Next Easter it will be sixteen years since I began my ministry as Parish Priest at Parafield Gardens, in Adelaide. I will never forget that time because our eldest son, Aneurin, was very sick. He was eleven years old and he had to undergo several dangerous and difficult operations. Sue stayed with him in the Adelaide Children's Hospital while I travelled back and forth to the parish. But while he was there the Roman Catholic Chaplain visited Aneurin and gave him a little crucifix to pin on his theatre gown.

Then the day came for the most serious operation and Sue and I walked beside the barouche as they wheeled Aneurin in to the operating theatre. The theatre staff allowed him to wear his little crucifix, and he himself seemed quite calm. Sue and I were both terrified because we knew the dangers that he faced. Then someone, I have forgotten who, asked Aneurin, "Where is your guardian angel?" and he immediately replied, quite confidently, "Sitting on my toe!"

Aneurin survived that operation and the following one and made a full recovery. He still has the crucifix and he wears it all the time. And I pray always that his guardian angel will stay with him.

There are some people who don't believe in angels, and I suppose it depends on what you mean by angels. You can find angels in cemeteries and in some churches; those angels are made of stone. They are real enough, but they do not live. There are painted angels which are much more colourful, but often they are unrealistic, with lots of trailing white clothes and huge flapping feathery wings, with smiling faces and hands held together in prayer. And if you go down to Marrickville Metro and walk past the Post Office, you will see angels for sale, big ones and little ones, all with their name written on the base. You can buy a whole set of all seven Archangels, if you like. They are very pretty, but they are not real. Aneurin's angel is real. No one but he could see the guardian angel and it was lighter than a feather on his toe, but I know that a real angel was there.

If we look in the Bible, there are many angels. There is the angel with the sword of fire standing at the gate of the Garden of Eden to keep Adam and Eve out. There are the three angels who visited Abraham and Sarah to tell them that Isaac would be born. There is the Archangel Gabriel who came to announce the birth of John the Baptist and Jesus Christ.

In the book of Daniel we hear of a thousand thousands serving God and ten thousand times ten thousand attending him, while in the book of revelation the Archangel Michael, the commander of the host of heaven appears with the army of God to fight against the powers of darkness, and finally Jesus tells Nathanael that he will see the heavens opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.

There are many other descriptions of angels in the Bible, but there is no time to look at them all now. Some have a task to do, like guarding the Garden of Eden, others protect people and represent them before God, like the angels who helped Jesus in the wilderness after his temptation and the seven angels of the seven churches in Asia mentioned in the book of Revelation.

However, the most important task of angels is to be messengers of God. The angel in the burning bush brought to Moses the message of God's name. The angel who stood in front of Balaam's donkey came to tell him that what he was doing was wrong. The Archangel Gabriel brought tidings to Mary and to the Shepherds concerning the birth of Jesus. It is also said that the Archangel Raphael carries the prayers of the faithful up to God in heaven. No wonder that Jesus told Nathanael he would see the busy angels going back and forth to heaven.

How, then, do we recognise angels? The Bible tells us that they can look like ordinary mortals. Lot and the people of Sodom thought that Abraham's three heavenly visitors were just human strangers. Nowhere does the Bible say that angels have wings, strange how we always assume the wings. Cherubim and seraphim have wings, but not angels. Angels are often simply people sent from God with a message.

So, if you were an angel, what would the message from God be, and to whom would God want you to deliver it? I met the Bishop of Jerusalem on Friday, and he has a message from God. The message he carries is that it is impossible to bring peace by using war. And he takes this message to the leaders of Israel, of Palestine and Saudi Arabia, President Bush of the USA and Tony Blair of Britain, and this week he has been telling Australia. He never stops speaking openly and as honestly as he can God's message of reconciliation. This is the task God has given him and he does it tirelessly and passionately.

I have a message, too, and I do my best to tell it. God's love is for everyone. Each person in this world, every tiny fragment of God's creation, is the most precious part of God's creation. I may not be an angel, I may not be a particularly good messenger, and the message I have is not a new one; but I do want as many people as possible to know that they are, each one of them, God's most precious gift to creation. I learned the message from Jesus, who knew that if each person treated themselves as a precious gift of God, and treated others the same, then the pain and sin of the world would be healed.

So let me ask the question again, and I would ask you to think about it. If you had one thing to say to the people you love and the people you meet and the people with whom you do business, what would that one thing be? And if there is something that you can say, have you started saying it?