Family Retreat 2018: photographs

The St Catherine's Trust annual Family Retreat took place last weekend, led by two priests of the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, Canon Amaury Montjeand and Canon Scott Tanner. They were joined on Saturday by Br Albert Robertson who was subdeacon at High Mass.



As always it was attended by many children - more than ever, in fact. The retreat is structured to make it possible for families to attend to attend together.

St Catherine's Trust Family Retreat: 31st March to 2nd April

Bookings are coming in. Don't miss out! Book now for the Family Retreat in the Oratory School near Reading with Fr Serafino Lanzettta. Details and booking here.



The Family Retreat is back in the Oratory School near Reading this year, for Passion Sunday weenkend (the weekend before Palm Sunday), led by Fr Serafino Lanzetta of the Gosport friars. Details and booking here.

The Family Retreat, run by the St Catherine's Trust, is designed to make it possible for the parents of small children to attend a retreat without leaving their children behind. We arrange activities for the children during the spiritual conferences. Everyone is welcome, however: you don't have to bring children with you!

Iain Duncan Smith and the Two-Child Policy

From The Independent:

Families with more than two children will not receive tax credits or housing benefit for their third or subsequent children under a fundamental change to the welfare system.

The controversial “two child policy” has been championed by Iain Duncan Smith, the Work and Pensions Secretary, who wanted the Conservatives’ £12bn of welfare savings to change people’s behaviour rather than salami-slice his budget.

I understand the need to trim the welfare budget.

I understand the perverse incentives created by welfare which have played an important part in the destruction of marriage, which manifest themselves in the stereotyped unmarried (or single) parents with lots of children and a surprisingly large income from the state. (Daily Mail: 'single mother of eight gets £2,200 a month from the taxpayer': yup, the story writes itself.)

I don't understand at all a desire to reduce family sizes, when the UK is already reproducing at below replacement levels. (Replacement is about 2.1 children per woman; the UK's is about 1.8.)

What is completely wrong, whether I can understand it or not, is a deliberate swinging of incentives towards abortion by arbitrarily cutting out larger families from the protection of the welfare state. If we are going to have a welfare state, why should it protect those undermining their health by smoking, people injured in dangerous leisure activities like rock-climbing, and people who have picked up venereal diseases from an immoral lifestyle, and not people who are bringing children into the world?

Churchil said: There is no finer investment for any community than putting milk into babies.

Iain Duncan Smith, a Catholic, thinks, on the contrary, that this is activity which should be discouraged, by the edifying sight of large families on the bread line. Something has gone very wrong with our society.

A little reminder: here is Iain Duncan Smith's explanation of why he voted for Same Sex Marriage; in an interview during his brief and unhappy reign as party leader, he described himself as an 'Anglo-Catholic' and said he didn't go to individual confession.

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St Catherine's Trust: next events

St Catherine's Trust (of which I am Chairman) can now announce a the dates for our events in 2012, including a new venue for our Summer School, the Fransiscan Friary and Retreat Centre at Pantasaph in Wales.

I noted before that the St Catherine's Trust Summer School won't happen this year. We were booked into Ushaw College and have been left high and dry when they announced their closure, since venues need to be booked about a year in advance.

Picture: the end of school quiz at the 2010 Summer School

The Summer School has been taking place every year since 2005, and has been a great success. We were amazed to get more than 40 students in the first year, and since then numbers have been up to 55. We have used a couple of non-Catholic boarding schools, but were determined to get into a Catholic venue, and preferably not one we would have to share with enormous numbers of language students, who tend to take over these places in the Summer holidays. After a vast number of enquiries and some site visits we have secured Pantasaph Retreat Centre, which is near Holywell. It has a Pugin Chapel and is located in beautiful countryside near to one of the UK's most important Catholic shrines, the Holy Well of St Winifride which gives Holywell its name. Pantasaph is itself the location of a shrine to St Pio, 'Padre Pio'.

The Summer School will take place Sunday to Sunday, 22nd to 29th July 2012.

Mass at the 2010 Summer School

We have also agreed the dates of the next Family Retreat at the Oratory School in Oxfordshire, which will be over the weekend of Low Sunday, ie 15th - 18th April 2012.

Marian procession at the 2011 Family Retreat at the Oratory School.

The Summer School includes not only catechesis from a priest, but inspirational teaching from our volunteer staff on a range of subjects, designed to supplement what is taught in a mainstream school, or indeed a home school. We discuss topics in Catholic history, literature, art, and philosophy; the students are introduced to Gregorian Chant or sacred polyphony, Latin and even a bit of Greek; they put on a staged reading of a radio play, and do a range of activities in the afternoon - they choose between various outside activities and sewing and drawing. We always have one or two outings to local places of interest. Plus we have Traditional Sung Mass every day, plus Compline, daily Rosary, and Benediction a couple of times during the week too.

