There are almost forty...

...young people in the Confirmation group in the local parish. I was invited to talk to them yesterday evening, a great crowd all gathered for a very well structured series of classes, tackled with enthusiasm and excellently organised, led by cheery young curate. They are all choosing Confirmation names and my job was to talk about saints, the role they play in the life of the Church, how they fit into the calendar, etc. Gives a sudden sense of the huge sweep of things when you find yourself thinking about the saints mentioned in the New Testament, and then remembering talking to some one who is now on the way to being canonised - a chat with Mother Teresa at a conference in Germany back in 1989...

The team helping with Confirmation preparation includes a couple of men from the diocesan seminary, enthusiastic, dedicated and cheerful. It prompted me to look at the website which is very good - check out the blog listed on its home page too.

On my bike...

...to Wimbledon for a meeting about a book on which I have been working. This is a book which has been a special project, and to which I have given part of my heart. (I'll be telling you more about it all later...)

On to London with joy. Collected some brochures re Tamezin magazine's Young Writer Award for a talk I am giving in a school tomorrow. (Would you like a talk about the magazine - it's for teenage girls - in your school? An opportunity for young writers to get into print, find out about journalism... Interested? Send me a comment to this Blog, with an email address - which I won't publish - where I can reach you). Cup of tea with Patti F. a friend from ACW. No cake as it is Lent. Lots of chat - committee meeting tomorrow and ACW has all sorts of good plans for the future...

Cycled back - crossed the river, thought I'd ride to Clapham Junction rather than Victoria or Waterloo. A lovely ride through Battersea Park in the dark - haven't been there since a sponsored "Walk the Bridges of London" event in aid of some pro-life cause some years back...

Approaching Clapham Jn I suddenly got a bit muddled, stopped to work out where I was...and there, approaching cheerily, briefcase in hand, was a friend from the Catholic Cultural Group! After mutual golly-fancy-meeting-you chat, we talked and talked...made plans for some future CCG meetings...

Then, golly, at Clapham Jn station, another friend, this time from the Assn of Catholics in Education...London seems full of Catholic contacts...

Home lateish. Jamie busy with a friend, P., working on some detailed legal stuff...I had some some supper but they hadn't organised themselves properly to get it ready, and were famished. Last summer I bottled lots of blackberries and apples. I am glad I did, as I was able to make a quick blackberry-n-apple-charlotte which was cooking cosily as we ate the first course. Big mugs of tea. More talk... a good day.

In the end...

...I didn't go to Westmin Cathedral. Too complicated a day, with a hectic rush to meet a deadline in the morning, then other features to be written through the day, and lots of admin. and phone calls and things. So it was the Jesuit church at Wimbledon at 7.30pm instead...I'd forgotten how large the church is, and if was full, full, of people, and there we were with the lady next to me sharing her hymn sheet and we were singing "To that cross my sins have nailed Him...." Long silent lines of people trooping up to receive ashes on foreheads. The choir sang Ave verum corpus at Communion. Large crowds so it was long, but beautiful...home late by bike.

I promised...

...to give occasional reports on how things are going with the BA Divinity course, done through Maryvale. For those unfamiliar with this, it's a course run partly by correspondence, with occasional sessions of lectures held at Maryvale (Old Oscott House, near Birmingham - lovely old place with recusant connections).

My latest essay came back today, duly marked, and I fell on it with quivering fingers to find out what mark I had got. It was a pleasing one and made all the work and worry worthwhile. Jamie beamed. I beamed. Well, actually I danced around a bit.

Next essay tackling philosophy doesn't seem so daunting now.

The Maryvale academic team produce systematic material which arrives regularly, along with reading lists, supplementary notes, etc. There is great efficiency on all the smaller details such as arrangements for exams (July! gulp...) and for the various weekend lectures.

At Maryvale itself there are some rather endearing aspects to life,centred on the age of the house and the financial limitations of a Catholic institution... my personal favourite is the neat piece of paper on the dining-room notice-board, where you make a tick if you want an egg for breakfast.

A catalogue...

