The Dreamer's Day

The star and the discerning heart (Happy Christmas!)

2011-12-26T22:53:00.003Z

I know that my blogging has gone beyond sporadic to rare. For much of this year I shut down my blog. I feel I still haven't given the explanation you deserve as to why this was. Suffice to say I have been experiencing the most considerable period of discernment of my life. I do want to share more but I feel I need more time to reflect upon how to share it. Equally, I am not at the end of this period at the moment. Perhaps I never will be.

Christmas is a good time to consider the journey one is making in life and faith. It is the rhythm of returning to the crib and looking back on the path one has taken there. In looking at Mary and Joseph one cannot help but feel humbled in faith. How great was the journey they made in faith and grace on all levels? How much they must have both wandered and wondered amidst the will of God. Yet we gaze upon them in a static scene, just a snapshot of a real life of movement, of fleeing of sorrow and protection on the road of life. How great their journey and how great its capacity to keep me on mine. We cannot always see the road ahead but in trying to hold onto the goodness of faith, even in our weakness and doubt, the way ahead will always be lit; illuminated before us. We cannot know the shape ahead of us but we can know that there is light.

I wish you all a peaceful and holy Christmas. I assure you of my prayers and my thanks for all that fellow bloggers write.

In the love of Christ.

On being a young Catholic woman

2011-11-02T23:36:00.005Z

So, over the summer I was at a party with a mix of Catholic and non Catholic friends. As the night drew to a close my closest friend and I found ourselves sat at a table with a young couple. The young man mentioned some close friends of mine and commented on the fact they were very religious, he raised his eyebrows and pondered something for a moment.

"No. It is much worse than that." He concluded "They aren't just religious, they are Catholic."

My friend and I exchanged a look and then professed our own allegiance to the faith. It seemed much fairer to tell the young chap then to let him go on. He looked even more perplexed than he had before and asked

"How can any young, educated woman be part of an institution which scorns women?"

This is a question which I have been asked, more often far more indirectly than this, many times in my life and it is one which saddens me greatly. Of course my friend and I tried to answer this question with as much clarity as we could but it is not easy to answer when the world has developed an idea of equality which is flawed on many levels.

At times in my own life I have lacked the humility sometimes necessary to understand what the Church reveals about the dignity of women. At times I still lack it. However, I do understand that the Church is the greatest defender of the dignity of the human person in the full understanding of what it is to be a human person. It is therefore the case that the Church is the greatest defender of women.

Paul VI stated that "Within Christianity, more than in any other religion, and since its very beginning, women have had a special dignity, of which the New Testament shows us many important aspects...; it is evident that women are meant to form part of the living and working structure of Christianity in so prominent a manner that perhaps not all their potentialities have yet been made clear"

What a powerfully open statement about the role of women. I am not aware of an other institution, secular or otherwise that has made placed such importance on what it is to be a woman.

Of course the reality of living that truth is often challenging. Sometimes in the past I have looked at the altar full of priests and, if I was utterly honest, I felt that it was a little unjust that such a form of life could be barred to me. Equally, in my late teens I sometimes found confession difficult as I felt it was hard to speak with a man, even one who represents Christ, about the pressures upon girls of that age. We are all human and sometimes mystery is hard to grasp, particularly when we want to fold it neatly into our twentieth century view of the world. These were my misunderstandings of something much greater than myself.

Nevertheless, in the Church I have found myself to be recognised as a person of value in all my relationships, these include those with family, friends and those I made while discerning religious life. This recognition of value in body and soul is something that supposedly "liberated" friends of mine are still seeking. I have watched over the years as friends of mine have entered particular kinds of personal relationships, taken the pill and lived the life which our society claims can make you fulfilled. However, what I have seen most of all is their yearning to be really loved, for stability and often for the person they are in a relationship with to marry them. Yet this is often not the plan for the "liberated" and often I have seen them rejected and hurt. I have also seen the reverse of this where close male friends have been devastated by such rejection.

I am certainly not claiming that all Catholic relationships are perfect or that people are not hurt, abused and rejected within them. We are all human and equal in our state. However, the Church always argues that love cannot come without responsibility and recognition of the full dignity of the other person. This means that when we try to use or objectify another and reject emotional or physical responsibility for the actions that we take, we must recognise ourselves NOT as liberated but as imprisoned by our own selfishness, desire and projection. Therein lies the difference.

The Church does not want to see women (or men) used by others, to cause harm to others through processes like abortion which damage the innocent and often damage the physical and psychological state of the mother. The Church wants to truly liberate women to be as God made them and to ask them to allow themselves to revel in the beauty of being woman. To be loved, with responsibility and to love with responsibility. Throughout the centuries, at a time when many religions forced women into marriage the Church also offered women who felt called to a different way of life the safety of religious communities in which they often became highly educated and truly liberated individuals. It respected their desire to remain chaste and, more than this, it praised and commended this choice. The Church wants to see the bodies of women protected and held as a remarkable creation of God, not objectified, over sexualised, starved, used, and then discarded in age when they are no longer deemed pleasurable to look at. The Church wants to see women recognised in their full dignity as mothers, not scarred and harmed by a supposed "choice" which often does not reveal to its victims what the long term damage may be to them.

I have not hidden away from the modern world, I have not shut my eyes to it. I have many friends who I love very much who live the supposedly "liberated" life of the secular woman. I am an educated woman, a modern, working woman. Yet I truly believe that no institution loves and respects woman in her fullness as the Catholic Church does.

I close with words from John Paul II (Muilieris Dignitatem):

The Church gives thanks for all the manifestations of the feminine "genius" which have appeared in the course of human history, in the midst of all peoples and nations; she gives thanks for all the charisms which the Holy Spirit distributes to women in the history of the People of God, for all the victories which she owes to their faith, hope and charity: she gives thanks for all the fruits of feminine holiness

BEHOLDING AND LOOKING BACK

2011-09-27T17:22:00.003+01:00

Sometimes you can carry something with you for a long time without really understanding it. I suppose that has been my experience in the long break I have had from writing on this blog. I have been entering a different phase of life. Perhaps if anybody is still reading this then I might, in time, talk about this journey in more detail.

In some ways it has been a retreat into examining a more interior life of the spirit in which I felt there was little room for me to comment on anything. I just needed to be still and listen. I just needed to be led. Of course I still need these things in hope and prayer but perhaps I feel that it is possible for me to return to the keyboard again. To come down from the mountain.

A word has been with me all summer. BEHOLD. I don't know why or whether it relates to anything specific. Yet I felt it, held it, in Lourdes and Madrid, when in the presence of those I love. In many ways perhaps that is all we need to do sometimes. We can search so hard for things that we forget to behold what is on front of us. Sometimes that will be obviously profound and extraordinary like the grotto at Lourdes or Pope Benedict. Sometimes it will simply be the face of another person, someone who you are so glad that God loved into existence. At the centre of it all is the host, as it rises from the altar because all of this life is contained within this moment. Equally all vocation is contained within that body. BEHOLD. The bridegroom. Just seek to look at the Lord who is always looking back at you and in doing so the heart of your relationship grows stronger and you can begin to respond.

Peace be with you.

WORLD YOUTH DAY

2011-08-26T14:46:00.005+01:00

The spirit and life in Madrid remains with me. Our Church is alive and its heartbeat is joy. No matter what the press may report, it is not possible to deny the love that flowed through the streets for those few days. I hold a deep sense of gratitude for the city of Madrid for allowing the love of Christ, love of Benedict and love for one another to be so present.

Opening Up

2011-07-13T18:38:00.003+01:00

Dear All,

It has been a very long time since I have written anything on my faithful blog. I felt I needed a break during a particular period of discernment in my life and I hope you will forgive the silence. Much has happened but I have kept you in my prayers. I think I have lost a few followers along the way but perhaps they might pop back in to say hello now I have reopened for business. I don't think I will be posting as frequently I used to but I hope to at least open former posts for viewing.

I am due to return to Lourdes in a week and a half and anyone who was used to following this blog will know that this is the favourite place of my thirsting soul and longing heart. Perhaps I can let you know how it goes. Be assured of prayers in the month of the sacred heart.

I'M JUST TAKING A SHORT BREAK FROM BLOG WRITING

2010-11-01T00:02:00.001Z

BEAR WITH ME. I'M JUST ON A BREAK. GOD BLESS. SQUELLY

Hanging out with Keats

2010-07-21T23:27:00.006+01:00

I have always had a soft spot for the poetry of John Keats and some of his letters. His life was a short one and certainly not one in which he came to a definite decision about a belief in God. However, some wisdom did certainly filter through his sensitive soul. I was just reading andI liked it and wanted to share:

"Do you not see how necessary a world of pain and troubles is to school the intelligence and make it a soul?"

In a way I think this is true. Any suffering is certainly an evil but, in our case, through the hope offered by the ultimate suffering we find ourselves coming closer to truth and the truth of love. Dearest St. Bernadette and so many countless others knew this better than anybody.

Getting excited about the Pope in Britain!

2010-07-21T13:25:00.012+01:00

I found out today that I have got one of the allotted tickets to see the Pope (I was on the reserve list before). Even though I've been off the blogging circuit (largely for reasons beyond my control) for a while now I know that word will have got round about the hostility of some of my fellow countrymen towards Benedict. However, of course what is not reported in the press is the swathes of people and indeed young people (Catholic and non-Catholic) who are curious, interested, excited and enthused about his visit. This is an important historical event for the country, something that goes someway to forging some healing of rifts that have existed in this country since the Reformation. Obviously, there are always those few who do not want rifts to be healed and because they are often deemed more interesting to listen to, they are often the few that get heard.

Over these last few months I have attended various events for twentysomethings in which nothing but delight was expressed about Benedict's visit. Some people have been afraid that showing support for Benedict may be looked at in such a negative light that they were worried about how to approach the topic at work. Vincent Nichols has been very good at buoyingspirits at events I have been to recently. The truth is, with all the controversy and the desire to cause controversy, at the end of the day peace is stronger and Benedict is full of peace. Perhaps all that those who look to cause rifts will cause, is a sense of a renewed strength and solidarity in those who want to show that peace is stronger.

Heart to heart.

A great witness to life

2010-06-04T00:11:00.002+01:00

H/T APOSTOLATE OF THE LAITY

Happy Trinity Sunday!

2010-05-30T13:49:00.006+01:00

Happy Holy Trinity Sunday! The great mysteries of our faith continue to astound me. I blundered into a confirmation mass last Sunday and it was one of great peace and beauty. It is easy to forget that the Holy Spirit is always moving, even if you can't see the fire quite as clearly as Peter- you can still feel it. I haven't had as much of a chance to blog as I would like in these couple of months and I have felt the loss of it. I have been trying to make some important decisions and listen very carefully to the Lord as I decide whether to take a year to teach in a community in need next year (September 2011) I have been teaching now for 5 years and I do love my job but I also want to give some more time to God and give a short time in service. I think this is probably the least that I can do for Him and I am well aware I will probably receive far more than I could ever give.

I have felt the need to be very still and reflect a little over the last few months. I feel providence is working through those I have met and although the press has been giving the Church a ritual battering for all sorts of things, it is important to remember that for all the ill there really are just some amazing people in our Church. I'm not talking about the lauded heroes or great saints - (though obviously we are proud and deeply in need of the communion of saints and our great martyrs) I'm just talking about the people we meet on the ground level who love God and see him in others. There is so much to be joyful about. Speaking of joys I haven't made to Lourdes this year, I will wait to see if the good Lady gives me the chance to go back. If not then I shall think back joyfully over the blessings I have had while there and be so very thankful for them.

On Trinity Sunday one realises that in every aspect of our God there is hope and a different way of communicating with us, his people. I am hopeful that we can listen.

Even when I go a little quiet always be assured of my prayers for all your intentions, especially today when we celebrate the greatness of our God and His sensitivity to all aspects of our being as well as all aspects of his.

Peace be with you!

The anniversary of St. Bernadette

2010-04-16T14:01:00.004+01:00

Bernadette died at three o'clock in the afternoon on the first Wednesday after Easter. Sister Nathalie, a Sister of Charity of Nevers gives this account: "Toward three o'clock in the afternoon she seemed in the grip of inexpressible interior anguish. The sisters in the infirmary were alarmed and fetched holy water which they sprinkled over her while suggesting pious invocations to her. She took hold of her crucifix, contemplated it with love, then slowly kissed Christ's wounds, one by one."

In the hour of Christ's death Bernadette raised her arms in a cross and cried out "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for me, poor sinner, poor sinner ..."

Bernadette had been told at the grotto many years before that she would not be happy in this world but in the other. She had taken this to heart and she never took it for granted. Her life was one of suffering and giving. Bernadette did not always find life easy but she gave herself completely to her vocation and gave up her beloved Lourdes. Her body remains a visible witness to faith in

Nevers.

Prayer to St. Bernadette

Bernadette, you have long sought the Lord where he called you to.

You asked. You listened. You trusted.

You were sure the Lord would guide you.

You surrendered yourself completely in the hands of God.

Like Mary you are confidant

Bernadette,

Inspire in me the same confidence, the same generosity and patience.

Lord, enlighten me on my path

And give me strength to say "yes"

when I hear your call.

Bernadette, you intensely desired the Eucharist,

You had done everything to receive communion

in the Body of Christ,

You loved to adore the Blessed Sacrament,

You united your life living in the offering,

that of Christ at the alter.

Like Mary, the Woman of the Eucharist

Bernadette,

Inspire in me the same hunger for the Eucharist, the food,

presence and sacrifice.

Lord, you have given us your Son,

the living and eternal Bread.

That the Eucharist transforms my life to be a

perpetual act of thanksgiving.

Bernadette, you always enjoyed serving others,

On 11th of February, the Virgin appeared to you when you

were fetching wood.

Among sisters, you learned to treat the sick and

residents of the hospice

Later, in Nevers, you were an excellent nurse,

offering an attentive and intelligent in charity.

Like Mary, who saw the family's needs, in Cana.

Bernadette,

Inspire in me the same generosity and the same faith

to see that Christ is present in each one

Lord, you have given us brothers and sisters to love.

That our eyes, our hands and our hearts are open

to all those that you put in our way.

Bernadette, your faith has grown in the Church.

The Church, it was your family, your church,

your religious community.

Bravely, you went to tell the priests to hold a procession

and to build a chapel.

Once your mission was accomplished,

you retreated in silence and humility.

Like Mary, in this day of Pentecost and then silence.

Bernadette,

Inspire in me the same love of the Church:

I trust that it will support me in my prayer.

Lord, you give everyone a place in your Church.

Let me answer my vocation with the same simplicity

and the same generosity as Bernadette.

Amen!

(Copyright Service Creation- Sanctuaries Notre-Dame de Lourdes)

This time last year I was fortunate enough to be in Lourdes on this day and little mention was made of Bernadette there. Her humility and recognition that she was simply a courier of messages at Lourdes mean that she is rarely the focus there. This, I think, would have pleased her. She is, of course, of great importance to the place but you often have to seek her out if you really want to understand her. So many people do. For me, for countless millions of others whether Catholic or not Bernadette is a powerhouse of strength, love and faith at its best.

Pray for us St. Bernadette!

Happy Easter!

2010-04-04T22:09:00.004+01:00

So, what happened to the girl who used to write this blog? Excellent question! It has been weeks since I have sat down to write a proper post. Well, if you had noticed I was gone, - I'm back. It seems like an appropriate day to stage a return.

It is very easy to get caught up in a series of "busy nothings" in life or, worse still, allow your life to become that series of busy nothings- there have been times recently when I felt like either or both of these were the case. I have been fighting against this fear of "busy nothings" in these weeks of Lent, like so many others, trying to maintain a sense of peace and prayer in my life amidst endless deadlines. It is definitely not always as easy as it seems. However, here we are on Easter Sunday and I feel, looking back I can only now see clearly the graces I have been given in these last six weeks of preparation. Perhaps part of the experience of Lent is battling to find the meaning and truth of all we experience in the weeks leading up to Easter. Things which seemed like mere distraction can give those stolen moments of reflection greater meaning and strength when they do come. When they don't come, perhaps our longing for them has some value too. Lent is that period of "lengthening" of longing for hope and peace and relationship with Him - the Lord we might only catch glimpses of in this life.

Now Easter is here I am overwhelmed, as always, by its beauty and its light. My words are inadequate. But we all know that really trying to understand the mystery is the work of a lifetime. Its good to be back reading posts though, sharing that work with you all. As I watched the Urbi et Orbi today I was struck by that thought, how close we all are in our faith. May we journey onwards together in the midst of our great hope!

I wish you all a most happy and blessed Easter! May the peace of Christ be with you!

I MISSED ONE! 15TH Apparition

2010-03-09T20:17:00.000Z

Thursday 4th of March

And so the main 14 days of apparitions come to an end. Again, Bernadette returned to the grotto with her Rosary and asked the Lady's name as she had been told to by the priest. In her own words:

"The third time I went to see M. le Curé, to tell him that a Lady had ordered me to go and say to the priests that they were to have a chapel built there, he looked at me for a moment, and then he said to me in a rather gruff tone, 'Who is this lady?' I answered that I did not know. Then he commissioned me to ask her name and to come and tell him. The next day when I arrived at the grotto I recited my rosary and then asked her, from M. le Curé what her name was, but all she did was to smile. When I got back I went to M. le Curé to tell him that I discharged his commission, and her only response was her smile; then he said she was laughing at me and that I would do well not to go to her again. But, I could not help going."

The Lady smiled once more but the vision was silent. The crowd was now far too large to put an exact number on but a conservative estimate is 8000 people. Bernadette's focus remained compete. The crowd was waiting for the miracle that would prove the Lady's divinity. It did not come and Peyramale, along with many others were unimpressed and took this as proof of their suspicions.

The grotto stood for the next twenty days with no visits from Bernadette or her Aquiro. The Lady would only appear another three times. However, the next apparition would cause the greatest commotion of all. On Thursday the 25th of March the Lady would reveal her name.

