Well we had a lovely visit from Mark and Monica, it was great to catch up with them! I missed out on Monday when they took Monica on the legendary Fish trail that Hull has to offer, stopping off at the Wilberforce museum and the Streetlife museum (where the coach ride was not working!!). It was also Leona's first fish trail so she was very excited too :o)

On Tuesday after a lazy morning we headed over to Beverly to check out the minster and also popped into St Mary's. On the way home we thought we would head through the Westwood and through Skidby to see the mill. James managed to get lost which was quite fun but luckily we turned up in a village we had tandemed too back in the day and it was plain sailing from there. Unfortunately the museum was shut but they for to see the cap off the top of the mill which has been removed for renovation (how exciting).

No sooner had they arrived but they were gone but at least they finally got their wedding present :o)

Today is the feast of St Joseph the Worker. St Joseph is the patron of our Parish of St Joseph and the patron saint of fathers and craftsmen and the patron of the Church. He's pretty important.

This evening I gave a talk at the youth group, one of the worst talks I've given in a while. I didn't have time to prepare properly, I didn't make the main point I wanted to make and the points I did make I don't think I made very clearly for the age group I was talking to (8-10 year olds). Oh well, a lesson learned. If it had been the older group it would probably have been okay.

The main point I wanted to make was this: That to a young person the Church seems to be full of two kinds of people, old ladies and priests. It seems like the only way to have any kind of faith or spiritual life is to either be sentimental, drippy and wimpy like a girl or to be religious in a very formal way like a priest or a nun. Those are the options: Act like an old woman, or become a priest or religious. The idea that a man can remain a man and yet find a vocation seems impossible. The only possible options seem to be ordination or castration. Perferably both.

He demonstrates how a man, without acting like a woman, can be holy.

What I like about St Joseph is that he is not a sentimental old lady and not a priest. He doesn't spent his life in Church praying and he isn't a big girl. He's just a bloke, an ordinary bloke. When Mary tells him she's pregnant, we don't read in the Bible that he went away and prayed about it, we read instead that an angel visited him in a dream. That's reassuring, because when ordinary blokes like me find ourselves in awkward situations, we often don't think to go and pray a novena about it. We sleep on it. Zzzz.

As a normal bloke, St Joseph demonstrates that work can be an expression of love. That mowing the lawn and trimming the hedge are just as important a lay pastoral ministry as "inspirational" workshops. This point comes in to sharp focus when you realise that the whole of creation consists of an act of God who is Love. By working hard for our families and creating a stable home, a miniature-universe, a domestic Church for our children, we immitate that act of divine creation and become not mere immitators of God's creation but sharers in his creative ministry.

St Joseph also shows us that even for the man who says "Yes" to God, who has God on his side, who is visited by angels and is taking care of the Son of God and is married to a woman who is without sin, things do not always seem to go well. There is no room at the inn. Jesus goes missing at the temple. If God didn't magically arrange for a room with a bed in Bethlehem, He isn't going to magically arrange my life either. Being a Christian doesn't mean everything goes right from now on.

St Joseph presents us with a vision of what it means to be an ordinary bloke leading the extraordinary life that comes from saying "Yes" to God. It doesn't mean holding hands and singing songs, it means being open to whatever God might be asking us to do and trying to do it. It means working hard and taking personal responsibility for all those in need of our care. It means receiving a share in the creative love of God. It means trying to do what God wants, everything going wrong and then carrying on trying anyway.

If I had said all that, it would have been a better talk.

There is an encyclical letter by Leo XIII on St Joseph called Quamquam Pluries (On Devotion to St Joseph) and also an apostolic exhortation from Pope John Paul II enitled Redemptoris Custos (On the Person and Mission of Saint Joseph in the Life of Christ and of the Church). The latter is excellent.

Of course, there's always Wikipedia and Catholic Encyclopedia if you want more.

If I had written this, people would say I was just being a fundamentalist blogger. Can you guess who did write it?

A clue: It wasn't the Pope...

