Farewell

Opening: Gracious God, as every Eucharist is the most beautiful goodbye sign of a most beautiful person, Jesus, we learn to say goodbye, through the same Eucharist, to persons and places we love; persons who have become part of us and persons we'd miss, and places that have become familiar and nostalgic that it is difficult to leave and yet we accept to say goodbye in the same spirit of painful love that turns our sadness into gladness. As this community pauses today in prayer with our dear sisters Bashona, Kolpona, Mala, Mitali and Mrinalini and as we entrust them to your care during their journey back to Bangladesh, we ask you to enable us to remember that we are all pilgrims on this earth and we have no permanent home. May they carry with them the love, support and learning they have received and be generous and fruitful in the service of the Lord. Offertory: Stay with us, Lord, on the road we are following. Warm our hearts to receive you; open our eyes to discover that life is stronger than death. When the desert begins to invade our lives and everything seems to be withering, let the springs well forth and the skies pour down manna and the poverty of our hearts and the scantiness of our gifts spring forth abundance by your graces as you transform all things. As your son takes his place at this table and at the centre of our homes and our hearts, may he multiply for all the bread that gladdens their hearts. Preface: Father of pilgrims, we gather together to praise and bless you.

Your name is faithful one and your love is everlasting. We have come to experience your love in many ways as life's pilgrims. We thank you for the Spirit you breathe into us, a wandering spirit, a challenging spirit, an assuring spirit, an accompanying spirit; for eyes that guide us, for feet that plod the paths, for occasional signposts when we have lost our way. We thank you for your love, which gives our journey meaning and direction. You bless us with your divine restlessness. You prod us from our complacency. You urge us down roads and places we do not feel strong enough to travel. You urge us down communities that we do not feel at ease to live in. Yet you urge us. But you support us with fellow travellers who bolster us when we despair; who refresh and renew us when we think our last step has come. For all those pilgrims who have gone before us and pointed the way to you, for Abraham and Sarah, Moses and Miriam, Jonas and we give you thanks, Father. But most of all we thank you for your greatest pilgrim, Jesus Christ. He is the one who walks on our Emmaus of disappointments and sadness, of hopelessness and despair. He opens our eyes. With him and with all the pilgrims in our congregation, we shall never cease to praise you and thank you and so, we sing. Breaking of Bread: We bless you, Lord, the lover of life. The bread broken between our hands is already the flesh for a new world in which all will be brothers and sisters. May this Eucharist look forward to the table that you will set for us in your Kingdom, forever and ever. Amen Goodbye: Guardian, guide, no pillar of cloud by day nor fire by night; yet we sense your presence with us, God of the journey. You are

walking with us into the lands we go. You are guarding us in our vulnerable moments. You are dwelling within us as we depart from one place to another. We have experienced your promise to be our peace as we faced the struggles of distance from friends and family, security and certainty, the planting of feet and heart in strange places. Renew in us a deep trust in you. Calm our anxiousness. As we reflect on our past life we may clearly see how you have been there in all our leavings, you have been there in all my comings. You will always be with us in everything. We do not know how we will be resettled, but we place our life into the welcoming arms of your love. Encircle our hearts with your peace. May your powerful presence run like a strong thread through the fibres of our being. Amen