Anniversary of the 14th Apparition

2010-03-03T17:15:00.001Z

Wednesday 3rd of March

Bernadette arrived early in the morning on this day as this was when the Lady most often appeared. As always Bernadette seemed focused only on seeing the Lady and was undisturbed by Peyramale's comments of the day before. Like Mary's, Bernadette's faith was unwavering and she did not falter in her belief that she must go to the grotto as she had been asked. She would later say in her usual direct and simple manner 'I have nothing to say because I have always told the truth'.

However, early as Bernadette was and surrounded by a crowd of THREE THOUSAND people the Lady did not appear and Bernadette left for school disheartened. However, in the evening she was compelled to go back to the grotto and there she met once more with the Lady she so loved to look on.

Bernadette had been told by Peyremale to ask the Lady for her name. He had also asked that the Lady make the rosebush flower as proof of her existence. Ever faithful Bernadette repeated this message from the priest but the Lady simply smiled back at the girl gazing upon her, bowed a little and smiled

Anniversary of the 13th Apparition

2010-03-03T17:12:00.002Z

Tuesday 2nd of March

At this apparition the Lady would make two requests that are staples of the modern Lourdes - one a chapel and the other procession. Bernadette would later tell how the Lady asked quite simply:

"Go, tell the priests to come here in procession and to build a chapel here”

That is exactly what Bernadette did- taking the short walk up to the house of Peyramale who was a generous but firm priest - known for his clarity and his temper. Little Bernadette, a peasant girl who would be indistinguishable from any other village peasant was accompanied by her two Aunts. The Soubirous family were still rather sceptical about the visions themselves. They were practical people but they also knew Bernadette and that all her life she had been unequivocally honest. They knew that she would not deceive them and therefore they walked with her. Peyramale's reputation was not without foundation - Bernadette repeated the Lady's request and aggravated his famous temper. He asked her if she or the Lady had any money. Bernadette shook her head- she had to admit she had nothing - not even a penny.
'Neither do I!' shouted Peyramale.
Peyramale told Bernadette that if the Lady wanted a chapel the least she could do was mention her name. He said that before she got anything she should make the wild rose bushes flower - a miracle to prove that she was deserving of her chapel or any time at all. Bernadette simply said she would ask the Lady all that Peyramale had told her to ask. He told her to go home and to stop her deception. He also told off her aunts for letting this silly little girl bother him in the first place. He shooed them away but Bernadette returned a few minuets later to ask that people should come in procession - she had forgotten this part because Peyramale had been so outraged by the chapel she hadn't even got to the second part of the request. Angered even more by this the priest told her once more to go home and stop her deception - he slammed his window shut. Bernadette went home but there was no deception to put an end to and her messages from the Lady would certainly not end there. Little did she know that the man who had turned her away on this day would soon become her ardent defender. The power of Aquiro.

The photo above is the chapel as seen from the grotto at night.

Anniversary of the 12th apparition

2010-03-01T17:21:00.000Z

The crowds were now at about 1500 and on this day, for the first time, a priest was among them. During the night something strange had happened and there was an atmosphere of excitement - though Bernadette seemed only aware, as usual, of the Lady she ran to the grotto to meet. She conversed with the Lady and continued her acts of penance.

A pregnant housewife Catherine Latapie had gone to the spring Bernadette had dug days before with the idea that bathing her arm, which had a paralysis of the ulnar nerve and caused her a great deal of pain, might soothe the agony. Her arm was healed and from that time forward caused her no pain. She also went into labour immediately and had to leave the grotto after which her baby was safely delivered. Dr Dozous, the local and esteemed M.D. was interested in this event and began recording the events at the spring which had medical implications. This is often recorded as the first miracle.

Anniersar of the 11th apparition

2010-03-01T17:18:00.000Z

11th Apparition

Sunday 28th. February

Bernadette continued to carry out her acts of penance with the graciousness and humility that so struck the crowd of now over one thousand people. This would involve Bernadette being absorbed in prayer, kissing the ground, drinking from the overflowing spring and moving on her knees as a sign of penance. Some still did not know what to make of her but the increasing popularity and notoriety of the grotto was giving the authorities a headache. Lourdes was anxious not be seen as a backwards mountain outpost and for this reason Bernadette was taken to the house of Judge Ribes following this vision. Bernadette was threatened with prison and interrogated (again). She remained firm saying she had made a promise to Aquiro and she could not break it. She would return to the grotto.

Anniversary of the 10th apparition

2010-03-01T17:17:00.001Z

Saturday 27th. February:

Eight hundred people crowded round the grotto where, two days before, Bernadette had dug a muddy puddle. The puddle was now a flowing spring - almost reaching the banks of the Gav. People watched as Bernadette carried out her acts of penance; drinking the water and eating the weeds. People waited for another message from the Lady. She remained silent. Watching. Praying. Those who had laughed and jeered at the previous apparition were also silent. Perhaps no longer so sure what to think about the little girl from Lourdes who seemed to have such dignity and grace in all she did- even when these actions might invoke judgement and involve humiliation.

Anniversary of the 9th Apparition - THE SPRING

2010-02-25T17:40:00.001Z

Thursday 25th of February

Following the impressive gestures of the day before a further fifty people joined the crowd that came to the grotto for many reasons - curiosity, prayer and cautious interest. The number at the grotto on this day was about three hundred. This vision would mark a turning point - though the crowds witnessing the events would not realise the significance of what they were seeing. In fact they would laugh and jeer at Bernadette who continued to follow the Lady's commands undaunted. In her own words:

"(The Lady) told me that I should go and drink at the fountain and wash myself. Seeing no fountain I went to drink at the Gave (the river just a few metres from the grotto). She said it was not there; she pointed with her finger that I was to go in under the rock. I went, and I found a puddle of water which was more like mud, and the quantity was so small that I could hardly gather a little in the hollow of my hand. Nevertheless I obeyed, and started scratching the ground; after doing that I was able to take some. The water was so dirty that three times I threw it away. The fourth time I was able to drink it. She also made me eat the bitter herbs that were found near the spring, and then the vision left and went away."

In front of the crowd that was laughing, gasping and jeering Bernadette retreated from the grotto with her usual dignity. When she overheard the crowd asking "Do you think that she is mad doing things like that?" she replied; "It is for sinners."

Though no one yet knew it, the spring Bernadette had dug was in fact the same one that would become known, in a matter of weeks, as the miraculous spring of Massabielle. It has an entirely separate source to the Gave river which flows just metres from it. When examined by scientists it was found to have no special factors compared with other waters and yet incredible things happen to those who come to bathe in it.

People laughed at the grotto that day but now 30000 gallons of water flow from the spring EACH DAY. It is taken all over the world and remains a symbol of faith and hope. Video of the spring can be seen/ heard at the post VIRTUAL LOURDES

(This is the half way point in the apparitions -18 in total. The next apparition occurs on the 27th of February)

Anniversary of the 8th apparition

2010-02-24T17:32:00.001Z

The crowds had continued to swell and now there was about 250 people surrounding the little grotto and the little visionary. For the first time Bernadette would carry a message to the crowd -one of serious gravity. The message of the "lady" was "Penance! Penance! Penance! Pray to God for sinners. Kiss the ground as an act of penance for sinners!". Bernadette was the first to obey this command - kissing the ground reverently and then raising herself back to a kneeling position. People were impressed with her immense humility and the dignity of the little peasant girl. People described how her whole physique changed when she encountered the Lady. It was almost as though her beauty was reflected in Bernadette's face. I think just looking at Bernadette's eyes a residue of that beauty could be seen for the rest of her life. They seemed to be looking beyond this world. While the events of this day may have moved and impressed the crowd as Bernadette cried out Penance! Penance! Penance! at the close of the vision - kneeling at these words; tomorrow's vision would bring Bernadette ridicule and humiliation...at least until something utterly extraordinary happened.

Anniversary of the 7th Apparition

2010-02-23T17:08:00.000Z

The crowds had now reached 150 people and after a day away from the grotto with no apparition, following her first meeting with Jacomet, Bernadette found herself called to Massabielle again. She continued in the same reverent manner as before - speaking with Aquiro in such deep ecstasy that she could barely be heard- though her lips could be seen moving. She kept her eyes fixed on the niche in ardent prayer. On this day the Lady would reveal a secret for Bernadette alone and she would never share it. The next few messages would be very public and the Lady would address the crowds- even though they could not hear or see her- so perhaps this secret was something Bernadette needed to hear before the explosion of activity and miracles that would create the sanctuary of Lourdes.

Anniversary of the 6th Apparition

2010-02-21T13:05:00.003Z

It is lovely that the days match up to the dates this year!

Sunday 21st of February
At the sixth apparition the crowds leapt in number and when the lady appeared early in the morning on this Sunday Bernadette was surrounded by one hundred people. She would later say that when the lady was present she was barely aware of those surrounding her - such was her focus. On this day the crowds were deeply impressed by Bernadette's reverence and ecstasy.

As Bernadette speaks and prays with Aquiro- the lady looks out over the crowd and tells Bernadette 'pray for all sinners.' Bernadette later said that the only time when the lady looked sad was when she talked of sinners- this would be with increasing frequency in the coming visions.

The fact that interest in these visions was growing meant the authorities in Lourdes could no longer avoid confronting what was happening down at the grotto. After this vision the Police Commissioner, Jacomet, had Bernadette summoned in order to question her. This would be the first of many such sessions in which Bernadette would be intimidated and interrogated. In spite of ill health and exhaustion Bernadette would always hold herself with dignity and respond with incredible precision. She never flinched or shied away when summoned but went willingly and politely wherever she was taken. Jacomet was concerned for the reputation of Lourdes and wanted Bernadette to tell what she saw. Bernadette would only speak of "AQUÉRO" ("that thing" in local dialect) and when he tried to muddle her about what she saw she calmly corrected him on the details that would remain unchanged, even on the smallest point, in the thousands of verbal and written accounts she would be forced to give until the time of her death.

Bernadette's father Francois came to collect her on this particular day and, afraid of the consequences of these visions and the trouble they were causing for his family, he was persuaded to assure the commissioner that he would not allow his little daughter to continue to go to the grotto of Massabielle. Francois and his family were at a low ebb and he was burdened by their fall in postion. He was a hard worker and a talented miller and he did not want to cause his children anymore pain. However, he loved his Bernadette more than he loved his reputation and when he saw how broken she was by his request that she should not return to the grotto he relented and let her go. Bernadette had never lied to him and much as it caused him hurt he found himself unable to deny her truth and sincerity.

Anniversary of the 5th Apparition

2010-02-20T20:36:00.001Z

5th Apparition
Saturday 20th of February

At the fifth apparition Our Lady spoke with Bernadette and taught her a prayer that was just for her. She would say this prayer every day of her life, but never wrote it down or repeated it to anyone. For the rest of her life people would constantly attempt to make Bernadette divulge this prayer and the secrets Our Lady had told her. Bernadette never gave in but with her immense strength of character and her own brand of feisty Pyreneen wit she would rebuke them for trying in a firm but gentle manner. One frequent response was 'men are powerful on earth but the Holy Virgin is powerful in Heaven'. Whatever was said it was noted by the crowds at the end of this vision Bernadette was overcome with a great sadness.

Word had now begun to spread amongst surrounding villages and this day saw the biggest crowd yet - about thirty people.

4th apparition- the origin of the candles

2010-02-19T23:03:00.000Z

Friday 19th. February was another short and silent Apparition (about thirty minutes) in which Bernadette and Our Lady continued to pray the Rosary together. The woman with the blue sash and the yellow rose between each foot would only join in with the Our Father and the Glory Be the rest of the time she would follow along on the beads with Bernadette's eyes fixed on her. Sometimes she would smile.

This time Bernadette went to the grotto with six women, one of whom was her Aunt. This was the beginning of the weeks of 1858 in which Bernadette would see Aquiro with the greatest frequency. She never claimed that the person she saw was the Virgin Mary and corrected those who did make any such statement. Bernadette was always very precise about the details of what happened at the grotto of Massabielle.

She came to the Grotto with a lighted blessed candle. This is origin of carrying candles and lighting them in front of the Grotto. I love the the fact that no matter the time of year or the time of day since the lighting of this first candle on the 19th of February the candles of faith have continued to burn at this little grotto. Whenever a doubt flickers across my mind I think of the candles burning beneath and close to the rock where Our Lady stood and I know that there is great faith in the world.

Third Apparition and Feastday of St Bernadette

2010-02-18T11:38:00.006Z

It is now the 18th here and this means two things:
1. It is the 152nd anniversary of the third apparition of Our Lady to Bernadette at the grotto. It was also the first apparition at which Our Lady spoke

2. It is Bernadette's official feast day (although interestingly there is disagreement over this because many outside of France celebrate it on the 16th of April- the date of her death) At Lourdes both are recognised - good enough for me! So it will be on my little blog.

1. The third apparition would be the one which would set thecourse of Bernadette's life. Having prayed the Rosary together the two young women were now ready to converse. Mary would make a request of this simple teenage girl from a small village. Bernadette, with a humility and acceptance would accept the Lady's promises with love and trust and return to the grotto knowing that happiness would not be hers in this life if she did - that was the level of her faith in the next life. The account that follows is in Bernadette's own words:

"The third time was the following Thursday. The Lady only spoke to me the third time. I went to the grotto with a few matured people, who advised me to take paper and ink, and to ask her, if she had anything to say to me, to have the goodness to put it on paper. I said these words to the Lady. She smiled and said that it was not necessary for her to write what she had to say to me, but asked if I would do her the favour of coming for a fortnight. I told her that I would. She told me also that she did not promise to make me happy in this world, but in the next."

2. A brief celebration of Bernadette's beautiful but often difficult life - it was made beautiful simply by her choices and by her simplicity. Even now, many years after Bernadette's death I have found the places she touched to have a silent, mysterious serenity to them. Yet they are so unremarkable to look at that you could easily pass them by without even noticing. Simplicity.

The BolyMill - TheBoly Mill was where Bernadette had spent most of her childhood with the exception of a couple of brief periods when she stayed with her Aunt at Bartres. The Mill had come to her father through marriage but a combination of the Industrial Revolution and the fact that the Soubirousfamily were so generous that they often allowed customers to take what they produced on trust meant they lost the mill.
The Cachot
This former prison cell was where theSoubirous' were forced to retreat to after the loss of their Mill. The six Soubirous' lived and prayed in this one small room and it was this ceiling Bernadette slept beneath during the visits. It was also a place of love where, long before the visions the parents and children could be heard reciting the Rosary together.

The Grotto
The grotto - where it all happened and where you can feel it still.

Bernadette saw Our Lady eighteen times in 1858

The Hospice
After the visions Bernadette, suffering a great deal as always with severe asthma which left her unable to breathe, added to by the exhaustion caused by constant harassment from people now filling Lourdes, was taken to the Hospice of the Sisters of Nevers. She was admitted, by her own request, as a destitute- Bernadette wished to remain poor. Even though she remained in Lourdes at this point, being separated from her family saddened her. Bernadette was also subjected to constant visits and scrutiny from visitors to the hospice. She would often weep before being sent out to retell her visions to yet more curious inquisitors. Yet she was always gentle and polite towards them never revealing her pain and frustration.
However, there were some joys here for Bernadette and in the Hospice chapel (left) she finally made her first communion - a moment of true happiness for her. It had been something she longed for.

Nevers
Bernadette left for Nevers aged 22, she would never see her parents again and it would be
thirteen years before any of her siblings saw her. She knew she could never return to Lourdes and the grotto where she had seen a little of Heaven. She brought with her very little (her bag and umbrella can be seen to the left). Here she would live and suffer as a nun. Her NoviceMistress would cause her much unhappiness and she would gradually find her body deteriorating around her lively, joyful soul.

Death but NOT the end
Bernadette died on April 16th 1879 and was buried in the small chapel of St Joseph- she would not stay in this place however (which can be seen to the left) Having been exhumed three times and found to be intact Bernadette waspermanently placed in the main convent chapel in 1925 where she can be seen today (see below) On this day when she was told she would not be happy in this life there seems to be much evidence that she is now exulting in the next with the same young woman she met at that Grotto in Lourdes.

St Bernadette, you promised you would forget no one; on this, one of your feastdays, please pray for us!
for video of Bernadette's body see:
From Lourdes to Nevers

The Second Apparition

2010-02-15T11:32:00.000Z

WOOPS! Forgot to post on the second apparition 14th of February

Okay so I meant to post on each of the Lourdes apparitions and seem to have fallen at the second of eighteen hurdles - clearly am a bit rubbish. Anyway should have posted this on Saturday but didn't get time.

The second time Bernadette went back to the grotto was with two friends. Her confessor had advised her to take holy water and she did as she had been instructed by him. Ever obedient, Bernadette had done as her mother told her and steered clear of the grotto even though it caused her great sadness. However, on this Sunday her mother relented and, provided she stayed with her friends, the sickly Bernadette, over whom her mother fretted was allowed to return there.

This was the second silent apparition. Bernadette later wrote her own clear account of it. Bernadette was forced to recount her vision hundreds, even thousands of times and not even the smallest detail ever changed or altered - impressive considering that at the time of the visions she had been struggling to remember the catechism which would mean she could make her first holy communion. The veil to the left is the one that Bernadette wore during the apparitions These were worn by most peasant girls in the basque region in order to keep them warm in the cold Pyreneen winters. Little did anyone know the events of the winter of 1858 would change the quiet town of Lourdes (and the world) forever. Below is Bernadette's account of the apparition whichoccurred on 14th of February (next apparition is the 18th)

"The second time was the following Sunday. I went back because I felt myself interiorly impelled. My mother had forbidden me to go. After High Mass, the two other girls and myself went to ask my mother again. She did not want to let us go, she said that she was afraid that I should fall in the water; she was afraid that I would not be back for Vespers. I promised that I would. Then she gave me permission to go.

I went to the Parish Church to get a little bottle of holy water, to throw over the Vision, if I were to see her at the grotto. When we arrived, we all took our rosaries and we knelt down to say them. I had hardly finished the first decade when I saw the same Lady. Then I started to throw holy water in her direction, and at the same time I said that if she came from God she was to stay, but if not, she must go. She started to smile, and bowed; and the more I sprinkled her with holy water, the more she smiled and bowed her head and the more I saw her make signs. Then I was seized with fright and I hurried to sprinkle her with holy water until the bottle was empty. Then I went on saying my rosary. When I had finished it she disappeared and we came back to Vespers. This was the second time."

