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30 Jul 10:00 am Thu
St Thomas - Coffee morning to 11:45
30 Jul 11:40 am Thu
St Thomas - Divine Mercy Chaplet
30 Jul 12:45 pm Thu
St Thomas - Mothers Prayer
31 Jul 07:15 am Fri
St Thomas - Fathers Prayers
06 Aug 12:30 pm Thu
St Thomas -Divine Mercy Chaplet, after Noon Mass
06 Aug 12:45 pm Thu
St Thomas - Mothers Prayer
03 Sep 10:00 am Thu
St Thomas - Coffee morning restarts 03 Sep
09 Sep 7:30 - 9:00 pm Wed
St Thomas - Bible Study - restart 09 Sep
The Parish Priest writes:
26JULY 2026 - SEVENTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
Dear Friends,
In today’s Gospel, Jesus speaks of two people who make an extraordinary discovery. One finds treasure hidden in a field; the other discovers a pearl of immense value. Both immediately sell everything they possess in order to obtain what they have found. At first glance, their actions may appear reckless. Why surrender everything for one field or one pearl? Yet their decision makes perfect sense because they recognise the true value of what stands before them. They know that what they are gaining is worth infinitely more than what they are leaving behind.
Jesus tells us that the Kingdom of Heaven is like this. Faith is sometimes presented mainly as a collection of duties: commandments to obey, sacrifices to make and things we are expected to give up. But the man in the Gospel does not sell everything reluctantly. Jesus tells us that he does so “in his joy”. He has found something so precious that everything else assumes its proper place.
The Christian life begins with this discovery: God is not merely one valuable part of our lives among many others. He is the treasure who gives value and meaning to everything else. When we truly encounter Christ, prayer ceases to be only an obligation, the commandments cease to seem like restrictions, and sacrifice is no longer simply a loss. They become our response to having found the One for whom our hearts were created.
The first reading shows us the wisdom needed to recognise this treasure. When God tells Solomon, “Ask what I shall give you,” Solomon could have requested wealth, power, victory or a long life. Instead, he asks for “an understanding mind” capable of discerning between good and evil. Solomon understands that the greatest gift is not possessing everything we desire, but knowing what is truly worth desiring. We face the same challenge. Our world constantly offers us its own “pearls”: success, comfort, possessions, admiration and security. Many of these things are good in themselves, but none of them can bear the weight of our deepest hopes. They are, as this Sunday’s Collect reminds us, “the good things that pass”. We should receive them gratefully and use them wisely, without confusing them with “those that ever endure”.
Let us remember, that the treasure is Christ himself. The pearl is life with him. Once we recognise their true value, following him is no longer a burden imposed upon us. It becomes the joyful choice of someone who knows what—and whom—is worth everything..
Fr Peter Kucharski (Parish Priest)
PRAYER FOR VOCATIONS
Gracious and loving God, we thank You for the gift of our priests, help them to be strong in their vocation and become instruments of Your love and grace. Send Your Holy Spirit to give courage and guidance to all You are calling to the Priesthood, Diaconate and Religious Life in our Archdiocese. May those called, hear Your voice, and respond wholeheartedly to become the person You have created them to be. Heavenly Father, form us all in the likeness of Your Son, Jesus Christ the Good Shepherd, so that we may love You more deeply and serve You more faithfully. We ask this through Christ Your Son, the Eternal High Priest. AMEN
PARISH PARTY. The overall total of our Parish Summer Party came to £ 5589.00. Thank you again to all who contributed for such a lovely celebration. The proceedings will support our church maintenance fund.
PARISH OFFICE. We will be closed from 17th to 31st of August. Office hours will resume on Tuesday 1st September. Some of the priests will be away as well during this period. If you have any queries, if possible, please wait until we are open again. Thank you for your understanding.
THURSDAY COFFEE MORNING. Enjoy company and cakes at St Thomas’ parish centre from 10:00am to 11:45am. The last one before the summer break is this Thursday 30th July. Meetings will restart on 3rd September.
