Hello all!

This morning I was at mass and it was the parable of the talents. The man who was given 2 talents made 4, the guy who got 5 made 10 and the lazy lout who got one buried his and gave it back to the master!

The master wasn’t happy and reacted like Simon Cowel after a bad audition on Britain’s got talent!

One thing I always wondered was what if there was another man who was given 3 talents for example and what if despite working hard he lost it all!!

Now a ‘talent’ in the Bible is actually a quantity of money rather than a gift such as singing but the principle remains the same!

God may not have given you 3 talents (about 3 million pounds according to google) but he has given you many talents and gifts!

You may be gifted at cooking or reading or writing, you may be gifted in sport or art or math or you may be gifted in love and charity and patience (still waiting on the patience)….

You may be gifted in prayer and understanding, wisdom and intelligence and you may even have spiritual gifts of healing….

Whatever the case, each gift is a talent that God asks you to accept, nurture, grow and develop these talents while putting them to the service of others!

I always remember Glen’s testimony in India. He serves in the Divine retreat centre in the music ministry but he wasn’t always so pious!

Glen had long hair and was into some dark type of music! He met mother Theresa and his life changed!

‘You look like Jesus with that hair’ she said, ‘why not use your gifts to glorify God’!

The penny dropped and Glen dedicated his life and musical gifts to loving God and bringing healing to others through the healing ministry!

Sometimes we think that God doesn’t want us to use our gifts as that would cause us to get prideful but this isn’t true!

God wishes us to use every gift to glorify Him and to love others and it takes time and maturity to be able to do that!

When I was younger I had a dream of travelling the world, speaking lots of languages and being a business man of a type….

My dream came crashing down when I realised that I had no interest whatsoever in business despite being very gifted on paper!

I gave my life to God perhaps more out of obligation than anything else thinking that my future was destined to be dull and boring but at least I’d get to heaven after my earthly exile!

But Jesus had other plans!! He said:

“Michael, I want you to travel the world and learn lots of languages while doing business but I want you to do my business”!

The rest is history!

So today as you read this you may find yourself in one of three categories!

1. You have lots of talents and are very successful but you are serving yourself with them like I was before.

2. You have many talents but you have no confidence and so they are all blocked or buried as in today’s parable!

3. You have many talents and you are using them to love others and to praise God!

Obviously the third scenario is the ideal yet do not despair if you relate more to 1 or 2!

God is merciful and it is never too late to surrender our lives, our talents and our fears to Him so that He can transform our lives and teach us how to be fully alive while serving Him and our neighbour!

So today, think of Susan Boyle who didn’t bury her talents or give up and how even Simon Cowell was left speechless!

Never give up! Your day will come too!

3 months ago we arrived in London! It feels like so much longer but in a good way!

We have all fallen in love with the place and are so grateful to God!

Yesterday we went to see some of the main sights including Buckingham palace and Westminister Cathedral.

Toni bought a football and so we played a bit in the palace gardens!

London truly is a very beautiful city and we are so blessed to be surrounded by places to pray from our local parish in Nottinghill to the nearby carmelites to Tyburn Abbey to Westminister Cathedral to St. Patrick’s in Soho and also so many beautiful parks to take a break from it all and enjoy the beauty of nature!

It is wonderful to have such choice and diversity at our fingertips with mass, confession and adoration so easily available! We are truly spoilt for choice!

We have found the priests in London extremely helpful and encouraging towards us and our mission and this too is an enormous blessing!

The famous ‘Big Ben’ tower is covered over at the moment for works but we did find Ben’s little brother near the cathedral!

A big thank you to everyone we have met and to everyone who has been praying for us and helping us financially or other!

The power of Jesus knows no limits and we are so grateful for every blessing as we testify to His power to heal and transform lives in these modern times!

Bless you all with His joy today!!

Mike

Hello from starbucks! A coffee in the morning works wonders, look even Einstein made his greatest discoveries after coffee!

Over the weekend we had the Nottinghill Carnival. I must admit that I understand even less of what the carnival was about after it than before!

In summary up to a million people came to Nottinghill, the locals who were wise boarded up their houses and literally disappeared for the weekend and the show began!

I have never heard more noise in my life as ‘music’ blasted from every corner!

Sorry if this offends any of you but as I looked about it seemed like a vision of hell!!

