Fr. Patrick J. O'Doherty

06/24/2026

DON’T GET INSULTED

So why are you reading this? My advice is stop it right now. Still reading are you….? Figures. Nobody ever tells you what to do. Every so often I make an impassioned appeal about something or other when we are all assembled at Holy Mass. It matters little. The situation is sometimes made worse by my preaching.

I think of the prophet Ezekiel who preached to a whole valley full of dried human bones. All the bones came back together and flesh grew on them, and skin grew on them, but they were quite dead. See what I mean; his preaching made the situation worse, very soon there will be a stink. Still reading, are you?

Our other friend Elijah, the one who went up to Heaven in the fiery chariot drawn by horses of fire, was once questioned by Our Lord who spoke to him from the sound of a gentle breeze. The Lord asked him, “What are you doing here?” So now I’m asking you, “What are YOU doing here?” and “Why are YOU still reading this?”

I don’t mean to frighten either you or me, but Our Lord sees us both this very second no matter where we are at. Do you think maybe now you should stop reading this? Someone is reading you, knows you, loves you. You are now, whether you like it or not, in the presence of the same Lord who spoke to Moses from the burning bush and to Elijah from the still small sound of a gentle breeze. What are you doing here?
Tell you what; I will tell you what I am doing here, wherever here is. My heart is saying to Our Lord: Lead all souls to heaven, especially those in most need of thy mercy.

In times past, and perhaps still, masters of prayer use to say to us: “Place yourself in the presence of God.” When I heard this I used to think in my mind, and I’m now writing it for you to see. What foolishness is this? Nobody puts themselves in the presence of God. You are in Our Lord’s presence whether you like it or not. You, and I mean YOU, through the greatness of Our Lord’s love for you, you have access to His house, now this second. And so I’m asking you, “What are you doing here?”

06/23/2026

THE SIGN OF THE CROSS

Ever since your father or your mother or perhaps a sister or a brother took your little hand and helped you make the sign of the cross on yourself, you have been making this sign. Is that true? Later someone told you what it meant: There is one God and this one God is three persons: God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. If we had never been told and come to believe that God is the most Holy Trinity could we have come to the knowledge of the Most Holy Trinity by reasoning it out? I myself think, “Yes.” If all we had was the Genesis story: Then the Lord God said, “Let us make man in our own image and in the likeness of ourselves”, and so it was and is, that the Lord created man in the image of Himself, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them.”

Could we conclude from this that God is the Most Holy Trinity? If it’s true that man and woman are in the likeness of God then it necessarily follows that in some way the All Holy God is like us. Looking at ourselves we can see that in some ways each of us is a trinity. You have three powers, yet you are one person. You have memory that somehow is past as well as present: remember your childhood, your mother and your father. Remember JFK’s assassination or 9/11 and the Twin Towers. You have imagination that is somehow present as well as future. Imagine you are on your death bed and Jesus our Lord comes to take you home. You have will. Will you say the Fatima prayer today for the salvation of all mankind? (What’s the Fatima prayer?)

So you are one person with three powers: memory, imagination, and will. Notice too the trinity that is Mother, Father, Child – from the intimate and holy union of your mother and father there is you – a stretch perhaps, but one family of three persons. Thank God however, that God has revealed Himself to us as one and Triune. Jesus Our Lord speaks of God as his father and ours. Jesus Our Lord says that whoever sees Him sees the Father and we know that Jesus Our Lord sends out, breathes out the Holy Spirit on us and on all mankind.

We know too that in the beginning God the Father created the Heavens and the Earth. We know that God the Holy Spirit moved over the darkness and we know that God the Word said, “Let there be light.” We know too that in the new beginning God the Father covered Mary with His shadow, the Holy Spirit came upon her and she gave birth to God the Son. The consecration at Mass is also a Trinitarian miracle and so will it be if ever you become a holy one, a saint. Should you desire it enough, the Holy Spirit will come upon you, the power of God will cover you with His shadow and then you will no longer live but Christ will live in you.