The Chapel at Pantasaph.

All this takes place in a safe environment: all our staff are CRB checked, we have public liability insurance and include first aiders among the staff.

This is a unique opportunity for children aged 11 to 18, so please put these dates in your diary now.

What I was doing yesterday

There was a very beautiful baptism (and 'Churching' of the mother) in St Bede's, Clapham Park, yesterday; I was honoured to be Godfather.
H-t to Fr Tim! He has more photos.

Family Retreat and Chant Course

The St Catherine's Trust Family Retreat and the Gregorian Chant Network Weekend Chant Course, which run in parallel, took place last weekend; both are sponsored by the Latin Mass Society. It was a tremendous weekend, with nearly 150 participants of all ages. The Retreat was led by the LMS Chaplain Fr Andrew Southwell, and the Chant course by the well-known composer Colin Mawby.

One of the features of the Retreat is a procession through the grounds of our venue, the Oratory School, from the large modern chapel to the smaller old chapel. The latter was completely packed, with people standing at the back.


The weather was glorious, and it was as always a very uplifting event, something quite unique in the calendar of traditional Catholic events.


Fr Southwell blessing banners for the procession made by the children on the Retreat. Making these banners was one of the activities the younger children did with the volunteer staff, enabling their parents to attend Fr Southwell's spiritual conferences.


Here is one activity for children taking place (photo by Mat Doyle: see his set here). The older children had talks from three different speakers, including one about the English martyrs from me.


Blessing of the people with holy water at the end of Compline.


Bookstall on Saturday afternoon provided by St Philip's Books of Oxford.


Colin Mawby. For more on the Chant course see the Gregorian Chant Network blog.


Some of the younger retreatants.

For the full set of photos, see here.

Mass at Holy Cross, Leicester

We stayed Saturday night in York after the pilgrimage and came home on Sunday morning, taking in Mass at Holy Cross, Leicester, the Dominican Priory. Fr Thomas Crean OP, the LMS Chaplain for the Midlands, usually says this Mass, which takes place at 12.30pm each Sunday. It takes place in a large side chapel, although the congregation were spilling out into the pews in the nave.

I have never visited the church before, and it is very impressive. I was able to see myself the new shrine to the English Martyrs which was recently dedicated by Bishop McMahon of Nottingham - Bishop McMahon is himself a Dominican, and also says the Traditional Mass, and he took the opportunity to be the first Ordinary in England and Wales to say an EF Mass in his own diocese.

Here's a photo from Mike Forbester's set (the same Mike Forbester who organised the chant in York for St Margaret Clitherow, of Rudgate Singers fame). (There's more on this Pontifical Mass here.)

Here's the shrine. It is nicely done, though it seems slightly odd for it not to have an altar attached to it.

The congregation was full of families with small children. They characterise congregations at regular Traditional Masses in most places, but here in Leicester the small children seemed to outnumber the adults!

Last call for the SCT Family Retreat

We now have more than a hundred people coming to the St Catherine's Trust Family Retreat, 8-10th April, but there are still spaces! Please get your application form (download it here) in NOW!

The Family Retreat is open to all, not just families, but we call it the Family Retreat because we make special provision for children of all ages. This is the sixth Family Retreat we have run, the second in the current, excellent location, the Oratory School, Woodcote, RG8 0PJ, located between Oxford and Reading.
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It is a unique occasion, with traditional liturgy (Mass, Vesppers, Compline, Benediction) and devotions, spiritual talks and talks and activities for the children. The Oratory School, with its two chapels and set in glorious grounds, is the ideal venue.


It is £190 for a couple, which is compares very well to prices for retreat centres around the country. Nevertheless the Latin Mass Society has set money aside to make this available to as wide a group as possible and will pay half the cost for anyone who ticks the box on the application form. So you have no excuse not to come!

The retreat starts on Friday afternoon, with Mass at 5pm, followed by dinner at 6.30. You can register either before Mass or after Mass, if you can't make the earlier time. It ends with lunch on Sunday.


More photos here.

Clear and orthodox statement from the bishops of England and Wales on Sex Ed

At last I have seen something really clear from the Bishops of England and Wales on Sex Education, which furthermore reiterates the teaching of the Popes on this subject. This is really quite an eye-opener. My emphasis.

We have no desire to minimize the necessity of some attention being paid to the problem both now and continuously in the future. But the remedy is to be found not so much in the imparting in public of fuller and more systematic knowledge of sex from the physiological or biological standpoint as by the removal of external temptations and by the general and determined inculcation of the practice of Christian virtue and our dependence on divine grave.
...

