Saturday, November 27, 2010

The Catholic Union of Great Britain ...

...brings together Catholics who are concerned about the public and community life of the country. Excellent gathering for the annual general meeting at Vaughan House, Westminster,a grand attendance despite a freezing November night. Lord Brennan President, and Jamie Bogle Chairman. A lot to discuss, following the Papal Visit and the General Election, and a v. active year for the Union: among the highlights a memoral Craigmyle Memorial Lecture delivered by Dr Philip Howard on the sanctity of life.

I was able to report on the Catholic Young Writer Award, which this year for the first time was a joint project between the Catholic Writers' Guild and the Catholic Union. Having it as a joint Award has proved a real success, and we now have great plans for 2011 - I am especially indebted to Sarah de Norwall of The Bard School whose creative thinking has been extremely helpful...

Discussion about recent court decisions affecting the rights of Christians at work and in the public sphere, also on the importance of resistance to any and all plans or promoting euthanasia. After the meeting, a friendly and lively gathering over wine and snacks, many things to discuss. I had appealed for ideas for the Young Writer Award and two people approached me to offer suggestions - both at the same time and both with the same thought, and an inspired one...more on this in due course...

Thursday, November 25, 2010

To Sussex...

...on Tuesday, for a very happy day, filming in Lewes for EWTN. You won't be able to view it until late 2011 - this was just the start of a good deal of filming for a new series of programmes tackling history, traditions, feasts and seasons... Lewes is a lovely Sussex town, with the great sweep of the Downs beyond, and cheery shops,and a rich history, and pleasing streets with cobbles and Georgian frontages and sudden old cottages. The day finished with chocolate cake and tea in the presbytery at St Pancras church...Fr Richard Biggerstaff, who had been walking us round the town all day and explaining its history for EWTN viewers, a welcoming host. BTW, he has an Advent series on EWTN any day now, info here...

As dusk fell, a train back up to London to address a meeting in Chelsea: "Women, the pro-life cause and the Catholic Church". A good gathering, extra chairs brought in, more people than I had imagined would turn out on a cold November evening, everything went rather well. I enjoyed giving this talk, and there was a great and friendly atmosphere - a happy evening to conclude a happy day...

Things have been v.v. busy, so writing up this Blog often happens late at night, as now. On Sunday evening I was at St Ann's Church, Banstead, giving a talk - a wonderful welcome from a wonderful parish. This evening - Wednesday - a convivial evening with fellow committee-members of The Keys, the Catholic Writers' Guild. Fr Peter Newby at St Mary Moorfields gave us all dinner: much lively conversation as we planned the programme for 2011. We have some good speakers lined up. BTW, our Catholic Young Writer Award was presented at our recent meeting: read about it all here. This Award has now been running for several years, and was established when Antony Tyler, founder of Fisher Press, was Master of the Guild...our present Master is journalist Mary Kenny, and she presented the Award to Corinna Keefe at the Guild meeting last week, when we had our traditional dinner and a wonderful illustrated talk on the Incarnation and Art, to lead us into the Advent season...

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

So Auntie was on the right track...

...and the H. Father hasn't changed anything. A great pity that L'Osservatore chose to break an embargo, and effectively misquote the Pope, and cause a ghastly mess. Will the editor now be requested to retire?

The clarification given today by Fr Lombardi doesn't really add anything. To my statement on the radio programme yesterday about homosexual prostitution - ie that the Church teaches that it is sinful - we can now usefully add that the Church teaches that other forms of prostitution are sinful too. This is something already well known, and doesn't add much to the debate - but perhaps it will mean that in addition to being denounced by one set of lobbyists, I will now be denounced by the Prostitutes Collective and its allies too (has happened before).

Comments to this Blog have included the usual vicious ones - I've left out only the most vile and ugliest, as I think that it's useful for my readers to know how much some people loathe me.

Monday, November 22, 2010

NO. The Pope hasn't changed the teaching on contraception...

