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There are people all over the world who long to have some connection with God and Heaven. How marvellous it is, that through membership of the Catholic Church we can know that "we too rejoice with the Angels", in the praise of God, every day, even in a tiny church in a little village (in this case, Harpenden!) thousands of Angels pray with us, adoring the Blessed Trinity.

Our Blessed Lady, standing in a snowy landscape, represents a perfect, sinless woman in a world populated by selfish, hard-hearted sinners. She was the perfect receptacle for the Son of God, descended from Heaven to save us. She never ceases to hold in her Immaculate heart the needs of all 'children of God', hence her numerous visits to this world throughout the centuries.

We need not worry if we have so many duties to fulfil that we cannot name every individual whom we hold up before God in prayer. If we intercede for them all at once, we can be sure that as we hold them before God it's as if we are bringing them into the sunlight. God's warm love falls upon each one, with graces according to their needs, because of the merits of Christ, and our faithful intercession.

It can seem as though our life's arrangements and relationships are destroyed in a moment, like a bombed out city from which we flee. But sometimes our crises have been permitted by God so that we can flee all that was worldly and sinful. Then we are freed to 'build' a new life of holiness and peace.

God is not far away from us; however, a person who trusts in the Son of God, and tries to lead a good life, knows that only a veil separates people on earth from God and the Saints in Heaven. A person who lives for selfish aims, feels as if God is far away - if that person believes in God - and that between God and himself there is an impenetrable wall. This false impression is caused by his sins.

Some good souls cannot go straight to Heaven. It is common to hear people say, with a smile, that they will have to go to Purgatory, that they know they are not saints. Yet it is a tragedy, in their eyes, when they arrive, to be held captive there, as they see at last what lack of love for God, or laziness, kept them from achieving real holiness. What remorse they feel there, when they see that they could have become worthy to leap straight from earthly life into the embrace of their Saviour, Jesus.

Priests should set an example of holiness and purity, neither giving up nor watering down the Faith, nor developing a worldly spirit in order to be popular. They will do little good if they are disloyal to the Saviour, Who asks them to imitate Him, and keep people safe from Hell.

A worldly priest hopes to fit in, more easily, with society; yet he will do no good amongst those with little interest in religion or the moral laws if he seems to be disloyal to Christ, and disloyal to the ideals of charity, simplicity, chastity and humility that he should uphold.

We are right to put prayer first - to put Christ first - no matter how busy our day. Whether we are religious sisters or mothers looking after sick children, we will do our work better and more cheerfully if it is underpinned with prayer. Blessed Mother Teresa insisted that her busy sisters had an hour's adoration each day.

God looks from Heaven upon the Earth, and sees the long line of Popes whom He has appointed to be leaders of the other Bishops and of the Church. He sees that although all have been faithful to the Tradition, some have been silent when they should have spoken and allowed evil to flourish. Jesus is the model for all Popes: gentle with the weak but bold in correcting serious faults or misunderstandings.

The person who is Baptised is able to receive Confirmation too, and the Holy Eucharist; and so, being fully initiated into the Church, and remaining in a state of grace - it is to be hoped - that person is on a sure road to Heaven as he or she fulfils everyday duties and tries to discern God's plan for his or her life.

Christ wants us all to know that nothing matters more than this: to do good, in union with Christ, and to go to Heaven, by the grace of Christ, when our work on earth is done, and God calls us Home.

Just as the land which is not watered by spring rains becomes dry, causing subsidence and dangerous lesions in the road, so a spiritual life not fed by the sacraments becomes weak. Those most likely to fall into the pit are those preoccupied by earthly troubles, those careless in their everyday life, and those unable to go to church who sink into depression or despair.

Those who adore the Lamb, on earth, in sincere devotion, will do so in Heaven, if they persevere to the end. But those who do not adore Christ, here on earth, will not adore Him, close by Him, in Heaven - unless they repent and are changed before they die.

Whenever we make new efforts to be more attentive to Christ's wishes, and more vigilant about our sins and failings, we come to prayer in a new closeness to Christ; even if we neither see nor feel this, it's as if the 'wall' that seems to separate Heaven from earth has been torn open, and Christ gazes down with joy and gratitude, because He is loved.

When people think about the subject of death, many speak about accidents. Yet God in His Providence decides the length of each person's life on earth. As a farmer sows the seed, and harvests the crop when it is ready, so God brings His friends home to Heaven when their work is done.

Some Catholics believe that Purgatory is no more than a peaceful ante-room before Heaven. There are deep caverns of Purgatory, however, where those who led sinful lives but were saved at the last moment by the Last Sacraments are permitted by our merciful God to do the penance they failed to do on earth. They enter Heaven, later on, in humility and gratitude.

People who try to persevere in doing good, in ordinary life, even in obscurity, or with unexpected hardships, or further problems which seem impossible to survive, are walking steadily upwards towards Heaven, like the woman on a narrow street, sloping upwards, in a Mediterranean town.

To pray in the name of Christ, with faith, is to act in a powerful way to help others and to benefit oneself and grow in holiness. Faith opens a door, so to speak; or, it's as if a person with faith in Christ, praying for others, parts the clouds that separate Heaven from earth. The Father always answers such prayers, for Christ's sake, though sometimes in unexpected ways.

Does not a great tree spring from a seed, in the dust of the earth? Why should God not have brought a man out of the depth of the earth, by His almighty power? He is capable of doing what is described in Sacred Scripture.