St Teresa & St John Southworth Churches, Cleveleys
Fr Chris Cousens—Phone: 853340
Rev Bernard Ward (Deacon) (Tel: 858346)
Enquiries for St John Southworth: Phone: 853340
5 June 2022
http://www.st-teresas-church.co.uk
Email: st.teresas.cleveleys@gmail.com
Lancaster Roman Catholic Diocesan Trustees Registered Charity Number 23433
Sunday : Pentecost
Contents: Gospel
Notices
Reflections for the coming week
Gospel: John 14:15-16. 23-26
Jesus said to his disciples:
‘If you love me you will keep my commandments.
I shall ask the Father
And he will give you another Advocate
To be with you for ever.
If anyone loves me he will keep my word,
And my Father will love him,
And we shall come to him
And make our home with him.
Those who do not love me do not keep my words.
And my word is not my own;
It is the word of the one who sent me.
I have said these things to you
While still with you;
But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit,
Whom the Father will send in my name,
Will teach you everything
And remind you of all I have said to you.’
Gospel Reflection : : Renew, Refresh
Holy Spirit, refresh the face of the earth; refresh like the cool wind through humid air, refresh like the cooling rain in stagnant water, refresh like greenery in the burnt desert – and refresh tired hopes, dull love, broken trust, with gentle confidence, with new visions of each other, with a belief in goodness. Refresh and renew us.
Refresh our countries, with compassion in politics, with peace based on justice, with respect for the dignity of all, and a genuine care for those in need, and policies to end inequality.
Refresh families with tolerance, communities with openness, whole neighbourhoods with involvement.
Refresh our prayer with your love, our sorrow with your forgiveness, our generosity with your life-long call and support.
Refresh us, renew us, renew the face of the earth.
We Remember In Our Prayers Gwyneth Hooker whose Funeral was last week. We remember her and her family, and all those whose anniversaries are at this time. May they be in God’s peace.
We Congratulate And Pray For Every Blessing for Muriel and Jeff Woods who celebrate their Golden Wedding at the 10.30 am Mass this Sunday.
We Welcome Into the Family of the Church Ruby-Sofia Bryan, whose Baptism was on Friday, and Cece Edwards whose Baptism is this Sunday.
This Weekend The SVP (The Society of St. Vincent de Paul) have organised a special collection to be taken at each Mass at St Teresa’s “for those in need.”
Church Opening Times : We are very pleased to announce that from this Monday (6th June) onwards St Teresa’s Church will be open each day, from the time of the morning Mass till early evening – as in days of old!
Trinity Hospice Coffee Morning : On Saturday, 18th June, Thornton-Cleveleys Friends of Trinity Hospice are holding a Coffee Morning at St. Teresa’s Parish Hall, 10 am – 12 noon. Entrance is £1, which includes coffee and biscuits. There are various stalls, a raffle and tombola.
The Lark Hill Association would like to invite any past pupils of Lark Hill Convent School, Preston, to come to Cardinal Newman College (formerly the Convent School) on Saturday, 25th June for a Mass at 2.30 pm in the Chapel, followed by a get-together. This a chance to meet up with friends, and there will be opportunity to explore the College on the Lark Hill site.
A Prayer For The Queen On Her Platinum Jubilee
Lord Jesus, our Good Shepherd, we are so thankful for the outstanding way in which the Queen has dedicated her life to lead the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth of 54 countries around the world throughout the 70 years of her reign. May her example of integrity and service continue to influence and encourage people, and bring honour to your name, for you are our Lord for ever and ever. Amen.
The National Anthem
God save our gracious Queen,
God save our noble Queen,
God save our Queen.
Send her victorious,
happy and glorious,
long to reign over us,
God save the Queen.
A Prayer for Euchraine
Lord of all people and all nations,
We lift before you the people of Ukraine and the people of Russia,
Each girl and boy, each woman and man, living in fear of what tomorrow might bring.
We long for a time you spoke of through the prophet Isaiah,
When weapons of war would be beaten into ploughshares,
When nation will no longer lift up sword against nation.
We cry out to you for peace.
Protect those who only desire and deserve to live in security and safety.
Comfort those who fear for their lives and the lives of their loved ones.
Change the hearts of those set on violence and aggression.
Fill earthly leaders with great wisdom to find paths to peace.
Please Lord, come and have your way in your world.
May your will be done here, on earth as it is in heaven.