Feastday of Our Lady of Lourdes

2010-02-11T17:18:00.012Z

God our Father among all creatures You have formed Mary, the perfect creature, the "Immaculate Conception." In Lourdes she proclaimed this name and Bernadette repeated it. The Immaculate Conception; this is a cry of hope: evil, sin, and death are no longer victors.
Mary, precursory sign, dawn of salvation! Mary, you, the innocence and refuge of sinners, we pray to you.

Ave Maria, gratia plena!

Lord Jesus, You gave us Mary as our Mother. She shared Your Passion and Resurrection. In Lourdes she showed herself to Bernadette, saddened by our sins but radiant with Your light. Through her, we entrust to You our joys and our sorrows, our own, those of the sick, and those of all people.
Mary, our sister and our mother, our confidant, and our help, we pray to you ...

Ave Maria, gratia plena!

Holy Spirit, you are the Spirit of love and unity. In Lourdes, through Bernadette, Mary asked for a Chapel, and for people to come in procession. Inspire the Church which Christ is building on Peter's faith: that it may be one. Guide the pilgrimage of the Church: that it may be faithful and daring!
Mary, you are filled with the Holy Spirit, you are the spouse and the servant. You are the model for Christians, and the maternal face of the Church. We pray to you ...

Ave Maria, gratia plena!

For the many graces received, for all the conversions, all the forgiveness, all the healings, for the vocations and promises which you have witnessed or engendered, for the love of serving others, which you have let us experience, Our Lady of Lourdes we thank you!

Benedicta tu in mulieribus!

With all our brothers and sisters of the human race, with all people in need of peace and justice, with young people in search of a way, you who appeared so young to little Bernadette, with all those who are in mourning, who are ill, handicapped, or facing a setback, with those who may have a reason for despair: Our Lady of Lourdes We pray to you!

Ora pro nobis!

Because you are the smile of God, the reflection of the light of Christ, the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, because you chose Bernadette in her misery, because you are the star of the morning, the gate of Heaven, and the first resurrected creature we praise you, we acclaim you and with you we sing the wonders of God,

Magnificat!

Looking to the 11th

2010-02-10T17:08:00.004Z

We all know that tomorrow is the 11th of February and that means its the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes. I first went to Lourdes in 2004 and find that with each year my personal relationship with it changes and grows. Looking back, I honestly think that without Lourdes in my life I would have been rather different. I am not even sure how this is the case but I really believe that it is. I have experienced no physical healing at Lourdes, there are no physical manifestations of my experiences there. However, like millions and millions of others I have been touched by the great power of love that exists there.

On the 11th of February a girl went to collect firewood and in that simple action begins the story which is not always joyful, especially for Bernadette who made great sacrifices in her life. Yet it remains a story of triumph, a grotto, a symbol of hope that stood through two world wars and draws more pilgrims to it now, in this secularised Europe than it ever has before. One can only begin to consider the awe Bernadette must have felt when all of this begun. Two years ago I was able to be at the grotto on the 11th and I was able to look up at the space where 'Aquiro' first appeared. That was a privilege enough for me and at the time I might not have fully realised why, yet because of that privilege I have been able to open a dialogue about Lourdes on this blog and people have emailed me and messaged me from as far afield as Africa. Thank you to all of you who have read along and given me a chance to talk about a beauty which language does no justice to. Lourdes belongs to all of us and the grotto is open to our faith and to our hearts. It is a gift.

For pictures of the 11th of Feb 2008 (150th anniversary) click here
For a post on the first apparition click here
For a sermon from Lourdes on Our Lady (2008) click here

Post Script
Last year I was very privileged in taking some petitions to the grotto for people and I was just wondering- if people reflect back- whether they feel any of those prayers were answered. Not that I am asking people to share publicly or I think that Lourdes is some kind of gumball machine where you put in a prayer and get a prize. I was just thinking it might be a nice time to consider those petitions again.

There are so many ways in which prayers can be answered- our ways are not His ways -and Lourdes is as much about the miracles you can't see, those of the soul, as those you can.

I wish you all a blessed feastday tomorrow and remember your intentions in my own prayers.

Our Lady of Lourdes - pray for us!

"Catholic" fiction or just writing with truth? 'The Body of This' by Andrew McNabb

2010-01-22T17:13:00.006Z

I was recently contacted to help publicise a book of short stories by Andrew McNabb (great grand nephew of Vincent McNabb). He has written a book of short stories called The Body of This which have been entitled "Catholic fiction". Of course it is no shame to receive this title for your work but it does mean that you might need a little help getting it out into the wider world - especially here in England.

I am not sure anything can ever really be described as "Catholic fiction" but more the story of humanity, based on the reality of truth. I would not object to the label either, but it is a shame that the secular publishers are so afraid of anything that goes against the trend of the secular society in which we live that they will not spend time promoting it. They would rather put a label on it and put it in the corner, claiming it can have no relevance for anybody but those of the same religion as the author. Yet look at the recent Sacred Made Real exhibition here in London- some told the National Gallery that a self respecting Brit would never put a foot through the door of anything so embarrassingly Christian- yet the opposite proved to be the case. England is thirsty for a centre but too frightened to say it out loud. Literature can be another way to quench this thirst

Our humanity, our link to one another is through Christ. John Paul II said that to deprive a society of Christ was an "inhuman act" because it was to deny them the solution to the reality of identity. In this case any fiction about the nature of humanity could be called "Catholic fiction"

It is important to promote good fiction of value and worth, fiction that touches upon that reality of who we are, that questions and explores the soul of the human person. For this reason I agreed to put a link out, for all my blog readers but, particularly those in the UK (since there is little budget here for promotion for "Catholic fiction") so that they have the opportunity to be aware that this writing is out there and for EVERYBODY - not just Catholic readers.

The Amazon link is here
More about Andre McNabb here

Just a little time for reflection

2010-01-20T17:43:00.003Z

Dear Loyal Blog Visitors,

How much I have been missing you all since the start of the new term. I hope you have all had peaceful and fruitful starts to your New Year. Mine has been a little hectic but I'm just beginning to catch my breath and be still for a little while. I have made several applications in the past week, looking at the possibility of venturing out of my current comfort zone. I hope you will pray for me, that my path is one filled with the right choices and that I may learn to serve Him first and myself second.

I have some posts planned for the next few days and I can't wait to get back to reading my favourite blogs. After the snow I think I can see just a fragment of spring breaking through the darkness and life beginning to reawaken. A little hope for these dark winter days. Seasons really are metaphors that explain themseleves.

Yours in prayer

Sacred Made Real exhibition is coming to Washington

2009-12-26T19:06:00.012Z

I know that the US is a rather large country and that Washington may well be the same distance and duration by plane for some people living in the USA as it is for me here in London. Nevertheless, I got a book for Christmas about the exhibition I attended in London a couple of months ago (you can read the post here) and found that the exhibition is off to the National Gallery in Washington in February and staying a few months- you can read about it here. I was really pleased because I remembered some people over the Atlantic leaving comments saying they'd love to go- hopefully some now can - hooray!

The book is available at Amazon - it was a great present to receive because it was one of those lovely things I never would have got for myself (bit of an extravagance). It contains so many beautiful pictures and is really very special.

CHRISTMAS

2009-12-26T12:30:00.008Z

PEACE AND JOY

A word from our sponsor (St Bernadette at Christmas)

2009-12-24T20:10:00.008Z

On Christmas Eve 1871 Bernadette attended midnight mass and sat with her fellow sister Victoire Cassou, who later gave this account:

With her veil drawn around her, nothing could avert her attention. After holy communion, she was so deep in prayer that she did not even notice that everyone had gone out. However, I remained close to her for I did not like the idea of going to the refectory with the other sisters. I contemplated her for a long time without her noticing me. Her face was radiant and heavenly as during the ecstasy of her apparitions. When the sister responsible for shutting the chapel doors came, she made a lot of noise with the bolts. Then Bernadette came out of what seemed to be an ecstasy.

Bernadette's body (left) and the chapel at Nevers (right).

This week is my blog's birthday and Bernadette has been a big part of its content so that seemed appropriate. Thanks to you all for reading and a very Merry, peaceful Christmas to you all!

Only 31/2 hours to go till midnight mass in the UK!

Final advent reflection

2009-12-24T00:46:00.009Z

Yesterday I had the remarkable experience of climbing the clock tower of British Parliament, affectionately known as Big Ben- all 334 steps to the top. I touched the clock faces on the inside of this world famous monument and then went up to watch Big Ben (actually the name of the bell rather than the tower) strike 12 - midday. It was so much fun and we were the last group to be able to do so in the year 2009. At the very top, where the bell is, you can see out across London itself and watching it from up there I felt a great affection for my city. Watching little read buses, the Thames and the London Eye on this cold Tuesday before Christmas everything seemed so pristine and perfect; so free of imperfection and chaos. There was so much life and hope, an aura of it from the silent height of the tower that has given London its rhythm and time for 150 years. There was a security in standing somewhere that survived four separate bombs during the war and came out chiming.

Yet, things are not always as they appear. I am sad for the character of my country because Big Ben may still be chiming out, peoples' hearts may still be filled with good and much that is positive has changed here since that first chime 150 years ago, I want to say that first because it is important to remember. Yet our moral compass in this nation has certainly not proved to be as resilient as our iconic clock, this year alone has seen Christians and the pro-life cause battered further as bills were passed in the building I was standing directly above at that moment in time. In fact the building the tower is connected to is, obviously, the building where all anti life bills have been triumphantly passed. As a mortal being man finds himself caught by time and the era in which we are living is one that does not want to recognise its own mortality or look back to that time 2000 years ago when all humanity, regardless of time, was marked to receive its greatest gift. The gift that we await now in these last days of Advent. Our ego in this time of Hawking and Dawkins is often great enough to think we don't need a God.

Waiting is something that seems to have been lost in a world where we are pushed to get what we want when we want it, something I found myself back in the midst of fairly quickly after I returned to ground level and the bustling consumer streets of central London; trying to find a sign of REAL Christmas was very difficult. Trying to find that sense of order, hope and peace I experienced looking out over the same streets from the advantage of height and distance seemed impossible. Being up there was a privilege and a joy which I will not soon forget but it did make me think about looking at things, including ourselves, as we really are. Sometimes receding from the chaos, surveying the overall picture can make you appreciate how fortunate you are, the beauty and the good things which are so vital to hold on to. Yet on its own this view would blind you from the reality and truth of the ways things are when you get close to them. In its own way it was a sort of mountain experience.

It can become a sort of metaphor for the way we look at ourselves and examine our conscience.

From a distance, surveying my actions and my personal truth I may consider myself to be ticking along nicely. Yet Advent is about coming down to the ground level of our soul, getting into the midst of the streets of our being. Can I find signs of the real Christmas within myself, not the self that I want to see from a pleasant distance but the self that is real and unromanticised- the bustle of my working soul. Where is Christ's birth within me? Getting into the muddle is about seeing the plank in my own eye and coming to the crib with humility, not just the gloss of the way I think I appear. Its tough to let go of the way I think I am and confront my own actions, desires and purity of heart. Confront my own ego.

It is a simple revelation but an important one, if I am to learn anything for Advent, my final prayer for this beautiful time of waiting is that I will be able to get down to the nitty gritty of those "streets of my soul" and examine them. Can I discern what I need to work on in the coming year to stop myself getting caught up in things of little significance which will only serve to throw my own moral compass off course? I want to clear the cluttered roads of my own desires so that every little part of my soul has Christ's name firmly sign posted. I hope that the aura of hope, the life may really be thriving at the very core - not just on the surface. It is a tall order but Christmas has to be about hope, the hope that we might be worthy of the great gift of life we are asked to receive. We only have to bow our heads and accept and then perhaps we will create a life for ourselves more resilient than any clock tower, more resilient than time itself. What greater hope can there be than this?

(Thanks to Soph for organising the trip yesterday- it was amazing!)

Hanging out with Carthusians (in spirit)

2009-12-21T23:38:00.012Z

With a lack of Internet access in my life over the last month or so I have been spending my time doing lots of extra reading - you don't need technology to procrastinate and I'll always find a way. So what have I been reading dear readers, who have been kind enough to return after I have neglected you for so long? Well, among other things the writing of various, unnamed, Carthusians. This has largely happened by accident. It's strange when things seem to converge and by coincidence several people give you things to read which are connected and that is what happened to me at the end of the summer. I was given a book of Carhtusian writings and then a friend sent me a few extracts from the book he had been reading and before I knew it I was hooked. John Paul II said there is no such thing as a coincidence and I think I quite agree.

I have to confess that up until this point I had read little written by "A Carthusian". Despite their enclosed nature it quickly became clear to me that these guys have a better hand on human nature and the modern world than those of us trapped in the grind. Advent, though it is almost at a close, has been the perfect ground for nurturing this reading for it has been born in the stillness and the silence of waiting and for this reason it is profound in its simple truths. I just wanted to share a little of my most recent reading with you, from a chapter entitled 'Christmas':

"For the world has need of love, for love alone gives joy. And grace is of itself fruitful; it cannot burn within us without lighting up other souls.

May the Blessed Virgin, hidden and silent in the cave of Bethlehem, help us to imitate her in her recollectedness and purity"*

I hope you all have a blessed and peaceful close to Advent.

*PAGE 89 The Prayer of Love and Silence, Gracewing, 2006 (originally published in 1962 by Darton, Longman and Todd Ltd.)

COPYRIGHT - The Carthusian order in England

Advent! It's good to be back!

2009-12-06T16:23:00.006Z

I am glad to have had some temporary internet access this weekend to update my own blog and catch up with some of my favourites. I wish you all a deeply peaceful season of advent. If you are reading this near the 8th of December check out my little post

Also, a little advent poem here

The Immaculate Conception

2009-12-06T12:52:00.012Z

The feast of the Immaculate Conception is nearly upon us. One of my favourite feast days of the year (though I say that about an awful lot of feast days). This feast seems perfectly suited to the run up to advent when we come to consider a fusion of divinity and humanity. Okay, and it obviously does link quite nicely to the message of Lourdes (you knew it was coming!). The message of Lourdes was, in a sense, the divine confirmation of a recent doctrine, on the 25th of March 1858 the lady finally revealed her name to St. Bernadette:

It had been 20 days since the last apparition. Bernadette felt internally compelled to go back to the grotto and, as ever, could not resist the call. However, as of today the Lady would no longer be Aquiro; today, on the feast of the annunciation, she revealed her name. Bernadette would later write; "She lifted up her eyes to heaven, joined her hands as though in prayer, that were held out and open towards the ground and said to me: Que soy era Immaculada Concepciou (I am the Immaculate Conception) ."

It is difficult to comprehend how alien this phrase was to Bernadette - there was no thunderbolt moment for her after speaking with the Lady- where she suddenly realised who she had been talking to. Instead, terrified she would forget the name she repeated it to herself aloud all the way back up the hill into the main town of Lourdes. When she reached the house of Peyramale she simply blurted out 'I am the Immaculate Conception' which understandably caused the priest to stop in his tracks and stare at the little peasant girl in front of him.Peyramale had been requesting the name of the Lady for weeks- now here it was.

Of course Bernadette was ignorant of the fact that this theological expression was assigned to the Blessed Virgin. Four years earlier, in 1854, Pope Pius IX declared this a truth of the Catholic Faith (a dogma). Of course the priest was not - he questioned Bernadette about how she knew this phrase and discovered fairly quickly that she obviously had no idea what it meant and nor did anyone with whom she had come in to close contact. Now the priest was troubled more than ever- he could see Bernadette was sincere and for the first time he was wondering....could it be?

(from the post The 16th Apparition)

However, Bernadette's connection with the feast day does not end there. Bernadette left for the convent at Nevers in 1867. Five months later on the 8th of December her beloved mother Louise died. It seems to me no coincidence that Louise, who had suffered a great deal in her life and had struggled through the period in which Bernadette had her visions died on this day.

Bernadette herself was appropriately canonised on the 8th of December.

The Immaculate Conception remains a bastion of hope and faith in our world; the woman who is the embodiment of the goodness God intended for us all. Surely one of the most essential aspects of goodness is compassion and for this reason we can be comforted because she is listening and ready to come to our aid. Our struggles in this life are many but we await the next with open hearts.

Missing my blog...again

2009-11-17T21:48:00.002Z

Yet again I found myself back at work with no internet access in my flat. I just wanted to say 'hi' and that I miss my blog. I wish I could tell all I have to tell in this short space but I will be back. I owe you three Friday poems. Watch this space...I'll find a way. God Bless!

The Joy of the Sacred

2009-11-01T13:07:00.013Z

Yesterday I went to the National Gallery to see the 'Sacred made real' exhibition. Like the average person on the street I can enjoy looking at interesting pictures and sculptures - I deeply appreciate it as a gift from God- but I cannot claim to understand it with the great depth and knowledge that others do. I know nothing of the name of techniques and brush strokes - as much as I admire the effects. The one sculpture in my life that sent shivers down my spine was the pieta in St. Peters. We always had a model of it at home but when I stood before it I was amazed by it, what it could tell me and how it could inspire me.

I saw 'The Sacred Made Real' exhibition advertised on a poster on the tube and thought it would be worth a bash. I had no concept that it would actually be a spiritual experience. These sculptures were carved from wood and a method called polychroming was used in order to make them appear life like. The statues were exhibited with paintings of a similar time that borrowed ideas from sculpting to create a sense of the 3D. These sculptures are without doubt the most beautiful and awe inspiring I have seen and they indeed seemed to me to be very sacred. Most of the have never left Spain and are still in the convents, monasteries and churches which the were commissioned for- they have been loaned under very particular circumstances. One picture at the end of the exhibition was taken from the room where monks of the Mercedarian order were laid out, awaiting burial. How could one fail to be moved by the peace and symbolism of this? The fact that seeing some of these works together again would be highly unlikely after the end of this exhibition added to the sense of privilege and intimacy one felt standing before them. They have been, and still are, treated as objects that are sacred because they aid prayer and transport us into meditation. I was surprised by how this was the case even in an art gallery and London. The Mater Dolorosa exhibited in Room 5, the room called Meditations on Death is felt to be so sacred that it was only loaned to the gallery on the condition that it was no to be photographed. One can understand when you look upon the true expression of sorrow etched on the face. No one could capture it on camera, but by some amazing grace this artist was able to capture it in wood.

