Reflections for weekday readings 2022-2023
In Your Word Is a Lamp on My Path (Messenger Publications) », Fr Martin Hogan offers reflections on the weekday readings for the liturgical year 2022 to 2023. Taking the reader from the First Week of Advent 2022 to the Final Week in Ordinary Time 2023, each reflection arises out of engagement with the gospel text and seeks to show how it can continue to speak to the Church and world today. In this his seventh volume, Fr Hogan explores the Word as the ‘true light, which enlightens everyone’.
In the introduction, Fr Hogan writes:
“In the course of the liturgical year, the gospel readings for weekdays offer us a significant selection of the words and deeds of Jesus from all four gospels. In and through these gospel readings we encounter the living word of the risen Lord to his Church.
There is rich fare here to nourish our faith life and to help us to grow in our knowledge and love of the Lord. These short reflections attempt to listen to the gospel readings on their own terms while showing how they can continue to speak to our lives today.”
Grounded in Fr Hogan’s own experience of a busy Dublin parish, the book reminds readers that the weekday gospel readings for the year can fill the days of their year with light, illuminating the path they walk as they journey toward the future.
Referring to the feast of Saint Brigid on 1 February, he reflects:
“She [Saint Brigid] was renowned for her hospitality, almsgiving and care of the sick. Saint Brigid’s cross remains a popular sign of God’s protection. In legend it was used by Brigid to explain the Christian faith.
As a woman of deep prayer, it is appropriate that the first reading for her feast is that wonderful prayer of Saint Paul in his letter to the Ephesians.
He prays that our hidden self would grow strong, that Christ would live in our hearts. When we allow Christ to live in our hearts, then our hidden self, our deepest self, grows strong.”
Fr Hogan’s series of reflections on the gospel readings of the liturgical year have quickly become a staple in parishes throughout Ireland; they have aided priests in the preparation of weekday homilies and have guided people of faith who base their daily prayer on the gospel readings.
Fr Martin Hogan is a priest of the Diocese of Dublin. He was a Scripture lecturer in Mater Dei Institute of Education for over thirty years. This is his seventh publication of reflections on the weekday readings.
Your Word Is a Lamp on My Path: Reflections on the weekday readings for the liturgical year 2022-23 by Fr Martin Hogan is published in Ireland and the UK by Messenger Publications. It is priced at €19.95/£18.95.
