Auntie...

...was invested as a Dame of St Gregory the Great yesterday (May 28th) by Archbishop Peter Smith  at St George's Cathedral Southwark.

 

The Mass was beautiful, celebrated by Mgr Keith Newton of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham. Glorious music, with cantor Jeremy de Satge: a Missa de Angelis, with Panis Angelicus at Communion, and hymns including  Newman's "Firmly I believe" sung heartily by all the congregation...Fr Stephen Langridge preached.

Our country...

...what a tragic state it is in.

Pray for the family of the soldier murdered in South London. Pray for our country and for its current government, only too obviously dazed and confused.

If you enjoy...

...reading this, then you will enjoy the DAY OF FAITH, to be held on June 18th in London.  So book in and come. You can come for the whole day, or just for the evening. Details here, and do book your place now.  There are a lot of people already booked in, but there are still some places left.

The Archbishop...

...of Southwark celebrated Mass today at Precious Blood Church, London Bridge, and blessed the new Shrine to Blessed John Henry Newman which has just been established in the church. It is a beautiful shrine, with a portrait of Newman (copy of the famous Millais portrait, from the National Portrait gallery), in a side-chapel, on the left as you walk up the main aisle towards the sanctuary.

A glorious Mass with good singing, and a particularly delightful moment when the children from the Sunday school trooped up for a blessing.  Just for a moment, the scene had the look of a painting:  "Sunday in a South London parish", with the line of children two-by-two  at the foot of the  sanctuary steps, and the candles gleaming and the Archbishop bending to bless a child, and the first of this year's sunshine finally managing to show itself through the high windows on this May morning.

Our Lady of Westminster...

...in the shrine at Hampton Wick, by the Thames, was the destination of a parish walking pilgrimage this evening. We gathered at St Joseph's, New Malden, where there is a beautiful Mary Garden created by parishioners, with flowers and shrubs named after Mary (rosemary, marigolds, etc etc). The parish priest led us in prayers and blessed us and then we set off...it was a cheery, friendly group and a pleasant walk. We stopped just outside Kingston and prayed the Luminous Mysteries of the Rosary, led by the Deacon. Then on through the town and across the river to the chapel of the Sons of the Divine Providence and the little shrine. There is also an attractive Lourdes grotto there, which on this May evening was covered with gloriously scented wisteria...

Then Fr Keyhoe at the shrine invited us in for tea and sandwiches and cakes, much appreciated. A happy evening.

The aim was to pray for vocations to the priesthood for our diocese. I had read that, as Archbishop of Krakow, Karol Woytila promised Our Lady that he would walk to every shrine within walking distance of the city, if she would grant him a student for his seminary for each such pilgrimage.  Within five years his seminary was full. So we are walking and praying.  This evening we arranged two further walks to local Marian places...

A procession through London...

...be there!!!

Sunday June 2nd. Starts 6pm with Mass at St Patrick's, Soho Square, then the Blessed Sacrament is carried through the streets. Come and join in!  We need a good crowd. It is a beautiful and impressive form of witness and London needs Christ.

This annual Procession has an international flavour - members of the Brazilian, Chinese, and other communities having links with St Patrick's always come along...

Beforehand, there will be a special hour of Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, starting at 4.30pm. This is at the personal invitation of Pope Francis, and in union with Catholics around the world. The Pope has called for a co-ordinated worldwide time of prayer before the Blessed Sacrament on June 2nd...don't miss this chance to join in...

The nearest Tube stations for St Patrick's are Oxford Circus or Tottenham Court Road.

A talkative day...

...and, yes, I know, most days with Auntie are likely to be talkative.  But today, we were judging the finalists for the Assn of Catholic Women Schools RE Project, so reading aloud the children's essays and sorting out which should be the final winners in the two different age groups.

The children were asked to imagine going through the door of a church, and learning about three things, three stages in a journey of faith: the font where people are baptised, the Sacrament of Reconciliation with the forgiveness of sins, and Holy Communion. There were specific questions that they had to answer.  One was about which day of the week is the one on which we should all go to Mass, the special day. Most of course get it right about Sunday - several mentioning that God rested on the Sabbath day, etc etc.  Some wondered if the special day might be Thursday, because of the Last Supper being on a Thursday. Which  actually  shows some quite good thinking....

