Sunday Reflections, Trinity Sunday Year A, 31 May 2026

The Coronation of the Virgin

Velázquez [Web Gallery of Art]

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16, Gospel).

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 3:16-18 (English Standard Version, Anglicised)

Jesus said to Nicodemus:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

The Adoration of the Holy Trinity (Landauer Altar)

Albrecht Dürer [Web Gallery of Art]

Three years ago I visited a parish in Dublin for a mission appeal on behalf of the Columbans with Angie Escarsa, a Columban lay missionary from Zambales, Philippines, who has been here in Ireland since the late 1990s. I concelebrated and preached at the Saturday evening Mass.

I noticed a young man in a hospital-style wheelchair-bed up near the altar-rails with his parents. I observed how they cared for him during Mass, with devotion and tenderness. I briefly met the family afterwards and learned that the young man had been very badly injured in an accident. It was clear that he needed full-time care.

On Sunday morning another Columban, Fr Dermot Carthy, concelebrated and preached. He is a native of the parish who came home four years ago from Peru where he had worked for 62 years. I simply attended Mass and stayed at the back of the church. (This can be a good experience for a priest from time to time.) I noticed an elderly couple two pews in front of me, both of them white-haired and not very tall. The wife helped her husband a number of times to stand, doing so in a way that indicated a tender love for the man she had spent most of her life with - 61 years as I learned when I met them after Mass. I told them that they had made my day, which they had. The face of the wife lit up when I said this. 

I noticed a young family at the Mass, husband, wife and four children, three girls and a boy. The eldest was in her white First Communion dress, as she had made her First Holy Communion the day before. I saw only one other girl in her Communion dress. When I made my First Holy Communion in 1950 every child would be at Mass the following Sunday, the girls in their white dresses, the boys in their new suits with a white rosette attached to the left lapel of their jacket. I met the family briefly after Mass and told the parents that they too had made my day, which they had.

I saw in each of these couples and families a reflection of the Holy Trinity. We are made in God's image and God is a Community of Three Persons, eternally generating life and drawing us into that life. Each of the three couples I met had shared in that power of generating life through marriage. The elderly couple had grown old gracefully, no doubt with many difficulties as well as joys along the way, but clearly loving each other with the love of Jesus the Risen Lord whom they had given to each other in the Sacrament of Matrimony. Their serenity spoke to me of God's love, of the life-giving Trinity in whom I find my origin and with whom I hope to spend eternity.

The middle-aged couple were carrying a heavy load, but with great love. They had generated their son with God's own loving power of creating which He had shared with them through their marriage. Now they were sharing together in carrying the cross with Jesus whom they had given to each other as the source of their love for each other when they exchanged their marriage vows. They understand the meaning of the words for better, for worse in those vows. The extraordinary love for their adult son who cannot look after himself comes from the heart of the Blessed Trinity.

I constantly marvel at the willingness of young married couples to bring children into the world and to raise them. This speaks particularly powerfully to me when I see parents raising their children in the Faith. I am blessed to know such couples and families and am aware that it is not at all uncommon for couples to have a child - or a parent - who needs special care.

In the lives of each of us there are individuals, married couples and families, often unaware that they are gifts of God to others, who draw us into the eternal life of the Blessed Trinity.

Blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear (Matthew 13:16).

For Irish Readers

The legend is that St Patrick explained the Trinity by holding up a shamrock. There are three leaves but only one shamrock.

Preamble to the Constitution of Ireland

In the Name of the Most Holy Trinity, from Whom is all authority and to Whom, as our final end, all actions both of men and States must be referred,

We, the people of Éire,

Humbly acknowledging all our obligations to our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ, Who sustained our fathers through centuries of trial,

Gratefully remembering their heroic and unremitting struggle to regain the rightful independence of our Nation,

And seeking to promote the common good, with due observance of Prudence, Justice and Charity, so that the dignity and freedom of the individual may be assured, true social order attained, the unity of our country restored, and concord established with other nations,

Do hereby adopt, enact, and give to ourselves this Constitution.

