Servers' Winter Trip

The servers' winter trip took place today. This year we made a visit Farnborough Abbey. 27 servers, together with helpers, made the hour long journey south whilst watching the animated film 'Joseph: King of Dreams'. Upon arrival we were greeted by Br Thomas the guest master who brought us into the Abbey church. We then celebrated a votive mass of Our Blessed Lady. The Abbot of Farnborough, Don Cuthbert Brogan, gave us short talk on the monastic life and a tour of the monastery. We visited the crypt where the Emperor Napoleon III is buried. After praying the the divine office with the community we had a short lunch in the south lodge just by the monastery farm.

Before setting back we had time to stop for ten-pin bowling at Bracknell. Much fun was had by all. On the way home we prayed the glorious mysteries of the rosary. The day we a great success with a good balance of activities. We now look forward to the summer trip...

The Miraculous Medal

During the week over 200 'miraculous medals' were distributed to the pupils of the Holy Ghost School. These were donated by the Legion of Mary. The design of the medal of the Immaculate Conception (the official name) was given by Our Lady to St Catherine Laboure in 1830 during an apparition in Paris. It is the most widespread devotional medal in the Catholic Church today.

Sexual Orientation Regulations

You will have seen a lot of concern from Christians about the Sexual Orientation Regulations currently being forced through by the Government without debate. You can read the regulations for yourself by clicking this link.

Christians believe in tolerance and freedom. So why are they opposing these regulations? Recently the parish newsletter has carried an advert from some parishioners advertising a room to rent in their home that would suit a 'practising Catholic'. Under these new regulations they wouldn't be able to place that advert unless they were willing to accept into their home someone who applied who was a practising homosexual (see paragraph 6 of the Regulations).
We don't let out Visitation House but if I were to and the Society of Militant Transexuals (I don't think there is one!) wanted to use it, I wouldn't be able to reject them on the grounds that they're ethos isn't in accord with the Church's understanding of human sexuality.
In our Catholic schools we seek to present the ideal of marriage as a faithful, monagomous union between a man and a woman. Under the proposed regulations, as we have seen recently with Christian Unions in some universities, this could be challenged as discriminatory. For further information about how the regulations would affect what is taught in schools it is worth clicking here to download an explanatory document from the Christian Institute - you will be surprised!

At present not all discrimination is illegal. Nor should it be if we are all to live in freedom.

Universities Ban Christian Unions

In our parish we have a group who carry out a very specific mission: their task is to see how we can be more effective in our influence in the local area and in society in general. The group was formed in the wake of the emergency appeal from the Catholic bishops of England and Wales to defend our schools against an attempt to force them to take non-Catholic children. The Group invites us to be aware of what is happening in society today. Recently they drew my attention to the fact that four universities have now banned Christian Unions. Here's an article on the issue from Independent Catholic News:

LONDON - 20 November 2006
Christian Unions seek legal advice after campus ban
Dan Bergin

Christian Unions in four British universities are seeking legal advice after they were banned or restricted for not meeting with equal opportunity legislation.

Exeter University's Guild of Students said the Christian Union (CU) is not open to all, because members must sign a form saying they follow Christ. The university has temporarily suspended them from the official list of student societies on campus. The Union has also had its bank account frozen and has been banned from free use of students' guild premises or advertising within guild facilities. Exeter University's student guild claims the CU constitution and activities do not conform to its equal opportunities policies.

The 150-strong Christian Union in Birmingham was also suspended this year after refusing to alter its constitution to allow non-Christians to address meetings, and refusing to amend its literature to include references to gays, lesbians, bisexuals and those of transgender sexuality.

Christian Unions at Edinburgh, Heriot-Watt and Birmingham universities say they have been accused of excluding non-Christians, promoting homophobia and discriminating against those of transgender sexuality. Edinburgh University has banned an event run by the Christian Union called PURE which promotes a traditional biblical view of personal and sexual relationships. The university defended the ban, saying that PURE was in breach of its equality and diversity policy because PURE claims that any sexual activity outside heterosexual marriage is not God-ordained.

