Monday, June 30, 2008

Gregorian chant...

...is the sound of the moment. It's popular, it's important, and it does you good.

So if you want to learn how to sing it, go to St Joseph's, New Malden, for a special one-day Gregorian Chant Workshop this Saturday, July 5th. Find out more about it here.

Sunday, June 29, 2008

Flanders...

...has a rich Christian past but seems uncertain of its future. Fastest growing religion is Islam. The countryside is lush and fruitful - everywhere, rich fields of crops, and in the suburbs, people busy on allotments (or whatever they are called in Belgium), and in the towns, busy restaurants and coffee-shops stocked with lovely food. In Antwerp on Saturday, a noisy parade with African-style drums and various other events, plus a massive Hindu parade on the Cathedral Square, while shoppers teemed through the pedestrianised streets.

Home late by Eurostar with a thousand images filling my head from a fascinating visit...

This morning, a quiet cycle ride to Mass through the London suburbs, to St Pius X church in Norbiton. Magnificent singing from the many young people present - turns out several were from the Cardinal Vaughan school which has a magnificent musical tradition...

To Belgium...

...via the Chanell Tunnel (Eurostar) in great style. One images it will feel very dramatic going under the sea, but of course it isn't at all - it's barely noticeable - the train whizzes fast through countryside and tunnels and then one is aware of being in a longish tunnel, then countryside again...

Brussels - kind friends had arranged for me to meet a colleague who introduce me to the city's charming old centre, and a lunch of moules-and-frites. Much talk of the state of things in Belgium generally, in the Church especially...a visit to the beautiful Cathedral, which is dedicated to St Michael and St Gudule (local saint - must find out more about her). As with most churches in Belgium, there is nowhere to kneel down. Pews and kneelers have been replaced with neat bleak rows of chairs so the place feels like a theatre or meeting-hall. Ghastly. So people sit smugly throughout Mass, as if it is a performance and they are mere spectators rather than participants... Even when you simply drop into the cathedral to light a candle and pray - and lots of people do the former and, one assumes and hopes, the latter - you can't kneel, except rather awkwardly on the floor, which I did.

Overnight stay at the welcoming home of M. - more talk and a delicious supper. The next day, a visit to Ghent. Again, a glorious cathedral, again a sense of its being a place where people watch but do not pray. At the - friendly and helpful - visitors' desk, I asked about the Blessed Sacrament. He didn't seem to understand at first - then light dawned "Oh yes, it's in the crypt". Which also houses a display - a rather interesting one - of some of the cathedral's fine vestments and other treasures. Which in turn means that the crypt feels more like a musueum, where people talk and walk about, rather than a church. I felt Our Lord was a bit sidelined and got few if any visitors, felt a bit mean when I had to leave...

In the evening, something very different - a cheering Mass, organised by Opus Dei for the feast of St Josemaria, at the glorious St Jacobus church in Antwerp. The painter Rubens worshipped here, and his works are all around the church. I don't know when I have been at Mass anywhere more splendid. But it wasn't this which made the evening memorable. The congregation gathered for this Mass included many young people, and it was heartening to sing out a glorious Credo and Pater Noster in such surroundings. I got the impression that people were hugely glad to be there - that such a Mass was unusual in its style and its joy. Afterwards many warm introductions at a reception in a nearby college.

It was an interesting example of what is alive, and what isn't, in the Church in today's Europe.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Tha National Prayer Breakfast...

...was held at Parliament this morning. Rousing hymns, and Danish pastries, and coffee and orange juice and croissants. I sat next to Edward Leigh MP, a fellow-Catholic, and we didn't wave our arms about in the hymns. But I must say I like the evangelical rousing singing, even early in the morning (I was cycling to the station at 6 am to get to Westminster on time). General pro-life tenor to the various talks etc, and a mood of standing-for-what-is-right, in a straightforward and decent way. It's difficult to gauge how useful such great events are - I did meet some old and valued friends, and I think the general largeness of the thing sent a cheering message, and a stimulus to good work in all sorts of fields... much of the best Christian work is done, of course, in more humble surroundings, a point that was well made by those organising the event...there were some extraordinarily good interviews plus video-coverage ofa range of really noble work done in places as far apart as India and Sierra Leone and so on...

It felt odd to be eating breakfast, with crisp white tablecloths and an atmosphere of genial goodwill, in the Great Hall where St Thomas More and St Edmund Campion were tried...I think their prayers are always with those who are trying to do what is Christian and right, and certainly all in the hall would have more in common with them than with Richard Rich or with Topcliffe... if martyrdom ever looms again in Britain it would be to Campion's faith and courage we must look...

