Ordinariate Chrism Mass . . .

I'm a great fan of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, probably something to do with the fact that I am a convert from the Anglican Church myself, and when I attend an Ordinariate liturgy it resonates with me and takes me back to my childhood.  Our older son also has great admiration for the Ordinariate and we both follow their news with interest.

Yesterdary, our son was fortunate enough to have some leave to use up and chose to take the day off and go up to Warwick Street for the Chrism Mass of the Ordinariate.  As usual, he came back full of enthusiasm and gave me a detailed account of his impressions.  I said to him, 'you should write that down, it's fascinating.'  So he did and here are his impressions of the day, written yesterday evening . . . 

This beautiful photo is 'borrowed' from the Ordinariate Flickr stream. There are lots more here.

"Earlier today, I attended the Chrism Mass of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham at the Church of Our Lady of the Assumption and St Gregory, Warwick Street, London.  I arrived at 10.55, knowing the Mass would start at 11.30, and the church was already almost full.  At least, the downstairs part of it was, excluding the pews at the sides reserved for priests.  Warwick Street has a gallery on three sides: the choir were in the gallery but there were others there too.  I found a place downstairs, on the right-hand side, in the third pew from the back, next to the central aisle.  It is a magnificent church, with a large mosaic of Our Lord crowning Our Lady, flanked by two angels and with a row of saints underneath.  I was pleased to see six large candlesticks on the remains of the high altar.  There were also six smaller candlesticks on the new altar.

I was surprised when a bell was rung at 11.15.  Priests started processing in, venerating the altar, and then filing into the pews that had been left empty for them.  The procession was headed by a cross, covered in a white veil tied with a violet ribbon.  The cross on the altar was likewise covered in a white veil tied with a violet ribbon.  Presumably white for the Chrism Mass but violet to remind us that we are still in Lent.  Then everyone sat down and the procession of the servers, deacons, Ordinary and Apostolic Nuncio began at 11.30.  The Apostolic Nuncio was the principal celebrant.  The Ordinary and the Nuncio were both wearing mitres.  The Nuncio alone carried a pastoral staff.  The Ordinary's mitre was plain white but big enough to reflect the dignity of his office.  It was thus a genuine example of noble simplicity (a phrase sometimes misused to justify opposition to beautiful vestments and liturgical furnishings).  The MC was Father James Bradley.

There were three hymns for the congregation: we began with Praise to the Holiest in the heightand ended with Lift high the cross.  During the distribution of Holy Communion, we sang Just as I am, without one plea.

We had an excellent choir singing Schubert's Mass in G.  We stood for the beginning of the Gloria but, after the first few words, the Nuncio sat down and so did everyone else.  (This is also a common practice at High or Sung Masses in the Extraordinary Form.)

The Ordinary began his homily with a quotation from the Ordinariate's patron, Blessed John Henry Newman, who had said, "... were St Athanasius or St Ambrose in London now, they would go to worship, not at St Paul's Cathedral, but to Warwick Street and Moor Fields."  The congregation enjoyed that, as Warwick Street church has been dedicated to the Ordinariate.  I enjoyed it for that reason and another: St Mary Moorfields is used by, amongst others, the Latin Mass Society, including for the Easter Triduum.

We had Eucharistic Prayer I, mostly read by the Nuncio alone but with some parts spoken by other individual priests and the words of consecration spoken by all the priests.  The blessing of the oil of the sick took place within this prayer, towards the end.

Deacons carried hosts to the concelebrant priests so they could all receive Communion at the same time.  The deacons then carried chalices from pew to pew of the priests' sections of the church.  For the laity, Holy Communion was under one kind only, received kneeling at the rails.  I received from the Nuncio and, as far as I could see, so did all the lay people receiving Communion at the rail on the right.  As far as I could see, all those receiving Communion at the rail on the left did so from the Ordinary.

