Help Save The Babies Now !

The Good Counsel Network does an amazing job of counselling women who are thinking of having an abortion, for whatever reason. It puts up adverts in underground stations, and these are not cheap. It also provides material support for women who would otherwise see an abortion as the only way to survive. This is also not cheap. The Network sends out letters asking supporters for donations to help meet the bills. The postage costs money too...

This month things are so incredibly tight financially that the Good Counsel Network is unable to send out all the fundraising appeal letters...

It desperately needs to raise £2,500 just to make ends meet. People are doing sponsored walks, and other activities, but more help is needed now.

If you are in a position to help financially, please consider giving money to this very worthwhile cause. By doing so, there is absolutely no doubt that you will help to save the lives of unborn children.

Things are difficult financially for many people at the moment - if you are unable to help materially, then please, please, help with prayer.

Pray the novena to St. Philomena that the funds will be raised to help the Good Counsel Network continue its life-saving work.

Novena Prayer to St Philomena

O Faithful Virgin and Glorious Martyr, St Philomena, who works so many miracles on behalf of the poor and sorrowing, have pity on me. Thou knowest the multitude and diversity of my needs. Behold me at thy feet, full of misery, but full of hope. I entreat thy charity, O great Saint! Graciously hear me and obtain from God a favourable answer to the request which I now humbly lay before thee – that Good Counsel may raise the money it needs and that as many lives as possible will be saved through their work (add your own intentions). I am firmly convinced that through thy merits, through the scorn, the sufferings and the death thou didst endure, united to the merits of the passion and death of Jesus, thy spouse, I shall obtain what I ask of thee, and in the joy of my heart I will bless God, who is admirable in His Saints. Amen.

Mantilla-twitch to Maria Stops Abortion.

Murdoch The Philosopher...

That's Iris, you understand, not Rupert...

As a "proper" author, with my name in print (yes, well, ok... one chapter!) I am always keen to plug any of my friends who have a similar literary bent... (meaning that I like to bask in their reflected glory, but let's gloss over that little point...)

Dr. Miles Leeson, Lecturer in English Literature at Portsmouth University, has written Iris Murdoch: Philosophical Novelist, a book about some of her fictional and philosophical works, which particularly considers how "...the history of philosophy is more prevalent in Iris Murdoch's fiction than is usually given credit..."

As I explained to Miles, (that's him on the right of the photo, taken during the Faith Summer Break a few years back) I once attempted to read a book by Iris Murdoch - so long ago that I forget which - and never made it to the end of the first chapter. However, I suspect that this says more about me than it does about her writing, and reading the introduction to Leeson's work has actually spurred me on to give her another go. This is no mean feat - to paraphrase someone or other, philosophy is a closed book to me, and, if I had my way, a burned and buried one too...

The book is published by Continuum Press, but is £3 cheaper on Amazon. This is not a light read - it is more an in-depth analysis for students of English Literature and Philosophy, and this is reflected in the price (£57 for the hardback on Amazon) - I shall, however, look forward to its release in paperback!

Opera On The Hop...

Now, why doesn't this ever happen to me when I'm hanging around Victoria Station or Bluewater?

Twitch of the mantilla to His Hermeneuticalness!

Meme Mutation !

Back in July, I was a little out of inspiration, and I decided to start a meme asking for people's favourite prayers. The Church is universal, and so is the blogosphere, and what with the mix of reverts, converts and cradle Catholics who blog, I was sure that there would be a few interesting prayers brought to light.

I had deliberately excluded the Mass and other Liturgy, as we all know how much everyone wants to get the right answer, and, of course, the Mass is the greatest prayer, etc. etc. That being excluded, it left people free to explore other prayers.

I use Google Reader to keep my finger on the blogging pulse, and I was surprised (and delighted) to see how popular the meme became... and it brought a few new blogs to my attention as well!

Within ten days, someone who hadn't been paying attention tagged me for the meme...

Now it's moved on. I saw that there was a Favourite Devotions meme, (only this has five favourite devotions), doing the rounds. I wondered if this was a case of Chinese Whispers, and so I did a bit of sleuthing...

Sure enough, Anne, (Imprisoned in my Bones) has 5 devotions, and no rules. She was tagged by NC Sue (In Him we live and move and have our being) who was tagged by Cathy (A bit of the Blarney) who was tagged by Esther G (A Catholic Mom in Hawaii.)

