From Fr Greg's Desk: Sunday 10th May, 2026

Happy Mother’s Day!
To all our dear Mums, Grandma's (read Nonnas, Lolas and Tatas etc.), and Great Grandma's, I wish a lovely Mother's Day to all of you this weekend! This is a particularly important vocation, a calling from God, and I hope you will be treated beautifully and deservingly by husbands and children alike. I look forward to those whom the Holy Spirit will name as our 'Mothers of the Year" at all our Sunday and Vigil Masses.

I will be praying especially for all our deceased ones as well, at each of the Masses celebrated in the Parish this weekend, particularly at our Memorial Mass on Saturday morning at 10.30 am, down at OLQP Gladesville. To those of you who have lost a Mother or Grandmother recently, I convey my deepest sympathies on this first Mother's Day without her.

Adult Faith Formation series on the Eucharist in Scripture Gell Room (Downstairs Parish Centre Ryde) Monday 11 & 18 May

We will continue to offer this "Didasko' series as a formation on the Eucharist in the run up to the International Eucharistic Conference in 2028 here in Sydney. Dr Mario Baghos, who is a senior lecturer at Notre Dame Sydney. He is a bit of an expert on Church History, Studies on Religion and Byzantine art and architecture, as well as religious symbolism in popular culture. You can check him out on YouTube as well. Why don't you come along and find out more about what Sacred Scripture says about the Eucharist??

Charitable Works Fund (CWF) Appeal May 2026
Once again we have the Archdiocesan Charitable Works Fund Appeal to help finance many of the Archdiocesan ministries and outreach made on our behalf. I urge you all to support this as much as possible, as it finances important outreach works such as University Chaplaincies (Fr. Dan is currently the Uni Chaplain at Macquarie University), Seminary formation (where Fr. Daniele is their Spiritual Director), Catholic Care, Aboriginal Missions and the like.

The Archdiocese currently requires our Parish to fund this by over $69,000 every year, so all your contributions to these charitable works are greatly appreciated. Any shortfall has to be made up through second collections monies received. These donations are fully tax deductible. I would greatly appreciate it if those of you who have companies or businesses, could kindly consider channelling your tax deductible donations for your firm this 'end-of-financial-year' through our Parish to the CWF, this would actually benefit all of us.

Please speak to me about this, or send me an email at pp@rgcp.org.au if you need more information. We definitely need your ongoing support of the CWF and its charitable outreach. Thank you all in advance for both supporting these very worthy ministries - and your own Parish into the bargain!!

Alpha Course Begins Next Friday 15th May
Our next 'Alpha Course' begins next Friday night at SCB (starts 7 pm with dinner included). This is an excellent way of learning more about your faith, who Jesus is, what he set out to do, what the Church is for, and how he plans to reach out to others through us. It runs for 13 weeks, and will be run this year on Friday nights at SCB at 7 pm for the first time. I would like to heartily encourage you to try it out if you haven't already done so, but especially to encourage friends and family who may have 'dropped off the Church's radar' over the years, or perhaps 'married into the family' having never had much faith at all to give this a go. Better still, why don't you come along with them, to help them to overcome any reticence they may have to come along?

And that's about it for now!!

God bless, and again, HAPPY MOTHERS DAY to all of you celebrating it this year.

Fr. Greg