Monday, June 23, 2008

If you have never read...

...anything by the great journalist T.E.Utley, you are missing out. Get started here to find out about the man. Recently I went to the presentation of the 2008 Utley Memorial Awards, organised by members of this talented family, an utterly enjoyable evening.

Because much political chatter in today's London is dominated by the noisier bits of the 1990s-Left, it's hugely enlivening to spend time in the wider company of people with large minds and lots of humour and a sense of history and a sense of proportion...and a sense of pushing open wider and wider the door that leads to rooms of ideas just a bit fresher and less claustropobic than those we have had to endure this past decade.

Take a look...

...at this new on-line magazine - it's a good read. The article by the Anglican Bishop of Rochester is especially recommended. And the one on the MOD is a worrying and thought-provoking read.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Tower Hill...

...by the Tower of London, is now a Memorial Garden to all the men of the Merchant Navy - hundreds of their names, on the panels of white stone - who were killed at sea bringing food to Britain during two world wars. In the grey fizz of rain, early on a Saturday morning with not many people about, the carved young face of the merchant sailor in his greatcoat stared out towards the Thames.

Gradually, our group gathered, and in the end we were quite a crowd: we were there to commemorate a different chapter of history, starting at the site of the maryrdom of Saints John Fisher and Thomas More, which adjoins the Memorial Garden. The rain was clearing as things began: the 2nd annual Martyrs Walk organised by "Continuity", the movement launched by the Catholic lay movement Miles Jesu.

After an intrduction and talk about More and Fisher, we set off through the City, stopping at various places for a short talk on the history: St Olave's church, St Peter-upon-Cornhill (oldest church in London: the first church on this site was built when we were still under Roman occupation), the Cross Keys pub. At Greyfriars, where we broke for lunch, we had a splendid talk by one of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal...wearing the same style of habit as worn by the brave Franciscan martyrs...) . Then on, praying the Rosary and singing hymns, to St Patrick's Soho Square, where we had Benediction, and welcome cups of tea, and buns, and an excellent talk about the Tyburn martyrs, and so on to Tyburn itself. I think the walk is about seven miles in all. It was extraordinarily moving to be singing a Litany of the English Martyrs as we walked along - all those English names and we sang "Ora pro nobis" after each one. By now it was warm and sunny. Mass at Tyburn, with Fr Nicholas Schofield officiating, in the cool white chapel, with the traffic roaring past on the Bayswater Road but everything calm within, and the words of consecration...

Thursday, June 19, 2008

The magnificent spire...

...of Chichester Cathedral soars above West Sussex, a landmark from coast and Downs alike. So it was interesting to read, in an excellent historical display in the Cathedral, of how it collapsed in the 1860s one ferociously stormy night, after great cracks had been appearing in the walls and despoerate engineering work had failed to stem off the disaster. The spire was rebuilt thanks to the speedy and effective generosity of local landowners, including the Duke of Norfolk. It is said that a group of them gathered for a breakfast meeting soon after the disaster and immediately agreed that Sussex' greatest landmark must be restored, and before the ham and eggs were even finished, they had each agreed to give a generous sum.

The Cathedral was at its most glorious in mellow sunshine. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds had telescopes set up in the cloister so that one could view the peregrines who are nesting on the roof. A Memorial Service for some distinguished person was taking place inside and the sound of voices raised in "Tell out, my soul" rang out as I walked round to the West Door.

I was in Chichester to award prizes and certificates gained in the Association of Catholic Women/CTS Schools Religious Education Project by pupils at St Richard's School. A delightful afternoon: the solemn small boy who had won Second Prize wasn't sure if he was allowed to open his parcel, and sat politely holding it very tightly, until I suggested that we open it together, and he was thrilled with the three beautiful books that emerged, while the Headmistress was even more delighted with the generous cheque for the school, which he was able to hand over to her with a suitable flourish.

Later I met, by pre-arrangement, the team from Continuity organising this year's Martyrs' Walk in London on Saturday. Come and join us! Just turn up at 11 am at Tower Hill (we're gathering at the site of St Thomas More's execution)

Monday, June 16, 2008

Do you remember reading

quite widely, until very recently, a columnist called Mark Steyn? Haven't seen much of his work recently. Here's why.

Do you care about your freedom?

Read this about what's happening in Canada.

And ask yourself how things are going in Britain too.

