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  PassionistsGlasgow

Father frank's log

4/21/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 15th – 22nd APRIL
 
After the evening Mass last Sunday someone said to me, “I love reading your Log, especially when it’s about Father Gareth.” I don’t know what it is about Father Gareth that so many people love, but certainly he is a unique individual and it’s great to have him on the team. So, to keep at least one reader happy. I am going to begin by thanking Father Gareth for keeping going throughout most of Lent and into Easter when, clearly, he wasn’t feeling all that well.
What seemed to be a long-lingering cold turned out in fact to be the flu. For much of the time he had no energy and no voice but, apart from the odd day, when he knew he just had to go to bed, he continued to celebrate Masses; hear Confessions, take part in our Lenten Taize,
Tenebrae and Reconciliation Services; represent us at the Chrism Mass in the Cathedral on Holy Thursday; and make his inimitable contribution to the Easter Triduum Services.
 
Most mornings during that time, when we were having breakfast together in the Passionist Community out at Bishopbriggs, Father Gareth would appear down for Morning Prayer and we would all ask, “Well, how are you today?” Invariably his answer was, “Great lads, great, never felt better in my life”, when obviously he wasn’t well at all, seeing as how he croaked, rather than spoke his response. He even had to endure a few weeks of not being able to go swimming, which is something he loves to do every day. Father Gareth is a great man for
recommending all kinds of remedies for various ailments and conditions to other people, sure fire cures; he would have made a great medicine man in the Wild West, touring around in a covered wagon peddling miracle remedies in a broad Welsh accent; so he took a bit of teasing as to why all these cures weren’t working for him.
 
And of course, given the fondness in which he is held, other people, wanting to care for him, were giving him certain cures as well. Just last week someone gave him menthol crystals to clear his sinuses. This resulted in a community exercise as we all took it in turn to pull the towel over our heads and breath in the solution. Father Gareth had, of course, put in far too many crystals, thereby nearly blowing all our heads off, and the smell of the menthol, like the costly nard used by Mary to anoint the feet of Jesus, filled the whole house.
 
I remembered as a child often pulling the towel over my head and breathing in menthol as I was prone to whooping cough, and I have to confess that I always enjoyed the experience, just as now I can enjoy the feeling of putting too much hot mustard on a sandwich, or too much horseradish sauce on beef, and getting that burning sensation passing through my nose to the top of my head. This led to a discussion on other childhood remedies which, for me, were the regular spoonful of malt; rosehip syrup; cod liver oil; and syrup of figs. I’m not quite sure what all of these things were curing or preventing but they were, I think, a
continuance of war time practices making up for what was lacking in people’s diets.
 
Of course, there were childhood treats as well as childhood remedies that wouldn’t have been there in war time. At the bottom of my grannie’s close in Partick Bridge Street there was a shop run by a lady called Madge Cockburn. In Madge’s shop you could experience the joy of a penny-drink which was a big glass of irn-bru; cream soda, or red cola. Also for a penny you could get a selection of things like sticks of liquorice; gobstoppers, humbugs; sherbet lollies, swizzels and the like. I’m sure Father Gareth would have enjoyed all of them, although what they were doing to our teeth and how they would have avoided the sugar tax I don’t know.
Anyway, it’s great to have Father Gareth back to himself; back to swimming, and even last night, back to making truffles which taste sweeter than any of the afore mentioned delights.
 
Thanks to all who had a care for Father Gareth. I am reminded of these words from the
Letter to the Hebrews: “Let us watch out for one another to provoke love and good works”.

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April 12th, 2018

4/12/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 8th – 15th APRIL

The question on everyone’s lips is not: “When is Father Frank’s Log returning?” but “When are we going to get some decent weather?” I had friends over from Dublin last week and of course when friends come you want some decent weather to show them around. It is, after all, officially summer time, seeing as how the clocks went forward at the end of March. It was, however, during the days that they were here, more like the middle of winter.
 
My great standby for visitors is always the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, and this time around they had an exhibition to mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of the wonderful Charles Rennie Mackintosh. I love going to Kelvingrove as I grew up very close to it, and it was so much a part of my childhood to visit the museum and marvel at the sheer scope of the exhibits. I also love the new refurbishment, and if you have ever seen the famous floating heads in the foyer, then you may be interested to know that my friends are convinced that I was the model for them. I do have to admit that one or two of them look quite like me.
 
The Mackintosh exhibition is really interesting and it gives you a real sense of what his influences were, the work of his contemporaries in “The Glasgow Style,” especially the famous four: Charles himself; his future wife Margaret Macdonald, her younger sister Frances Macdonald, and Frances’s future husband, James Herbert McNair; and then those that they influenced themselves. Some of the collection pieces of his own work are brilliant, and I love that so many of them are just ordinary, everyday things that were put to use; coat stands; umbrella stands; fire guards and the like. There’s even a toilet door. As someone who holds with the belief that God is best found in ordinary, everyday things, this kind of art really appeals to me, rather than the more esoteric variety. I still find it hard to believe I attended a Mackintosh designed school for two years at the St. Mungo’s Academy Annexe in Barony Street with absolutely no appreciation of my surroundings whatsoever.
 
Apart from Kelvingrove, another regular part of my childhood was going with my father on a Sunday afternoon to Henderson’s shipyard on the Clyde at Partick, where he worked for the Anchor Line as a timekeeper. Whenever there was a ship in drydock being refurbished he would take myself and Hugh along (Patrick was too young) and we would be able to board the ship and walk all in and around every part of it. I have wonderful memories of those
Sunday jaunts. I only discovered recently that the Anchor Line restaurant on St. Vincent Street is bedecked with memorabilia from the Anchor Line and, thanks to a generous gift from a church patron with nautical connections, I was able to go there with my friends during their visit, steep myself in memories, and bore them to death with reminiscences.
 
On the second day, while searching for a particular shop on the southside (being a north-sider the southside is a foreign country to me), we found ourselves walking through Queen’s Park and visiting the Scottish Poetry Rose Garden with its cairns and dedications to some of Scotland’s best-known bards. It probably wasn’t the wisest time to visit as there were no roses out and, in the driving rain, wind and cold, the place felt and looked a bit bedraggled, as did we. We did, however, find a nice coffee shop with lovely pastries and warmed ourselves up. We also found the shop we were searching for which was near to the monument to the Battle of Langside where, 450 years ago this year, Mary Queen of Scots fought and lost her last encounter with Regent Moray. The rest of the time was spent browsing book shops and the like and, all in all, despite the weather, we had an enjoyable couple of days. There is always something to do in this great city – hail, rain or snow!
 
The fullness of joy is to behold God in everything. (Julian of Norwich)
God communicates with us by way of all things. They are messages of love.
(Ernesto Cardenal)

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Father frank's log

3/22/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 18th – 25th MARCH

For very many years now my younger brother has ventured out, every Saturday afternoon, to an expanse of waste ground, bearing carrier bags of scraps to feed the birds. I have only accompanied him on a few occasions, and each time I was amused by the fact that, when we arrived at the chosen spot, there was not a bird in sight anywhere, neither on the ground nor in the sky, but that as soon as he would scatter the first scraps the birds would immediately appear from everywhere – crows, blackbirds, seagulls, pigeons, and various other smaller birds – until he was surrounded by literally hundreds of them. I think that the wrong brother was called Francis because I was in no doubt that they recognised him and knew him. This was affirmed for me by the fact that, at the height of the snow a few weeks ago, at our Passionist Community house in Bishopbriggs, we decided to scatter some scraps in our back garden, thinking that it would be a kindness to the birds at such a time, as they may have been finding food difficult to come by. The scraps were there for days and not a bird came near.

This bird-talk brings to mind one of my favourite true stories which many of you may remember. It was back in the late summer, early autumn of 2007, that a seagull began to appear at the R.S. McColl shop in Aberdeen where, as in most seaside towns, seagulls are not the most popular of God’s creatures. As the story goes, this bird would apparently hide around the corner and wait for the shop to open in the morning. When there was no one else in the shop and the assistant was at the till the bird would saunter in, pick up a packet of Spicy
Doritos, and saunter back out again. This became a daily event, with the gull always using the same routine and always choosing Spicy Doritos above all else. The shopkeeper began to get a bit frustrated and instructed the assistant to close the door over after opening up to prevent the bird from getting in. By this stage however the seagull, nicknamed Sam, had become a firm favourite with the locals, and they decided to club together to leave a fund behind the counter to pay for Sam’s Spicy Doritos, and so the door was left open.
 
Sam soon came to the attention of the media. Journalists and television crews appeared from all over. Sam didn’t let them down. Undeterred by all the attention he continued with his shoplifting escapade on a daily basis and, pursued by the cameras, it was discovered that he was unselfishly carrying the Spicy Doritos to a nearby spot where he would peck the packet open and share them with his friends. Sam persisted with his early morning visits to R.S. McColl’s for his Spicy Doritos for some time to come, no doubt unaware that for very many people, in that particular year, he beat politicians, film stars, football players, television
celebrities, heroes and the like, to be the Scottish News Personality of the Year, and well deserved it was too. If anyone knows whatever became of Sam, please let me know.
 