RIDE + STRIDE FOR CHURCHES 2026 will be held on Saturday 12th September, from 10:00am to 6:00pm. Join us and cycle, walk or run around Kent's churches to raise money for their maintenance. Last year, more than £ 150,000 were raised, which was a record breaking amount. Sponsorships forms are available in the parish office. Email sevenoaks@rcaos.org.uk for information. If you can help welcoming the participants in our churches, let us know.
MENTAL WELLBEING. Sevenoaks Counselling is hosting the panel Raising Teens in a Digital World: How can we support our teenagers' mental wellbeing? on Tuesday 22nd September at 7:00pm at Otford Methodist Hall. The discussion will feature counsellors, young people and wellbeing professionals. The goal is to explore how parents can support teenagers as they navigate today's digital world. All are welcome.
FATHERS PRAYERS. Are you a father, godfather or grandfather? Are you concerned about the spiritual welfare of your children, grandchildren or godchildren? Would you like to meet like-minded men in the parish? If that's you, we are setting up a Fathers Prayers group and plan to meet on the last Friday of each month. Come when you can, bring a friend. No need to commit. Meetings will be at 7:15am in the St Thomas's parish centre. There’s the option of going to 8:00am Mass afterwards followed by coffee, croissants and fellowship for those who would like to stay. Text or WhatsApp James McBrien on 07713 152190 if you would like to join us.
REPOSITORY SHOP TIMES THIS WEEK.
Saturday 25th July: after 6:00pm Mass
Sunday 26th July: after 8:00am Mass; after 9:15am Mass; after 6:00pm Mass
Saturday 1st August: after 6:00pm Mass
Sunday 2nd August: after 8:00am Mass; after 11:15am Mass; after 6:00pm Mass
SUPPORTING SEVENOAKS (LOAVES AND FISHES) FOODBANK. The foodbank is very grateful for your continued support. They have really noticed the difference! Goods can be donated in the Tom Quinn porch or you can give financially (details on the Loaves and Fishes Sevenoaks Foodbank website). Current priorities are: tinned meat (e.g. chicken korma, stewed steak, Fray Bentos), pot noodles, biscuits and squash drinks. Just an extra item or two in your shopping trolley on a regular basis is so worthwhile. Thank you.
FAMILY RESOURCES. The CELEBRATE summer faith resources was created to encourage families to share the faith with their children. The pack contains faith filled activities, support for family prayer, books for different ages and film suggestions. The Summer Psalm Walk was designed to help explore Psalm 139 whilst walking in your local park or on holiday. Click here to access it.
The CELEBRATE festival is coming soon to Worth School and Abbey, West Sussex from 15th to 17th August. There will be speakers such as Fr Roberto Pasolini (Preacher to the Pope), masses, prayer time in Worth Abbey, fun and formation for children and young people aged 3-24. Camp in the field or stay in school accommodation. Weekend tickets also available. For information click here
CALLING ALL CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE. In the run-up to the 2026 National Eucharistic Congress ADOREMUS on Saturday 10th October, the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales is launching a national Catholic schools ART COMPETITION. Young people are invited to reflect creatively on themes such as the Blessed Sacrament, the presence of Jesus and the beauty of the cathedrals. Entries to be submitted by sending a photo of the artwork to artcompetition@christian.art by 15th September. Art experts will judge the categories 6-8, 9-12, 13-15 and 16-18 years old. Schools and pupils are encouraged to pray, imagine and create! For information, email info@christian.art.
ADORATION. There will be NO Adoration on Thursday and Friday 29th and 30th July at Most Holy Trinity.
