Back to school...

...to St Philomena's, in Carshalton, Surrey. I was there for 13 years from the age of four, and here we were, members of the Catholic Union, meeting there for the Summer Gathering. Mass in the beautiful chapel - filled with memories. Lunch in the old panelled library. Rain splashing down on to the green lawns...but, goodness, the things we needed to tackle were not there in the vanished Britain of my childhood and teenage years. Same-sex marriage.Infringements of the rights of Christians in Britain. A host of petty bits of bureaucracy that make running Catholic schools - or any schools - increasingly difficult. Euthanasia - and the creeping advance of it in British hospitals with misuse of the 'Liverpool Care Pathway'. The next years are going to require courage and good leadership in the Catholic Church in Britain.