As we enter into Holy Week we might ponder the legends of two birds associated with Christ’s Passion. The first is the goldfinch, known for eating thistles and thorns, which in Christian art refers to Jesus’ crown of thorns. That’s why the child Jesus is sometimes depicted in art holding a goldfinch, foreshadowing his Passion and death on the cross. And then of course there is the robin, the legend saying that the robin's breast is red because, when Jesus was on the road to Calvary, a robin plucked a thorn from Christ's head where the crown of thorns had pierced, and a drop of Jesus' blood fell on the robin's breast, turning it red. 
 
This will be the last log until after Easter so, let me finish with a quote from St. Francis:
 
My brother and sister birds, you should greatly praise your Creator, and love Him always. He gave you feathers to wear, wings to fly, and whatever you need. God made you noble among His creatures and gave you a home in the purity of the air so that though you neither sow nor reap, He nevertheless protects, feeds and clothes you without your least care.

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father frank's log...

3/15/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 11th – 18th MARCH

My bedroom window in Bishopbriggs overlooks a wooded area and a pond which is home to a rare breed of frogs. While I hear these frogs constantly, I have never actually seen any. Only Father Gareth, when he was parking the car one night, claims to have seen one that had come through the fence and into the estate. There are also deer in the woods, and I told the story recently of, after over a year of never catching a glimpse, coming across a number of them, romping through the estate, as I returned from a middle-of-the-night sick call to the Royal Infirmary. I have since seen two of them, now antlered, grazing in the woods.
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I can now, however, report a more unusual sighting. Before the recent snow, in the middle of another very cold spell, I looked out of the window early one Saturday morning, and I saw two beasts walking across the frozen pond. At first I wasn’t sure what I was seeing, but as they drew closer I could see that they were, what I can only describe as giant foxes. They were the size of wolves and their coats were, if not black, then a very, very dark brown. I watched them for a while and, when I heard Father Gareth come out of his room, which is next door to mine, but overlooking the street, I called him in and asked him to have a look. He was as mesmerised as I was.

I think that the other members of our community were more sceptical. And then, one night, as Father Gareth was driving home from the church, and nearing the house, he came upon one of these giant foxes on the path in front of him. He arrived home almost in a state of terror, being of a delicate disposition, and told anyone who would listen that, up close, this beast was even bigger and more ferocious looking than when he was watching it out of my bedroom window. I believed every word he said, but the others remained sceptical, and Brother Antony, being a local lad, seemed to suggest that giant beasts of one kind of another were fairly normal in Bishopbriggs.

At the risk of sounding fanciful, and having far too vivid an imagination, I must confess that this wasn’t the first time I had come across a larger-than-life version of an animal. When I was doing my 30-day retreat at Manresa House in Clontarf, in Dublin, back in 1987, I would walk early every morning on Dollymount Strand, which is a part of Bull Island, a specially protected bird sanctuary and nature reserve, which has since become a special area of conservation under the EU Habitats Directive. On one particular morning, about 6 a.m., as I clambered over the sand dunes to get to the strand, I was suddenly face to face with a huge hare, and, I kid you not, it was the size of a small kangaroo! Once again, I stood mesmerised as we gazed at each other, and then the hare scampered off. Being on a silent retreat I couldn’t go back to talk to anyone about it until we were on one of our two break days, when we were allowed to chat, and even go out for a few hours with the other retreatants. My story, however, met with the same reaction as that of our Passionist community to the giant foxes. Perhaps Clontarf is twinned with Bishopbriggs and giant beasts are quite normal.

Very soon, when we enter into the Easter Season, we will meet many different people in the Gospel stories, some of whom will see and believe; some of whom will believe without seeing; and some of whom will see and still not believe. All I can say to my doubters is, I know what I saw, and I will not withdraw my testimony.

Here is the chorus of a beautiful hymn to Christ by David Haas, inspired by 1 Peter 1:8:
Without seeing you we love you. Without touching you we embrace.
Without knowing you we follow. Without seeing you we believe.
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Father Frank's Log

3/8/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 4th – 11th MARCH

Thankfully the snow has abated now but what a time we had! As mentioned in last week’s log (I call it a log and not a blog – nostalgic memories of Captain Kirk’s Log in Star Trek – and someone sent me an email recently, in all innocence, addressed to Father Frank Log) I brought my brother to hospital to see a consultant about his broken metacarpals. I had the car but we prudently decided to get the bus as overnight, Tuesday into Wednesday, the snow had come with a vengeance. The bus took a long time but we arrived at the minor injuries clinic in Partick just slightly late for his appointment. In the end there was no stookie, just the splint, a regime of finger exercises to follow, and blood tests to be sent to his doctor. We made it back on the bus but it was obvious the buses would be cancelled later in the day.
I decided to try and bring the car back as far as St. Mungo’s and I made it safely in the wake of other traffic that had ground the grit well into the road. Father Gareth, Brother Antony and Father Justinian were getting ready to head home to Bishopbriggs and I stayed to do the afternoon Adoration and Confessions – nobody came to either.

As Glasgow was now on red alert I thought it best to stay the night at the church so as to be here for the morning and allow the others to stay home safe. There is a nice reclining chair in the office so, after closing the church for the night, I pulled on a pair of heavy socks and my walking shoes and headed out to see if anywhere was open. I saw a number of foreign students taking lots of photos of the snow with great excitement. I had some vouchers from Christmas and so I bought a duvet to keep me warm and stocked up on some food for the night and the morning. As I got to the top of the High Street, just at the Duke Street junction, I saw a man, slightly the worse for wear, having a great laugh at some poor soul’s spinning car wheels as he tried to move off from the traffic lights, but instead just sliding all over the road. There was no other traffic in sight. The smile was wiped from his face however when he turned around and saw that the Old College Bar was shut. He let out a cry of great anguish as if to say “you can take the buses off, close the shops, shut down the airports, and stop the trains – but don’t close the Old College Bar” – this was a sure sign of Armageddon!

I slept okay on the chair, except that my feet got cold. There were 5 people at the 10 o’clock Mass; nobody for morning Confessions, and 8 people for the 12.15pm Mass. I headed out after lunch to try and get a charger for my phone as it had run out of power and my charger was in Bishopbriggs. I had a successful trip and managed to get myself a pizza in the only open café I could see. As I trudged back to St. Mungo’s I passed 3 men heading over the walkway. They were carrying bottles of something to keep them warm and one was crying out to the other two. “Eskimos, we’re turning into Eskimos!!!” He had a point.

Later in the afternoon I got a call asking me to tend to two people in the Royal Infirmary as the chaplain was snowbound. I put a notice on the Confessional to say I would be back as soon as possible. I had trouble getting out of the hospital as it seems there was a major incident coming in and people were being directed out by another route. When I returned, feeling the beginnings of storm Emma as I waded through the snow, there was one person waiting for Confession. I then closed the church and had a quiet night, doing a little work; reading, and saying a few prayers in the darkened church. Earlier in the day I had discovered a bed in one of the rooms in the old house and so I decided to take my duvet up there and get a better night’s sleep, which I did, hoping that the next day would begin to see a change.

Isaiah 1:18. Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; Isaiah 55:10. "My word is like the snow and the rain that come down from the heavens to water the earth. They make the crops grow and provide seed for planting and food to eat. 

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Father Frank's Log...

3/3/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 25th FEBRUARY – 4th MARCH

I have a famous older brother, at least to those who follow football, but I also have a younger brother whose life is much more secluded and private. He has worked for the same organization since he left school, which is over 45 years ago, and while the running of the organization has changed hands, the location has moved, and the nature of the work has altered dramatically with developments in systems and technology throughout those years, he has been there as an ever-constant presence, like an immovable rock in an ever-changing sea.
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He hates missing work, and rarely has, in all that time, apart from a couple of strokes which saw him hospitalised for a period. No sooner would he be out of hospital than he was making plans to get back to work as soon as was humanly possible, and even on occasion when it didn’t seem humanly possible. He is a man of routine, and those routines are sacrosanct.

Since coming back to Scotland, I have tried to call up to him once a week to have a chat and watch some television together. Last Monday when I called up he wasn’t there and I wondered and worried what was keeping him so late. Not long afterwards he appeared with a splint in his hand, having been at the hospital for most of the day. It turns out he’d had a fall the previous Saturday but declined to mention it or do anything about it, until he appeared into work on Monday morning with a black eye, a swollen hand, sore feet, and a stiff shoulder. Thankfully he was ordered by kindly colleagues to get himself to the hospital where it was discovered he had two broken metacarpals. The poor guy must have been in agony, but in his own stoical way he had just intended to soldier on as if nothing had happened.
I stayed with him that night and helped him to get up the next day before I headed in to St. Mungo’s. He has a number of other health issues too, and was really quite incapacitated. I went back to him that evening to discover he had spent the day practicing various ways of rendering himself more mobile. Later in the evening he asked me what my plans were. I told him that I was intending staying the night again, to which he furtively replied: “You do know I’m going to go back to work tomorrow, don’t you?”

I wasn’t the slightest bit surprised, and neither were his work colleagues. He reminds me of one of those TV characters like the great Jack Bauer in 24 who, after being beaten, stabbed, shot and blown up, pulls the tubes out of his body in the hospital, to get up and get on with the task at hand. In fact, I remember back in 2010, just a week or so after my brother had come out of hospital after suffering a stroke, he went back to work in the midst of a snow blizzard. Sometime during that day the buses were taken off the road. Someone kindly gave him a lift as far as they could, and then he ended up walking about 5 miles knee deep in snow the rest of the way, still intending to go to work the next day. I knew nothing about it until I phoned him from Dublin later that night. As I write, I am preparing to bring him to hospital in the morning, perhaps to get a stookie, and, no doubt, he will be back at work shortly after.