After the prayer after Communion, we had the blessing of the oil of catechumens and the consecration of the chrism.  After the Nuncio had poured balsam into the oil that was to become the chrism, it appeared to me that the Nuncio was about to pour some into the oil of catechumens (which would have been a mistake) but was stopped by Fr James Bradley.

The Nuncio said how pleased he was to be there and how much he had enjoyed the singing.  He also said he hoped to be there again next year and that, having already hosted one fundraising event at the Nunciature for the Ordinariate, he hoped to do so again.  He also assured people that both Benedict XVI and Pope Francis were supportive of the Ordinariate.

There was only one procession at the end of Mass.  The Nuncio blessed people both during the entrance procession and again on his way out.  Many people genuflected to him.

I had been surprised that the consecration of the chrism and blessing of the other oils had not taken place at the end of the Liturgy of the Word, as that is what I remembered happening at the Chrism Masses of our own diocese that I had attended in previous years at Arundel Cathedral.  When I got home, I checked The CTS New Daily Missal and read, "In accord with traditional practice, the blessing of the Oil of the Sick takes place before the end of the Eucharistic Prayer, but the blessing of the Oil of Catechumens and the consecration of the Chrism take place after Communion.  Nevertheless, for pastoral reasons, it is permitted for the entire rite of blessing to take place after the Liturgy of the Word."  So, the Ordinariate is simply following the traditional practice, which is still permitted and actually mentioned in the Missal before the alternative.  (I wonder what the pastoral reasons are for the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton not following the traditional practice.)

The one disappointment was that, although there was perfect silence before Mass, some people started talking as soon as Mass was over.

In general, I was very impressed with the high standard of the liturgy.  Everything was done with very great care and reverence, exactly as it should be, but in a way that seemed entirely natural.  The rubrics were followed, not for their own sake but for the sake of acting according to the mind of the Church.  I believe the Ordinariate has the potential to be a very positive influence on the Catholic Church in England and Wales if only enough cradle Catholics become aware of how they do things!"

The Invisible Woman . . .

Just received another great video link from Sr Anastasia. I'm sure many of us can identify with a lot of this! Great sentiment.

A reminder to us when we're wondering why we're rushing around like maniacs trying to do look after the family, home and often a job too; and feeling perhaps a little under-appreciated . . .

He notices!

Damme - bicycles, canals and a windmill; typical Flanders . . .

Give me a lovely day out over a longer holiday any day! I love having a day out. It doesn't much matter where but yesterday was one of the extra special kind as we went to meet friends and family for lunch in Damme which is not far from Brugges/Bruges in Belgium.

We didn't plan for our visit to coincide with Ascension Day (naturally, they keep it on the proper day!) but it worked out that way so we decided to avoid the crowds in Brugges and went to the nearby small town of Damme. It's a beautiful small town built around two canals.

Being a public holiday the town was full of people relaxing and enjoying their day of leisure, and . . . more bicycles than you could imagine.

We had a delicious lunch in a restaurant called De Spieghel. Named after the fictitious prankster Till Euelenspiegel (German spelling). Roughly translated this means owlglass. You may be familiar with the orchestral work by Richard Strauss based on this story.

There is an amusing statue of Till Eulenspiegel complete with mirrors and some animal friends looking over the canal in Damme.

And the beautiful church of Our Lady.

If you're looking for a slightly different day out for a treat, I'd recommend a visit. We went with the car via Eurotunnel and it's just about an hour and a quarter's drive from the terminal to Brugges and nearby Damme. If, like us, you live in the south of England, it's a very easy journey.

No, I'm not working for the Damme tourist board but I like to share good things!

Home Sweet Home . . .

As I have mentioned once or twice before, the Pater Familias travels a lot on business and has done so all of our married life. It's quite normal for me to hesitate for a split second before answering when friends ask, 'and where is he this week, then?'

It's a bit like the joke about the Japanese tourist saying,'It's Monday, so this must be France' - A bit hard on the poor Japanese who are probably no more like this than a certain type of tourist of any other nationality.