...(unsolicited) arrives from a publisher of Lefebvrist books. They are still energetically promoting a Hermeneutic of Rupture. The brochure enthuses:"Lest we forget the doctrinal questions at stake at this time, this book presents a rigorous comparison of Catholic teachings before and after the Second Vatican Council. Set out as a comparative study, with novel teachings alongside Catholic teachings. Very useful."

So no sign of any question of a Hermeneutic of Continuity from these people, then. A pity.

Ash Wednesday...

...is looming as I write this. I have just one and a half hours to eat any cake there is left in the house. Then it's Lent.

Westminster Cathedral is a particularly dramatic place to go and get ashes, partly because it's always so crowded. Also, I could whizz off by bike and take a quick look at the new statue of the Queen Mum just unveiled nearby. I suppose that wouldn't be a particularly Lenten thing to do, but it would be vaguely reassuring in these messy times. A neighbour just popped over as I started writing this evening, with a copy of an indignant letter he'd written to a newspaper, complaining about Govt corruption ( and golly, I agree with him - see my own earlier post, below)and wanting to talk about it. Things are so all-wrong in our poor old country at the moment. Well, that's something to pray about in Lent, of course....

This pic ...

...of the Easter candle has been produced by a parish in Bath - they've turned it into cards which are now on sale for parish funds. Interested? Contact the organiser of the project by emailing malcolmkirkham@tiscali.co.uk

I think this is a good initiative - and I know and like the parish, having been given hospitality there: the parish priest is also chaplain to Bath University.

Spent today...

... on housework, then 2 features for the Catholic Times, some editing on the Catholic Heroines book (which is coming along nicely) and then a loooooong session with mugs of tea, working on the Philosophy for my BA.

At our lectures recently, along with the reading list, and other material came a memo noting various points and reminding us that JPII's first message was "Do not be afraid" - Not even of Philosophy!

It is very dreary...

...reading about the corruption in our Government. The Home Secretary is some one called Jacqui Smith, and she has been pretending that her sister's house in London, where she sometimes sleeps during the week, is her main home, because that way she can claim some sort of extra funding, for her actual home, which she shares with her husband and children and of course spends most of her time. This sort of thing would, just a few years ago, have been a resigning matter. But not now.

I've added...

...a couple of new Blogs to my "Where auntie looks and lingers...." so do click on and enjoy...

To Mass...

...at St Elphege's, Wallington, possibly one of the ugliest churches in Britain,but with happy associations for me, and a large thriving parish with lots and lots of young families. Also older people whom I have known virtually all my life...and who know me...bought marmalade (cash raised goes to charity) from Mary T., exchanged greetings with Fr H. the parish priest, swapped news with various friends... chatted to a lady whose family I knew way way back...a Sunday Mass like this somehow gives a sense of having roots and seeing the Faith and the Mass as being deep in the life of every ordinary Catholic down all the centuries.

And no, that doesn't mean that the marmalade and the friendly chat after Mass were the central part of it all, quite the contrary. A modern church well-filled, a procession with Cross and candles,the back-and-forth of voices raised in familiar responses, a Host and Chalice held high by a priest, people shuffling forward for Communion, can be awesome in its very ordinariness.

Hard at work...

...this week on new book English Catholic Heroines, which will be published in the Autumn. Contributions on different Catholic heroines by a number of excellent writers...my job is to put it all together, check short biogs of each contributor etc.

When not busy with this and other work, am deep in Philosophy for Divinity degree. John Paul II's Fides et Ratio a good read, hadn't tackled it before.

Time off: all this week, the Daily Mail has been giving away free DVDs of classic films from the 1940s - The Dam Busters, The Wooden Horse, The First of the Few, Millions Like Us etc. So easy to smile at the cheps with clipped eccents, moustaches,hearty jokes. Less easy to do so at the courage, willingness to give their lives for others. These films were old when I was young. They were the wallpaper of the culture of our parents' younger lives, they celebrated values that had been tested. People knew there was a propaganda message of course - and that real life had plenty that was sordid and cruel, that the war was producing much that was horrible, and so on. But that isn't the point. There's much more to think about than that.

