Latest Newsletter - Our Lady & St Joseph Catholic Church Matlock

The Presbytery
1 St Joseph’s Street
Matlock
Derbyshire
DE4 3NG
 01629 582804
FAX 01629 582804
Parish Priest:
Fr. Bernard Needham
Parish Deacon: Rev. Richard Walsh
Parish Sister:
Sr. Frederica Britto
www.matlockcatholicchurch.org.uk
[email protected]
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21 March 2015
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28 March 2015
Fifth Sunday of Lent
Palm Sunday
Year B
Year B
MASS TIMES AND INTENTIONS
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Week: 21 March 2015
Saturday
6.00 pm (Vigil)
Sunday
8.30 am
10.30 am
Monday
9.30 am
Tuesday
9.30 am
Wednesday
9.30 am
Thursday
9.30 am
Friday
7.00 pm
Maureen Fraughan
Donor’s Intention
All the People of our Parish
Morning Prayer & Holy Communion
Morning Prayer & Holy Communion
Morning Prayer & Holy Communion
Declan Larkin RIP
Maureen Feeley RIP
MASS TIMES AND INTENTIONS
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Week: 28 March 2015
Saturday
6.00 pm (Vigil)
Sunday
8.30 am
10.30 am
Monday
9.30 am
Tuesday
9.30am
Wednesday 11.30 am
Maundy Thursday 8.000 pm
Good Friday
3.00 pm
Pauline Robinson RIP
All the People of our Parish
Barbara Smith RIP
Holy Souls
Padraic O’Dea RIP
Mass of Chrism: Cathedral
Mass of the Lord’s Supper
Watching until 10.30pm
12 Noon: Ecumenical Service of Witness
3.00pm: Good Friday Liturgy
7.00pm: Stations of the Cross
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SCRIPTURE READINGS
5 Sunday of Lent. Jeremiah 31.31-34 Hebrews 5. 7- 9
John 12. 20-30
Palm Sunday.
Isaiah 50.4 - 7
Philippians 2. 6 -11 Mark. 14 1-15.47
SACRAMENT OF
RECONCILIATION
Friday: 6.30 - 6.55 pm
READERS
Week Commencing 21 March
Week Commencing 28 March
Saturday 6.00 pm
Sunday 8.30 am
10.30 am
L. Philpott.
M. Rhodes
M. Goddard. S. Bradshaw
F. Kornas
C. Johnson
C. Wroe
D. Johnson
F. Kornas
TELLERS
Parish Team
Alan & Eileen Johnson
CHURCH CLEANERS
Sheila Sheppard & Pat Gallon
David & Doreen Johnson
COLLECTIONS
8 March 2015 £546.30
Saturday: 10.30 - 11.00 am, and on request
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M. Rhodes
K. McCluskey
A. Roe
15 March 2015 £678.00
Easter Flower Collection
Reconciliation
Lent is a time when we particularly hear
the call “Repent” and be reconciled with
God”. The Lord in his goodness has
given us a special way in which we can
celebrate this reconciliation in the
Sacrament of Reconciliation. There will be a Parish
Service on Thursday March 26th at 7.00pm. Three
priests will be available to celebrate the Sacrament of
Reconciliation.
Blessing of oils
Please note there is no Mass on
Wednesday 1st April.
Fr Bernard will be joining all the
priests of the Diocese in celebrating
the Mass for the blessing of the oils
in the Cathedral.
Services
in
Holy Week
Maundy Thursday 2nd April
8.00pm Mass of the Lord’s Supper
Watching until 10.30pm
Good Friday 3rd April
3.00pm Liturgy of Good Friday
7.00pm Stations of the Cross
Good Friday is a day of Fasting &
abstinence.
Holy Saturday 4th April
8.00pm Easter Vigil Mass
Easter Sunday 5th April
8.30am Easter Day Mass
10.30am Easter Day Mass
Ecumenical Service
of Witness
This year the Ecumenical Service is
organised by ‘Churches Together in
Matlock’, and will be held at the Park
Head, Hall Leys Park on Good Friday at
12 noon.
There will be a retiring collection on
the weekend of 28th/30th for those
who wish to donate to provide
Easter Flowers
Holy Places in Palestine
There will be a diocesan collection on
Good Friday for the upkeep of the Holy
Places in Palestine. Maybe at this time
more than ever our fellow Christians need
our help. The mere fact that there are
fewer pilgrims/tourists means their access
to funds in severely restricted.
Please Note
Due to a change in security, our bank will not accept
cheques made out to St. Joseph’s or Our Lady & St
Joseph’s. Cheques must be made out to the Parish
Account which is :Matlock & Wirksworth RCP.
First Holy Communion Children
The following children made their First
Confession on Saturday 7th March.
Please pray for Molly Seeney, Isabella
Gould, Henry Elliott, Lucas Barker and
Ashleigh Hunt. They are now preparing
for their First Holy Communion and you
are invited to pick a name from the
basket at the back of Church and pray for them and
their families.
Celebrating St Teresa of Avila
A time for silent prayer and reflection for
Lent with St Teresa of Avila and the
Carmelite Saints. Saturday 28th March
at St Bernard’s Abbey. For more
information please see the poster on the
notice board at the back of church.