The art form itself is little known outside of Spain because it was thought by many protestant groups to feed idolatry they believed those "crazy catholics" practiced but suddenly the walls have fallen and the National seems to have taken a gamble in recognising a thirst for the sacred here. Certainly, I never thought I would see the day when Rosaries would be sold in the secular shops of the National Gallery but God is great and indeed nothing is impossible for Him - I think we are starting to see the proof of that here in England. In the most unlikely of times there is work afoot. A journalist from the Times newspaper said this week:

"With the arrival of The Sacred Made Real at the National Gallery, however, I think we can safely conclude that the Reformation in Britain is finally over, and that admirers of the remarkable popish art gathered before us here will not now be dispatched to the Tower. Henry VIII’s revolt has run its course at last." (source here)

To be fair it has been nearly five hundred years- its about time we got a break. I certainly am not carried away with the idea that all our troubles are over- far from it- you only have to read the full 'Times' article to get an idea of the underlying resentment people still feel for our Church. However, at least there is hope and more than that - perhaps even opportunity for people to encounter something of the divine.

The exhibition encouraged more than a passive observation - it was about meditation with music specially composed to accompany the pieces. One was asked to reflect in quite a deep way on what they were looking at - with commentary by a Jesuit priest. This was more than just showing art that has not been see before. This was about the sacred and I was surprised by that. In a world where we throw words around, often without a full regard for their meaning I had expected something beautiful, unusual, ethereal even, but probably not sacred. To use a somewhat colloquial phrase I was blown away, my soul responded.

There were five rooms in total and each of them held a separate aspect of meditation. One room called Saint Francis in Meditation was dedicated to depictions of Saint Francis in ecstasy and one could see something in that art of revelation. No artist could have created that expression on the face of Francis without some interior life. They rendered something beyond my own vocabulary. They rendered something we can all understand - the effect of God on a man who is completely focused on God. (There was also a rendering of St Bruno meditating on the crucifix that made me think the same)

I could probably go on all day about the aspects of Christ shown through this exhibition with one room dedicated to Meditations on the Passion and another, as already mentioned to Meditations on death. My words can never do it justice. Many of these artists were quote aesthetic in their own way and before beginning their work would fast, receive communion and pray. The effects are very clear.

I wanted to just share with you some of my delight and joy at having the privilege to encounter this exhibition. It is a very personal reflection but if you want to find out more the website is here

ROSARIUM VIRGINIS MARIAE (John Paul II)

2009-10-28T18:50:00.006Z

Praying to Christ with Mary

Jesus invited us to turn to God with insistence and the confidence that we will be heard: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you” (Mt 7:7). The basis for this power of prayer is the goodness of the Father, but also the mediation of Christ himself (cf. 1Jn 2:1) and the working of the Holy Spirit who “intercedes for us” according to the will of God (cf. Rom 8:26-27). For “we do not know how to pray as we ought” (Rom 8:26), and at times we are not heard “because we ask wrongly” (cf. Jas 4:2-3).

In support of the prayer which Christ and the Spirit cause to rise in our hearts, Mary intervenes with her maternal intercession. “The prayer of the Church is sustained by the prayer of Mary”. If Jesus, the one Mediator, is the Way of our prayer, then Mary, his purest and most transparent reflection, shows us the Way. “Beginning with Mary's unique cooperation with the working of the Holy Spirit, the Churches developed their prayer to the Holy Mother of God, centering it on the person of Christ manifested in his mysteries”. At the wedding of Cana the Gospel clearly shows the power of Mary's intercession as she makes known to Jesus the needs of others: “They have no wine” (Jn 2:3).

The Rosary is both meditation and supplication. Insistent prayer to the Mother of God is based on confidence that her maternal intercession can obtain all things from the heart of her Son. She is “all-powerful by grace”, to use the bold expression, which needs to be properly understood, of Blessed Bartolo Longo in his Supplication to Our Lady. This is a conviction which, beginning with the Gospel, has grown ever more firm in the experience of the Christian people. The supreme poet Dante expresses it marvellously in the lines sung by Saint Bernard: “Lady, thou art so great and so powerful, that whoever desires grace yet does not turn to thee, would have his desire fly without wings”. When in the Rosary we plead with Mary, the sanctuary of the Holy Spirit (cf. Lk 1:35), she intercedes for us before the Father who filled her with grace and before the Son born of her womb, praying with us and for us.

Taken from APOSTOLIC LETTER ROSARIUM VIRGINIS MARIAE OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF JOHN PAUL II

Pictures taken on my visit to the convent of Nevers 2008

The crime against Down Syndrome babies in England

2009-10-27T18:37:00.019Z

Sitting here watching the news, in the most cold and calculated way, I have just been subjected to a report on how 93% of babies with down syndrome are aborted in this country (you can read the article here). Amazingly the BBC chose to interview a mother and some really positive things came out of that interview. Of course, this was not the subject of the report, this was just an "interesting" side issue. The topic was how women are waiting later to have children and the fact that this results in children with down syndrome was simply an interesting point for study. It made me feel ashamed of this society of ours which talks about the eradication of almost 100, 000 people as "a decision".

What arrogance exists in this society of ours? A society that preaches inclusion and equality. This is a genocide based on the fact that we consider the people who have this condition to be unworthy of life. UNWORTHY OF LIFE! What right do we have for such an awe inducing "decision"? Here are people killed before they are born because they do not meet our apparently high standards for existence.

It is a true tragedy that we lose people who have every bit as much to contribute to this society as you and me - PROBABLY MORE!

What disgraceful arrogance in human beings allows us to "decide" that somebody does not deserve to live?

For anybody who feels that the decision to give a child with down syndrome a death sentence is just and right - stand back and think of the implications- not just for the child but for all. To destroy someone with love to give, with words to say, who without intervention would have a place in this world. In my head and my heart I go back to my own experience of friends in my life with down syndrome. How much these people had to give -how much they have given me- SO MUCH!

I go back to Jean Vanier a man who has learned more from people with down syndrome, and various other conditions, than from any others he has come into contact with- which include famous politicians and academics. This was a man who taught philosophy at university and yet NO college student and NO volume of Aristotle ever taught him more than living in community with those with "disabilities". There are hundreds of L'Arche communities all over the world filled with assistants who make the same claims as Vanier himself.

When you don't give somebody a chance at life how can you make claims about their value?

I have lived with someone with a supposed "disability" in my own life and to be perfectly honest he was a lot less disabled than the rest of us and so utterly alive. These days doctors would encourage mothers to abort babies with the same condition Garvan had. What a terrible hole in the world; not to have lost him in our family but NEVER to have had him. Below you can see him dressed as a spaceman at a party and also, with me when I was born.

There can be no worse crime than for a society to deny other human beings their right to life simply because, deep down, the rest of us think we are worth more.

The fact it is done silently and legally does not make it better - if anything it makes it worse.

How can you have October without virtual Lourdes?

2009-10-27T17:36:00.014Z

A little visit to virtual Lourdes in honour of the Rosary. What better place to celebrate than at the grotto where praying the Rosary was overseen by Our Lady herself? She joined in the Our Father and followed silently as Bernadette prayed the Hail Mary. This was the case from the earliest vision. How many rosaries have been said there since? It must run into trillions! Hooray!

From a personal point of view I think it is where I learnt to fully appreciate this most beautiful and powerful of prayers.

Remember that your prayers went there too and all those thousands of Rosaries surrounded them. I so hope that those prayers are being answered. I believe they are - perhaps already have been?

The Ave Maria being sung in the midst of the Rosary procession

To respond with love

2009-10-26T21:23:00.020Z

Last Friday I spent the day packing boxes full of peoples' donations for parts of Eastern Europe where there is extreme poverty. I went to help because the woman who collects the donations in her house (who was working for this charity since before the fall of the Berlin wall) is now ninety and, as a severe asthmatic, has been told she should no longer lift anything, how ever small. This hasn't stopped her. The donations will be couriered through Poland until they reach a religious community there. When it gets to the Fathers it will be divided up in order to share it among communities in need and then it will be taken on to parts of the Ukraine, Belarus and among others, communities still affected by the Chernobyl disaster, where babies are still being born without eyes. It will be taken by the Fathers themselves who will go back and forth tirelessly with fairly limited transport until it is all delivered. It is only scratching the surface, yet because of the personal response of all these people children will have toys, elderly people will have soap, mothers and fathers, teenagers will have clothing. Without that van of aid they would not. It really is as simple as that.

It is difficult to describe how humbled I felt being around Vi, the woman in question. I packed for a few hours and was tired; she has people in and out of her house at all different hours of the day all the time. Each day friends from church come in and do some packing. Yet all of us are purely bathing in the light of her true goodness- since this is one of her many projects. She never loses patience with her packers and insists on making us tea and cakes, she answers thousands of questions from those of us who have no idea of the severe customs laws, she painstakingly copies out labels for every bag and box in Polish - she has looked up and checked all the words and has to copy them from her hand written list. This is a woman whose favourite Birthday present was 900 tea bags for her parcels. In parts of the Ukraine people can't afford tea, all they can drink is hot water. Vi has responded to them, but more than this, she has responded to them with love.

There are so many forms of poverty in the world, in our own lives. One of the great examples of love in our world today is Jean Vanier, founder of the L'Arche community. It is his belief that each of us is poor and handicapped in our own way so we shouldn't get any ideas about our own greatness, nor others lowliness. Each of us can give and each of us can learn from one another but no human being is less valuable than another in the sight of God. I understand all of this as best I can - with all my own flaws.

Nevertheless, I feel an increasing concern in my own life about how I am responding, personally, to the cries of the poor. I feel a stronger pull towards walking with them in my own life in some way. In Western terms I don't come from a particularly wealthy family but I have been given so much in my life in terms of love and the education I received- I believe that this privilege is a responsibility- the tools I need to respond. My university chaplain constantly warned us of this- if you are given opportunity then it is your responsibility to turn this into a chance to love. I know that I have written in the past about when I was in Tanzania two and a half years ago, about how the children I met there have burrowed into a place in my heart. I think about their lives often and I think about their pain. It is easy for me to see snippets of lives of those who suffer, to be briefly united to them and to feel compassion for them. It is much harder to know what to do about these feelings. How can we help those who most need it? How can we turn these feelings into a loving response in whatever way that might be possible?

I don't have any answers to that one (obviously) except the one that we all have, the one that Christ ultimately gives us - respond with love. How we do this is deeply individual and personal (again, sorry I am stating the obvious). As long as we respond. Action through prayer is certainly a highly powerful response and you can see it working in our own missionaries.

I just feel that I need to be working on improving my personal response. I am grateful as always to be part of a Church that does so much for the poor, no matter the criticisms levelled, I have seen it in action. Where there are no others, the Church is there at the heart of poverty. Thus we are all there.

Below is a video I filmed of the kids singing in the Fransalian school in Tanzania. It was the happiest school I have EVER visited and it is one of the many projects the MSFS are responsible for in just this one area. You get to hear me laughing away at the end as I was treated to another rendition of my 'favourite' song. It makes me smile whenever I watch it. Projects like this are hope personified in a world where there is no infrastructure whatsoever to support the average person. Education is a light of strength. Christ lives in the hope of each one of these children.

I ask for your prayers as I am deciding a few important things in the coming months. I believe I have been offered an opportunity to respond more fully on a personal level - I ask for your help that I will do His will. That I will respond with love in the particular way he wishes me to.

I promise to keep you informed as things develop.

Back to Bernadette

2009-10-19T21:51:00.007+01:00

It has been a little while since I have had a chance to talk about St Bernadette and you all know that I love talking about St. Bernadette - a book I have just been given allows the perfect opportunity. Hooray!

It is called "We Saw Her" and its comprised of witness accounts from those who were there in 1858 and saw the events. Before I go to bed I can't help but share this with you:

"It was no longer the same Bernadette - the angels in heaven must be like that. At times she listened with a sad and dejected air; then her lips moved again. Once more I heard that long sigh which made me so happy. Ever since, when I wake at night I try to reawaken the picture of her face and above all that smile and those lovely bows" LOUIS BAUP *

Me too and I wasn't even there! :-)

*We Saw Her, B.G. Sandhurst, Longmans, Green & Co, London, 2003 (first published 1953)

The Relics of St. Therese

2009-10-18T21:32:00.007+01:00

On Tuesday I arrived at the Cathedral piazza, which I know so well, to see a screen with Mass being streamed and the whole place lit up and filled with those waiting to get close to the relics. Those lights which shone out into the Autumn twilight were indeed very literal. However, there was a greater light behind them, a light of united hope. To me the greatest gift of seeing the casket containing the relics, and running my hand over the glass casing that surrounds them, was not so much about personal desires and intentions but the hopes of all those who have come close to it since it begun its travels. Of course I believe that St Therese is ready and willing to intercede for us, listening for our individual, hopeful and heartfelt petitions, yet the symbolism of this event was certainly about something greater than this.

I felt that the most valuable thing created was a connection between the faithful of the world, in all their trials, around somebody who lived with the simplicity of love. It was about being aware of the power of that simplicity, of what a desire to love can do, how it is still bringing people together in a community of sorts. A community of hope and I am so grateful to Therese for that. Beyond the value of any ornate casket is the value of the prayer uttered by each of those who have looked upon it, prayer that will never lose its value, nor the ear of she whose relics are within.

Whoever wished to make others believe that there is little faith on this island of ours has been aptly corrected and we are left with that sense of hope, that faith, which comes with a shower of graces. Need I say more? I think not - the answer to prayer is already so clear and so present. We are already thankful, yet I am sure this will not be the end of the thanks - I am sure there are many still to come. All we need do is wait and pray...

Pictures of the relics tour of England on the bbc here.

I pray that the next journey will be as successful but doubtless it will. St Therese pray for us!

Prayer to St Therese of the Child Jesus

Teach us how to open our hearts without reserve to the Holy Spirit as you did, to seek and find God's will in all the crises and choices, in the joys and disappointments of our lives. Gain for us too the grace to do his will with courage and untroubled hearts, so that we may radiate a joy and gladness like yours in service of Our Lord.

Humility

2009-10-13T15:02:00.003+01:00

My Year 9 (aged13-14) were looking at Darcy's letter to Elizabeth the other day. We came across the word humility and I asked them what they thought it meant

The girls said admitting you're not good at something

The boys said not letting on that you are good at something.

Interesting difference in gender perspective. I found it amusing.

I did my best to correct BOTH about the ACTUAL meaning of humility.

I am off to see the relics tonight and I am so looking forward to it - I hope to be able to post on it sometime soon and will remember you all when I get to the casket.

Trials and hopes

2009-10-11T14:35:00.005+01:00

My lack of posting recently has probably been an implication to visitors and friends that all in my camp is not running quite as smoothly as it usually does. I have to say I have never experienced a start back to school quite like this one and myself and the kids have been struggling not to buckle under the new pressures placed on both of us by the institution we share and the systems that govern that institution. I am not afraid of a bit of hard work, but lets just say this has taken things to new lengths. As a result I have not been too well with a bug I just can't shift in the last couple of weeks (it is not of the swine variety) and I am now on antibiotics which I hope will help. I know I sound like I am moaning but I promise you I am not, on the contrary I am really just explaining myself. I miss posting but probably more than that I miss visiting the blogs of others and sharing thoughts, prayers and ideas with inspirational Catholics from all over the world. I remain blessed in so many ways and I cannot even attempt to complain in any way about the life I lead when I have so much (just thinking of the Gospel today). So on to a few cheery things I have been party to of late, of a more uplifting nature.

I am sure that no one here in England can fail to have missed the wonderful shower of hope being poured out upon us by the relics of St. Therese which I look forward to visiting in Westminster this Tuesday. So in preparation for their arrival lots has been going on this weekend. Yesterday at the Cathedral there was a day for Mary which I attended and found filled 1) With people 2) With hope. Who can be downcast when we have a mother who offers such love and leads us to her son and the hope of serving Him with real strength and honesty? Young Catholics here are responding and you can see it in their attendance at events such as these. There was further evidence of the on the afternoon procession.

In the afternoon we went to the 'Rosary Crusade' which has now been running for 25 years and led by the statue of our Lady of Fatima we walked through the streets of central London with the traffic stopped for us while we prayed the Rosary. We were permitted to walk on the roads, because of our large numbers. It was awesome! In the true sense of the word as Catholics of all ages joined together to pray in the heart of our city. We started in Victoria and walked through Chelsea and Knightsbridge to Brompton Oratory praying the Rosary with a special intention for our priests and the affect of St Therese's relics here. These busy consumer areas were brought to total standstill on a Saturday afternoon, just for a few moments by Our Lady and her powerful prayer. It was a great witness and I have to say I had a lot of fun walking down Sloane Street, Kings Road Chelsea and bypassing Harrods with the likes of Prada and Louis Vitton dominating, and watching people's bemused but interested faces. Of course I am under no illusion that many of them probably thought we were nuts but who cares? Our Lady is a powerful advocate and the act itself was just a tool - who knows what a witness like this might do? Only Christ knows. I know being part of it was wonderful and I am so grateful for this privlidge.

So there is hope, our country has many flaws indeed but one side of its desire for total freedom is that we are free to witness to Truth. We didn't try to intrude upon any body in a combative way we simply brought our prayer to the street, and to be totally honest, I found people ultimately respectful of that. Our Church is alive! For all that our media tries to insist it is not, for all our struggles against the terrible, crushing wrongs which our law supports and promotes we are here and we have something that can never be broken: we have FAITH and through faith we have an endless sense of hope and possibility. We cannot deny or put away our struggles but we can say that we will face them in a united way with an unbreakable sense of what Truth is.

For anybody else who is having a tough start to Autumn lets not forget that light in our lives and remember all those who can't quite find that light. My life would be so dark without it.

Dear friends you are always in my prayers.

