Message from Parish Priest
Fr Michael Trainor
7th March/8th March 2026 ~ Third Sunday of Lent
Being Generous: Project Compassion & Caritas
Dear Sisters and Brothers,
Last week, as we entered into the first week of Lent, I reflected on prayer. This week I turn to the theme of generosity or the ancient practice known as “almsgiving”. This is giving away goods including our dearest possessions, including money, for others. Giving something away for others, ‘something’ with which I identify, is releasing (or ‘giving away’), something of my very self. It can be a freeing experience. It’s a release. Almsgiving and financial generosity thus becomes one of the Lenten practices that enables me to be freer, without attachments, and to open up my heart, ultimately to God.
St Gregory of Nazianzen (c329-390), that great eastern theologian of the Trinity, reflected on the practice of almsgiving. He focused on all that surrounds and gifts us:
Recognize to whom you owe the fact that you exist, breathe, that you understand, that you are wise, and, above all, that you know God and hope for the Kingdom of heaven and the vision of glory, now darkly as in a mirror but then with greater fullness and purity. You have been made a daughter and son of God, co-heirs with Christ. Where did you get all this, and from whom?...
Who has enabled you to look out upon the beauty of the sky, the sun in its course, the circle of the moon, the countless number of stars, with the harmony and order that are theirs, like the music of a harp? Who has blessed you with rain, with the art of husbandry, with different kinds of foods, with the arts, with houses, with laws, with states, with the life of humanity and culture, with friendship and the easy familiarity of kinship?
…Is it not God who asks you now in your turn to show yourself generous above all other creatures and for the sake of all other creatures?... Shall we for our part repudiate those who are our kith and kin?
…Let us never allow ourselves to misuse what has been given to us by God's gift… let us not labour to heap up and hoard riches while others remain in need.”
Lent is our time to be generous, of releasing our grasp on our possessions, for sharing our money with the poor. Contributions to Project Compassion and regular financial gifts to Caritas are pragmatic ways to do this. Caritas operates in most countries and is facilitated by the bishops of the local regions. It is a trusted Catholic NGO without the hype and emotional heart-tugs experienced commercially with other, and perhaps more well-known, charitable organisations. A consequence of our Lenten reflections might be regular contributions to Caritas (www.caritas.org.au).
Your brother,
Michael