While my older brother pursued his journalistic career and raised a family, and I pursued my Passionist studies and moved around in various ministries, our younger brother facilitated us in doing that by assuming the major share, by far, of looking after our mother in the latter years of her life, which he did lovingly and willingly, without complaint. To me he is one of those unsung heroes of ordinary life who just gets on with things no matter what, and asks for nothing in return. If I were to choose a Gospel image that might capture him, it would be Jesus, setting his face firmly towards Jerusalem, despite those trying to advise him against it, determined to do what he was meant to do, resolute and committed, to the very end.

As Christopher Reeve once said: A hero is an ordinary individual, who finds the strength to persevere and endure, in spite of overwhelming obstacles.

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Father Frank's Log

2/22/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 18th – 25th FEBRUARY
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On the 2nd Sunday of Lent, which always tells the story of the Transfiguration of Jesus on Mount Tabor, I tend to think of mountains where I’ve walked.  I say walked, rather than climbed, as I always preferred to find the gentler ascents, and to be there for the beauty rather than the challenge. When Father Gareth and Brother Antony returned from Highgate last week, having thoroughly enjoyed their time there with the other students, they told me that they had been talking to an English Passionist, Father Ben, someone I knew well from years past. Father Ben had recently returned to London after spending some years ministering in the diocese of Galloway, but that wasn’t his first stint in Scotland. For 4 years, back in the late 1990’s, he had lived in Kingussie where he looked after the parishes of Kingussie, in the diocese of Argyle and the Isles, and the parish of Aviemore, in the diocese of Aberdeen.

His primary reason for being there, though, was to take time in a quiet place, with little distraction, to try and decipher the diaries of Father Ignatius Spencer, a 19th century Passionist priest, whose cause for Canonization Father Ben has been pursuing relentlessly for many years. The task was made all the more difficult because Father Ignatius’s handwriting was so tiny, at times managing to cram 6 months of entries into a single page. Part of the interest surrounding Father Ignatius Spencer is that he was an ancestor of both Winston Churchill and Princess Diana Spencer, as well as in his own time being a nephew of the Duke of Wellington. Those, however, aren’t reasons to be canonised. The main thrust for that, in the mind of Father Ben, is that as well as being a holy Passionist, and a diligent priest, he was 120 years ahead of his time in his work for Christian Unity. He converted from Anglicanism and spent his life working for the conversion of England to the Catholic faith. He is also known as the Apostle of Prayer for England.

The house where Father Ben was staying during this time was the parochial house in Kingussie, where it seems that Canon Sydney MacEwan lived for a while. The attic contained some items that may have belonged to him back in the day. Canon Sydney MacEwan was the famous singing priest, perhaps best known for Bring Flowers of the Rarest which is still often played on our radios to mark the first day of May. Interestingly enough, he was born and grew up in Springburn, the neighbouring parish to St. Mungo’s, and his father was from Partick, where I was born and grew up myself. He once said “I think I prefer a concert audience to a congregation. People listen to me more attentively in a concert than in a church”. But everything he did, including his singing, was really for Christ and for the Church, and we’ll forgive him that he went to St. Aloysius and not to St. Mungo’s, and that at one time he wanted to be a Jesuit and not a Passionist.

During his years there, deciphering the diaries, Father Ben found it hard to get away for a break and so, two years in a row, and being based in Prestonpans at that time, I gave up part of my summer to cover for him, so that he could get away. To be honest, it was no great sacrifice. Being younger and fitter back then, I loved to do a bit of walking in the mountains, and from this house in Kingussie, without even taking the car, I could stay on the same side of the road and, within minutes, be walking in the Cairngorms, or I could cross to the other side of the road and, within minutes, be walking in the Monadhliaths, two ranges in the Grampians. I walked in these mountains every day I was there, and I often had my breath taken away by beauty, which I always like to think of as Transfiguration moments.

Father, your Servant, Father Ignatius Spencer, spent his life preaching the love shown for us in the Sacred Passion of your Son, and working tirelessly to bring people to know that love. Help us to follow his example and show us that you are well pleased with his life by granting any favours we ask, through his intercession. Amen.
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Father frank's log...

2/17/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 11th – 18th FEBRUARY

Last Wednesday, about 9.45 p.m., Father Gareth said, “Isn’t it strange how, on the day when you can’t have something, you want it all the more?” It was Ash Wednesday, a day of fast and abstinence, and Father Gareth had taken a sudden and strong notion for a slice of beef, a lamb shank, a chicken leg, or perhaps all three. He was right of course, we are never so hungry as on a fast day, no sooner do we begin to deprive ourselves of something than our longing for it grows stronger. Such is the way of temptation, and Lent had only just begun.

Earlier that day we had big crowds at each of the three Masses in the church as people came forward to be signed with ashes, and also a big number of people who came for ashes throughout the day, who were unable to attend any of the Masses. We also had a very nice service in the City of Glasgow College which was conducted by Brother Antony, as college chaplain, and I provided a bit of music. It was obviously appreciated by the students and staff who came, and I thought that the witness of the students and staff walking around the college for the rest of the day, with their ashes on their foreheads, was quite significant.

My most memorable experience of Lent was back in 1987 when I made a 30-day silent retreat at Manresa House in Dublin, named after the cave where, according to tradition, Saint Ignatius of Loyola shut himself up to pray and do penance from March 1522 to February 1523, and during which he wrote the Spiritual Exercises which formed the basis of my retreat. At the time I was doing a year-long formation course in preparation for working with our students and novices, and the retreat was part of the course.

There were 30 of us on the course from various Religious Orders, 20 women and 10 men, representing 15 different countries and cultures throughout the world. It had been a wonderful experience and the 30-day retreat came towards the end of the course. Because of the nature of the various elements of our programme, we had come to know each other very well, warts and all, and there had developed a great spirit of friendship and support among us. There had, of course, been occasional moments of humour to break the intensity as when, in the middle of our first group dynamic session, during which nobody had spoken, the silence was broken when a Sister from Pakistan, who had a bit of a tickly cough, asked the facilitator, “Do you mind if I take a tablet?”, to which he answered not a word. At the end of the session he left the room, again without speaking, and we all turned to this Sister and asked why she had made such a strange request as, with her broken English, we had, every single one of us, thought she had said, “Do you mind if I take up the carpet?” We laughed till we cried.

But, much as we had come to know each other well throughout the course in all the talking and sharing, I would say that we came to know each other even better in the quiet and the stillness of the 30-day silent retreat. We became very attuned to each other whether it was in the chapel quietly praying, or sitting at table sharing a meal with gentle music playing in the background, or just noticing each other walking in the grounds, or in the park next to the Retreat House, or on the long stretch of beach on the opposite side of the road. We seemed to intimately connect with each other’s moments of joy and sorrow, struggle and pain, without ever saying a word, because no words were needed. And God was palpably present in the silence as we moved towards a joyful celebration of Holy Week and Easter at the end of it all.
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This Lent has begun on St. Valentine’s Day, and it will take us through to Easter Sunday, which is April Fools’ Day. St. Paul says, we are fools for Christ, but then he goes on to say, but we are so wise in Christ. So, we can acknowledge a certain foolishness, a touch of madness, that is built in to our believing in, and following of Christ, but we also celebrate its wisdom. Again, as St. Paul says: The message of the Cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the wisdom and power of God. Happy Lent!

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Father frank's log

2/8/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 4th – 11th FEBRUARY

Early this morning I dropped off Father Gareth and Brother Antony to catch a train to Euston Station, from where they will head to the Passionist Retreat of St. Joseph’s at Highgate in North London. St. Joseph’s sits impressively at the top of Highgate Hill and has a magnificent dome. The story goes that during the 2nd World War the Ministry of Defence requested that the dome be covered so that it didn’t become a marker for the enemy, to which the rector replied that when they covered up the dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral he would cover up the dome of St. Joseph’s. Neither were ever covered. St. Joseph’s wasn’t bombed but the dome of St. Paul’s did suffer some damage. Very near to the church is Highgate Cemetery where Karl Marx is buried, or, if you prefer, Jeremy Beadle is also buried there.

The reason for Father Gareth and Brother Antony’s trip is to take part in a gathering of young Passionists from our Province, the others being Father Frank (Trias) who is based in Minsteracres Retreat Centre in County Durham; Brother Conor who is based in Crossgar in County Down, Northern Ireland; and Brother Aidan who is based in Highgate itself – so, two Scots; two from Northern Ireland, and one Welshman. Such gatherings are invaluable as young Passionists from our part of the world are few and far between, and it’s good that they meet from time to time to encourage and support each other, and to continue their growth and development in Passionist Religious Life.

These five men are spread throughout a few years of formation, whereas when I entered in 1975 there were six in my class alone, which in itself was small compared to times past. Of the six, two were from Glasgow, two were from Belfast, one was from Nigeria, and, at first, I thought the other might have been from Sweden or Holland or somewhere like that, as he spoke very quickly in a kind of sing-song accent, and I couldn’t understand a word he said, but it turned out he was a lovely guy from County Clare in the West of Ireland. Till the day he left I still couldn’t understand him.

