps those who are really against God are those Christians who have ended up making themselves an ‘enemy within’, a scandal or a stumbling-block to the faith of others”

Fr. Francis Gaine · “It's a Scandal”

“Repentance and judgement go together, because repentance means you are judging yourself, seeing yourself from God’s angle, revealing your sins and repenting of them”

Fr Fabian Radcliffe · “The Light of Truth”

“the extraordinary thing is that Zacchaeus repented without any word of rebuke from Jesus. All Jesus asked was that Zacchaeus come down from the tree so that he could get things ready for him to stay. It was not that Zacchaeus was looking at Jesus: it was that Jesus was looking at Zacchaeus.”

Fr Dominic White · “Real Pleasures”

“Sadly, I think the penance, the preparation Advent most demands of us Christians these days is to learn anew to be joyful and to learn again to share our joy with others”

Fr Mark Edney · “Make Straight the Paths of Joy”

“The Good News of the Gospel is that although in death we shall return to dust, through Jesus the dust that is ourselves will be raised to share in the glory of his resurrection.”

Fr Peter Clarke · “Not for Eating”

“Repentance, for John, meant being resolved for the future to change the way we see ourselves. From that change in our whole cast of mind will follow changes in the way we behave.”

Fr Denis Minns · “Relaxing Penance”

“The sight of so many others wearing this sign of repentance should be an encouragement to us to make a real effort to renew our Christian lives”

Fr Dermot Morrin · “A Public Sign”

“can we find the time and inclination to ask Jesus, “What must I do?” by way of a spiritual preparation for his coming into our lives, of our coming into the life of the Kingdom of Jesus?”

Fr Peter Clarke · “Heralding the Reign of God”

“With the arrival of Lent people think of giving up little indulgences. It might be better if we thought of taking up new commitments.”

Fr Columba Ryan · “Lent, the discovery of love”

“The symbol of repentance rises out of the symbol with which the advent of the Saviour is acclaimed, the beginning of our re-enactment of the mystery of our passing with Christ from death to resurrection”

Fr Fergus Kerr · “The Sign of Ashes”

“He draws us into a community, the Church, whose very existence is mission, movement, to go out and preach the Good News. He calls us to share in his enterprise which is one of total security (‘God is faithful’), and at the same time one of unpredictable adventure.”

Fr Fabian Radcliffe · “Repent! Again!”

“I invite us to approach this Lent as time to ‘remember’ who we are in the sight of God rather than what we are”

Fr Clement Paul · “Remember and Move On”

“God is always preparing us for the next call. That is why attentiveness is an essential virtue of discipleship...when we are willing to be attentive to the Spirit’s action, we will be ready, so that when Jesus walks by and says, “Come!” we will immediately leave what we have and follow him.”

Fr. George Smiga

“Detachment does not mean that we do not care. We care deeply. Detachment reminds us that it is God’s will and not our will that will ultimately be done.”

Fr. George Smiga

“If we live with faith in God and love for one another, we will really have all that we need—and that will bring us peace and lasting joy”

Fr. George Smiga