On a cheerier note, do look at this...

parish blog which I think is a very good one. And take particular note of the excellent First Communion scheme they are recommending....

Great meeting...

...organised by Family and Youth Concern on Saturday. First speaker Mrs Irina Tyk, headmistress of Holland House School in Edgware - a fresh, amusing speaker who challenged the cliches that abound in the education scene today. She's set up The Butterfly Project reading course for children using the phonics method, to which people are now returning after discovering that the various "let's pretend" methods don't work, and she's author of Culture in the Classroom, on which subject she spoke. Among other things, she mentioned the difficulty of teaching children who have not been given any concept of right and wrong - this robs them of points of reference, an understanding of morality, and an ability to grasp many things. She emphasised the need to encourage children to have the confidence to look widely, to challenge the recieved statements they get from TV, and the limited packaged-version of soundbites they recieve through the narrow tube of that sub-culture.

Next speaker was Ray Lewis, a former prison governor who now runs the Eastside Young Leaders Academy in the London Borough of Newham.

This is a scheme, in one of the poorest parts of London, for giving troubled young boys a fresh start, so that they don't drop out of school and lose all life's great possibilities. An inspiring and invigorating message. There are some good things going on: with strong links with some of the famous Public Schools chools of Britain, the Young Leaders initiative has recently sent two boys to Rugby School....Ray Lewis is now now assisting new Mayor of London Boris Johnson on youth projects. He was very, very funny about daft bureaucracy and the collosal waste of money involved in various stupid official youth schemes. The Young Leaders Academy involves, among other things,a recognition that boys are different from girls and have their own specxific needs, and am introduction to church and to Christian worship...

We also met foster-parents Owen and Eunice Johns, who have fallen foul of new horrible policies forcing them to accept that homosexual activity is normal and to teach this to any children in their care. They are refusing to do this and after years of dedicated service as foster-parents are now being blocked...


Much lively discussion on all of these and related topics...but a general sense of anxiety as to what the future will bring, now that family breakdown in endemic in Britain, and so much social policy reinforces this. It was good to hear encouraging stories, but goodness, these are rare and the heavy hand of bureaucracy is mostly used to crush independent initiative and to force complaince with anti-marriage and anti-family policies...

London was en fete for the Trooping of the Colour, bright sunshine, hordes of police, various Tube stations closed etc, and I struggled with a heavy case down Picadilly to get to this meeting...but it was well worth it.

Thursday, June 12, 2008

A copy of Magna Carta...

...is on the table near me as I write. Regular readers of this Blog will be aware that J. and I obtained a copy on a recent visit to Runnymede, where the Carta was signed by King John in1215...

We put the copy, in its rather splendid black and gold-coloured case, on the table here with other odds and ends after reading it and talking about it for a bit...then it got moved about when I cleaned and dusted...and somehow it has simply stayed there...but today its presence suddenly struck with with a special force: I could not have known that it would be so relevant so soon.

Here is a relevant section, taken from the table and read and typed out for you to read with me:

"No free man shall be taken, imprisoned, outlawed, banished, or in any way destroyed, nor will We proceed against or prosecute him, eccept by the lawful judgement of his equals and by the law of the land."

Habeas Corpus, you see. No arbitrary unjust imprisonment without due trial.

Last night, Parliament voted that I can be imprisoned for 42 days without trial and without being charged.

Want to hear...

...about the Catholic Women of the Year? Vatican Radio has an interview with Auntie about it all.

More schools...

...to visit to distribute prizes and certificates gained in the Catholic Truth Society/Association of Catholic Women Schools RE Project. Do click on that link to the CTS - they have some wonderful books and DVDs. I am interested in their excellent material for children, but their other books and materials are also top-quality - and did you see the recent publicity over their new pamphlet on exorcism?

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Don't forget...

...this event in London on Saturday June 21st. It's an opportunity to learn some history and mark London's extraordinary heritage as well as honour the Faith...

Another event worth noting is the Evangelium conference planned for August, run by the CTS. Visit www.evangelium.co.uk for info. It's Explaining the Catholic Faith in the modern world and speakers include Fr Jerome Bertram author of The People of the Gospel, Walter Hooper, biographer of CS Lewis, and Fr Thomas Crean OP of A Catholic Replies to Professor Dawkins....

The National Catholic Register...

...in the USA contacted me to write something about the future of Catholic adoption societies in Britain now that we have this horrible new law compelling all such groups to agree in principle to place children with homosexuals and lesbians or face being closed down. You will be able to read my piece in a few days in the Register.