Now Esther noticed that the Mass wasn't allowed - so top marks for paying attention.

Esther was tagged by Matt (I think) of Big C Catholics, who didn't post any rules, so Esther really gets a gold star for doing her homework. Matt was tagged by Jeff, the Curt Jester who, in addition to not posting any reasons for his favourite prayers, complained about the term "meme" !

Jeff was tagged by Julie D (Happy Catholic), who in turn was tagged by the Ironic Catholic - who called it a Dog Day Summer Meme. So disrespectful!

Ironic Catholic was tagged by Mary O'Regan (The Path Less Taken), but Mary actually had the correct rules published AND limited herself to THREE devotions... and although she was tagged by someone else, she mentioned that I started it all (or maybe she was blaming me!)

So it's Ironic Catholic who gets 100 lines and a half-hour detention for mutating my meme...

Just in case anyone is interested, Mary was tagged by Kate (At Home In My Father's House), who was tagged by Fr. John Boyle (Caritas in Veritate) who complained, Scrooge-like, that he didn't do memes, and then promptly went and gave five prayers instead of three, so that's another detention. Fr. John was tagged by Karen (Gem of the Ocean), who was tagged by Dominic Mary (Libera Me) who was tagged by me.

Of course, it's still whizzing about out there, as each person tagged was asked to tag five others, so, if you've completed the meme and haven't been mentioned, feel free to give a link to your post in the com-box!

Pope Benedict In Southwark 2010...

As I said before, things are gearing up for the Papal Visit. The Southwark Archdiocese Papal Visit Team have started up their own blog, Pope Benedict in Southwark 2010, which aims to provide information and conversation about the forthcoming Apostolic and State Visit of the Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI to Britain. They intend particularly to focus on the involvement of priests and laity from Southwark.

The blog is being run by two volunteers, James Blythe and Daniella Adams, and they intend to help build up a sense of what's happening using various media. They have already set up a Facebook page, My Papal Visit 2010, which is meant to compliment the official page, The Papal Visit, with a slightly more interactive and relaxed approach. Obviously James and Daniella are hoping that people will pop over and become fans of both pages.

Daniella will also be setting up a twitter feed during the visit, and will tweet regularly on the Papal events.

It's a great way to keep up with what is happening - for example, the latest wall post at the time I'm writing this on the My Papal Visit 2010 page had the message "If any young people missed on tickets to see the Holy Father at Hyde Park, comment here and we can get you one!"

They have definitely got a finger on the pulse of what is happening in Southwark - they even clocked that Our Lady of the Rosary, Blackfen has had suggestions for how to prepare for the Papal Visit. So pop on over and explore...

Reflecting On The Incarnation...

It does seem rather unseasonal to be reflecting on the Incarnation, but it was triggered off by the Faith talks at the Summer Session, by the word Incarnadine from my last post.

The Scotist view of the Incarnation really does make more sense than the Thomist one. It gives a beauty and dignity to Creation; the idea that the world was made for Christ, and the Church, his Bride, was prepared for him before the Creation of the world.

For the three of you not in the know, the Scotist view was that of Blessed John Duns Scotus, and championed by the Franciscans, that Jesus Christ would have become Incarnate even if there had been no Fall. The Thomist view, that of St. Thomas Aquinas, and defended by the Dominicans, was that Jesus became Incarnate because of the Fall.

If God made us matter and spirit, then there must have been a reason. After all, God created the angels out of love and gave them free will... and they were just spirit. Why bother making creatures which were both matter and spirit unless he intended His Son to become Incarnate so as to be able to communicate with us as matter and spirit? And therefore to bring us to the fullness of life, not just to save us from our sins.

Obviously, the Fall threw a spanner in the works, and therefore we did not recognise Christ when he came: we rejected his message, and he had to undergo the Cross.

Sorry... just musing out loud. It's been a weird sort of day.

More On MacMillan...

Now that I've had the chance to catch up on sleep, I thought I'd put up another post about the Guest Speaker at this year's Faith Summer Session.

I think I am the sort of person a real artiste dreads: "I don't know anything about music/art/literature etc., but I know what I like..." - I was steered into the Sciences early on (my natural inclination) and remained a complete Philistine in other areas.

So I hadn't heard much about James MacMillan. I'd heard his name mentioned a few times, always very positively, and knew that he was a composer of some standing. He then wrote a letter to The Bitter Pill protesting about their disgraceful treatment of Fr. Tim Finigan, followed by another one in defence of bloggers, and he went up even higher in my estimation.

