CAFOD COLUMN; develop-ment agency of the Catholic Church in England & Wales. FAMINE IN EAST AF-

RICA—SOMALIA The UN estimates that the number of people in need of food aid has increased from 5 million in September 2016 to 6.2 million between February and June 2017. 50 per cent of the population do not have enough food to eat and are at risk of famine; with more than 363,000 acutely malnour-ished children and 70,000 se-verely malnourished children needing urgent life-saving sup-port. Our sister agencies have been present in Somalia since 1992 and 2011 and responded to the devastating drought and food crisis of 2011. They have strong networks of local partners work-ing with vulnerable families in need of nutrition, health and cash transfers to buy available food.

From the early days of our par-

ish: Some men of St. Joseph’s

parish mentioned in World

War Two.

Stoker Gerard Smith, awarded the Distinguished Service Medal. He had been torpedoed five times before going into the submarine service. His sub was blown up and he sustained two broken arms, He served in the Royal Navy for eight years. Driver Jim Spicer, of 18 Grosve-nor St, was a prisoner of the Ital-ians from 1942 Sylvester Watson, brother of Tom and Jim, was a prisoner of the Germans 1942. Despatch Rider Tom Watson, of 3 Field St, was presumed killed on 29th of May 1940, when his ship was sunk at Dunkirk. His brother escaped from Dunkirk. Corporal Jack Wilders, aged 27, was wounded in Normandy and again in Sicily. From the Adver-

tiser, courtesy of John Gwilliam

NEXT SUNDAY’S (16/4/17) MINISTERS

9.30am (St. J) 11.00am (OLSP)

Reader 1 P Cunningham G Hennon Reader 2 : A Nacca B Bennion E.M. 1 S Robertson J Wildman E.M. 2 E McGarry D Tierney E.M. 3 P Caffrey C Shore E.M. 4 J Horrocks G Hennon E.M.5 G Casey L Armstrong E.M. 6 K Walmsley Children’s Liturgy: A Wolstenholme & P Caffrey

Keep in touch via our parish website www.catholicheywood.com New this week are resources to help your prayer life eg links to St. Beuno’s, each day’s Mass readings, the Prayer of the Church. Any ideas for the website, let Fr Paul know. A reminder that if you would like to receive the newsletter by email, in pdf format, please let Fr. Paul or Fr. Alf have your email address.

WORKING together, sharing our time, talent and treasure as

the Body of Christ in Heywood & beyond

WORSHIP AND DISCIPLESHIP

The Parish Passover Meal is on Wednesday evening at 7pm in St. Joseph’s Presbytery. Please sign up on the list at the church doors if you want to come. Please bring a dish to share (no pork/ham etc). There is a list in the sacristy for readers and Eucha-

ristic Ministers for the services of Maundy Thurs-day, Good Friday, Holy Saturday. Please sign up. There is a list in the sacristy for people, male or fe-male, who would be willing to have their feet

washed at the Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Thurs-day evening. Please do be generous in signing up.

Następna Św. Msza w niedzielę 7 maja o 16:00. W sobotę 15-ego kwietnia o godzinie 12 odbędzie się święcenie pokarmów wielka-nocnych w naszym kościele.

WELCOME:

OUR PARISH COMMUNITY

The Catholic Women’s League meets on Tuesday, 11th April, at 7pm at St. Joseph’s

Presbytery, with Mrs Laura Dutson as Guest Speaker. The next meeting of the De-

veloping World Group is on Thursday 20th April at 7pm at St. Joseph’s Presby-tery. All welcome.

WORD: GROWING IN

FAITH and IN KNOWL-

EDGE OF FAITH

The next Baptism Preparation

Meeting is Sunday May 7th, 6pm, in St. Joseph’s Presbytery. Contact Fr. Paul or Fr. Alf before coming.

Congratulations to the winners in the March Draw of the 200 Club: 1) £226.25 John Morris 2) £90.50 Michael Logan 3) £45.25 Teresa Armitage 4) £45.25 Michael Barrett The parish gained £452.50. New members always welcome. Please see Fr. Paul or Fr. Alf. Thanks for your generosity: Gift Aid : £498.20, Loose : £703.86 (including a donation of £140), Developing World Fund: £81.75.

It would be wonderful if we could identify and call one or, prefera-

bly, two young people to fulfil this very important role of PARISH

YOUTH REP for our parish community. (see poster above). Full

and exciting training will be give, they will be commissioned by

Bishop John and it will look really impressive on their CV.