06/22/2026

TEN LORDS A LEAPING

I suppose the partridge in the pear tree stands for Christ Jesus Our Lord, nailed to the cross of Calvary. But what about the ten lords a leaping? Who are they, who do they represent? The Ten Commandments, the ten lepers, the ten bridesmaids? Perhaps the three groups. And what of this ‘a leaping business’. St. Luke tells us that Mary the Mother of Our Lord, perhaps in her third month, went up into the hill country to visit her cousin Elizabeth. She went into Zachariah’s house and greeted Elizabeth who was herself with child. As soon as Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child ‘leaped’ in her womb. There it is again, that leaping word; the child, John the Baptist, “leaping” in Elizabeth’s womb before the child Jesus in the tabernacle of Mary’s womb!

Speaking of tabernacles, “The Ark of the Lord”, did not King David come ‘leaping’ and dancing, whirling around before the Lord with all his might as the Ark of the Lord was being carried up to Jerusalem? There it is again, that ‘leaping’ word, David ‘leaping’ before the Lord. Then, there is the bride in the song of songs saying: I hear my beloved, see how he comes ‘leaping’ on the mountains, bounding over hills, my beloved is like a gazelle, like a young stag. See where he stands behind our wall. He looks in at the window, he peers through the lattice. My beloved lifts up his voice, he says to me, “Come then, my love, my lovely one come.” Show me your face let me hear your voice; for your voice is sweet and your face is beautiful. Do you wonder who this is leaping on mountains and calling out to you, “Come to me”? “El Shaddai,” It is “Mountain God” who in times past appeared to Abraham and said: I am El Shaddai, bear yourself blamelessly in my presence.

One thinks of other mountains and times and seasons. One remembers that the Ark came to rest on the mountain of Ararat and forward as well as Mary, the Ark of the Lord, went in haste to the hill country to visit Elizabeth. And there are those mountain visits. Sinai with Moses entering the dark cloud of the Lord’s presence. Elijah on Mount Horeb, and that ‘murmuring voice’, that was El Shaddai passing in front of him. Later too on the mountain of transfiguration, Moses, Elijah, Jesus Our Lord, Peter, James, and John.

Most of all however, there is that Holy Mountain Calvary and that still soft, murmuring voice thirsting for you: “I thirst, I thirst, I thirst.” So brother of mine, sister of mine blessed shall you be when men persecute you and ridicule you and speak every kind of calumny against you for my sake. Rejoice and leap for joy on that day, for your reward will be great in Heaven. There it goes again, that ‘leaping’ word. Leap for joy when they abuse you because of me. I am El Shaddai and I thirst.

06/21/2026

HAPPY FATHER‘S DAY
Happy Father's Day to my father, John O’Doherty and to all fathers. There’s a Japanese proverb that says there are three things to be feared: hurricanes ,earthquakes, and fathers. Anybody who knows me knows I'm a mama's boy and always have been. I think God has put a particular burden on fathers because we are supposed to model the fatherhood of God for our children; that's who we are in the grand scheme of things - Abba, daddy, father.

I remember reading a a book some years ago written by a Protestant minister called “Are You Running With Me Jesus?” The title of the book grabbed my imagination, but the book itself was okay. One of the little stories I read in the book was about a disciple of Christ who did work in the slums with street kids. The children were out on the streets from the age of six or seven trying to look after themselves. He tells about what happened when he told one of the boys that God was our father and how the boy immediately bristled. He continued telling him that he’s like your father, you know, like your father at home. The little boy said: I hope to Christ he isn’t, because when my father comes home when he’s drunk, he vomits on me. That stuck in my mind.

Then on the other hand I was visiting with this Jewish gentleman and his wife who had two children . He was my doctor at the time and invited me to their home. His two little boys were running around the room. They didn't say words like Daddy, or father or Papa. They called him Abba, Abba, Abba, and Jesus told us the same thing. He said when you pray, say Abba. I know we have translations of it but back to the original language Abba, Daddy. So there's the struggle then because every man you see is a child of Adam and we have our brokenness, and we're not modeling the fatherhood of God the way we should, so it's a bit of a problem on Father's Day. Well, where do we go from there?

