Sunday Reflections, 5th Sunday of Lent, Year A

The Raising of Lazarus

Caravaggio [Web Gallery of Art]

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, Ireland, New Zealand)

Readings (English Standard Version, Catholic Edition: England & Wales, Scotland, India)  

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel John 11:1-45 (English Standard Version, Anglicised)

There was a man named Lazarus who lived in the village of Bethany with the two sisters, Mary and Martha, and he was ill. It was the same Mary, the sister of the sick man Lazarus, who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair. The sisters sent this message to Jesus, ‘Lord, the man you love is ill.’  On receiving the message, Jesus said, ‘This sickness will end not in death but in God’s glory, and through it the Son of God will be glorified.’ 

Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, yet when he heard that Lazarus was ill he stayed where he was for two more days before saying to the disciples, ‘Let us go to Judaea.’ The disciples said, ‘Rabbi, it is not long since the Jews wanted to stone you; are you going back again?’ Jesus replied:

‘Are there not twelve hours in the day?

A man can walk in the daytime without stumbling

because he has the light of this world to see by;

but if he walks at night he stumbles,

because there is no light to guide him.’

He said that and then added, ‘Our friend Lazarus is resting, I am going to wake him.’ The disciples said to him, ‘Lord, if he is able to rest he is sure to get better.’ The phrase Jesus used referred to the death of Lazarus, but they thought that by ‘rest’ he meant ‘sleep’, so Jesus put it plainly, ‘Lazarus is dead; and for your sake I am glad I was not there because now you will believe. But let us go to him.’ Then Thomas – known as the Twin – said to the other disciples, ‘Let us go too, and die with him.’ 

On arriving, Jesus found that Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days already. Bethany is only about two miles from Jerusalem, and many Jews had come to Martha and Mary to sympathise with them over their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus had come she went to meet him. Mary remained sitting in the house. Martha said to Jesus, ‘If you had been here, my brother would not have died, but I know that, even now, whatever you ask of God, he will grant you.’ ‘Your brother’ said Jesus to her ‘will rise again.’ Martha said, ‘I know he will rise again at the resurrection on the last day.’ Jesus said:

‘I am the resurrection and the life.

If anyone believes in me, even though he dies he will live,

and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.

Do you believe this?’

‘Yes, Lord,’ she said ‘I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who was to come into this world.’

When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in a low voice, ‘The Master is here and wants to see you.’ Hearing this, Mary got up quickly and went to him. Jesus had not yet come into the village; he was still at the place where Martha had met him. When the Jews who were in the house sympathising with Mary saw her get up so quickly and go out, they followed her, thinking that she was going to the tomb to weep there. 

Mary went to Jesus, and as soon as she saw him she threw herself at his feet, saying, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.’ At the sight of her tears, and those of the Jews who followed her, Jesus said in great distress, with a sigh that came straight from the heart, ‘Where have you put him?’ They said, ‘Lord, come and see.’ Jesus wept; and the Jews said, ‘See how much he loved him!’ But there were some who remarked, ‘He opened the eyes of the blind man, could he not have prevented this man’s death?’ Still sighing, Jesus reached the tomb: it was a cave with a stone to close the opening. Jesus said, ‘Take the stone away.’ Martha said to him, ‘Lord, by now he will smell; this is the fourth day.’ Jesus replied, ‘Have I not told you that if you believe you will see the glory of God?’ So they took away the stone. Then Jesus lifted up his eyes and said:

‘Father, I thank you for hearing my prayer.

I knew indeed that you always hear me,

but I speak for the sake of all these who stand round me,

so that they may believe it was you who sent me.’

When he had said this, he cried in a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, here! Come out!’ The dead man came out, his feet and hands bound with bands of stuff and a cloth round his face. Jesus said to them, ‘Unbind him, let him go free.’

Many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary and had seen what he did believed in him. 

