ROTA FOR LECTORS – MAY 2026

May 2/3: 5pm Angela; 9am Phil; 11am Margaret, Simone, Mary(H) 9/10: 5pm Lisa; 9am Carolyn; 11am Jim, Giannina, Gaberielle(H) 16/17: 5pm Linda; 9am Paul; 11am Lizzie, Patricia, Lorenza(H) 23/24 : 5pm Maggie; 9am Ross; 11am David, Marian, Angela(H) 30/31: 5pm Phil; 9am Margaret; 11am Mary, Lisa, Simone(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.

Deep in the human heart is a longing to be connected to others, to love and to be loved. I am leading this Workshop from 10.00am until 2.00pm on Saturday 11th July . The Workshop will help us to understand the reasons why we sometimes feel lonely and what a devastating effect Loneliness can have on us. I’ll suggest effective ways to ensure that your experience of Loneliness can actually become the means of finding deep, satisfying ways of being close to the Lord and to other people. The workshop will take place at the London Jesuit Centre. If you would like to attend this Workshop, please book now on the London Jesuit Centre website.

Anxiety and Worry often make life difficult for many people. I am leading this Workshop, from the evening of Friday 22nd May ( 6.30pm to 8.30pm) then continuing on Saturday 23rd May (11.00am TO 1.00pm). This Workshop will explain how Anxiety begins, how it can take hold of us and then spoil so much of our lives. I’ll also offer some very good, tried and tested ways in which people can escape from Worry or at the very least reduce it and begin to live much happier lives, feeling and monk . The Workshop will take place at the London Jesuit Centre. If you would like to attend this Workshop, please book now on the London Jesuit Centre website.

Monday 11th May: Patricia Tuesday 12th May: Maggie Wednesday 13th May: Chris Thursday 14th May: Jim Friday 15th May: Marian

An Intention for holy Mass is a specific prayer, often for a particular person or purpose, that a priest offers during the celebration of a holy Mass. It is the best way that we have to unite our lives, our hopes, our fears, our joys and our sorrows with the Lord Jesus. It is the best way possible, because every time holy Mass takes place, the Lord’s Death and Resurrection also takes place. A holy Mass Intention is a prayer asking that the Lord’s victory over sin and death be applied to the Intention. The Intention can be for those who are still living in this world or for those who have left this world. Anyone, of course, may request a holy Mass - In Thanksgiving, for a Birthday, for someone who has died, on the occasion of a special Anniversary, for someone who is unwell or for any other intention that we believe the good Lord wishes to hear and possibly to give us. Every holy Mass is the making present of the Lord offering his saving love to everyone, so every holy Mass is for everyone! However, sometimes we have specific Intentions that we may wish to mention to the Lord. A ‘Stipend’ or Offering for the holy Mass is not a fee! It is not ‘the cost of a holy Mass’! The holy Mass is so sacred, so full of the Lord’s presence and saving power that it is priceless! In fact, the Stipend is only a gesture of gratitude and care for the priest who celebrates the holy Mass for you. It is a way for supporting our priests who, although they do not receive salaries, still need personal funds to meet their own ‘costs of living.’ The Stipend suggested by the Archdiocese of Southwark Finance Committee is a minimum of £10 for each holy Mass. Of course, anyone who can’t afford a Stipend should still request a holy Mass Intention and I’m sure every priest would always be more than happy to celebrate holy Mass for someone in that situation.  Here in our parish, please use the holy Mass Intention envelopes which you will find in the porch of the church. Please write the details of the Intention, a preferred date if required, enclose the Stipend, and let me have it directly or post it through the presbytery letterbox.