Then I heard he had been chosen to compose a Mass setting for the Papal Visit, using the new English translation, and I realised that he was a very big noise indeed, as is borne out by the Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers' biography.

We have sung the same Mass setting at Faith conferences for quite a few years now, and I was vaguely aware that it was referred to as "the MacMillan Mass" - it only occurred to me as James MacMillan took a seat in the chapel that this was the very same MacMillan... and the congregation were going to be singing his Mass setting... and he'd probably want to throttle someone by the end of it... In actual fact, he was an extremely engaging and unassuming man, with the most gorgeous Scots' accent and a gentle but penetrating wit. He even has the good taste to read this blog (albeit only occasionally... but then he is a very busy man!)

James' talk, on how music can be used as a tool for evangelisation, was fascinating, though quite a lot of information was packed into a very short time. I need (and want) to listen to it again in more detail - it should be available for download on the Faith website quite soon.

The final part of his talk was on some of his own work which had caused a bit of a stir because it was so very clearly pro-life in its message. James went through three parts of a work he had done in collaboration with Michael Symmons Roberts - Quickening. He read out the texts, and explained some of the background and meaning, and finished up by playing a recording of the first part (he read them in reverse order, something I only knew because I'd typed the text onto PowerPoint slides for him) - Incarnadine.

It really moved me, and in the few minutes between the end of the talk and the start of questions I chatted to my neighbour, who had been equally affected. The text itself (of which I'd had a preview, as I'd typed!) was enough to make one sit up and take notice, but put together with the music, it simply blew me away. I hope I'm not infringing copyright by quoting a few of the phrases which really jumped out at me:

"This is love’s alchemy, mercurial,

what risk to bring another pair of hands

into the world!..."

"...Yet this new life is our elixir,

this soft dividing pearl is our great price."

"Incarnadine, vermillion, crimson;

that night your words were made flesh I became

a hummingbird trapped in a scarlet room,

whose wings beat so quickly they cannot be seen."

I love the way that several well-known phrases are turned upside-down - "another mouth to feed," "the pearl of great price," "the Word was made flesh." Unfortunately, I wasn't able to track down any recording of the work on YouTube, so, if you really want to hear it, you'll just have to go and buy it from Amazon or iTunes (I did!)

Rome Reports...

The intrepid trio are being immortalised by Rome Reports as the "Trio-lars" ! I'm sure that they are used to all sorts of weird and wonderful pronunciations of their surname by now. Anyway, their tremendous achievement, cycling from Sidcup to Rome, made it onto Rome Reports TV (who left out the "Sidcup-to-Canterbury" bit of the journey!).

The two charities didn't get a plug, though, so I figure that I'll make up for the oversight by reminding you all that the Treloars funded the trip for themselves, and then decided to raise money for their two favourite charities on the back of their pilgrimage. The two charities are Mary's Meals and the Cardinal Winning Pro-Life Initiative. You can still make a donation via the donations page - they are currently at £3,912 - but they plan to close the page soon, so get those donations in as soon as possible.

Here's the news report...



Mantilla-twitch to Leutgeb who saw it first.

Faith Summer Session Photos...

Fr. Tim Finigan was the official photographer for the Faith Summer Session this year, and so he has put up the group photos onto Flickr where everyone can admire and download (or print off) any photos they want.

I didn't manage to take quite as many photos as I'd have liked, particularly the informal shots, because being on crutches made it a little difficult to wield a camera... However I have put up a selection of the best ones up on my own Flickr page.

Somehow or other, despite being corralled into the auditorium for the official photo session, I managed to avoid being included in any of the photos. I didn't quite escape unscathed... I was nabbed by one priest, but since he doesn't blog, I might just get away with it...

Poets' Day...

...or, push off early, tomorrow's Saturday!

(Even though I'm still on holiday, I'm considerate enough to think of those who are less fortunate!)

Day 4...

Call me paranoid, but I think Sylvester might be getting a trifle impatient...

Oh well... nothing a tin of tuna won't fix.

Ok. Make that two tins...

...smoked salmon, perhaps...?

Networking...

As Fr. Tim has pointed out, the Faith Summer Session is a great opportunity for networking. I suspect that there are quite a few bloggers around today, especially as it's the day for visitors. If we manage to get a bloggers' photo, it should prove interesting.