Whatever happens to the various Catholic adoption societies - and it is better that they close down than attempt to compromise with a grossly immoral law - the ordinary secular authorities are vigourously promoting the lesbian and homosexual lifestyles. A horrid poster in our local shopping centre enthuses brightly for lesbians to come forward to take other people's children for fostering and adoption. (We can be sure that the people who designed the poster are not offering their own offspring for this social experiment).

Children are not a piece of property to which people have a "right".

I am so glad you asked...

...and since you seem so interested in what we are doing on July 8th....

We've been invited to Tea with the Queen!!

Well, us and a few hundred others. We're going to a Garden Party At Buckingham Palace.

It is very exciting and I will borrow a hat from my sister-in-law and wear the nice blue dress-and-jacket bought for our Silver Wedding a couple of summers ago.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Hot July weather...

...continued today. While on the Isle of Wight, one of the jolliest activities was giving out the prizes gained by St Thomas of Canterbury RC primary school, at Carisbrook. They had gained prizes and a Merit Certificate in the 2008 Schools RE Project organised by the Association of Catholic Women and the Catholic Truth Society.

It was a very happy morning: the children sat cross-legged on the floor and the Head Teacher began the Assembly by reading out the Gospel from Sunday's Mass (the calling of St Matthew) and gave a little explanation of it, and then we had the prize presentation. Great enthusiasm. The little boy who won First Prize and a trophy for the School held the latter high up above his head like a football champion. A little Polish girl had gained a Merit certificate for her essay even though English is her second language. The local newspaper turned up to take photographs, and we all posed outside in the bright sunshine.

I was really sorry to leave the Isle of Wight - got home yesterday afternoon - and today seemed hot and sticky and difficult while I was tackling work. Glorious lunchtime break with a friend. She had recently visited Lourdes and brought me, among other things, a Rosary which is now tucked into my pocket. It is the 150th anniversary of Bernadette's apparitions this year and the Rosary is a special commemorative one. Everything felt better as I cycled home from our prolonged, enjoyable and talkative lunch.Tackled ironing, emails, cleaning kitchen floor, and various bits of work in fresh heart.

PLEASE ASK ME...

...what the Bogles are doing on July 8th. Please...

Monday, June 09, 2008

Sunday morning on the Island...

...began with a friendly note from our next-door neighbour (see below) and an invitation to supper there. On hearing of our day's plans, and especially the prison visit (again, see below) she also kindly lent us her car, which was to prove a wonderful boon.

Mass at St Cecilia's - glorious liturgy, sense of order and beauty beneath the serene and pleasingly austere arches of the cool chapel, friendly Extern sister bustling Jamie into doing one of the Readings, young family in front of us awed by the nuns' lovely singing...

Then a change of pace. A drive to the big modern prison in the centre of the Island. A friendly Visitors' Centre offers tea and snacks, toys and books for children, a kindly ambiance...but most people seemed to prefer to congregate by the bleak door of the prison itself, waiting for the numbers to be called and for the checking and photographing and shoes-off-please and the doors sliding open and admission to the visiting room. We were number Ten. While we waited, I walked about on the wide green lawn that separates the prison from the road. The sun was very, very hot.

Arrangements for visiting a prisoner are efficient, and we sat at a table and were able to talk freely. Major news: The prisoner for whom I have been asking readers of this Blog to pray HAS HIS APPEAL ON TUESDAY (it will be imminent as you read this). It would be a kindness to pray for him.

Because, for obvious reasons, I will not be going into details of this case on this Blog, I will leave the matter there. There was much to discuss. We left only when the visiting hours finished and all were ushered out.

We drove in silence to the sea. The sun had been beating down fiercely all afternoon. We found a small quiet stretch of beach near Fishbourne, scrambled into swimming-things, splashed into the water. It was heavenly. Further out to sea, the ferry chugged along. Above us the sky was cloudlessly blue as I rolled over to float on my back.The bell of nearby Quarr Abbey pealed reassurringly through the evening air.

Back at the cottage, a delicious supper was waiting next door, where kind neighbour H. welcomed us and was pouring chilled wine. Much talk of many things, including the plight of the prisoner we'd been visiting, the Island, Cowes, St Cecilia's, and more...a pleasant summer-evening supper...then Jamie had finally to go to catch the ferry and train back to London... The pace changed again. H. fetched the papers relevant to the history project. Another extraordinary coincidence of this weekend, you see, was that she had written to me asking if I might be able to help with this story of a remarkable nun - her aunt - born in the 19th century, founder of a college in India, a fascinating story...and the name was suddenly familiar to me as this nun had also been for a time Headmistress of my old school and was something of a legend there...we pored agreeably over papers and diaries, coffee was brewed, a book might be emerging from all this...

