14.03.2026
‘We stand in solidarity with those who suffer afresh in the region’
Archbishop Michael Jackson and a number of clergy from the United Dioceses of Dublin & Glendalough were to travel to Jerusalem this coming week for a joint retreat with the Archbishop and clergy of our partners in the Diocese of Jerusalem. The outbreak of war has meant that it is not possible to travel. Archbishop Jackson has shared a reflection for the coming week and urges people of Dublin & Glendalough to pray for their brothers and sisters in Christ in the Diocese of Jerusalem and to read the passage of Scripture which will be the focus of a shared online retreat this Wednesday (March 18 2026).
Mothering Sunday was to have had a special resonance both for me and for the clergy who were to accompany me on a shared retreat with the clergy of the Diocese of Jerusalem in Jerusalem itself. Sunday was to have been the day of our outward travel.
The impact of walking the holy way in Jerusalem is never to be underestimated and at this time of Lenten preparation for Easter was going to be particularly evocative.
International events intervened and have rendered such travel impossible. We have nonetheless been enabled to share in a half day Retreat on line on Wednesday March 18th with the clergy and Archbishop there. This will have as its Scriptural focus Romans 8.35–39 which confronts all the forces that seek to separate us from the love of Christ.
As we stand in solidarity with those who suffer and with those who suffer afresh through war in the region we mourn with them in their living bereavement and pray for them daily.
I encourage all members of our diocese to pray for them and if possible to read somewhere at some time Romans 8.35–39 on Wednesday in a Christ–like solidarity.
You are encouraged to let the final hope of that passage ring in your ears on that day not least as on March 19th a member of that diocese is to be ordained. It is the Feast of Joseph of Nazareth.
“…. nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
May you all receive blessing from God Almighty in these dark days when ironically the daylight lengthens for us at home and in security.
+Michael
Dublin and Glendalough
Romans 8:35–39
35 Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 As it is written,
‘For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.’
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.