Leo Cushley

Achievement maybe remembered, but it is humility and humanity of Pope Benedict be truely respected 1/5/23

God sent his son among us, in humility simplicity to live like us, so that we could become like god, in spite of our self absorption, silliness, and messes we made the world. 23/11/22

I don't know about you, but I remember Soviet time thrown in Czechoslovakia in 1968 when topple the government. Of course I wasn't actually there, in fact I was only 7 years old, but the kids know what's going on much more than we think.

When I was a young priest, once I got a phone call middle of the night, the phone goes off 3 at morning as the young guy has to pick up, so as the phone went, I sort to spring into action, the man other end wanted urgently, to speak to the pope, interesting. I replied, quite truthfully, I didn’t have the pope’s the number to hand, sorry. But the man at other end insisted, doesn’t catholic church has everywhere, isn’t it just like a big rental company with branches all over the world.

On this Remembrance day, as we just had, I’ve been thinking about how things united us, and how we can work together, for the good of all, for the good of the planet, in the margins of COP26, I bumped into an old friend, who once like me, worked in the heart of United Nations, we briefly re-lived our glory days in New York, then talked about what actually going to be on the negotiations taking place. Because this time he’s in there, and I am not.

It is said that the early summer is the time of year when Armies go campaigning. Well I don’t know about that, but it’s certainly the time of the year when prayer breakfast go breakfasting. What am I on about this time, well, every year about this time, there is a thing called national prayer breakfast, many folks get together in Edinburgh, Christian of all denomination and nun to pray. We invite politicians and business people and come from all over, and this year prayers breakfast is about to start, in fact, in about 40 minutes from now at 8 clock this morning. Does it involve prayer and bacon and eggs? Well, yes, usually they does, but last year and this year, the breakfast bed had been either virtual or homemade, as prayers breakfast has to be hold online, so it’s not only cholesterol free, also extremely low calorie. It also means that the emphasis has definitely being on the prayer and reflection.

He was one of the most accomplished philosophers intellectuals of our times, one of the finest people I've met since coming back to Scotland a few years ago. His death is great loss to not only his Jewish friends and families, but to the whole of British intellectual religious life. His book is definitely worth reading too, actually at this time of the year as we approach Easter. I was given one of the books which starts, unsurprisingly by looking at the book of Genesis, the first book of scriptures that we share. Two of my priest friends I have been reading it, and one of them said to another, "isn't amazing how Jonathon Sack sounds so catholic?" And the other replied, "Yes, but isn't that because we are so Jewish?" And we get to see that overlap in these days in a special way. As Jewish prepare to celebrate passover starting on Saturday, just as Christian celebrate holy week starts this Sunday.

Imagine today, taking all the eggs you have in the house, and all the meat too, and anything with fat in it, and making a great big dinner out of all of it, and then imagine, not going to supermarket to buy any of these things for the next 40 days. Well, that's what many people used to do. Because today, as you may already heard, it's Pancake Tuesday, or Fat Tuesday in New Orleans, or Goodbye to Meat Day like Venice, where they're famous for big street celebration.