Handy refreshers

2009-09-28T14:55:00.004+01:00

Found this great little book from CTS in Westminster Cathedral this week which is to help prepare us Brits for the arrival of Saint Therese of Liseux's relics in the UK. It is excellent preparation and is both a handy refresher if you are familiar but, I think, would make a good introduction too. It also has where the relics will be and when. Check it out at here.

When the praying gets tough

2009-09-23T12:38:00.007+01:00

During the second world war there was a relatively unknown diarist called Etty Hillesum who had a unique and beautiful style of writing. She spent a great deal of time in the Dutch transit camp of Westerbork where she suffered with her fellow Jews and had to watch train after train full of human beings , including babies, women, the elderly, sick and infirm, get sent to Auschwitz and an "unknown destiny". Etty was also a deeply spiritual person and this love of religion colours her writing and elevates her soul in order that she can cope with what she sees. I found a tragic yet beautiful passage as I was reading her letters the other day and I found the part where she talks about the entrance of some Catholic-Jewish religious in Westerbork. She tells how "There was a remarkable day when the Jewish-Catholics or Catholic-Jews arrived, nuns and priests wearing the yellow stars on their habit."* She describes how one priest had not been out of the monastery for fifteen years "yet his gaze remained unwavering and friendly above the brown habit, as if everything was known, familiar, from long ago"*

Etty had no reason to write this way, most of the people she was writing to had no interest in the Catholic clergy. There is no bias in what she writes yet she is able to convey a beautiful serenity. I think we know it, I think she recognised it as the serenity of grace. Grace in a place where, as you can read in the rest of Etty's letters human suffering is abundant and devastating. Yet together human beings went on , whether Catholic or not just hoping and trying to bear what was happening. She continues that a man tells her:

"he saw some priests walking one behind the other in the dusk between two barracks. They were saying their rosaries as imperturbably as if they had just finished vespers at the monastery"*

I love this idea because it is proof that faith does not die when the sense of humanity in those around you does. People may be persecuting you, may be harming and destroying life all around you but you do not give up. You hold on and Etty asks in her beautiful mystical way :

"And isn't it true one can pray anywhere?"*

This I will try to remember next time I feel that internal call to prayer but tell myself I will pray later when I am less stressed, distracted or busy. Surely these people must be our models for prayer.

Etty died in Auschwitz on November 30th 1943 aged 27. She was proudly Jewish and in the course of the last years of her short life had become a proud lover of God. She took her Talmud and Bible to Auschwitz with her.

*All quotations were taken from Letters from Westerbork, Etty Hillesum, Grafton Books, Uk 1987

Cluny

2009-08-31T23:42:00.006+01:00

A little way from Taize is the village of Cluny where there used to be a gigantic monastery - fatherhouse to 1000 others of the Benedictine order in France. Here are a few shots of what remains - only a few feet shorter than St Peters itself when in its full glory. It was destroyed during the throws of the French revolution. Yet its ethereal beauty has not been wholly lost. You can just sense it is a place of holiness.

A very kind blog award

2009-08-31T20:33:00.012+01:00

I am so grateful to Roz at Our Beautiful Catholic Faith for awarding me such a kind blog award. She writes a beautiful blog of reverence and prayer with some stunning photography to boot. I thank you truly and I would like to pass it on to:

Anne at Imprisoned in My Bones - Releasing My Inner Jeremiah

Cathy at A Bit of Blarney

Jennifer at My Chocolate Heart

Andrea at Arise to Write

The official rules are as follows:

1. Copy the picture above and post it on your blog.
2. Pass it on to who you think who is/are deserving.
3. Leave a message to them.
4. Pass as many as you want.
5. Message back or leave a comment to the owner.

Paying a visit to St. Catherine Laboure

2009-08-30T16:57:00.024+01:00

While in France this summer I had a chance to drop into the Miraculous medal chapel on Rue de Bac where Our Lady appeared in 1830 to Catherine Laboure. Catherine died in 1876 and was canonized in 1947 - when exhumed her body was found to be incorrupt and supple. She and St. Bernadette died within three years of one another, although Catherine lived a much longer life, in terms of their humility, poverty and love of vocation as well as (obviously) a devotion to Our Lady there are striking similarities. Catherine's body is now on view close to the alter in the chapel where she had a total of three visions. In all truth I didn't get to spend all that much time at the Church compared to somewhere like Nevers and I would love to have had more to explore its beauty. I was truly blessed to be able to kneel at the alter and say my Rosary ( I remembered all my "bloggy"-friend's intentions there whatever they might be) before her body. Unfortunately my camera battery died and so I managed to get fairly useless photo evidence apart from the following offerings:

Catherine is the saint who the miraculous medal was revealed to. At this time in France there remained political instability and persecution of the clergy. Our Lady gave us the prayer inscribed on the medal O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.

Catherine was a poor farm girl who had lost her mother at a young age, she had turned to Marian devotion in the depth of her grief. She came to the Sisters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul at the age of 24. Our Lady revealed the medal Catherine was to have struck in some detail and told her to ask her confessor to carry out the instructions. It took Catherine two years to convince her confessor of the verity of her visions, she had to write out several accounts and after this time he concluded that she was a practical, honest, sane person. The first two-thousand medals were delivered on June 30, 1832. Nobody but Catherine's confessor knew the identity of the nun it had been revealed to and its spread through France was miraculous in itself. It quickly earned the title we all associate it with while Catherine retreated in silence to work with the elderly and infirm in the countryside - no one realising her link to the medal. She is often called the saint of silence for this reason. It was only in the year of her death that she admitted to another nun that she was the recipient of the medal instruction.

In many ways it was a vision that leads us to the clear confirmation at Lourdes "I am the immaculate conception".

I was given my own miraculous medal for my first holy communion at the age of 8 and have increasingly come to value its significance. This summer I joined the Malitia of the Immaculata, which is a worldwide ecclesial movement founded by Maximilian Kolbe in 1917. It is a movement of prayer based around the prayer and medal as revealed to Catherine Laboure. Its principal prayer is:

O Mary,conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to you, and for all those who do not have recourse to you, especially enemies of the Holy Church and all those recommended to to you.

I really like how St Catherine's medal is quietly linked to so many other saints and events in our Church, much like the woman herself, it remains a powerful witness of hope.

Memories of Nevers

2009-08-29T22:04:00.012+01:00

It is now a year since my beautiful visit to Nevers, Bernadette's final resting place, and now a place where earthly souls can rest for a little time bathed in peace before returning to the world. I can't really describe the beauty of being able to stay at the convent at Espace Bernadette and being able to be beside her body in the chapel late at night when nobody else was there. During the day I liked to watch children peep in at her with fascination and kneeling pilgrims tilt their head beside her while in a deep kind of conversation of prayer. Yet I also loved it late at night before they closed the chapel, I could simply kneel before her tiny structure and marvel, I could enter into that deep, deep peace that she emanates.

When I started this blog the first thing I wrote about was that trip to Nevers in the dying days of August - a trip that sustained me for the long winter ahead and sustains me still (You can read that post here). I met many of you through that early post because in this world there is a surge of warmth from many when you talk about Bernadette. She is a true spiritual giant. My journey to her was a privilege and in my darkest moments I cling to her words:

"I shall forget no one"

I have complete faith that this is true whether one is beside that little body or millions of miles away, across oceans and seas. For, of course, Bernadette is now on the other side of that veil which separates us from those that have gone before us - amidst the communion of saints.

St Bernadette - pray for us!

I thought I might share some of the happy snapshots from that trip:

Grapes growing in the convent gardens

Beautiful St. Bernadette - awaiting the day when she will wake

The room in which Bernadette died is one where she lived and prayed through the last months of her life, suffering deeply. Her bed, like all the others in the infirmary was covered with a white drape. As she suffered, finally unable to walk she called it her white chapel. The place where her bed stood is now marked by the tabernacle, covered in a symbolic white drape. Words fail the powerful presence of peace in that room. Oh so beautiful! I go there often in prayer.

The spot where Bernadette actually died, sitting up as she struggled to breathe. The floorboards, the fire place, the statue are as they were. I knelt before them deeply touched by Bernadette's own hidden life of love and prayer.

This is Our Lady of the Waters, a statue which has its place at the back of the convent, hidden behind hedgerow. Bernadette would often steal herself some peace here, away from what was often an extremely difficult life in the convent. She was not a big fan of statues of Our Lady, she found them beautiful and showed them reverence but was always very aware that they could not reflect the real beauty of what she had seen. Yet she felt that this statue had "something" of the beauty she had seen in the Lady at the grotto. This is a similar stance to the one the Lady took when she revealed her name to Bernadette: 'The Immaculate Conception"

St Joseph's chapel where Bernadette rested till 1925 is the perfect place to hide away and say your Rosary. It was here that many early visitors to her burial site were said to have experienced miraculous cures through the intercession of Bernadette.

The front of the convent where Bernadette lived out her vocation, directly through those doors is the main chapel where Bernadette's body now rests.

The actual chair in which Bernadette died.

The clothes Bernadette wore to the convent.

The few possessions Bernadette brought with her from the hospice where she had been living in Lourdes until the age of 22

Poem for Friday

2009-08-28T22:25:00.003+01:00

Joseph

The silence

Watches over

Without the eyes of the

World to meet him.

You will not look to seek him,

Even though

He is just a little way behind.

He is the strength

Touched by gentility of mind.

He is keeper

And the leader,

Who sought Him

Sorrowing.

The calm on the flight,

The clarity of sight,

When all around

Was panic and slaughter.

Protector in the stillness;

The silhouette in the distant desert

Whose feet met the sand,

Silently,

In the unfamiliar land,

While the blood

Of innocence was behind.

And so he lead

And we will never know what was

Said

Or what passed between the

Beloved

Throughout their journey

We can only know the stillness,

The depth of willingness…

Of what it is to love.

We can only touch upon the

Humility

Of one who was so

True

And so

Willing to become the

Facility,

Who lived the hidden life,

Bathed in the

Greatest gift of light...

Which is given to us all.

Listen for the call…

For in the still,

Small,

voice,

In the whisper of the dream...

It shall come.

Sleep in the knowledge

And comfort

Of silence.

LESSONS FROM TAIZE- PART 1

2009-08-28T16:24:00.005+01:00

Only now are the lessons I learned at Taize beginning to take hold in my life. I think they have been marinating in the midst of my own reflection and prayer over the last couple of weeks and now they are starting to take root and grow. What struck my heart most there was a recognition of the value of every human being and a prompt to live simply, in communion with the poor and with one focus - GOD.

You wake to prayer with the community, it is at the centre of the day and at its end. For each of these three daily prayers the brothers take their place before the alter and we watch - we wait- we stop. There is chant but then it ceases and there is silence. For ten minutes this church, filled with thousands, is rendered silent. You find yourself looking forth into the light of the alter and perhaps grasping just for an instant what it is we are waiting for. When you stop before that table, that symbol of sacrifice do you ever just wait silently for a few moments to consider what that sacrifice has really done? That the temple was shattered, that we were taken beyond the realms of the visible, that there are no longer walls between us and God. He is. We are. We are His.

Sometimes this revelation can be terrifying. God is so huge, we cannot hope to comprehend or understand Him in this life, we are too little, too flawed. Yet we can leave ourselves open to the awesome nature of His truth - the truth that comes with His son. The Christ that comes to lead us. Looking into those flickering lights you start to feel that sense of immense possibility that dwells in each of us to really live in the presence and knowledge each day, even the days we feel exhausted and shattered Simplicity and prayer help to bring the world into focus and that is what Taize does for people. It lifts the exterior away for a short while leaving only the interior.

Even language becomes rather fluid. In chants that encompass world languages one begins to feel deep prayer emitting from the heart without the words being in your own language or even a modern language, the translation is printed in the song books, but one does need this to comprehend the sacred. I was having breakfast one morning with a new friend from the Russian Orthodox tradition. She said much more articulately than I had been able to express, "You feel as though the words you speak are your own" The beauty of them is that they ARE - they are the words of each one of us because they are the words of hope and love expressed by all Christians whose souls are constantly before the alter of the world...waiting....watching...waiting for that we KNOW lies beyond.

To read what the community say about the prayer through song click here

To check out the translations of the beautiful chants click here

The end of the summer journeys

2009-08-26T14:44:00.005+01:00

I'm back home from the last of my summer trips having utterly neglected my blog in the past couple of weeks. So I thought I would mark my return with the simple story of somebody I met this summer in Taize. In three weeks time this particular chap is going to enter a Benedictine monastery. He is bright, gentle and has a wonderful life to his faith. He showed a tremendous ability to communicate with people, especially those struggling in matters of faith. As it turned out we were at the same university at the same time and he grew up in the town where I teach now. He is just 25 and he has taken a great deal of effort to discern his calling over the past two years. Here in Europe we, as is the case elsewhere, we have our problems with a drop in vocations. To meet somebody like this guy who has an excellent law degree and could have carved himself a very different material path really was so uplifting. His love of God and desire to follow that above all else has been something wonderful to encounter this summer and I thought I would share this encounter with you. I wondered if you might be so kind as to pray from him since I am sure he will be an asset to our Church but, like the rest of us, needs a little support long his way.

The tabernacle and picture of Our Lady next to the alter

The alter and cross used for veneration at Taize

Areas where the brothers pray, sing and meditate

Coming Home

2009-08-18T21:09:00.009+01:00

Coming home from a place where you have been surrounded by a deep sense of spirituality is always difficult. There is a feeling of coming down from the mountain. Taize was a challenging place in many ways. Yet it is also a place of high ideals and goals - somewhere that attempts to allow people dialogue and give people a sense of their value in the most real sense; not their academic or material value, but their infinite value in the sight of God. The four thousand young people present there each week in August are evidence of the thirst for this truth amidst the often parched shores of Europe.

The brothers in the Taize community are made up of various Christian denominations, including Catholic, and are also truly international as well as inspirational. The Vatican fully supports the work of the community and their close relationship goes back to the Papacy of John XIII. John Paul II visited and said mass there while the prior of the community meets with Pope Benedict every year. While I was there two Catholic Bishops stayed for a number of days and it was lovely to have mass said for the Assumption by a lovely French Bishop on Saturday, The Taize community does not ignore differences between denominations but brings us together in a united love of God and what it is to be human. It brings us together to show there can be at least one place on earth where we can accept unification and dialogue.

It does this mostly through prayer- drawing those four thousand young people in to the church of reconciliation each day to pray through the unique Taize chant three times a day. It is humbling to see all these people drawn into the daily rhythm of very beautiful prayer. The rest of the day you work to contribute in some way to the daily running of the community- helping to cook, clean etc. and you are also involved in a group discussion led by a brother followed by small group meetings which offers the opportunity to share ideas with people from different cultures and denominations. The discussion groups strongly echo Catholic social teaching and often the notes site encyclicals. There is also plenty of time for some solitary reflection.

In many ways it was not an easy week and I found myself challenged and confronted with many ideas. Yet coming back I feel renewed. What I take with me most is the deep prayer I entered into amidst the Taize chants and readings. The repetition of simple phrases and the meditation upon these was enlightening in the most simple of ways. It is simplicity that I also keep with me from Tiaze; living in unity with those who have less and stripping away the superficiality our society imposes so that all that remains is time with God. I couldn't even charge my mobile phone and it was really good for me to be in this situation. As Brother Roger lived his life he moved gradually from his own Luthran background towards a deep unity with the Catholic faith. He was a man of true peace and beauty- unfortunately this beauty was too difficult for a woman who suffered chronic mental illness to cope with and on the 26th of August 2005 he was murdered at evening prayer- of course she was not responsible for what she did. His community was heartbroken yet their ultimate answer has been peace and compassion. I hope to share a little more of what I learnt over the coming weeks.

As for me, its A Level results day tomorrow so I will be in school (hopefully) celebrating with my students.

See you in a week!

2009-08-08T00:23:00.003+01:00

I am off to Taize in France tomorrow (I am sure there are many familiar with Taize chant) where I will be staying and praying with the community for the week, camping with others. I think it might involve a fair old bit of singing as well as washing up and earning our keep. I have never been there before and I am excited about it. I will be driving with four others so won't arrive till Sunday morning. I have to say I am not the best camper in the world but for peace and prayer and experience I will try my best. I invested in a pink rain coat for the occasion. If you want to read more about Taize you can do so here.

Please know that you will all be very much in my prayers and I look forward to sharing my experiences with you.

Rest in Peace Private Patch

2009-08-06T14:16:00.004+01:00

I can't help but be moved by the funeral of the last surviving British Tommy from the trenches of World War I - he was 111. Harry Patch wanted his funeral to spread a message of peace and reconciliation. He wanted people from both sides to be present at his funeral and he wanted no guns or cannons fired. He was a gentle peaceful man and we are proud of him. Read it here.

Back with a few thoughts

2009-08-06T00:31:00.010+01:00

I'm back from my trip to Holland having had a busy and lovely budget trip. I really enjoyed the experience and even learnt a few Dutch words. Den Haag and Delft (where the blue and white pottery comes from) were picturesque and beautiful - Amsterdam was a little more challenging. Obviously, it is an architecturally beautiful city with its tall and unique buildings looking out upon the seemingly unending, winding canals. However, there were obviously things which are legal in and blatant in this city which made it a difficult place to be in for a few days let alone for people who actually live in the Netherlands. It was my impression that many Dutch people are not keen on what Amsterdam has become and I objected to the assumption that, because I was there with five other people in their mid twenties, my friends and I were on drugs. Watching people of all nationalities enter the "coffee shops" where marijuana is sold and seeing them exit worse for ware wasn't really very pleasant. Of course it wasn't everywhere but this and legalised prostitution did change how the city seemed to me. I am not criticising the Dutch for this because the whole place was flooded with tourists partaking in these things - a good number of them English. Also, who can preach about law making when most of us in Europe stand by and allow millions of children to be aborted without batting an eyelid? Certainly not us!

On the brighter side I attended a beautiful mass in Den Haag on Sunday and was kindly directed to the stunning Church by the Brothers of Saint John who seem to have a thriving community there. I found every Dutch person I encountered to be kind, welcoming and polite - they went out of their way to help us and speak to us.

