Blogging With Purpose

The World Day for Migrants and Refugees is Sunday 25th September.  Every single day is often a huge  survival challenge for Migrants and Refugees.  World Days are important as they focus our attention, prayers and actions in a world where information fatigue can often interfere with our capacity to open our hearts and minds to understand what our contribution can ...

We are present at the National Ploughing Championships 2022 in Ratheniska, Co. Laois from September 20th, 21st & 22nd.  Call in and say ‘hello’  – we will be delighted to meet you! We are in the stand area at 609 (Row 3, Block 39)  The National  Ploughing Championships draws people of all ages and cultures to the ‘heart of the farming landscape’, ...

The title, Our Lady of Sorrows, given to Mary the Mother of God, focuses on her intense suffering and grief during the passion and death of her son. Traditionally, this suffering was not limited to the passion and death event; rather, it comprised the seven ‘dolors’ or seven sorrows of Mary, which were foretold by the Priest Simeon who proclaimed ...

The Nativity of Mary is one of the most ancient Marian feasts (8th September). It is thought that this feast originated in connection with the Feast of the dedication of a church dedicated to Mary, now the Church of St Ann, in Jerusalem in the 6th century. Tradition holds that this is where the house of Mary’s parents, Joachim and ...

We are entering a new season in more ways than one.  As we move gradually out of summer and feel already the change of air and subtle sense of Autumn arriving,  our senses are awakened to the delicate and transient beauty of each season, as well as to the losses – life that can no longer be sustained and nature’s ...

Today, the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (24 June 2022) is an opportunity to take time out to contemplate who the Sacred Heart was for Nano Nagle, and how this legacy of Compassionate Love speaks to our lives today.  “Nano,  we pray our hearts may bear the self-same fire and cast it on the earth”.  A well documented ...

Laudato Si’ Week 2022, from May 22-29, marks the 7th anniversary of Pope Francis’ landmark encyclical on creation care.  The Earth is ours to heal. This week offers the opportunity to unite  globally in listening and responding together ‘to the cry of creation’.  We need to seize it  as a vital opportunity to  intensify our efforts through the dynamic Laudato ...

Nano [Nagle] had become aware , and not only aware, but had tested the very depths of human suffering in her own life and in the lives of others, and like them too, had experienced the healing power of love – and so she could say from her deepest being: “If I could be of service in nay part of ...

In each of the Gospels, as we read of the Resurrection of Jesus, there is a common thread – the first witnesses to the reality of the empty tomb were women (or solely Mary Magdalene, in John’s account).  Luke tells us there were a number of women at the empty tomb, Mary Magdalene, Joanne and Mary the mother of James. ...

Ash Wednesday is tomorrow March 2nd.  Our Lenten Journey (from ‘cross to resurrection’ and from ‘ashes to light’) is ‘Your Journey’.  ‘Your Journey’ Lord,  that is now also ‘Our Journey’ with those suffering the unspeakable. Let us live this journey in appreciation of the opportunity it offers to simply and hopefully reconnect to that deepest knowing of what ‘resurrection’ actually ...