They were also asked what they should do immediately after receiving Holy Communion, and again most got it right with something along the lines of "I return to my place and kneel and say some prayers". Some listed specific things about which they pray: "I pray for my Mum and Dad, and ask God to say Hello to my Nan in Heaven."

On Confession, some gave...um... too much information: "I tell the priest my sins, things like fighting with my brother - but he started it..."    "God forgives us and we should forgive others, like I forgave Rita even though she was mean to me first".

Martyrdom...

...the theme of Fr Alexander Sherbrook's sermon today at St Patrick's, Soho, on the feast of the Mexican martyrs.  Inevitably, thoughts and, later, conversations, turned to the topic of being a Christian today in Britain and the legal and social pressures that are bearing down on us as the full implications government's insistence on a wholesale redefinition of marriage become clear.  Our freedom to teach about true marriage is by no means clear under the plans, and it is already assumed that this right should be denied to us. We have been given no assurances about the rights of priests and teachers and catechists to teach what we know to be true.

I was at St Patrick's to lead the young students of the School of Evangelisation on the final History Walk of their term. They graduate in June - they have been taking part in a course of study through the Maryvale Institute - and their days have also been filled with a number of other projects including of course the street-evangelisation for which St P's has become famous. Our History Walk took us to the nearby (Anglican) church of St Giles-in-the-Fields. The big Blessed Sacrament procession which St P's holds each June always finished here at St G's, with Benediction in the churchyard, after which the kind parishioners of St G's serve wine and snacks...a delightful ecumenical gesture which sends out a message of goodwill and friendship to all.

We also took a Tube journey to the Tower of London,  looked at Traitors' Gate etc, and finished with prayers at the site of St Thomas More's martyrdom. We also walked soberly round the great memorial to the men of the Merchant Navy who are commemorated in the great garden nearby, men who have no graves on the earth because they died at sea...

Home, to an evening of study centred on Lumen Gentium and  Bl John Paul's writings on Mary: academic essay to be completed by the end of June.

A wonderful evening...

...launching the "Newman week" at the Ordinariate church at London Bridge. I think Pope Emeritus Benedict would be pleased and moved to see how things have developed here: a new shrine of Blessed John Henry Newman is being established at this church and a copy of the beautiful Millais portrait arrived and was unpacked today. The week of celebrations was launched with a lecture by Dr Andrew Nash...and he did a superb job. I am allowed to say that even though he is my brother: he really was simply terrific, a magnificent lecture giving the great sweep of Newman's life and work, beautifully illustrated with sketches and photographs on a screen set up in the church.  The lecture was accompanied by an excellent display about Newman, produced by the Communion and Liberation Movement from Oxford. This welcomed people as they arrived at the church, and they were also greeted with a glass of champagne...it really was a splendid evening.  After the lecture, refreshments were served in the Rectory. It was a grand day, and a success for the Ladies Ordinariate Group, members of which worked hard with the parish priest Fr Christopher Pearson, to make it all happen...

You won't read about this...

...in the secular press, so read it here: Pentecost in Rome, and a vast crowd of some 200,000 people packed  into St Peter's Square and the nearby streets and squares, right down to the banks of the Tiber...these are members of the various New Movements and communities in the Church who, in an initiative begun by Blessed John Paul, come to celebrate Pentecost with the Holy Father...

To Somerset...

...for a country weekend. Spent much of Saturday sitting in the sunshine reading through the essays sent in by children (hundreds of them!) for the annual Schools RE Project run by the Association of Catholic Women. Birds sang, the freshly-cut lawn was cool and green, the view was glorious...in the evening, we all went to a gathering at the local Catholic parish where Patrick Reyntiens (artist: stained glass)  was speaking - a delightful event, done in a sort of "Desert Island discs" style, a packed church, wine and snacks in the garden in sunshine.  It was interesting to learn more about Reyntiens work: never really thought about how stained glass is done...his son has created the magnificent new window in Westminstare Hall for the Queens' Diamond Jubilee, which I was showing to a group of people just this past week.

Sunday Mass: again packed..., in this rural area, lots of Indian families...a changing Britain...

 Pentecost. Figures published by the Latin Mass Society reveal how numbers of Catholic baptisms and marriages have dropped by a staggering amount over the past 50 years. to a fraction of what they once were.  I have been studying these figures for a long while so no news there.  Of interest is the groups that have gone against the trend: among priests ordained in recent years large numbers have come from the FAITH Movement and from other groups which no one noticed for a while, like the Neo-Catechuemnate. Some years back, a report announced that there would be no baptisms or ordinations by the year 2000, but things didn't work out that way.