The Preamble has no legal force but is an expression of values. In 2015 the voters of Ireland changed the Constitution so that same-sex 'marriage' could be introduced. In doing so they removed  any connection between marriage and bringing new life into the world. In 2018 the voters, the majority baptised and confirmed Catholics, amended the Constitution to allow the killing of babies in their mothers' wombs. Both decisions were implicitly a rejection of the eternally life-giving Holy Trinity. Explicitly they were a rejection of life-giving and and of life.

Benedictus sit Deus

Setting by Mozart who composed this music when he was twelve.

Antiphona ad introitum   Entrance Antiphon (Cf. Tobit 12:6)

Benedictus sit Deus Pater, Unigenitusque Dei Filius, Sanctus quoque Spiritus, quia fecit nobisum misericordiam suam.

Blest be God the Father, and the Only Begotten Son of God, and also the Holy Spirit, for he has shown us his merciful love.

Traditional Latin Mass

Trinity Sunday

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 05-31-2026 if necessary).

Epistle: Romans 11:33-36. Gospel: Matthew 28:18-20.

Holy Trinity and the Saints in Glory

Sebastiano Conca [Web Gallery of Art]

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19; Gospel).

     

                         

 

'We will not stop celebrating Mass.' Sunday Reflections, Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross

Christ in Agony on the Cross

El Greco [Web Gallery of Art]

When the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross falls on a Sunday, as a feast of the Lord it replaces the celebration of the Sunday in Ordinary Time. So the Mass of the 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time is not celebrated this year.

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

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

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel John 3:13-17 (English Standard Version, Anglicised)

At that time: Jesus said to Nicodemus, ‘No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.’

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

.

Fr Ragheed Aziz Ganni

(20 January 1972 - 3 June 2007)

For me the face of the persecuted Christians in today's world is that of Fr Ragheed Ganni. An article by Ed West published in the Catholic Herald, now published monthly in England, on 20 December 2013 and that has a very personal dimension, gives as good an account of Father Ragheed as any I've read. (The link to the article that I used before no longer functions.)

Ed West writes: Fr Ragheed was one of 1,000 Iraqi Christians murdered during the pogrom that began after the Coalition invasion of 2003. The persecution culminated in October 31 2010, with the massacre of 52 worshippers at a Catholic church in Baghdad. In the words of one Chaldean bishop, this is a 'Calvary' that has largely been ignored in the western media, outside of the Christian press . . .

 It has been a shocking and horrific ordeal for one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, which has been all but driven out of its homeland. A pre-war population of a million is now somewhere in the region of 150,000, many of them elderly, and more than 60 churches have been bombed.  That figure has got smaller in recent months and the ancient city of Mosul, in many ways the heart of the Christian faith in Iraq and Syria, has been emptied of its Christians by ISIS.

The article describes First Holy Communion day in Father Ragheed's parish in 2006: The atmosphere in Ragheed’s home town had become terrifying. On 4 August 2006, when 80 children of his parish of the Holy Spirit received their first Holy Communion, battles broke out in the street outside, and the children cowered from the sounds of guns and rockets.

The good shepherd helped them through. He told AsiaNews: 'Although people are used to it and remained reasonably calm, they started to wonder whether they were going to make it back to their homes or not. I was aware of the immense joy of the 80 children receiving their first Communion so I turned the subject into a joke and said to them: "Do not panic, these are fireworks. The city is celebrating with us." And at the same time I gave them instructions to leave the church quietly and quickly.'

The author further notes: Friends later recalled that he had become increasingly weary and broken by the demands of the priesthood amid such terror. After an attack on his parish, on Palm Sunday 2007, he wrote: 'We empathise with Christ, who entered Jerusalem in full knowledge that the consequence of His love for mankind was the cross. Thus while bullets smashed our church windows, we offered up our suffering as a sign of love for Christ.'

