To Pembury...

...in Kent, where Fr Ed Tomlinson of the Ordinariate and his team are transforming a rather bleak hall into a real church.  It's a busy place now, with well-attended Sunday Masses. But at present the Sunday school meets in the sacristy, the children jammed in on the floor, under and on the tables, and on any available ledge or worktop. Fun, but sort of impracticable in the long-term as numbers continue to grow.  The tiny weekday chapel - we had a beautiful Mass there - has stacks of  the embroidered kneelers that some of us are making, and which on Sundays are used for Mass in the main hall.  I had brought a further kneeler, just completed: I wanted to deliver it in person as I had dedicated it in memory of a young relative and wanted to hand it over personally: Fr Ed blessed it and we used it as a kneeler for Communion, and now it takes its place with the others...

It was good to be at Mass in this little village on a Spring weekday,and afterwards to talk over news and ideas with Fr Ed. Outside, the land hs been cleared for the new extension that will enable a proper use of the church and halls and include a garden and a shrine. There will be a good entrance and the church, already a local landmark, will be a real presence in the area. There is a large Crucifix with its own roof that will stand as part of the new scheme. It will all have the look and feel of "a little English village church".

But much to ponder.  While things are going well at Pembury, there is a general feeling of worry in the Church: the Synod this Autumn (prayers needed),the rising official pressures on Church schools with attempts to impose gross forms of propaganda under the guise of "sex education"....

Pray for the Pope. Pray for our Bishops.