FUNDRAISING FOR DIOCESAN LOURDES PILGRIMAGE. From Bishop Paul. One of the trustees of our Lourdes pilgrimage has been doing a sponsored walk to raise money to help disabled pilgrims to go to Lourdes. He will be in parts of Kent and SE London this week. If you would be willing to contribute, he has a fundraising page here
MARRIED COUPLES. Save the dates: September 8th, 15th, 22ndand 29th. The Growing in Faith Together for married and engaged couples is an ONLINE course, which has been developed in collaboration with the Southwark Marriage and Family Life team, the Agency for Evangelisation and Sycamore, a programme about the Catholic faith by Fr Stephen Wang, Bishop-Elect of Arundel and Brighton. Growing in Faith Together consists of four one hour-long sessions via Zoom and is a wonderful opportunity for: married couples to enrich their friendship and love and engaged couples who want to continue exploring their faith together. The next course begins on Tuesday September 8th at 8.30pm. For further information and to book a place, please email Carole .Thank you for responding to the call from +John Wilson to celebrate marriage together.
TRIP TO POLAND. Save the date for our Parish trip to Poland with Fr Peter in June 2027. Details to follow.
RESIDENTIAL FOR CHILDREN. Summertime 2026 will be held from 11th to 14th August in the Westminster Pastoral Centre. The price is £199. For children aged 11-15, this residential trip has the goal of deepening their catholic faith, in a great social atmosphere, including football, sports and visit to Thorpe Park. For details of how to get to the venue, with a coach laid on at St. Anselm’s, Dartford, contact the parish office or Fr. Stephen Boyle, chaplain to the Guild of St. Stephen or 01322 220075.
MOTHERS PRAYERS. The St Thomas’ Mothers Prayers group meets on Thursdays, after the 12:00noon Mass. We start at 12:45pm, in the parish centre, and we finish by 1:30pm. Mothers Prayers is for ALL women, even if you are not a biological mother. Age is not important either or whether you have young or adult children. We have grandmothers who pray for their grandchildren too. You can check the MP website here.
For dads, there is a Fathers Prayers movement. And the one for children is called Children of Faith, which helps children to pray for anyone or something they may be concerned about. For information, email the parish office
DIVINE MERCY. Pray the Divine Mercy chaplet every Thursday, starting at 11:40am, just before the 12:00noon Mass, at St Thomas’ church. All are welcome.
ROSARY. Every Saturday, after the 9:30am Mass, you are invited to pray the Rosary at St Thomas’ church. At the same time, there are also Confessions.
HOME VISITS. We would like to come closer to you by visiting your homes to chat about how we can improve our ministry. Sign-up forms are available in the porch to schedule a priest’s home visit. Think of a day and suitable time when you could receive a priest for a cup of tea or coffee and a friendly conversation (no longer than 45 minutes). If you wish, we can also bless your home. Visits will continue throughout the coming year, until next Christmas.
RETROUVAILLE. Does your marriage need some TLC? Need help with communication and trust? Retrouvaille helps marriages. It can bring hope and healing to relationships.
For information, go to www.retrouvaille.org.uk or call 07887 296983.
LISTENING TO YOU. The team welcomes anyone who would like to meet to be listened to in a safe, friendly and confidential environment, on an individual basis at a convenient time for them. If you want to make an appointment, contact the Parish Office.
SEVENOAKS COUNSELLING is a professional service offered by Christians to the whole community. We have provided a trusted, affordable counselling service to Sevenoaks and the surrounding district since 1983. We are welcoming and non-judgemental to everybody. We provide counselling which is professional and caring; confidential; tailored to individual needs, either short term or long term and offered by qualified and experienced therapists. Click on the website for information.
MASS INTENTIONS - A BEAUTIFUL WAY TO PRAY. We have available spaces for Mass intentions in the coming weeks. Offering a Mass for a loved one, whether living or deceased, is a profound act of love and faith. Please contact the parish office to reserve a date. Let us continue to pray for one another through the powerful gift of the Eucharist
SACRAMENT OF MARRIAGE. The Maryvale Institute is launching a new course this September, designed for all who wish to go deeper into the Sacrament of Marriage. It is for parish priests, counsellors, those working with married couples, and couples themselves. The course is rooted in the Church's richest theological tradition. The programme explores marriage as vocation, covenant, and a path of sanctification — not merely a ceremony, but a lifelong participation in Christ's love for the Church. It runs over six modules, designed to be both academically robust and accessible to participants without prior theological background. Details may be found HERE.
