Wednesday, 23 September 2009  26th Sunday in Ordinary Time -
Year B   Words can be little devils. They sneak around the place
insinuating themselves into sentences they have no right to be
in, giving meanings they have no right to give. Naughty words!
They spread their deceiving odour like the nectar of a flesh-
eating plant and gradually the words properly appointed to guard
clarity and truth slide into oblivion.  In the Church these
little monsters have infiltrated with remarkably destructive
vigor. The otherwise harmless little word 'our' for example, as
in our faith, our parish, our Church has, bit by bit, nudged the
definite article into the trash can. 'Our' faith is now far more
important than 'the' Faith; and instead of us belonging to this
or that parish, or to the Church, they now belong to us - our
parish, our Church!  Another far more dangerous one is the 'all-
things-bright-and-beautiful' word community. Like a Crown of
Thorns starfish on the Great Barrier Reef it has spread its
tentacles over the w