After a year of postulancy at the Graan in Enniskillen, we moved to Mount Argus in Dublin to begin formal studies, and there were 21 of us on the student corridor, a motley collection of religious all-sorts. In the monastery itself, between priests, brothers and students, there were over eighty men. Between the student corridor and the community chapel, where we all gathered for community prayer and Eucharist, there was a passageway referred to as the race-track. This was because on any given morning you would find two or three students who had overslept, racing along with seconds to go for the start of Morning Prayer, trying to escape the steely gaze they would receive from the student director, if prayers had already been intoned before they got there.

Most of us studied at Milltown Park, a Jesuit institute about five miles from Mount Argus. Our mode of transport was bicycles. Many of these bicycles were from a store of abandoned, lost or stolen bicycles in the keep of An Garda Síochána, the Irish police. One of our Passionists in Mount Argus was chaplain to the police and so, once it was deemed that certain bikes were never being reclaimed, we were able to acquire them for the students. By the state of most of these bicycles we could see why they were abandoned or “lost”, and that stealing them was probably deemed by the thieves to be a mistake in the first place. It was quite a sight to see us all heading out of a morning to class.

We would return early in the afternoon for a bit of lunch and then gather in the recreation to relax for a while, before we got down to study in our rooms. Part of our recreation together was the “neglected record slot” whereby someone would dig out an old 78, 45 or 33rpm disc that had been left behind by previous generations of students and play it full blast on the turntable. It would then be awarded roses or raspberries – but mostly raspberries. We had a small snooker table too that we enjoyed, and quite a few excellent footballers who lived for getting out onto the pitch at the back of the monastery, and for playing in the seminary league on a Saturday, which, more often than not, we would win. Needless to say, we had our tensions among us too, but, all in all, it was good to have each other, and I admire our present crop of young Passionists who have to travel at times a lonelier road. So, hopefully, our five young Passionists will have a great few days together and come back the better for it.
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Jesus. give the light of your Holy Spirit to those young people who have received the grace of a Passionist vocation. Inspire them to give their lives, keeping the Memory of your Passion alive in their own hearts, and in the hearts of others. Amen.

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Father Frank's Log...

2/8/2018

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father frank's Log...

2/2/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 28th JANUARY – 4th FEBRUARY

Apart from Father Gareth, who was in Wales visiting his mum anyway, our Passionist Community in Glasgow are all Scots, and so we four Scots settled down last Thursday week to celebrate Burns’ Night with some lovely haggis, neeps and tatties. Being the only drinker in the community I was also able to enjoy a wee dram of 15-year-old Glenfiddich with it, a generous gift to the community; malt whisky being reputedly the perfect complement for haggis. Of course, if Father Gareth had been there, he would have tried to make a case for Rabbie Burns being Welsh, and would probably have tortured us by reciting the Address to a Haggis in his mock Scots accent, which is truly cringe-worthy.

When I was at primary school at St. Peter’s in Partick, from 1956-63, I won a book of Burns’ poetry at a poetry recital competition. Ironically, it was for reciting a poem that wasn’t by Burns at all. It was a poem called The Sair Finger by Walter Wingate, a schoolteacher and poet from Dalry in Ayrshire, who died 100 years ago this year, about a wean wi’ a skelf in his pinkie – for non-Scots readers that means a child with a splinter in his little finger.
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Much later in life, when I was a deacon in Rome, I had an unexpected and unusual request to recite a lot of Burns’ poetry. It was during one of the breaks from university and I was invited by one of my Italian Passionist colleagues to spend a few days with him at the Passionist Retreat near to city of Verona, which was his home community. Now, while Verona has more to connect it with William Shakespeare, with Romeo and Juliet, The Two gentlemen of Verona, and The Taming of the Shrew all being set there, it was Rabbie Burns who had most captivated an old Passionist priest in the community for many years and, when he heard that I was a Scot, he produced his collection of Burns’ poetry, and also a tape recorder, and had me spending hours each day reciting the poems so that he could listen to them being read in a Scots accent. Having lost my accent to a large extent, and sounding more Irish than Scots, I had to really work at it and lay it on thick. He seemed very pleased with the outcome anyway.

I know that the Scots poet Liz Lochhead recently described Burns as the Harvey Weinstien of his day, and I wouldn’t be qualified to comment on that, but I think it is also true to say that Burns influenced some extraordinary people. Abraham Lincoln for example could quote Burns’ poetry by heart and drew on Burns’ passion for social justice and the equality of human beings, often reflected in his works, when campaigning for the emancipation of slavery. Burns is also said to have inspired Martin Luther King in his I have a dream speech. Winston Churchill was another admirer, and when Bob Dylan was asked to name the lyric that had most inspired him he quoted directly from Burns’ My Love is like a red, red rose.

It has been suggested at times that Burns was anti-Catholic, but I think the most informed view is that, certainly in his poems, he was mostly critical of the Kirk, and that he was simply anti-hypocrisy in any religion, and we could all go along with that. I was going to finish with an extract from one of Burns’ poems, or perhaps one of his songs, but I know you’re really all longing to read The Sair Finger – so here it is:

You've hurt your finger? Puir wee man! Your pinkie? Deary me! 
Noo, juist you haud it that wey till I get my specs and see!
My, so it is - and there's the skelf! Noo, dinna greet nae mair. 
See there - my needle's gotten't out! I'm sure that wasna sair? 

And noo, to make it hale the morn, Put on a wee bit saw, 
And tie a Bonnie hankie roun't, Noo, there na - rin awa'! 
Your finger sair ana'? Ye rogue, You're only lettin' on. 
Weel, weel, then - see noo, there ye are, Row'd up the same as John! 

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Father frank's Log...

1/27/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 21st – 28th JANUARY
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Last Friday I decided to attend the closing of the St. Mungo Festival at the City of Glasgow College, where Brother Antony is the Catholic chaplain. Apart from himself, nobody else in the college seemed to know very much about it and, just before 4 p.m., when it was due to begin, there was a snow blizzard blowing outside and the college website was reporting that the college was closed and that all the staff had been sent home. Brother Antony suggested that he would go along and check it out while I continued to work in the office, and he would phone me to let me know what was happening. When he arrived at the college he was told that there was no one inside except the janitor, but he went in anyway, only to find a table set with food and drink, and a few people gathered waiting for the event. He phoned me and suggested that I should come in by the back entrance to the college, the blizzard having by then eased a little. When I got to the back entrance there was a lady coming out who informed me that the college was closed and that there was no one there except the janitor. Of course, I knew better, and I went in to find everything as Brother Antony had reported. Between the weather and the confusion there were very few people there, just a few staff members, a handful of students who, in noble student tradition, seemed to be there for the free food and drink, and then those of us who were genuinely interested in St. Mungo.

As it turned out, I thoroughly enjoyed it. In the college there are three visual interpretations relating to St Mungo, and the closing event was an opportunity to see and find out more about them. The first was a sculpture that some people will remember used to sit at the bottom of Buchanan Street called “The Spirit of St. Kentigern”. It was loved and hated in equal measure at the time, but few people really knew what it was meant to be. It was eventually removed and placed in storage, but was now rescued, restored, installed on an impressive new plinth, and placed at one of the college entrances. The second piece, called St. Mungo’s Cave, reminded me of a labyrinth. It was a wooden construction that represented the skyline St. Mungo would have seen on his journey from his birthplace of Culross in Fife, to what later became Glasgow, the city that he founded on the banks of the Clyde by the Molendinar Burn. The final piece, which we didn’t actually get to see, except as a projected image, was a more traditional statue of St. Mungo being carved in Portland stone, which will eventually find a home in the garden area next to the college, visible from Cathedral Street.

The presentation of these pieces was nicely and simply done, condensed because of the bad weather and the smallness of the group, and was rounded off by one of our St. Mungo’s musicians, Vincent Mellon, playing and singing his own composition, Molendinar Song, which he had also sung at the 12 noon Mass the Sunday before, at the celebration of the Feast of St. Mungo, along with another of his compositions, Let Glasgow Flourish.

In the course of the evening I got talking to a few people including a lovely lady who lectured in the hairdressing department at the college. Once we had solved the problems of the world she told me that I would be a welcome visitor to the hairdressing department at any time. I was delighted with this but when I told it to Brother Antony he just laughed and asked what good would that be to me. He said the same to my new friend who simply said that she could give the top of my head a nice polish. I might just give that a try some day.
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I’m sure Vincent, who could tell you every place in this great city where the famous Glasgow Coat of Arms can be found, won’t mind me ending with the chorus of Let Glasgow Flourish:

Let Glasgow flourish by God’s word and the praising of His name;
To be a light to all the world, and throughout the world the same.

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Father frank's log...