Noise, drunkenness, drugs, rubbish everywhere doesn’t really do it for me and for those who call it a ‘cultural celebration’ I could not but think of John Paul II and how he used the term ‘culture of death’!

Of course it wasn’t all bad and we even spotted this giant cross!

But Jesus was not Lord of this carnival, that is for sure!

Poor Seamus was working in McDonald’s and came home like a zombee while Toni was reminded of his past life of smoking weed as one almost got high by going outside from the passive smoking!

Of course to the majority of people my age and younger it was excellent and these moments remind me of how counter cultural it is nowadays to live out one’s faith!

At times you can feel like a social leper and can really question what it’s all about!

It is at these times my mind drifts to places like Lourdes, Medjugorje, Knock etc. and I remind myself that I am not alone!

So today is Thursday and the carnival is well over and I have recovered!

In terms of evangelization of today’s world the task is certainly monumental and one can’t but feel the motherly cry of Our Lady of Medjugorje

‘Pray for those who do not know of God’s love yet’

Only a mother could express it with so much love and mercy and humility as she sees that even the worst of sinners is a potential future saint!

So let’s keep trusting and praying and not get discouraged. Every soul counts, every sacrifice counts, every prayer counts and while we might not save or convert the multitudes we can save and convert ourselves and the one or two that Jesus has put in our lives to help!

Mother Theresa of Calcutta, model of prayer, perseverance and suffering in the most adverse conditions. Pray for our perseverance in these Godless times!

Tuesday August 27th we celebrate the feast day of St Monica in the catholic church!

Monica is the mother of St. Augustin but Augustin wasn’t born saint, he became one!

Augustin was a man of the world and despite praying for him for years he seemed to be getting worse!

Monica however never game up and eventually Augustin came to the end of himself and discovered Jesus…

The rest is history as they say and despite already having fathered a child he went on to be a priest, a bishop and a saint!

At times I think of how my own mum used to nag me when I had given up going to mass and was immersed in the world and the terribly irony that when I did give up the world for Jesus, she wasn’t happy either!

I don’t really blame her, the way Jesus answered her prayer was so dramatic and extreme that the poor woman thought I’d lost the plot….not to mention the big salary I left behind to live poverty to the extreme.

Fortunately 12 years later she has come around and even sends me some money from her old age pension! Again what a terrible irony as she now has a salary of a kind while I don’t!

In a way she has lived her poverty already rearing 6 kids in very modest times. She never went on holiday, never thought of herself and in many ways was a saint! I can only remember her slapping me a few times and from an early age I learnt that she could protect me from the short fuse of Dad and talk him around to not beating me to death which I probably half deserved!

It’s true that after my conversion she changed as the irish ‘mental health’ system took the faith out of her faith and made her afraid of spirituality!

And there my cross was born! My own mum, the one praying for my conversion now the one telling me that I was mad!

It has been the most bitter of chalices to accept and Satan took full advantage!

But after 10 years it stopped and I thank God that my mum now accepts my life and a few months ago I had the chance to introduce her to Toni who is a living witness to the power of God’s love!

And while my soul is still healing from some of the pain, I can thank God for how far it’s come and in a sort of a way we are even!

I crucified my mum pre conversion, she crucified me after amd yet in the middle was love and misunderstandings!

So moral of the story, St Monica and St Augustin are examples to us all of perseverance in prayer and of the bond between mothers and sons!

So today if you are a mother, keep praying for your sons and if you are a son keep praying for your mother and trust that out of great pain and mistakes can come an even more glorious resurrection for God can turn even the most awful trials and injustices for the good!

St Monica, pray for us today!

Hello from Notting Hill’s McDonald’s! The Notting Hill Carnival is on today and the place will be jam packed with people and activity!!

This mornings Gospel is a slightly frightening one when after a lifetime of eating and drinking with Jesus and expecting to just sail into heaven Jesus replies “I do not know you”.

Who is it referring to? Well, it’s about me and you!

All of us that are regular mass goers and eat and drink the body and blood of Jesus on a daily or weekly basis will be held accountable for our lives!

If after 30 years of mass we are still hard hearted, bitter, unforgiving and jealous, then it’s easy see why Jesus would say “I do not know you”!