Yes, I really believe that God is still calling many to priesthood and the religious life. He is still choosing men and women to serve in a spirit of thankful self-giving and with an uncompromising desire to follow and live out the gospel. However, I would say that the secular and spiritual climate generated by our culture is not favourable to these vocations, nor do they nurture a free and mature response to the call. Here I am not just talking about the wider society; I am talking about the Church, and the particular Church in this diocese of Middlesbrough. It is from our own that priests and religious will come, from our own diocese, from our own parishes, from our own families, from our own sons and daughters. It is we who will create a culture favourable to responding to God’s call; no-one else.

First they say : "the secular and spiritual climate generated by our culture is not favourable to these vocations" and we're all thinking.. okay, everybody knows we live in a bad culture, turn on the TV and it's all sex and violence.

Then they say: "Here I am not just talking about the wider society; I am talking about the Church, and the particular Church in this diocese of Middlesbrough."

Translation: The culture in our Church in this diocese of Middlesbrough generates a secular and spiritual climate which is not favourable to vocations...

Harsh.

So who wrote it?

I just want to encourage all my readers (both of you) to get yourself over to Laurence England's blog to read about the situation he is facing in Brighton.

He needs all our prayers and support.

Go

Many thanks to Fr Tim Finigan who has nominated me for Best Church Militant in the cannonball blog awards.

Are you aware that, with him being a priest and all, it's actually a sin if you don't vote for me?

(that may not actually be true)

Remember that in this context "militant" doesn't mean "violent", in theological terms it just means "alive and wandering around" I think. Basically what they are saying is that I do stuff from time.

What have I been up to?

I gave everybody the heads up on Reclaiming the Future which was picked up by Damien Thompson and the Catholic Herald.

In response to the eternal LiveSimply project (let's celebrate the 40th Anniversary of Populorum Progressio for four years) I set up a LiveChastely campaign for the 40th Anniversary of Humanae Vitae and got a couple of hundred people to Promise to LiveChastely (it's not too late to do that yourself).

Last month I went on The Big Questions on TV and defended Pope Benedict in what was later described as A Bear Pit and prompted Jackie Parkes to nominate me for Catholic man of the year... I understood she has also written to Rome asking for an indult allowing me to polygamously marry all of her daughters as soon as they come of age. No Jackie. No. Wone woman is enough for me!

It's not all rock and roll though, I also cut the grass and trim the hedge at our Church (though not as often as Fr Massie would like) and at home I spend time "listening" (you men know what I'm talking about) and wiping bottoms.

Anyway...

Pick Me! Pick Me!

Last Sunday was the "World Day of Prayer for Vocations to Priesthood and to the Consecrated Life" and our Bishop sent out a pastoral letter to mark the occasion. Yes, that's right. It was Bishop Terence Drainey who wrote:

I would say that the secular and spiritual climate generated by our culture is not favourable to these vocations, nor do they nurture a free and mature response to the call. Here I am not just talking about the wider society; I am talking about the Church, and the particular Church in this diocese of Middlesbrough.

Damning words, but he didn't stop there. He also wrote...

why are we talking about a vocation’s crisis?

...

The crisis, if there is one, is of lack of response, spiritual deafness, lack of trust in God’s providence and an inability to recognise the values of the Kingdom of God in our world.

Ouch!

Combine those two statements and you have stunning indictment of our diocese. A crisis of spiritual deafness, of lack of trust, of an inability to recognise the values of the Kingdom of God. A culture that is not favourable to vocations. Not the secular culture of the world we live in, but the culture in this diocese.

If this was your house, you would have to sell it as an "investment opportunity". Somebody would need to rip out all the floors, re-wire the electrics and re-plaster the walls. Whole thing will have to be redone. It would certainly require drastic action.

I wonder what he will do?

Contratulations to Laurence England who today looked death in the eye. The Dastardly Dr Death that is..

Everybody! I met Dr Death! Not only did I meet him, but I told him to his face that what he was doing was irresponsible, in selling kits to test the strength of banned drugs brought into the country illegally from Mexico, in order for people to kill themselves. He claimed that his stance on suicide was 'neutral'. I told him that the kits were hardly going to be used in order not to commit suicide. He denied he was 'promoting' suicide, even though seemingly every waking moment he has, he is thinking of new ways people can top themselves. I somehow managed to gain access to the meeting even though it was advertised on the radio as being for over 50's only. I was asked no question on entry nor was I asked in the meeting to leave because I was too young. There were other 30-somethings there too. What a gigantic fibber he is!