1/20/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 14th – 21st JANUARY
A couple of weeks ago Father Gareth organised a simple lunch for one of the Passionist Young Team who was returning home to India. She was, of course, looking forward to seeing her family; she showed us some photographs of them, and of her church back home, but she was very sad to be leaving Glasgow, and to be leaving St. Mungo’s and the Passionist Young Team, which had come to mean a lot to her as a community of faith and friendship.
A few days later she was at Mass in St. Mungo’s for the last time and as I bid farewell to her again I caught a snippet of a conversation she was having with two ladies of the parish. I couldn’t possibly hazard a guess at these ladies ages, but let’s just say they weren’t members of the Young Team. I understood from what I heard that this girl was going back with these ladies for a post-Mass cup of tea, and that this had been a not uncommon occurrence since who knows when. Sometimes the cup of tea stretched to fish and chips, which had become a favourite meal for our Indian friend, and I imagine not one she would be getting too often back in Kerala.
I suppose what struck me most was that there was, in the parish, this simple act of kindness going on quietly in the background, and I wondered just how many more such hidden acts of kindness were going on in the parish that I was totally unaware of. Of course, there is absolutely no reason that I should be aware of them, parish priest or not, but still it delighted me to know that our parish as a family of faith, friendship and compassion, was alive and active, and known only to the God who sees all good things done in secret and blesses them.
It reminded me of a time when one of our old Passionists died, and in the aftermath of his funeral a story emerged that no one, except a very few people, knew about. It seems he went out one night to visit a house in the parish (not St. Mungo’s). He rang the doorbell and waited, quite a long time, for it to be answered. It turned out that he had gone to the wrong house and it was an old protestant lady who eventually opened the door. She apologised for taking so long and explained to him that at a fixed time every night she had to put eye drops in and she found it very difficult to do.
Afterwards, a local teacher who went for a walk most nights with this priest, wondered why at a certain time he started to excuse himself and leave. It turned out that, ever since that chance meeting, he had been going around to this old lady’s house every night and putting the drops in her eyes. Eventually the lady died, and not long after that the priest died too, and it was only then that the story of this quiet, hidden kindness came out into the open. I still feel very moved every time I tell that story.
In Tennessee Williams’ play, A Streetcar Named Desire, the troubled Blanche famously says “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.” There is an echo of this in the mysterious story in the Old Testament, from the Book of Genesis, where Abraham receives three strangers as he camps by the Oak of Mamre. He serves them a meal, and as the conversation progresses he seems to be talking directly to God. This story was later captured in a famous Russian Icon where these visitors are depicted as angels, and as a metaphor for the three persons of the Blessed Trinity.
Let’s take to heart this verse from the Letter to the Hebrews which often accompanies this famous icon where it simply says:
“Never forget to show kindness to strangers, for some who have done this have entertained angels, without knowing it”.
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January 11th, 2018

1/11/2018

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 7th – 14th JANUARY
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Today (Thursday 11th January) I offered the 12.15 p.m. Mass with two Passionists who have recently celebrated their diamond jubilees of priesthood; Father Justinian McGread CP from St. Mungo’s community here in Glasgow, and Father Ralph Egan CP from our community at Mount Argus in Dublin. They were ordained on 21st December 1957 along with seven others, all of whom have now gone to God. One of them was Father Eustace, well known to all at St. Mungo’s, and much missed. Father Justinian and Father Ralph each had their own celebration in Glasgow and Dublin respectively, but when Fr. Ralph came over for a visit to Glasgow with his sister it provided the opportunity to have a simple celebration with both of them.

I was thinking back to when I first met each of them. Back in 1969 I was a youth leader at my parish of St. Laurence’s in Drumchapel and we took a group of young people down from the parish to the Passionist Retreat House at Coodham in Ayrshire. Father Justinian was one of the Passionists based there at the time. After a little while I was invited by the Passionists on to the organising team for both the Youth Retreats and the Young Adult Retreats. I remember that our planning meetings used to take place over a weekend down at Skelmorlie, in a house on the sea-front that was owned by some Religious Sisters. I would finish work on the Friday evening and then meet up with some other members of the team. We would get the train to Wemyss Bay and a bus along to the house. When we arrived, Father Justinian would always be there to welcome us with a huge pot of Spaghetti Bolognese and some nice crusty bread, and I used to look forward to it immensely. Father Justinian’s spaghetti became legendary, so you can imagine my delight on coming back to Glasgow at the end of 2016, and coming to live in community with Father Justinian for the very first time, to discover that, nearly 50 years on, he was still making his spaghetti, and I now look forward, every Saturday night, to arriving home from the Vigil Mass in St. Mungo’s, and sitting down to my favourite meal.

I first met Father Ralph in1976. I had joined the Passionists in 1975 and spent my postulancy year at the Graan in Enniskillen. Part of my involvement with the retreats at Coodham was around music and, when I arrived at the Graan, I was asked by the rector, Father Ignatius, to set up a music group for one of the Sunday Masses and also to provide music for the Graan prayer group. Also, my postulancy director, Father Bernard, had me travelling around the countryside with him to provide music at various prayer meetings in halls and homes, sometimes in very remote places indeed. Prayer groups were very popular at the time.

In September 1976 I moved to Mount Argus in Dublin to begin philosophy studies. Although the Passionists had been in Mount Argus since 1856, it only in fact became a parish in 1974, and Father Ralph was appointed as the first ever parish priest. Once again, on my arrival, he asked me if I could set up a folk group in the parish for what was then the 1 p.m. Mass on a Sunday. I put a notice in the parish bulletin for interested members, but it wasn’t specific enough as to who was eligible, so come the night of the first rehearsal I had 40 people there, ranging in age from 14-36. It was a bit chaotic, but somehow, we managed, and we played for the first time at the Mass on the 1st Sunday of Advent 1976. The folk group lasted in some shape or form for 40 years and only disbanded in the autumn of 2016. Father Ralph returned for a second spell as parish priest from 1996-2000, when he was also rector, and in January of 2001, we swapped jobs, he taking over as rector and parish priest in Prestonpans, and me taking over as rector and parish priest in Mount Argus, where I remained until coming back to St. Mungo’s in 2016.  I have lived in community with Father Ralph a few times over the years and he has always been very pleasant company and a faithful and committed priest.

Loving God, may those to whom Fr Justinian and Fr Ralph have ministered for 60 years, appreciate, affirm, support, and celebrate their gift of service, and pray for them always.

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January 11th, 2018

1/11/2018

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FATHER Frank's Log is taking a break until the New Year. We hope you enjoy reading the Archives of 2017.

12/28/2017

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FATHER FRANK'S LOG

12/23/2017

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 17th – 24th DECEMBER

Where our Passionist community lives in Bishopbriggs, there is a wood behind our house. One of the advantages of this wood is that it is home to a rare breed of frogs, which means that nothing can be built on their habitat, which is a pond just beyond our garden fence. This wood is also home to a family of deer. When I first arrived in October 2016, the other members of the community informed me that I would see these deer regularly, especially as my bedroom window overlooked the wood. Fourteen months later I still hadn’t seen a single deer. They were more elusive than God and, unlike God, I had begun to doubt their existence.

Then, just the other week, I was on call on Friday night for the Royal Infirmary. At 2.30 in the morning I was awakened by the sound of the hospital pager which, understandably, emits a very loud bleep. After praising God for calling me at this hour, I phoned the hospital, and was put through to a nurse who told me what the situation was, where I was to go, and who I was to attend to. I quickly got dressed and took the oils and the host from our little oratory in the house and tried to tiptoe down the stairs and out to the car without waking the whole household.
My habit on such occasions is to park in the yard at St. Mungo’s and walk over the footbridge to the Royal. I arrived at the hospital within about half an hour of being woken, and made my way to Ward 65 where an old lady, originally from Donegal, was nearing her final breath. A good number of the family were gathered. They were obviously a family of faith and we gathered round the bed to say the prayers, and to give her the Sacrament of Anointing, although, being unconscious, she was unable to receive the Eucharist. After chatting for a while with the family, I then left them to begin to make my way back to Bishopbriggs.

My first task was to find my way out of the hospital – which is not as easy as you might think. Walking through the Royal Infirmary in the wee hours of the morning is a strange experience. Once you leave the wards and enter the corridors the place seems absolutely deserted, and of course the Royal is now so vast. For security reasons the external doors are locked and there are usually only one or two discreet doors to exit onto the street, but of course I couldn’t find them. At one stage I passed a security station where there was a half-drunk cup of tea on a desk and a transistor radio playing quietly, but my shouts of “hello, is anybody there”, met only with silence. I wandered the corridors calling out the same thing until, by sheer chance, I came upon a door where it seemed something was being delivered or removed in a white van, and I was able to escape to freedom.

It was a very frosty night and I drove slowly and carefully. About 4 o’clock in the morning I turned into our estate and, just as I turned off the main avenue, a deer sprang out of one of the gardens and ran on ahead of me. I stopped the car to watch, and soon it was joined by another deer, springing out of another garden. I continued to drive slowly forward and they both followed a path before me until I turned into our car port and they continued on ahead. Lord, I believe, help my unbelief.
I sat for a moment and smiled. They were lovely to see, and now I fully expect to be driving home after Midnight Mass this Christmas and see at least six of them, this time in the sky, pulling a sleigh, with a big man sitting in a red suit, laughing all the way, and arriving at a stable in Bethlehem to deliver the first of his gifts to a child in swaddling clothes. Have a very blessed Christmas. The log will return in a couple of weeks’ time. Meanwhile, here is Santa’s Christmas prayer:

On Christmas Eve the other night I saw the most amazing sight, for there beneath the Christmas tree was Santa kneeling on his knee. His countenance was different than that all-familiar, jolly grin; his head was bowed, and hand to breast, and slightly tucked into his vest. For there in a Nativity was Jesus and His family, and as I heard him start to pray, I listened close to what he’d say. “Lord, you know that you’re the reason, I take pleasure in this season. I don’t want to take your place, but just reflect your wondrous grace. I hope you’ll help them understand, I’m just an ordinary man, who found a way to do your will, by finding kids with needs to fill. But all those centuries ago, there was no way for me to know, that they would make so much of me, and all the gifts beneath the tree. They think I have some hidden power, granted at the midnight hour. But it is my love for you, inspiring all the things I do. So, let them give you all the glory, for you’re the One True Christmas Story.”

