Gospel Reflection 2021

 Sunday 18 B - Aug 1 

In today’s Gospel, there are four exchanges between Jesus and the crowd. In the first, the crowd, having followed Jesus to Capernaum, asks a very matter of fact question: “Rabbi, when did you get here?” Jesus replies by naming their motivation in pursuing him. They have been fed. Jesus acknowledges this, yet challenges them to see beyond the fulfillment of their material needs. The crowds have followed Jesus because they have been fed. They ought to be seeking out Jesus because he can give them eternal life.

As the second dialogue begins, it seems that the crowd might be on their way to accepting Jesus and his mission. They ask: “What can we do to accomplish the works of God?” Jesus replies that they must have faith in the one sent from God. But in the third dialogue, the crowd reveals their inability to see Jesus’ true identity. They ask Jesus for a sign so that they might know that Jesus is from God. How strange this sounds since Jesus has just fed more than 5000 people. What more is expected?

[read all> loyolapress.com ]

[Updated August 1]

Mass Times in OLSC Parish
St John’s: Tuesday, Thursday at 9.15am, Saturday 8.30 am
Sunday at 9:00 am (Italian), 11:00am and 5:00pm
St Joseph’s: Tuesday to Saturday at 9am
Saturday at 6:00pm (English) Sunday at 9:00am and
10.30am(Vietnamese)
Good Shepherd: Sunday at 9:30am.
TRY BOOKING FOR MASS at St John’s Church:
11am Mass... https://www.trybooking.com/BSDVX
5pm Mass... https://www.trybooking.com/BSEDF

A message from Fr Martin ...  
Dear Parishioners,
Alleluia, we are at least partially out of
lockdown and can move around. I am sure some
parents are happy for the children to be back at
school and the children are thrilled to be back with
their friends. It is wonderful that we are able to
celebrate masses again and come together as a family united
by our faith in God and Christ.
There are some people who I
have spoken to who have found
this last lockdown very challenging. As we continue this strange existence can I encourage all of us to keep supporting each other, even with a simple
phone call. Things can change very quickly and isolation can be very detrimental to some people. Our
faith calls us to move from our own personal needs
to the needs of others. As Jesus reminds us he came
not to be served but to serve. Let us inturn serve
each other in our own special way.
This week some of our parishioners got together on Zoom and revisited our Mission Statement for our parish of OLSC. They will reread it; they will reflect over it and maybe add some new ideas. In the near future, we will publish the revised version
of this mission statement and invite the wider parish to read it
and give some feedback. A mission statement can be a great way of showing the wider community who we are as people of faith. It could also be seen as a summary of the aims and
values of who we are as a parish in our church. We
all come with different life experiences and we can
hopefully connect with each other on different lev els. The relationship between Jesus and his Father is
something we can all imitate – built on Love.
Finally, I was recently stuck in traffic and my
first instinct was to change lanes so that I could keep
moving. I wasn’t running late or in a rush to get
anywhere in particular. How ever, I suddenly stopped and
thought to myself why do I
need to rush. Why don’t I just
appreciate the time sitting still
and enjoy this moment of
stillness. That is what I did. I
could just sit still, say a prayer and watch the world
carry on around me. If you find yourself stuck in
traffic, or in a waiting room or lining up for some thing, take a deep breath and enjoy that moment of stillness. You just don’t know when you will get that chance again during a busy day.
God Bless and stay safe.
Fr. Martin.  Fr Martin.   

Calling all Lectors ...
During Covid last year, when we had to cancel Masses
or restrict attendance, we sort of dropped off on hav ing a prepared roster of readers for each of our Masses
at St John’s. At this point, we ask folks to be readers
when entering the doors of church, but it may be nice
to have a little time to prepare. To that end, I’m won dering if there is anyone who would like to join this
liturgical ministry as lector (reader) of Biblical text.
The commitment doesn’t need to be big … ie: once
every two months, or fortnightly … whatever works for
you. Once I put a roster together for a couple of
months, I send it out and folks can then let me know if
there are any changes needed. There is great flexibil ity. If you would like to join this ministry, then please
email me at jjacobsvandegeer@gmail.com with your
name, desired Mass time and frequency of reading. It
would be great to have many voices on board. Thank
you in advance for your generosity of time.
Peace, Jennifer

Carmelite Centre – Lectio Divina
CatholicCare collection
Please note that we will be having a second collection next weekend to support the good works of CatholicCare. CatholicCare services include counselling and mental health programs, support for separating families, refugee and asylum seeker help, specialised support for children and teens, pastoral care, homeless

Blessed Meditations
Looking for something thoughtful and inspiring to
read? Perhaps Blessed: Meditations on a Life of Small
Wonders, by local author Ann Rennie, may be some thing you would enjoy. This is a book that asks you to
pause and ponder. It’s a miscellany of musings, ranging
from the serious to the whimsical and the spiritual to
the serendipitous.
Blessed interweaves past and
present to create a potpourri of
essays that are part memoir, part
meditation, celebrating a life full
of little asides of joy and small
wonders.
A number of these pieces
have been published in edited
versions in publications including
The Age, The Australian, The
Sydney Morning Herald and
Australian Catholics, and Ann
Rennie’s previous book, The Secret Garden of Spiritual ity. Anne Rennie currently teaches English and Reli gious Education at Genazzano. lanewaypress.com.au

Feast of St Mary of the Cross
Next Sunday is the Feast
of Mary MacKillop, our first
Australian saint, and so we
should celebrate. Join us for
cake, in the Aikenhead Hall,
after 11:00 am Mass next
Sunday.
Mary Helen MacKillop RSJ
(15/01/1842–08/08/1909)
was an Australian religious
sister who has been declared
a saint by the Catholic Church, as St Mary of the Cross.
Of Scottish descent, she was born in Melbourne but is
best known for her activities in South Australia.
Together with Julian Tenison-Woods, she founded
the Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart (the
Josephites), a congregation of religious sisters that
established a number of schools and welfare
institutions throughout Australia and New Zealand,
with an emphasis on education for the rural poor.
A little snippet which you may be interested in
reading:
“MacKillop clashed with the Roman Catholic Bishop of
Brisbane, James Quinn, over the control of the many schools
she established; MacKillop believed the sisters should control
the schools while Quinn believed the diocese should control
them. In 1879, relationships between them had deteriorated
to the point that Quinn directed the sisters to leave his diocese.
Despite protests by the laity, Quinn was determined and
MacKillop and her Josephite sisters had left the diocese by mid
-1880 with other Catholic orders taking over the operation of
their schools. When the Diocese of Rockhampton was excised
from the Brisbane diocese on 29 December 1882, it enabled
MacKillop and her sisters to return to Queensland, where they
established a school in Clermont and then in other places
within the new diocese.” Wikipedia