Palm Sunday - 2026 - Year A

20 March 2026

Fr Donald Senior CP has written a whole book about the passion. In the Preface he makes this important statement:        “Pain touches every human being … Suffering is both individual and communal… The struggle to understand the origin and meaning of suffering is as long as human history. It is not surprising, therefore, that the suffering and death of Jesus should have such a prominent place in the Gospels.” (The Passion of Jesus in the gospel of Matthew, Preface).

Creation is not a thing of the past, but is in continual process.  So just like when you do a task (cooking /carpentry/sewing/befriending) it is never right until it is quite complete.  It’s the same with God creating; we are just now experiencing something of the lack of satisfaction in our world, but God is ‘working on it;’ however He chooses to do it with our cooperation.  So this time of difficulty is quite clearly not just of difficulty and suffering (like the crucifixion) but a time of working with God towards the continuing task of creating a better world.

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Jeff’s Jottings: Deadly Celebrations

Jeff Bagnall was a lecturer for many years at Craiglockhart College teaching RE to many future Catholic Primary teachers.

25th Sunday In Ordinary Time - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 18 September 2026
The first reading is part of a heart-warming poem. It was written about the time that the people were going to be released from captivity by a friendly emperor, Cyrus. It attributes this release to the love of God, who has a special relationship of love for people, a relationship traditionally called a covenant. It is a two-way agreement: God will look after the people, and the people will live in a way pleasing to God. But the agreement is not conditional; it is not like God saying ‘if you keep my commandments I will be your protector and god;’ it is unconditional on God’s side: ‘I will be your God, so you will be my people however you respond to me.’ In the part of the poem we read today, the prophet is announcing to the people, God’s call to them; it is a call to give up any wickedness and turn their lives towards Him. But the prophet is also emphasising that God’s ways are mysterious, for He does not depend on the people behaving well for Him to love them and to be their God; there is no way they can deserve or merit God’s love, it is generous, free and everlasting. The extract is chosen for this contrast between God’s ways and ours, an idea taken up in the Gospel reading for today.

26th Sunday in Ordinary Time - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 18 September 2026
Reading Ezekiel we must remember that the Jews believed that they were the chosen people of the one and only God, Yahweh; they had laws and rules to live by and a covenant which they often thought of as ‘if we keep your laws, God, you will see that we prosper.’ Yet this arrangement didn’t seem to be working out in their history, especially when they were being taken over by a neighbouring empire. So much so that they began to think that they were being punished by God or even would die because of the sins of their ancestors; indeed they attributed all the difficulties and hardships of life to the original disobedience of the first humans ( Genesis 3 ), and they had a saying: “The parents have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” Ezekiel was trying to replace this idea with the fairness and mercy of God. Not only was God punishing the wrongdoer for his own sins and blessing the good, but saying that there would be forgiveness and blessing if the sinner repented and turned away from sin.
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