What is more, the PF tends to work in areas that have seen their fair share of trouble in one way or another.

Fortunately he decided to postpone his latest trip in good time but it is very warming to know people have his interests at heart. I have had several enquiries from friends this week asking if he's at home in the UK or, as is often the case, in one of the trouble-spots we are currently seeing on all the news programmes.

I keep telling him his guardian angel is doing overtime!

A new game . . .

Thanks to the link on Fr Tim Finigan's blog to the photos of the recent LMS Requiem Mass posted on Joseph Shaw's Flickr stream, I've just spent a happy few moments playing one of my favourite games - 'Spot Our Eldest'.

Thanks are due of course also to Joseph Shaw, LMS Chairman, for taking and posting the photos.

Our Eldest tries to attend all the LMS events which are held in London as it's easily accessible by train from here. I always have a look to see if I can spot him in the crowd. I'm just a typical proud Mum, at heart.

If you'd like to see more of the photos, follow the link on Fr Tim's blog or go direct here.

¿Habla usted español? . . .

Regular readers of this little blog, and of course family and friends, will know that the Pater Familias travels a little bit - at this stage, the aforementioned family and friends will be spluttering into their cocoa at my use of the phrase, 'travels a little'.

The latest trip was to the beautiful city of Barcelona (hence the title of the post - d'oh!).

Over the years, we have come to an understanding that I really don't need a gift from each port of call - there are only so many hand-crafted 'greetings from . . . (insert the destination of your choice)' trinket boxes/teatowels/plastic gl0w-in-the-dark statues of Our Lady/garishly-painted whatnots that one can find house room for.

We have hit on a good solution which suits us both. The PF nowadays picks up one or two of the complimentary glossy magazines offered by the airlines and purchases a little edible something that is typical of the place he has visited. Thereby he feels he's doing his bit by thinking of me and bringing a gift back with him and I have gifts that I enjoy and can share and don't need to find a permanent home for. Everyone's a winner!

I have to say my Spanish is very limited but women's magazines are pretty universal and as so much of them is pictures anyway, it doesn't really matter and it's always amusing to see how certain words and products are translated into different languages.

The edible delight this trip was a filling-extracting box of delicious Turrón (Spanish), torró (Catalan), or torrone (Italian).

Sorry, no photo of that - there's not enough left to photograph!

The next trip will probably bring a booty of censored OK magazines and dates - I'll leave you to guess which part of the world that might be.

What's in an acronym? . . .

What's the difference between an RM, an RT, and an RTL . . . or even an RML?

Growing up with two bus-mad brothers these were the sort of questions that dominated my childhood. At the time, I really couldn't have given a fig and still find it hard to understand their fascination with what is (to me, at least) basically just a means of getting from A to B if you don't have access to a car; it's too far too walk or your destination is nowhere near a railway station.

However, I must admit the the new Routemaster bus showcased in the news today is rather appealing. It almost makes me wish I had a bus pass!

I expect I'll get a few comments now from my siblings!

Who's a lucky girl then? . . .

See what I found on the breakfast table this morning!

A gift from Number One Son . . . and gifts arrived in the post from the other end of the globe (Manchester!) from Number Two Son - TGF Amazon!

Even the Pater Familias left me something as he's also away. Who's a lucky Mum then?

As I was taking photos of the flowers above, I couldn't resist a snap of these lovely daffs too - Ooh, you can' t beat a bunch of daffs at this time of year- nothing like it to cheer you up after a long, miserable winter.

And . . . even as I type, Number One Son is preparing supper for the two of us - TGF M&S!

Now, if I'm quieter than usual in the next few days, you'll know why . . . I'll be busy counting my blessings - and they are manifold (to use a good old-fashioned Biblical expression).

What do you do when Valentine's Day falls on Match Day?