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FATHER FRANK'S Log

12/14/2017

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 10th – 17th DECEMBER
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I was kindly invited out for a pre-Christmas meal this week in a city centre restaurant. We arrived and got ourselves settled in a lovely booth. We selected our starters and main courses and ordered some wine. The starters came and looked delicious, but when we were about half way through the fire alarm went off. For a time, nobody moved, the whole restaurant just kept on eating, presuming it to be a false alarm that would be switched off at any minute. But then the staff came around and asked us to make our way outside into St. Vincent Street. So, off we went, very calmly, no rush or panic at all. The mood outside was jocular, although we were wondering if we were going to be able to continue our meal or not. Then three fire engines arrived and out piled a host of firemen, and into the restaurant through what I presumed was the service entrance. After about 20 minutes they re-emerged through the front door of the restaurant, and before too long we were invited back into the restaurant where we had fresh starters brought to the table and the offer of a free drink at the end of the meal. It was all very painless, although we never did find out what caused the alarm to go off.

The last time I had that kind of experience was on my way to Malawi to represent our Provincial at the ordination of a young Malawian Passionist, Patrick Mphepo. I flew to London Heathrow and was scheduled to transfer on to a flight to Nairobi, Kenya, where I would pick up a connection to Blantyre in Malawi, named after Blantyre in South Lanarkshire, birthplace of David Livingstone. Unfortunately, the flight from Heathrow to Nairobi was delayed and by the time we landed I had missed my flight to Blantyre. There was no flight then until the next morning which meant we had to go through customs and security to be put up in a hotel near the airport for the night. On the minibus taking us to the hotel I got talking to a lovely family, the mother of which just happened to be the daughter of the former Celtic player, Ian Young, whom I saw playing many times in the early 1960’s.

We had a big chunk of the day still to kill, so I joined the family on a trip to the Giraffe Centre, created by the African Fund for Endangered Wildlife, where the children, and adults, delighted in ascending high platforms and have the gentle giraffes come and eat of our hands; and then on to the Karen Blixen Museum at the place named after her. She was the author of the book Out of Africa, her own autobiography, later made into a film starring Meryl Streep. We returned to the hotel and had a meal together, and then to bed as we had a very early start next morning and would have to go through all the security procedures again. Unfortunately, at 2 o’clock in the morning, the fire alarm went off and we had to evacuate the hotel. After about an hour we were allowed back in again but sleep proved elusive as I was afraid of oversleeping and missing the flight again. This proved wise as the alarm call I had booked at the hotel never came. Eventually I got to Blantyre and went straight to the cathedral. The Mass had already started so I decided just to sit quietly in the congregation and greet the young newly ordained Passionist afterwards. At least I would be able to concelebrate his first mass at his home village the next day. However, the ordaining bishop spotted me and called me forward to sit on the sanctuary with the rest of the priests, which I had to do in secular clothing, feeling rather uncomfortable. A feast followed and later that night I slept like a log. The next day I was collected and taken to the village where Fr. Patrick’s first Mass was being held. This time I was able to vest and concelebrate properly, along with Fr. Terence, whom many will remember from St. Mungo’s. Fr. Terence had travelled down with some students from Zambia, where he was staying at the time. So, all in all, despite missed flights and fire alarms, I enjoyed the trip immensely, and I have great memories of the days that followed, and of the beautiful country and people of Malawi.
I suppose we could look at the Season of Advent as a kind of alarm call. Certainly, it’s a wake-up call, and a timely warning to get our lives in order so as to be ready, in each and every moment, to meet Christ face to face, when He comes again. Alarms go off for a reason, and it’s best to heed them.

Here are a few Advent thoughts from Pope St. John Paul ll.
“It is necessary to understand that the whole of our life must be an ‘advent,’ a vigilant awaiting of the final coming of Christ. To predispose our mind to welcome the Lord who, as we say in the Creed, one day will come to judge the living and the dead, we must learn to recognize him as present in the events of daily life. Therefore, Advent is, so to speak, an intense training that directs us decisively toward him who already came, who will come, and who comes continuously”.
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Father Frank's Log

12/8/2017

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 3rd – 10th DECEMBER
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I worked in the Olivetti factory in Queenslie from 1970-1975, at which time I left to join the Passionists. I was a cost accountant and I worked with a great group of people in the office, including our boss who, as an accountant and as a human being was top class. I had only been there a few months when myself and this boss had to go into town for some meeting or other, my memory of where it was and what it was about is a bit vague. What I remember clearly is the journey back when we went to Queen Street Station to catch a train. We were cutting it fine and at the end had to run along the platform as the train was getting ready to pull out. As we ran, I was aware of my boss dropping something which then seemed to bounce back up off the platform and straight into his hand without him breaking stride. When we leaped onto the train and took seats opposite each other, trying to catch our breath, I looked up and saw him inserting his glass eye back into its socket. Until that moment I hadn’t realized that he wore a glass eye, and I understood then what he had dropped and caught on the platform. Ever since it has given me a new understanding of the phrase “catching your eye”.

Thinking about “catching your eye”, when I was living in Dublin, one of my rituals whenever I returned home was to go for a walk around the west end where I was born and grew up, and also to saunter down Clydeside to the docks where my father had worked as a time keeper for the Anchor Line shipping company. The west end of Glasgow remains one of my favourite places. Just before I left St. Mungo’s in 1986 I gave a solo mission in St. Simon’s, Partick, the parish where I had served on the altar for years as a child, and just about everyone who came to the mission regaled me with stories and memories that I treasure to this day.

At one of the mission sessions a man caught my eye and seemed to observe me suspiciously throughout. He approached me afterwards and interrogated me; then, having firmly
established my lineage and making a comment or two on my preaching; he proceeded to ask about my mother, then retired, my older brother Hugh, who at that time was writing for The Scotsman, and finally about my younger brother Patrick, who was working for National
Savings. He then held my eye for a bit longer, before saying, “Aye, Ah kent yir faither”.

Now, as we all know in Scotland, when someone tells you he kent yir faither, you know you are being advised, in no uncertain terms, not to get above your station, not to form any high
opinions about yourself, and not to forget the humble roots you came from. It’s a national trait to have a certain ambivalence towards anyone who does reasonably well for themselves. On the one hand you might feel quite proud of the local boy or girl who did well, but on the other hand you have to be suspicious of them until you satisfy yourself they’ve remained humble and ordinary. The only reply I could think of to make to my interrogator, on behalf of myself and my brothers, was “Aye, Ah know ye did”. I hope that satisfied him.

One of the ways I like to think about God is that God is always trying to catch my eye. God is in all things if only I would notice. I think of Moses on the hillside noticing the burning bush, and when he approaches it he takes off his sandals because he realises that he is standing on Holy Ground, that he is in the presence of the living God. How often am I standing on Holy Ground without even realising? I think too of that wonderful description of prayer as “looking at God, looking at me, lovingly” God catching my eye, me catching God’s eye, in a gaze of love. How often in the Gospels does Jesus open eyes that we might see? And, of course, our God is the God who guards us as the pupil of his eye. In the words of an old hymn:

O soul, are you weary and troubled? No light in the darkness you see? There’s light for a look at the Saviour, and life more abundant and free! Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face; and the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of his glory and grace
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December 02nd, 2017

12/2/2017

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 26th NOVEMBER – 3rd DECEMBER
 
In this month of November, as well as remembering my deceased loved ones, I found myself also remembering the death of a much-loved fictional character. Over the years I was a huge fan of the television series Inspector Morse. I would never miss an episode and I can remember, during the years 1996-2000, when I was parish priest in Prestonpans, that I enjoyed nothing better than staying home on a Wednesday night, making a big mug of tea and a sandwich, and settling down from 8-10 p.m. to watch Inspector Morse on ITV, watching out for the cameo appearances of the author of the books, Colin Dexter, who, like Alfred Hitchcock, liked to put in a brief personal appearance in each episode.  I liked everything about the series - the stories, the setting, the pace, the music, and the characters. Also, the acting was wonderful.
 
Just to show how sad I am, I once traveled to Oxford and spent a week, as part of my summer holiday, visiting some of the haunts connected with the series. I had a pint of real ale, Morse’s favourite tipple, in the Turf Bar; the Eagle and Child, and the Bear Inn – not all on one day of course! I perused the world-famous Blackwell’s Book Store on Broad Street.  I visited the Asmolean Museum, the Sheldonian Theatre, the Bodelian Library, and the Oxford Union. I walked and relaxed in the Botanic Gardens, and at that stage I could have told you which episodes each of these places featured in. “Get a life!” I hear you say, but I had a really enjoyable time.
 
I even remember the date Morse died. On Wednesday 15th November, 2000, having just revealed that his first name, a well-kept secret to the end, was in fact Endeavour, we saw Morse collapse outside the Oxford University Church, while inside they were singing Faures Requiem. What made it even sadder was that he didn’t have his browbeaten but loyal sidekick, Sergeant Lewis, with him. “Get Lewis for me”, he said, as he was carried into the ambulance. But Lewis never got there in time, Morse never got to say what he wanted to say, and, in the end, he had to call Chief Superintendent Strange over and simply say, “Thank Lewis for me” - and that was that, those were his last words.
 
There have been a couple of spin-off series that I have enjoyed as well- Lewis and Endeavour – but they couldn’t quite live up to the original. The actor who played Morse so wonderfully, John Thaw, died only 15 months or so after his on-screen death, aged just 60.
 