After the talk, I told ABC news, BBC South Today and guys from The Argus, that I thought he was reckless and that his presence in a venue three doors down from the YMCA was scandalous. I don't know whether I was on TV in the US, or in the UK on South Today, but I did get my quote and picture in The Argus. This is just the beginning! I have decided that if people like Nitschke are going to shameless promote themselves and their views, then I might as well do it too...and what is more, at least I'll be preaching the Faith of Christ and defending the sanctity and value of human life!

[link]

These bloggers eh? Hiding behind their keyboards naming and shaming people.

I really think Laurence ought to have written to Dr Nitschke in private, after all, it was a private workshop. Publicly advertised yes, but a finite number of people were present and it wasn't everybody so it would be wrong to publicly disagree with anything that was said there.

Not!

Well done Laurence, I owe you a beer.

"The CWL meeting on Monday next will start with a Eucharistic Service beginning at 7.15 pm for the World Union of Catholic Women's Organisation. It will be followed by an open meeting."

[link]

I remain confused regarding "Eucharistic Services", my wife was at a training day for Extraordinary Ministers and a lady asked if training would be given on how to lead a "Eucharistic Service". She was told in no uncertain terms in front of everybody by the Diocesan MC that training would not be given because "they should not be happening".

Yet they continue to happen.

I know quite a few of the ladies of the Catholic Women's League and they are wonderful, this blog entry is not a complaint against them. This is a complaint against the diocesan authorities who allow wonderful people like the Catholic Women's League to be so mislead that this sort of confusion happens.

By failing to provide clear guidelines on the use of Eucharistic Services and failing to make any kind of public response when such services take place with alarming regularity the diocese leave on the minds of most of the faithful the impression that such services are okay. That there has been some kind of "change" and from now on laypeople can lead a kind of substitute for Mass whenever it is inconvenient to find a priest.

Please can we have a clear statement on whether these services are allowed, in what circumstances and what form they should take. To not provide such a statement is deeply unfair to good people like the ladies of the Catholic Women's League who in following the example of local clergy unnessarily risk gaining a reputation as crazy-womynpriest type people.

I have been asked to publicise the following event which looks awesome and remarkably cheap for a three day retreat...

During the weekend of the 18-20 September 2009. Young Catholic Adults (YCA are part of the international Juventutem Federation) will be running a Traditional Retreat at Douai Abbey in the south of England, the weekend will be led by Juventutem Ecclesiastical Assistant Fr de Malleray. Douai Abbey, situated on high ground in the Berkshire countryside provides an ideal setting for quiet reflection, retreats and for conferences. One of the comments frequently made about Douai is that it offers an environment and atmosphere of peace and serenity, where the cares of daily life can be left behind.

Hospitality has been a special concern of monasteries from the earliest times. St Benedict teaches in the Rule "All guests are to be welcomed as Christ". All rooms are fully en-suite offering accommodation for guests in the Bl Hugh Faringdon , St Alban Roe and the St Benet Biscop buildings. For the first time Young Catholic Adults will be using the main Abbey Church for a Missa Cantata, sung by the Douai Singers.

Places are limited so please book early

-YCA will have half of the whole retreat centre to itself
-There will be a social in the evening
- Fr. de Malleray FSSP head of Juventutem will preach the retreat, all Masses will be in the Extraordinary form
- There will be a Sung Mass (Missa Canta) on Saturday 19th September 09’ at 10am. The choir will be the Douai Singers, in the main Abbey Church, followed by a Marian Procession at 11am (starting from the main Abbey Church) around the extensive grounds of the Abbey (weather permitting, if the weather is poor there will be Marian devotions in the main Abbey Church)
-The weekend will be full-board (except for the Sunday lunch)

How to book

The cost of the weekend will be from as little as 25 pounds for students (or 48-88 pounds for non students) for more details, please see http://www.youngcatholicadults.co.uk/news.htm or email juventutemcatholicam@yahoo.co.uk; or ring 07908105787.