I was chatting to 'Number Two Son' on the phone this evening. You know, the usual sort of mother/son thing - What have you been up to this week? Any plans for the weekend? etc. We were talking about Valentine's Day and I reminded him that the Pater Familias is away on a business trip at the moment so Valentine's Day will be a non-event in our house this year (or maybe postponed?)

His reply? . . . 'Well, I'll be at the match tomorrow'

He then sent me the link to this great video. It's an answer to that perennial question, 'What do you do when Valentine's Day falls on Match Day?' I hope it makes you smile.

Some chores are fun . . .

As in many households, I imagine, we seem to have amassed quite a collection of empty bottles over the Christmas period, not that we've had any parties as such and there were just 6 of us at home for Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Nevertheless, we were running out of worktop space so something had to be done to remedy the situation.

I always find there's not much point in rushing to the bottle bank on 27th December as you can almost guarantee you'll find it overflowing and surrounded by boxes, bags and other containers full of empties.

So today was the day selected. A beautiful crisp winter's day; ideal for a little 'stroll with a purpose'!

The Pater Familias was off doing something energetic in the sporting line involving a racquet and shuttlecock so Number One Son and I set off with a large carrier bag in each hand and had a very enjoyable walk. As soon as we had offloaded the bottles, just about 5 minutes' walk away, we backtracked and made our way to the nearest coffee shop which is open on a Sunday afternoon to enjoy our reward.

The chap in the photo above was very curious about these two strangers walking past his field. He obligingly posed for his photo though I felt rather mean as we had no treats between us that we could give him.

Now, the big decision this evening is, as remarked upon by Victor in his comment on my post yesterday . . . Do we begin to take down the decorations now as we've celebrated the Feast of the Epiphany at Mass today, or do we wait until 6th January?

As I've mentioned before, we'll be leaving the crib up until the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord but maybe we'll just begin to tidy a few of the other things away.

Our Crib is up! . . .

Yay! Our crib is out of it's wrappings and displayed in pride of place in our sitting room - all ready for the big day - or should I say the big night, as we always place the infant Jesus in the crib as soon as we get back from Midnight Mass.

We had a lovely Sunday again today. We enjoyed a delicious meal with friends last night in their home which was beautifully decorated for Christmas which really set the scene for us. This combined with the very seasonal weather and the fact that we'll all be together again shortly as a family really makes it a Super Sunday.

This morning's Mass was great with a very good homily and the children's nativity play at the end of Mass which is always guaranteed to bring a tear to the eye. We spent a relaxed afternoon decorating the tree and putting up a few decorations. I was going to say 'tasteful decorations' but then they're not really. We still tend to belong to the school of putting the same up things every year which have become part of our family tradition. When it comes to the tree, it's a case of 'pile it all on' with no regard for colour scheme, or any other scheme come to that!

Maybe one year, we'll have an adult tree with a tasteful theme which will be echoed in the other decorations but I've a feeling that day is quite a long way off.

Finally, Number One Son and I lit the fourth candle on our Advent wreath at 6pm and prayed the Angelus together - it doesn't get much better than this! God is very good!

Hallowe'en, All Saints, All Souls etc. . . .

Happy Feast Day dear reader and to all would-be Saints.

It was interesting this morning listening to the children's responses as our PP spoke to them about today's Feast. Not all of them sounded too sure that they wanted to be Saints eventually!

I think a lot us of adults listening were much more interested in St Augustine's approach - 'Make me a Saint, Lord, but not yet'!

As a small child I always found these two successive feast days difficult to understand, and trying to make out where Hallowe'en fitted in as well was just too much for me.

I knew that Hallowe'en was really a celebration of the Eve of All Hallows as my mother had explained, but I just couldn't understand why we had a day celebrating witches (as I then saw it) and that this was somehow related to the following day when we remembered and celebrated all the saints! Add to this the idea that we could all be saints one day was just too much for me to grasp.