 

The Raising of Lazarus

Rembrandt [Web Gallery of Art]

Shorter form John 11:3-7, 17, 20-27, 33b-45 (New American Bible)

The sisters of Lazarus sent word to Jesus, saying, “Master, the one you love is ill.” When Jesus heard this he said, “This illness is not to end in death, but is for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So when he heard that he was ill, he remained for two days in the place where he was. Then after this he said to his  disciples, "Let us go back to Judea.”

When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him; but Mary sat at home. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise.” Martha said, “I know he will rise in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world.”

He became perturbed and deeply troubled, and said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Sir, come and see.” And Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him. ”But some of them said, “Could not the one who opened the eyes of the blind man have done something so that this man would not have died?”

So Jesus, perturbed again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a  stone lay across it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the dead man’s sister, said to him,  “Lord, by now there will be a stench; he has been dead for four days.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believe you will see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone.

And Jesus raised his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you for hearing me. I know that you always hear me; but because of the crowd here I have said this, that they may believe that you sent me. ”And when he had said this, He cried out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, tied hand and foot with burial bands, and his face was wrapped in a cloth. So Jesus said to them, “Untie him and let him go.”

Now many of the Jews who had come to Mary and seen what he had done began to believe in him. 

 Léachtaí i nGaeilge

St Martha

Francesco Mochi [Web Gallery of Art]

On Christmas Eve 2022 I met a friendly young Irishman working as a security guard in a Dublin hospital. He told me that he believed in Egyptian gods. I was somewhat taken aback as I had never met anyone before with such beliefs. Our conversation was very brief. Later, as so often happens, I thought of what might have been a helpful question: Which of those gods died for you?

In today's gospel we read: ‘Your brother’ said Jesus to her ‘will rise again.’ Martha said, ‘I know he will rise again at the resurrection on the last day.’ Jesus said: 'I am the resurrection and the life. If anyone believes in me, even though he dies he will live, and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?’ ‘Yes, Lord,’ she said ‘I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who was to come into this world.’

So often I have heard people, usually Catholics, say something along these lines: We're all on the same road and we all believe in the same God. Not true. Jesus says very clearly to Martha, I am the resurrection and the life. It is only through Jesus Christ that we can attain heaven. Jesus teaches this to us again in John 14:5-6, Thomas said to him, 'Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?' Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.'

In this incident Jesus is drawing his disciples - and us - to faith in him. He says that explicitly to them before they go to Bethany: Lazarus has died, and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe. He also draws Martha into her wonderful expression of faith: Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world. This is before he raises her brother Lazarus from the dead. Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him.

That faith in Jesus Christ is also faith in our bodily resurrection at the end of time. When we pray the Nicene Creed at Mass on Sundays and solemnities we pray, I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. We say the same thing if we pray the Apostle's Creed instead of the Nicene Creed, I believe in . . . the resurrection of the body and life everlasting.

Commenting on today's gospel in his Angelus talk on 9 March 2008, Pope Benedict XVI said,  Christ's heart is divine-human:  in him God and man meet perfectly, without separation and without confusion. He is the image, or rather, the incarnation of God who is love, mercy, paternal and maternal tenderness, of God who is Life. 

Drawing our attention to Martha's expression of faith, Pope Benedict says, It is a question that Jesus addresses to each one of us:  a question that certainly rises above us, rises above our capacity to understand, and it asks us to entrust ourselves to him as he entrusted himself to the Father. Martha's response is exemplary:  'Yes, Lord, I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world' (Jn 11: 27). Yes, O Lord! We also believe, notwithstanding our doubts and darkness; we believe in you because you have the words of eternal life. We want to believe in you, who give us a trustworthy hope of life beyond life, of authentic and full life in your Kingdom of light and peace. 

May that too become the prayer of the young man I met at the hospital in Dublin on Christmas Eve 2022 and others like him.

 

Antiphona ad introitum    Entrance Antiphon

Iudica me, Deus, et discerne causam meam de gente non sancta; ab homine iniquo et doloso eripe me, qui tu es Deus meus et fortitudo mea.

