St. Philomena

I have had a devotion to St. Philomena ever since I discovered that she delights in confounding modernists and sceptics, with many miracles attributed to her intercession.

If she was considered to be a saint by St. John Vianney (the Curé d'Ars) then I'm not going to stop praying to her just because someone (who probably doesn't believe miracles are even possible) says that she didn't exist. I'll take the side of a canonised saint over a modernist sceptic any day.

Fortunately, my Parish Priest is quite keen on St. Philomena, and so yesterday we had a Mass in her honour. The Latin Mass Society gave a grant towards the expenses of a schola, and we had a wonderfully uplifting Solemn High Mass.

The Schola Sanctae Scholasticae sang Tomas Luis de Victoria's Missa O Quam Gloriosum, and his motet O Quam Gloriosum, as well as Tallis' O Sacrum Convivium and the Gregorian propers. It was great to be able to allow the music lift one's heart and mind to God while watching the awesome Mystery unfold on the Sanctuary. We are created body and soul, and so the external "trappings" of the Liturgy are so very important for the worship of God: the material aspects are not just optional add ons, but are integral to the action of the Liturgy.

I took some photos during the Mass, and they are on Flickr in the St. Philomena 2016 album.

If you want to read more about St. Philomena, I can recommend the excellent summary on Zephyrinus' blog.

The Schola Sanctae Scholasticae have been instrumental in setting up the Gregorian Chant Hymns website, which, by making various recordings and other resources freely available, is dedicated to promoting the learning and singing of Gregorian chant in the liturgy.

Caught Unawares...

As is usual on a Sunday, I spent the morning at church. Friends visited the parish, and so I went down to the sea front... It was rather busy, but the weather was good, and at weekends in the Summer months I expect Margate to be busy. Nevertheless, we managed to sit comfortably in the Two Halves micropub and watch the world go by as we chatted.

By the time we left, it seemed to be rather more busy than usual. Jonathan figured out there was some sort of carnival procession happening. I was pretty sure that it was all happening on the main seafront, and prepared to take an alternative route to the station. Alas, it seemed that the carnival was due to go up past the station, and after dropping Jonathan off so he could catch his train home, I proceded to follow another little back-route home, feeling rather smug that I had learned a few alternative ways around the locality.

I was therefore rather disconcerted to find my road blocked off by numerous parked cars and rather a large number of pedestrians all sitting on the grass. A marshall tried to direct me back the way I came.

"But I live here!" I wailed. The marshall allowed me through (I'd only just made it in time) and I parked in the first gap I found. I thought about walking home (I was quite near) but I decided to stay and watch the parade - after all, it's not every day you get to see a carnival.

The majority of floats appeared to have been sponsored by local Kent businesses and sports' clubs. There were also lots of floats labelled "Miss insert-name-of- town-here" with lots of girls dressed up in sashes, crowns and so on. I don't know if there was just one "Miss" per Kent town who invited her chums along or if each town got to appoint several Misses. But it was great fun watching them wave regally as they passed. I was a little surprised by the netting on the side of each float - almost as if they feared the locals would try and fling tomatoes...

One of my fellow onlookers explained that the Carnival was an annual event, and the route was well-known, so I'm not sure how I missed it last year. Next year I shall be better prepared!

More photos can be seen in my latest Flickr album.

A Day With Mary At The Seaside...

Today we were blessed with what looks to be an annual event here in the parish of Margate.

The Day With Mary team held one of their devotional days last year at St. Austin & St. Gregory's Church, Margate. This year it was held at the other church in our parish - St. Anne's in Cliftonville.

St. Anne's church is bigger than St. Austin & St. Gregory's; it has a much bigger hall, there is an outside area, parking near the church is much easier, and there is no Saturday evening Mass, making the organisation of the Day With Mary much more straightforward. Given today's success, I expect that the Day will be held at St. Anne's from now on...

We started, as ever, with the Crowning of the Statue of Our Lady and a procession with recitation of the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary. I think the route went along the sea front, but walking on uneven surfaces isn't my strong point (especially if I have to watch my feet), so I remained in the church, as did a few others...

Mass was next - a beautiful Missa Cantata. Fr. Mark Higgins preached the sermon - he's just arrived as curate in the neighboring parish of Ramsgate.