Last year Edinburgh university banned copies of the Bible in its halls of residence after protests from the Students' Union. Exeter Christian Union said on Thursday that it would take legal action after 14 days if it was not fully re-instated as a student society by the guild with full rights and was allowed to call itself the Christian Union. Emma Brewster, CU representative at Exeter University told the BBC: "This is a fundamental issue of freedom of speech and of common sense. Legal action is the last thing we want to take, and we certainly don't relish it, but we are fully prepared to stand our ground for truth and freedom."
© Independent Catholic News 2006

Advent Pastoral Letter

Archbishop Kevin McDonald has published a Pastoral Letter to be read at all Masses on the first Sunday in Advent. In it he announces a period of reflection and consultation throughout the diocese during Lent next year. The Archbishop recognises that "fears for the future persist and they centre particularly on the fact that over the next few years we will have fewer priests than we have been used to having in the past". He encourages us both to pray for vocations to the priesthood, "strongly" recommending "the practice of prayer before the Blessed Sacrament for an increase in vocations", and to discern plans and strategies for living with fewer priests. He wants us to focus particularly on three particular issues: alongside facing the future he asks us to reflect on how we might grow in communion and reach out in mission.
The Archbishop's Pastoral Letter will appear in a few days on the diocesan website. You can access it by clicking this link.

Caption Competition

"Once again, it was the written part of the "Is yours the true religion?" exam where Pope Benedict would really shine. And as always, he was a good sport about it. "

photo: REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi

h/t: American Papist

Pope Benedict visits Turkey amid unrest

On Tuesday the Holy Father will go to Turkey for his first official visit to an Islamic country. The prospect of a Papal visit has not been received well in Turkey which is ruled by an Islamist party. Posters condemning the visit, such as the ones in this picture, have appeared everywhere. They advertise an anti-Pope rally and read "No to the Crusaders alliance! The ignorant and sneaky Pope should not come to Turkey" (AP Photo/Osman Orsal).

There have also been heated demonstr-ations. Recently the 'Hagia Sophia' was invaded by demonstr-ators protesting against the Pope. The Hagia Sophia was, of course, a Christian Church which was converted into a Mosque when the Islamic invaders captured Istanbul. Since the last century it has been a museum.

After 700 years of occupation and discrimination the remaining Christian community has dwindled to a small proprtion of the Turkish population. In recent years, with the rise of militant Islam it has suffered greatly once again. The Pope is going to Turkey primarily to meet Patriarch Bartolomeos, the 270th successor of St Andrew, first amongst equals of the Orthodox patriarchs, and leader of the worlds 300 million orthodox Christians.

The Turkish authorities make life difficult for Patriarch Bartolomeos. They refuse to recognise the Patriarchate's international role. The law states that no one but a Turkish citizen can become Patriarch yet in 1971 they closed the only high-level theological school in the country, on the island of Halki, which means that the Patriarchate cannot train Turkish-born Greeks for ministry within the country. Despite talk of tolerance, Turkey pursues a policy of slow strangulation of non-Islamic religious minorities. The Patriarchate's small cathedral, the Phanar or Fener, is squeezed into the back streets near the polluted inlet of the Golden Horn. It has frequently been a target of bomb attacks, in 1993, '94, '96, '97, '98, 2004.

Pope Benedict's visit comes at a difficult time. That it is not welcome is shown by the fact that the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister and the Minister for Religious Affairs will all be absent during the visit. It important therefore that we pray for the Pope, especially for his safety at this time.

Go Karting

Last Friday our new 'Keep the Faith' group (Year 7) made a visit to Mitcham race track for an evening of Go Karting. It seems that the rain and wind added to the fun! This group meets twice a month and provides a way for our young people to keep in touch, to pray together and learn more about their faith. It has so far been very popular with an average of 20 at each meeting since September.

Reclaiming Christmas

After the success of our 'Catholicism for the Curious' posters last Lent, we decided to try something similar for Advent and Christmas this year. In many places the stranglehold of secularism is such that the word 'Christmas' itself is studiously avoided. Some people send cards with the words "Season's Greetings", a strange sentiment given that the season in question is 'the bleak midwinter'! In other places we can hear the greeting "Happy Holidays" - which I always think is best uttered by one of those grinning, battery-operated flowers that wiggle about in reaction to noise. And of course we also hear of those dour, humourless local authorities that celebrate 'Winterval' - wasn't it Oliver Cromwell who abolished Christmas and forbade mince-pies?
Where was I? Oh yes, Advent and Christmas! Wouldn't it be great, we thought, if all our parishioners were to display the same poster from the beginning of Advent until the Feast of the Epiphany? If we all had the same poster - a simple Nativity image - in our windows, it would say to the people of Balham that Christmas means more to us than office parties and tinsel. And then we thought, why stop there? It's not just Catholics who rejoice at Christmas time. All Christians are united in celebrating our Saviour's birth. Why not invite other Christian communities to join us in giving witness? So we did. I'm very pleased to say that they were just as enthusiastic about the project as we are. It will be wonderful to get all the Christians of our parish to give this united witness.
So the posters are at the printers and we hope they will be delivered this week. We can then begin distributing them on Sunday. Experience shows that it is good to generate some prior interest, so why not talk to your Christian friends about what we are doing. If they don't attend a local Christian church you could pick up a poster for them from the Holy Ghost. The idea is to give a powerful, joint testimony to Christ in the two important liturgical seasons of Advent and Christmas.
Simple. Easy. Effective.

