Feast of St Andrew the Apostle

Fr Paul reminds us that today we not only celebrate the Feast of St Andrew the Apostle but also the beginning of our Church’s new liturgical year. He then reads from Matthew’s Gospel (4: 18-22) about Jesus inviting two sets of brothers Simon and Andrew, and James and John to follow him and be his disciples.

Andrew was born in Bethsaida in Gallilee and, as we hear in today’s Gospel, he worked as a fisherman. Fr Paul says it is thought Andrew may have been a disciple of John the Baptist first. We know Andrew was one of the first to follow Jesus.  In one of the Gospels, Andrew introduces his brother, Simon Peter, to Jesus.

We celebrate Andrew because he was one of the twelve disciples and he has been widely venerated since ancient times.

As we reflect today on this feast of St Andrew, Fr Pauls says we might ask him to pray for us.

At the end of today’s reflection, Fr Paul adds a postscript about the Church’s liturgical year, saying:

Our Church each weekend celebrates the readings we have, which are in a three-year cycle (Year A, Year B, Year C).  Having just completed the liturgical year readings for Year A, we now enter into the readings for Year B.  These readings will continue throughout the year until Advent next year.

We also make a change for our weekday Masses, which has a two-year reading cycle. We have Year 1 and Year 2 and just having finished the Year 2 cycle we now return to the Year 1 readings.