Two priests were giving out First Blessings after Mass today... I think both of them are leaving the Conference this evening, so they couldn't be spread out. I did, however, manage to get one of the First Blessings last night, so I was hopefully able to clock up two Plenary Indulgences for the Holy Souls.

I was delighted to be able to chat with James MacMillan last night - yes, it was the James MacMillan, the composer, not someone with the same name, nor a drug-induced hallucination. I was extremely flattered (and somewhat flabbergasted, to be frank) when he told me that he'd read my blog. Not very frequently, to be sure, but he'd read it. Yes, I'm name-dropping, and I don't care who knows it! So now I can claim to have bought a drink for Delia Smith (yes, the Delia Smith, she of the egg-cookery-instructions... though that was a few years ago) and James MacMillan. James was even kind enough to buy one for me too... (I discovered that the bar at Woldingham stocks Bailey's)

I'm really looking forward to his lecture this afternoon: it's not particularly concerned with music and the liturgy, but will address evangelisation through music (at least that's what I recall of the conversation from my alcohol-induced haze!)

I also got to meet up one of the speakers involved with Catholic Voices. Very nice chap... he seemed pretty on the ball and very articulate, so I'm quite encouraged. He said that he, too, read my blog... but only the spat with Mr. Ivereigh, which might explain why he seemed a little wary of me...

Heheheheh...

Getting Along...

I'd forgotten how big Woldingham School is. It's set in really beautiful grounds, but, being on crutches this year means that I'm not in the best position to appreciate them. Walking between my room, the Auditorium, the Chapel and the Dining Rooms is proving to be harder work than I anticipated. However, I am not complaining: the congenial company, excellent talks, and marvellous facilities more than compensate... The exercise may even go a little way towards helping me become less... errr... large. Then again, given the very nice food, perhaps not...! People have also been really kind to me, carrying trays, opening doors, and bringing me cups of tea... and something a little stronger in the evenings.

Faith has held its Summer Session here at Woldingham School for many years, and, as I have also been involved in the past as a helper on both the Faith Summer Break and the Southwark Diocese's Altar-Servers Break (also held at Woldingham), I've gotten to some of the staff quite well. They are really lovely people, always cheerful and very keen to help us in any way they can.

Now, if only the British Summer would start (sorry, I mean stop... we've had torrential rain and thunder and lightning this afternoon!) things would be perfect.

A Real Treat...

I am awfully excited... I have just found out that the Guest Speaker for tomorrow evening's session is none other than James MacMillan.

I seriously hope that I haven't gotten the wrong end of the stick in my Tramadol-and-diazepam induced haze, and it turns out to be some other James MacMillan...

...that would be embarassing!

Faith Summer Session Well Under Way...

I promised Sir Dan of the Nesbitry that I would post something about the Conference...

There are over 200 young people present at the Faith Summer Session in Woldingham, including over 30 priests and more than seminarians, and it's going really well so far. Last night, Fr. Michael John Galbraith opened the proceedings with a good introduction, entitled The Church: Foreshadowed from the beginning.

Among other things, he explained that Catholicism is attracting a lot of antagonism, and there is an almost visceral hatred of the Church, because she claims to teach objective Truth. This is a real challenge to our society which wants everything to be seen as relative.

This morning it was the turn of Fr. Tim Finigan to give his talk, The Church: Our living link to Christ. Despite my speculations as to whether any new technological breakthroughs would be forthcoming, Fr. Tim stuck to PowerPoint for the presentation; I really hope that he will make the slides available online, because there were several very fascinating quotes which I'd really like to look at in more detail.

Fr. Tim explained that the Faith vision particularly took the Scotist view of the Incarnation, namely that Christ would have become incarnate even if our first parents had not sinned. He then showed how this lead organically to the conclusion that the Church must also have been intended. There was a quote from one of the earliest Christian literary works, The Shepherd of Hermas (I think) which described the Church as an old woman because she had been the first to be created, and the world was made for her sake. This seems to me to be one of the most powerful arguments against those people who say things like "Oh yes, I believe in God, and in Jesus, but not in all that Church stuff..."

I'm having a really great time (no surprise there) and I'll post again as soon as I get the chance...

Oooooh... Time For A Video!

