Every experience of sorrow in our lives could be suffering without meaning but if we have the grace to lay aside self-pity, blame and anger then we shall find in the heart of our suffering God a true hope, and yes even a meaning which in the love of God is the source of a robust wisdom.

Deacon Emmanuel Kahn is the preacher today and says "Great Lent doesn’t begin for another three weeks until Sunday evening, February 22nd. However, I think the tax collector in the Gospel we have just heard from Chapter 18 of St. Luke has some important advice for each of us, whatever our ages, about how we can prepare for Great Lent."

St. Gregory the Theologian speaks for himself this week, with a little extra for the children on avoiding 'silly talk.'

Fr. Christopher asks, "Why do we thank people? A cynic may answer to encourage more present giving in the future, and there is some truth to that. We do it to acknowledge the love and kindnesses of people and because there is a relationship. If there is not a two way exchange it is not a real relationship."

When we repent, when we seek to change our lives and our relationship to Christ, what is “at hand”? What is near? What is about to happen? The kingdom of heaven!

We should all take away from the Feast of Theophany a renewed commitment not only to our own personal renewal in the Spirit but also through our own service of God and a share in the blooming of creation and the healing of the nations.

Theophany is a good time to recall our baptism and to ask ourselves whether or not we are living to the full the life of a baptised Christian. Are we repenting of our sins; are we being filled with the Holy Spirit?

Dn. Emmanuel speaks about St. Basil and the first of the year.

Fr. Gregory gives extracts from St Gregory of Nyssa's orations on the feast of the Nativity of Christ. He intersperses these reflections from contemporary life as the context in which both the promises and the challenges of the gospel are to be worked out by each one of us.

Fr. Christopher reminds us that the coming of Christ was an act of mercy and salvation in a world soiled by darkness, sin and evil.