To the Walworth Road...

... to a baker's shop, recommended by a friend, to order a cake.  I have always rather liked this corner of London, a step or two from the Elephant and Castle. It still has proper shops - real and some of them messy, all sorts of shops and  not just Starbucks and estate agents.  And this was a real baker, inexpensive and with some yummy cakes on display. After we had arranged about the cake  - it's gotta be big, there are quite a lot of people coming - I bought a lovely warm pasty and hurried off to catch the bus. I know one shouldn't eat in the street. But sitting on a cold morning at a bus-stop  in the Walworth Road eating a delicious wedge of flaky-pastry at a bus-stop and remembering how I used to travel along this road with my father, more than thirty years ago, on our way to work, was one of those happy moments that just deserve to be relished and recorded.

En route to the Borough High Street, a girl on the bus was talking loudly into her mobile: "Yeah...bring them all along: we want theatre, and some street-dancers...yes, sounds great....mmm....yeah we want Shamans and Druids, everyone....it'll be wicked".  I don't know what she was organising, but I got the impression that she very much wanted us all to hear.  So now you know: to make a thing a success you want witch doctors and bogus druids and a general air of something satanic.

There is an ache in the heart in modern London.

Spent the day cheerily at Pr. Blood church, wrapping prizes won by children across London in a big project involving learning about the Psalms. We will be displaying some of the children's beautiful work...  Also tackled some writing for my Maryvale diploma in Evangelisation. Then Evensong and Mass, and a cheery time over glasses of wine and hot sausages. Thank God for being part of the Church....

Things are going to be difficult...

...for Christians in Britain, as in other countries in what we used to call "the West", over the next years.

For some while now, it's become fashionable among Catholics to talk about "the coming persecution". Too often the approach is  approach is a slightly smug  "Ah...well...it'll be good for us..." and even to add a note of relish.

Hmmm.  Persecution isn't fun, and talking tough doesn't mean that you will be tough when the time comes.  Gloating and oooh-golly-I'm-ready-for-a-fight  isn't a useful approach.  Better to be downbeat and realistic, add some humour, and lots of prayer, and keep going.

Plenty of nastiness coming our way. Attempt to impose forms of euthanasia under the nasty idea of "assisted dying" - this won't win a majority of votes in the House of Lords when it is brought forward in the next couple of days, but at this stage the aim of its supporters is simply to gain publicity and promote their message, and this will be very successful.

Then of course the ghastly plans to redefine marriage. Ugh: and the government is doing all it can to force this horrible thing through a Parliament that doesn't want it. Pray - and write again to your MP.

And, on the back of the govt's horrible planned law, great waves of propaganda promoting homosexual lifestyles  now being sent to schools, with everyone assuming that this it is compulsory to teach this stuff. It isn't. Schools have no obligation to promote homosexual activity, and Catholic schools have an absolute right to give the Catholic Church's teaching on this subject.

We are all going to need courage and be quite clear: "As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord".

... Yesterday, at a meeting...

...planning an Autumn event (info in due course) we broke off for tea, prepared by our kindly hostess who had welcomed us into her lovely flat near Westminster Cathedral.

 I went into the kitchen to help, took up the tray, crossed into the hall...and the bottom of it fell out, leaving me holding the frame! Shattering sound of crashing crockery - and milk, biscuits sugar, showering the carpet and walls....

You cannot imagine how far bits of broken china can travel, or how much mess one shattered milk-jug and full sugar-basin can make.

Mopping, hoovering, wiping - and, initially, leaving small trails of my own blood as I did so, because I didn't realise that I cut my thumb as I seized the first broken pieces from the carpet...

...and...

reading the children's essays, and discussing children and Religious Education generally, always brings out the tales of howlers. My recent favourite was the small girl praying earnest "Hail Mary, full of grapes..."

Children...

...have sent in some splendid work for the Assn of Catholic Women 2013 Schools RE Project. They had to study the sacraments of Baptism, Reconciliation, and Holy Communion, as part of the celebration of the Year of Faith. A brochure showing a door of a church invited them to open the door and go in...this Project, sponsored by the Catholic Truth Society, has now been running for several years and we get literally hundreds of essays from Catholic primary schools across Britain. Every entry is carefully read, and we award a large number of prizes, all generously donated by the CTS. A team of judges then meets and some top winners are chosen - 1st,2nd and 3rd winners in two age groups. They win cash prizes for their schools, and the 1st winner in each age group gets a trophy to keep for one year...