Events Open to the Public

The Sung Mass (Missa Canta) on Saturday 19th September 09’ at 10am followed by a Marian Procession around the extensive grounds of the Abbey at 11am (starting from the main Abbey Church) are open to the public.

There are also a few rooms allocated for all age groups (not just YCA) so please book soon.

There are limited places so please reserve your place early!

Oddly, I've never heard of the Young Catholic Adults but I'm reassured that...

Young Catholic Adults was founded in February 2004 at Oxford in the UK. It is a national lay movement that actively engages in rebuilding the Church and restoring all things in Christ. YCA are loyal to the Magisterium and faithful to John Paul II's teaching with regard to Ecclesia Dei (1988).. In 2007 YCA joined the international Juventutem Federation http://www.juventutem.org/pages/en/home.php

Cyanide and Happiness is a terrible, terrible comic which no decent upstanding person should read (no really). I read it every day.

If you live in the Diocese of Middlesbrough you might like to help Margaret Turnham with her PHD in Church History.

Margaret Turnham is studying for her PhD in Church History. She is undertaking a study about the Spiritual experiences of us catholics in the Diocese of Middlesbrough and she needs your help!

Would you please take time to download and complete the survey below and return it to her.

[link]

As the tasteful pregnancy countdown (above) put's it, the baby should be here by now!

The baby is not here.

You know that phrase about "you'd be late to your own funeral", child number two is late to their own birth! They will regret this for the rest of their life though when they have to wait longer for birthday presents. Ha!

In the meantime, don't forget to say a quick prayer. The first moments of a human life are the most riskiest (the last moments are quite iffy as well). We've no reason to believe that anything will go wrong, but it wouldn't hurt to pray that Ella and the new baby all get through this in one piece.

We'll let you know as and when we have some news.

In case you were wondering...

96.9 Viking FM is the local radio station around these parts, it's the cool one for cool kids. You know how it is, there's the local BBC radio station (Radio Humberside) for sensible boring grownups and then there's the local commercial (does it for money) radio station that caters to young people who like more music and less talking. Radio Humberside is the one that Fr Massie appears on from time to time talking about religion.

When Viking FM (the cool one) wanted to do a feature on the Eurovision Song Contest do you think you got in touch with Fr Massie? Nope. They wanted somebody cool so they got in touch with me of course. They had been online looking for somebody to talk about Eurovision parties in Hull and they found my blog entry about our legendary Eurovision party (founded by Zosia in 2005 I think). They invited us in to the studio to talk about it but alas, Ella was supposed to be having a baby (no news yet) so we declined. This years Eurovision party is cancelled.

Ella and I are watching Eurovision alone this year (as alone as you can be with a toddler and an unborn child) and wondering if any of the nations will have a song to trigger the arrival of our new baby.

Update: They haven't finished counting the scores yet but man that was a poor year. Where was the fun?

Ella began the first stages of labour in the early hours of this morning, just gone midnight. She got to hospital at about 4am and gave birth at 6:30am to a beautiful baby girl. Mum and baby are both happy and healthy.

Don't ask about names!

More information and pictures when I get a moment...

Here is our latest arrival... and she has name and not even a week old. So here is Joanne Marie Preece:

We were thinking John for a boy and had no real girl options, we liked John because of family ties, then there is John of Beverley and John Fisher to mention a few, then when she was born on not only the feast of Pope John I and the birthday of John Paul II it seemed that John was meant to be... and therefore Joanne, as in Joannes Paulus II, meaning we now have two papal children.

It all began way back on Monday morning quite liturally bang on midnight was the first real contraction but it was time to ring the hospital at 3am when you are at your lowest ebb :o) (I had to go in early, um, no pun intended)

Arrived there at 4:15 by the time we had baby sitters etc. I had to go on a horrible drip which hurt! By just gone 6, the midwife would not let me have any gas and air! after 15 min I sent James back out to ask for it as I personally felt that I would pass out with out any form of pain relief by this point! She let me have it and by 6:30 the baby was here! It was all quite quick really, I felt a bit thrown!

