Consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary

Following a request from bishop`s house at all Masses this weekend we united ourselves with Pope Francis as he consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary today in the presence of the Statue of Our Lady of the Rosary from the Capelinha (Little Chapel of the Apparitions) from Fatima.

We united ourselves with the Holy Father today by saying the consecration prayer at Mass.

Consecration Prayer to the Immaculate Heart of Mary

Virgin Mary, Mother of God and our Mother, to your Immaculate Heart we consecrate ourselves, in an act of total entrustment and of oblation to the Lord.

 

By you we will be led to Christ your Son, and Only-Begotten Son of God, and by Him and with Him to His Eternal Father. We shall walk in the light of faith, of hope and of love so that the world may believe that Christ is the One sent by the Father to give to us His word, and we, as His ambassadors, shall carry His knowledge and love to the ends of the earth. 

Thus under the maternal protection of your Immaculate Heart, we will be one people with Christ, ransomed by His death and witnesses of His Resurrection, and by Him led to the Father for the glory of the Most Holy Trinity Whom we adore, praise and bless. Amen

A Day in Darlington

A recent development in the diocese has been a new venue for the Extraordinary Form at St Augustine`s, Darlington. This started as a monthly Mass on a Wednesday, became a weekly Mass in Lent and now is reverting to a monthly Mass. Tomorrow I`ve been asked to travel to the south to sng a Missa Canata for the feast of St Wilfrid. This is being preceded by a servers training day and there will be an exhibition of vestments and missals and items of interest. I`m looking forward to saying Mass in this lovely church at 2pm.

Move update

Interestingly, I get more daily visitors to Forest Murmurs than to this blog. I`m still getting comments on Forest Murmurs and have recently acquired two more followers! A good number of visitors here also come here after visiting my old blog. I didn`t think it made sense to keep the old name now I have left Forest Hall but this one is taking a while to get settled in. I still have things to transfer from the other blog here but hope it will be all done soon.

Fabric of Britain

Just before I forget again this BBC4 programme is a must for anyone interested in the history of vestments. It focuses on the Opus Anglicanum from the High Middle Ages which was much sought after throughout Europe and which thanks to the work of the Reformers largely survived on the continent. There are some quite remarkable pieces of work. Also featured for about eight seconds are the hands of well-known LMS MC Richard Hawker as he lays out vestments in Watts and co!

Can be viewed until October 13th. Click here to view.

Settling In

Well I`ve been back in Gateshead over a month now and I am still regularly asked how am I settling in. I reply `slowly`. However it is going well. I have a very heavy schedule of weekend Masses with a vigil Mass at St Wilfrid`s at 6pm on Saturday, then three Masses on a Sunday morning at St Joseph`s. the 9am is a quiet OF Mass with no singing. At 10.30 there is a sung English OF Mass. I`m pleased to say we have a small but enthusiastic group of singers and I like what they do. We are fortunate to have an organist too.The Mass starts with the entrance antiphon I am delighted to say, sung to a psalm tone after which there is the opening hymn. The ordinary of the Mass is sung, apart from the Kyrie, and with organ accompaniment.  The EF Mass follows at 12. Attendance has increased dramatically since the demise of he Sunday EF Mass at St Dominic`s, Newcastle and I would say it makes more sense to have one well-attended Mass rather than two small congregations on each bank of the Tyne. This is normally a Low Mass but I am very keen to increase the number of sung Sunday Masses as Low Mass feels somewhat less than one might hope for on a Sunday. I hope we will have a sung Mass every fortnight. We are trying to recruit singers as the schola is only two strong and we have no organist.

Once a month there is an African Mass at 2pm and I said that too last Sunday. I hope we will get a rota of priests from the diocese to help but 2pm on a Sunday afternoon is not a hugely popular time. The singing is accompanied by percussion, mainly drums. The music was lively and enthusiastically sung. I had wondred whether a solution might be to have the Missa Luba so we could combine the African and Latin Mass! It would make for an interesting article in Mass of Ages!

Each of these Masses is very different and it is hard to see how they could be amalgamated.

Apart from Sunday Mass, there is a weekday Mass at 12.05 from Tuesday to Friday and a 10am Mass at St Wilfrid`s a couple of times a week. The idea of 12.05 is to offer a Mass for workers. St Joseph`s is in Gateshead town centre and the civic centre is very near. I`m not sure many workers come to the Mass.  So all in all I`m kept busy, apart from being Judicial Vicar too. The parish hall is used by many groups and our hall bookings organiser is retiring his month and I`m hoping the transition to our next volunteers goes smoothly. I`m still chairman of the North East Catholic History Society which I enjoy and which is not onerous and de facto chaplain to the diocesan Association of the Eucharist which meets at St Joseph`s. And of course I`m also Northern Chaplain to the LMS although that is not a presssured role and teach a bit of Latin in the classics department ( as was) at Newcastle university.

Apart from this I`ve been trying to get sorted out in the presbytery. My cats have been settling in too. As I live in a first floor flat in the old presbytery they have quite a few stairs to descend to get outside but as yet I haven`t managed to get a cat flap installed so they`re not getting out much and show little interest in leaving the flat. I do take them out sometimes but Dizzy seems to have lost his enthusiasm for meeting people. At Forest Hall he was in the sacristy every morning to see who was there and who would stroke him. He also never missed a Tuesday coffee morning but here he seems content to lie on the sofa all day. I hope he`s not depressed. Here he is on a rare trip outside last week.

So there we are. Sorry this blog has been rather quiet but I`m kept very busy here. And as well as all this we have Pope Francis with whom there seems never to be a dull moment.

Brinkburn again

Rather late in the day but just to say Brinkburn went well. The weather was glorious, the liturgy beautiul and a respectable turnout made it all worthwhile. Mike Forbester has a number of pictures on Rudgate Ramblings one of which I include here.