RECENTLY DIED
Joseph Patrick Murphy
Funeral on Friday 29th July at 2:30pm at St Thomas’
MAY HE REST IN PEACE
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A Question Worth Asking... Faith, reason and the Christian understanding of God
Recently, I was watching a debate between an atheist and a Christian speaker. The atheist asked a question that, I suspect, every Christian has heard at some point in their life: "Where did God come from?" I must admit, the Christian's answer was one of those little "mic drop" moments that immediately made me stop and think.
He began by explaining that if God is the Creator of everything that exists, then He cannot be part of the created order. The God of the Bible is not limited by time, space or matter because He is the One who created them.
He then made an interesting observation. Time, space and matter are all interconnected. If there were matter but no space, where would you put it? If there were space and matter but no time, when would you put it there? They belong together. He pointed to the opening words of Scripture: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." In his explanation, "in the beginning" refers to time, "the heavens" to space and "the earth" to matter. Whether or not that was the original intention of the biblical author is beside the point. It is a beautiful illustration of a profound truth: God is not something within the universe. He is its Creator.
As I listened to the debate, I realised that many of the questions atheists ask are not unreasonable questions at all. In fact, they are often very good questions. The problem is that they sometimes assume that Christians believe in God as simply the biggest and most powerful being somewhere "out there" in the universe. If that were true, then asking, "Who created God?" would be entirely logical. The Catholic faith, however, has always understood God rather differently.
For nearly two thousand years, Christians—and especially some of the greatest minds in our Catholic tradition—have reflected upon these questions. St Thomas Aquinas, one of the greatest philosophers and theologians the Church has ever produced, taught that God is not merely a being that exists. God is existence itself. Everything in creation depends upon Him at every moment for its existence (Summa Theologiae, I, q. 3, a. 4). That means God did not simply create the universe and then step back to watch it unfold. He is sustaining it in existence right now. Creation is not only something that happened; it is something that is happening. If God ceased willing creation to exist for even a moment, it would simply cease to be (Summa Theologiae, I, q. 104, a. 1).
This also explains why Catholics have never been afraid of science. Science tells us how the universe works. Theology asks why there is a universe at all. The two are not enemies because they are asking different questions. The more we discover about creation, the more we ought to marvel at its Creator.
There is another point from the debate that I particularly liked. The Christian speaker said that if God were small enough to fit entirely within our human minds, He would not be worth worshipping. There is something wonderfully humbling about that thought. Sometimes we approach God as if He were a difficult mathematical problem waiting to be solved. The reality is far greater. If God truly is the Creator of time, space and matter, then we should expect Him to be infinitely greater than our ability to comprehend Him fully.
Perhaps one of the greatest misconceptions in our culture today is that faith begins where reason ends. The Catholic Church has never taught that. We are not asked to stop asking questions when we become Christians. Quite the opposite. We are invited to ask the deepest questions imaginable: Why is there something rather than nothing? Why does the universe exist at all? Why are its laws intelligible? Why do we seek truth, beauty and goodness?
The Christian faith is not afraid of such questions. It has been engaging with them for centuries.
So, the next time someone asks you, "Where did God come from?", do not be afraid of the question. Instead, recognise that it is actually an invitation to a much deeper conversation. It may well be that the greatest mystery is not that God has no beginning, but that the God who created time chose to enter time in Jesus Christ so that we might know Him and share in His divine life.
That, I would suggest, is an answer worth reflecting upon.