....in fact, he wasn't even talking about contraception. He was talking about a different aspect of sexual morality, relating to male prostitution and therefore to homosexual activity.

You will find this link helpful.

Today, the Jeremy Vine show, a discussion in which Auntie took part. You can listen if you like - and perhaps you will share the views of people who have already written in to this Blog to say how much they hate and despise me.

Essentially, it's like this: it's like this: the issue about which the H. Father was speaking was about homosexual activity - which is itself sinful (and of course is absolutely not open to life So we are not discussing contraception here). A parallel might be made with another sinful situation: a chap plans an armed robbery, but something makes him feel that even though he has every intention of stealing, he doesn't really want to murder anyone. So instead of a gun, he takes a replica. Now - this doesn't mean that the Church will start to distribute replica guns to criminals. It doesn't mean that the Church says that robbing a bank is OK so long as you only use a replica gun. It doesn't even mean that the intention of using a replica gun is in any way acceptable. But the decision to abandon the real gun is, in however remote a way, a faint beginning on the road towards the beginnings of moral thinking.

Thursday, November 18, 2010

For a flavour of London in November...

...you could try this blog....

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Things have been v. busy...

...so I've been unable to write up everything adequately on this Blog.Brief overview: last week saw another fund-raising event for Maryvale, this time at the Sacred Heart Church in Wimbledon, another excellent talk on John Henry Newman by Dr Andrew Nash...on Friday a meeting of the Association of Catholic Women: we are running more Study Days on Art and Music for teachers in 2011 and have been given some generous funding to do so. Jeremy de Satge (The Music Makers) will teach Gregorian Chant - this is proving popular, and his recent workshop at the Towards Advent Festival was, as always, a success...

Today, after a busy afternoon, I ended up in Westminster,in time for an evening Mass at Westminster Cathedral. Because of some problem about a fire alarm, the Mass had to be transferred to the hall. It was oddly impressive, somehow, to see lots of people crowding in there, kneeling on the floor, with Mass celebrated at a makeshift altar. I was so glad I had gone. And I met a friend there, and we went on for a drink at the "Bluecoat Boy" nearby, and then walked to Waterloo, stopping at the Abbey to walk through the Field of Remembrance. The Abbey Cloisters were open, and there was some singing coming from within the Abbey itself - a choir practising, or something. Suddenly, there in the lamplight, was a sense of 1,000 years of history...

At Waterloo the papers all had front page news of Prince William's engagement.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

London...

...was looking magnificent today - the view from the train as we chugged into Cannon Street station showed the dome of St Paul's against a clear blue sky, Canaletto-like and glorious. It felt all wrong getting the Tube on such a day, so I walked down Ludgate Hill. They still run real Routemaster buses along some routes and I caught one. It felt like 1979 and was wonderful. Then I had to transfer to a no. 11 as I needed to get to Chelsea. As we went down Whitehall, all eyes turned instinctively to the Cenotaph, where the blood-red poppy wreaths lie against the whiteness of the monument in memory of our war dead, "their memory hallowed in the land they loved."

Following that solidarity that follows such the silence of such a moment, I got talking to the lady sitting next to me. We shared brief comments about Remembrance Day, and about its importance, and so on, and the talk moved from there to linked things...she mentioned the church in Wimbledon which she attends...and then came an extraordinary coincidence/piece of Providence. Read on.

Some months ago, I left my bicycle padlocked at a local station for a few days while away. On my return I found an anguished note in the front basket:"Dear Cyclist - you have padlocked your bicycle to mine! I have been unable to access my bike for several days. Please telephone..." I quickly dialled the number to offer huge apologies, and discovered that I had inadvertently padlocked my bike to that of a local Anglican clergyman! We arranged to meet and when I'd completed my heartfelt apologies, got chatting over some coffee. His church turned out to be an enthusiastically Evangelical one, already known to me through an ecumenical discussion group. I wondered...might he be prepared to get involved with the Schools Bible Project with which I am involved? We badly needed an Evangelical on our committee...