Unfortunately, until parents are better equipped for their task, and do in fact carry out their obligations, there will always be some children lacking in the knowledge of those things intended by God for their own progress in virtue and for the fulfilment of God’s designs. But we do not admit that, therefore, the duty of imparting this knowledge necessarily falls upon the school-teachers. Teachers have no strict right to arrogate to themselves parental duties; if called upon by the parents to deputize for them in this delicate matter they may very properly do so. ... we feel it necessary to insist that the teacher is primarily ‘in place of the parent’ (in loco parentis) and not a civil servant doing the work of the State. Accordingly, a teacher must always respect the rights and wishes of the parents concerning the education of children, and rather than taking over parental duties should regard it as their task to help parents towards the proper fulfilment of obligations.

...This help, however, on the more intimate matters of life must always remain personal and individual. Class or group instruction of children or of youth on the physiological aspect of sex would be fraught with grave dangers and would be against the traditional teaching of the Church.
...

The reason for the recent agitation in certain quarters for more general sex instruction is not altogether clear to us. If its main purpose is a social one, namely to safeguard the physical welfare of the nation, then the advocates of sex instruction on the lines suggested are doomed to disappointment, since the evils concerned are the effect not so much of ignorance as of a weakness of will unsupported by the means of grace. Information alone will not produce a healthy and sound nation; much less will it be sufficient to prepare souls for their eternal destiny in the next life. It is not so much information as formation which is required — formation of character, the training of the mind, the heart, and the will with the necessary assistance of religion.
...

Even if parents are found to be neglecting duties which are essentially parental and which cannot be normally undertaken as satisfactorily by others, the State should hesitate, by teaching in the schools or by other means, to encourage parents in their neglect. The State should rather take steps to see that parents themselves are better equipped for their parental tasks.
This encouragement of the fulfilment of parental responsibility will, indeed, be the first endeavour of the Church.

Yes, this was signed by all the ordinaries of England and Wales and commanded to be read in all Catholic churches on the 3rd Sunday After Easter.

In 1944.

See the full text on Lux Occulta, to whom a big hat-tip and thanks!

FHC at St Anthony of Padua

Fr Aldo Tapparo, Parish Priest of St Anthony of Padua in Headington, gave First Holy Communion today in his freshly redecorated church (with a new Sanctuary lamp too).

Regular readers may recall earlier photos of Masses there, with some rather - well - unfashionable pastel colours. For example, here is a Mass celebrated by Fr Daniel Seward last winter. (Note the Sanctuary lamp next to the Tabernacle.)

It was a beautiful occasion, illustrating the 'ordinary' Catholic life of Catholics attached to the 'extraordinary' form of the Roman Rite. It is not all solemn liturgies in great or historic churches - not that there is anything wrong with those. It is simply that life also includes low Masses on weekday mornings and family occasions which are important to a small circle of people.

May Dominic's love of the Blessed Sacrament always burn brightly!

Lucy Shaw Cakes provided a suitably decorated cake which was consumed after Mass.

More photos here.

Prinknash Abbey

I managed to post a little photo of the Mass at Prinknash Abbey I attended on Saturday, from my IPhone; here are some (slightly) better ones, though the lighting was difficult. Mass was said for us by Fr Mark Hargreaves; there is Low Mass every Saturday at 11am, and on the first Sunday of each month at 3pm. Mass takes place in the monastery chapel, which has a special transept for visitors, who observe the liturgy from the Gospel side.

Prinknash is a continuation of the Caldey Island community, a group of Anglican monks who became Catholic en masse in 1913. (There are still monks on Caldey, but these are Cistercians who took over the buildings after the earlier community had been forced sell up: there is even an LMS pilgrimage to the island, which had a monastery on it in the Middle Ages).

The Caldey community was a favourite retreat for Mgr Ronald Knox in his Anglican days - he converted not long after they did. As Anglicans they had endless problems with the hierarchy: being a 'Catholic' Anglican before the Great War was a dangerous game. Knox quotes a friend as saying the 'a stranger listening to the conversation [at Caldey] might have imagined "bishops" to the name applied to some secret band of criminals.' (A Spiritual Aeneid, p70).

Like many English religious communities, the monks of Prinknash had a period of enormous growth in the mid 20th Century, which came to an abrupt end in the 1970s. At the end of that time they built a new monastery, complete with Abbey Church, and turned the old one into a guest house. A couple of years ago they moved out of the 1970s building and back into the old monastery, and it was in the old chapel that Mass took place. The 'new' monastery is now derelict - from an architectural point of view it is not a great loss.

At Mass we met up with the LMS Rep from Birmingham, Matthew Doyle, and the assistant rep for Cheltenham, Damian Barker, for a picnic lunch. We ended up staying all afternoon, looking at the extensive 'Bird Park', which also houses tame deer, goats, ponies and much else. It is a lot of fun with small children, and I recommend it. It is best to take plenty of 20p coins, since these release portions of food for the different kind of animal you encounter.

There are a few more photos here.

