Favourite Readings

There is no need to worry; but if there is anything you need, pray for it, asking God for it with prayer and thanksgiving, and that peace of God which is so much greater than we can understand, will guard your hearts and your thoughts, in Christ Jesus. Finally brothers, fill your minds with everything that is true, everything that is noble, everything that is good and pure, everything that we love and honour, and everything that can be thought virtuous or worthy of praise.
Keep doing all the things that you learnt from me and have been taught by me and have heard or seen that I do. Then the God of peace will be with you.

ABOU BEN ADHEM

Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace
And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold:—
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,
"What writest thou?"—The vision raised its head,
And with a look made of all sweet accord,
Answered, "The names of those who love the Lord."
"And is mine one?" said Abou. "Nay, not so,"
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerly still; and said, "I pray thee, then,
Write me as one that loves his fellow men."
The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again with a great wakening light,
And showed the names whom love of God had blest,
And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.

Mary's BIG Birthdays

BY THE TIME

By Thomas Gerald McCann

(For Mary approaching
her Fiftieth Birthday)

By the time you get to fifty
You’ll be weeping
And longing for the days
That are no more.
You’ll sigh for the youth
You’ve left behind you
And wonder what the future
Has in store.

But for now just feel the glow of love
Around you
As you go through the gateway
To your golden years.

By the time you get to sixty
You’ll be younger
Than you were
Ten years before.
You’ll look on the decade
Just behind you
And count all the blessings
That it bore.

But for now just feel the glow of love
Around you
As you go through the gateway
To your golden years

By the time you get to seventy
You’ll be smiling
Looking forward to
The years that are to come.
There’ll be no more sighing
No more longing
Just the happiness of being
Forever young.

So for now just feel the glow of love
Around you
As you go through the gateway
To those golden years.

THE CURE AT TROY

By Seamus Heaney

Human beings suffer,
They torture one another,
They get hurt and get hard.
No poem or play or song
Can fully right a wrong
Inflicted and endured.

The innocent in gaols
Beat on their bars together.
A hunger-striker's father
Stands in the graveyard dumb.
The police widow in veils
Faints at the funeral home.

History says, Don’t hope
On this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up,
And hope and history rhyme.

So hope for a great sea-change
On the far side of revenge.
Believe that a further shore
Is reachable from here.
Believe in miracles
And cures and healing wells.

Call miracle self-healing:
The utter, self-revealing
Double-take of feeling.
If there’s fire on the mountain
Or lightning and storm
And a god speaks from the sky

That means someone is hearing
The outcry and the birth-cry
Of new life at its term.

Frances, Jane and Paula with Seamus Heaney at a function in his home town of Bellaghy to honour him following his receipt of the Nobel Prize For Literature in 1995.

THE CLOTHS OF HEAVEN

By William Butler Yeats

Had I the heaven's embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light;
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Erin and Aine at Yeats grave in Drumcliffe Churchyard, Co Sligo.

TOGETHER

By Thomas Gerald McCann

(A wedding day reflection for Sean and Ailish)

In the shadow of Benbulben before family and friends
You have pledged each other to a love that never ends.
As together you go forward after an enchanted day
This advice is offered to guide you on your way.

Base your life together on honesty and trust.
Side-line selfishness – that’s a must!
To each other and to others be generous and kind,
Have strength and gentleness of mind.

Cherish the children entrusted to your care
As the gift and blessing that they surely are;
But if that gift does not come your way,
Together find another role to play.

Life is a highway to a promised land,
A road for you to walk together hand in hand,
Strong in the faith passed on to you
And letting its principles guide all you do.

Should crisis come this blessed day recall
And though you may stumble you will never fall;
But steadfast as Benbulben, come what may,
You two will be together, forever and a day.

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