Chance Meeting

After Mass this morning in New Milton, children were gathering at the crib. One family told me they were visitors, from Byfleet. I knew it well half a century ago, when I served my second (Anglican) curacy in the parish of Woodham, with responsibility for the church on the Sheerwater estate. The visitors told me the Catholic church on the estate had closed down; and so had the one in Byfleet, so they had to travel to find a Mass near their home.

Crib beneath the altar in Our Lady of Lourdes, New Milton

In some dioceses churches have been able to be kept open because there are Ordinariate priests to serve them. In our own area  St Thomas More parishioners have a former Episcopalian priest, now in the Ordinariate, looking after them. He is one of several ex-pats in Portsmouth Diocese, indeed New Milton has a great young Polish Priest and there are two Nigerian clergy nearby.

Whereas the Catholic Church suffers, in this country at least, from a shortage of priests, in the Church of England it is congregations which are declining. I doubt if many churches in the C of E would have had sixty at a morning eucharist -  yet we had that many at New Milton today. So if Anglican clergy find it hard to face a move into the Ordinariate, perhaps they might listen to an appeal to "come over to help us". Of course they must first believe what the Catholic Church believes - but already there are many who do, except that they also think that their church is still somehow an authentic part of the Catholic Church.

Apres Messe

On another tack altogether, it was very good being with our Ordinariate Group yesterday in Bournemouth. One of its best features is the fellowship we enjoy after our mid-week Mass - so I though you might like to see a few of us gathered round the coffee and biscuits on the last day of the old year.

RETIRED?

Despite leaving the Church of England, I am still in communion with an important part of it - the Pensions Board. After forty-one years of full-time ministry, I was able to sit back in 2001 and take things easy. Until, that is, five years ago Pope Benedict gave us the great opportunity of the Ordinariate.
So since 2011 I have once again been in pretty active ministry, looking after our little flock in Bournemouth and giving a hand in local Catholic parishes.

Our Lady of Lourdes, New Milton

This morning, as most Thursdays, I celebrated in the lovely Catholic parish church of New Milton. This enables the Parish Priest, Fr Marcin Drabcik, to take a day off - though he seldom does, being something of a workaholic. It is always a pleasure to say Mass in his church. Everything is beautifully ordered, and the people are very welcoming. I never leave without one or two people, and usually several of them, thanking me. Today we were about thirty. This is the usual Thursday number, though some weeks it is forty or more. Occasionally I have been able to help on a Sunday, particularly when Fr Marcin has gone to his native Poland. The most recent time was to lead a Pilgrimage from New Milton. Then, as on every Sunday, the church has been packed to the doors

There are Catholic parishes up and down the country welcoming former Anglicans to their altars. Indeed there are churches which might have closed but for the influx of Ordinariate clergy. If there is one message for my Anglican clergy friends, it is that you would be very welcome in the Roman communion, and you would be well used.  I cannot imagine a happier or more fruitful way of spending my declining years. But you don't have to be retired! I wish I'd had this Anglicanorum Coetibus opportunity earlier. In any case, don't leave it too late; you are needed now..

What would we do without the Ordinariate?

Somehow everyone seems to be on holiday at once. Fr Marcin from New Milton is on his post-Easter break in Poland (where he is making arrangements for a pilgrimage later in the year) and Fr David from here in Lymington is not back from his break until Monday. So we have been holding the fort - 'we' in this case being a couple of retired priests and me. There have been sick visits and confessions to hear; but between the Mass this morning in Our Lady of Mercy, Lymington and the Vigil Mass this evening  in Our Lady of Lourdes, New Milton Jane and I have managed a picnic and a couple of hours in the Rothschild gardens at Exbury.

Late Rhododendrons at Exbury

On Tuesday - Tuesday is at present notionally 'day off'- we go to London, to meet up with friends and visit the Gallery at Buckingham Palace. But first there is tomorrow,with another early start for Sunday's Ordinariate Mass in Southbourne. If the weather holds Monday could provide my second sea swim of the season- though to be honest I only stayed in for a minute or so yesterday. May in the Channel is not like August in Malta.

Japanese Maples are everywhere at Exbury