St Agnes' Catholic Parish

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A welcoming Catholic community in the heart of Port Macquarie, supporting people at every stage of life — through compassionate aged care, quality education and training, pastoral care, and vital community and family services.

A few weeks ago, we kicked off Term 3 at Encounter Youth & Kids with the theme Being Lukewarm. 🔥❄️ Our youth worked toge...
26/08/2026

A few weeks ago, we kicked off Term 3 at Encounter Youth & Kids with the theme Being Lukewarm. 🔥❄️ Our youth worked together to unfreeze frozen T-shirts before Ashlinn shared her faith journey and challenged us to reflect on what might be holding us back from fully living our faith.
We look forward to a social night this Friday! See you there! 5.30pm - 7.30pm at the St Agnes' Community Centre!

25/08/2026

Fr Paul reads from the Gospel of Matthew (23: 27-32) in which Jesus draws attention to the double standards of the scribes and Pharisees, saying ‘Alas for you, you hypocrites!’

Fr Paul says in this Gospel we hear the last two of the seven ‘Woes!’ or ‘alas’ and they take on a darker hue, twice Jesus mentions dusty and unclean tombs.

Jesus also condemns the Pharisees for thinking they were different from their ancestors and would never have shed the blood of the prophets if they had been alive in those days.

So, Jesus calls them hypocrites, not once, but three times in this Gospel.

The Gospel today is challenging us to look at our own lives. We, too, can be easily blind to our own hypocrisies that exist in our lives just like the Pharisees were.

In closing, for our reflection Fr Paul invites us to consider, ‘What are those hypocrisies in my life at the moment?

24/08/2026

Fr Paul reads from the Gospel of Matthew (23: 23-26) in which Jesus takes the Scribes and Pharisees to task over neglecting weightier matters of the law—justice, mercy and good faith.

Fr Paul says, today, we hear Jesus criticise the Scribes and Pharisees, basically, because they have become obsessed with every little detail, and they have missed the bigger picture. This is the meaning of what Jesus says in the Gospel - that one minute they are straining out gnats and the next trying to swallow camels. The Scribes and the Pharisees also had a problem with appearances. Yes, it looks good on the outside but what about the mess on the inside.

So, the Scribes and the Pharisees sit on their self-centred pedestals. Pedestals they created themselves. They are just not real. They do not understand what life is about.

Fr Paul notes, it is three times now that the writer of Matthew insists that what God wants is not the ritual of sacrifice and all the bits and pieces that go with it. What God wants is a genuine openness and a gift of oneself.

23/08/2026

Today as we celebrate the feast of St Bartholomew, Fr Paul Gooley reads from the Gospel of John (1: 45-51) in which Jesus seeing Nathanael approaching said, ‘There is an Israelite, who deserves the name incapable of deceit.’ Nathanael responds asking Jesus, ‘How do you know me?'.

Fr Paul says Bartholomew was born at Cana and brought by the Apostle Philip to meet Jesus. Nothing further is known for certain. Eusebius speaks of him in India, but the Roman Martyrology has him martyred in Armenia, skinned alive according to the Persian custom.

Because his relics were enshrined on an island in the Tiber that is principally used as a hospital, he has become a patron saint of the sick.

On this day, Fr Paul invites us to ask, ‘St Bartholomew…pray for us!’

21/08/2026

Fr Paul reads from the Gospel of Luke (1: 26-38) in which God sends the angel Gabriel to the town of Nazareth in Galilee to visit Mary. Afterwards, Fr Paul shares a little about the memorial of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which is celebrate today.

Fr Paul says, the doctrine of the Assumption was promulgated in 1951, and we had its feast last week on the 15 August. As was normal for the greater feasts, this celebration went for a week afterwards, and today’s memorial of Our Lady, Mother and Queen, marks the conclusion of that period of celebration.

Today we remember that the Blessed Virgin reigns in heaven together with her Son. She reigns not because she is in any way equal to God but because she is the mother of Christ the King. Her privileges come from her willingly agreeing to become the Mother of God and make our redemption possible.

So today, Fr Paul invites us to pray:

Hail, Mary, full of grace,
the Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou amongst women
and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God,
pray for us sinners,
now and at the hour of our death.
Amen.

20/08/2026

Fr Paul reads from the Gospel of John (21: 15-17) in which Jesus asks Peter ‘do you love me?’ and invites him to ‘feed his sheep’. Afterwards, Fr Paul shares a little about the life of St Pius X, Pope whose memorial we celebrate today.