Magnifica Humanitas — Pope Leo XIV
the Soul of the Human Person in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
With his first encyclical Magnifica Humanitas, Pope Leo XIV addresses one of the defining questions of our age: what happens to humanity when technology develops faster than moral wisdom?
At first glance, the document appears to focus on artificial intelligence, digital systems, and technological ethics. But beneath the discussion of algorithms and machines lies something much deeper. The encyclical is ultimately about the human person — about whether modern civilisation still understands what a human being truly is.
The title itself, Magnificent Humanity, reveals the Pope’s concern. Humanity is not magnificent because of technological achievement, productivity, or intellectual power. Human dignity comes from something far greater: that every person is created in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:27). Pope Leo deliberately places this encyclical within the tradition of Catholic social teaching. Just as Pope Leo XIII responded to the Industrial Revolution in Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo XIV now responds to a new digital revolution. But this time the danger is not only exploitation of human labour. It is the gradual reduction of the human person into data, efficiency, consumption, and controllable behaviour.
One of the strongest themes running through the document is the concentration of power. The Pope repeatedly warns about systems — political, technological, and economic — that increasingly gather influence into the hands of a small number of individuals or institutions. Artificial intelligence can become a tool not only of progress, but of manipulation: shaping opinions, controlling attention, influencing behaviour, and quietly reducing human freedom. In many ways, Pope Leo identifies one of the greatest temptations of modern civilisation: the desire to maximise power, productivity, and influence by extracting more and more from others. Human attention becomes a commodity. Relationships become transactional. Even silence and rest are treated as inefficiency.
Theologically, this reflects one of the oldest patterns of sin: the desire to dominate rather than to serve. This is why the encyclical repeatedly contrasts intelligence with wisdom. Artificial intelligence may analyse information, imitate speech, and organise knowledge, but it cannot love, repent, sacrifice, worship, or possess conscience. Human beings are not machines. We possess souls. We are capable of communion with God and with one another. No algorithm can reproduce this mystery. Pope Leo also warns that society increasingly risks losing its relationship with truth itself. Synthetic media, digital manipulation, and systems designed to influence emotion create a culture where reality becomes unstable. Here the encyclical echoes Christ’s own words: “The truth will make you free” (John 8:32). When truth is weakened, freedom itself begins to disappear.
Another major theme is work. The Pope strongly rejects the idea that human worth should be measured only by productivity or usefulness. Catholic theology has always understood work as participation in God’s creative action. Human labour possesses dignity because the worker possesses dignity. Technology should assist the human person, not slowly render humanity spiritually irrelevant.
The encyclical is particularly powerful when discussing autonomous weapons and AI-driven warfare. Machines may calculate probabilities, but only human beings can make moral judgments. To delegate decisions of life and death to systems without conscience is, for Pope Leo, a deeply dangerous step for civilisation.
Yet perhaps the deepest insight of Magnifica Humanitas is its spiritual diagnosis of modern humanity. The real crisis is not technological but theological. The danger is not simply that machines become more human-like, but that human beings begin living like machines: constantly connected yet isolated, endlessly stimulated yet spiritually empty, efficient yet incapable of contemplation.
At several points the Pope recalls the image of the Tower of Babel. Humanity again seeks greatness through its own power while attempting to build a civilisation without transcendence. The result is confusion, fragmentation, and loss of meaning.
The Christian response is therefore neither fear of technology nor blind enthusiasm for it. The Church does not reject scientific progress. Rather, she insists that every development must remain ordered towards the good of the human person and ultimately towards God.
In the end, Magnifica Humanitas is far more than an encyclical about artificial intelligence. It is a warning about a civilisation that risks losing its soul. And at the same time, it is a call to rediscover what it truly means to be human.
St Thomas of Canterbury, pray for us.
St Joseph, pray for us.
St Bernadette, pray for us.
St Edith of Kemsing, pray for us.
Fr Peter Kucharski, Parish Priest of Sevenoaks
12 Granville Road email
Sevenoaks 01732 454177
TN13 1ER