Running this vast project involves teams of volunteers who mail out the brochures (a task done agreeably over mugs of tea and lots of chat, daily for several days at the CTS office in South London), reading all the essays, organising the final judging, and then packing and mailing out the prizes (a mammoth task).  It is all well worth while, and reading the children's essays reveals encouraging evidence of some good work being done in Catholic primary schools...

And we badly need good news, because so much of what is happening in Britain at the moment is horrid. Schools are being sent nasty material promoting same-sex "marriage", including material aimed at very young children. There is increasing evidence of unjust discrimination of employees in various services who dare to show - even privately - opposition to the imposition of acceptance of same-sex unions. The tradition of fair play and freedom under the law is now regarded as out of date and wrong, because an obligation to agree with the Government on this subject is deemed to take priority over every principle and every sense of conscience. And the Govt is trying to rush the legislation through Parliament despite strong and growing opposition...read more here...

To Northern Ireland...

...to speak at a conference organised by All Saints Church, Ballymeena, on 'Women and the Church'. Large attendance. An excellent introductory speech by Baroness O'Loane, who spoke of  great Christian women who had influenced and inspired her...and the parish priest spoke extremely well, giving the teaching of the Church with specific references to John Paul and Mulieris Dignitatem etc...

Earlier, a weekday Mass in the church with a substantial congregation - certainly over 150 -  and when I remarked on this I learned that was smaller than usual as a coachload of people had gone to Knock on pilgrimage...

Sunday - a journey to the coast, glorious countryside, a crowded Mass with lots of families...

Next time you hear that the Catholic Church in Ireland is dying...it isn't.

Extraordinary...

...sudden conversation this afternoon, in a busy café where I'd parked myself to tackle some work on my laptop for an hour or so. Pleasant girl sitting in vaguely yoga-position, cross-legged, at the table nearest to the only electric plug was friendly and helpful when I asked if I could share it...and after we had both spent a longish while beavering away on our respective computers, we got talking. She helped me tackle a bothersome layout problem on my Word document, and somehow we moved on from that to talk of theatre and writing and travel and  more...she announced with some vigour that she was an atheist and this resulted in a very lively conversation. Delightful girl: an actress and dancer, bright, articulate...conversation ranged over Dawkins, Hitchens, touched on evolution, Buddhism...it was blustery and rainy outside as we said goodbye, and I put my hands into my pockets to keep warm - and encountered a small Bl JPII medal given by a friend from Rome. I gave it to this new friend. JPII was an actor too....

On to Marble Arch, for the Tyburn Lecture. A disappointment. The Tyburn nuns are wonderful and always have a warm welcome, and the Lectures, celebrating free speech and debate about crucial current issues, are a magnificent tradition. But this one was unimpressive: given by a lawyer who lectures at the London School of Economics, it ended up as a rather tired-sounding rant against John Paul and Benedict. Somehow, after a lively conversation earlier, I felt let down. The speaker parroted the line that is apparently being pushed in The Tablet.  The silliest bit was his suggestion that John Paul didn't engage with the modern world. All those great gatherings in the cities of the world, the wall-shattering change that swept across Eastern Europe,  the breakthrough in relations with the Jewish people,  that extraordinary rapport with the young that created World Youth Day...apparently none of that really happened...oh, and he didn't seem to think that Benedict XVI would have much long-term impact either...

Listening to this rubbish was slightly embarrassing, like hearing someone who dabbles in poster-paints denouncing Michaelangelo.


 

I LIKE Papa Francis...

...have done from the start, but he keeps giving us all more and more reasons for doing so. Like today: read here...

The river Humber...

...goes out to meet the sea at Hull, and this became one of Britain's busiest ports. Some two million people arrived here from Northern Europe in the 19th and early 20th centuries, travelling from here across the country to Liverpool to sail to America.

Hull: the sea, fishermen, a great maritime heritage...today the old docks have become a marina for  expensive pleasure-boats. There are wonderful old pubs and smart new cafes and restaurants...a fine statue showing a family group, commemorating those long-ago emigrants...an old lightship which you can board and explore, seeing the cabins and galley and shining brass equipment that was all in use just a few decades back...and the magnificent  buildings which once housed the shipping authorities and port officials are now  elegant empty offices advertising space to let...and there are a  number of museums, telling the local history and the maritime history...

