2nd Sunday of Easter

I was nearly not going to post this - as this topic can be a real turn off. But here it is.

I often help out with a Children's Liturgy Group at church on a Sunday. Today we talked about prayer which I believe to be a deeply private and personal matter. I'm afraid I'm not a big believer in Evangelisation (although I have nothing against people who are brave enough to knock on strangers doors).

I shared some stories with the children about times I have fervently had a word with the big fella and it had paid off.

1. Years ago - when I was about 11 or 12 (and there were only 3 TV channels!) I was watching Scotland play a world cup qualifier. They needed one goal to qualify and I said a prayer that Scotland would score. And they did ! (when was the last time Scotland managed to do that!).

2. When my mum was terminally ill in hospital, her final month or so she was very ill and her usual (Irish) spirit was gone. It was very upsetting. but more so because we didn't feel we could bring her grandchildren to see her as they would be too upset. I wanted her back for a day, an hour even. I prayed that night for something to happen but I knew she couldn't get better. I was speaking to our Monsignor at a meeting and he said he would offer up prayers for her too.

Two days later she was sitting up in bed doing crosswords. We brought her grandchildren to see her. She cracked jokes, did their hair (nagged me about mine!) - in fact, my sister and I were talking about bringing her home for Christmas. She was amazing. She passed away the following day - but I will be forever grateful we had that last day with her and that is how she will be remembered by her grandchildren.

3. Finally, I told them the story of a day at work. A new job for me, and we had implemented a big suite of programs...it all went live....30 mins later I ran a bit of code accidentally and deleted the lot ! I didn't know whether to cry, puke or pee myself. I thought I would be sacked !

In my head I prayed like never before - and ten minutes later the whole network crashed. A massive multinational worldwide computer network stopped working. I was overjoyed ! It gave us time to apply a fix and sort it - without (many) people knowing. Talk about divine intervention !

Anyhoo. here's the wee display No 3 did with my as the focal point. She picked the wild flowers. Someone took a photo of it and sent it to me later in the day - and I thought I would share it.

Normal (irreverent) service resumed tomorrow !