My father was very good to me as a younger child and I was close to him, and I learned things from him. However, it seemed like when we got older and got to be teenagers, he didn't seem to have much time for us. Here’s a little story of something I learned from my father and he wasn't trying to teach me anything at the time but I learned this, no lies. I played in this castle as a young boy and I was able to climb up on over the walls, don't ask me how, and I tried to catch pigeons in the castle which I did occasionally. There was a river flowing all around the castle and there was a bridge over the river. My father used to sit on the bridge and he'd watch the traffic go by day, after day, after day. So this happened and it left an extraordinary impact. I'm going to preface it by saying that I think my father knew when I was six or seven years old that I would be an alcoholic.

Now alcoholism is a spiritual disease so don't get excited. There’s the sin of gluttony of course, but alcoholism is a spiritual disease that affects your mind and your soul. So I'm looking up at my father who is sitting on the bridge, bear in mind he's the law in our town; we called him a plain clothes detective officer. The town had 1,600 people and the whole town used to pass in front of my father every day as he sat on the bridge and people would come and talk to him.

So he tells me this story as I'm looking up at him. He says there's a big rat, a big rat, and he's living behind the baseboard in Mrs Croak’s Pub. The pub was next door to our home at 3 Castle Street, Cahir, County Tipperary. We lived at 2 Castle Street and the Hickeys lived at 1 Castle Street. He said that late at night, when all the patrons have gone home from the pub, drunk or sober, the rat would come out of his hole behind behind the baseboard. He’d make his way along the baseboard following it and end up laying under a drip of one of the Guinness black beer barrels.

Now remember all stories are true, some of them actually happened; so he's telling me a story and I'm visualizing this rat lying on his back and the drip from the leaking cask of Black Irish beer called Guinness Stout. One of the names for a pint of Guinness in Ireland, believe it or not, is ‘the parish priest’ because Irish beer is black but has a white collar on it, so go figure.

I'm into this story. Then the rat, after whatever five or 10 minutes, is properly drunk out of his mind and he gets up staggering and says ,”Where’s that bloody cat now? I'll straighten him out!” That was the story my father told me and of course it has stayed with me up to this day. At this stage of my life I know that my father was talking about me and that he knew I had a temperament that should never,ever,ever touch any type of alcohol or any type of drugs, re**er, co***ne or psilocybin mushroom - all of that stuff and he was right of course, so I owe him a particular debt.

The other thing that I admired (I'm only looking back) as I mentioned earlier that he sat on the bridge here and saw the town passing in front of him every day. So, I put a big stone bench outside the church here and very often I'd sit on the bench and I didn't realize I was watching the parish coming to Mass. I'm there before every Mass and sometimes people will say, “Will you hear my confession, Father?”
So I learned something about being a father to a town from the way my father was engaged.

Now I want to tell you some little dark story that happened in the same town. There was a murder in the town while I was growing up. Outside the town, within a half a mile, the landscape would begin to go up the way and there were mountains all around us; we could see the mountains just by walking out of our homes. These were small mountains - we call them the Galtee Mountains. Up towards the mountains there was farmland and different animals - cows, sheep, and goats. One of the inhabitants of the town used to milk the cows and sell the milk throughout the town. As he went back to his farm at the foot of the mountains a classmate of mine, and he did this often, would jump up on the back of the man's cart. The man would reach back with his whip to get him off the cart. This ritual went on for quite some time and here’s the dark side of this terrible story. I once said the young man's name, he was a classmate of mine and that's enough for you to know.

The young man came down from his house at the bottom of the mountain a half a mile or so, came into the farmer’s yard and released one of the milk cows out into the dark of night, around 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning. Of course, the milk cows were very sensitive. The farmer himself somehow knew a cow had been released and got up so he could bring the cow back into the barn for the night. As he was leading the cow back into the barn, this classmate of mine came out from behind the door of the cow barn and killed the farmer with a sledge hammer.