Thank you to everyone who works so hard to make our Evangelisation Cafe a means to help non-Christian people and people of no Faith, make connections with our Catholic Faith and our parish. Frankly speaking though, we had, until recently slightly lost our way a little. The Evangelisation Cafe, on a certain day, had lost its purpose to evangelise! It was tending to slightly become just a place where people who already are Christian and attend Christian Services gather to socialise. Nothing wrong with this, of course, except that this is not the purpose of the Evangelisation Cafe. It is good and important that occasionally we have opportunities to socialise as Catholic parishioners. Yet the Evangelisation Cafe exists not to be inward-looking but to reach out to people who do not yet have any contact with us or with any of the Christian Churches in Sanderstead or indeed with the person of the Lord Jesus. On Saturdays however, there is a wonderful ethos of Evangelisation in the Cafe, created by the Hosts. Often, on Saturdays, the Cafe has a large number of visitors who have no connection with our parish at all. They are welcomed warmly by our Hosts who spend time chatting to our visitors and they are offered free drinks and free cakes baked and provided by many of our parishioners on our rota. It is real Evangelisation in action.  Please, dear sisters and brothers of our parish, help to make our Cafe what it is meant to be - a place where your family members, your friends and your neighbours and colleagues who have no or very little connection with the Christian Faith, can come for free coffee and cakes and, if and when they wish, begin to get to know what it means, through us, to have an adult Catholic, Christian Faith in the Lord Jesus. Please be actively involved as a Host or Baker/Provider of cakes. Please come to the Evangelisation Cafe and bring someone with you who has no connection with the Christian Faith. The Lord will do the rest!

Our rota for the delivery of food to the Good Shepherd school in New Addington begins this week. Please find the rota below. The dates indicated are Thursdays during the school term. Please collect the two hessian bags of fruit on Thursdays from the porch of the presbytery between the hours of 8.30am and 2.30pm. Please then bring the fruit to the school in New Addington. The fruit could even be collected and delivered on Friday mornings too, if necessary. The address of the school is: 23, Dunley Drive New Addington CR0 0RG. The school is close to the Good Shepherd Catholic Church. 7: Marian 14: Amit 21: Ros  28: Andrea Joseph

OLDE FORGE CAFE BAKERS/PROVIDERS ROTA MAY 2026 2: Giannina 9: Chinwe 16: Kinga 23: Margaret Fuller  30: Lizzie Please, if possible, could you provide enough cakes for the whole of each week. Thank you to everybody who is helping to provide cakes. To avoid having too many cakes, Coral mentioned to me that non-perishable cakes can be safely stored in the Cafe for a short while. When it is your turn to provide a non-perishable cake, please bring your cake to the Cafe a few days before the date of your turn. OLDE FORGE CAFE - HOSTS ROTA MAY 2026 2nd: Patricia, Fr Malachy 3rd: Emmanuela, Jenny 5th: Jim, Linda 9th: Mary, David 10th: Phil, Marian 12: Ros, Patricia 16: Jim, Colette 17: Gaberielle, Maggie 19: David, Lorenza 23: Paul 24: Giannina, Emmanuala 26: Jenny, Lorenza 30: Mary, Ros 31: David, Jim Please note that for each of the above dates when the Cafe is open, one of the two Hosts has been trained in the use of the new coffee machine. Please would that trained person be the only person operating the machine and also please train the other person in its use. Many thanks. Thank you to everybody who acts as a Host. If an unexpected emergency occurs on the date you are scheduled to be a Host, please don’t worry about the Cafe. No need to try to find someone to ‘stand in’ for you. There is no need whatsoever to ‘swop’ with someone! We are not a Business, having to stay open to make money! - we open when and if we can. We take this role of ‘Host’ as a Vocation from the Lord to be his Missionary and his Prophet. Actually, the Cafe has, at times, functioned well with just one Host. The success of our Evangelisation Cafe depends on us. The more we speak to others of our Cafe, inviting them to visit us, the more successful it will be. Please invite members of your families, your friends, your neighbours and colleagues. Please check when it is your turn to be a Host (or a Baker!). Please see this role as a Calling, a Vocation from the Lord which you are generously telling the Lord you will do”. Thank you so much for your trust in the good Lord

This week we celebrate the great feast of Our Lord’s Ascension into Heaven. So important a Feast Day is this, that the Church obliges us to celebrate holy Mass on this day, to give due honour to the Lord and to receive again his gifts that bring us Eternal Life. We will have two holy Masses for this Feast Day. The first holy Mass is a Vigil holy Mass on Wednesday 13th at 6.00pm and the second holy Mass will be on Thursday at 9.30am .