Fr Paul says, Pius was born in the village of Riese, near Venice, and was one of ten children of a very poor family. He was ordained to the priesthood at the age of 23. He was successively bishop of Mantua and of Venice, and was elected Pope, against his wishes, in 1903.

In his time as Pope, Pius sought to “restore all things in Christ”. He campaigned for the freedom of the Church from state control. He revised the code of Canon Law, founded an institute for scriptural studies, and initiated the revision of the Latin translation of the Bible (the Vulgate) and the reform of the liturgy.

Pius lived in great poverty even when he was Pope, and preached sermons every Sunday in the courtyards of the Vatican, to any who would listen. In his simplicity and goodness of heart, he performed miracles even when he was alive, and the clamour for his canonization started immediately after his death on 20 August 1914, broken-hearted at the outbreak of the First World War.

So today, Fr Paul invites us to ask, ‘St Pius… Pray for us!’.

From community participation and in-home disability support to supported independent living, St Agnes’ Catholic Parish h...
19/08/2026

From community participation and in-home disability support to supported independent living, St Agnes’ Catholic Parish has worked alongside NDIS participants, people who experience disability and their families for over 30 years.

At the Parish, we make sure that our disability services are shaped around each person – with our team taking the time to understand what matters most to individuals and their families.

Part of that team is support worker Michael Daley, who recently accompanied Ian Newnham to a country music event.

This story reflects how the Parish is , providing person-centred disability supports that help people pursue their goals and stay connected through every stage of life.

Read more: https://tinyurl.com/2yxn3jkn

19/08/2026

Fr Paul reads from the Gospel of John (17:20-26) in which Jesus prays, ‘Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, so that they may always see the glory you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world’. Afterwards, Fr Paul shares a little about the life of St Bernard of Clairvaux, whose memorial we celebrate today.

Fr Paul says, Bernard was born near Dijon, in France, in 1090, of a noble family. In 1112 he joined the new monastery at Cîteaux. This had been founded fourteen years before, in a bid to reject the laxity and riches of the Benedictine Order and to return to a primitive poverty and austerity of life.

Bernard arrived at Cîteaux with four of his five brothers and two dozen friends. Within three years he had been sent out to found a new monastery at Clairvaux, in Champagne, where he remained abbot for the rest of his life. By the time of his death, the Cistercian Order had grown from one house to 343 of which 68 were daughter houses of Clairvaux itself.

Bernard was a man of great holiness and wisdom, and although he was often in very poor health, he was active in many of the great public debates of the time. He strongly opposed the luxurious lives of some of the clergy and fought against the persecution of the Jews. He was also a prolific writer, of an inspiring, rather than a technical, kind.

He died in the year 1153.

So today, Fr Paul invites us to ask, ‘St Bernard… Pray for us!’.

18/08/2026

Fr Paul reads from the Gospel of Matthew (20: 1-16) in which the Jesus tells his disciples the parable of the workers in the vineyard.

In Jesus’ time, as Fr Paul says we hear in this Gospel, workers would go to the marketplace and wait until someone hired them. Sometimes they were lucky, and they got a full day’s work, but others were not so lucky and often it was only a half a day’s work or less, or no work at all. Fortunately, the owner of the vineyard mentioned in the Gospel today was kind and gave all the workers a day’s wage including those, who through no fault of their own had worked just that one hour.

With this lesson in mind, Fr Paul says we might reflect today on ‘How can we be generous to others ….. just as this owner of the vineyard was and just as God is?’.

Every three minutes, someone in Australia reaches out for help because of domestic and family violence. For many people,...
18/08/2026

Every three minutes, someone in Australia reaches out for help because of domestic and family violence. For many people, access to a safe mobile phone can be a vital lifeline.

St Agnes' is proud to support DV Safe Phone, a national program that collects and repurposes mobile phones for people experiencing domestic violence.

Thanks to the generosity of our staff and community, we've already collected 60 phones in our latest donation drive, and now we're aiming for 100!

If you have an old mobile phone tucked away in a drawer, consider donating it. Before donating, please factory reset your phone to remove any personal data.

Phones can be dropped off at the Parish Administration Centre, 49 Hay Street, Port Macquarie between 8.30am to 4.30pm.

Every phone donated makes a difference. Together, we can provide safety, connection and hope to those who need it most.

Address

49 Hay Street
Port Macquarie, NSW
2444

Opening Hours

Monday 8:30am - 4:30pm
Tuesday 8:30am - 4:30pm
Wednesday 8:30am - 4:30pm
Thursday 8:30am - 4:30pm
Friday 8:30am - 4:30pm

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