My father, God rest his soul, got the word and went around the small town like lightning, I saw this for myself. Nobody pointed it out to me but I knew that somebody was dead and I also knew that my father didn't move from the bridge that day. He sat there hour, after hour, after hour. He used to do that every day anyway, sit on the bridge as the town passed in front of him all day long. People stopped to talk to him and then move on.

At the end of this particular day at 4:00 pm in the afternoon my father got up on his bicycle; bear in mind here you're talking about the law in our town, my father couldn't drive a car and yet he was ‘the law’. He got up on his bicycle, cycled up to the bottom of the mountain where there were seven homes and consciously and deliberately, went from house, to house, to house. When he came to the house of my classmate, my classmate got out the back window of the house and went up into the mountains, so my father knew who the killer was. It’s just like we say nowadays, “he psyched him out”. Two days later he came down off the mountains and the police picked him up.

Anyhow, I’m an Abba, a father, and we who are men are supposed to model the fatherhood of God for our children. Happy Father’s Day.

06/20/2026

FUNNY THING

Funny thing you can go through grade school, high school, college, seminary and over and over hear about the Twelve Apostles and all that Jesus said and did until the time that He was taken up. You can, like me, recite the names of the 12 Apostles from memory: Peter, Andrew, James, and John, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the Less and his brother Jude, Simon the Zealot and the traitor Judas.

Now a question for you. Are you ready? Did Jesus Our Lord have women disciples who like the twelve accompanied Him on His mission from city to city? And if He had women disciples, what were their names? Honestly, now do you know? St. Luke who was not one of the twelve, records in his gospel that Jesus Our Lord made His way through towns and villages preaching and proclaiming the Good News of the Kingdom of God. With him went the Twelve as well as certain women who had been cured of evil spirits and ailments: Mary, surnamed the Magdalene, from whom seven devils has gone out, Joanna, the wife of Herod’s steward Chuza, Susanna, and several others who provided for them out of their own resources.

Both Matthew and Mark have this to say about the women who were present on Calvary: There were some women watching from a distance. Among them were Mary from Magdala, Mary the mother of James the younger and Joset and Salome. They used to follow Him and look after Him when He was in Galilee. And there were many other women there who had come up to Jerusalem with Him. John in his gospel, mentions Mary by name as standing beneath the cross on which her son, the Son of God, hung in agony. And my point is? Simply that Jesus Our Lord has women disciples.

Are you a disciple? Do you believe that Jesus Our Lord is calling you daily to deny yourself and to daily take up your cross and follow him? This is what I know: I have been chosen by God, before the world began, to be holy, to be blameless in his sight, to be full of love. Me blameless, me holy, me full of love? Mary, Our Lord’s mother, has taught me that this can happen if The Holy Spirit comes upon me as He did upon her, if I am willing. She has taught me to say: “Be it done to me according to your Word, Lord God. I am your servant. Do in me what you will, do through me what you will, do with me what you will.” I am very aware that this “Do with me what you will” could lead to a terrible crucifixion ~ looking good on wood.

Notice, the words at Holy Mass – “Through Him, with Him, In Him O God, Almighty Father, in the unity of the Holy Spirit all glory and honor are yours forever and ever. Amen.”

06/19/2026

THIS CROSS BUSINESS

This “take up your cross” business gets to me. I can see Our Lord in my mind’s eye bruised, beaten, spat upon, under the weight of a cross, a heavy wooden cross on the way to being nailed to it. What’s my cross? What does it mean for me to take it up? M. Shawn Copeland said, “to follow Jesus Our Lord is to follow a way that requires us to take up the cross.” So, who’s M. Shawn Copeland? I’ve no idea who he is, other than he must be a child of Adam and I presume a child of God through Baptism. I read an article by him in America Magazine, the February 26, 2007 issue and he said that. Said what? What you just read, “To follow Jesus Our Lord is to follow a way that requires us to take up the cross.” Normally I wouldn’t pay much attention to a M. Shawn Copeland or anybody else for that matter who told me to take up the cross. What’s unique however about Mr. Copeland is that he attempts to say what he means by “Take up your cross.” We never know, he writes precisely, who or how the cross comes to us. The cross could be deep darkness of mind or heart, aching and persistent loneliness, foreclosure of a future, immeasurable loss, diminishment, breakdowns in society, the burden of speaking truth.

