Good morning.
The Psalm for today’s Mass is taken from Psalm 118. This brought to mind a few snippets of trivia which I would like to share with you.
Depending on which version of the Bible you use, Psalm 118 is considered to be the middle of the Bible due to there being an equal number of chapters (594) before and after it. Also of interest is that it lies between the shortest Psalm, 117 – which has two verses, and Psalm 119 – which is the longest Psalm, occupying around seven pages of the Old Testament! I often threatened mischievous pupils that they would write out Psalm 119 as punishment – not that I ever intended to enforce it – as just looking at it was enough of a deterrent.
But further to this, some people who have a lot more free time than I do have determined that the middle verse of the Bible is Psalm 118 verse 8, which reads, “Better to take refuge in the Lord than to put one’s trust in mortals” (The African Bible). Now I know that this is not one of the verses in today’s psalm, but it contains a fair amount of wisdom.
We live in a time when we can seldom watch a newscast or read a newspaper and not encounter the terms “Corruption, state-capture, mismanagement, etc.” Even (dare I say) Donald Trump has championed the term “Fake news”. What, and who, should we actually believe or trust?
Well, the Psalm gives us the answer. Better to trust in the Lord! Of course, we live a multi-cultural, multi-faith society where not everyone follows the same religion, but we can only be true to our own faith. Conviction, not just belief, is the secret. Make Jesus Christ the centre of your life and all the other decisions will fall into place.
Much more easily said than done, I know, and the names of the number of martyrs in the history of the church are a stark reminder of the price that some people have paid for their conviction. But we should not let this deter us.
It is wonderful to see so many of you flocking back to Mass. Clearly there is a need being met and we are really pleased to see you all. Please book early for the weekend Masses. Remember that bookings close tomorrow at midday and we encourage you to attend a weekday Mass if you can’t get into one of the Sunday Masses. The Mass booking link is at the bottom of this page.
God bless, stay safe and we hope to see you soon. Dc Mike & the team.
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