People at the latest Home Office vigil for refugees on Monday prayed for “the thousands of men, women and children, known and unknown, who set out to seek safety and a better life in Europe, but who were drowned in the Mediterranean, the Atlantic, the Aegean Sea, or the English Channel”. The call for safe passage was echoed by young adults – sixth formers from John Henry Newman Catholic College, Birmingham, All Saints Catholic High School, Sheffield and Columban Faith in Action volunteer Hannah Lonergan – who visited Calais at the weekend. They said, “It was challenging to see young people our age fighting for their basic human rights in a place where they are not respected or recognised and we ask people to recognise their rights and to show compassion to those seeking safety.”
Professor Peter Hindmarsh has been appointed the new chair of the Catholic Union Charitable Trust. Emeritus Professor of Paediatric Endocrinology at University College London, Hindmarsh replaces Colonel James Bogle who has served as chair of the Trust since its foundation in 2015. He said, “I am looking forward to working to develop the Catholic Union as an organisation working for all Catholics in Great Britain. I am immensely grateful for the contributions made by my predecessor Jamie Bogle and for the many years of service given by Bernard Waddingham our Treasurer.” The Trust organises seminars and open discussions to promote Catholic social action and teaching including on education and morality in a secular world .
A Catholic headteacher confronted a knife-wielding man who entered his secondary school, saying he had a gun. On March 27, 2023, Ciran Stapleton spotted Matthew Lennox, who wore a small bag across his chest, at St Joseph’s Catholic High School in Slough. He found Lennox in a corridor and engaged him by inquiring about his tastes in music and video games. “I thought, the only way I'm going to get through this is to try and keep him calm before the cavalry comes,” Stapleton recalled. Lennox was later tasered by police and is now confined to a psychiatric hospital.
A Rocha UK, a Christian environmental charity, has focused on Lent as “an opportunity to reflect on the practice of fasting and commit to giving up something that brings benefit to nature and helps address climate change”. Suggestions have ranged from directly engaging with nature to becoming more environmentally conscious in daily life. Christians were recommended to adopt an eco-friendly action for Lent, such as going plastic free or buying local produce. Churches were invited to join the eco-church movement, discovering how to steadily improve church grounds and adopt environmentally sustainable practices. A prayer walk guide encouraged Christians to use their senses as an act of worship.
Online bookings have opened for Catholic Peoples’ Weeks summer and autumn 2024 events. They include an all-age week in August at Thornbridge Outdoors in the Peak District. The theme will be, “What are we doing at Mass?” According to the Catechism, “The Eucharist is the Source and Summit of Christian Life”, and the aim is to address what that actually means. An 18-plus event at Hyning Hall, Carnforth, Lancs in September will focus on “Longing for Light”. A weekend “Eat, Pray, Love” at Alton Castle in October is fully booked but interested people can register on a waiting list. Details at: https://catholicpeoplesweeks.org/
Archbishop Mark O’Toole of Cardiff has praised an ecumenical pilgrimage last Friday from Cardiff’s Anglican Llandaff Cathedral to the Catholic Metropolitan Cathedral of St David. Speaking after he walked in the pilgrimage, the Archbishop, who is also Bishop of Menevia, said “the experience has been one of moving from being strangers to being friends on the journey of life and pilgrimage of life.” He reported that “we were privileged to be able to welcome for the first time into the Catholic cathedral at St David’s in Cardiff, the Cross of Wales - a unique gift of King Charles to the Church in Wales.” The pilgrimage was led by Dr Philip McCarthy, the creator of Hearts in Search of God, a project promoting walking pilgrimages within Catholic dioceses.
Justice and Peace Scotland and Sciaf have organised an online Lent reflection on work underway to tackle gender-based violence in Rwanda. The lunchtime discussion, reflection and question and answer session with speakers from Rwanda and Scotland will take place on 21 March, titled, “Improving the lives of women and girls in Rwanda”. It is 30 years since genocide ripped the country apart. Women and girls in Rwanda still bear the scars of that conflict and continue to suffer sexual and gender-based violence.
Censured Irish priest Fr Tony Flannery is to give a public talk on the Church in Ireland today in Holy Week in Galway. The Redemptorist, who was put out of ministry in 2012 over his liberal views, said in a post on his blog that despite the falling attendances at Mass and the decline of the Catholic faith, “We are living in a really interesting time in the Church since the arrival of the papacy of Francis.” He believes Francis’ “biggest legacy” will be the freeing up of discussion, areas of study and the search for truth in the Church, all of which had been seriously restricted.
The current aggressive polarisation within the Church shows how important it is to re-establish synodality as a form of ecclesial life and leadership, reform group We Are Church has said. Marking the eleventh anniversary of Pope Francis’ election the international group said his reform process has already fundamentally changed the Church despite strong resistance. Separately, the reform movement Spirit Unbounded has said that for the Church to be synodal bishops will have to accept a new model of authentic co-responsibility with the laity. “A centring on a deposit of faith guarded by the hierarchy shuts out the living Spirit,” the movement said in a statement.
Mary Ward Loreto, the NGO founded by British nun Sr Imelda Poole IBVM to combat trafficking in Albania, provided 1,751 services last year to a total of 1,630 beneficiaries according to its annual report. Direct interventions over the past twelve months included assisting 132 minors as well as 302 women and 37 men. Outreach included essential support to Afghani asylum seekers. Of the 900 refugees sheltered in the camps in Golem and Shengjin, MWL has successfully reached 291 individuals.
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