For a change, all of this makes sense to me. In my own wrestling with what it means to take up one’s daily cross I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s an active and passive cross. By active cross I mean the cross of every day self-denial, everyday giving stuff up, everyday dying to pride, covetousness, lust, anger, envy, gluttony, and sloth. By passive cross I mean the patient acceptance of what happens to us along the journey: sickness of mind and body, loneliness, not being wanted, being useless, being afraid, and on and on and on.

Cahir, County Tipperary, Ireland, about 1959, I’m 13 years old, I work summers for one of the town butchers in a slaughterhouse. So much blood, guts, skin, bones, guns, knives, salt, sheep and cattle. Among my many duties I lead lambs to the slaughter. One after the other, week after week, the butcher pressed the gun to the lamb’s skull, fired and week after week, lamb after lamb, they dropped to the floor dead. Then that day came when this one lamb did not drop to the floor dead.

The butcher had pulled the trigger, the noise filled the room, the lamb did not fall, it did nothing; it didn’t blink, it didn’t cry out. I can see it even now in my mind’s eye. The lamb’s horns had grown up under its skull at the place where the butcher placed the gun and the bullet bolt could not pierce the skull.

“I wonder what Isaiah the prophet saw that made him say of Christ 700 years before the Crucifixion – Like a lamb he is led to the slaughter, like a sheep before his shearer he was silent, not opening his mouth.”

06/18/2026

THE MRS. CONDON STORY

Time to tell the Mrs. Condon story again. In Cahir, County Tipperary, Ireland we had our traditions. When you passed the parish church for instance, you blessed yourself because Jesus Our Lord was in the tabernacle and sometimes you even made a visit. When you passed the parish priest on the street you always saluted him because he might be carrying Jesus in the sacred host to someone who was sick at home and couldn’t get out to Holy Mass anymore. Always, when a funeral passed, you stood and placed your hand over your heart.

‘Twas on one such occasion in fact, that my phobia about spiders began when while watching a funeral pass by, a large black spider fell on my head. So what does all that have to do with Mrs. Condon? Nothing much really, other than to tell you that the way we did shopping was a tradition too.

It was normal, at least for me, to do the shopping for my mom. You would be told, “Go to Mrs. Condon and get a pound of butter, or a pound of margarine, one dozen eggs, a pound of tea, and bread that was called “grinders” (why? I have no idea). This was most often paid for on the spot or you would say to Mrs. Condon if you didn’t have the money: “My mother says she’ll be in” and this meant put it on her bill and ‘twould be paid for later. Once having brought the shopping home and bear in mind that this was before I was seven years old, my mother handed me the tea, the pound of tea that I had just brought from the store and said, “bring this back to Mrs. Condon and tell her it’s two ounces short and tell her that it was two ounces short last week as well.”

Don’t you know I was very scared by what I had to do. I knew what it meant. Mrs. Condon was cheating. Mrs. Condon became wicked angry, she opened the tea bag and put a big scoop of tea in it. “Now”, she said as she handed it back to me, “that should satisfy her!” At this stage there is probably four ounces above and beyond what was rightly ours. When I brought this back to my mother she sent me back with it to Mrs. Condon and I was to say, “My mother doesn’t want this. She just wants fair weight.” I suppose this incident and others like it, formed a strong sense of justice in me, but also a fear that persists to this day. I get anxious and fearful when I have to confront anybody.

Did you know that an ancient Christian legend says that the spider has eight legs because he or she tried to pull the nails out of Christ’s hands and feet?

06/17/2026

THE WIND

One time the wind picked me up. I was going somewhere in our little town of Cahir, County Tipperary. Perhaps I was going to a Legion of Mary meeting; I belonged to the Junior Praesidium. I was walking along the sidewalk when all of a sudden, the wind caught me from behind and caused me to run right across the road and it crashed me into a railing some distance away without me being hurt. Even as I write this, I wonder at it. Nothing like it has happened since. Today when I think about the wind picking me up, it fills me with a longing for the Holy Spirit to pick me up without reserve. Breathe on me breath of God, my soul with grace refine, until this earthly part of me glows with your fire Divine.