If young people were influenced - and they were - by films honouring courage, loyalty, faithfulness, high standards of behaviour in public and in private...how are today's young being influenced by the images put across in today's mass media?

GLORIOUS NEWS....

....I HAVE MY MOBILE BACK!!!

I left it in Rome a couple of weeks ago, and it has been found and returned to me by a kind priest friend.

So, all those to whom I related the news that I was no longer contactable during the day when travelling....I AM NOW REACHABLE AGAIN!!! Same old number...

Enjoy this blog?

Well, then you might enjoy this

Your chance to vote...

...for your top favourite films. Excellent initiative sponsored by Soulfood Cinema. Click on here to join in. Soulfood cinema is a project run by a young Catholic team and is evidence of some of the good things that are happening in the Church in Britain, especially in London.

The Thames Valley...

...in the gentle sogginess of February, flights of birds in a wide grey sky, sheets of shining water on fields, children on half-term in wellies and rainproofs. We were at Fawley Court for a conference of Aid to the Church in Need. Fascinating presentation on the state of the Church across Latin America - there are good projects there that are very well worth supporting, and ACN needs funds in order to do so - and also one on India. This last was from John Pontifex, recently returned from Orissa, where Christians have been killed, their homes burned, and many forced to flee following attacks by an extremist Hindu cult...which uses the swasticka as its traditional symbol...

Our conference was for the various diocesan organisers for ACN across Britain - good discussions, lively talk, a beautiful early morning Mass in the panelled chapel, a lovely evening reception at which a generous supporter welcomed us to her home.

Are you a teacher, or governor...

...or have you a child who is a pupil, at a Catholic primary school in Britain?

The 2009 Schools RE Project run by the Association of Catholic Women has just been announced. It's run jointly with the Catholic Truth Society.

To celebrate...

...a special day, J. took me to see The Sound of Music at the London Palladium. Now that will doubtless really make people sneer at us. Let 'em. It was a wonderful evening, a theatre packed, lots of cheerful happy families, and a show that kept us all spellbound. Charming, inspiring, joyful, uplifting. I really recommend it. Incidentally, the real story behind the musical/film is immensely readable: get a paperback of Maria von Trapp's book and enjoy it...

J. also gave me a bunch of roses, a box of chocolates, and a lovely card. We had a happy happy day. So there.

Do you know...

...of some one who merits nomination as a "Catholic Woman of the Year"? We are seeking nominations from across Britain - looking for 'unsung heroines',women who serve the Church and the community in home, school, or parish, perhaps in business or commerce or as a local councillor or magistrate, or by caring for the housebound or elderly, visiting prisoners, getting involved with some community enterprise...women who bring their faith to bear on the service they give, and do so with good cheer and goodwill. Those who are selected as "Catholic Women of the Year" get no cash or formal honour, just an invitation to lunch, at which we celebrate the service given to the Church, of which they are representative. This has been an annual event now for forty years....interested? Send a nomination - in the form of a letter, giving some background information and details - to the Chairman, CWYL, 22 Milton Rd Ware Herts SG12 0PZ. Must arrive by April 25th

Stating things clearly...

...and even bluntly, from the heart and in language allowing of no ambiguities, the Holy Father has in a statement which is at once official and rather moving, established that no Catholic can be anti-Semitic,or support any attempts to deny the Holocaust of Jewish people in WWII."It is beyond question that any denial or minimization of this terrible crime is intolerable and altogether unacceptable." He met a Jewish delegation yesterday following the appalling statements made on the subject by a Lefebvrist bishop.Yesterday's meeting went well, and the leading rabbi told the Pope "Thank you for understanding our pain and anguish".

Quoting Nostra Aetate, the document of Vatican II, the Holy Father confirmed that this document guides and informs the Church on the subject of relations between the Church and the Jewish people. "The Church is profoundly and irrevocably committed to reject all anti-Semitism and to continue to build good and lasting relations between our two communities." He also quoted the prayer made by Pope John Paul II begging for forgiveness and reconcilation between Christians and Jews and added "I make this prayer my own".