RCIA/Journey in Faith con-tinues on WEDNESDAY 19th April at 7pm. IF GOD IS CALLING YOU INTO THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, or wish to deepen your under-standing of the Faith, speak to Fr. Paul/Fr. Alf.

Churches Together in Heywood meets at the Presbytery at 7.30pm on Tuesday 18th April.

The SVP meets

on 19th April at 6.30pm at the Presbytery.

PARISH OF OUR LADY & ST. JOSEPH, HEYWOOD partner with St. Joseph’s, Numan, Nigeria

Parish Priest: Fr. Paul Daly paul.daly@dioceseofsalford.org.uk Assistant Priest: Fr. Alfred Rebello

St. Joseph’s Presbytery, Mary St, OL10 1EG Tel: 369777

Chaplain - Fairfield Hospital: Fr. Andrew Starkie (Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham)

Our Lady & St. Paul’s Presbytery, Argyle St, Heywood, Ol10 3PB Tel: 625512 PARISH WEBSITE www.catholicheywood.com

We reflect on the Church’s teaching in the Catechism of the Catholic

Church (CCC1122-7) Christ sent his apostles so that "repentance and for-giveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations." "Go, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." The mission to baptize, and so the sacramental mission, is implied in the mission to evangelize, because the sacrament is prepared for by the word of God and by the faith which is assent to this word: The People of God is formed into one in the first place by the Word

of the living God.... the preaching of the Word is required for the sacramen-

tal ministry itself, since the sacraments are sacraments of faith, drawing

their origin and nourishment from the Word. "The purpose of the sacraments is to sanctify people, build up the Body of Christ and worship God. Because they are signs they also instruct. They not only presuppose faith, but by words and objects they also nourish, strengthen, and express it. That is why they are called 'sacraments of faith."' The Church's faith precedes the faith of the believer who is invited to adhere to it. When the Church celebrates the sacraments, she confesses the faith received from the apostles - whence the ancient saying: lex orandi, lex credendi. The law of prayer is the law of faith: the Church believes as she prays. Liturgy is a constitutive element of the holy and living Tradition. For this reason no sacramental rite may be modified or manipulated at the will of the minister or the community. Even the supreme authority in the Church may not change the liturgy arbitrarily, but only in the obedience of faith and with religious respect for the mystery of the liturgy. Since the sacraments express and develop the communion of faith in the Church, the lex orandi is one of the essential criteria of the dialogue that seeks to restore the unity of Christians. Celebrated worthily in faith, the sacraments confer the grace that they signify. They are efficacious because in them Christ himself is at work: it is he who baptizes, he who acts in his sacraments in order to communicate the grace that each sacrament signi-fies. The Father always hears the prayer of his Son's Church which, in the epiclesis of each sacrament, expresses her faith in the power of the Spirit. As fire transforms into itself everything it touches, so the Holy Spirit transforms into the divine life whatever is subjected to his power. Point to ponder: Why do the sacraments matter? How do they matter to me?

We reflect on Care of creation with Pope Francis’ Laudato sii (124-5) Any approach to an integral ecology, which by definition does not exclude human beings, needs to take account of the value of labour, as St John Paul II wisely noted. According to the biblical account of creation, God placed man and woman in the garden he had created not only to preserve it (“keep”) but also to make it fruit-ful (“till”). Labourers and craftsmen thus “maintain the fabric of the world”. Developing the created world in a prudent way is the best way of caring for it, as this means that we ourselves become the instrument used by God to bring out the potential which he him-self inscribed in things: “The Lord created medicines out of the earth, and a sensible man will not despise them”. If we reflect on the relationship between human beings and the world around us, we see the need for a correct understanding of work; if we talk about the relationship between human beings and things, the question arises as to the meaning and purpose of all hu-man activity. This has to do not only with manual or agricultural labour but with any activity involving modification of existing real-ity, from producing a social report to the design of a technological development. Underlying every form of work is a concept of the relationship we can and must have with what is other than ourselves. Together with the awe-filled contemplation of creation which we find in St Francis of Assisi, the Christian spiritual tradition has also developed a rich and balanced understanding of the meaning of work, as, for example, in the life of Bl. Charles de Foucauld and his followers. To Ponder: What is a balanced ecology?

