The Roof goes on, and Sleeping Joseph is completed

Work on our new ladies' Guest House, St. Joseph's, is progressing quite rapidly.

In one of our pictures given below you see 9 men working at once, not untypically, on the roof.

At the time of writing this news post, the roof's skeleton frame is covered by planks and a membrane, and the 5 North-facing Dormer Window frames are in place. The slaters are at work in a shed to the side, sorting out their slates, ready to start going on.

The 2024 Pentecost Lectures

As every year since 1994 (with a single gap in 2022 because of covid) 4 public lectures were given at Pluscarden over the Tuesday to Thursday after Pentecost: 21 - 23 May.

Our speaker this year was Dr. Linden Bicket, lecturer in Literature and Religion in the School of Divinity at Edinburgh University. Her subject was "Scottish Catholic Literature and the Transfiguration of the Commonplace."

Homily for the Feast of the Holy Trinity, 26 May 2024: DJC

Heavenly Father, You so loved the world that You sent Your only Begotten Son to be one of us, not to condemn the world but to redeem the world. Before Your Son went to the Cross to destroy the power of sin and death, he prayed to You. And in this prayer he said that before the foundation of the world, before anything was ever made, he shared Your glory as Your only begotten Son. This love You have for Your Son, this glory You give to Him, is the Holy Spirit. This same love and glory Jesus gives to us so that we may be one, as You and the Son are One.

Homily for the 8 o’clock Mass, Easter 7B, Sunday 12 May 2024, on John 17:11-16

On this last Sunday of Eastertide before Pentecost, we reach the climax of the Last Discourse of Jesus, given in St. John’s Gospel. This is the High Priestly Prayer of Jesus: Chapter 17. This year we read the central section of this prayer, which is concerned above all with the 11 disciples sitting there with Jesus at the Last Supper.

Homily for Easter 6B, Sunday 5 May 2024: John 15:9-17

As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you. Abide in my love (15:9)

We are in the central Chapter of the Last Discourse of Jesus, as recorded by St. John. Here we find ourselves at the heart of the teaching of Jesus, of his life, of his mission. In these sublime words, so full of consolation for us, Jesus as it were opens for us a window into his own heart, and into the heart of God.