Parish News

AUGUST 2025 2/3: 5pm Mary; 9am Lisa; 11am Carolyn, John, Jim(H) 9/10: 5pm Gabrielle; 9am Lesley; 11am Regina, Patrick, Linda(H) 16/17: 5pm Paul; 9am Lizzie; 11am Lorenza, Patricia, Marian(H) 23/24: 5pm Patricia; 9am Maggie; 11am David, Angela, Ross(H) 30/31: 5pm Phil; 9am Lisa; 11am Simone, Mary, Margaret(H) Thank you to our wonderful Ministers of the Eucharist who have accepted the Lord’s invitation to this awesome, sacred ministry, by their willingness to give up their own plans and convenience in order to do God’s will rather than their own. Let us pray for them because they too fight the same personal weaknesses we all have to fight against and they too have to fight the same temptations we all have to fight. God be with them.

"WHO HAVE YOU BROUGHT WITH YOU?" These are the words of the Lord Jesus to each one of us, every time we come to holy Mass. Please don't be content to come alone or just to come with someone who already comes every week, to holy Mass. Invite and encourage others in your family, those living next door to you, those living down your street, your friends. Do that and the Lord will work through you, probably slowly and bit by bit. Do that, and one day you will hear him say to you, "Well done, good and faithful child of mine. Enter into the joys prepared for you, for all eternity. Thank you to the wonderful people who have the privilege of being Eucharistic Ministers and Lectors and thank you to the wonderful people who act as Hosts and Bakers for our Evangelisation project, 'The Olde Forge Cafe.  We live in a time/space world in which none of us can be in two places at once! We provide rotas to make our commitments as feasible as possible. Often, there are conflicting calls on our time and energy. All we can do in deciding which call to follow, is to listen to the Lord speaking to us and then follow the voice of God in our consciences. Trying to arrange the rotas according to what is convenient for everyone is extremely difficult and results in some people doing a great deal and others doing very little! Instead, we will just publish general rotas and simply ask everyone to please just try to do what the Lord asks of you. So, please, if you don't mind, do not send me or Jim or Kim and Manuel who manage the Cafe, dates and times you are unavailable. If we are unable to bring the Lord in Holy Communion to the Sick and Housebound members of our parish every week, but as often as we can, then that is all we can do. If sometimes we are unable to open our Evangelisation Cafe, but we open it as often as we can, then that is all we can do. We trust in the Lord to send his Holy Spirit into the hearts of us all and we pray that the hearts of us all are open to his call. We go forward doing all we can to build his Kingdom in this world and to bringing his love and truth to others as the Lord's missionary disciples. Thank you to all the very dear friends of the Lord Jesus who so often put his plans before their own - your reward will be great in Heaven.

It is wise to write a Will so that the resources you have when the time comes for you to leave this world, goes to the people and organisations you wish. May I suggest that you might consider leaving a Bequest in your will to our parish or to our diocese or to our priest as well as to other causes. A gift in your will can enable us to continue to help people to know the Lord Jesus and his saving love. What a wonderful legacy you would be leaving behind.

Forgive me for raising the issue of parish finances, but I need to alert you to how we must finance our parish and manage our financial resources, if we are to continue as a viable parish. We pay a monthly levy to the diocese of £1,110.59. We also pay a monthly Health and Safety levy of £118.43. Monthly charges for electricity are around £200.00 These are just a few basic monthly costs. Our general monthly expenditure is well in excess of these amounts. Our weekly Collection is presently around £450.00. As you will appreciate then, our present weekly income is not covering our normal weekly expenses. Please may I suggest that every adult member of our parish give a minimum of £15, each week, in our Collection. If you are in personal financial hardship, please just disregard this suggestion. If you are in a reasonable or good financial position, please give more than this suggestion. We live in a relatively affluent area, so our finances should be secure. In addition to a Current Account, we also have a Savings/Loan account. I am reluctant to take anything from that account to pay our normal bills. The Savings/Loan account is there in case we face any unforeseen, sudden, emergency call on our finances or for any special projects we might have. That said, we are about to incur a debt of almost £8,000 to replace our very poor church Sound System with a much-needed new system. We will have to take that cost from our Savings/Loan account.  In this weekend’s first Scripture Reading at holy Mass, we were given an inspiring example of generosity prompted by trust in the providential care of God. In this very practical matter of how we manage our parish financial resources, please be generous.

2/3: 5pm Richard; 9am Chinwe; 11am Jim 9/10: 5pm Patricia; 9am Mike; 11am Lisa 16/17: 5pm Mutsa; 9am Gerry; 11am Phil 23/24: 5pm Marian; 9am Claire; 11am Lorenza 30/31: 5pm Lizzie; 9am Collette; 11am Paul

To Alex, Rob, Tom, Billy and Tim for providing us with high-speed internet connections.  To the family of Anne Abbott for arranging the clearance and tidying of a large area of land behind the church and for the pruning of a large tree that presented a Health and Safety problem.

JULY Tue 15: Lisa Wed 16: Jim Thu 17: Lizzie Fri 18: Gabrielle

Every week, a group of international Catholic young people, aged 20 years and older, gather at a central London Catholic Church, St Charles Borromeo, in Ogle Street, for prayer, reflection and social time. They are called ‘Soul Food’. I have had the pleasure of joining them for prayer and reflection, in the past. Next week I hope to join them again. How inspiring it is to glimpse a growing number of young Catholics deeply and joyfully living their Faith, just like St Carlo Acutis.

To keep our church clean and tidy on the inside is a prayer in itself, a prayer of praise and thanksgiving to God. Please feel free to offer your time and skills to pray in this way. Cleaning and tidying of the church can be done at almost any time, on almost any day, just let me know if you need access to the sacristy. The same applies to the grounds surrounding our church and buildings. The Lord can work through our gardening efforts, to create a place of beauty, peace and calmness. We need more people to help with the gardening. You need know nothing about gardening. A willingness to help is all that is needed. Please let me know if you can help or simply come along on Tuesday mornings when our Gardening Group will be there and will be delighted to welcome you.