I came accross this very situation in Medjugorje where despite living there and having the grace to serve God and His people there, one lady was so full of bitterness and hatred towards me and then towards Seamus and Toni!

I was baffled that living in such a place and going to mass every day that someone could be so blind and full of hatred!

She of course is to be pitied and prayed for and yet she is not alone!

The Gospel today speaks very clearly of this hypocrisy and the risk of eternal damnation.

So today as christians Jesus is looking at us and our hearts and is asking us to put away our presumption and pride and to humbly go back to loving people and not judging them less we too hear on that last day “I do not know you”.

Our Lady, the humblest of all creatutes, pray for us that we may be like you!

Have a great day and I forgot to mention….I got new shoes!!!

Yesterday I went for a stroll! A man gave me a leaflet for ‘Hare Krishna’. At least now I know how to write it and that it’s ‘Hare’ rather than ‘Harry’ as in ‘Harry Potter’…which one could argue isn’t a million miles removed!

So I went into a church and read the leaflet! Apparently if I chant “Hare Krishna” over and over my spirit will have an awakening and the rest will be history.

It’s sounds the same as being baptised in the Holy Spirit as the charismatics say except that you’d have Hare Krishna as your guide and not Jesus!!

I quickly threw it in the bin aware that many will be attracted by this cheap marketing and promise of peace!

I then picked up a leaflet in the church. There was the face of Jesus and the miracle prayer!

One wasn’t asked to dress like a clown and chant ‘Jesus is Lord’ to experience Jesus! No, in the silence of our hearts we can invite Him and He can come! We need no magic formulae or techniques besides just being open!

Later I met a group of the Hare Krishna’s chanting about the place! I got the impression they didn’t like me as none made eye contact.

Because of the deliverance gift God has given me it often happens that people turn away from me as soon as they see me! In reality they are being controlled by spirits and I see them and a grey sort of a film over their eyes. The spirits around them cannot stand the presence of Jesus and Mary and they begin to manifest! Most people don’t know it but demons feel pain too and they are very protective of their human hosts!

Anyway, I’ll be leaving the Harry Potters and their false peace to it and pray they meet Jesus!

So my stroll continued and a nice girl gave me a free hand cream! Just what I needed! Michael who has one bag, a toothbrush and a razor…what would he want a hand cream for!

Yet every moment is a moment to be nice so I accepted it graciously knowing there would be a bin nearby!

I’ve always looked young for my age and many people are surprised to learn that I never use moisturiser or any special creams for my face besides dihydrogen monoxide every morning (more commonly known as water!!).

And because I’ve mastered the art of looking like I might have money when I actually have none the girl invited me into the shop for a free trial (she obviously didn’t look down at my shoes)!

So I exfoliated my hands with a salt based cream and afterwards my hands were soft like silk! I spoke to her about Jesus as she was helping me!

She then showed me a product for my face and I could choose between vanilla, grapefruit and the smell of the ocean! I had no interest in walking about like a grapefruit or stinking of the sea but it was amusing!

And of course the moment I was waiting for arrived…the sales speech!

One for £45, two for £80 and the whole lot for £100!!

The poor girl! I still haven’t £20 for new runners at Primark not to mention £100 to smell like a lobster!

She was good though! ‘What’s your favourite product’….’the grapefruit one I replied’ knowing exactly where it was all going!

£45 suddenly became £35!

Haggling is so easy when you just don’t want to buy anything!

I told her that I’m a missionary and that I am looking after a young guy and that I don’t have that type of money!

She left to speak to her manager!

£35 became £25…

Now I was embarrassed for her and I also wondered if I would have been as successful in reducing the price if I actually wanted it!

The penny dropped and I left thanking her graciously as and apologising that she didn’t make a sale!

Harry Krishna had promised to clean my soul, a grapefruit with salt my body….what next I thought!!

So I continued my day giving thanks to Jesus for His presence in my life! I need no Hare Krishna or fancy creams or clothes to be happy!

I walk about with a smile wearing cheap but clean clothes and I feel great! I use no creams and people can’t tell the difference and wonder why I look so young for my age!

And what’s the answer?!

Jesus is the answer and the inner love and freedom that He gives us as He fills us from the inside out with His Holy Spirit!

So my dear friends, I leave you with the miracle prayer!!