In Amsterdam I did what most tourists do and visited the house of Anne Frank. When I was about 11 I read her diary and was shocked by its abrupt ending and Anne's ultimate fate- like so many millions touched by the raw wisdom of this girl. Visiting the house, I had a much more emotive reaction than I expected. It was like revisiting that sense of shock I first felt at the age of 11. There is something about standing in the place where something really happened which means you absorb something of shock and sadness that makes that place notorious. The darkness of the annex, the tightness and tininess - the reality that here was hidden eight people with their hope of survival, a hope that was so very nearly realised is something pressed home when you are in the rooms where they tiptoed around fearfully, laughed together, argued with one another and ultimately gave each other strength and good counsel. This place where you are standing really was their life and their hope. This place where you are standing is the place where Nazi officers accompanied by Dutch police burst in and shattered that fragile hope, sending them to their deaths. This happened in this place, just over sixty years before - these people, all their hopes and every intricacy of their identity were sent to die in concentration camps designed for this purpose-this makes the hurt and pain of it very real.

Of course I feel that my awareness of this fate has been heightened by my visit to the destination of the Franks' and many others like them. Auschwitz, that place of forsakeness and destruction. While not all would die there, all eight people in the annex were initially sent there and then on to other camps where they finally gave up. Of course Anne Frank has become a symbol of all those like her, all those people who had their potential annihilated, including the 1.3 million children. Anne is a symbol because we know her name, her family, her inner most thoughts and people are able to connect with these things. In many ways they are the timeless sentiments of the teenager but tinged with a wisdom that came with a strong character and an awareness that this strong character was being threatened without good reason

One cannot help but wonder about the nameless that met the same fate who remain relatively forgotten. They too had their gifts, their families, their hopes, their desires and their flaws. When you consider Anne Frank, you can't help but wonder what this intelligent, talented young woman might have become:

Would she have married?

Would she have had children?

If so, how many?

Would she have published countless novels?

All that potential lost, perhaps generations of potential lost, all her children and her childrens' children starved in the awful Bergen- Belsen.

Is the same not true of all those whose names and faces are not remembered, those who had nobody left to remember them? 140,000 Jews in Holland when Hitler invaded resulted in only 20,000 survivors. What of the remaining 120,000 ? Everything they would have been- wiped out- all the children they might have had and the things they might have done- wiped out.

Is the same not true of abortion? Is Anne not symbolic of those children and what is lost to the world when they are exterminated? Many would argue that of course there is a distinction but where is it? The unborn, the hidden human beings who are seen as less then human. Doesn't that sound familiar to you?

The members of our society that live with a looming threat over them, especially the disabled:

Of Down's syndrome babies, 690 were aborted in 2002, an increase of 17 percent over the 2001 total of 591.

More babies were aborted in 2002 who had Down's syndrome (372) than those that were born with the disease (329).

In 2002, five babies were aborted for deformed feet and another was killed because of a cleft lip and palate.

Also, in 2000 and 2001 combined, nine babies were the victims of abortion because of a cleft lip and palate while two more babies were also aborted for having a cleft lip.

(statistics taken from here)

A death sentence without a crime. Anne herself, in her famous diary asked why there was hatred and destruction and a desire to think of another human being as worth less because you don't understand them or want them. Is this not true of the unborn now more than ever?

In the forty years that abortion has been legal in Britain think of all the potential that has been pointlessly eradicated. SIX MILLION individual lives since 1967. FOURTY MILLION in America since 1973 (stats can be supported here)

-Each of these human beings would have had their own fingerprint- unique to them, of all the people who have ever lived. What would they have touched? What would they have become?

-Would they have married?

- Would they have had children?

-How many?

-What would their signature have looked like?

-Would they have made a medical breakthrough?

-Would they have published countless novels?

-Would I have sat next to them in school?

-Would I have taught them?

Everything they would have been, all those hearts that would have been beating, all that potential wiped out, the potential generations incinerated by a "choice". To quote John Paul II who lived through World War II in a country that was at the heart of the Nazi extermination program:

The cemetery of the victims of human cruelty in our century is extended to include yet another vast cemetery, that of the unborn.

We cannot think of the evil that murdered Anne as a piece of history when it exists all around us with a different face. We have our opportunity to peacefully and lovingly stand out against it in the trend of our society. As John Paul II warned:

A nation that kills its own children is a nation without future.

The power of remembering must also be accompanied by the power of actions which are peaceful and true. A final quotation from John Paul:

True holiness does not mean a flight from the world; rather, it lies in the effort to incarnate the Gospel in everyday life, in the family, at school and at work, and in social and political involvement.

Yet we should also remember God knows each one of those little human lives and He knows the answers to the questions posed here.

Reflections on a quiet morning outside the abortion clinic.

2009-07-30T18:09:00.012+01:00

Because I am flying out from Heathrow tomorrow I am staying with my parents so I went to the abortion clinic this morning to pray outside with my Mum. This clinic, unlike the one closest to my own house on the opposite side of the city, is BPAS (British Pregnancy Advisory Service). Marie Stopes (the one closest to my house) and BPAS (the one closest to my parents') are the two largest abortion providers in Britain. Most of these abortions are government funded - funded by the taxes I pay. The worst thing about it- and brace yourself for this because it actually hurts me when I think about it- the building used to be a Catholic Convent. Ouch! It is a huge, beautiful Victorian building and now it is used for this..

We just stood quietly on the opposite side of the street and prayed our Rosary as a witness. I find it so hard to watch those girls going in and out -I so want to hep them and stop them causing this pain to themselves and their child. I looked up at that building I noticed something striking: the psychology of it. I realised I have never stood outside an abortion clinic that doesn't have the blinds down and the curtains drawn in almost every room. In a quiet Liberal Democrat, residential area this seems totally unnecessary unless, somewhere within, you feel what you are doing needs to be hidden. It was an empty street on a Thursday morning, a side street at that - rain rather than sun - why hide? That got me thinking about the parallels to Nazi concentration camps- the attempts to sanitise everything and keep the realities from prying eyes. To keep people asleep to the realities because what they don't see can't hurt them. It was also interesting how everybody going in did so with their head down and rung the doorbell impatiently while they waited a short time as though they were anxious not to be seen. It wasn't us bothering them - we were just two people standing on a street. I think they felt, even on a subconscious level, that they did not want to be associated with this place or what was happening there.

The thing is there is hope in this because what we can hope that peoples' consciences will one day open their eyes to what is right. Nothing is impossible for God. Sometimes we seem to have come so far from our centre of morality that we can perceive no way back. Yet there must be a way back -as with ideologies of the past- as long as there is prayer.

A quick nod to Saint Martha

2009-07-30T13:31:00.003+01:00

I know I am a day late but I just wanted to mark the feast day of my confirmation patron Saint - Martha. Martha liked to get things right but in her hurry to do so she got them wrong- I picked her for this reason- because I can relate. The thing that I like best about her though is her willingness to learn - it is not easy to be criticised by someone you love and respect. It is hard to then take this criticism to heart and learn from it. Martha is a good example of how to do so graciously and I pray to her that, when I am corrected, I will act to correct the error of my ways, that I will listen carefully to what others have to say.

When the bishop asked me why I chose her, I did tell him "Because she had to learn the hard way" He looked rather shocked but I stand by it.

OVERPOPULATION VIDEO - DISPELLING SOME MYTHS!!

2009-07-28T23:53:00.002+01:00

Link to some great posts on Lourdes

2009-07-26T16:07:00.003+01:00

Just wanted to tip you off about some great posts on Lourdes which I have been really enjoying over on Poetry, Prayer, and Praise - they can be found here.

henna hand

2009-07-26T15:15:00.003+01:00

My friend is getting married tomorrow and last night I went to her henna party, she is from an Asian background and this event traditionally prepares the bride for her wedding. The brides friends also have the opportunity to have henna - I thought I'd show you how mine turned out.

Journeys and promises

2009-07-24T00:52:00.002+01:00

One of the luxuries of summer holidays is being able to stay up late into the night reading and praying. Late night and early morning are, in my opinion, the best times for these activities because there is a stillness in them that seems to speak of expectancy. During the school week I normally flag out by about 10 (which at 25 is rather a sorry thing to admit to the world at large but a day with kids ranging from 11-18 will do that to you). During the school term I get to enjoy the early mornings because I have quite a commute. During the holidays I switch and the night becomes my time of stillness.

At the moment I am preparing for my various summer journeys, of which there are a few. I always find the process of travelling quite a spiritual experience, perhaps a reminder of our pilgrim way through life. I feel that every journey has a spiritual element to it and there is an element of growth and renewal in leaving behind what you know and going towards the unfamiliar, even just for a few days. There is so much of this beautiful world to experience but, thanks to mankind, not all of it always seems particularly beautiful. Nevertheless, where there is life there is surely goodness and hope to be found. I am not, of course, speaking of external beauty - but true beauty- the beauty of the soul, which often has an external appearance which suggests the opposite to superficial beauty.

My first journey this summer is to a friend's wedding- one ceremony is in the north of England and the other in Holland because her future husband is Dutch (I am leaving for Holland next Friday while the English festivities are early next week). It seems strange to be seeing another dear friend embark upon the vocation of marriage. The more of these ceremonies I go to (and they are rather frequent these days) the more moved I become by the incredible beauty of an institution of such trust in another person, such willingness to accept another with all their faults and failings. In an increasingly cynical world it also seems very brave to do so, when the statistics and culture seem to be persuading against. Nothing gives me more pleasure than to see friends who I have grown up with happy in their lives. Although this is a friend from university, I still feel that, to some extent, we were children when we met. Of course marriages also contain a certain aspect of sadness because they are farewell to an aspect of that particular friends life - however, this sadness is far outweighed by the joy and promise of the life to come.

I am praying that the journeys I make this summer, that the journeys all make this summer, will be fruitful - that they will teach me, help me to grow and help me on my own pilgrimage - the pilgrimage of life.

I am reading a book about Dominican spirituality at the moment - just because I like to find out about different orders and understand them better. Tonight I read this quotation from Meister Eckhart

'God is always ready, but we are unready. God is near us, but we are from from him'

I pray that the journeys of life may make us ready (whether these journeys be literal or metaphorical)

I pray that that the journeys of life may allow us to draw near to Him.

Wherever I travel you are all truly in my prayers.

SUMMER PROMISES- MILITIA OF THE IMMACULATA

2009-07-22T15:28:00.010+01:00

Summer evokes some strange feelings- perhaps because it is so heavily linked to childhood- I feel a heavy dollop of nostalgia these days. It is nice to be away from the classroom for a few weeks but I always plan to do far too much and never seem to accomplish quite what I intended. I am trying to be more realistic this summer holiday and not set myself too many tasks. Last week, on the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and the anniversary of the final apparition at Lourdes I did achieve one thing I had been praying about and preparing for over a number of months - I became a member of the Militia of the Immaculata -a movement of prayer that unites lay, clergy, married and unmarried Catholics. I felt this was a good way for me to thank Mary for the many graces I have received through her- especially in Lourdes and Nevers- and a way to make a real commitment to her in actions as well as words.

Read about it here

The movement itself was founded by Fr Maximilian Kolbe in 1917 and continues to spread itself throughout the world. I picked up a leaflet about it up in the town of Lourdes close to the Cachot, Bernadette's home at the time of the visions, when I was there in April. As many people know I also had the privilege of visiting Fr Kolbe's cell this year and only then did I really comprehend what it meant for him to make a sacrifice of love in a place of such momentous hatred. I believe that Maximilian Kolbe prayed for great graces and that, when he needed them most, he received them in abundance.

In spite of its impressive name, the Militia of the Immaculata is in some ways a very simple movement indeed. It mainly centres around wearing the miraculous medal, and as many who read this blog know I love my miraculous medal! St Maximilian believed that the Miraculous medal was a BULLET which targeted sin and evil. As a member of the Militia one is asked to commit to the cause of the miraculous medal, first and foremost to wear it yourself and pray the prayer which we all know so well: "O Mary conceived without sin pray for us who have recourse to thee" daily. Fr Kolbe added slightly to this "and for those who do not have recourse to thee, especially the enemies of the Church and those recommended to thee. Amen." One is also asked to pray the rosary regularly. Once you feel confident of your own commitment the idea is to pass the medal on to members of your family and friends and finally to go beyond the realms of family and friends into the wider world. It is a movement of prayer and peace, dedicated to Mary and her immaculate heart.

I am glad to have joined, while I already do many of those things that the Militia requires I feel doing them as part of an army of prayer is something a little different, it is, I hope, a start to keeping a very real promise in life. It is only one way to do it- as we all know- our great Church gives us many ways to make our individual promises and commitments to God- we all do so every day. I just wanted to share with you something that had been very meaningful to me. I can never return the great love that has been given to me by God- in terms of its perfection and purity- but I can hope to share it with others and live it as best I can.

MI Consecration Prayer

Explanation of the Prayer of Total Consecration

(Composed by St. Maximilian Kolbe)

O Immaculata, Queen of Heaven and earth, refuge of sinners and our most loving Mother, God has willed to entrust the entire order of mercy to you. I, (name), a repentant sinner, cast myself at your feet, humbly imploring you to take me with all that I am and have, wholly to yourself as your possession and property. Please make of me, of all my powers of soul and body, of my whole life, death and eternity, whatever most pleases you.

If it pleases you, use all that I am and have without reserve, wholly to accomplish what was said of you: "She will crush your head," and "You alone have destroyed all heresies in the whole world. " Let me be a fit instrument in your immaculate and merciful hands for introducing and increasing your glory to the maximum in all the many strayed and indifferent souls, and thus help extend as far as possible the blessed kingdom of the most Sacred Heart of Jesus. For wherever you enter you obtain the grace of conversion and growth in holiness, since it is through your hands that all graces come to us from the most Sacred Heart of Jesus.

V. Allow me to praise you, O sacred Virgin R. Give me strength against your enemies

18th apparition - A day for Mary

2009-07-16T14:51:00.000+01:00

So today is the anniversary of the last of Bernadette's apparitions at Lourdes and of course it is also the feastday of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. It seems so long ago that I tried to post on the anniversary of each of the other apparitions- this one feels a little disconnected. This, the eighteenth time Bernadette saw Our Lady, was really just a silent farewell by which time the grotto was already overwhelmed by visitors and Bernadette had her vision on the opposite side of the river bank, transported in her ecstasy so that she felt she was kneeling by the niche in the rock.

"I felt that I was in front of the Grotto, at the same distance as before, I saw only the Blessed Virgin, and she was more beautiful than ever!"

Bernadette had to let go of her grotto, and a few years later of Lourdes (in the physical sense) all together and find her own path to serving God and Our Blessed Mother in her life. As we all do- the fact that she managed to do it with such completeness is a testimony to her sainthood. But hey, the rest of us can but try!

I do know that I believe completely in the phenomenal POWER of Mary's immaculate heart and that she is capable, through her son, of things that we would consider impossible. I believe, as she promised at Fatima, that she will triumph over all the evils of this world. I also know that through her, in spite of all my faults and failings I have received so many graces in my life (one of them has been stumbling on blogging as an outlet and meeting so many people living out their faith and vocations in so many different ways everyday).

To read each of the other apparitions just click on the post labelled marked apparitions

Confessions of a reluctant grace seeker

2009-07-15T23:37:00.013+01:00

I had a beautiful experience in confession today (don't worry I'm not about to recount my sins - I fount that hard enough the first time around). Why am I telling you this? Well because my confession to you is that I find confession the hardest of the sacraments (though bear in mind I am not married, will obviously never be ordained and have never had the last rites). The reason I find it hardest is because I don't think I'm very good at it and rather than going more to overcome this I avoid it. I am ashamed of this but it is the truth. I love the graces I receive from this sacrament - I love the way it lifts the heart and humbles you with a kind of fresh awareness of what forgiveness really means but I am weak and often this is not enough to induce me.

Nevertheless, in search of that beauty and grace which I so love to receive I do crawl out from under my rock from time to time and make myself go. The last time I went, I had a slightly rocky experience as I went into the box just before mass and because the priest was in a rush he let me say one thing and then said he was going to absolve me and chucked me out (I was just warming up!)

So you can imagine my confusion when I couldn't even get into the Cathedral and found the whole place in flux- turned out a university graduation was taking place inside (?) and the cathedral would not be open until 4pm. I was flummoxed - having built myself up to go I was rather disappointed. Then I caught sight of signs pointing me in the direction of offices belonging to the Cathedral where confessions were taking place.

By the time I had traipsed around the corner I had lost a bit of courage. I like the safety of a confessional box (yet another shameful confession to you dear readers) so I waited in line outside an ordinary room a little nervously.

However, a far cry from my last experience the priest listened and responded with a thought provoking tenderness. He made me very aware of how many great priests serve us in our Church - something I do take for granted in my life. The experience was one of humility, love and forgiveness and it made it very clear to me (as if my conscience didn't already know it) that I need this sacrament so much in my life. It keeps us in touch with that redemption and forgiveness that comes with the nails of the cross. It makes us more aware of our own part, hard as it might be to accept, in the passion of Christ. Yet it makes us equally aware of all the love and mercy that is shed with the blood and our personal relationship with Christ illuminates the point that this love and mercy belongs to us- on an intimate and personal level. It is trust. I feel privileged to be subject to this trust - that is to trust in the infinite mercy and to be trusted to amend my ways with a contrite heart. I am weak, but when I recognise my weakness I am strong (to paraphrase St Paul)

At the end of my confession, after absolution the priest in question asked if he might bless me with a relic of St Paul of the Cross. Of course I eagerly said yes (I can't imagine anybody said no!) So I thought I would end by leaving you with the words of Pius IX on the beatification of St Paul on October 1st 1952:

"Although continually occupied with the cares of governing his religious society, and of founding everywhere new houses for it, yet he never left off preaching the word of God, burning as he did with a wondrous desire for the salvation of souls"

His relic seems to be a fitting one to use in confession. I am sure that he won't have given up his mission just because he has reached heaven. St Paul pray for us! is certainly an invocation I will remember next time I am tapping my foot in line for confession - which I hope will be sooner rather than later.

hope

2009-07-12T02:16:00.001+01:00

Finished reading Redemptoris Mater and so much enjoyed it - I feel that there is so much hope to be found in the gift of Mary our blessed mother. I thought I would just share this bit:

The Second Vatican Council, by presenting Mary in the mystery of Christ, also finds the path to a deeper understanding of the mystery of the Church. Mary, as the Mother of Christ, is in a particular way united with the Church, "which the Lord established as his own body." It is significant that the conciliar text places this truth about the Church as the Body of Christ (according to the teaching of the Pauline Letters) in close proximity to the truth that the Son of God "through the power of the Holy Spirit was born of the Virgin Mary." The reality of the Incarnation finds a sort of extension in the mystery of the Church-the Body of Christ. And one cannot think of the reality of the Incarnation without referring to Mary, the Mother of the Incarnate Word.