I like being able to connect with the actual settings for books I read, or television series I watch, and of course that applies even more so to the settings for the Gospels. I have only ever made one trip to the Holy Land but it will remain always with me as a sacred and special memory. To visit the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem; to walk around Nazareth; to dip my feet in the River Jordan near to where Jesus was Baptized;  to go out into the desert where Jesus was tempted; to enjoy a glass of wine in Cana; to go out in a boat on the Lake of Genessaret; to visit the ruins of Simon Peter’s house at Capernaum; to celebrate Mass on the Hill of the Beatitudes; to go up Mount Tabor, the setting for the Transfiguration; to look over Jerusalem from the place where Jesus wept; to enter the house of Martha, Mary and Lazarus in Bethany; to be in the room where the Last Supper was celebrated and the Eucharist instituted; to pray in the garden of Olives; to go down into the dungeon where Jesus was kept overnight by Caiphus; to walk the Via Dolorosa; to stand on the site of Calvary; to kneel in the Holy Sepulcher; and to go up the hill from where Jesus’ Ascended into heaven, hearing an echo of Jesus’ last words before He returned to the Father, and to feel a part of His final commission to bring the Good News to the ends of the earth. Oxford was good – but the Holy land was incomparable, and no matter how tenuous the exact authenticity of some of these sites may be, they still brought the Gospel story alive, and I truly felt I was walking in the footsteps of the Lord.
 
You all know this poem about walking in the footsteps of the Lord:
 
One night I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord. Many scenes from my life flashed across the sky. In each scene I noticed footprints in the sand. Sometimes there were two sets of footprints, other times there was one only. This bothered me because I noticed that during the low periods of my life, when I was suffering from anguish, sorrow or defeat, I could see only one set of footprints, so I said to the Lord, “You promised me Lord, that if I followed you, you would walk with me always. But I have noticed that during the most trying periods of my life there has only been one set of footprints in the sand. Why, when I needed you most, have you not been there for me?” The Lord replied, “The years when you have seen only one set of footprints, my child, is when I carried you”
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FATHER FRANK'S LOG...

11/24/2017

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:FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 19th – 26th NOVEMBER

A few years ago, while I was still based at Mount Argus in Dublin, I was in the middle of a meeting with our accountant when he suddenly took ill with an angina attack, and we had to phone an ambulance. The ambulance came quickly and it was agreed that I would follow behind the ambulance to St. James’s Hospital. He gave me his car keys and asked me to get his coat and bring it with me, and also to phone his son and let him know. I went to my room, phoned his son, and came down to where his car was parked. It was a fancier car than anything I had ever known, and when I pushed a button on his key fob, expecting it to unlock the car doors, it put the lights on inside the car instead, and the doors remained locked. With some uncertainty I used the key, but as soon as I opened the driver’s door the alarm started to go off. I grabbed his coat from the back seat and closed the door again, but still the alarm continued and grew even louder. Then all the lights began to flash as well. I stood there looking at it, wondering what to do next. Passers-by looked at me suspiciously and I began to feel irrationally guilty, even more so when a police car came along. Thankfully it was the police who helped me to switch the alarm off and get on my way.

I was reminded of this because of another car incident we had this past week. Last Monday, around 2.30 p.m., someone phoned the office to tell me that a car had parked across the gates into our yard at St. Mungo’s so that no one could either get in or get out. When I went down to see what was happening I found three members of staff from the St. Mungo’s Old Folks Centre for Wellbeing and one member of staff from AGAP (Archdiocese of Glasgow Arts Project) wondering how they were going to get home, as their cars were parked in the yard, and indeed two of them were wondering how they were going to collect their children from school. I was also wondering how I was going to get out myself, as I had an appointment to get to later in the afternoon. We had no choice but to phone the police and the traffic wardens who attend the local parking meters.

The traffic warden came first and took photos of the car, the “Keep Clear” signs; the “No Loading at any Time” sign, and the double yellow lines, then slapped a ticket on the car. He then phoned for a tow truck, only to inform us that none would be available that day, so we would have to wait for the driver to come back – God knows when. He left, and a little while later the police came. They said they would have a tow truck within half an hour. During that time Father Gareth arrived and we swapped cars so I could get to my appointment. Later on, I discovered, the tow truck came as promised and took the car off to the pound.

The final episode was some hours later, when Father Gareth set out for home at 8.45 p.m., having returned from Youth 2000 in St. Andrew’s Cathedral. As he drove out of the gates a woman jumped in front of the car so that he had no choice but to slam on the brakes, even though the gate was closing behind him and ended up scratching the back of the car. She demanded to know where the car was that had been parked there. When Father Gareth informed her that she had parked illegally and that the police had towed it away, her only concern seemed to be how much it would cost to get it back; there was certainly no remorse, and no apology for any trouble she had caused by what could only be described as a very selfish and irresponsible act, but before any of that could be said to her, she walked away.
​
The Gospel that day (Luke 18:35-43) showed Jesus healing a man who was blind. Perhaps that lady needed to be healed of her blindness; of her inability to see the selfishness of her actions. “What do you want me to do for you”, said Jesus? “Lord, that I may see”. We might also want to reflect on Matthew 7:12, the Golden Rule: “Do unto others what you would have them do unto you”. Why not take a moment some time to pray, and ask the Holy Spirit how you might exercise this teaching in your own life, and where might it be lacking?
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November 16th, 2017

11/16/2017

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 12th – 19th NOVEMBER

On 8th November Brother Antony and myself travelled over to our Passionist Retreat House in Crossgar, County Down, to take part in a reflection day for our Passionist Province. We had taken advantage of a 20% discount on Stena Line to get priority boarding on the Cairnryan to Belfast Ferry, and a place in the Stena Plus Lounge where there would be comfy seats, newspapers and nibbles, and, we presumed, a little more peace and quiet than throughout the rest of the boat. Unfortunately, this didn’t turn out to be the case.

It was the day of the first leg World Cup Qualifier between Northern Ireland and Switzerland, and in the Stena Plus Lounge there was a businessman of some kind, perhaps a sales rep, who spent the whole sailing on his mobile phone talking very loudly to clients to whom he had promised hospitality tickets for the match at Windsor Park. The gist of his call to his clients was that there was good news and bad news, and did they want the good news or the bad news first. It seemed that they all went for the good news first, because this call was repeated many times, and often more than once to the same client as the mobile phone reception on the ferry kept cutting out, and he would have to redial and start the whole conversation all over again.

The good news was that he had managed to acquire tickets for them. The bad news was that they weren’t hospitality tickets, they were just ordinary tickets, and they weren’t even the best ordinary tickets as they were way up in a corner at the top of one of the stands, although he wanted to assure them that the view would be okay. They were also e-tickets and so when he got to his office he could either email them to his clients or, if they preferred, they could come and collect them. He would be at the office until 5 o’clock.

By the time we got to Belfast we, and everyone else in the lounge, knew his name, his business, his mobile phone number, and the names of his clients, and we hadn’t had a minute’s peace and quiet the whole journey. I’m sure many people have had the same experience on planes, boats and trains, and perhaps Brother Antony and myself are not alone in finding it quite frustrating and annoying.

The Province Day went well. It’s always good to meet up with fellow Passionists from around the province, to catch up on all the news, to find out how everyone is doing, to have good conversations about how we feel things are going in each of the communities, and how the plans we agreed at the last Provincial Chapter are taking shape, and then to feed that back to the men back home who had to hold the fort, or who weren’t able to go to the gathering for age, health or other reasons.

Our return journey was thankfully more relaxing, although there was a strong wind and heavy waves that caused the ferry to rise and fall quite in the sea quite dramatically. At one point my glass of apple juice went skimming across the table, and there was a poor lady who, along with her friends, had been taking serious advantage of the bottles of wine freely available in the lounge to drink to her heart’s content, but who then, with the violent and stomach churning motion of the boat, had to recycle her Sauvignon Blanc into a brown paper bag. Not a pretty sight.
Brother Antony will be repeating the journey this weekend as he is bringing two Scots lads over to Crossgar for a Vocations Retreat, where they will join other lads from Ireland, north and south, who would like to find out a bit more about the Passionists, and about our way of life and ministry. These weekends are held a few times a year by way of helping young men on their faith journey, and in the discernment of how Christ may be calling them in their lives and in their own personal vocation. Just now and again it may happen, by the grace of God, that some of them feel Christ is calling them to become Passionists themselves.  Here is our Prayer for Passionist Vocations:

Jesus, you gave your life on the Cross so that we could share in God’s own life and know his love for us. May the love that flows from the Cross transform our hearts, so that we can bring your love and compassion to those whose lives we touch, especially those who are suffering. Give the light of your Holy Spirit to those young people who have received the grace of a Passionist vocation. Inspire them to give their lives as Passionist priests, brothers or sisters, keeping the Memory of your Passion alive in their own hearts and in the hearts of others. May Mary, who stood by the Cross, be their example, and may Saint Paul of the Cross be their guide. Amen.
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FATHER FRANK'S LOG...

11/8/2017

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 5th – 12th NOVEMBER
It has been said by Scripture Scholars that in St. Luke’s Gospel Jesus always seems to be going to a meal, at a meal, coming back from a meal, or telling stories about meals, and that has certainly been true this past week when the weekday Gospels for just about every day were about meals. Of course, in the Gospels meals are to do with much more than just food, they are about fellowship, friendship, forgiveness, reconciliation, conversion and love.

