CHRISTMAS CRAFT FAIR in Kilbrittain Hall on Sunday November 22nd from 2 - 6 pm.  Admission Free.  Local crafts available.  Organised by Kflbrittain Parents Association.

WEST CORK ADULT LEARNING offers free help with Texting at the Education Centre, Bridewell House, Pearse Street, Bandon.  Contact Raymond (023)8842870

BANDON GA.A. Mass for the deceased members of the club will be celebrated in the Pavilion on Friday 20th November at 8.00 pm.

BANDON CHRISTMAS COAL FUND A.G.M. Monday November 16th at 8pm Collection Saturday 5th, Sunday 6th December.

A FUNDRAISING DANCE IN AID OF CASTLELACK NATIONAL SCHOOL at the Casteleahan Enniskeane on Saturday 2 Ist November 2009 at lopm.  Music by Michael Collins Band.

CUMANN SEANCHAIS NA BANNDAN, BANDON LOCAL HISTORY SOCIETY A talk will be given by Seamus Crowley of Mallow on The St. Legers of Doneraile Park on Wednesday 18 th November at 8p.m. at the Parish Centre ar the rear of St. Patrick's Church, Bandon.  New members very welcome to join on the evening.

BANDON S.VP. Due to difficult times above Society requests that all those wishing to be considered for Christmas Help should make written application on or before Dec 8th.  Details of all residents especially children are required.  Please give your telephone number.  This time in needed to budget our resources carefully.  Applications can be left in box at rear of Church or in our secure box at the shop in Weir St, Bandon.

BANDON FLOWER CLUB Annual dinner and demonstration by Margaret AhemkG.I.FA on Monday 16 th at 7.30 in the Munster Arms Hotel.  Tickets available from June 8842167 or Geraldine 8841068 or any Committee member.

WRIGGLETTO relaxed weekly music and movement classes for you and your pre-school child (infant to age 5).  New term begins in December in Bandon.  Songs, chants, movement, dance, instrument play, famfly ftin!  Try it out for free - reserve a demo space or hear more by calling Mairead Gallagher at 0214776908.

COMMUNITY CHOIR Practices for the Community Carol service commenced Thursday, November 12th at 8.30p.m. in St. Peter's Church, Bandon.  They only take an hour each Thursday.  Community Carol Service will take place in St. Peter's Church this year on Friday December 18th at 8pm.  All welcome to practices and to Carol Service.

ST.  FINBARR CATHEDRAL JUNIOR CHOIR will sing EVENSONG at St. Peter's Church, Bandon on Saturday November 21st at 7pm.  AU welcome.

GAGGIN Bazaar will be held on Friday November 20th at 8.30 pm in Gaggin Community Haft.  Home baking a speciality.  Your support would be appreciated and all are very welcome.

BANDON & DISTRICT SOROPTIMIST are holding a gramophone evening in Bandon Golf Club at 8pm on Friday 27th November.  Proceeds go to caring for carers.

ST.  BROGAN'S COLLEGE BANDON OPEN EVENING Thursday 19th November 2009. 7.00pm to 8.30pm. Principat's address at 8.30pm

Warnings of things yet to come are theme today, even the Son knows little about them.  Scarce comfort, then, for us mere mortals trying to make sense of it all in a world already well touched by disaster.  End times are a constant preoccupation of the Christian mindset but the events often described are usually starkly familiar.  Wars, rumours of wars, disease and famine: we could open newspaper or listen to the voices from the pulpit of television news and know that these things are happening here and now.  There's nothing new here except, perhaps, our ongoing ability to reach new heights of de-sensitisation to it all.

If we were to be ready, here and now, for the second coming of Christ, that cosmic coming together of heaven and earth then we could perhaps look anew at that first coming and contemplate the outrageousness of it all.  If we think the second coming, as spoken of in scripture, is extraordinary, then the first is even more then that.  From manager to gallows and in between, that coming is one which we can also be de-sensitised to.  But while disasters and wars only seek to destroy, the incarnation redeems and makes new.

It is easy to talk of things in the future, they have yet to happen; but to talk of things in the here and now is more difficult.  Wars and disasters happen to our world in the here and now and it was the same for the people who listened to and wrote about Jesus.

The salutary lesson of today's Gospel reading, and indeed every Gospel reading, is here and now.  If we could contemplate the reality of this world, touched by God in Christ, then perhaps our base and fundamentalist nature (from which none of us is exempt) might stop talking of disasters and punishment in the future and instead look at those things that happen now and recoil in horror at how we refuse to recognise Christ in those around us, waiting for a future disaster while our current one unfolds before our eyes.