In these reflections, however, I wish to consider primarily that "pilgrimage of faith" in which "the Blessed Virgin advanced," faithfully preserving her union with Christ. In this way the "twofold bond" which unites the Mother of God with Christ and with the Church takes on historical significance. Nor is it just a question of the Virgin Mother's life-story, of her personal journey of faith and "the better part" which is hers in the mystery of salvation; it is also a question of the history of the whole People of God, of all those who take part in the same "pilgrimage of faith."

PETITION

2009-07-12T01:45:00.003+01:00

Just a request to anyone able to do so here in the UK to sign the petition HERE arranged by SPUC to lobby against abortion referral in schools. I understand this is a policy Mr Obama is in admiration of so if anyone in the US is interested in this issue it might be worth checking out this:

"Although people think that giving contraceptives to teenagers should stop them getting pregnant, this is not the case. Recent research found that areas which provided greater access to contraceptive services tended to had bigger increases in teenage pregnancies. Figures for 2007, the latest available, show the highest rate ever of under-18 abortions."

Statistics here show that throwing contraceptives at kids is only increasing irresponsible behaviour and casing a RISE in abortions and STIs. Why would you want to implement this failing policy

SPUC to hold national petition day against school abortion push

Preston, 3 July 2009 - Tomorrow (4 July), hundreds of pro-life campaigners throughout the UK will be seeking signatures from the general public and church-goers for SPUC's petition against the promotion of abortion in schools.

"The aim of the petition is stop schools being turned into abortion referral centres," said Tony Mullett, the national co-ordinator of the petition day. "Abortions are being arranged for children in schools behind their parents backs and one out of three secondary schools already has a school-based clinic where sex advice can be offered and abortions can be arranged without parents knowing. Successive governments have targeted young people with sex education telling them where to get contraception and abortion advice. But sexual diseases and abortions continue to increase among the young. The policy has failed, and now they are arranging secret abortions, destroying unborn children and leaving young teenage mothers to deal with the aftermath of abortion. It is profoundly evil."

SPUC's goal is to reverse the government's approach and end the promotion of secret abortions through schools.

Frankenstein's Way...

2009-07-10T12:48:00.007+01:00

Last night I attended a talk by John Smeaton who heads SPUC (Society for the Protection of Unborn Children) and it was hard to listen to the great grip that the culture of death now has in British society. Of course nothing is impossible for God and we plough on with great courage and hope because there are many here on this little island that feel the great injustice that a hatred of the vulnerable incurs.

However, it does not make it any easier to listen to how much that hatred causes pain to the elderly and the innocent. We did have a small victory (actually not so small) in Parliament this week where a law to lift criminal prosecution on those who aid and abet their friends and loved ones to get to the suicide clinics abroad, such as the disgracefully named dignitas, failed to be quashed. It remains enshrined in law here that it is illegal to help your loved one take their life, even if this is in another country. This offers us some considerable hope in our fight.

Yet it does not help us, as Mr Smeaton rightly pointed out, to ignore our many defeats because of one small victory. The pro-life movement in Britain is being persecuted and the anger of those who are angry with life or God (even if they claim he isn't there to be angry with) or the world want us to be eradicated. The human-hybrid embryology bill has been passed and some wanted it passed with amendment that would allow pro-life charities who offer counselling services to be prosecuted if they did not openly state that they did not offer an abortion service. Why, when we are such a significant minority is it necessary to curtail us further? Are they so afraid that we might remove one small aspect of their power? That we might save just one mother and child who would otherwise be subject to the horrors of abortion? Is that how weak they are? I believe it is and I also believe it says more about them than it does about us.

I remember when I met a Holocaust survivor who had been in Auschwitz she talked about how the Nazis were always obsessed with counting the prisoners- day in and day out. They needed to account for every one and not let a single one out of their sight- they wanted to have power and control over each of them. Sound familiar? When that anger with life fills your soul it seems you do not want any person saved.

Of course I continue to be concerned about the legislation surrounding "advice" clinics that are appearing on school grounds, of course I am concerned that there are proposals to offer abortion on school grounds without the knowledge of parents. Of course I could never work in such a school. I have written about this and similar issues at some length in previous posts.

We will continue our protest and our stand for life. There is always hope but one cannot help that we are caught in an age over-reachers - the modern Prometheus multiplied and just as Shelley's Frankenstein had to learn through catastrophe that follows the manipulation of life's greatest gifts so this generation might also have to learn. It is the innocent who will suffer first but as many of our great theologians have warned the rest of us will follow.

I love my country but I cannot lie about it and I cannot pretend that the situation we are in is not a desperate and precarious one. Christ suffers with each of these children and as Mother Teresa rightly predicted those children are now extending the culture of death which their brothers and sisters were victims of to their parents and all of the vulnerable around them. We even extend it to other countries as the developed world openly feeds China money to continue its forced abortion and sterilization campaign. Indeed when Obama came to power he restored America's contributions - this was done on his first day as president- an apparent priority.

So it goes on...Africa another example of our desire to enforce our "solutions" on others.

In her wisdom the Church foresaw what would happen if we entered a slippery slope of objectifying another and playing with the rhythm of life. It has not only bread destruction but the kind of arrogance that successful destroyers possess: the belief that they are right at all costs. The more one looks at Humane Vitae or subsequent documents such as Theology of The Body. The more certain one becomes that this great Church of ours truly holds the key to truth. We should be so proud that ours is the only institution in the world that has upheld the right to life of EVERY individual that has ever existed - now that is hope. For no matter what men are capable of or what one man does to another our Church will continue to do so and she shall prevail. I pray that we may all be an integral part of this.

Down here in the dirt

2009-07-08T20:15:00.008+01:00

When Bernadette was about to be given the last rights for the fourth time in her short life she shrugged and said 'down here we are in the dirt'. This was not intended to be a criticism or rejection of the great beauties of this life but simply an observation that here we are separated from the great beauty of heaven- from the source of beauty. She knew this better than most because she had seen through to that other world and met the Queen of heaven. It does not lessen the value of the life we live here to say that it is imperfect - every follower of Christ, every human being knows this to be true. We all carry our burdens, of differing weights, but we cannot forget that where there is dirt there must be growth, life and productivity. From down here in the dirt we can fix our eyes on heaven with all the more clarity. Bernadette did not like suffering, she did not want to suffer but through it she found a way to strip everything else away so that only God remained. I often fail to see this when I find myself in a little more dirt than usual (like this week) and I would do well to remember it.

I wondered if you would be so kind as to remember someone very important to me in your prayers. My Mum, like all mothers, is very stoic and always holds back on how she is feeling, putting others before herself. I know she is not feeling well at the moment (its my parents' 37th wedding anniversary and I popped home to see them). She is a strong woman but she still likes to avoid a fuss. Please, if you would be so kind, pray for her and her health. Many thanks to you all. God Bless!

NB Sorry I am not replying to comments again - my blogger ID is on the blink again and thinks I am an impostor.

Redemptoris Mater

2009-07-07T00:17:00.008+01:00

I am trying to do a little more encyclical reading and at the moment I am on John Paul II's Redemptoris Mater. I read this today and enjoyed its simple beauty - I wanted to share:

When we read that the messenger addresses Mary as "full of grace," the Gospel context, which mingles revelations and ancient promises, enables us to understand that among all the "spiritual blessings in Christ" this is a special "blessing." In the mystery of Christ she is present even "before the creation of the world," as the one whom the Father "has chosen" as Mother of his Son in the Incarnation. And, what is more, together with the Father, the Son has chosen her, entrusting her eternally to the Spirit of holiness. In an entirely special and exceptional way Mary is united to Christ, and similarly she is eternally loved in this "beloved Son," this Son who is of one being with the Father, in whom is concentrated all the "glory of grace." At the same time, she is and remains perfectly open to this "gift from above" (cf. Jas. 1:17). As the Council teaches, Mary "stands out among the poor and humble of the Lord, who confidently await and receive salvation from him."

From Redemptoris Mater (1987)

TRUE HEART AWARD

2009-07-06T22:26:00.008+01:00

A week ago my friend Jennifer over at My Chocolate Heart gave me something very special and I hope she will forgive me for taking so long to fulfil my bloggerly duties. I have had crazy week at school and wanted to give this post the time it deserved. Jennifer awarded me the True Heart Award and I am so pleased to be chosen to pass it on. She is a wonderful and poignant voice in the blogging world and when it comes to pro-life issues she writes about this modern tragedy of our world with tragic beauty. So thank you Jennifer!

"Those who receive this award are of the sweetest nature. They are kind, friendly, funny, loving, eager to share their love for Jesus with others, and brave in their efforts to reflect Him to this darkened world. They are the kind of folks you're blessed to know, even if it's only in the bloggy-sphere."

I must pass this award on in order to warm Jennifer's chocolate heart...

I would like to give it to

Lisa at ARE WE THERE YET?

Laura at CATHOLIC TEACHER MUSINGS

Ann at PRAYER, POETRY AND PRAISE

Julie at JOYFUL DAYS

Tracy at A CATHOLIC MOM IN MINNESOTA

Andrea at ARISE TO WRITE

Nacy at BE NOT AFRAID

Fr Anthony at FATHER ANTHONY HO

KREATIV BLOGGER AWARD

2009-06-25T09:48:00.017+01:00

I was humbled and touched to receive this award from Andrea at Arise2write http://arise2write.blogspot.com/2009/06/kreativ-blogger-award.html. Having a blog has opened up a whole world of awareness for me with regard to the many strong and faithful Catholics in the world living out their vocations day by day. I feel privileged to 'know' them - and share faith with them. I am required to nominate 7 other bloggers for this award and they are supposed to nominate 7 others. (Be sure to leave a comment on their blog about the award.) After they accept the award they are then asked to write a list of 7 things that their blog readers may not already know about them.

1)When deciding what profession I wished to enter I seriously considered publishing but the call to be a teacher was very strong and I followed that path instead. However, I love literature and the smell of bookshops always draws me in. I can get lost in a bookshop in the morning and not reappear until the afternoon. I think it started when I was little and my Mum would let me stay in Hatchards bookshop while she went shopping next door. I would spend hours sitting in there reading. All the girls who worked there used to know me.

2) I can take no credit for the poems I have written in my life. For what they are worth, they have come to me as gifts and I have felt them like fluttering wings. Until I had put them on this blog I can think of only two other people who had read them and I am so grateful for peoples' kindness and generosity when they have read them here. Nothing better summarises my feeling than a quotation from the Czech poet JAROSLAV SEIFERT who wrote

"Poetry is with us from the start.
Like loving, like hunger, like the plague, like war.
At times my verses were embarrassingly foolish.

But I make no excuse.

I believe that seeking beautiful words is better than killing and murdering."

Writing has been like a gift given to me and I am so grateful to have received it.

3)I have a penchant for braking various bones. I have thus far fractured a finger once, my arm three times and my ankle once. Nice.

4)I used to LOVE to act. Right up until the end of University I participated in all sorts of different productions but right now I can't imagine anything worse than being somebody else on stage. I have become what I like to call confidently shy about these things and I feel like I don't want the spotlight anymore - when I was a kid it gave me a real boost. I had a great time and it let me explore all sorts of different things. It also let me wander round as a Victorian for while - I really liked the elegance- especially the long glov.es.

Also, I got to travel- visiting Vancouver while with a touring production. It was a beautiful place.

4) I am terrible at maths - I managed my GCSE but after that I ditched it with delight and haven't looked back since. I have a lot of admiration for people who are great with numbers. My brother is an engineer and he can work out any mathematical problem - its fascinating! I just see a bundle of numbers, panic and run for the hills!

5) I have a passion for 16th century history. I love to wander round monastic ruins and find places where the old relics of Catholic England have been stored. There is something sad and strangely beautiful about the whole thing. I mourn for the lost Catholics of England and feel as though I could reach out and touch the last monks and nuns who walked the stony corridors of great buildings. The picture below shows a pair of 12th century Rosary beads, a crucifix and alter piece from a monastery that was dissolved on a Scottish island.

6) My dog is called Fleur - this is her wearing a pumpkin hat - I don't normally put her in hats but somebody bought it for (strange I know but what can I say?) so I thought I better take a picture of her with it on. She looks very unimpressed:

7) I am going to write a whole post on number seven so stay tuned - it is linked to another post and I need a little time to put it together.

SEVEN NOMINEES

I always feel sad with these things that I can't give them to more people but these are some blogs that I really enjoy

1) A Catholic Mom in Minnesota

http://mnmomtwofour.blogspot.com/

2) A Catholic Journey

http://romancatholicjourney.blogspot.com/

3) Catholic and Loving it!

http://www.lovingit.co.uk/

4) The Pondering Catholic

http://theponderingcatholic.blogspot.com/

5) Thoughts on Grace

http://colleenspiro.blogspot.com/

6)Mum to 12...Now My Bakers Dozen

http://mum2twelve.blogspot.com/

7) Aussie Coffee Shop

http://http//aussiecoffeeshop.blogspot.com/

A heavy hearted post

2009-06-23T12:17:00.012+01:00

There was a program on the television last night which was dealing with crimes in some of England's worst estates, but namely the problem of how whole groups young men are behaving towards young women - in some cases attacking them . Frankly, I was terrified. We have become a society of Dr Farankensteins and what we have created is a monster which claims liberal ideals but has actually sent us spiralling back into years of abuse and the degradation of womens' dignity. The views that these gangs of boys had of women was appalling. There was no sense of respect, no desire to find out who a woman is, no wish to form a meaningful relationship. Similarly, some of the girls who colluded with the boys allowed themselves to be used in this way. For them, sexuality has become an animal act with no meaning, often something they inflict upon another person in a manner of violence. When I consider 'Love and Responsibility' or 'Theology of the Body' and the deep meaning of sexuality and the sexual urge in these theological works I want to weep for these boys and girls. There were even instances when girls had set other girls up to be attacked.

They are perpetrators but they are also victims of a society which has removed value and meaning from something very beautiful and taught them to abuse it, themselves and others. How can they ever expect to form a normal relationship if they cannot see anything other than their own gratification? The only problem highlighted in this probing and honest documentary was consent - but how can anybody be so naive and ridiculous as to suggest this is at the root of the problem? The actions of these gangs is a result of a view which encourages and enables young children to engage in adult relationships - telling them that this is a normal part of growing up. It has no meaning beyond that of 'acting out'. As a result of this view, many of these attacks remain unnoted and are put down to 'experimentation'

I know this seems like a common rant on this blog but working with young people and seeing all the good they do, and are capable of, it makes me so sad that we encourage and allow some of them to waste their potential because they have so little value for themselves and others.

This documentary showed what exists at the extreme end of social policies that do not make clear what right and wrong actually are. That constantly preach of human rights and diversity but deny a generation the right to the view that some things are reserved for a sacred bond between two loving people. We have created an ethical code which is built on the shaky ground of moral relativism. Most of the boys in this program no longer had fathers or a good role model in their lives. I am not suggesting that every child who does not have a father will use and abuse people in this way but why have we undervalued the role of the family and father so much? It obviously does matter - yet in order not to offend anybody we insist it doesn't matter when the statistics make it clear that the opposite is the case.

When I was training to be a teacher I was told I was entering this profession at a time of a TIDAL social change. Children will, on average, see four partners pass through their mothers home in their life time. The result? more behavioural and social difficulties than ever before. The two are directly linked and there is a lot of evidence to suggest and support this but no one is willing to use it. We were told that even though this was the case we were never allowed to say this. There are obviously situations where a one parent family is necessary or the result of complex circumstances - these differ greatly. However, the truth is that often children are being taught that relationships are not built to last, that we are worth no more to each other than temporary fulfilment allows.

What value can we expect them to have for themselves if this is true?

We can't say -'do what you want' in one breath and 'how on earth could you do that?' in the next.

I want to make clear that I understand that this documentary was dealing with a vast minority and that it was looking at the extreme end of this problem. However, this makes it no less significant. The Catholic Church is constantly criticised for its stance on contraception and sexual ethics because it is argued that it damages people. The documentary I watched last night suggests otherwise. A casual, flippant attitude towards the use of another person to fulfill your needs is clearly far more damaging to all than a document which suggests the value of each human being from conception to death. If we were able to have, EVEN THE IDEAL, of stepping back and really see another persons humanity, as well as our own, then we would be in a good position- that is all the Catholic Church has ever asked of us and that is exactly where we have failed to help these particular kids. So I would say to anybody who aims to criticise the Pope for his stringent views to look in their own back garden and see what ludicrous liberalism has done to destroy the bodies and souls of those living next door to them in a country where contraceptives have been thrown at kids like sweets and only produced emotional and psychological pain and the spread of infection and disease.

Tell me, which policy is more damaging?

A great new initiative

2009-06-18T09:48:00.003+01:00

Myah has begun a new blog which will offer us the opportunity to pray for particular Mums and their babies. For those who don't know Myah had a beautiful little girl called Faith. Check out the new blog http://prayers-for-mommies-and-babies.blogspot.com/

HONEST SCRAP AWARD

2009-06-15T16:09:00.019+01:00

Thanks so very much indeed to Colleen for giving me the HONEST SCRAP AWARD. I was honored to receive it. Colleen writes a beautiful blog that uplifts and inspires. Check it out here http://colleenspiro.blogspot.com/2009/06/thankful-for-blessings-june-16.html

In accepting this award, I need to do the following: 1) Say thanks and give a link to the presenter of the award. 2) Share "ten honest things" about myself. 3) Present this award to 7 others whose blogs I find brilliant in content and/or design, or those who have encouraged me. 4) Tell those 7 people that they've been awarded HONEST SCRAP and inform them of these guidelines in receiving it

Ten things about myself:

1)I live in the East End of London, which has a bit of a reputation but I rather like its character and sense of optimism. I grew up in South West London and in the summer I still like the idea of being in Richmond Park overlooking the meandering Thames.

