Pilgrim progress- a disciple on a journey!

Image taken from http://riseoftheroses.org/ This past week, a familiar tune drifted through the televisions of many Irish households and through the internet for many other international followers. As a tenor belted out the words “The pale moon was rising…” this haunting melody signaled that the new Rose of Tralee had been crowned. The Rose of Tralee International Festival is a festival which runs from the 15th to the 19th of August and is one of Ireland's largest and longest running festivals. It is based around the selection of the Rose of Tralee, an international event that encompasses young women of Irish descent from Ireland and around the world. People sometimes ask if the Rose of Tralee Festival is a beauty pageant. As their website states, “The Rose of Tralee Festival is a multifaceted event that celebrates the many attributes of modern young Irish women.” When we were younger, we all wanted to be a ‘Rose’, to dress up in a beautiful dress and share our story with

Time for share-groups! Photo-Nodlaig Lilis Last week from the 14th to the 17th of August, between 1000 and 1100 young people gathered on the monastic site of the Cistercian Abbey of Mount Saint Joseph Abbey in Roscrea, Co. Tipperary. The Summer festival is held every year for 4 days beginning on Thursday evening and ending with Holy Mass on Sunday. The theme for the festival was: “I want you to be happy, always happy in the Lord!”. The abbot, Dom Richard Purcell, spoke about the event saying: “Mount St Joseph Abbey is part of the living monastic tradition – and during the festival we will be one big faith-community united in our prayer and search for God. We entrust the success of this exciting venture to the intercession of Our Lady and St Joseph”. I have been involved with Youth 2000 since 1997. My first retreat was the week after I had discerned concretely and made the decision to try out convent life. I went home from the first retreat which was held in Esker possessing som

In 100 years, there will be flying taxis and people will travel to the moon routinely. Knowledge will be instilled into students through wires attached to their heads. These may sound like the predictions of modern-day futurists, but they’re how people a century ago saw the future–otherwise known to you and me as the present. One hundred years ago on this day, a young man from a small town in Alba, Italy, with a futuristic vision took a huge leap of faith into the unknown. Just two weeks previous, the so called ‘war to end all wars’ began, World War 1. That young man was our Founder, Blessed James Alberione who planted the tree of the Pauline Family, nurtured it and made it grow in the garden of Jesus, the Way, the Truth and the Life until it reached its fruition. His message was one of uniting all things in Christ, quite opposite to the death and destruction that the horrors of war was beginning to manifest throughout Europe. In the Gospel, we hear how the Lord calls at