Shortly before his death Fr Ganni wrote in an email: 'Each day we wait for the decisive attack, but we will not stop celebrating Mass; we will do it underground, where we are safer. I am encouraged in this decision by the strength of my parishioners. This is war, real war, but we hope to carry our cross to the very end with the help of Divine Grace.'

This young Iraqi priest of the Chaldean Catholic Church, an engineer by profession, was murdered on Trinity Sunday, 3 June 2007, along with three subdeacons, Basman Yousef Daud, Gassan Isam Bidawed and Wahid Hanna Isho after he had celebrated Mass in Mosul, the city of his birth.

At a Eucharistic Congress in Bari, Italy, in 2005 Father Ragheed said, There are days when I feel frail and full of fear. But when, holding the Eucharist, I say ‘Behold the Lamb of God Behold, who takes away the sin of the world’, I feel His strength in me. When I hold the Host in my hands, it is really He who is holding me and all of us, challenging the terrorists and keeping us united in His boundless love. He also said, Without Sunday, without the Eucharist, the Christians in Iraq cannot survive.

To put some time perspective on the Christian faith in Iraq and Syria: in 2021 the Church in the Philippines will celebrate 500 years of the Catholic Christian faith in that country, a great occasion for thanking God for that precious gift. The Christian faith has been lived in Iraq and Syria for four times as long as that, since the time of the Apostles. Mass was celebrated for 2,000 years in Mosul until a couple of months ago when Christians were driven from their ancestral homeland by ISIS.

Father Raqheed's words, But when, holding the Eucharist, I say ‘Behold the Lamb of God Behold, who takes away the sin of the world’, I feel His strength in me, reflect the words of Jesus to Nicodemus in today's Gospel: And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

A Muslim friend of Fr Ragheed, Adnam Mokrani, professor of Islamic Studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, said that on his ordination day, 13 October 2001, recalled that the new priest said, Today, I have died to self. St Paul in today's Second Reading tells us, Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God did not regard equality with God has something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave and that he became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.

As we celebrate the Exaltation of the Holy Cross and as we pray for persecuted Christians, particularly in Iraq and Syria, parts of Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of the Congo and other places, may we thank God for the gift of our Christian faith and ask him for the courage to live it as Father Ragheed and countless others have done, becoming obedient to the point of death.                                   

 

Christ on the Cross

Velázquez [Web Gallery of Art]

Traditional Latin Mass 

What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful (Benedict XVI). 

 The Exaltation of the Holy Cross

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 09-14-2025 if necessary).

Readings. Epistle: Philippians 5:2-11. Gospel: John 12:31-36.

Crucifixion (1596-1600)

El Greco [Web Gallery of Art]

And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all things to Myself (Gospel). 

'I want to share that I believe in Jesus Christ who has given his own life for us.' Sunday Reflections, 2nd Sunday of Lent, Year B

 

The Transfiguration

Blessed Fra Angelico [Web Gallery of Art]

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel Mark 9:2-10 (English Standard Version Anglicised: India)

After six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became radiant, intensely white, as no one on earth could bleach them. And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus. And Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah.” For he did not know what to say, for they were terrified. And a cloud overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the cloud, “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.” And suddenly, looking around, they no longer saw anyone with them but Jesus only.

And as they were coming down the mountain, he charged them to tell no one what they had seen, until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead might mean.

 

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

Assumpsit Iesus Petrum

Sebastián de Vivanco (Ávila, 1551 - Salamanca, 1622)

Música Reservata de Barcelona directed by Bruno Turner

Assumpsit Iesus Petrum, et Iacobum et Ioannem fratrem eius, et duxit eos in montem excelsum seorsum, et transfiguratus est ante eos.

Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves.

Et ecce vox de nube dicens: His est Filius meus dilectus, in quo mihi bene complauci, ipsum audite.

And a voice came out of the cloud, "This is my beloved Son; listen to him" (Mark 10: 2,7).