Leutgeb of Bara Brith fame thinks that it's a real shame that this video has had less than 3000 hits, and wants it to go much higher. The computer I've found at the school doesn't have speakers (and the earphones I have for my iPhone don't seem to work on it) so I have absolutely no idea what the soundtrack is... I shall find out on Friday.

In the meantime, though, I shall do my bit to raise the hit rate on the video...

Day 2...

The second day of the Faith Summer Session sees His Hermeneuticalness giving one of the talks. I'm interested in what he might have up his sleeve this year, because, after having championed it for many years, he has started to refer to PowerPoint as terribly passé.

I shall endeavour to stay alert and take photos.

I'm still on painkillers, though, so I don't actually hold out much hope...

Blogging Lite...

I'm off to the Faith Summer Session at Woldingham this week. I don't know if I'll get a chance to blog - I'll certainly have a go.

I have to say that the titles of the talks look a little daunting: they're all about the Church. I expect that the recordings will find their way onto the website in due course - in the meantime you can listen to the talks from last year's Summer and Winter Conferences.

Normal blogging will hopefully resume on Friday.

Siberian Hamster...

The inimitable Fr. Z has been having hamster trouble.

It seems that the little hamster in the sidebar has been causing some browsers to load slowly, or to scream "malware detected," and so, Fr. Z has decided that maybe the hamster has to go to join all the other little hamsters in the skies...

...though Vincenzo (the Photoshop whizzkid) decided that perhaps the hamster ought to be sent on pilgrimage to Rome...

I'm afraid that every time I hear "hamster," I start chortling. The classic BBC series Fawlty Towers had an episode called Basil the Rat (I used to think it was The Health Inspector, but apparently not.) Now, unless you have seen the episode, you won't appreciate the connections between rats and hamsters. I have looked in vain for the relevant clip on YouTube, but they only have a later part of the episode.

The health inspector pays a visit to the hotel, and Basil Fawlty goes up to Manuel the waiter's room to get him to sort out the dead pigeons in the water tank. Then he spots Manuel's pet...

I can't remember my favourite scene exactly, and searching Google hasn't helped. But basically, it goes like this:

Basil:"What's that?"
Manuel: "He my hamster."
Basil: "It's a rat!"
Manuel: "I think so too... I say to man in shop, he rat, he say no, he filigree Siberian hamster, only one in shop, special price only five pound."
Basil: "It's a bloody rat. Don't you have rats in Spain, or did Franco have 'em all shot?"

Anyway, Polly the maid pretends to give the rat to a friend to look after. In reality, they hide it in an outbuilding... and, predictably, the rat escapes. Polly, Terry the chef and Manuel all try to find the rat before Basil Fawlty discovers the deception...



This is just such a funny episode, and there's no more on YouTube, so I'm going to download it from iTunes.

It's Getting Closer...

There has been a lot of negative publicity given to the visit of the Holy Father. I have to admit, when the organisers were making such a hash of the preparations, I was extremely dubious about the whole thing.

However, now that details of the Holy Father's itinerary have been published, and the ticket allocations for each parish have been dished out, I sense more excitement about the visit. This is despite attempts to put a dampener on the events by focussing on the cost of the tickets. Leutgeb has countered that hoary old chestnut very adroitly.

Our parish's ticket allocation for Birmingham has been snapped up, and the Hyde Park tickets are pretty much all gone, so our Parish Priest is busy trying to get hold of spares from other parishes.

Stuart McCullough alerted people to the fact that Fr. Armand de Malleray, FSSP is encouraging people without tickets for the Hyde Park event to turn up to a different part of the park and pray the Rosary, accompanied by some of the priests from the FSSP. There are details given on their own website.

I definitely won't be able to go to either event - I was doubtful before, but my recent ligament injury has confirmed it - though I still hope to be able to go and line up along a route somewhere to wave a flag. The mood has changed, and the organisers of the Papal visit are encouraging the faithful to line the streets, while the use of the popemobile will help to make the Holy Father more visible.

Our parish newsletter has been giving suggestions for how we can prepare for the Holy Father's visit, and I was delighted to see that the FSSP have much the same idea:

"...please make sure you devote special time to pray for the spiritual success of Pope Benedict’s visit. Let us not underestimate the great power of prayer and of mortification. This is a unique opportunity. Our Blessed Lord surely expects all souls of good will to intensify their prayers for His Vicar on earth as he is about to visit Our Lady’s Dowry."

Excellent suggestion!