Over the last weekend, we became acutely aware of the summer heat and the devastation of fire. We sense that a difficult summer lies ahead. The merciless heat and the threat of fire leave us living beneath a kind of pall—an atmosphere of uncertainty and fragility. How deeply we long for cooler, safer days. It seems to me that this experience of living under a looming difficulty mirrors, in a small way, what we celebrate in this remarkable feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary. For this moment, all creation, weighed down by heaviness and fragility, has longed. Tired of the inhibitions and distortions of the flawed condition into which…

One of the most precious things we have when someone we know and love dies is a photograph of them.  Photographs bring back memories of time spent together, of stages in a person’s life, of the events that characterised their life.  But a photograph not only keeps alive the memory of the person it depicts.  Most importantly, a photograph evokes a whole relationship.  The photograph becomes a powerful symbol of the bonds we had with this person and becomes the means by which we continue to savour the history of our relationship with them, its seasons, it joys, its regrets – and most importantly, its continued hopes.  Yes, even in…

In the last weeks we may have noticed something new. The days have already become that little bit longer, the mornings are a little less cold. The trees are starting to put out new buds. The wattles are all blooming along the highways. There is every sense that we are entering a new season. We commonly refer to this new season as Spring – even if it be quite different from the season of the same name in the northern hemisphere. Whatever we may call it, though, it is a season of new life. The cold and dampness of winter give way to warmth, colour, and energy. Everything seems to stir…

I am very happy to share that I am a Gerard Majella child.  His picture hung in the boys’ bedroom in my family home growing up in Launceston, Tasmania and I was mindful of him on a daily basis.  I can still picture the image of him and its location near our wardrobe. In the 1950s in Australia his veneration was especially strong, promoted by the Redemptorist Fathers especially during their famous parish missions. He was the patron saint of expectant mothers who prayed his intercession for the safe delivery of their babies.  Indeed, the picture that adorned the wall of our bedroom replicated the story how, during a visit to a family,…

It has been noticed by scholars that the drawings we find in the Roman catacombs of the first Christians praying are of figures, “standing, looking up, with arms outstretched, and eyes wide open, ready to walk or to leap forward . . . posture reflects tense expectation, not quiet heart searching. [They say] . . . We are on the watch, in expectation of the One who is coming . . .[1]    With their witness, as those who proclaim that Jesus cannot be found in a tomb, we are those who live a life in constant watchfulness and expectation.  In the apparent absence of Christ from our midst, we live our…

Some weeks ago, if we were sufficiently sensitive, we may have noticed that the character of the light during the day had changed as it does around this time every year. There is a day around the end of July where something changes. This year I noticed it on Tuesday 26 July. Now, a little while later something also begins to shift in the landscape around us. In our gardens and along the sides of the road we will notice the wattles coming into bloom. Ribbons of glorious yellow now thread their way along our highways. The blooming of the wattles had a special significance for our aboriginal brothers and…

One of the most significant lessons that I have learnt in life is about the necessity and power of paradox in our lives. Spiritual experience attends to sets of opposites; it does not seek to resolve them. In the paradoxes and the intersections of our life we are, as one writer puts it, we are “stretched out amid the opposites in [our] life, between hanging on and letting go, between involvement and surrender, between deep engagement and gentle detachment.  This is [our] crucifixion and [our] joy. It is [our] crucible in all its insecurity and beauty, fragility and possibility.”[1]   A problem is to be solved. A paradox, on the other, is…

The greatest show on earth has just concluded in Tokyo even though it could not have the crowds we normally associate with the Olympics. Nonetheless, the Olympics came for us at an opportune time, and in this time of isolation they brought us together and they gave us some relief from the constrictions of the current lockdown. We watched many extraordinary stories of human achievement.  There were stories of amazing success and bitter failures – stories to inspire us as we marvel at what the human body can achieve.  The strength, flexibility and skill of the athletes left us in awe as will the stories of lifetimes of dedication, commitment and discipline…

Soon after the final declaration of Mary’s sanctity was given in Rome, I read a poignant but rather challenging letter to the editor of The Sydney Morning Herald from a Vincent Matthews: “My wife is a saint. And I don’t need the Pope to confirm it.  For nearly 40 years she worked as a nurse in many parts of Australia easing the suffering of the sick and helping to cure many. She is idolised by her three children and is a special nana to two adoring little girls.  Aged 74, she works in a charity shop, gives part of her age pension to Medecins Sans Frontieres and to World Vision to help a child struggling to…

One of the most significant lessons that I have learnt in life is about the necessity and power of paradox in our lives. Spiritual experience attends to sets of opposites; it does not seek to resolve them. In the paradoxes and the intersections of our life we are, as one writer puts it, we are “stretched out amid the opposites in [our] life, between hanging on and letting go, between involvement and surrender, between deep engagement and gentle detachment.  This is [our] crucifixion and [our] joy. It is [our] crucible in all its insecurity and beauty, fragility and possibility.”[1]   Our Christian spiritual framework lives and breathes irreducible sets of tensions – humanity…