Newsletter - 27 August 2023
Our hearts are restless until they rest in you
These famous words come from St Augustine’s Confessions. They describe the turning point in Augustine’s life – his baptism by St Ambrose at the age of 32. He had abandoned the faith of his mother Monica and was driven to seek after meaning and purpose in life through intellectual pursuits. But even with his gifted mind and great learning, something within remained restless and unsatisfied.
It was only when he met Ambrose and heard him speak of Christ that he found the rest his soul longed for. He said about Ambrose that “I was unknowingly led by You, that by him I might knowingly be led to You.”
Monday 28 August is Augustine’s feast day - a good time to recall the full passage from his Confessions where he speaks of the rest our hearts long for.
Great are you, O Lord, and exceedingly worthy of praise; your power is immense, and your wisdom beyond reckoning. So we, who are a due part of your creation, long to praise you – we also carry our mortality about with us, carry the evidence of our sin and with it the proof that you thwart the proud. You arouse us so that praising you may bring us joy, because you have made us and drawn us to yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.
Grant me to know and understand, Lord, which comes first. To call upon you or to praise you? To know you or to call upon you? Must we know you before we can call upon you? Anyone who invokes what is still unknown may be making a mistake. Or should you be invoked first, so that we may then come to know you? But how can people call upon someone in whom they do not yet believe? And how can they believe without a preacher?
But scripture tells us that those who seek the Lord will praise him, for as they seek, they find him, and on finding him they will praise him. Let me seek you then, Lord, even while I am calling upon you, and call upon you even as I believe in you; for to us you have indeed been preached. My faith calls upon you, Lord, this faith which is your gift to me, which you have breathed into me through the humanity of your Son and the ministry of your preacher.
Ted Wood ccn
Focus of the Week
SUNDAY MASSES
As from Sunday 3 September masses will be returning to their normal times of 9am and 11am.
ADORATION
Adoration will resume on 4 September.
LAUNCH DAY
We would like to start the new academic year together as a parish. Let’s gather on Sunday, 17 September for a bring and share meal during lunchtime. This will be an opportunity for us to reconnect and for newcomers to join us. Additionally, we will have the chance to discover all the groups and activities available in our parish.