Will this receive the publicity it needs and merits? Over to you: get the word out, so that the message of the Church and Peter's successor is clear.

The Lefbvrists will now have to decide: if they want to rejoin the Church, they must do so by accepting the authority of the Pope, and the teachings of the most recent Vatican Council, and publicly abandoning the anti-Jewish stances taken and material published by various groups within their ranks. As must those other soi-disant "traditionalist" campaigners who have sent anti-Jewish rants to me and to others recently.

on Monday...

...a hugely successful Day of Art and Music sponsored by the Association of Catholic Women and held at Coloma School, Croydon.

This was a Day for teachers at Catholic primary schools and we were hugely impressed by the dedication and enthusiasm of the teachers - a wonderful atmosphere throughout. Coloma's headmistress welcomed us, there was a splendid buffet lunch, and we had a beautiful lecture hall, plus a smaller room for the art session.

Dr Lionel Gracey gave a superb presentation using some of the world's great art, showing how glorious paintings can be used to teach the Faith. He lectures on this at Maryvale, and will visit parishes or other groups on request - warmly recommended.

Then, after tea, a wonderful session with Jeremy de Satge of The Music Makers, who got us all singing Gregorian chant. We learned the Kyrie, Agnus Dei, and Sanctus, and the sound was beautiful. Then a psalm, this time in English, and one of the teachers took turn and turn about with Jeremy to sing the verses, while the rest of us took the refrain...

The day ended with a beautiful Mass in the school chapel. Glorious singing - the chant was wonderful - a young teacher doing the readings, candles glowing on the simple altar as the February afternoon darkened outside. The day was a real success, and we now plan more. This one drew teachers from across the diocese of Southwark. Interested in having something in your area?

Still catching up...

...with activities. After Rome, Oxford. Lengthy visit and tour of Oxford Oratory - more on that later. A lot more, as there are some superb plans for development there, which I'll write about properly later on.

And from Oxford, home to London. Meeting of the Catholic Cultural Group - interesting talk by guest speaker Paul Burnell, a colleague with whom I've worked on Catholic newspapers and who is now with the BBC, speaking on the novels of Michael O'Brien.

Next: Birmingham. Maryvale Institute. I cannot describe how exciting and interesting it is on the BA Divinity course. yes, exciting: philosophy, large questions, lots to think about. And we have some superb lecturers. Prof Jack Scarisbrick on the English Reformation, Henry VIII, Mary, Cardinal Pole, Cranmer. Tragedy, cruelty, treachery, and more...

Maryvale is an old old house, with uneven floors and sudden bathrooms and a gem of a chapel somehow hidden deep at the heart of it all. A walk in the chilly grounds, snow lingering on the lawns. Hearty meals provided by Bridgettine sisters with wide smiles and those extraordinary headresses. Night prayer and then glorious sleep in the comfortable silence of a house where lots and lots of people have slumbered down the centuries.

Shorthand....

...whirl through Auntie's recent activities...

In Rome, giving a lecture at conference on Theology of Communication, sponsored by Sacred Arts Communications, met various old friends including a priest from Britain now working in a parish near Rome. Coffee with him and Edward Pentin, Rome correspondent for various newspapers (sample of his latest writing here) at a cafe near the Pallotine Sisters where I was staying.

There was a great deal to discuss...a significant time to be in Rome and to be tackling issues connected with the Church and Communication...much talk interrupted by my vocal worries about getting back to the Sisters in time for my taxi. I needn't have worried - was in plenty of time...but left my mobile phone at the cafe! Discovering this en route to the airport, I used the taxi driver's phone to contact Jamie and tell him... driver was v. helpful but oh, dear, I don't travel well in fast taxis on winding roads and was dreadfully carsick, a poor way to repay his kindness...