Clement Shahbaz Bhatti [Wikipedia]

(9 September 1968 - 2 March 2011)

 

In today's first reading God asks Abraham to sacrifice his only son 'on a height that I will point out to you'. We can only imagine the heartbreak of Abraham being asked by God to give offer his only son by Sarah his wife, born when both of them were very old. But God wasn't looking for the life of Isaac but for Abraham to submit himself to God's will, no matter the consequences. Abraham's sacrifice of his own will made him our Father in faith, as the Roman Canon says, the Father of countless Jews and Christians.

From the time of St Stephen, the first Christian martyr, down to our own day, God has been calling certain individuals to give up everything that is precious to them, including life itself, for the sake of others.

The struggle of Abraham is a sign of the struggle that Jesus would have to go through. Last Sunday we got a glimpse of his struggle in the desert where he was tempted by Satan, basically to abandon the mission the Father had given him. During Holy Week we will see his awful struggle in the Garden of Gethsemane and his cry from the Cross, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Each of us in some way has to share in that struggle, to let go of our own will in something big or small for the sake of others and to do what God want us to do.

Shahbaz Bhatti was living in a situation where he knew that God might ask him to give up his own life. Less than two months before his own death, Governor Salmaan Taseer of Punjab, a Muslim, was murdered by one of his own security guards because of his opposition to Pakistan's Blasphemy Law.

 Mr Bhatti was deeply committed to working for groups discriminated against, including the Christian minority in Pakistan. He gave as the reason for his commitment, I only want a place at the feet of Jesus. I want my life, my character, my actions to speak for me and say that I am following Jesus Christ. He was gunned down on 2 March 2011 in  Islamabad, just after leaving his mother's home.

In the video below Shahbaz Bhatti speaks about the possibility of his death. A note with the video says :Bhatti's close colleague shared the video with Al Jazeera saying that Bhatti had requested him to do so in the eventuality of his assassination because 'it is with the Muslim world I want to share the message of love. That is the only message that can bring the Muslim world out of the circle of hate and killings'.

Al Jazeera is not responsible for the content of this video.

[Update: Benedict Rogers, a close friend of Shahbaz Bhatti, in an article published on 2 March 2021 writes about this interview: Four months before his murder, he recorded an interview with the BBC for broadcast in the event of his death.]

Below the video is a transcript of what Mr Bhatti said.

Minister Bhatti, you forgot one question in the interview. Your life is threatened by whom and what sort of threats are you receiving?

The forces of violence, militant banned organizations, the Taliban, and Al Qaeda, they want to impose their radical philosophy on Pakistan. And whoever stands against their radical philosophy that threatens them, when I’m leading this campaign against the Sharia Law, for the abolishment [abolition] of [the] Blasphemy Law, and speaking for the oppressed and marginalized, persecuted Christian and other minorities, these Taliban threaten me.

But I want to share that I believe in Jesus Christ who has given his own life for us. I know what is the meaning of [the] Cross and I am following of the Cross and I am ready to die for a cause. I’m living for my community and suffering people and I will die to defend their rights. So these threats and these warnings cannot change my opinion and principles. I will prefer to die for my principle and for the justice of my community rather [than] to compromise on these threats.

Sts Peter, James and John, as they came down the mountain after having seen the Transfigured Jesus, wondered what 'risen from the dead' meant. A few weeks after the assassination of Clement Shahbaz Bhatti the bishops of Pakistan petitioned the Holy See to declare him a martyr. Bishop Andrew Francis of Multan, who drafted the petition, said, We Christians in Pakistan want to transform the death of Shahbaz Bhatti into a prophecy of the Resurrection. It was only after the Crucifixion that the Resurrection could occur and it was only after Easter Sunday that the Apostles found the answer to their question. On 2 March 2016, the fifth anniversary of his death, the Diocese of Islamabad-Rawalpindi began collecting testimonies about Shahbaz Bhatti to inquire into his martyrdom and sanctity.

May each of us pray for the grace to make these words of Shahbaz Bhatti our own: I just want a place at the feet of Jesus. I want my life, my character, my actions to speak for me and say that I am following Jesus Christ.