Give me justice, O God, and plead my cause against a nation that is faithless. From the deceitful and cunning rescue me, for you, O God, are my strength.

[In the video the upper subtitles are in Latin while the lower ones are the Italian translation]

 Traditional Latin Mass

Passion Sunday

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 03-22-2026 if necessary).

Epistle: Hebrews 9:11-15. Gospel: John 8:46-59.

Abraham

Lorenzo Monaco [Web Gallery of Art]

Your father Abraham rejoiced that he was to see my day; he saw it and was glad (John 9:56; Gospel).

 

           

 

 

Sunday Reflections, 4th Sunday of Lent, Year A, 15 March 2026

Fr Noel O'Neill with Myeong Sek

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, Ireland, New Zealand)

Readings (English Standard Version, Catholic Edition: England & Wales, Scotland, India)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel John 9:1-41 (English Standard Version, Anglicised)

[For the shorter form (9:1, 6-9, 13-17, 34-38) omit the text in brackets and italics.]

At that time: As Jesus passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. [And his disciples asked him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.’ Having said these things,] he spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man’s eyes with the mud and said to him, ‘Go, wash in the pool of Siloam’ (which means Sent). So he went and washed and came back seeing.

The neighbours and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying, ‘Is this not the man who used to sit and beg?’ Some said, ‘It is he.’ Others said, ‘No, but he is like him.’ He kept saying, ‘I am the man.’ [So they said to him, ‘Then how were your eyes opened?’ He answered, ‘The man called Jesus made mud and anointed my eyes and said to me, “Go to Siloam and wash.” So I went and washed and received my sight.’ They said to him, ‘Where is he?’ He said, ‘I do not know.’]

They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. Now it was a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. So the Pharisees again asked him how he had received his sight. And he said to them, ‘He put mud on my eyes, and I washed, and I see.’ Some of the Pharisees said, ‘This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.’ But others said, ‘How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?’ And there was a division among them. So they said again to the blind man, ‘What do you say about him, since he has opened your eyes?’ He said, ‘He is a prophet.’ 

[The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight, until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight and asked them, ‘Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?’ His parents answered, ‘We know that this is our son and that he was born blind. But how he now sees we do not know, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself.’ His parents said these things because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess Jesus to be Christ, he was to be put out of the synagogue. Therefore his parents said, ‘He is of age; ask him.’

So for the second time they called the man who had been blind and said to him, ‘Give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner.’ He answered, ‘Whether he is a sinner I do not know. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.’ They said to him, ‘What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?’ He answered them, ‘I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?’ And they reviled him, saying, ‘You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from.’ The man answered, ‘Why, this is an amazing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshipper of God and does his will, God listens to him. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.’] They answered him, ‘You were born in utter sin, and would you teach us?’ And they cast him out.

Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and having found him he said, ‘Do you believe in the Son of Man?’ He answered, ‘And who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?’ Jesus said to him, ‘You have seen him, and it is he who is speaking to you.’ He said, ‘Lord, I believe’, and he worshipped him. [Jesus said, ‘For judgement I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.’ Some of the Pharisees near him heard these things, and said to him, ‘Are we also blind?’ Jesus said to them, ‘If you were blind, you would have no guilt; but now that you say, “We see”, your guilt remains.’]

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

Fr Noel O'Neill with Myeong Sek at grave of You Ha

Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and having found him he said, ‘Do you believe in the Son of Man?’ He answered, ‘And who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?’ Jesus said to him, ‘You have seen him, and it is he who is speaking to you.’ He said, ‘Lord, I believe’, and he worshipped him (John 9:35-38; Gospel).

The blind man met Jesus, heard him and believed. When St John wrote his gospel his purpose was that we, like the blind man, would meet Jesus, hear him and believe.  

