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Jenny O'Brien

Contributor

Jenny O'Brien

Articles by Jenny

Opinion Opinion

Mary and Elizabeth, women for all time

According to Luke’s Gospel, it is immediately after her conversation with the Angel Gabriel that Mary sets off ‘with haste’ to visit her kinswoman Elizabeth in the hill country of Judaea. The beautiful image chosen for this year’s Marian Procession features the encounter between the two women – the older woman heavily pregnant and the younger still in the earliest stages of pregnancy.

Opinion Opinion

Ash Wednesday starts journey to Easter

The season of Lent extends from Ash Wednesday until the Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday evening, when the Easter Triduum begins. During this period neither the Gloria nor the Alleluia are sung, and a different Collect (Opening Prayer) is provided for every day, to emphasise the importance of these weeks.

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Opinion

The victory of love

Easter is almost upon us. On April 14 we begin the Easter Triduum (pronounced trid-you-oom), the most important three days in the Church’s year, when we celebrate the mystery of Christ’s passion, death and resurrection.

Opinion

Mary the prophet

‘A pregnant woman is not the usual image that comes to mind when one thinks of a prophet,’ writes the American theologian Elizabeth Johnson in her book Truly our Sister, yet in the first chapter of Luke’s Gospel we come face to face with two Spirit-filled pregnant prophets doing exactly what prophets do: speaking aloud God’s truth.