An enchanted island...

...awaited us over the Solent as we crossed to the Isle of Wight for what was to prove an extraordinary weekend.

A number of things had come together. Kind friends had invited us to use their cottage at Cowes for a little holiday. While on the Island, we would be able to do something I had been planning for a while - visit a prisoner who is in HM Prison there (regular readers will be aware of this case, as I have been begging for prayers for him). I completed the neccessary paperwork and we made arrangements...we also planned to visit the dear nuns at St Cecilia's Ryde, who are not only wonderful friends and a delight to be with at any time, but have also been praying for this particular prisoner.

And then, quite unconnected with any of the above, last week when writing to the winning schools in the ACW/CTS Schools Religious Education Project, I realised that one of the winning schools was St Thomas of Canterbury primary school at Carisbrook...on the Isle of Wight! So I was able to contact the school and arrange to bring the trophy and prizes over for a presentation ceremony...

Finally - in what was to prove another extraordinary link in a chain of things binding the weekend together - the next-door neighbour at the cottage where we would be staying, a close friend of our kind hosts, had contacted me about a project of particularly interesting historical research, of which more in due course...

So our weekend began, with the sunlight sparkling on the Solent, and lunch in Ryde, all trippers and sun and noise and seaside... and then a wonderful affectionate welcome at St Cecilia's, where glorious pink roses snuggle over the fence and trellis, and bushy lavender scents the air as you walk up to the main door, and a sweet Extern Sister greeted us with hugs and dear Sister E. came whirling into the Parlour to hug us through the grille, and we sat and talked of a thousand things, and there was that sense of wisdom and humour and down-to-earth reality that seems so elusive in so much of life and so ordinary in this quiet place set up on the cliffs beyond the Ryde sands and the sea.

We went into chapel for Vespers and the nuns sang enchantingly - you can listen to them, too, if you click on to the link I've given.

And then on to Cowes, via the most glorious sweeps of rounded green hills and lovely meadows - proper meadows, not just bare patches or big squares of yellow rape - and the fun of discovering the (very charming and comfortable) cottage, and then a long evening walk by the sea, with the sun setting and people milling about looking yachty and suntanned, heading for drinks and barbeques, and the sound of tinkling glasses and noisy laughter coming from pubs and clubs. We enjoyed long cold drinks and ended with fish and chips from a friendly shop, and the ferry chugged in and out across to Southampton and the waves lapped up by the Victorian Esplanade and there were faint trails of the memory of a once-great seafaring nation and lots of history to think and talk about...

Thursday, June 05, 2008

To Cambridge...

...with Mother, to visit some young relatives. Something of an adventure to get there: I had stupidly chosen to go via Liverpool St instead of Kings Cross. An unexploded bomb from WWII (I'm not inventing this!) brought delays to the Circle Line...we were late getting to the station, and later still arriving in Cantab. as the train was the slooooooooowest ever known, and went round via every village in Hertfordshire and Cambridegshire...however, it was bliss to arrive, and to sit in the lovely summery garden while E. and F. gave us a delicious meal and chilled wine and we caught up on family news, and it was even more delightful when the children woke from their afternoon rest and came down to play...enchanting toddler H. going merrily round the lawn on his little tricycle with Great-Auntie Joanna , and baby F. gurgling contentedly on the lap of great-grandmother. We loved every moment of our visit.

Travelled back to London and thence to the suburbs - people on trains are v. kind when you are with an elderly person, and young people not only leap up to give Mother a seat but give assistance in other ways: it's a real lift to the heart to see this. Often, you get nice conversations, too - M., who doesn't get up to London much these days, hugely enjoys a chat and it was all rather fun.

Had left my bike at Mother's (cycled there last night following a Catholic Writers' Guild meeting - speaker was A.N. Wilson, most enjoyable). So collected bike and cycled home in the cool evening...