Fr Noel O’ Neill, a Columban priest from Limerick, Ireland, who died last year aged 92, went to Korea in 1957, four years after the war had ended there. Working in Gwangju he became involved with the Mudeong Institution, also known as the Beggars' Camp, which housed 600 people from the margins, including persons with learning disabilities. He noticed that there were not able to speak for themselves and felt drawn to these ‘forgotten ones’. 

      

Holy Mass in Emmaus Community, Myeong Sek in grey

Fr       One of these 'forgotten ones' was a young woman named You Ha. Father Noel was called to visit her when she was dying in a nearby hospital. He arrived just in time to hear her say Kamsahamnida, ‘Thank you’, her last words. You Ha had no family and the hospital was going to use her body for medical research. But Father Noel bought a grave for her in the Catholic cemetery and took care of the funeral expenses. He had these words inscribed on the tombstone: Will you forgive society? Will you forgive the Church? For too long have we ignored you.

This experience led to Father Noel’s discovering his ‘vocation within a vocation’: to spend the rest of his life enabling persons with learning disabilities to live in small family-like homes in the wider community. He saw this not just as a matter of charity but of justice.

The first person to join him in such a community was Myeong Sek. Here are Father Noel's own words.

Myeong Sek had been abandoned by her parents when she was a few years old and ended up in ‘The Beggars Camp’, Mudeong Institution, which I frequently visited while in parish ministry. After much negotiation with the authorities there I succeeded in getting permission for Myeong Sek to leave and to join with me and a volunteer as we moved into a two-storey house in a residential part of the city. It was October 1981. This was the first attempt in Korea of offering people with special needs the opportunity of living in the local community.

Early in 2012 Myeong Sek was diagnosed with cancer. She spent the last ten days of her life in a hospice. A hospice and Emmaus [the name Father Noel had chosen for the small communities] have something in common. A hospice is for people dying whose ailment cannot be cured. Emmaus is for intellectually disabled people whose disability cannot be cured. A visit to either one alerts us to the preciousness of each moment of life; it arouses within us a sense of gratitude.

While Myeong Sek was in the hospice I visited her every day. As I sat beside her bedside and held her tiny hand, we reminisced about the funny incidents we had shared together throughout the previous 30 years, the times we used to sing Kaptori Wa Kapsoni (a popular Korean action song) and dance the hokey pokey.

 

As she laid back on her bed she would break into a broad smile, a loving smile, sending me a message that no words could express. They were happy moments, happy days, happy years.

That smile also hid the many wounds and hurts she had endured in her lifetime. I was only too well aware of those painful wounds. Watching the peaceful look on her face I felt she already sensed the heavenly welcome. She could almost make the dying words of St Thérèse, the Little Flower, her own: ‘I am not dying, I am entering into life’.

Myeong Sek was waked for three days at the funeral home. Those who had lived with her in the group home were dressed in mourning black dress, and they greeted those who came to pay their respects, present and former staff members who had known her for many years. Many Catholic friends and sponsors came who were touched and moved by their relationship with Myeong Sek. This tiny, fragile woman had the gift to make them feel loved and at peace with themselves as they struggled with their problems.

Myeong Sek often said, ‘When I die, those who come to the wake, feed them well’. They came in large numbers to pay their respects and all ate well. Before leaving as each one ate and departed you could almost sense the presence of Myeong Sek as she said kamsahamnida, ‘thank you, thank you’.

 

The funeral Mass was held at the parish church Myeong Sek used to attend. Six priests concelebrated for a packed congregation. I chose for the Gospel the story of the two disciples on the Road to Emmaus. As the two disciples eyes were opened at seeing Jesus break the bread, so also my eyes were opened by my relationship with Myeong Sek. This tiny, fragile woman, who could not read or write, who had no concept of time or money, was my teacher, my professor. We need to invite and welcome more Myeong Seks into our society because they will surprise us with the manner they can touch our inner selves and help us to welcome our weaknesses, our old age with graceful and peaceful courage. Yes, Myeong Sek was differently abled.