Well, to make a longish story short: he subsequently sent me the name of a lady in the congregation, and a couple of weeks ago I cycled over to her house to drop her a note. We met, got on extremely well, and she kindly agreed to help with the Bible Project.

And today, on a number 11 bus on London I meet another lady from that same church, and they are close friends! We were both so amazed to discover this - after all, there are some 12 million people in London on any given day, so it seems quite astonishing that we should meet in this way!

And in a rather lovely way, it feels as though it's a nice sign of Providence for the Schools Bible Project...

Sunday, November 14, 2010

This week...

...I was in Canterbury, speaking at the Catholic chaplaincy of the University of Kent. A good attendance for weekday Mass, the chapel full on this ordinary, dark and cold November evening. Afterwards, a wonderful welcome and a happy evening as I led a discussion on the Holy Father's visit. Lots of enthusiasm, a warm and friendly atmosphere, much swapping of anecdotes and much lively talk over a delicious and hearty supper, the chaplain, Fr Peter Geldard presiding over things and indeed cooking the (excellent) spaghetti carbonara...

It was a very interesting time to be in Canterbury, as news had just broken about the five Anglican Bishops and the new chapter opening as plans for the Ordinariate unfold. Fr Peter was a leading figure, when an Anglican, in the debates over women's ordination. It was fascinating to talk all this over with him.

The chaplaincy at UKC is a modern building, dedicated to the English Martyr, St John Stone. Fr Peter is having to expand it and showed me the new extension - which includes v. smart loos with tiles showing Chaucerian pilgrims en route to Canterbury...

I stayed overnight - still a great buzz of talk beneath me as I lay in bed upstairs - and was able to raid part of Fr P's excellent library and do some useful reading for my Maryvale studies, got deep into the Council of Chalcedon and Nestorius, and more...

The next morning I caught the train back to London, and on arrival at Victoria needed to hurry off to a bank, Post Office and other errands. I got caught behind a small group of young people led by one with a placard which simply said "NO FUTURE". That seemed a rather ghastly notion so, intrigued, I followed them down Victoria street. Turned out that they were about to join a massive demonstration which was pounding its way down from Whitehall past the Houses of Parliament. It was students, all shouting about the education budget... I needed to cross the street at this point to reach the bridge to get to Waterloo. The police suggested I simply find a gap in the crowd and slip through, and this I was able to do...but the crowd now seemed a lot more menacing. There was the beating of a great drum, and much fevered rhythmic chanting. It felt nasty, suddenly wild and slightly hysterical. As I hurried on and looked back, I felt glad to have got away.

The evening news and the next day's papers were full of scenes of mayhem as a mob from the students' demo had broken out and crashed its way into the Conservative Party HQ, breaking windows, grabbing furniture and equipment and bashing its way up on to the roof, in sheer anarchic anger. Not clear what message they were trying to send to the rest of us by doing that.

Monday, November 08, 2010

Have you heard...

the Mustard Seed communities? If you are thinking - and you should be! - of a charity to support this Christmas, this is one that has been specially recommended to me. Do look it up and give it your support.

In general - I'm not neccesarily just talking about this particular venture now - I have become v. conscious, over the past two or three years, that charity-giving is changing. In the future it's not going to be dominated by the big charities. Now, with the Internet and so on making the world shrink, links between nations are on a fresh scale. A young man or woman from a Catholic family in Britain gets involved - during a Gap Year or whatever - with some good project in India or Africa or the West Indies - and tells everyone at home about it, and they get interested and want to help. A small charity Trust can be established, and funds sent very easily - no need for anything very grand, and a smallish amount of money can go a very long way. A website, some fund-raising events, contacts with family and friends who want to help.