2) I am terribly stubborn and it can be a good quality, but mostly its a pretty awful one. I always have so much admiration for people who convert to the Catholic faith because I think it takes a massive dollop of courage to change your whole perspective. I am always afraid that had I not been a cradle Catholic I might have been too stubborn to move my feet.

3) In primary school I was always bottom of the class. I got put on a table by myself and I used to pass the time chewing my pen and staring out the window. I feel it was time well spent. I am still a well acknowledged day dreamer and by the time I got to secondary school I was ready to ignite my brain flame a little - I survived pretty well. I don't think little kids are always built for the education system at such a young age.

4) My parents are Irish and so I always have a little nationality identity crisis. I have been raised in England, I have an English accent but I admire the Irish in many ways - they have had to have so much strength in the face of adversity. They still haven't legalised abortion and that is rather an amazing thing considering the world we live in.

5) I am the worlds worst procrastinator! If I have something urgent to do I will always find something irrelevant to do first in order to put it off. I work better under pressure.

6) I started blogging by accident but I'm not sure I can imagine life without it now.

7) I am named after Edel Quinn who was a prominent figure in the Legion of Mary. My Dad was a keen member of the Legion for many years. I have become ardently Marian myself (again without any conscious intent to do so) and find myself rather proud of my name. It also means noble in German. (I am far from noble but I like the idea)

8) I am the youngest of four children. I was spoilt by my big sister and walloped by my big brother so I figure it evened out in the end. We are still close and talk often. My eldest brother died when we were younger.

9)I am still not quite sure where life is taking me but I know the good Lord knows so that is just fine. Totus Tuus.

10) My confirmation name is Martha and when my Bishop asked why I chose it when I was kneeling in front of him I said "because she had to learn the hard way" I think it gave him a bit of a surprise.

PASSING IT ON:

There are loads of blogs I really love reading but these ones just jumped to mind so here we go:

Lisa at 'Are We There Yet?' http://arewethereyet-davisfarmmom.blogspot.com/2009/06/happy-t.html Lisa is just awesome and a real inspiration.

Laura at 'Catholic Teacher Musings' http://teachermuse.blogspot.com/2009/06/taking-break.html A blog of wisdom, truth and fun.

Julie at 'Joyful Days' http://ourjoyfuldays.blogspot.com/2009/06/back-on-road.htmlwrites a wonderful blog and has been someone who encouraged me a lot.

Ann at 'Prayer, Poetry and Praise' http://poetryprayerandpraise.blogspot.com/2009/06/clonard-solemn-novena-our-lady-of.html is an amazing poet and writes a blog full of inspiration, praise and beauty and has also encouraged me a lot

Suzy at 'Sailing by Starlight' http://sailingbystarlight.blogspot.com/2009/06/depths-about-us.htmlkeeps a stunning blog and inspired all of us over lent with her work on 'Faith Quilt'

Andrea at 'Arise to Write' also writes with depth and beauty http://arise2write.blogspot.com/2009/06/wilderness.html

Also, to Monica who I just think is great really http://monicacrumley.blogspot.com/2009/06/will-ya-get-me-outta-here.html

REGAINING SCOPE

2009-06-11T15:20:00.006+01:00

My kids have finally got through their exams and I have to say I am a little relieved and a little sad. I have been teaching my GCSE and A Level groups for two years now and you can form quite a relationship in that time (it doesn't seem long but they change so much during these years). Now I am hoping that they will go into the world and flourish. It is strange when you get to that point, a couple of days before they actually go into the exam hall, and you realise you can't do anything for them any more - you have to relinquish control and let them go in there on their own, hopefully, with their heads held high. Its hard to let go.

Having said that, I am relieved to have regained a little of my life and I am glad that they have made it through this major stage. Life is so tough for some kids - there seems to be so much pressure on them and so many of them don't have that centre that real faith gives you. When you think of yourself as truly valued by something far greater than yourself then you can keep a balance. When your self worth hinges on the results of exams things are so much harder. The more I step back and look at things, the more thankful I am for this great gift of faith that allows us to see through the chaos. It is not easy to do so but if we know there is something beyond the chaos that is a pretty good start.

There, in the midst of them

2009-06-04T17:06:00.010+01:00

I was just procrastinating and found these photos of a Church I visited in Zanzibar which is built on the former sight of a slave market. The alter rests on the place where slaves were sold, often into deep misery. It is built directly above cramped cells where hundreds of slaves 'waited' for their turn to come in cramped and filthy conditions.

When the slave trade was abolished an Anglican Bishop thought the most apt use for this ground would be to build a Church. I agree. This Christian church is a sign of solidarity with all the nameless and forgotten who have been subjected to terrible sufferings at the hands of other men in this world. It is difficult when thinking in these terms not to consider abortion, that great evil and persecution of our ow time, justified with the similar cry: 'this is not a human being...not a proper one'

This church is a place of hope and triumph, a recognition that evil does exist and can be overcome but not without, hard work, prayer and patience.

Walking around those cells where slaves suffered so terribly is a reminder of the unseen and constant suffering that Christ must have been struck by. To harm another human being in this way is to wound Christ himself. This is the burden we carry now with regard to the unborn.

I think every time I encounter a place such as this, an abortion clinic, Auschwitz, the cells of these slaves, it becomes clear to me how they are all tied together in one heavy knot. When we abandon our humanity we abandon the ability to recognise humanity in others, especially the fragile, vulnerable and weak. When we become arrogant we move further from God because it is not the superior, the powerful or the materially minded He is in the midst of -it is the forsaken and forgotten. It they who remain closest to Him but that doesn't make it their persecution right.

As John Paul II said- 'we must forgive but by the same token we must not forget'. Our witness must be to those who have not got the power to speak for themselves, our hope must be to abolish the injustice that weighs down the hearts and minds of man. Our job must be to see the humanity in others in order that they might come to see it in themselves. Our job must be to love, even in the midst of hate.

CRUTCHES

2009-06-02T14:57:00.013+01:00

When I was still studying for my degree a friend of mine asked me whether or not I could accept the view (courtesy of Freud) that religion is simply a crutch we create to lean on because we can't cope on our own. I hadn't considered this for a long time until somebody asked me exactly the same question the other day. I had a prepared response. Actually I had several and since I quite enjoyed answering it - I thought I would repeat the fun here.

1) Define RELIGION

My wonderful University chaplain once read out a quotation from a famous Lutheran who stated that we must be careful to ensure that we do not confuse religion and faith. Religion can be manipulated and misused - nobody is more aware of this than our beloved Church who has found herself rather battered by the will of man over the years. FAITH cannot be manipulated. Even when we screw up - it remains essentially pure.

Thus crutches are something we use when we need to be supported and YES religion has been abused in this way. People have taken it up for a while when they felt battered, bruised and even bored- then they have discarded it. However, Faith is something you work at all your life- it is a relationship and thus even if you tell yourself you have discarded it for moments, weeks or even years you always return to it. Why? because it is not a concept or an idea- it is a real entity. Therefore it is not for leaning on it is for interacting with - therein lies an essential difference.

2) The relationship

Faith is not a one way thing, you don't just lean on it in order to hop through life. It is a challenge to build a relationship with the invisible - to catch those moments that reveal something deeper than the superficial.

It is about maintaining that relationship when everything around you is telling you that it doesn't exist. It is about rising above your doubts and your darkness and far from being a crutch it is often painful, challenging and exhausting to keep that relationship alive. To live true Christian values is no easy thing; to stare yourself in the face and admit often you fail is far from a crutch- it is often enough to make you think you might just fall flat on your face. Yet in the end those struggles are rewarded with so much love.

3) Doing the easy thing

Is life easier when you have faith? I don't think so. Right from the beginning of the Church people have been faced with extremely difficult decisions - your life or your faith?

John Paul believed that the twentieth century had begun a new era of martyrdom because it had instigated a new era of persecution in the Church. Was Fr Kolbe leaning on a crutch when he gave his life for another man? Was John Paul II leaning on a crutch when he risked his life standing out against two great oppressive regimes - Nazism and communism? Are we leaning on a crutch when we confront the great tragedy of abortion and find ourselves going against public opinion and 'women's rights' (?). I don't think so.

It is easy to believe that having faith is easy, that we get to stick our heads in the sand and forget about the rest. Whoever judges that to be faith is sadly misguided.

Faith is many things - beautiful , enriching, extraordinary - it isn't easy it sometimes makes life harder if anything.

4)Religion itself and thus the faith rooted in that religion cannot be generalised or jumbled. Different religions all follow a particular ethical code and as we all know these can be diverse. We can't even begin to consider it as one giant concept. It quite simply makes no sense to do so.

5) If at the end of my life none of it proved to be true (which obviously I don't believe to be the case) than I wouldn't have changed it for anything anyway. Why? Because it has given me more that anything else in my life- but not in the way Mr Freud thinks.

I love my religion and having spent a few months on crutches myself a few years ago - I can tell you truly- there is certainly no allegory or metaphor that could be less fitting for something so expansive, breathtaking and beautiful than the faith that grows from, and has deep roots in, is kept alive and fed by TRUE religion.

Rather than limiting us and holding us back- preventing us from standing on our own two feet Jesus tells us to get up and walk beause if we believe we let go, relinquish control, and love - no support necessary.

We have the questions
God has the answers

Forgive my manners

2009-05-29T22:26:00.004+01:00

As an Englishwoman I should have better manners so I am issuing a good old apology - British style. Dear friends please forgive me for not replying promptly to comments left in the comment box of late. I am having difficulty with sporadic blogger ID so that even if I am signed in the comment box is not recognising me and refusing to let me sign in again. When it does recognise me I am getting in those replies. So please know three things 1) I am reading and appreciating your comments 2) I am not ignoring you 3) a reply will come - eventually.

Thank you as always for your kindness and patience

Recalling...

2009-05-28T00:42:00.006+01:00

When I am preparing students for exams it is always so easy to forget what it is like to be on the other side of that preparation and lose patience. I was going through an old diary this morning and I came across this little piece of writing. The voice that spoke to me from these pages seemed so much younger and seemed to have so much less perspective yet it was written only three years ago. The thing that surprised me was how much perspective I seemed to lack. I was rather ashamed at my own self indulgence and self importance. At the same time I remembered all that pressure which you carry when there is a weight of expectation upon you. It is funny now the recollection of my former self begins to teach me lessons. Perhaps I needed a gentle reminder to help me better understand those I am supposed to help and support with patience...even if they do seem to lack a little perspective.

I find myself back at the beginning again with the same mountains to be climbed; a staircase of thick beautiful novels with their own specific scents. A mixture of that fresh, sharp bookshop smell - newly printed ink on clean white paper and the seemingly ancient texts allowed to mature on library shelves like vintage wines until they have a musty aroma. It is in these pages I find both my tranquility and my challenge. Over and over again I will break the spines of young books and dissect their core into the early hours of the morning with no one as my companion but the shadow of dead writers that put pen to paper many years ago when an idea burnt freshly upon the flesh of their young mind and the searing sting of genius carried their words across the paper. Now they are gone and every one of their images is left standing strong as when it was first created awaiting my scalpel to slice deep in to its heart and find its purpose. If I cannot find one I shall have to force one upon it. The writers have no words with which to argue, their shadows are silent, their words are said but mine are not and I must try to piece them together and make them enough.

Pretentious and self important....a winning combination but also a good reminder for me of what it is like to think that exams and all the blind fury which surrounds them really are the most important thing in your life.

Finding the beads

2009-05-25T22:36:00.014+01:00

I searched high and low for my beloved Rosary beads today. I put my beads in their little pouch in my pocket yesterday and, of course, at the time I questioned whether this was a good idea. It wasn’t. How far can they travel from my pocket? Far enough is the answer.

I love these particular beads and if I can help it I like to say my Rosary on them, I know it shouldn’t make a difference but I can’t help it…I have favourites (You can read about them here Beads of hope for 2009). They continue to help me touch upon the World Church as I pray because they speak of those suffering persecution yet still able to create such beauty for the love of a mother; a mother who draws close to the children who live their lives to glorify a beloved son. They make me aware, when I start to consider how hard I find things sometimes, of the fact that at least I can say my Rosary freely and I feel so lucky to be able to do so.

Thankfully St Anthony came through for me and I found them safely tucked up in their little patch near my bed.

To me (on a good day) the Rosary is like a window and, just for an instant, I feel like the veil between this world and the other falls (or at least thins). Sometimes that doesn’t happen – I get distracted, look out the window or start thinking about making my next cup of tea – lose the rhythm. However, on the occasions I get it right its like catching a glimpse of something and knowing its real.

I wish I got it right more often than not…I don’t. Even so I am so thankful for this gift of a prayer which always seems to me like fluttering wings. Saying the Rosary is learning. I feel I can always get better at it – closer, more focused, stronger - and this is the beauty of it. When I was younger we used to say it as a family but saying as an adult is different. It starts to take root in you and becomes an anchor of peace. I am still learning but I would rather face the journeys ahead of me with these beads between my fingers than without them.

I never get bored of the well known statement made by John Paul the great "the Rosary is the rhythm of life".

Giving thanks for Faith

2009-05-24T13:42:00.005+01:00

Faith, the little baby I wrote about in the post a couple of days ago died just a few hours ago. Her very short life has been a witness to the power of love and the soul. I am certain she has been welcomed in heaven with open arms. Her mother Myah wrote such a beautiful post on her blog (click here). Of course I have never known Faith or Myah personally but my heart has been deeply touched by them both and I think it will continue to be so for very many years to come. I will continue to pray for Myah in her grief, though I know that her faith in God will help her, and I thank her for sharing Faith's life with us.

A witness to Faith & prayers needed!

2009-05-21T09:40:00.015+01:00

I wanted to just write a little reflection on the writings of another blogger who never ceases to inspire me. I am sure nearly everyone who has read this blog has already been following The Story of Faith Hope which is written by Faith's Mum (or Mom) Myah. For anyone who does not know the story of Faith she is a beautiful little girl born three months ago full of smiles and gurgles. Faith has a condition called anencephaly which means that she has no brain.

Myah was advised not to carry Faith to term because there would be no purpose in doing so. This is where the miracle begins. Myah chose her own path - you can read her own inspiring words on her blog but I just want to say that I think that she is a woman of tremendous strength. Did I mention Myah is only 23?

Well, not only did Myah recognise that her baby deserved to be born she began to write about her journey and witness to her decision. The result? An incredible witness to the sanctity of human life but also to the beauty of human love.

The hospital sent Faith and her Mum home with a memory box and information on bereavement- even though Faith was alive. The more I read about Faith, like thousands of others, the more I see God's finger prints all over her- and by association the rest of us. Faith can be seen on Myah's blog cuddling her Mum, gurgling away and smiling.

Faith is living proof that the brain doesn't mean much if you have a soul. She is a witness to the amazing power of individuality and love which God gives to us all. I just wanted to personally thank Myah for her strength and the gift of sharing Faith Hope with us.

The reason I wanted to write this post is to show support forMyah who has received hate mail and even had websites set up about herself and her daughter. I won't spend much time considering the individuals that level abuse at people who choose to give birth to their children and love them unconditionally. I think they must be rather sad and rather bored. Instead I just wanted to make the point that far from being a witness to that hate, Faith is a witness, as her name suggests, to the hope and love which we can hope will save us from such futile evils.

What more cause for celebration and hope could you ask for than seeing this child?

Thanks Myah and Faith Hope!
A LINK TO MYAH'S BLOG http://babyfaithhope.blogspot.com/

SINCE WRITING THIS POST IT HAS BEEN BROUGHT TO MY ATTENTION THAT FAITH IS NOT TOO WELL TODAY. PLEASE OFFER ALL THE PRAYERS YOU CAN FOR HER RECOVERY AND FOR MYAH WHO MUST BE WORRIED.

MEDITATION PRAYER WITH THE MIRACULOUS MEDAL

2009-05-20T15:57:00.008+01:00

I love the Miraculous Medal and all that it stands for as a contribution and witness. I was given mine for my First Holy Communion and it is one of the most precious gifts anybody has given to me. You can read about my sadness at losing it earlier this year (The loss of a little witness) and the delight I felt when I found it(http://thedreamersday.blogspot.com/2009/02/rediscovery-of-little-witness.html)

I have included a beautiful prayer which you can use in meditation upon the medal which comes from the Malitia of the Immaculata

What I love about the medal is the inspiration it has provided others like Fr Kolbe who in 1917 founded the Malitia of the Immaculata - check out the website to find out more and even join! There is loads of great information about the medal, how to live its message and how Fr. Kolbe lived its message http://www.consecration.com/. Here is the prayer

Oh Mary, this medal is a sign and a guarentee of your presence.
You are present because your power is present, your voice is present and your love is present.

Therefore, O Immaculate Conception and mother of the Church, we call on you now to fulfil your guarantee. Rain down upon us the great graces you promised to those who carry this medal, especially to those who wear it around the neck. Make us perceive your presence now and always.

Make us consciously experience your power, love and guidance, that in your meditation we may begin to share your perfect respnse to God and to each of his creatures, and to join in your war against the ancient serpent.

Help us to abandon our self-centred feelings and preoccupations. Help us to accept our sufferings, offering them back to the father through you.

Teach us to listen and learn, that by becoming one with you in purpose, we might more fully respond to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, participating in the life and unity of the Trinity through your intercession. Amen.

Babies born at 22 weeks in novelty news story

2009-05-20T09:36:00.003+01:00

Of course no one wants to make it too explicit but the bottom line is that the babies featured in this story were 22 weeks. However, they have tried to gloss over this somewhat.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/lancashire/8058445.stm

Abortion at 24? Cetainly no one can tell us that we don't know what we are doing