Christ in the House of Mary and Martha (detail)

Velázquez  [Web Gallery of Art]

Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her (Luke 10:41-42).

I just want a place at the feet of Jesus. (Shahbaz Bhatti).”

Extraordinary Form of the Mass

Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) 

Second Sunday in Lent 

The complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 2-28-2021 if necessary).

Epistle: 1 Thessalonians 4:1-7.  Gospel: Matthew 17:1-9.

Authentic Beauty

Authentic beauty, however, unlocks the yearning of the human heart, the profound desire to know, to love, to go towards the Other, to reach for the Beyond.

Pope Benedict XVI meeting with artists in the Sistine Chapel, 21 November 2009.

Humoresque

by Antonín Dvořák 

Violin: Itzhak Perlman; Cello: Yo-Yo Ma; Conductor: Seiji Ozawa; Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Czech composer, Israeli violinist, Chinese-American cellist, Japanese conductor, American orchestra.

Laudate Dominum, omnes gentes; laudate eum, omnes populi.

O praise the Lord, all you nations, acclaim him, all you peoples! (Psalm 117 [116])

'When I hold the Host in my hands, it is really He who is holding me and all of us.' Sunday Reflections, Corpus Christi, Year C

Pope Benedict elevating the Body of Christ at Mass [Wikipedia]

But when, holding the Eucharist, I say 'Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world', I feel His strength in me. When I hold the Host in my hands, it is really He who is holding me and all of us, challenging the terrorists and keeping us united in His boundless love (Fr Ragheed Ganni, Iraqi martyr).

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, India [optional], Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa)

Gospel Luke 9:11b-17 (New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised Catholic Edition, Canada)  

Jesus spoke to the crowds about the kingdom of God, and healed those who needed to be cured.

The day was drawing to a close, and the twelve came to him and said, ‘Send the crowd away, so that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside, to lodge and get provisions; for we are here in a deserted place.’ But he said to them, ‘You give them something to eat.’ They said, ‘We have no more than five loaves and two fish—unless we are to go and buy food for all these people.’ For there were about five thousand men. And he said to his disciples, ‘Make them sit down in groups of about fifty each.’ They did so and made them all sit down. And taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke them, and gave them to the disciples to set before the crowd. And all ate and were filled. What was left over was gathered up, twelve baskets of broken pieces.

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

In countries where Corpus Christi is observed as a holyday of obligation on the Thursday after Trinity Sunday.

Readings (Jerusalem Bible

Luke 9:11b-17 in Filipino Sign Language

In the video above Bishop Robert E. Barron, auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles, tells a story about the young Flannery O'Connor (1925-1964), at the time a promising writer, and Mary McCarthy (1912-1989) an established writer. Mary Flannery O'Connor was a devout Catholic from the southern US state of Georgia where, at the time, Catholics were fewer than two percent of the population. Mary McCarthy, who lost both parents when a child and who had an unhappy upbringing, described herself when the two met as an ex-Catholic. She and her husband had invited the young Georgian for dinner. The latter was very shy. But when Mary McCarthy described the Eucharist as 'a very powerful symbol' Flannery O'Connor, overcoming her shyness, retorted almost violently, 'Well, if it's a symbol I say "to hell with it"'.

Bishop Barron goes on to speak of the Eucharist as ipse Christus, Christ himself, quoting St Thomas Aquinas, with whose writings Flannery O'Connor was very familiar. The bishop then speaks of Christ 'really, truly and substantially present'. 'Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity' is the Church's traditional way of speaking of the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. This is vastly different from being a symbol, though symbols can be powerful.

Servant of God, Fr Ragheed Ganni (1972-2007)

Chaldean Catholic priest Fr Ragheed Ganni was shot dead with three subdeacons, Basman Yousef Daud, Wahid Hanna Isho, and Gassan Isam Bidawed, in Mosul, Iraq, after celebrating Mass in Mosul, Iraq, on Trinity Sunday 2007. The cause for their beatification has begun.  Father Ragheed gave a powerful testimony on the Eucharist at a Eucharistic Congress in Bari, Italy, at a vigil there on 28 May 2005. I have posted this testimony a number of times but think that it is especially appropriate for the feast of Corpus Christi, the feast of the Body of Christ.