Now, as an adult, I'm finally beginning to see what it's all about - it's taken quite a while. Put simplistically, I like to think now that when I go to Mass on All Saints Day, my parents have already made it into that number and they in turn will be interceding for me. On All Souls Day, I'm praying for all the faithful departed including members of my own family who might not yet have made it to the Communion of Saints which could also include my parents. Either way, I'm remembering them especially at this time.

Father, All-Powerful and ever-living God,
today we rejoice in the holy men and women

of every time and place.
May their prayers bring us your forgiveness and love.
We ask this in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

A busy time . . .

I've been very aware that I haven't posted anything on the blog for a while.

It's been a busy time at home with visitors all of last week including number 2 son which was lovely. We also managed to squeeze in a belated birthday meal out for the Pater Familias with some very good friends; took our younger son back to Manchester and spent the weekend with him and came back to a theatre outing on Monday evening.

Now, finally we have time to draw breath!

Luckily the newly-retired husband was around to entertain our visitor and managed a trip to Brighton on a really warm day, the usual tourist sights in London and shopping for all the 'rellies' back home.

The weekend in Manchester was really good - time with number 2 son is very precious as the distances means we don't see enough of each other. Father and son went for a bike ride - this is one of the Pater Familias' retirement projects - now he's looking to buy his own bike. This gave number 1 son and I a chance to have a good long walk around Chorlton Water Park. A pub lunch all together afterwards before making the journey home again. All in all, a good family time.


On Saturday evening we went to the Vigil Mass at St Mary's, 'The Hidden Gem' and were amused when the celebrant suddenly remembered that they were not exchanging the sign of peace anymore (because of the dreaded Swine Flu). He had got as far as saying, 'let us now offer one another a sign of peace' when he suddenly remembered and shouted, 'No, no stop! We're not doing that anymore'. I know we weren't the only ones who found this amusing.

There were broad smiles and exchanged looks of amusement all around us; in a way that was the sign of peace for us at that particular Mass. By the way, Holy Communion under one species only too. In our home parish we still have Holy Communion under both kinds and exchange the sign of peace in the usual way. Interesting.

Retirement . . .

Once upon a time, we had a dining room . . . then my husband retired . . . or did he just re-locate his office? !

Well, he has until Christmas to sort it out (luckily we have a nice big kitchen we usually eat in) - I'll keep you posted!

I didn't know that . . .

I don't usually blog about the family as they are very keen not to have their privacy invaded, and I respect that (shame though it is, as I could blog forever about silly little family incidents :-)).

Today, however, the Paterfamilias has a special birthday and I had intended to say it was the day that he qualifies for his bus pass.

I thought I'd have a look on the council web site and see if he could apply online. It was then I discovered that from April of last year both men and women qualified for free bus transport from the age of 60 (equality of the sexes and all that).

Oops, I don't know how I'm going to break it to him that he could have been swanning off all over the place absolutely gratis for over a year!

That's my boy!

Oh I did have fun teasing number one son when his photo appeared on the front cover of our diocesan newspaper this month! I'm only just posting it now as I've been waiting for the online version to be posted on our diocesan website. I had scanned the photo in the newspaper but it really wasn't good enough to use.

I know it's really a picture of our bishop mixing the perfume and the oil to make the chrism at the Chrism Mass but there's no denying that is definitely our eldest standing there holding the book, as large as life.

It's a while ago now, of course, but it was a beautiful Mass and very moving to see so many of our clergy together in one place and reaffirming the promises they made at ordination. It's so encouraging for the rest of us 'ordinary folk in the pews.'

Family matters . . .

. . . and families matter too, don't they?

We had a great Bank Holiday weekend, starting off with some good friends round for dinner on Saturday evening and then number two son coming down on Sunday to collect his laptop. He was only here for just 24 hours but it was lovely to be all together again even for that short time.

