The Catholic Parish of Frenchs Forest.
to Love and Serve
Our Parish is made up of three vibrant communities:
If you’re a visitor or new to our parish, we extend a very warm welcome to you.
If you have any questions, please chat with Fr Biju, Fr Joseph or myself, or browse our website.
We want you to feel at home with us. - Fr Satheesh
Please Note
From the weekend of 1st /2nd June the new official Parish Mass Weekend Times will be
St Anthony in the Field
· 9:00am Sunday Mass
St Martin de Porres Davidson
· 5:00pm Saturday Vigil Mass
· 8:30am Sunday Mass
OLGC Forestville
· 5:30pm Saturday Vigil Mass
· 10am Sunday Mass
· 6pm Sunday Mass
Prayer, Service and Witness
from Fr Satheesh
My Dear Parishioners,
As we celebrate the sixth Sunday of Easter we are heading towards the Ascension and Pentecost.
This week we hear in the Gospel all about Love. Love one another as I have loved you.
Jesus’ command to ‘love one another’ is given twice in this short passage. As such, it needs be taken seriously and become the guiding principle in our daily lives. But, as Pope Francis once said, expressing Christian love means going beyond words, words, words.
‘First and foremost,’ the Pope points out, ‘it is important to realise that Christ’s love is not a superficial feeling.’ In this Gospel passage Jesus was not telling his disciples to be unflappably polite or overtly nice to each other. This was not a message about social conventions. Jesus is concerned with our attitude toward others, and those actions that flow from it. ‘Love,’ as the Pope points out, ‘is fulfilled in everyday life, in attitudes, in deeds.’
Thank you so much to those who show this love by volunteering to assist with our parish ministries. It is wonderful to have our faithful volunteers and new people join groups such as church cleaning, reading, visiting the sick and acolyting. We value each and every person who shares their love in this way.
We welcome back Fr. Biju Mathew to the Parish after his annual leave. Fr. Shiju Simon got his new appointment as the Parish Priest in the Archdiocese of Kottayam, Kerala. We wish him all the best. I will be away from the Parish from 17 May to 14 June. Going to India for my annual leave and attending the Diocesan Clergy Conference.
We will be having our Pastoral Works Broken Bay Appeal on the Weekend of 18/19 May,2024. Please note our Parish office will be opened from Monday to Friday 8.30 am to 2.30 pm.
We welcome all to celebrate the School Family Mass this weekend at 8.30 am at St. Martin’s Davidson.
For your awareness, there will be two Counts of Mass Attendance in Broken Bay in 2024. It will be held in May and November 2024. Hence, the first one will be commencing from 4/5 May.
God Bless you
Fr Satheesh Antony OSH
Reflection
The boundlessness of God’s love is seen in the fact that God loved us even before we were deserving of God’s love. In fact, it was God’s love that made us able both to receive and to give love in return. Love is of God; love is God. Divine love is constant and trustworthy. How easily we can think this thought or speak these words, yet how difficult, even impossible, it is to comprehend what it means. We can only really recognise love in its many concrete manifestations. Love is patient, kind and forbearing; it believes, it hopes, it endures. The love of God breaks down the barriers between Gentile and Jew, between slave and free, between the poor and the prosperous, between women and men, between the healthy and the ailing, between young and old.
Embraced by such love we are gradually transformed. We begin to recognise God’s love in places we never suspected it would be found. We discover that what we once judged unclean may merely be an unfamiliar openness to God’s truth. We discover that our own insistence on legitimate religious practice may really be spiritual elitism. Our eyes are opened to ways we have tried to confine God’s love to the conventional boundaries we ourselves have set. As we are drawn into God’s love, we eagerly embrace the commandments that help us to live righteous lives. To the extent that we love as universally as God does, we will know that we live in God and that God lives in us.
© Dianne Bergant CSA
Parish eNews News Blog
full blog can be found at Parish News Blog
please note - to be able to follow a link in news articles below, please click on READ MORE to open the article.
Where possible, the parish news blog will be updated daily Mon-Friday.
click here to access past issues of our eNews
Stay up to date!
To receive important Parish updates, make sure you subscribe to our Parish weekly parish eNews below
The parish blog/eNews is an important tool that we use to communicate with Parishioners.
Join our weekly mailing list so you always know what's on!