St Catherine's Trust Family Retreat: report and photos

Mass in the New Chapel

The St Catherine's Trust Family Retreat ran from 9-11th April; this was our fifth, the first being in Spring 2006, following the first ever SCT Summer School in 2005. We felt that there was a huge unmet need for spiritual support of Catholic families attached to the Traditional Mass, many of whom have very unsatisfactory liturgical lives - travelling long distances to Sunday Masses, sometimes in different places each week, or not being able to get to the Traditional Mass regularly at all. Our instinct was correct, and the Family Retreat - priced to accomodate the greatest possible range of people, with children coming for free - has been a great success over the years. This year we were in a new venue, the Oratory School in Oxfordshire, near the village of Woodcote between Oxford and Reading. The 2010 Retreat hosted a Chant course as well, about which I've written a separate blog post on the Gregorian Chant Network blog.

The Oratory School is a Catholic school with two chapels, both arranged for ad orientem Mass thanks to the school's Chaplain, the long-standing LMS National Chaplain Fr Anthony Conlon, who retired from that post last year.

A Statue of Our Lady is carried in procession through the School grounds.

The Family Retreat is designed to enable parents of children of all ages to attend with the maximum spiritual benefit. There are activities for children of all ages during the adults' talks, and our Retreat Giver, Fr Andrew Southwell, always gives a spiritual talk to the children as well. This year the younger children made small Marian banner for the Marian procession which we had around the grounds of the school, from one chapel to the other; they also had an Easter Egg hunt.

Prayers at the end of the Procession, in the Old Chapel.

Fr Southwell was assisted by Fr Thomas Crean OP who spent much time in the confessional.

Bookstall supplied by Southwell Books.

In addition to Sung Mass on each of the three days, we had Rosary each day and Compline on Friday, and Vespers and Benediction as well as Compline on Saturday. The Marian procession, in glorious sunshine and in the lovely surroundings of the school grounds, was a new feature, and was very moving. We had small girls scattering petals before the statue, which was preceeded by a thurifer and four torchbearers, and followed by our two priests, Fr Southwell in a cope with an MC, and then the retreatants and singers, more than 150 people in total.

Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament,

See a slideshow of the photographs.

Baptism and Churching

Baby and godparents are met in the church porch, where two exorcisms and an anointing take place. The priest gives the baby some salt, representing the wisdom of the Church's teaching, which has itself been exorcised.

Yesterday Margaret Shaw was baptised, and her mother was given the blessing of a woman after childbirth, 'churching'. A friend of mine present at the service, a permanent deacon, said he 'hadn't realised we had it' - he'd heard of churching as an Anglican thing, but not as a Catholic one. It deserves to be more widely used: you can buy laminated cards with the prayers and rubrics on it from Southwell Books here.

During the confession of faith, the priest leads the child and the godparents into the church with his stole.

The ceremonies took place in St Bede's Clapham Park, and were performed by Fr Andrew Southwell. We have a long association with St Bede's, and going to London makes it possible for my mother to attend. Margaret is her sixteenth grandchild.

The godfather, in case you were wondering, is Br Stephen Morrison, a novice of the Premonstratensians at Chelmsford.

Arriving in the baptistery, the priest gives the child a third exorcism, and pronounces a blessing of the child's ears and nostrils: 'Ephpheta! Be opened, and breath fragrance. But thou, foul fiend, begone, for the judgment of God will overtake thee.'


After the renunciation of the devil by the godparents, an anointing with oil, and a second confession of faith, the baptism proper is performed. The water used, as is traditional, is blessed at Easter with the addition of chrism. In medieval churches it was regarded as so valuable it was kept under lock and key, hence the large fonts with elaborate closing tops.

The baby is anointed with chrism, and given her white linen baptismal garment (a cloth, in this case), and a beeswax candle lit from the Paschal candle. 'Take this burning light, and keep your baptismal innocence.'


The Churching of Women also involves the leading of the woman into the church by the stole: again, it is symbolic of her (re-)entering the church. After prayers in the porch, and the recitation of Psalm 23, where she is given a candle which is lit, she is led to the communion rail. Psalm 23 is one of the 'enthronment' psalms, about the 'King of Glory', God, entering His Temple.


She kneels again for a blessing. 'Let not the enemy prevail against her.' - 'Nor the son of iniquity approach to hurt her.'

It is a ceremony which combines thanksgiving with prayers for protection and blessing.

"Almighty, everlasting God, who, through the delivery of the blessed Virgin Mary, hast turned into joy the pains of the faithful in childbirth, look mercifully upon this Thine handmaid, coming in gladness to Thy temple to offer up her thanks: and grant that after this life, by the merits and intercession of the same blessed Mary, she may merit to arrive, together with her offspring, at the joys of everlasting happiness. Through Christ our Lord."

More photos here.