T HE P ARISH OF S AINT A UGUSTINE C OATBRIDGE ! S COTLAND 1892 - 2017 S IXTH S UNDAY OF O RDINARY T IME 11 F EBRUARY 2018 P REPARING FOR THE L ENTEN J OURNEY Lent, the forty days before Easter (not counting Sundays), is a somewhat curious period in the Church’s calendar. Most things in the Church’s year are festivals and we happily talk about celebrating them. Lent is very different: it is a minor-key period which is never ‘celebrated’ but only ‘kept’. Some Christians treat Lent very seriously, while others ignore it entirely. Even among those who keep Lent, there is no agreement on how it should be kept. Many Christians try to give up Masses for Ash Wednesday something: for instance, chocolate, alcohol, meat on Fridays, Wednesday 14th February Facebook or television. It’s even become a period for us to try to break bad habits, almost as if Lent gives us another 10am & 7pm opportunity to retake those New Year’s resolutions! So what exactly is Lent about? One word used by those who observe Lent is ‘preparation’. Lent is a preparation for Easter. Easter, with its message of Christ destroying sin and death through his death and resurrection, is the most exciting moment in the Church’s year. Yet we can undercut this note of victory by being so occupied that, amid the frantic activity of our lives, we carelessly stumble upon Easter. Lent provides us with forty days’ build-up to Good Friday and Easter Sunday that forces us to prayerfully ponder the death and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. As the best way to appreciate a sunrise is to be there in the darkness before dawn, so the only way to appreciate Easter is to have come to it through the sombre and penitential season of Lent. Please make every effort to support the extra Lenten services here at St. Augustine’s, especially the extra 8.00am Morning Mass. Details of additional services are printed on the inside page. ANNUAL SCIAF ‘WEE BOX’ APPEAL Please remember to pick-up your Lenten SCIAF pack as you leave Church this weekend. This pack includes your ‘wee box’. You are invited to return this at the end of Lent. Please note that all donations this year will be DOUBLED by the UK Government! - Lenten Timetable - Starts This Thursday 15th February Extra Daily Mass (Mon – Fri): 8.00am Please encourage children to attend this Mass St. Ambrose High School Mass (Mon – Fri): 8.40am For staff and pupils Parish Daily Mass (Mon – Sat): 10.00am Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament (Mon – Fri) 10.30am – 7.00pm Sundays of Lent: Evening Prayer & Benediction 5.30pm Stations of the Cross: Tuesday at 7.00pm Lenten Confessions Saturdays 10.30am; 4.00 - 4.30pm Tuesday 6.30 – 6.55pm Sundays 6.15 – 7.00pm Mary’s Meals Backpack Appeal The parish is asking for your support with our up -and-coming Mary’s Meals Backpack Appeal. The Appeal is being organized by Primary 6 Confirmation candidates as a sign of their practical witness to their faith. It is also a powerful way to live-out our Lenten commitment to almsgiving. The young people of P.6 are inviting everyone in the school and parish to put together a backpack filled with goodies for needy children living oversees in poverty. These simple backpacks enable impoverished children to go to school equipped with the basic necessities for learning. It is our hope that every family in the community will take part in the project. If you can help please fill an old backpack and drop it off at the Church or Parish House by Sunday 25th February. It is not necessary to fill the backpack with all the suggested items – just as much as you are able. Below you will find useful suggestions to help you. SUGGESTED ITEMS: Backpack / school bag / exercise book / notepad / pencils / pens crayons / ruler / sharpener / pencil case / towel / soap / shorts t-shirt / dress / sandals / small ball / spoon / toothbrush toothpaste ASH WEDNESDAY – 14th FEBRUARY 2018 Masses / Services for Ash Wednesday: 10.00am Parish Mass 7.00pm Parish Mass Please note that Ash Wednesday this year falls on a school in-service day. Therefore parents are reminded to bring their children to one of the above parish Masses. Ash Wednesday is also a Day of fast & Abstinence, requiring Catholics to abstain from meat. (Read below for more information). Days of Fast & Abstinence Catholics abstain from flesh meat on Ash Wednesday, Good Friday and the Fridays in Lent. Abstinence is one of our oldest Christian traditions. From the first century, the day of the crucifixion has been traditionally observed as a day of abstaining from flesh meat (‘black fast’) to honour Christ who sacrificed his flesh on a Friday. Fasting on Ash Wednesday & Good Friday entails reducing our food intake to 1 main meal + 2 collations (small snacks) as a small sacrifice. The Law of the Church Up until 1966, church law prohibited meat on all Fridays throughout the entire year. The new law of the Church was set-out in 1983 in the revised Code of Canon Law, which states: “Abstinence [is] to be observed on Ash Wednesday and on the Friday of the Passion and Death of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Canon 1251). “All persons who have completed their fourteenth year are bound by the law of abstinence” (Canon 1252). It is the long-established custom of the Catholic Church to extend this law to include all Fridays in Lent. Since Jesus sacrificed his flesh for us on Good Friday, we refrain from eating flesh meat in his honour on Fridays. Flesh meat included the meat of mammals and poultry, and the main foods that come under this heading are beef and pork, chicken and turkey. While flesh is prohibited, the non-flesh products of these animals are not (like milk, cheese, butter and eggs). Fish do not belong to the flesh meat category. In former times, flesh meat was more expensive, eaten only occasionally and associated with feasting and rejoicing; whereas fish was cheap, eaten more often and not associated with celebrations. Abstinence is a form of penance. Penance expresses sorrow and contrition for our wrongdoing, indicates our intention to turn away from sin and turn back to God, and makes reparation for our sins. It helps to cancel the debt and pay the penalties incurred by our transgressions. Abstinence is a form of asceticism, the practice of self-denial to grow in holiness. Jesus asks his disciples to deny themselves and take up their cross (Matthew 16:24). Abstinence is a sober way to practice simplicity and austerity, to deny the cravings of our bodies to honour Jesus who practiced the ultimate form of self-denial when he gave his body for us on the cross. Thus, to give up flesh meat on Fridays, only to feast on lobster tail or Alaskan king crab, is to defeat the ascetical purpose of abstinence. Less is more! Those who are excused from fast or abstinence. Those who exceed 65 years are exempt. So too are the following groups: young children, those of unsound mind, the sick, the frail, pregnant or nursing women according to need for meat or nourishment, manual labourers according to need, guests at a meal who cannot excuse themselves without giving great offense or causing enmity and other situations of moral or physical impossibility to observe the penitential discipline. PARISHSaturday NEWS _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ BROADCASTING OF SERVICES GIFT-AID Please note that all the Masses and services at The gift-aid scheme allows the parish to claim an St. Augustine’s are broadcast online. You can additional 25p for every £1 donated by a UK tax- watch services directly through our parish payer. Please consider enrolling in the scheme. website or through the MSN Media host site. Forms available from the sacristy/Chapel House. HOSPICE HOEDOWN St. Andrew’s Hospice are holding a Country & Western Night this Friday 16th February 2018 at New Multi-Sports Club Airdrie Working Men’s Social Club, 15-17 Broomknoll Street, Airdrie. Tickets: £12.50pp. At St. Augustine’s Parish Centre Starts 7.30pm – Midnight. Call 01236 766951 to book your tickets. Every Friday from 4 – 5pm 50p per session Open to all pupils from P.4 – P.6 ROME PILGRIMAGE For more details contact Vikki Sadler Final Price: £860 (NLC Active Schools Co-ordinator) (includes all entrance fees) on 07984 291606 or [email protected] Next Meeting: St. John the Baptist’s Church, Uddingston SACRAMENTS DATES 2018 Thursday 22nd February 2018, 7.30pm Pilgrims to pay outstanding balance on this night First Reconciliation th Tuesday 13 March 2018, 7pm --- THIS PILGRIMAGE IS NOW FULL First Holy Communion Sunday 6th May 2018, 10am Mass SVDP SENIOR CITIZENS DINNER Sunday 13th May 2018, 12noon Mass Many thanks to the SVDP for organising another Confirmation memorable Senior Citizens’ Dinner at the Bank Monday 26th February 2018, 7pm Mass Club. A great night was had by all. FR TRAVERS SVDP FURNITURE PROJECT We offer our thanks and prayers to Fr. Travers St. Vincent de Paul is looking for volunteer who has now moved to St. Mary’s & St. Bernard’s drivers for the Coatbridge van. The regular to continue his priestly ministry there. Please driver is unable to work for some time owing to return envelopes in the weekend collection an accident. Any willing parishioners should baskets or to the Parish House by Sunday 25th speak to a member of the SVDP at the back of February. Fr.