Lunch gave me the opportunity to have a look at the devotional items on sale - I didn't get to check out the books this year - but I was desperate to have a cup of tea, and so neglected to take my usual shots of the books and other items on offer. I will endeavour to do better next year! However, I did manage to have a very enjoyable chat with friends.

Once back in the church, we had Exposition. The Blessed Sacrament Procession with recitation of the Luminous Mysteries (following the same route as the earlier Marian Procession,), a talk on Our Lady by Fr. Bernard McNally, the recitation of the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary, and meditations on the Stations of the Cross formed the second session of the day. Tea provided another opportunity to photograph the stalls selling books, statues, rosaries, medals and what-have-you, but this was completely missed by your shame-faced blogger here. I was just having too much fun basking in the glorious sunshine...

The final session kicked off with a talk on Our Lady given by Fr. Tim Finigan, followed by the recitation of the Glorious Mysteries of the Rosary, Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, enrolment in the Brown Scapular and confering of the Miraculous Medal. We ended with the traditional farewell to Our Lady's statue - it makes me cry every time! Watching everyone in the church waving little white hankies (in imitation of what happens at Fatima) is unbelievably emotional.

I am sure I have said it before, but, I want to say it again: if you ever get the chance to attend a Day With Mary in a parish near you, even if only for part of the day, make the effort.

More photos are in my Flickr album.

The Blood Of The Martyrs...

Justórum ánimæ in manu Dei sunt, et non tanget illos torméntum mortis. Visi sunt óculis insipiéntium mori: illi autem sunt in pace.
Wis 3:1-3

(But the souls of the just are in the hand of God, and the torment of death shall not touch them. In the sight of the unwise they seemed to die, but they are in peace.)

There has been a brief discussion on social media about whether we should call Fr. Hamel a martyr; whether he died in odium fidei. I don't think there is any room for doubt on that score: what other reason could make two men walk into a small church during the celebration of Mass and cut the throat of the priest (who was in his 80s and hardly likely to be any kind of physical threat to anyone)? 

Fr. Jacques Hamel, ora pro nobis.

Feeling Birdbrained...

I've been spending more time on the beach with my feathered friends. They really are amazing. I went and sat on the beach, not a bird visible in the sky, and threw out some small pieces of bread. Within a few minutes, a whole load of eager gulls were wheeling around me.

It was a bit reminiscent of that Hitchcock classic, The Birds.

The gulls were, however, all very well-behaved towards me - even though they did have a few squabbles among themselves. It seemed to be a territorial thing - there was much chasing and squawking by some birds who also appeared to let certain others go and eat without protest - but I don't know enough about gull behaviour to interpret it.

I am unsure why "birdbrain" is such an insult - the gulls appeared pretty smart to me. Once the bag containing the bread scraps had been put into my pocket I was no longer of any interest, and they rapidly abandoned me.

But today I was feeling distinctly birdbrained. Arriving home from work, I walked directly from my car to the polling station. Standing in the queue, I realised, to my horror, that I couldn't remember my house number. Arriving at the desk, I had a sudden flash of inspiration, and I gave my address in a confident voice.

"Ah, ummm... that address doesn't appear to exist..." was the reply.

I had given the wrong street name!

More Sea Views...

The subjects for my blogposts seem to fall into three categories of late: cats, the seaside and church activities. At the risk of boring you all to death, this is going to be yet another one of my seaside posts!

The weather has been pretty ghastly over Half Term. If I was visiting, I'd probably be pretty miffed - I guess that's why people go abroad for holidays, where the weather is more predictable. However, as I actually live here, I can enjoy the scenery in bad weather without feeling as if I've lost an opportunity to catch the sun.

It was so windy at the beginning of the week that even the majority of the gulls were hunkering down on the grass - one or two tried flying, but were rapidly blown back inland. I drove down to the car park on Westbrook promenade and took a few photos of the waves...

I could see from the remnants of surf on the walkway just how far the waves were reaching. I'm no lightweight, and there were two sets of railings between me and the water, so little chance of my being swept out to sea at that point, but I had no intention of getting soaked by a rogue wave! I decided to beat a fairly rapid retreat to the comfort of my own front room.