Good morning!As part of reaching out to more people I decided to reopen a facebook page!

I left facebook about 2 years ago mainly due to the diversity of friends I had and the constant disagreements they were having!

I had catholic friends and protestant friends, I had charismatic friends and non-charismatic friends, I had gay friends and straight friends and then the most difficult bunch of all friends…family!

If I posted something about Our Lady, the protestants were put out, if I spoke of the Holy Spirit the conservative Catholics began to get heartburn, if I mentioned the lack of love for gay people in the catholic church then nearly all the Catholics went wild, if I spoke of my involvement in inner healing and deliverance ministry some of the priests began to attack me and if I wrote anything about family that wasn’t flattering then I got disinherited!!!

Despite all the different groups I had, it became too complicated and the arguments that people had on my blog weren’t worth it!So I quit!!

Why then am I back?!!

Well I’m back but not as before!

1. It’s merely for evangelization

2. I won’t be replying to any comments!

3. I’m using it to reach out to as many people as possible! I already have over 1000 friends and I haven’t a clue who most of them are!

4. I will have no groups!

Already I have received many messages!

One poor guy in Bosnia contacted me looking for money! I guess he figured the ferrari was mine! Sorry mate, I’m still waiting on money to buy shoes for myself!!

As I’ve made a lot of gay friends I posted Seamus’ testimony! How wonderful it would be to bring a plane full of gays to Medjugorje for Gospa to touch them and bring them to Jesus just like she did with Seamus!

In any case we can keep praying! The love and mercy of Jesus knows no humam limits and as apostles of that love we must bravely push through into new areas of mission!

So keep us in the prayers and may as many people as possible be touched by the merciful love of Jesus!

Bless you all!

Mike

Good morning!

Despite hating english in school I do recall once learning about the importance of a catchy headline!

Of course God is a fair God but this morning’s gospel reading challenges us a little!

It is the parable of the workers and how at the end of the day they all got the same wages despite the fact that some did a full days work and others only an hour….

Perhaps the core line is “has nobody hired you” which echoes another passage in the bible where a man was waiting over 30 years to be healed and for someone to lift him into the pool!

In this parable of the workers the master saw that the men were not lazy men, just nobody had hired them! Had they been hired earlier they would have done the work too!

As I reflect on this I think of the life of new converts!

New converts to christianity are in some ways like the waiting workers! Through no fault of their own they haven’t been hired so to speak!

Many have grown up in abusive families who did not know God, others have grown up in other religions or in today’s system of atheism….

And so when they experience God they know nothing at the start about the church and they have mountains of inner wounds and fears and vices!

To the workers who were working all day (those who grew up with a good family and faith) these new converts seem unruly, undisciplined and wild!

It’s not long before division breaks out between “them” and “us”.

Saint Therese of the child Jesus has the answer!

Her humility allowed her to see that it was an act of mercy on behalf of God that she grew up with extremely prayerful and loving parents!

Her dad adored her, went to mass every day and was often to be found on his knees in prayer. How many of us may say that about our dads?

Personally I only ever saw my dad on his knees when he was pulling a calf and besides going to mass on a Sunday he never showed any interest in God or prayer or my life for that matter!

And I’m not alone! Many of us have had upbringings which did very little to bring us closer to God and church!

And as the worker who was hired at the last minute many of us have experienced the grace of conversion later in life.

At times the church is a hostile place for us! We make mistakes, we say the wrong thing or dress in the wrong way and the wolves start howling and criticising us!

We have many wounds to heal from and often heavy pasts from things like drugs and sex, often we have no support from our own families and so it hurts when our new family begins to judge us and point out all our faults as if we were somehow unworthy of God’s mercy !

Conversion and healing takes time! It is like learning english when english is not your native language! Native speakers must learn to be patient with us and accept like Therese that was it not for God’s grace they could be in our situation!

So my message to you today is simple! Don’t be like the grumbling workers grumbling to the master about their wages but instead be workers of mercy!

Thank God for your faith, be humble and ask God to give you love, mercy and patience for those who were not as fortunate and are converting and healing one day at a time!

One of ‘One Directions’ successful songs is ‘What makes you beautiful’!

Yet with a little bit of creativity we can hear God our loving father singing it to us!

