An Easter Day Feast For Everyone

The righteous will ask ‘When, Lord, did we see you hungry and feed you …?’ The King will reply, ‘I tell you, whenever you did this for one of the least important of these my brothers and sisters, you did it for me’. Matthew 25: 37, 40

The story is told that one Easter day, when King Oswald had sat down with Bishop Aidan, a silver dish was placed on the table before him full of rich foods. They had just raised their hands to ask a blessing on the bread when there came in an officer of the king, whose duty it was to relieve the needy, telling him that a very great multitude of poor people from every district were sitting in the precincts and asking alms of the king. He at once ordered the dainties which had been set in front of him to be carried to the poor, the dish to be broken up, and the pieces divided amongst them.

The bishop, who was sitting by, was delighted with this devoted action, grasped Oswald by the right hand, and said ‘May this hand never decay’. His blessing and his prayer were fulfilled in this way: when Oswald was killed in battle, his hand and arm were cut off from the rest of his body, and they have remained uncorrupt until this present time; they are in fact preserved in a silver shrine in St. Peter’s church, in the royal city (Bamburgh).

O beloved Father who has redeemed us
and who reigns serenely as sun and sea
may you forgive us our sins both past and present.
Remedy in heaven our faults
and may we today welcome with joy our Lord
An Timire collected by Sean O Floin.
Mount Melleray Monastery, Ireland