Unfortunately the baby arrived too quickly and had to have IV antibiotics becuase I did not have enough and so we were in hospital for a futher two days :o(

James was not able to visit me so much this time so I had to wile away the time watching the other ladys husbands come to visit them while I read a bit of Fr Brown.

Leona seemed to like the new baby and so far has taken to her well with hugs and kisses, and helping passing the cotton ball for bum wiping :o) she is also taking the oppertunity to carry on pushing the odd boundry but I am sure she will soon work out that it does not work on us mean parents :o)

Many thanks to everybody who sent cards, presents, good wishes and prayers. All are very much appreciated.

Now I'm off to get some rest... ha!

I've just seen the sad news that Catholic Action UK are shutting down their news service because they don't have time to keep up with everything.

I just wanted to thank Hercules and co for the brilliant contribution they have made to the world of blogging these last few years. The internet will be worse place without you.

Have noticed in the comments and just wanted to give a word of congratulations to Mary Lewis who had a baby boy on 30th April and also to Matthew and Wendy Doyle who have recently had a positive pregnancy test.

I would also like to mention the couple at our Parish who had a little boy last week (not sure I should mention names) congratulations to them as well.

Naming a child is one of the most surreal things I have ever had to do. People are not named, they just have names surely?

Anyway, I thought you might appreciate this timely episode of Dinosar Comics

We have a new Archbishop of Westminster. Lar-di-dar. I can't honestly say I give a monkeys. I've tried getting excited about it but I really can't. Maybe it's because Archbishop Vincent Nichols has been instrumental in making sure that my daughters will be shown a diagram of a penis before their ninth birthday whether I like it or not.

I consider this a serious betrayal of Catholic parents.

Rule of thumb: If it seems inappropriate to put something in a thought bubble above an Archbishop's head, then it's probably inapropriate to show it to little girls without their parents consent. Got it? Good.

That's not a picture I lifted from Google by the way, that's the actual diagram from the "All That I Am" materials that Archbishop Nichols approved. More on this from the Indomitable Jackie Parkes

I hope and pray that Archbishop Nichols proves me wrong, that he turns out to be instrumental in leading a genuine reform of the culture in the Church in England and Wales, but my guess is that he's going to do absolutely nothing except provide my own Bishop with a convenient excuse for deferring his own responsibility for Catholic education elsewhere.

Or and I just being ungenerous?

The Pontifical Council for the Family says...

Each child is a unique and unrepeatable person and must receive individualized formation. Since parents know, understand and love each of their children in their uniqueness, they are in the best position to decide what the appropriate time is for providing a variety of information, according to their children's physical and spiritual growth. No one can take this capacity for discernment away from conscientious parents.

Each child's process of maturation as a person is different. Therefore, the most intimate aspects, whether biological or emotional, should be communicated in a personalized dialogue. In their dialogue with each child, with love and trust, parents communicate something about their own self-giving which makes them capable of giving witness to aspects of the emotional dimension of sexuality that could not be transmitted in other ways.

[link]

Individualized formation.

Parents decide the appropriate time, no one can take this capacity away.

Intimate aspects communicated in a personalized dialogue.

Does that sound even close to what happens in so called "Catholic" schools today?

Okay, so yesterday it rained and it was cold outside and for some reason our central heating never came on and the house was freeeezing until I realised that the thermostat was set really low. Did one of us knock it? did Leona do it? who knows... I whizzed it up to get the heating on again.

I whizzed it too high. Today it was lovely sunny weather outside and we had some errands to do in town including registering Joanne's birth during which we got a £25 parking fine because we are both like zombies right now and didn't notice that you have to pay to park near the registry office. We also collected nine-hundred 6x4" prints from the boots photo counter and bought some envelopes. Anyway, while we were out doing our errands the heating came on and attempted to heat the house to the astronomically high temperature I had set on the thermostat. We came home to the kind of conditions usually associated with the Sahara desert. As other parents might know (we didn't), babies and toddlers don't sleep well on hot nights.

