On Sunday 7 October Lordship Parish Pastoral Council celebrated its twentieth anniversary with a celebration of the Eucharist followed by a party in Lordship. We congratulate all who have served on the Council over the last twenty years. The Council is a beacon of hope and an shining example of commitment and dedication to all who aspire to collaboration among priests and lay people in furthering the mission and ministry of Jesus in the parish context. The homily was delivered by Bishop Clifford, himself a parishioner of the parish and we thank him for making his words available here for you to read.

Over the years other parishes in the Archdiocese have taken up the lead given by Lordship and Ballymascanlon and with the encouragement of the late Cardinal O Fiaich, Cardinal Daly and now Archbishop Brady have continued to emphasise the importance of this initiative. So much so that as part of our present six year plan for the Diocese the aim is to have a Parish Pastoral Council in every parish by 2008. The programme will address the role of lay people in the on-going work of the Church and the whole question of the diocesan and parish structures. Happily that work continues apace under the guidance of Father Andy McNally and the members of the Committee appointed to address the needs of the parishes into the future.

This is a work of mutual support between laity and clergy in the Diocese. It is an attempt to harness the good will of all of the community in building up the Church, the Body of Christ. It is an effort to live out our own Baptismal commitment as followers of Jesus Christ and to recognise the need of other in the local community, in the Church and in the world. The parable of the talents in the Gospel of St. Matthew, spell out the implications that has for each and every one of us. In the story from the Gospel one man was given five talents, another two, and another one. The men given the five talents and the two were commended for using their talents well. The man given the one was chastised for not using the talent he was given. It was not because he had only one talent that he was singled out. It was because he did not use the one talent given him by God that he was condemned. The same point is made in our reading today from the prophet Habakkuk when he talks of a vision for our time. He says; ‘Write the vision down, inscribe it on the tablets to be easily read since this vision is for its own time’. For us, as followers of Jesus Christ we too must have a vision. We must be people of vision, people of hope. A people without vision is condemned to fail.

We live in a world where slowly but surely some people would have us move religion to the sidelines of life. We live at a time where religion and practise do not have the same profile as they had in previous years. Previous generations had no problem about professing their faith, about talking about God in everyday life. God was, as Patrick Kavanagh would say, ‘in the bits and pieces of Everyday’. Today the profile has changed. The committed Christian can be made to feel someway out of step with the modern world. The growing separation of religion from everyday life puts its own pressure on us all; pressure to comply to the new world, pressure to confine faith to e private life. This sense of being constrained to confine faith to private life can be corrosive in the life of the Christian. As Christians we made even be made to feel that we are strangers in today’s modern world.

The reading today from St. Paul challenges us ‘to fan into a flame the gift that God gave us’. He says; ‘God’s gift was not a spirit of timidity, but the Spirit of power and love and self control so that we are never ashamed of witnessing to the Lord’. That is the challenge to every one of us. Twenty years ago the late Cardinal O Fiaich at the Synod of Bishops in Rome said that ‘the laity in the Church are like a sleeping giant waiting to be awakened’. Thankfully the laity of Lordship and Ballymascanlon have awakened to the call and are addressing that call with generosity and vigour.

One of the great instruments of renewal in the Church in our diocese has been the Renew Programme. It was meant as an opportunity for spiritual renewal in the diocese as we approached the Great Jubilee of the year 2000. It was taken up throughout the length and breadth of the diocese and proved to be one of the most effective opportunities to reflect on faith and practise and gave an opportunity for many people to talk about their faith and share that with others. Happily the programme was supplemented with the faith sharing groups that followed and in a few instances those meeting continue in the diocese.

I believe that many challenges face us in today’s world. I will list just five. The first I believe is for every community to continue its programme of faith formation so that we can build a culture of support for each other to let the Christian voice be heard. Today’s world would have us confined to the margins of society. I believe that we must be a strong voice for Christian values in our world. Today in Maynooth College we have hundreds of lay people studying theology. Year by year lay people qualify in theology, taking degrees in theological studies and in Scripture. That is encouraging. But we still need to let the Christian voice be heard in local and national media, in debates on religion and in every forum available to spread the Christian message. The words of today’s Gospel from St. Luke says; when you have done all you have been told to do say, we are mere servants; we have done no more than our duty’.

The second area we need to address is the new Ireland, the new Irish. Today we have some 420,000 migrants in our country. That is one-tenth of the population of the Republic of Ireland. We have many Polish people newly arrived here and eager to be involved in the Christian community. In our Diocese we have two full-time Polish priests ministering to this community, one based in Dundalk, the other in Drogheda. We have one full-time Nigerian priest in Dundalk ministering to the needs of the African communities locally. There are many other migrant groups who feel isolated. Many are simply waiting an invitation to be involved in the Church. The call is clear; the opportunities are immense.

The third area is the recent dialogue between the Government and the Churches here in Ireland. In February this year an initial meeting was held between the Government and the Churches and faith groups in Ireland. This is the beginning of a formal dialogue between both. That meeting was followed up with meeting between Government and the individual Churches. It is all the beginning of structured talks between both to explore the role of each in the community and to address key issues of common importance. It is important that as a parish and as a community we are aware of these developments and that parish communities have an opportunity to siphon back their own concerns and issues through the proper channels.


The fourth challenge in today’s world is to address the whole question of ecumenism and the relationship between the Churches. The Ballymascanlon Conferences, the official organ of contact between the churches in Ireland, begun in the Parish here as far back as 1973 and continues to meet three times yearly to address issues of common concern to the Churches. The new venue will be the newly appointed Diocesan Pastoral Centre, in St Patrick’s Hall, Dundalk. Areas of doctrine, of common witness, of pastoral outreach, of common witness are discussed at these meetings. It is important that as an informed community we all keep in touch with the work of the Churches and that we support their endeavours as best we can. At a recent gathering of the Churches in Europe some 2,500 people attended a five day meeting in Romania. There were 34 from Ireland. We listened to key speakers address the challenges that lie ahead. One of the key speakers from Rome, Cardinal Kasper, challenged all of us to be witnesses to the faith in our own way of life and in our commitment to others. He said this is the key to all ecumenical work, to witness to the fact that we are followers of Jesus Christ. That is spiritual ecumenism at its best.

The fifth and final challenge is that we continue to work for peace and reconciliation in Northern Ireland. For some four decades, like the rest of Northern Ireland, our own diocese has been at the cutting edge of distrust, suspicion, division, death and destruction. We thank God that we have now entered a new phase in the relationship between the nationalist and Unionist community in Northern Ireland. The 4th April 2007 marked the beginning of the New Assembly in Northern Ireland and hopefully has begun a new relationship between divided communities in the North,. We have an obligation to think peace, to talk peace and to work for peace. It is important that we give as much energy to the work of reconciliation in peace times as we gave in times of division. That will be a challenge for all of us.


Today I thank you the people of Lordship, Ravensdale and Bellurgan for your own witness top the faith. Today we need your witness as never before. . You have been leaders in the parish and in the diocese. I congratulate you on that and wish God’s blessing on you and on this community. May your work continue to thrive and to bear much fruit. Thank you.



+ Gerard Clifford.
7th October, 2007.