Good Afternoon All you lovely people,
I hope you are feeling something of the joy that remains abundant in our very different lives, and that you are managing to share it with someone.
If we were in church today (Friday) we would have heard the following in our Gospel Reading:
You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last. Jn 15.16
This is one of those glorious and helpful passages that both comforts and challenges us.
For many, faith can be a bit of a struggle. Trying to understand all what is going on, coping with the big questions like, why does God allow suffering, and why does Religion provoke such division. Add to that personal questions about the literal stories, or whether miracles happen, and for some, as I say, it can be a struggle.
But this scripture can really help, because rather than us trying to fathom and understand all the big questions in order to get to faith, we are taught that we are chosen. God want to embrace us. Elsewhere we are taught that faith is a gift, so our starting point is not necessarily to understand it all, to know it all, or even to agree with it all, but rather to be open to the job of faith, which is to allow us to see the Grace of God at work wherever it is at work (rather than where we think it should be at work).
So, faith allows us to see that God can work through a huge range of scenarios and people, and he certainly is not limited to Church or Sacraments or Scriptures, or Denominations or indeed Faiths. It is not for us to judge or to direct, but it is within us to discern.
I believe that You and I are called to be part of this extended fellowship, and we have so many things that link us together, and lead us to share a desire for worship.
The passage continues in a sort of apostolic vein. We are called, or chosen or gifted with faith, but then we are sent, to ‘Go and bear fruit that will last.’
Maybe our current question is, what is the fruit of our faith. What happens because we do what we do? In fact what do we do actually as an expression of our faith.
Hopefully we pray, read our scriptures, listen, and follow that pattern we have spoken about before. Open our hearts to Jesus, open the scriptures, spend time with Our Lord, recognise him in our Spiritual Communion as the bread is broken, then go back in to the thick of it, and live lives that reveal the great things God has done.
The Scriptures are such a help with this, because they give us clues. When we thing of bearing fruit we can’t help but be drwn to the teaching about the Fruits of the Spirit. They are the things that come pour way, when we allow our faith to flourish. You know what they are – The Fruits of the Spirit are Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness and Self Control.
Let’s get this the right way round. Like with faith, we have to be receptive to allow these things in. We don’t struggle to produce them, we open our hearts and souls to receive and embrace them. If we live by the Spirit, these Fruits will come our way, and we can bear them well, and in so doing show something of the glory of God.

I hope you are staying safe, and not feeling to frustrated by life. I know you are missing family and friends. We all are. But we have one another, and that matters.
Bless you, Bless you, Bless you,

As ever,
Fr Marcus