What was once a busy noisy place is now clean and beautiful...but on a hot sunny day there were not many people in this waterside area, except at the cafes overlooking the marina. I walked along the quayside and old docks, gazed out towards the sea, pondering the history... and was  almost alone. Returned to a café to catch up on emails and do some work.

The crowds are elsewhere, in the big new inland shopping centre. The fine old City Hall now hosts a tourist bureau, and the Post Office has closed and is run from the back of a shop instead.

Lunchtime Mass at St Charles church - sudden Bavarian baroque in this Yorkshire seaside city! A good number of people for a weekday Mass. A rich history. A huge number of names, four long columns of them, on the  1914-18 War Memorial...

In the evening, a change of pace. I was speaker at the HULL FAITH FORUM .This has been running for several years, and is linked to the Faith Movement.  Young people from parish Confirmation groups, a great atmosphere, excellent local priests doing good work...

"I vow to thee my country..."

is the title of a lecture to be given by Charles Moore, at Brompton Oratory on June 13th. More info here...I will definitely be attending.  6pm, preceded by Evensong.  It is sponsored by the Friends of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, and the theme is the future of Christianity in Britain.

Charles Moore is a v. good writer, and of course his latest biography is provoking a good deal of interest...

at Maryvale...

...there is an annual Pilgrimage with open-air Mass and Procession, honouring the Sacred Heart. This year it will be Sunday June 9th. Starts 3pm. Phone 0121 360 8118 for info - or just turn up. 

The Sacred Heart shrine here in this glorious old house is the shrine that John Henry Newman knew and loved. The wide lawns and the cool shaded paths are beautiful in the early-summer sunshine. There is birdsong and the cooing of pigeons, and the rustle of trees the roar of Birmingham traffic is a distant but useful reminder of the busy-ness of modern life and the world to be evangelised...

Endings and beginnings...

...and things changing...

Final weekend of my 5-year Degree course at Maryvale. For the past several trips to Birmingham, I've travelled by the cheaper Chiltern Line, which also mean arriving at the v. agreeable Moor Street station, ("retro"). Then one hurries through the underpass, and can get a taxi from New St station...except that today it was all different. They're doing some major reconstruction, and youngsters carrying magnificent signs, depicting giant-sized hands pointing the way, directed us all to a new taxi rank, in a new and different street...and what with this, and a sensation of gosh-this-is-my-last-Maryvale-weekend, and so on, gave this Friday evening a different feel from others...

Maryvale with an unchanging welcome...the sudden gulpy feeling as I was given some lovely cards of congratulation and kind things were said re the DSG...then a talkative supper, followed by study time, and then the sound of singing from the chapel, and I hurried, a trifle late, into Night Prayer. I love the chapel here, the candles glowing, the voices saying the psalms turn-and-turn-about...

Exams tomorrow.

/

A long-time hero....

Steve Stevens, awarded the DFC for wartime heroism,  later a pioneer pilot in Africa with the Missionary Aviation Fellowship, later still a founder of the Nationwide Festival of Light in Britain and then in Australia...now in his 90s he is still writing and campaigning, and has just sent me a copy of his latest book "Fighting for love, purity, marriage and family life".  It tells the story of the Festival of Light, and how it rallied young people in the 1970s...I was one of the thousands who were taught and inspired  by the NFoL and I am so grateful for the work and witness of Steve and Kay Stevens.

To Cavendish Square...

...to eat sandwiches in the sunshine w. sister-in-law, prior to a little shopping expedition.

Expedition initiated by said sister-in-law: "Joanna, what are you going to wear for this being-made-a-Dame thing?"  Faint note of dread that Auntie will turn up in favourite comfy shoes and unmatching will-this-do skirt n top.

For all previous special occasions, Auntie has been dressed by sister, sister-in-law, or, on one occasion, a niece. Grateful thanks to all. It's now become a tradition...

Cavendish Square is a pleasant bit of greenery off Oxford St, marred only by an equestrian statue which looks quite agreeable until you discover that it is of Butcher Cumberland. Grrrrh. It was removed in the 19th century because he was so loathed, then finally put back. Ugh.

Shopping. Shoes: nice ones, not expensive,  and surprisingly comfortable. DRESS: and will match v. suitable hat.