This also happens in Catholic parishes. Our local parish here in the London suburbs has forged a strong friendship with the people of L'Aquila in Italy, whose homes were destroyed by an earthquake. A couple from our local parish went there, got involved, and since then have done a magnificent job in taking lorry-loads of goods to assist them. The parish has raised thousands of pounds and been immensely generous. And the young people from L'Aquila have done exchange-visits with young people from our parish, to mutual benefit. Lots of good friendships, and fun, and so much goodwill...you can read all about it here, and that's another good venture for you to support this Christmas...

News breaks...

concerning the Anglican Ordinariate. You may find this website helpful. And this blog.

Sunday, November 07, 2010

Magnificent searing lights, sparks and explosions...

...tore through the sky as J. and I made our way home last night: Bonfire Night, which many had feared was in danger of vanishing under the all-encompassing plastic pumpkins and ghoulish outfits of Hallowe'en, seems to be flourishing. The old days of a bonfire in the garden at home, and Daddy letting off a few fireworks as children cheered and held sparklers, have given way to the most magnificent and awesome displays run as gigantic public events. We stopped as we got off the train at the local railway station and just stood there along with others enjoying the fantastic whooshes and explosions of stars and flashing lights that ripped through the sky, from a display a couple of miles away up near the Common.

And today, for the first time, it feels that winter is approaching: crisp cold air as I cycled off to return toys kindly lent by friends for the Play Corner at Towards Advent, and then hurried on to Mass. We have a team of seminarians in the parish over the next weeks, helping out with Confirmation classes and so on and were all invited to meet them after Mass - impressive young men, and most cheering and interesting in conversation. Numbers at the seminary are slowly climbing too, and there is an upbeat mood...

Some happy emails re Towards Advent though as always we must discuss the future logically. Some booksellers were absent this year - the trend is away from book sales at present, which is a depressing thought. And although the hall was v. crowded during the morning, things got slack during the early afternoon. The Cathedral tours and workshops were popular and although these do take people out of the main hall and thus away from the sales area, they are a major attraction...already there have been some good suggestions for next year's speakers...

Saturday, November 06, 2010

At the Towards Advent Festival...

The choir sang a lovely version of the Londonderry Air, with these words:

I would be true, for there are those that trust me.
I would be pure, for there are those that care.
I would be strong, for there is much to suffer.
I would be brave, for there is much to dare.
I would be friend of all, the foe, the friendless.
I would be giving, and forget the gift,
I would be humble, for I know my weakness,
I would look up, and laugh, and love and live.

A most successful...

...happy day as the Towards Advent Festival of Catholic Culture celebrated its 10th anniversary. We had a full hall for the opening ceremony, with Archbishop Vincent Nichols, and the beautiful singing of the choir of Coloma Convent Girls' School. The Westminster Cathedral Hall is perfect for this event: we had displays and stalls from every sort of Catholic group and guild and organisation - books and Christmas cards and Advent calendars and more, beautiful jewellery on sale in aid of various good causes, hand-crafted Nativity sets and Christmas gifts from the Holy Land, CDs and books and pamphlets,honey and beeswax candles and other monastic produce...we had the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal and Youth 2000, the St Francis Leprosy Guild and the Society of Catholic Artists, the Friends of Westminster Cathedral and The Music Makers, EWTN Catholic TV, the FAITH Movement, and more, and more, and more...

Teas and sandwiches and home-made cakes were provided by the Association of Catholic Women, along with a play corner for children. The Catenians and the Knights of St Columba did sterling work handing out leaflets to everyone coming and going from Masses at Westminster Cathedral. We had a tour of the Cathedral - which attracted a large group - and a popular workshop on Gregorian chant by The Music Makers, and a splendid reprise of the glorious Papal Visit by Niamh Maloney and her young team, the group that produced those wonderful placards "We love you Papa more than beans on toast" and "Give it some welly for the Pope in the Park". Oh, it was all joy...

Friday, November 05, 2010

Read Auntie on...

The "Benedict bounce" here.

Thursday, November 04, 2010

Off through the Autumn dusk...

