The Gift.🎁

My day began as it always does: Holy Mass, Holy Eucharist, Adoration of the most Blessed Sacrament. Beauty extraordinaire!! My grateful to God heart can find no words.🎆

Jennifer accepted my prayer, I admired her magnificent locks. ‘I did not admire your hair so I could offer you a prayer’, I told her and we both laughed. Poetry! Walking home more laughter when Nora told me earnestly: ‘He is sooo good to us. EXCELLENT!’ before walking on. I loved how she had no doubt whatsoever I would totally get who she was referring to.😂 

Snow on mountain, sheep grazing happily, sun shining brightly. Breathtakingly radiant.☀️

Delightful afternoon Holy Rosary in St. Anne’s as we sat together in cozy circle of prayer and song. Motley crew.❤️ Kitty prayed her decade even though she is completely deaf. Bridie, blind and deaf, cocooned in silence. Katy, over ninety years of age, prayed her decade ‘as Gaeilge’, every syllable perfect. Dan, blind, smiling as he prayed his decade.

Oh how my heart dances in their midst, all of us transported to a higher plane, ‘Prayer’ definitely does exactly what it says on the tin! 

‘Rising up long before daybreak, Jesus went and departed into a desert place and there He prayed’.(Mark1:35)

Bridie called out St.Teresa of Avila prayer as our beautiful Holy Rosary drew to a close just as she used to do before Lockdowns called a halt to our ‘Holy Huddle’. Beautiful Bridie unable to see or hear us remembering every word. Sublime moment in time. Many people now refer to this as ‘Bridie’s prayer’.🌺

Kind oil delivery guy gifted me a calendar for my beautiful Marina as he does every year without fail. Marina over the moon, enduring power of kindness!!

I never leave St. Anne’s without pep in my step, that is the law of the gift. When we give ourselves to others in concrete daily ways something very joyful comes into our life. We receive so much more too than we could ever hope to give and that is totally true.

‘The human person can only fully find himself through the sincere gift of himself’. (Fr. Tim Gallagher)

When I complimented Katy on her decade ‘as gaeilge’, she replied: ‘It’s a small enough return to the Lord who does so much for us all the time’. ☀️🙏🏻

                                I was asked to write a piece on St. Anne’s Holy Rosary.🙏🏻❤️