...AND IT WAS A JOY!!!

...the  2015 Towards Advent Festival of Catholic Culture was a great day.

The choir of St James School, Twickenham, sang a lovely Christmas carol, and then the Cardinal Archbishop opened the Festival, with a beautiful speech reminding us about Advent as the season of waiting, and also of travelling - like Mary and Joseph on their way to Bethlehem.  He asked us to give our throughts in particular to people who were journeying in distress: the Christian refugees feeling religious persecution, leaving their homes and land, in order to hold on to their faith. He reminded us too about the Year of Mercy with its message of the greatness of God's love....

And so the Festival opened, the choir singing a glorious Salve Regina, and then all present joining in "O come O come Emmanuel..."  It was a moving moment to be standing on the platform at the  Cathedral Hall, sharing the hymn-sheet with the Cardinal, with an absolutely packed crowd all singing the ancient Advent carol of hope and journeying...

The young winner of our Towards Advent Essay Project, Agnes Freely, of The Laurels School,  was presented with her prize by the Cardinal: I had wrapped it up and placed it beneath the big Christmas Tree on the platform, The prize was books, and I topped it with what looks like a small bag of Brussels sprouts...they are chocolate ones!

A good and happy day: books and Advent calendars, monastic produce, rosaries, home-made soaps and jams and jellies and more, and more...a powerful workshop on the plight of Chrsitians in the Middle East...  the joyful witness of the dedicated Franciscan Friars (one of whom, at my request, blessed the beautiful new book I bought in which to record my Dissertation research, as recommended by the U niversity authorities)...Knights of St Columba wearing impressive ribboned collars and medals, ladies from the Friends of the Venerabile with golden shoulder-sashes...oh, and much, much more. People had travelled from far and wide in order to come, and the wonderful team doing the coffee from a massive tall percolator and delicious sandwiches and cakes never once flagged in their hospitality...

A young relative had come along with his mother to help, and delivered leafletss with me outside the Cathedral urging people to "come to the Festival - just round the corner, with freshly-brewed coffee!"... his enthusiasm seemed to be infectious - we got a number of people deciding to do just that.  Later he and I went up the Tower of the Cathedral - with warm thanks to the kind and delightful young lady in charge who made it a really special day for this nine-year-old boy, who was thrilled to stand gazing out across that stunning view of London "with the cars looking just like toy cars!" and the great green domes of the Cathedral lying way below us...

We have been running this Festival every year of this new Millenium - fifteen years so far, a decade and a half. A tradition established, and more to come..