May your peace reign, now and always. Amen
Daily Reflections for this week
Monday (Cardinal Newman)
The condescension of the blessed Spirit is as incomprehensible as that of the Son. He has ever been the secret presence of God within creation and the voice of truth in the hearts of all rational beings, tuning them into harmony with the intimation of God’s law. He is especially called the “life giving” Spirit, being the inward light of the patriarchs and prophets, the grace abiding in the Christian soul, and Lord and ruler of the Church. Therefore, let us ever praise the Father Almighty, who is the first source of all perfection, in and together with his co-equal Son and Spirit.
Scripture (Acts 2:1-8) When Pentecost day came around, they had all met together, when suddenly there came from heaven a sound as of a violent wind, which filled the entire house in which they were sitting; and there appeared to them tongues as of fire; these separated and came to rest on the head of each of them. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak different languages as the Spirit gave them power to express themselves. Now there were devout men living in Jerusalem from every nation under heaven, and at this sound they all assembled and each one was bewildered to hear these men speaking his own language. ‘Surely’, they said, ‘All these men speaking are Galileans?’
Tuesday (Dietrich Bonhoeffer)
We, too, are being driven back to first principles. Atonement and redemption, regeneration, the Holy Spirit, the love of our enemies, the cross and resurrection, life in Christ and Christian discipleship—all these things have become so problematic and so remote that we hardly dare speak of them. The day will come when people will be called again to utter the word of God with such power as will change and renew the world. It will be a new language which will horrify people, and yet overwhelm them with its power.
Scripture (Isaiah 61:1-2)
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me for the Lord has anointed me. He has sent me to bring the news to the afflicted, to soothe the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to captives, release to those in prison.
Wednesday (Fr. Richard Rohr)
When you no longer expect something from life, you are for all practical purposes an atheist. When you are no longer open to do something new, you might as well hang it up. The experience of the Spirit is an undeserved, unmerited becoming, a new whole greater than the sum of all the parts. It draws us out and beyond ourselves. It is radical grace. To walk in the Spirit is to allow yourself to be grabbed by God and taken into a much larger world of meaning.
Scripture (2 Timothy 1:6-7,13-14)
That is why I am reminding you now to fan into a flame the gift of God that you possess. God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but the spirit of power and love and self-control. Keep as your pattern the sound teaching you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. With the help of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, look after that thing given in trust.
Thursday (St. Teresa of Avila)
The prayer of quiet, then, is a little spark of the true love of Himself, which our Lord begins to enkindle in the soul; and his will is that the soul should understand what this love is by the joy it brings. This spark given of God, however slight it may be, causes a great crackling; it is the beginning of a great fire, which sends forth the flames of the most vehement love of God. What the soul has to do is nothing more than to be gentle and without noise. By noise I mean striving with the understanding in search of words and reflections whereby to give thanks for his grace, and gathering up the sins and imperfections to show that it does not deserve it.
Scripture (Titus 3:4-7)
When the kindness and love of God our Saviour for mankind were revealed, it was not because of anything we had done ourselves; it was for no reason except his own faithful love that he saved us through the washing by which the Holy Spirit gives us new birth and new life. For God abundantly poured out the Holy Spirit on us through Jesus Christ our Saviour, that by his grace we might be made right with God and come into possession of the eternal life we hope for.
Friday (Evelyn Underhill)
From the first to the last, the emphasis is to be on God and not on ourselves. Admiring delight, not cadging demands. Faithful and childlike dependence – a clinging to the Invisible, as the most real of all realities, in all the vicissitudes of life – not mere self-expression and self-fulfilment. Disinterested collaboration in the Whole, in God’s vast plan and purpose, not concentration on our own small affairs. Three kinds of generosity. Three kinds of self-forgetfulness. A confident reliance on the immense fact of His Presence, everywhere and at all times, pressing on the soul and the world by all sorts of paths and in all sorts of ways, pouring out on it His undivided love, and demanding undivided loyalty. We stand in a world completely penetrated by the living God. We are citizens of that world now; and our whole life is or should be and acknowledgement of this.
Scripture (Ephesians 4:2-7)
With all humility and gentleness and with patience, support each other in love. Take care to preserve the unity of the Spirit by the peace that binds you together. There is one body, one Spirit just as one hope is the goal of your calling by God. There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father of all, over all and within all. On each one of us God’s favour has been bestowed in whatever way Christ allotted it.
Martin Bennett