...to Coloma Convent Girls' School, where there was a Parents' Evening for parents of girls "Eleven and upwards", ie new arrivals at the school this term. This is an initiative of a couple of parents who had the idea - drawn from Pope John Paul's Familiaris Consortio - that families should help and support each other in the task of raising Christian children. Mutual swapping of ideas, information, and encouragement...pitfalls to avoid, things that work well, and so on.

It was a lovely evening - a large group of delightful parents, an atmosphere of great cordiality, common sense, and goodwill. Much to discuss. I had been invited to speak about the mass media, especially the Internet. Wow, this is a minefield for families today - access via mobile phones and laptops mean that parents are robbed of all technical control, and the rules that could be applied even a couple of years ago can now be thwarted by adolescents: the computer in the family room, no individual computers in bedrooms etc. Today, tumbling prices of technology mean that teenagers can simply save up and buy equipment that can be used anywhere...and they are also wise to going to friends' houses, going to the local library, etc etc...so parents have to be especially vigilant, and above create a family atmosphere in which values are accepted and shared...there was a lot of good discussion, and swapping of useful ideas, and a sense of solidarity among those present. What make the evening work, however, was that the next talk, by Mrs Mary Grey, was on family prayer. This excellent talk, centred on everyday wisdom, practicalities, and the truth of what it is like raising today's teenagers, lifted hearts and showed the way ahead. A family praying together - in the car, before or after a meal, celebrating special days, etc etc - is a bastion that evil cannot smash. We really got a message of hope, and it was a grand message to take home.

Coloma is a very popular school,and doing a grand job. BTW, the choir will be singing at Towards Advent this Saturday. Come and hear them!

Wednesday, November 03, 2010

Thwarting the Tube strike....

...I made my way to Uxbridge, where I was giving at a talk at the Catholic Church of Our Lady of Lourdes and St Michael. What a lovely parish! Evening Mass for All Souls Day - a large congregation (even though this was the third Mass of the day), and it was so beautiful, somehow, on this November evening, candles glowing, people praying together...when Fr Nicholas, the parish priest, read out the names of those in the parish who had died and been buried from the church in the past year,there was a sense of quiet history...

Afterwards, a gathering in the parish hall, tea and cakes and I gave a talk on "Feasts and Seasons". A very warm and friendly atmosphere - much goodwill and lively conversation over questions. And afterwards, much cheery talk over supper in the presbytery...and the talk continued as a kindly parishioner drove me to West Drayton station - we were still chatting and laughing until the last goodbye. Home via Paddington,a bus to Victoria (Tube stations all bleak and sealed) and I bought some hot chocolate there and enjoyed it on the last lap home via Clapham Junction and Wimbledon...

Monday, November 01, 2010

Roses, and wine, and good company...

...at the launch of a new DVD, celebrated in a small party at the St Paul's Bookshop next to Westminster Cathedral.

The CD is called A Parish Rosary. It contains all twenty mysteries, accompanied by glorious music, Ave Marias by Schubert and Caccini...it has been produced by the Cathedral's Rosary Group. The group has been meeting faithfully for some 8 years at the Cathedral, and, as Canon Christopher Tuckwell, the Cathedral's Administrator, said in his speech this evening, is central to the Cathedral's spiritual life.

This is a double-CD, very attractively produced, and would make a perfect present for some one who is housebound and wants to pray but often feels alone. Its tone has a warmth that communicates a real sense of prayer - and this is because , as group leader Anna Johnston explained this evening, it was all recorded in the Cathedral.You can order it here.Anna is herself a professional singer, and the music really is a delight.

We had a very happy party, and were all given roses as we left...

I walked back down to Westminster Abbey and across Waterloo Bridge with Josephine Siedlecka of the Independent Catholic News Service. The Houses of Parliament look magnificent illuminated against the night sky. We had been talking about the H. Father's historic address in Westminster Hall, and now as we walked there, we stopped and recalled it. Our Parliamentary tradition is rooted in Christianity, is nourished by it, and is imperilled where it is marginalised or crushed...he did well to make us understand this, and the thought is a solemn one...