Just what you would expect from the Holy Ghost!

November

November is the month when we pray for the repose of the souls of those who have died. In Catholic families it is customary to pray for deceased relatives, and in the parish it is no different. On Sunday we celebrated the 11.30am Mass for all our parishioners who died during the course of the last twelve months.

We don't get many sick calls in the parish but in the last few days we've been called out four times. On three occasions we were able to arrive in time to give the Last Rites to prepare the person for their transition from this 'vale of tears' to the life to come. On the fourth occasion the person had died peacefully in her sleep and we were able to say the prayers for the dead asking God to have mercy on her and receive her into his heavenly home.

It can sometimes be difficult to catch a priest at home in the presbytery, and sometimes we get the dreaded answerphone. At the Holy Ghost we try not to leave the answerphone on at night - although inevitably sometimes we forget. It is always worth leaving a message during the day and calling again at night. The priest will happily drop everything he can to attend a soul in its last agony.

Today's Wedding

Congratulations to Naomi Bull and Andrew Greenwood who were married today in a splendid ceremony at the Holy Ghost. Here they are photographed signing the register. their mothers, in the background, were the witnesses. Music for the ceremony was provided by Jeremy de Satge and members of his schola Cantamus.

Back from Ireland

I flew back from Dublin airport on Wednesday evening having been at a priests' conference in Meath since Monday. I was invited over to speak on Fostering Vocations in Today's Culture. It was a good meeting and was well-attended. I met a number of interesting people over there including the Bishop of Meath and Fr Vincent Toomey, former professor at Maynooth, the Irish seminary, and personal friend and ex-student of the present Holy Father.
I travelled with Ryanair and was impressed by its efficiency. We were a bit late leaving Gatwick, but that was nothing to do with the airline. On the return journey everything from check-in to arrival went smoothly and efficiently.

Richard Dawkins meets his match

Richard Dawkins continues his personal crusade against religion in his latest book. Recently, however, he met his match in a debate on Irish Radio with the philosopher David Quinn. I have transcripts of the debate but they are too long to put on this blog. You can, however, hear it for yourself by clicking this link. Once there, scroll down to Monday 9th October to hear the programme in question. The debate is from minutes 8-25 or so of the 59 minute programme.

Mongeham & Sandwich

On Saturday I was giving a Day of Recollection to the Folkestone Deanery. The theme was Vocation and about thirty people attended. The photo is of two young lads who served on the day. The Catholic Church in Mongeham is very interesting. It is quite small but a lot of care has gone into its design. Many of its early parishioners worked in the local coal mine (there were about five coal fields in Kent) and the Sanctuary Light is converted from an old miner's Davey Lamp.

Fr Benedict Visits Balham

On Thursday evening we were very pleased to welcome Fr Benedict Groeschel to the parish. During an Evening of Recollection Fr Benedict spoke to a packed Church about the 'Spirituality of Pope Benedict XVI'. He spoke with his usual candour and good humour. If you weren't there you missed a real treat!
Fr Benedict was very badly injured in a car accident some years ago and has only recently resumed his weekly television show on EWTN, so we were exceptionally lucky that he came to Balham. It was a great grace to have him here.

One of the impressive things about the evening was the sheer number of young people who turned out to meet him, as you can see in this photo. During his inaugural Mass Pope Benedict said that one of the legacies of Pope John Paul II was a more youthful Church. Fr Benedict speaks of the "John Paul Generation". We certainly saw them present this evening.

After Benediction Fr Benedict met people as they left the Church and then went into the school hall to talk to more people while coffee and tea were being served. We'd like to thank all those who helped out in various way and contributed to making this evening such a significant one in the history of our parish. Fr Benedict was greatly impressed by our parish. As he said when he walked into the Church his first thought was, "Thank God! A CATHOLIC Church!".

Fr Benedict Groeschel speaks to priests

Fr Benedict Groeschel today addressed a gathering of priests at St. Bede's parish, Clapham Park. He spoke to the group of about 30 clergymen about the turn around taking place in modern pyschology and how the concept of virtue has returned to mainstream discussion. Groeschel who is a professor of pastoral psychology explained that many in his field are now abandoning the 'value neutral' understanding of life, by which we make our own truth and decide on our own good, for a more meaning and goal directed approach based on objective reality. He was very well received and joined the group for Benediction and Lunch afterwards.

