Patrick Comerford
We are in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and this week began with the First Sunday after Trinity (Trinity I, 7 June 2026). The Church Calendar today commemorates Saint Barnabas the Apostle (11 June).
Later day, I plan to meet a visiting writer from New Zealand at lunchtime in London. I hope to be back in Stony Stratford this evening in time to watch the openi match of the World Cup, between Mexico and South Africa, although this time round I plan to watch only matches played in Mexico and Canada, and to avoid any matches played at venues in the US, in my own personal protest against the Trump regime and the way it has hijacked this World Cup in very politically-motivated way. Before today begins, meanwhile, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:
1, reading today’s Gospel reading;
2, a short reflection;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
John 15: 12-17 (NRSVA):
[Jesus said:] 12 ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13 No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. 16 You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. 17 I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.’
Today’s Reflection:
Later this month, I hope to mark the 25th anniversary of my ordination as pariest in 2001 and the 26th anniversary of my ordination as deacon in 2000. Shortly before my ordination, over diner with our friend Canon Norman Ruddock at the Rectory in Wexford, Bishop Noel Willoughby, told me about what he called his ‘Barnabas File.’
He had retired as Bishop of Cashel and Ossory and was then living in Wexford. As a bishop, he told me, he regularly got letters moaning and groaning about what he had done or what he had failed to do. He read them, acted on them if he needed to, and then dumped them. But when he got encouraging letters, praising him, or just simply nice letters, he filed them away in his ‘Barnabas File’ and then take them out and read them when the pressures of ministry and the critics were grinding him down. Those letter writers were to him what Saint Barnabas was to the Apostle Paul on their shared missionary journeys.
In the Church Calendar, today is the Feast of Saint Barnabas. The lectionary readings for the Eucharist today include Acts 11: 19-30, set in Antioch, where we are called Christians for the first time. Earlier, Barnabas had sold all his goods and had given his money to the apostles in Jerusalem (Acts 4: 36-37). Now, in Acts 11, Barnabas arrives in Antioch. He then brings Saul from Tarsus to Antioch, and the two are sent out together.
Barnabas and Paul travel together for such a long time that their names are almost inseparable. When a dispute arises about taking John Mark with them, that dispute ends with Paul and Barnabas taking separate routes.
In today’s Gospel reading (John 15: 12-17), we are reminded that the great commandment Christ gives us is to love one another as Christ loves us (verse 12), and that we are called to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last (verse 16).
Christ tells us we have been given his commands so that we may love one another (verse 17). If we love one another, and if that becomes our priority in ministry, then we too can be like Barnabas to the other Pauls we meet in our Christian life.
Love one another. And that is enough.
Today’s Prayers (Thursday 11 June 2026, Saint Barnabas the Apostle):
In Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), the theme this week, from 7 to 13 June 2026 (pp 8-9), is ‘Safe Churches in Zambia’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a programme update from Fran Mate, Senior Regional Manager for Africa, USPG.
The USPG prayer diary today (Thursday 11 June 2026, Saint Barnabas the Apostle) invites us to pray:
God of encouragement, as Saint Barnabas strengthened the early Church, strengthen leaders in Zambia. Help them build churches where every person is treated with dignity and respect.
The Collect:
Bountiful God, giver of all gifts,
who poured your Spirit upon your servant Barnabas
and gave him grace to encourage others:
help us, by his example,
to be generous in our judgements
and unselfish in our service;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post Communion Prayer:
Almighty God,
who on the day of Pentecost
sent your Holy Spirit to the apostles
with the wind from heaven and in tongues of flame,
filling them with joy and boldness to preach the gospel:
by the power of the same Spirit
strengthen us to witness to your truth
and to draw everyone to the fire of your love;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Yesterday’s Reflections
Continued Tomorrow
With Canon Norman Ruddock (left) and Bishop Noel Willoughby (right) in Wexford in 1998 … a reminder of the ‘Barnabas Files’Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