To slightly adapt the words of Jesus in today's gospel: It was not that You Ha or Myeong Sek sinned, or their parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in them.

And may the Myeong Seks in our own lives display the works of God to us and open our eyes as Jesus opened the eyes of the blind man in today’s gospel, bringing us to say, ‘Lord, I believe’ and to worship him.

 

Myeong Sek's funeral Mass

Myeong Sek's funeral

 Traditional Latin Mass

Fourth Sunday in Lent

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 03-15-2026 if necessary).

Epistle: Galatians 4:22-31. Gospel: John 6:1-15.

Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes

Lambert Lombard [Web Gallery of Art]

Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted (John 6:11; Gospel).

 

           

                                                         

Sunday Reflections, 3rd Sunday of Lent, Year A, 8 March 2026

 

Jesus and the Samaritan Woman at the Well

Guercino [Web Gallery of Art]

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, Ireland, New Zealand)

Readings (English Standard Version, Catholic Edition: England & Wales, Scotland, India)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel John 4:5-42 (English Standard Version, Anglicised)

[For the shorter form (4:5-15, 19b-26, 39a, 40-42) omit the text in brackets.]

At that time: Jesus came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour.

A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, ‘Give me a drink.’ (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, ‘How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?’ (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, ‘If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, “Give me a drink”, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.’ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.’ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.’

[Jesus said to her, ‘Go, call your husband, and come here.’ The woman answered him, ‘I have no husband.’ Jesus said to her, ‘You are right in saying, “I have no husband”; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.’] The woman said to him, ‘Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.’ The woman said to him, ‘I know that Messiah is coming — he who is called Christ. When he comes, he will tell us all things.’ Jesus said to her, ‘I who speak to you am he.’

[Just then his disciples came back. They marvelled that he was talking with a woman, but no one said, ‘What do you seek?’ or, ‘Why are you talking with her?’ So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people, ‘Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?’ They went out of the town and were coming to him.

Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, saying, ‘Rabbi, eat.’ But he said to them, ‘I have food to eat that you do not know about.’ So the disciples said to one another, ‘Has anyone brought him something to eat?’ Jesus said to them, ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. Do you not say, “There are yet four months, then comes the harvest”? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, “One sows and another reaps.” I sent you to reap that for which you did not labour. Others have laboured, and you have entered into their labour.’]

Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, ‘He told me all that I ever did.’ So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, ‘It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Saviour of the world.’

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

Servant of God Alphonsus 'Alfie' Lambe

24 June 1932 – 21 January 1968

Alfie Lambe was born in Tullamore, Ireland, joined the Irish Christian Brothers but was advised to leave because of his poor health. He joined the Legion of Mary where he showed outstanding qualities and was appointed to South America as a Legion envoy, with the mission of helping the Legion grow there. With Seamus Grace, another Irish legionary, he left for Bogotá, Columbia on the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel 16 July 1953. He was only 21.Until his early death in Buenos Aires, he was to serve in Columbia, Argentina, Ecuador, Uruguay and Brazil. He acquired the Spanish nickname El Corderito, 'the little lamb'. The Archdiocese of Buenos Aires initiated the cause for his beatification in 1978.

Noel Lynch, who went to South America as a Legion envoy around the time of Alfie's death, wrote about Alfie. One story he tells parallels today's gospel.

One of the ideas of the Legion Handbook is that a legionary most always be on duty. Alfie taught by example. One day Alfie met a young man in a railway station. With a smile he asked him would he like to do something for Our Lady. The young man answered that he would but that he did not go frequently to Sunday Mass. Alfie replied; 'I did not ask you about Mass but would you be willing to work for Our Lady?' That same week he attended his first Legion meeting. Within a few weeks he was an officer of that Praesidium and soon after became officer of his Curia. Within a few years he went for the priesthood and today is rector of the diocesan seminary.

The Praesidium is the basic unit of the Legion of Mary and meets weekly while the Curia consists of the officers of a group of praesidia in a particular area and meets monthly.