Fr Ragheed Ganni's Testimony

Mosul Christians are not theologians; some are even illiterate. And yet inside of us for many generations one truth has become embedded: without the Sunday Eucharist we cannot live.

This is true today when evil has reached the point of destroying churches and killing Christians, something unheard of in Iraq till now. In June 2004, a group of young women were cleaning the church to get it ready for Sunday service. My sister Raghad, who is nineteen, was among them. As she was carrying a pail of water to wash the floor, two men drove up and threw a grenade that blew up just a few yards away from her. She was wounded but miraculously, survived. And on that Sunday, we still celebrated the Eucharist. My shaken parents were also there. For me and my community, my sister’s wounds were a source of strength so that we, too, may bear our cross.

Last August in St Paul’s Church, a car bomb exploded after the 6 pm Mass. The blast killed two Christians and wounded many others. But that, too, was another miracle – the car was full of bombs but only one exploded. Had they all gone off together, the dead would have been in the hundreds since 400 faithful had come on that day. People could not believe what had happened. The terrorists might think they can kill our bodies or our spirit by frightening us, but, on Sundays, churches are always full. They may try to take our life, but the Eucharist gives it back.

On 7 December, the eve of the Immaculate Conception, a group of terrorists tried to destroy the Chaldean Bishop’s Residence, which is near Our Lady of the Tigris Shrine, a place venerated by both Christians and Muslims. They placed explosives everywhere, and a few minutes later blew the place up. This and fundamentalist violence against young Christians has forced many families to flee. Yet the churches have remained open and people continue to go to Mass, even among the ruins.

It is among such difficulties that we understand the real value of Sunday, the day when we meet the Risen Christ, the day of our unity and love, of our (mutual) support and help. There are days when I feel frail and full of fear. But when, holding the Eucharist, I say 'Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world', I feel His strength in me. When I hold the Host in my hands, it is really He who is holding me and all of us, challenging the terrorists and keeping us united in His boundless love.

In normal times, everything is taken for granted and we forget the greatest gift that is made to us. Ironically, it is thanks to terrorist violence that we have truly learnt that it is the Eucharist, the Christ who died and is risen, that gives us life. And this allows us to resist and hope. 

Apse of Chapel, Irish College, Rome

Fr Ragheed Ganni is on the far right, holding the palms of martyrdom.

Fr Ragheed Ganni lived in the Pontifical Irish College in Rome while he studied theology, before and after his ordination. He would have been familiar with the 17 Irish martyrs, a representative group, beatified by St John Paul II on 27 September 1992. Among them were four known as the Wexford Martyrs, Matthew Lambert, a baker, and three sailors, Robert Tyler, Edward Cheevers and Patrick Cavanagh, who were hanged, drawn and quartered in Wexford on 5 July 1591. The opening words of Father Ganni's testimony, Mosul Christians are not theologians; some are even illiterate, echo those of Matthew Lambert. He could not read or write and said in court under questioning, I am not a learned man. I am unable to debate with you, but I can tell you this, I am a Catholic and I believe whatever our Holy Mother the Catholic Church believes. 

This testimony was given by a baker who died for his belief in the Bread of Life and, to use the words of Fr Ragheed Ganni, the Eucharist, the Christ who died and is risen, that gives us life. 

The Supper at Emmaus, Velázquez [Web Gallery of Art]

Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread (Luke 24:35).

Ego sum panis vivus. Patres vestri manducaverunt manna in deserto, et mortui sunt. Hic est panis de coelo descendens: si quis ex ipso manducaverit, non morietur. [Ioannes 6: 48-50]

I am the bread of life. 

Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, 

and they died. 

This is the bread that comes down from heaven, 

so that one may eat of it 

and not die. [John 6:48-50]