AAAAARGH!! When I arrived home, mild chaos. Infestation of ants in the hall and all round Jamie's desk!! Nightmare. Emitting noises of mild panic, rushed out to Tescos and bought anti-ant stuff, spent an hour spraying and cleaning and coping. Meanwhile, had remembered that I left my mobile phone in Cambridge. Phoned to sort this out: by an extraordinary piece of Providence, I am speaking tomorrow at a school only a few miles away and can get into Cambridge to collect it...having deal with this and other issues, I pottered into the kitchen (it was by now v. late) to tackle things there, and the phone rang again. It was Ave Maria Radio from the USA (see below), ready for a live interview about the Church and adoption societies and the Govt's nasty new laws...

Tuesday, June 03, 2008

It's quite odd...

...to be standing in a rainy London suburb talking on the telephone and know you are being on a radio programme in America. Ave Maria Radio - various discussions on a show run by a chap called Al Kresta. This Thursday they'll discuss the latest developments regarding Catholic adoption societies and the new ghastly Govt regulations on homosexual adoption. More on all this later.

Priestesses...

...are briefly in the news again. Phone call from Premier Radio saying the Church had just issued a new statement saying that anyone taking part in such an ordination would be excommunicated...could I comment? I did so, as part of a discussion with a (?former? not sure if she has left her order or not) nun who is warmly, if somewhat incoherently, in favour of priestesses and said that she knew women who definitely felt they ought to be ordained. This last seems to me to miss the point entirely.

What is interesting is that all the ancient pagan religions seem to have had priestesses. And there were also certainly plenty of women around in that first band of Christians, with women the first to get the news of the Resurrection etc. So the Lord certainly wasn't hidebound by the conventions of His day in choosing only men, as the standard prattle has it - on the contrary. He knew what he was about. A male priesthood all fits in with the Bridegroom/Bride understanding of things, Christ and His Church...

I have to say that, out among younger Catholics, the whole thing doesn't really seem to be an issue anyway: the general sense appears to be that it's an issue that's settled.

Monday, June 02, 2008

Prizewinners...

...in the 2008 Schools RE Project run by the Association of Catholic Women get a Compendium of the Catholic Catechism, top prizewinners get a cash prize their schools, plus various books...cycling back today after another session of packing and posting at the Catholic Truth Society I suddenly worried that schools might get sniffy and say that the Compendium is too dull and formal a prize for a child. Of course the whole point is that it's meant to be a prize to keep and use throughout life, and also something that makes a formal statement about the Faith and its significance...what do Blog readers think?

Enjoyable correspondence about Mondegreens in the Daily Telegraph.

What is a Mondegreen? Go to the link to get the background re the name etc. One example is the monk in the middle of the Hail Mary "Blessed art thou a monk swimming..."

Sunday, June 01, 2008

A busy weekend...

...had begun on Friday evening with a fund-raising event at a friend's house in Chelsea, in aid of the International Theological Institute. I'd been working on this for ages, and it was great to have niece L. to help out. Drinks, talk, nibbles. A nice team came from St Patrick's Soho Square,(free, as they count as students), and members of the Catholic Cultural Group, and various other people. It all went well - though numbers not as good as in previous years, a bit disappointing - but golly when it ended L. and I were exhausted! Home to a late-night snack and big mugs of tea.

Before L. went back to university on Saturday morning, Uncle J. treated us all to breakfast in a posh new cafe just opened locally...scrambled eggs and smoked salmon, and lovely coffee. Then off to Kent (see entry below)...

Thanet...

...is an island. It's part of Kent, but not part of Kent. Water all round it. Lots of crucial history. We were there to speak at a Deanery meeting at St Ethelbert's in Ramsgate. Ethelbert was the King to whom St Augustine was sent with his mission from Rome.

It was lovely being on the Kent coast - it's still real English seaside. At Walmer the beach had fishing boats and tarry ropes and lobster pots and bits of metal this-and-that and mess. We ate fish and chips sitting on the pebbles. On the greensward along by the sea there' s a big new bandstand built in memory of the Royal Marines killed by an IRA bomb a few years back - it has their names all round it.

The weekend was a campaigning one, following on from the grim new legislation passed by the Govt on human embryos, future threats to Catholic schools, and more...we were giving info and collecting names of people interested in the Catholic Union ... spoke at Masses at St Ethelbert's and also at St Peter's at Westgate-on-Sea.

A large and cheery meeting on Saturday night at St E's - a good atmosphere. Afterwards a convivial dinner with the parish priest, and talking till late.

Before coming home we stopped to enjoy the sea a final time. It had been lovely in Saturday's sunshine but I particularly like an English beach in the rain, and the sea grey and not many people about, and the wind all buffeting and clean, and then indoors for hot drinks and the water lashing the windows.