Ground-breaking Catholic festival attracts thousands

More than 2,000 Catholics, a world-famous composer and three UK-based archbishops attended a unique festival of Catholic life, music and culture last weekend.

Sir James MacMillan, the Jewish peer and founder of Blue Labour, Lord Maurice Glasman, Archbishop Wilson of Southwark, Archbishop Longley of Birmingham and Archbishop O’Toole of Cardiff-Menevia took part in the first WeBelieve festival.

Held in the grounds of St Mary’s College, Oscott,  Birmingham, the three-day event (25- 28 July) included liturgy, theological discussions, workshops and a broad musical offering ranging from polyphony for the Extraordinary Form of the Latin Mass to charismatic worship, Ukrainian sacred song and vespers in the Syro-Malabar rite.

An open-mike event to highlight Catholic talent featuring the singer Adeniké Adewale was also held, while poetry was provided in workshops by Fr Paul Murray OP and Sarah de Nordwall. The Southwell Consort sang during celebrations of the Tridentine liturgy and held a closing recital.

WeBelieve was organised by the Guild of Our Lady of Ransom in partnership with Oscott College to celebrate, in the words of the Guild’s website, “the truth, beauty and goodness of our church.” Many of the young families attending camped in the grounds of Oscott, where events were held in separate marquees dedicated to truth, beauty and goodness.

John Withers, the event manager said the inspiration for the festival was “tied up with the Guild of Our Lady of Ransom,” which had been founded in 1887. Inspired by St John Henry Newman’s call for a ‘Second Spring’ – first preached from the pulpit of the chapel of St Mary’s, Oscott – the Guild had “organised large scale Catholic gatherings,” said Withers. “There was a sense of the Church re-emerging from the shadows,” he added.

Withers said it had taken two years to build up the relationships in the Church that led to the diversity of Catholic groups at WeBelieve.

“The culture of the event was truly unique,” he told The Tablet. “It was really rich and joyful, with a sense of generosity.”

He said the festival had never been held before: “This was a total unknown. A week beforehand, I was thinking, “We have the Latin Mass crowd, the charismatic part of the Church, the Ukrainians and the Syro-Malabar Catholics coming together. What does that look like?”

After the festival, he received emails from participants saying, “Thank you. We feel seen. We feel heard.”

Sir James MacMillan spoke on the subject ‘Tradition is a Flowing River’, in an interview with Pierpaolo Finaldi, chief executive of The Catholic Truth Society. Other speakers included the daughter of the Catholic paediatrician St Gianna Beretta Molla, Dr Gianna Molla, who spoke on the theme of holiness.

The former Anglican bishop of Rochester and Catholic convert, Monsignor Michael Nazir-Ali gave a talk titled ‘What we believe and why: the Nicene Creed, past and present.’ The festival’s title reflected in part the 1,700th anniversary of the Nicene Creed.

Other participants included a number of bishops including Bishop Nicholas Hudson of Westminster Diocese, Bishop David Oakley of Northampton Diocese Bishop Kenneth Nowakowski of the Ukrainian Catholic Eparchy, Bishop Timothy Menezes, an auxiliary of Birmingham, and Bishop David Waller, the Bishop Ordinary of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham.

A number of charities and Catholic agencies also attended including the Catholic Truth Society, Cafod, Aid to the Church in Need, Mary’s Meals, Unbound UK, TenTen Resources, the Caritas Social Action Network, Divine Renovation UK, The Mark 10 Mission, March for Life UK and Come & See Catholic Formation Ministries. 

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