I was thinking about the meals I’ve shared in myself, just during this past week. Last Saturday I collected my younger brother and we went to a surprise party being thrown for our sister-in-law’s 70th birthday; this despite the fact that for the past 6 months she has been telling her husband, our Hugh, and all her family that she didn’t want any kind of party at all, and that especially she didn’t want a surprise party. The celebration was being held in my niece’s house, and alongside all the adults there were her six grandchildren and all her grand-nieces and grand-nephews. There were kids running around everywhere and the noise was deafening, but, somehow, they were quietened down for Janet’s arrival, only to reach new decibels when she walked in the door. Janet took it in her stride and, if she was annoyed, she didn’t show it. We then went on to enjoy some beautiful food and, when we could hear ourselves over the kids, very enjoyable conversation; catching-up, telling stories, sharing memories, strengthening family ties, and generally having a good time.

On Sunday I thought I wouldn’t eat very much at all, as I was still feeling a bit stuffed from the night before. After celebrating the 12 o’clock Mass I went back to Bishopbriggs for a bit of a rest before coming back in again for the evening Mass. In the course of the afternoon I caught some very evocative aromas coming from the kitchen as Brother Antony was putting together a lovely stew, and Father Gareth was producing his signature dish, chocolate truffles – most of which he eats himself. So, when we came back from Mass later on we sat down and enjoyed more good food, conversation and laughter, winding down after a busy day, and strengthening our Passionist community bonds.

On Tuesday Father Gareth, Brother Antony and myself, took up an invitation from one of their former lecturers at Heythrop College in London, who is now the new parish priest at St. Aloysius, Father Michael Holman. We walked into town and joined Father Michael and the Jesuit community for lunch, along with the two Spiritans from St. Columba’s, Father Ambrose and Father Dominic; and Father Paul Gargaro from St. Patrick’s in Anderston. Together we are meant to form a cluster of parishes in the Archdiocese. Once again we enjoyed good food and conversation, and explored some ways that we could support each other in the cluster, and also reach out to others, especially to the young people in our parishes, as we have been trying to do here in St. Mungo’s with our Passionist Young Team, and with Brother Antony’s developing chaplaincy ministry in the City of Glasgow College; Strathclyde University and Caledonian University. Once again, around the table, we strengthened ties and created new friendships in the Lord.

Three meals in four days, all very different, but, as with the meals in the Gospel, they were to do with much more than just food, and without a doubt, Christ was the unseen guest at the table on each occasion. Every table can be an altar. Every meal can be a supper at Emmaus.

They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord's Supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity - all the while praising God and enjoying the goodwill of all the people.
​
Acts of the Apostles 2:26-27
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FATHER FRANK'S LOG...

11/3/2017

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 29th OCTOBER – 5th NOVEMBER

On the Feast of All Saints I was recalling my very first day as a postulant with the Passionists. I was 24 years of age, and it was October 4th 1975, the feast of my name saint, Francis of Assisi, when myself and another Glasgow lad left from the Retreat House the Passionists then had at Coodham in Ayrshire. We were driven by a member of the community to Ardrossan, and then sailed on a boat called The Lion to Belfast. All the belongings we were asked to bring easily fitted into the boot of the car. These included wellies and dungarees as we were told we would be doing a fair amount of manual work in the monastery and in the grounds. Our destination was The Graan in Enniskillen, the place where, until recent years, every Passionist from Ireland or Scotland began their journey of formation. I remember that the route from Belfast to Enniskillen took us through the three Tyrone villages of Augher, Clogher and Fivemiletown, until we eventually drove up the avenue to this very imposing monastery three miles outside of the town of Enniskillen where we were greeted, a bit sternly I thought, by our Postulant Director, and introduced to our four classmates, one from County Clare; two from Belfast, and the other from Nigeria.

After a cold supper and an introductory lecture to lay down the rules, I was shown to my room, which in monastic terms is called a cell. My cell comprised of an ancient single bed with a lumpy mattress; a single wardrobe with two wire hangers, a small desk, a rickety chair, a small rug on bare wooden floorboards, and a ceiling light without a shade. I immediately wondered what, in God’s name, I was doing there. After unpacking, I went along to the wash hall to brush my teeth, and on the way back I became aware of something whizzing past my head. It turned out to be a bat, and it wasn’t even Halloween yet.

The only other item in the room was a huge portrait in an old gilt frame of someone that turned out be St. Gemma Galgani, who lived in Lucca in Italy from 1878-1903, and who, even though because of poor health she never actually joined the Passionists, is numbered among the Passionist saints. She was a very pretty looking girl and I looked at her and said; “Well Gemma, it’s not much of a room, but if I’m going to share it with you for the next year or so, I’d better find out who you are”. I then tiptoed along to the monastery library and found a book on her life, written by her spiritual director, the Passionist, Father Germanus.

Still a bit overawed by my surroundings, and with so many thoughts and questions going around in my head, I realised that I wouldn’t sleep a wink that night, and so I spent the whole night reading Gemma’s story. By morning time, she had become one of my favourite saints, and ever since she has been one of my constant companions and soul friends on the rocky road of faith. I have visited her shrine at Lucca on three occasions, as well as her shrine at Madrid where her heart is kept in a reliquary; I carry her picture constantly in my breviary, and I even now have a niece called Gemma. Canonised in 1940, St. Gemma is now very much revered as a true mystic, and is called the Daughter of Passion, because of her profound imitation of the Passion of Christ, including being one of those saints who received the stigmata. Here are a few thoughts from Gemma, the mystic of the Passion, to leave you with:

“Why did you suffer for me, dear Jesus? For love! The nails…the crown…the cross…all for the love of me! For You I sacrifice everything willingly. I offer You my body with all of its weakness, and my soul with all of its love.”
 “See, oh Jesus, even at night, those hours, those hours! I sleep, but Jesus, my heart does not sleep. It watches with Thee at all hours.”
“Can You see that as soon as the day breaks I think of You? As evening comes, I am near You. I am near You at every moment. I love You, Jesus…”
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FATHER FRANK'S LOG...

10/26/2017

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FATHER FRANK’S LOG: 22nd – 29th OCTOBER

This week I have been preparing some materials for the month of November, our special time of remembering our loved ones who have died, and it prompted a particular memory. For 10 years I was the secretary to the North European Conference of the Passionists. We have since done some restructuring, but the Passionist Provinces in the Conference at that time were Ireland/Scotland; England/Wales; Netherlands; Belgium; Germany; France and Poland. There was an annual meeting of the leaders of the provinces that usually lasted 3 or 4 days. The meetings moved around the various locations and, especially with the language differences, the meetings were quite intense. Because of that, by way of a break, half a day was always set aside for some cultural experience arranged by the host province.

Some of the experiences that I especially remember were, for example, when we held the meeting in Munich and had an afternoon at the Oktoberfest (Munich Beer Festival) This was around the time they introduced the “Quiet Oktoberfest” which, up until 6pm at least, maintained the beer tents family and elderly friendly, and now Passionist friendly, with the orchestras in the tents playing only quiet brass music and traditional folk tunes, so we weren’t going too wild. From another meeting held in Bordeaux we visited a local vineyard. After the tour we were seated around a garden and given two small glasses of wine, one of them a very expensive wine, and the other a very modestly priced wine. We weren’t told which was which and we were asked to discuss which of them we preferred. To a man we preferred the cheap wine, so perhaps our taste buds were more suited to German beer.

Lest you think all our cultural experiences were alcohol related, in Belgium we went to Leuven to visit the shrine of the leper priest, Father Damien, who was voted the greatest ever Belgian in a poll conducted by the Flemish Public Broadcasting Service for his work as the resident priest in a leper colony on Molokai Island, eventually submitting to the same, then incurable disease. At a meeting in the Netherlands we visited the Shrine of Father Charles of Mount Argus at Munstergeleen, the place of his birth, and then on to Maastricht, where the Treaty on European Union was signed in 1992. At a meeting in Minsteracres, a Passionist Retreat Centre in Northumberland, we visited Hadrian’s Wall, built by Roman Britain to keep the Scots out. I was happy to be living proof that it didn’t work.

But the foremost memory that was prompted this week was when we had a meeting in Warsaw which took place at the end of October, beginning of November. On All Saints' Day the cemeteries and graveyards in Poland are decorated with candles, flowers and wreaths throughout the day, and the candles are left to burn through the night. And so, for our cultural experience, the Polish Passionists provided us with votive lamps and brought us to Powazki cemetery, the primary cemetery in Warsaw, where we placed the lamps on the graves of deceased Passionists. It was dark by this time and the effect of all these lamps burning throughout this huge cemetery was incredibly solemn and beautiful. Afterwards, in the church of St. Charles Borromeo, within the cemetery, we attended a concert of sombre music to fit the occasion. It was a cultural experience with a difference, but one I will never forget.

In the old Catholic ritual this commendation was said over a dying person by the priest:

"Go forth, Christian soul, from this world in the name of God the almighty Father, who created you, in the name of Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God who suffered for you, in the name of the Holy Spirit, who was poured out upon you. Go forth, faithful Christian. May you live in peace this day, may your home be with God, with Mary, the Virgin Mother of God, with Saint Joseph, and all the angels and saints. Amen"
May our deceased loved ones rest in peace.
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