After all we are made in His image and likeness and yet many of us walk about with our heads down feeling ugly and unloved!

Fortunately God sees differently and we too can learn to see ourselves and others differently by simple allowing ourselves to be loved just the way we are!

Ladies,
Don’t need make-up, to cover up
Being way that you are is enough

These lines hit me!
But when you smile at the ground it ain’t hard to tell
You don’t know, oh oh
You don’t know you’re beautiful

And I’m sure others can relate. Failures and disappointments in life can hurt us and affect how we see ourselves. We find it hard to accept love, to forgive ourselves, to smile!

Instead we become shy and socially awkward. We live in the shadows!

Yet God sings
If only you saw what I can see
You’ll understand why I want you so desperately
Right now I’m looking at you and I can’t believe
You don’t know, oh oh
You don’t know you’re beautiful, oh oh
That’s what makes you beautiful

There is something profound in the last line! Not knowing that you are beautiful makes you beautiful! It catches elements of mystical theology and the dark night of the soul while being sung by ‘One direction’ who are less known for mysticism!! 😂😂😘

So God continues to sing to us
So come on, you got it wrong
To prove I’m right, I put it in a song
I don’t know why, you’re being shy
And turn away when I look into your eye eye eyes

Again how profound! How many turn away from God’s eyes because they cannot accept His love.

And what’s the answer? Forgiveness and especially forgiving oneself for all the pains of life. It’s not about being perfect but about being humble!

Today God is singing this song to you! He is not blaming you or accusing you but is smiling on you!

He desires to light up your life! He desires to heal your wounds, to restore your hope, to get to know Him personally!

So as you listen to this song and think about the words why not give yourself a break!

You are a child of God just like everybody else and He thinks you’re beautiful just the way you are!

You don’t need drugs, alchohol, sex, wealth etc. to cover the pain! You just need your loving heavenly dad!

Today may we all come to realise just how beautiful we are and may we get rid of all the masks and insecurities that hide our true beauty!

Have a beautiful day!

Mike

Good morning!Last night I met a few more interesting people in the gay world! The stories were both happy and sad!

The first man told me that his mum had recently died. All his life she did not accept him as she wanted a girl…up to her death she told him!

So when she died he told me that he feels free, that he feels her helping him!

What a sad irony that this man has gained a mum by losing his mum and that she couldn’t love him when she was alive.

Only a short time ago I said it to my own mum in Ireland when we arguing!

‘We’ll be better friends when your dead’!

It sounds like a horrible thing to say and yet it’s the truth!How often do mum’s destroy the lives of their children by playing God! At times I wonder if God’s biggest enemy isn’t Satan at all but controlling mums!!!

Of course Satan uses them or at least tries to! Mum’s are called to allowing their children to be who God made them to be, to let go and let God and not impose their own wills!

The second chap I met was a Jehovah’s Witness. His mum had kicked his brother out of the house for being gay and he was also gay….What pain inflicted by mums on their sons at times and probably without really meaning to!

Fr. Leon in Medjugorje once gave a teaching on exorcisms. He explained that when a person has been cursed or abused by a parent that the spirits are very hard to remove. This is because the child has a natural love for his parents and when parents are abusive it is very difficult to break free.

And so we must forgive our mums and move on with our new mum, Our Lady!Our Lady is the perfect mum.

Never did she interfere or get in the way of God’s plan for her son. She stood by Him even when that meant standing at the cross while He got crucified!(that’s Our Lady as a child with her mum, Saint Ann)

She supported Him in being Himself and in doing God’s will every step of the way and she will support you and me too!

She loves us, she accepts us, she understands us, she knows us and God has blessed her with special gifts to guide us and help us in every way!

She will not impose her will or turn her back on us, she will not give up on us or disown us for her love is unconditional!

So today, whatever the relationship you had with your biological mum, know that you have another mum, Our Lady queen of heaven and if you ask her for help she will give it to you!

I’ll finish with my favourite prayer that ironically my mum taught me as a child.

‘Remember , O most gracious virgin Mary, that never was it known, that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy help or sought thy intercession was left unaided. Inspired by this confidence I fly unto thee, O virgin of virgins, my mother; to you do I come, before you I stand, sinful and sorrowful. O mother of the word incarnate, despise not my petitions but in your clemency hear and answer me. Amen’