On the day that Elijah the prophet was taken up, his disciple Elisha said to him, “Let me inherit a double share of your spirit.” “Your request is a difficult one”, Elijah said. “If you see me while I am being taken up, it shall be as you ask; if not, it will not be so.” Now as they walked on, talking as they went, a chariot of fire appeared and horses of fire coming between the two of them, and Elijah went up to Heaven in the whirlwind. Elisha saw Elijah being taken up and the spirit of Elijah came to rest on him.

It dawns on me as I write this that I already have what I am looking for: The Holy Spirit of God. Who is it in me that forgives sin, that changes bread into the Body of Christ, and wine into His blood? Well goodness gracious, me Patrick O’Doherty son of John and Catherine full of the Holy Spirit of Christ.

‘Twas June 13, 1970 that my mother the Church, one Holy Catholic and Apostolic, breathed on me, and laid hands on me and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit, if you forgive men’s sins they are forgiven them, if you hold them bound, they are held bound.” There was no sound of a rushing wind that day, there were no tongues of fire, no cracking of rocks, but the Holy Spirit came that day. I was prostrate on the floor that day. There were fifteen others most of whom are still alive, though that I know of three who have fallen asleep. My shoe lace was open and that preoccupied me for a time and I wondered would my mother, God rest her soul, have to leave the Ordination Ceremony; she being sick that day. But the Holy Spirit came that day and picked me up.

It’s been 56 years since that great and terrible day when I was ordained a priest forever in the Order of Melchizedek. Melchizedek was King of Salem and Priest of God Most High. He brought bread and wine – remind you of anyone? See also Genesis 14:17-24 and the New Testament Letter to the Hebrews 7:1-14.

06/16/2026

https://youtu.be/XLvKkdwJ6xU

This video is a reflection on parts of the Holy Mass and the ‘secre...

06/15/2026

DRESSING DOWN FOR CHURCH
It says in Scripture, “worship the Lord in holy attire.” (Psalm 96:9) We should ‘dress up’ for church. But why, for what reason? Some people say because the Church is the house of God and we should dress up out of reverence for God. Me, I don’t see it that way. We should dress up out of reverence for ourselves as children of God and out of reverence for one another.

Before ‘the Fall’, Adam and Eve were naked but felt no shame in front of one another or in front of God. Genesis says that “the Lord God walked with Adam in the cool of the evening” and the three of them were naked. Now what does it mean for God to be naked, I don’t know, but this Trinity of Adam, Eve and God felt no shame and were completely open to one another. Something changed and don’t talk to me about snakes. They say that there was someone else there – someone called Satan. They gave into him and ever since then we have a problem with our own nakedness. God doesn’t have a problem with it, but we do. The man and woman made loin cloths out of fig leaves and they hid from God among the trees of the Garden. So we should come to church “dressed up” not “down” out of respect for the weaknesses of one another. When God looks at woman naked or otherwise, He can say:

“How beautiful are your feet in their sandals,
O, prince’s daughter!
The curve of your thighs is like the curve of a necklace,
Work of a master hand.
Your navel is a bowl well rounded
With no lack of wine.
Your belly a heap of what
Surrounded with lilies.
Your two breasts are two fawns
Twins of a gazelle.
Your neck is an ivory tower.”

Now that’s God for you, but me, it would be easier, deferring to my wounded vision, if the two fawns would be fully clothed. “Cross your heart” living bra, etc. And ladies, I’m sure when you see us in our shorts and tee shirts, our knobby knees and hairy legs, you go into ecstasy:

“My beloved is fresh and ruddy,
To be know among ten thousand.
His head is golden, purest gold, his locks are palm fronds.
His eyes are doves at a pool of water.
His lips are lilies, distilling pure myrrh.
His belly a block of ivory, covered with sapphires.
His legs are alabaster columns, set in lockets of pure gold.”

Gentlemen, so that we might not be an occasion of sin to the ladies, let us too dress up for Church.