This evening the weather was considerably drier, and the wind had dropped - though a sea mist appeared to be building. I could barely make out where the sea ended and the sky began. The tide was out, which allowed me to see just how deep the water got at high tide - it's difficult to judge when the tide is actually in. Even so, I thought a few more photos, especially of the sunset, wouldn't go amiss. If the view was good enough for Turner to capture more than once, then who am I to disagree...?

I hope to get a few more photos once the Summer weather makes an appearance...

Corpus Christi...

We were very fortunate in Margate to be able to celebrate the Feast of Corpus Christi with a TLM on the proper day. On the Sunday, however, the Deanery held its Corpus Christi procession at the Shrine of St. Augustine in Ramsgate.

It was a huge success - over 350 people squeezed in to the church to adore Our Lord. Children who had made their First Holy Communion were invited to ring bells and scatter rose petals before the Blessed Sacrament as the procession walked along the seafront promenade.

A few years ago, someone rather dismissively told me that no-one bothered with silly things like processions any more...

Do have a look at the pictures of no-one bothering...!

St. Augustine's Feast Day...

Last Saturday was the Feast of St. Augustine of Canterbury (in the old calendar), and, as the National Shrine is in Ramsgate, we had the opportunity to venerate the only relic extant in England (I think that was what Fr. Holden said in his introduction... I shall have to try to pin him down on that one!) It was wonderful to see so many people making a pilgrimage to honour the saint.

After a procession with the relic along Ramsgate's Westcliff promenade, there was a High Mass, with Fr. Armand de Malleray FSSP as celebrant.

Fr. de Malleray's sermon gave plenty of food for thought, particularly when he contrasted the secular disbelief in the power of priests to change the bread and wine through the words of Consecration at Mass with the total acceptance that words spoken in Parliament can actually change physical realities. As Fr. de Malleray pointed out, through the words spoken by Black Rod, thousands of women found that they were no longer carrying a child in their womb, but merely a collection of tissues and cells!

Fr. Marcus Holden, the Rector of the Shrine (and Parish Priest of Ramsgate) has organised a whole series of events for Half Term celebrating the work of St. Augustine - you can find out more here.

There are also more photos to see on my Flickr album page.

More Gull-Watching...

Now that I work locally, I have the opportunity to spend an occasional afternoon sitting by the beach. It's not, in my opinion, warm enough to go paddling just yet (though we did have a few warm days at the beginning of May) but I do enjoy driving down to a little point near home where I can park the car and watch the waves as they hit the sea wall.

The other afternoon I decided to get myself a KFC takeaway, and eat it in the car. The last time I was gull-watching, I had brought some bread as "bait" - but not just any old stale stuff. It was brioche. Nevertheless, the gulls were not impressed with my offering, and ignored the scraps I threw in their direction. I had to crop my photos to zoom in on the birds.

This time I threw out a few chips...

One chap (I assume it was a chap) obviously thought the chips should be his... he spent a lot of time squawking and chasing other gulls away... meanwhile a few opportunists were sneaking in behind him and hoovering up the chips.

The gulls of Margate are obviously much more choosy than the ones in Cornwall (the PM was answering questions about the gull-menace in Cornwall last Summer!) I'm not sure if that's because they are a more discerning class of gull or if they are just better-fed.

More photos HERE...

Miaowrini's New Hobby...

Miaowrini appears to have started a new hobby... or, rather, adopted a new approach to an old hobby...

She now comes in through the catflap late at night and miaows in a particular way for attention. The sound is unmistakable as she has a mouth full of mouse. She then deposits the mouse in the hall in front of my bedroom door (directly in line with my pillows, so I can't miss it), bats it about a bit, looks in my direction as if to say "Deal with it!" and promptly stalks off.

When I attempt to retrieve the unfortunate mouse, she suddenly comes back to watch. Sometimes she tries to swat it from my hand. I get the distinct impression I'm being Ofsteded by my own cat...

She appears to have discovered a regular supply - yesterday she brought me three. I have visions of seagulls lurking in dark alleys: "Pssst... you wanna score some mouse?"

A Possible New Hobby...

Ever since I moved to Margate, I have been fascinated by the gulls. The more I watch them, the more beautiful I find them, and I promised myself that I would have a session of photography with my "proper" camera, as I thought my phone camera wouldn't be up to the job.

Arriving home on a beautiful evening, I thought it might be fun to go and sit on the beach... so made a cup of tea in my travel mug (happily unused and abandoned since the end of my daily commute to London) and went out.