Vacancies
St George’s Catholic
Voluntary Academy, Littleover, Derby are looking
for a Key Stage 1 & Key Stage 2 class teacher for
September 2015 (NQT/MPS/UPS). Please apply via
https://jobs.derby.gov.uk/ or ring the school on 01332
766815. Closing date: Thursday 26th March.
St John Fisher Catholic Voluntary Academy,
Derby are looking to appoint a full-time Key Stage 2
Teacher from Sept 2015. For more information and an
application pack please call the school office and speak
to Mrs Harlow 01332 572154 or email
[email protected]
The Governors of The Good Shepherd
Easter Cards
There area limited number of Easter Cards
for sale at 50p each and they will be in the
hall.
Primary Catholic Voluntary Academy, Nottingham are
seeking to appoint a Deputy Headteacher. Please
contact the school office (tel: 0115 926 2983) or email
[email protected] for further details
and to receive an application pack. Closing date 20th
March 2015
If a grain of wheat falls
on the ground and dies,
it yields a rich harvest.
As the first fruits of our renewed humanity, Christ escaped the
curse of the law precisely by becoming accursed for our sake.
He overcame the forces of corruption by himself becoming
once more “free among the dead.” He trampled death under foot
and came to life again, and then he ascended to the Father as an
offering, the firs tfruits, as it were, of the human race.
“He ascended,” as Scripture says, “not to a sanctuary made by
human hands, a mere copy of the real one, but into heaven itself
to appear in God’s presence on our behalf.”
He is the life-giving bread that came down from heaven, and
by offering himself to God the Father as a fragrant sacrifice for
our sake, he also delivers us from our sins and frees us from the
faults that we commit through ignorance.
We can understand this best if we think of him as symbolized by the calf that used to be slain as a holocaust and
by the goat that was sacrificed for our sins committed through ignorance. For our sake, to blot out the sins of
the world, he laid down his life. Recognized then in bread as life and the giver of life, in the calf as a holocaust
offered by himself to God the Father as an appeasing fragrance, in the goat as one who became sin for our sake
and was slain for our transgressions, Christ is also symbolized in another way by a sheaf of grain, as a brief
explanation will show.
The human race may be compared to spikes of wheat in a field, rising, as it were, from the earth, awaiting their
full growth and development, and then in time being cut down by the reaper, which is death. The comparison is
apt, since Christ himself spoke of our race in this way when he said to his holy disciples: “Do you not say, 'Four
months and it will be harvest time?' Look at the fields I tell you, they are already white and ready for
harvesting. The reaper is already receiving his wages and bringing in a crop for eternal life.”
Now Christ became like one of us; he sprang from the holy Virgin like a spike of wheat from the ground.
Indeed, he spoke of himself as a grain of wheat when he said: “I tell you truly, unless a grain of wheat falls into
the ground and dies, it remains as it was, a single grain; but if it dies its yield is very great.” And so, like a sheaf
of grain, the first fruits, as it were, of the earth, he offered himself to the Father for our sake.
For we do not think of a spike of wheat, any more than we do of ourselves, in isolation. We think of it rather as
part of a sheaf, which is a single bundle made up of many spikes. The spikes have to be gathered into a bundle
before they can be used, and this is the key to the mystery they represent, the mystery of Christ who, though
one, appears in the image of a sheaf to be made up of many, as in fact he is.
Spiritually, he contains in himself all believers. “As we have been raised up with him,” writes Saint Paul, “so
we have also been enthroned with him in heaven.” He is a human being like ourselves, and this has made us
one body with him, the body being the bond that unites us. We can say, therefore, that in him we are all one,
and indeed he himself says to God, his heavenly Father: “It is my desire that as land you are one, so they also
may be one in us.”
Cyril of Alexandria (d. 444)
Blessed is he
who comes in
the name of the Lord.
When Jesus entered Jerusalem like a
triumphant conqueror, many were
astonished at the majesty of his bearing;
but when a short while afterward he
entered upon his passion, his appearance
was ignoble, an object of derision.
If today’s procession and passion are
considered together, in the one Jesus
appears as sublime and glorious, in the
other as lowly and suffering. The
procession makes us think of the honour
reserved for a king, whereas the passion
shows us the punishment due to a thief.
In the one Jesus is surrounded by glory and homer, in the other “he has neither dignity nor beauty.” In the one
he is the joy of all and the glory of the people, in the other “the butt of men and the laughing stock of the
people.”
In the one he receives the acclamation: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes as the king of
Israel”; in the other there are shouts that he is guilty of death and he is reviled for having set himself up as king
of Israel.
In the procession the people meet Jesus with palm branches, in the passion they slap him in the face and strike
his head with a rod. In the one they extol him with praises, in the other they heap insults upon him.
In the one they compete to lay their clothes in his path, in the other he is stripped of his own clothes. In the one
he is welcomed to Jerusalem as a just king and saviour, in the other he is thrown out of the city as a criminal,
condemned as an impostor.
In the one he is mounted on an ass and accorded every mark of honour; in the other he hangs on the wood of the
cross, torn by whips, pierced with wounds, and abandoned by his own.
If, then, we want to follow our leader without stumbling through prosperity and through adversity, let us keep
our eyes upon him, honoured in the procession, undergoing ignominy and suffering in the passion, yet
unshakably steadfast in all such changes of fortune.
Lord Jesus, you are the joy and salvation of the whole world; whether we see you seated on an ass or hanging
on the cross, let each one of us bless and praise you, so that when we see you reigning on high we may praise
you forever and ever, for to you belong praise and honour throughout all ages. Amen.
Guerric of Igny (c. 1070/80-1157)
God loved the world so much
that he gave his only Son.