I was as excited as he was (or, maybe more so) about looking at the new super-duper laptop. How I managed to resist the temptation of setting it up before he was able to collect it, I don't know. It was a bit like knowing that there was an early Christmas present in a cupboard that I wasn't allowed to open until Christmas morning.

The paterfamilias spent a large part of Sunday attacking the grass in the back garden with a scarifier borrowed from a colleague to 'wage war' on the now defunct moss and weeds which make up our euphemistically named 'lawn'. He had already had a 'death to weeds' day a little while ago attacking them with chemicals (sorry, not very organic, I'm afraid).

I think he would have loved to have a 'toy' like this at his disposal - the Sioux Weed Eliminator - the name says it all, I think!

Talk about ' boys' toys'.

A busy weekend ...

It's going to be a busy weekend but hopefully good fun.

Tomorrow I'm going on another 'Works Outing' with a girlfriend to see the Grand Designs (of Kevin McCloud fame) exhibition in London.

It should be very entertaining seeing how 'the other half' live and drooling over all the super new products and maybe laughing at some of the ideas over coffee and chat - at least I hope there'll be plenty of time and places for that very important ingredient in a Girls' Day Out. I expect the Paterfamilias is already bracing himself for my return full of 'great ideas' of things to do to our own humble abode.

I hope the coach is more or less on schedule. We need to go to the Vigil Mass so that we can get away early on Sunday morning as we're off to Nottingham at the crack of dawn - well about 8 O'clock at least - to drive northwards to see some of our family who have other relatives visiting from overseas so there'll be quite a few of us, adults and children. Then back again the same day so we'll probably be worn out by the time we get home.

Manchester and back ...

We had a great weekend in Manchester. The journey up was one of the best we've ever had - no traffic problems at all and lovely sunny weather most of the way.

We had a bit of trouble finding St Mary's (the Hidden Gem) for Mass on Saturday evening and missed the opening prayer (I hate being late for Mass!).

Even though we've been there several times now, we don't know the city well enough to find the church easily from wherever we manage to find a space to park. You wouldn't believe how many people we asked and nobody had a clue (and they weren't ALL strangers either - I was thinking, 'look for middle-aged women to ask - they're the most likely to know!').

I used to think Manchester was a stronghold of Catholicism! In the end a young couple (Eastern European judging by their accents) who had seen us approaching several people and getting further and further away from the church incidentally, took pity on us and said if we were going to Mass at the church so were they and so we followed them.

I must say it is very well named - the HIDDEN Gem!

After a lovely Mass we met up with number 2 son and went to the Curry Mile for a fantastic curry and a lovely relaxed evening together chatting and catching up with one another's news.

On Sunday we went for a good long walk at Chorlton Water Park - so many energetic people - I think half of Manchester was out running on Sunday morning. We didn't want to go too far out of town as we were going for lunch in the city centre at Malmaison - another success.

Sad to say farewell but hopefully it won't be too long before it's our son's turn to make the journey home down South for a weekend.

The journey back was a bit busier (everyone returning from visiting their mothers on Mother's Day perhaps?) but we still managed it in about 4 hours driving time which is quite good.

Back to normal today and catching up with washing and ironing etc. It's amazing how being away for just two days can make you so behind with the chores, isn't it?

No 'posh nosh' for this Mum after all ...

Well, that was short lived! I was looking forward to trying out the smart Italian restaurant near us on Mother's Day with the paterfamilias but we've had a change of plans . . .

Number 2 son has now informed us that although he can't come home to the bosom of his family that weekend (sob ...), he would quite like it if we could travel up to Manchester and see him.

Actually this will fit in quite well as it's also his birthday at the end of the month and we wouldn't be able to see him anywhere near the date otherwise so it's all worked out in the end. Shame that number one son won't be able to join us as he'll be away elsewhere that weekend but he'll be enjoying himself on his holiday so not to worry.

Mind, you I'm not letting you-know-who forget about the meal at you-know-where at some other time. Especially with food like this on the menu!