The view was almost heart-achingly beautiful, and I settled down to pray Vespers. That completed, I started to watch the gulls - I suspect it's mating season, as much of the wheeling flight seemed to have a display element. I decided to try and take a few photos...

I couldn't see much on my mobile, but I thought it might be worth cropping the photos to focus more closely on the gulls in flight. You can see the results on my Flickr page. Not too shabby, even if I do say so myself!

Happy Holidays...

I woke up very early this morning to see a fiery red glow on the wall - a spectacular sunrise (or it would have been, if I'd had my contact lenses in!) But, "Red sky at morning, shepherds' warning!" is the old saying, and so I wasn't surprised to find that the skies at lunchtime were grey and forbidding, and it was cold and wet. I suppose we ought to expect rain in April.

It wasn't raining very much, though, so I decided to go for a little stroll along Marine Drive.

First of all I went in to the Sunset Rock Shop - they have a wide selection of different rock flavours, including the traditional peppermint and spearmint, as well as slightly odder offerings such as curry flavour, gin and tonic flavour, and Grumpy Old Git - I suspect the latter refers to the lettering running through the rock rather than the flavour. Intriguingly, examining my photos later, I spotted boxes labelled "seagull poo" next to the fudge. I shall have to go back and investigate.

I then went to the Ruskin de la Mer gift shop. I didn't see anyone in the shop and was browsing happily, until I was suddenly greeted by the owners, Gregory and Tracey, who were sitting quietly at the back of the shop. I jumped a mile...

I discovered that I already follow Tracey on Twitter (she tweets as @ShopMargate as well as @RuskinRap) and the three of us chatted for a while about how fabulous Margate is. The shop was gorgeous too - I shall have to go back when I need to buy presents for my nephews!

Tracey also told me about a charity she is promoting, Beach Within Reach, to allow people with mobility problems to travel over the sandy beaches of Thanet in specially adapted, all-terrain wheelchairs.

Crafted Naturally was next on my itinerary. I was delighted to see that Pumpkin had been reinstated as Marketing Manager after his recent illness. Wendy told me that the poor puss had lost well over a third of his body weight. However, he's now on the mend - and he consented to pose, and to purr when his ears were scratched...

Wendy also told me about her new website for the range of campervan (and VW Beetle) goodies (for anyone unfortunate enough not to be able to get to Margate in person!)

By this time I was feeling peckish, so I strolled in to Bernie's Chocolate Bar for a little light refreshment. Sadly I couldn't manage to perch on one of the tall stools by the window, but was able to catch glimpses of the sea from my table, and Bernie came over for a brief chat while I scoffed the delicious carrot cake and luxury hot chocolate...

Finally, I stopped off at The Two Halves - not for a drink (I was driving) but to apologise for having missed their latest Curry Night. Again. I found Jackie and Sean cutting up the names of runners for a Grand National Sweepstake. I couldn't resist, and promptly bought two tickets.

I drew Gilgamboa and Many Clouds; It meant nothing to me - I'm not a sporting type. However, I thought that the latter sounded promising, given the weather, and was informed that it was actually the favourite. So it's probably the kiss of death for that horse...

A bit like the time I entered the Rugby World Cup sweepstake at work, and asked if my team were any good.
"Who have you got?"
"Ummm... New Zealand..."
Unfortunately for me, the All Blacks were knocked out pretty early that year...

Hunting Skills...

This afternoon I was having a quiet read (what else are holidays for?) when the catflap clattered. I didn't look up - it's a noisy flap and the cats are in and out several times a day. I then heard Monsignor Miaowrini practising her pounce-and-roll technique in the front room. I still didn't look up - she had been rolling around there all morning...

Then I heard the peculiar kitty-scrabble-sound a cat makes when it is holding on to something with its front paws and kicking ecstatically at it with the back ones. This made me look up...

There, in the hall, was an impressive collection of feathers...

I followed the trail to the front room to find Miaowrini clutching a small bird, rolling over and over with it in her paws... a sort of kitty-crocodile-death-roll. I retrieved the still-warm bird, which had died of fright, I think, as there were no obvious injuries, and cleared away the feathers.

Naturally, my first instinct was to update the Kitty Kill Count. After all, hunting trophies have been scarce since we moved to Margate. I blame the seagulls...