Maryvale Institute

Yesterday I was up at 5.00am in order to leave at 6.00am to get to Birmingham for a meeting at the Maryvale Institute at 9.00. When I got there the meeting had been postponed to 10 but, since others who left London later got horribly delayed in traffic, I was glad for the early start. Maryvale was celebrating its Silver Jubilee as an institute dedicated to catechesis and further education and its guerst of honour for the day was Archbishop Michael Miller, the Secretary of the Congregation for Education in Rome.

The parish's association with Maryvale goes back several years, and we are the only parish listed in its jubilee handbook as a Maryvale 'partner' - the others are all dioceses, institutes and organisations. Over a hundred catechists from all over London and beyond have trained here to become Catechists. Parishioners have completed a number of different Maryvale courses, and several have gone on to begin the BA in Theology. I am an external member of the Maryvale Board of Studies which gives me a good opportunity to feed information and experience from the parish back to the various course directors at the Institute.

I am also on Maryvale's Pontifical Development Group, which is an important new project aiming to develop closer ties with the Holy See. The meeting yesterday morning was a meeting between this group and Archbishop Miller. It was an opportunity for him to grow in appreciation of how much of an effect Maryvale has in the Church - its distance learning programme makes the study of theology accessible all over the world - and he was particularly impressed to hear that 2,000 catechists in the Arab world have been trained thanks to Maryvale programmes. The Archbishop expressed the Church's gratitude for our work and encouraged us to look into the possibility of becoming an Institute accredited by a Pontifical University.

Later that day the Archbishop presided over a special Mass of thanksgiving which was attended by people from all over the world who had come for the occasion. The Mass was followed by a celebratory supper prepared, as always, by the wonderful Brigittine sisters.

Matt O'Gorman at Forum Christi

Forum Christi is the parish group for 16-30s. It meets every Sunday in Visitation House. It brings young Catholics together to meet one another, to pray, to receive some catechesis and to hear some of London's best Catholic speakers (addressing a wide variety of topics relating to faith and life). This Sunday Matt O'Gorman, the dynamic press secretary of the charity LIFE, addressed the group. He spoke about the various pro-life challenges that young Catholics face today. As always at Forum Christi the evening was completed with prayer and then some 'theology on tap' at the local.

Oxford

Yesterday I was in Oxford to preach at the University Chaplaincy. Before the morning Mass I was able to take a stroll through the city and took this photograph of the Cathedral from Christ Church meadow. It was a lovely bright morning and the streets were pretty well deserted. The centre is now closed to traffic apart from buses and taxis but I had the impression that the city was looking rather un-cared for. Perhaps it was just that the roadsweepers hadn't had a chance to clean things up after a Friday and Saturday night of student revelry. In my day we had to live within a fixed grant (most of which went on 'battels' - accommodation fees) the advent of the Student Loan seems to have allowed a certain relaxation of economies.

The celebration of Mass went well and the students were very kind about the sermon afterwards. I even met two of our parishioners who had travelled up for an annual Cathsoc football match. In the afternoon I attended a meeting of the Vocations Group and was able to talk to them about vocations discernment, seminary formation and the process of application. This is a really good initiative and is a credit to Fr Jeremy Fairhead the chaplain.

Nicole Syed & James Parker

Over the years the parish Marriage Preparation Course has become very popular. We often get enquiries from engaged couples in other parishes who have heard about our course and would like to attend.

One of our keynote speakers is Nicole Syed. She deals with the sensitive area of the Church's teaching on contraception by explaining what Natural Family Planning is and how it works. Nicole is a specialist in the whole area of fertility and has helped many couples in different ways. Some of her clients are keen to learn to understand and harness the power of their own fertility avoiding the contamination of chemicals, hormones and other contraceptive contraptions. Sometimes her clients have experienced difficulty conceiving. These she can often help by teaching them to learn and interpret the signs of their own fertility. Sometimes she can help them identify real problems that need medical solutions.

Most movingly, Nicole has helped couples learn to interpret the signs of abnormality that may lead to a miscarriage in pregnancy. I've known some mothers to suffer multiple miscarriages before their doctor has begun to investigate the problem seriously. I've also known Nicole to help couples spot the warning signs and take the necessary remedial medication to enable the pregnancy to carry to full term.

Nicole has helped and inspired many, many couples in our parish over the years and we owe her a debt of gratitude. One of our parishioners, Joanne Connolly, was so impressed by Nicole that she gave up her job to train to become a Fertility Care Practitioner herself and has now qualified.

Last month Nicole Syed married James Parker in a wonderful, faith-filled celebration of love and vocation. Fortunately for us, she will continue to work at the London Fertilitycare Centre and help us with our marriage classes.

To find out more about how Natural Family Planning can help you and enrich your marriage contact Joanne or Nicole and make an appointment for an initial meeting. You can also visit the Fertility Care website.