On arrival at airport I collected myself, got airborne,slept blissfully. Stanstead lights glowing...with a meeting in Oxford the next day, I'd arranged to get a late-night bus and stay overnight with my brother and his family who live near there. Journeying through blizzards...snow falling in huge steady feathery flakes from an almost luminous sky...Oxford silent, mysterious, beautiful, and bereft of the taxi I had booked...a kind passing taxi-driver however took pity on me and we made our way slowly...slowly...slowly....and with great care through snowy roads. "I will take you there, my dear, as best I can, and we will pray...." So we did, he a Moslem and I a Catholic, sitting there in the cab, committing the journey to God, and all was well...

And...

...things have been so rushed that it has been impossible to write up this Blog until now.

Backtracking with news and info. in a moment, but first I am going to stop - and please do so too as you read this, and say a prayer for the people in Victoria, Australia, where the bush fires are raging.

The stories are heartbreaking.

Rome...

...in warm rain, St Peter's Square glittering and wet, a clean smell of pine as the vast Christmas tree that has stood there throughout Christmastide is dismantled, lights glowing high up in the windows of the Apostolic Palace as twilight falls...

I hadn't had huge hopes of getting to Rome - struggled through slushy snow to get to the station, almost certain all flights would still be cancelled - and it was exciting to find the journey was possible after all, and to swoop up above Britain's snowy fields and then land at Ciampino and be met by Sister Marie who with Dr Christine Mugridge had invited me to speak at the launch of a book at Vatican Radio.

Just two days into which to cram so many things: meetings, talks,discussions. Obviously, there was much talk of recent events. Important statement here from Secretary of State, clarifying the official position of the Church - do pass on as required.

We went to the Papal audience - vast crowds packing the Paul VI Hall, large youth groups from Poland, USA, Italy, Spain, seminarians from France, ecumenical group from some international college in Switzerland, parish groups from Hong Kong, and more...young couples in wedding finery asking for a blessing, bishops lining up with H. Father on platform, young people enthusiastically breaking into song...

Topic of the conference/book launch was the Theology of Communication ...interesting to be speaking at HQ of Vatican Radio, lots of people from various publications and other media incl. Edward Pentin who is Rome correspondent for the Catholic Herald, and Joan Lewis of EWTN's Joan's Rome.

Snowbound...

...at home, and busy at the computer, interrupted only by a splendid snowball fight and building of a fine snowman with the neighbouring children...

Main Catholic news is still the fallout from the Lefebvrist business. I've had some dotty stuff sent to me ("It's now clear: they won't have to accept Vatican II - the Agreement Is To be Signed Today!!") sane analysis of situation can be read here.

Do get...

..a (FREE!) ticket and come to the lecture by Philip Booth on Christianity and Capitalism as part of the FAITH MATTERS series at Westminster cathedral hall. His talk is on March 18th. It couldn't be more topical. You can get a ticket by clicking on that link and going to the relevant lecture. See you there!

Yesterday evening...

...Jamie had to go to a Rather Grand white-tie-n-tails do, and just when I was cosily settled at home with some work on my newest book (English Catholic Heroines, coming along nicely - chapters written by different people on great heroines of the past. See parallel book, already out, on Heroes, a good read), my mobile phone rang. Could I find, in the relevant drawer, this-or-that absolutely crucial part of his outfit? And could I come now and meet him at the station, where he was hurrying to change and whizz off? He'd been at a meeting all day. Surreal scene: two Bogles in dark street near suburban station, one struggling in bitter cold wind and flint-like bits of snow to undress and get into elaborate evening dress. The other handing over bits of equipment and struggling against laughter while trying to show sympathy for plight.

Snow...

...dusting my face as I cycled to Mass in a bitter east wind. Too cold for Mother and me to go out to our favourite local cafe, so we stayed snug inside and drank tea and talked...the wind was even more icy as I made my way back across the suburbs, and now the flakes are falling softly - as I write this the street in front of the house is shrowded in white and there is the beginning of that sense of great silence that snow always brings...

A friend from Australia (Dr Tracey Rowland - have you read her excellent book on the Pope's theology? DO) writes that they are having an exhausting, frightening heatwave there, temperatures in Melbourne higher than ever recorded before, elderly and frail people suffering. How ghastly - I hope for their sake that it breaks soon ("And we can bless again/ the drumming of an army/ The steady, soaking rain")...