In today's gospel Jesus asks for help: Give me a drink. He asks a stranger, a Samaritan woman, which astonished his disciples. Alfie approached a stranger while waiting for a train and asked him if he would like to do something for Our Lady.

The question of Jesus to the Samaritan woman led her to become a missionary that very day to the people in her own town. Alfie's question to the young man in the railway station led him to become a missionary in his own diocese as a priest.

Jesus was aware of the background of the woman. Alfie didn't know anything about the young man he approached but wasn't put off when the latter indicated that he didn't attend Sunday Mass regularly. Alfie replied, I did not ask you about Sunday Mass but would you be willing to work for Our Lady?

The gospel has these striking words: Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony, 'He told me all that I ever did.' Clearly the woman was not filled with fear or shame like someone whose sins have been publicly revealed. She wanted to share the good news that she had found the Messiah. 

Her words echo those of Psalm 139 (138): O Lord, you search me and you know me . . . you discern my purpose from afar . . . For it was you who created my being, knit me together in my mother's womb. I thank you for the wonder of my being . . . O search me, God, and know my heart. O test me and know my thoughts. See that I follow not the wrong path and lead me in the path of life eternal.

The woman at the well experienced the truth of the words : O Lord, you search me and you know me . . . you discern my purpose from afar.  Jesus called her to be her real self, to be the person God wanted her to be. The young man approached by Alfie Lambe discovered who God wanted him to be through the gentle invitation to work for Our Lady.

Because of the Samaritan woman's missionary work among her own people they came out to meet Jesus and many more believed because of his word. And the final words of the gospel tell us that a missionary's work is to bring people to meet Jesus: It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Saviour of the world. 

That too was the whole purpose of Alfie Lambe's work in South America: accompanying Our Lady knowing that her mission is to bring us all to know her Son.

That too is the mission of the Legion of Mary: The object of the Legion of Mary is the glory of God through the holiness of its members developed by prayer and active co-operation, under ecclesiastical guidance, in Mary’s and the Church’s work of crushing the head of the serpent and advancing the reign of Christ (Handbook, page 11).

The special Preface used when the Gospel of the Samaritan woman is read has these beautiful words:

For when [Jesus] asked the Samaritan woman for water to drink, 

he had already created the gift of faith within her

and so ardently did he thirst for her faith, 

that he kindled in her the fire of divine love.

The last line of the quotation from that Preface is a reference to an ancient prayer to the Holy Spirit with which every Legion of Mary meeting begins, leading to the Rosary.

Come, O Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of Your faithful, and enkindle in them the fire of Your love.

v. Send forth Your Spirit, O Lord, and they shall be created.

R. And You shall renew the face of the earth.

Let us pray.

God our Father, pour out the gifts of Your Holy Spirit on the world. You sent the Spirit on Your Church to begin the teaching of the gospel: now let the Spirit continue to work in the world through the hearts of all who believe. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Jesus kindled in the Samaritan woman the fire of divine love. Through the  Legion of Mary he kindled in Alfie Lambe the fire of divine love. Through Alfie he kindled in the young man at the railway station the firs of divine love.

Through the sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation Jesus has kindled in each of us the fire of divine love.

Ave Regina Caelorum

This ancient Latin hymn to Our Lady is traditionally sung or recited at the end of Compline (Night Prayer) from the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, 2 February, through Wednesday of Holy Week.

Hail, Queen of heaven; hail, Mistress of the Angels; hail, root of Jesse; hail, the gate through which the Light rose over the earth.

Rejoice , Virgin most renowned and of unsurpassed beauty. Farewell, Lady most comely. Prevail upon Christ to pity us.

Traditional Latin Mass

Third Sunday in Lent

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 03-15-2026 if necessary).

Epistle: Ephesians 5:1-9. Gospel: Luke 11:14-28.

Christ Carrying the Cross

El Greco [Web Gallery of Art]

Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it! (Luke 11:28; today's Gospel)