We reflect on the Church’s teaching on Marriage (Amoris Laetitia 73) “Mutual self-giving in the sacrament of matrimony is grounded in the grace of bap-tism, which establishes the foundational covenant of every person with Christ in the Church. In accepting each other, and with Christ’s grace, the engaged couple promise each other total self-giving, faithfulness and openness to new life. The couple recog-nizes these elements as constitutive of marriage, gifts offered to them by God, and take seriously their mutual commitment, in God’s name and in the presence of the Church. Faith thus makes it possible for them to assume the goods of marriage as commitments that can be better kept through the help of the grace of the sacrament. Consequently, the Church looks to married couples as the heart of the entire family, which, in turn, looks to Jesus”. The sacrament is not a “thing” or a “power”, for in it Christ himself “now encounters Christian spouses. He dwells with them, gives them strength to take up their crosses and follow him, to rise again after they have fallen,

forgive one another, bear one another’s burdens”. Christian marriage is a sign of how much Christ loved his Church in the covenant sealed on the cross; it makes that love present in the communion of the spouses. By becoming one flesh, they embody the espousal of our human nature by the Son of God. That is why “in the joys of their love and family life, he gives them here on earth a foretaste of the wedding feast of the Lamb”. Even though the analogy between the human couple of husband and wife, and that of Christ and his Church, is “imperfect”, it inspires us to beg the Lord to bestow on every married couple an outpouring of his divine love. To ponder: what does it mean to say that marriage is a sacrament?

Tuesday

MAUNDY

THURSDAY

Date Mass, other Services and Parish Events Time

Church

Mass, please note earlier time MASS OF THE SACRED CHRISM

Mass Confessions Passover Meal

8.15am 11am 1pm 6-6.30pm 7pm

St J Salford Cathedral Fairfield Hosp’l St J. St J Presbytery

Spy Wednesday

Legion of Mary MASS OF THE LORD’S SUPPER, followed by Con-fessions (for 30 minutes) and Watching at the Altar of Repose till midnight. Holy Hour 10.30-11.30pm

6.15pm 7.30pm

St J Presbytery St. J

Mass

Mass

Sung Eucharist

Baptism of Corey Michael Hutchinson Stations of the Cross and Benediction Choral Evensong

9th APRIL 2017 PALM SUNDAY

OF THE PASSION OF THE

LORD

Palms will be blessed at all Masses

9.30am 11am 11am 1pm 3pm 4pm

St J OLSP St J St J OLSP St J

Exposition of the Bl. Sacrament Mass

Confessions Catholic Women’s League Stations of the Cross Eucharist

9am 9.30am 6-6.30pm 7pm 7pm 7.30pm

St J St J OLSP St J Presbytery St. J St. J

GOOD FRIDAY Fasting from a meal (age 16-59) and abstaining from meat (15 and over)

12.30pm 3pm

Outside St Luke’s St. J

11am 12noon 8pm

St. J St. J St J

Holy Saturday

Confessions święcenie pokarmów wielkanocnych THE VIGIL AND FIRST MASS OF EASTER

We pray for the Pope’s intention for April: That young people may respond generously to their vocations and con-sider offering themselves to God in the priesthood or con-secrated life. We pray for the people of the parish of St. Mary, Littlebor-ough, and for Fr Arthur Neary, their parish priest. For all who live/work on Atholl Dr, Ayr Gr, Banff Gr & Berwick Cl. For Joseph Moran, Bridget Harte, Bill Ellison, Agnes De-boeck, Kath Hearne, Kath Foulkes, Josie Green, Anthony Whitworth, residents of Beech House and all the sick. For Douglas Low & all who died recently; for Kathleen and Charles Rhodes, Thomas Irwin, Walker Butterworth, Bernard Stott, Edward Dower, Robert Kenny & all we remember at this time.

Monday Mass

Mass

Mass

Sung Eucharist

PALM SUNDAY- A Sonnet by Malcolm Guite

Now to the gate of my Jerusalem, The seething holy city of my heart, The saviour comes. But will I welcome him? Oh crowds of easy feelings make a start; They raise their hands, get caught up in the singing, And think the battle won. Too soon they’ll find The challenge, the reversal he is bringing Changes their tune. I know what lies behind The surface flourish that so quickly fades; Self-interest, and fearful guardedness, The hardness of the heart, its barricades, And at the core, the dreadful emptiness Of a perverted temple. Jesus come Break my resistance and make me your home. If you would like to listen to the poem read, go to

https://malcolmguite.wordpress.com/2015/03/28/a-

sonnet-for-palm-sunday-3/ and click on the link.

United Act of Witness and Worship SOLEMN LITURGY OF THE LORD’S PASSION

9.30am St. J

9.30am 11am 11am

St J OLSP St J

EASTER SUNDAY THE RESURRECTION

OF THE LORD