Ella is very tired, so having opened every window upstairs I am now sat downstairs at 1am with the ten day old girl trying to keep her settled while Ella sleeps and reading the web to avoid boredom.

These are the sort of conditions under which one discovers things like this...

How did I not know about this already?

No wait...

ROME, MAY 28, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Laypeople are not merely the clergy's collaborators, but rather share in the responsibility of the Church's ministry, says Benedict XVI.

The Pope called on the laity to become more aware of their role when he inaugurated Tuesday an ecclesial conference for the Diocese of Rome on "Church Membership and Pastoral Co-responsibility." The conference is under way through Friday.

"There should be a renewed becoming aware of our being Church and of the pastoral co-responsibility that, in the name of Christ, all of us are called to carry out," the Holy Father said. This co-responsibility should advance "respect for vocations and for the functions of consecrated persons and laypeople," he added.

The Pontiff acknowledged that this requires a "change of mentality," especially regarding laypeople, shifting from "considering themselves collaborators of the clergy to recognizing themselves truly as 'co-responsible' for the being and action of the Church, favoring the consolidation of a mature and committed laity."

[link]

Don't misinterpret this: "shared responsibility" is not the same as "shared power" or "shared authority".

What shared responsibility means is that if we have priests and laity who are doing things they shouldn't and bishops who won't do anything about it then we have the responsibility to do whatever we can about it.

If I were stranded on a desert island and I could only take one blog with me to read (yeah, I know how unlikely that scenario is) I know definitely which one it would be. You can keep your Fr Z's and your Hermeneuticalnesses. The single most best Catholic blog in the world ever is that of John C Wright.

John is a Science Fiction writer who converted from Atheism to Catholicism around a year ago (ish) I particularly enjoyed a recent blog entry on Nihilism which I am going to inflict on you now...

To use another movie example, when Neo, that puny Jesus of the third Matrix movie, is asked by Agent Smith why life is worth living and truth and justice and the American Way is worth fighting and dying to preserve, Neo (since he is a modern new-Age new type of post modern fellow—hence his name) cannot answer that life is sacred since Man is made in the image of God, and endowed with certain inalienable rights. Neo, being modern, cannot answer that we hold these truths to be self-evident. Modern men are too cool and hep to believe in truth or to consider evidence. Truth and evidence is for squares! (We space hippies call such creatures of reason and natural reason “Herbert”).

No, indeed, the only thing neo enough for way cool hepcat Neo to announce as his reason for living and dying is “Because I chose to!”

This is the manifesto of nihilism:

Nothing means anything except by force of the personal willpower of my wonderful all-important wonderful self-actualized self-expressing selfhood. Hurrah, me! A meaningless meat machine whose death means nothing can be meaningful to me because, as the God of my personal cosmos inside my own tiny skull, I let is be so decreed by fiat. Life is sacred because ME SAID SO!

The line is delivered with stirring crescendo is background music, and I assume the movie director wanted the audience to cheer. I giggled in embarrassment and immediately wrote a check to Agent Smith for President political action committee.

Nihilist defiance is one way of smoothing out the jar between thinking human life is nothing but a collection of atoms blown together like a sand-dune by the blind winds for a brief moment, long enough to admire the stars in their elfin beauty, before the wind changes quarter, and you are dispersed like you never were; and thinking human life is sacrosanct.

But it is a way that my judgment (my illative sense) condemns as absurd and illogical.

My judgment condemns nihilist defiance of The Abyss because it is meaning to defy something that cannot notice you. It does nothing and changes nothing. Neo cannot make life, truth and justice sacred in an indifferent cosmos merely by an act of will. If he could, Agent Smith could, with an equal act of will, make death, lies and injustice sacred instead.

You cannot make the meaningless have ultimate and sacred meaning merely because you say so. Reality is not plastic. You do not have a magic ring, and even if you grit your teeth and are unafraid, you cannot change reality. Neverneverland is not an option.

Oddly enough, this is the exact same argument the agnostics and Nihilists use to dismiss religion. The difference is, what they call my wishful thinking posits that I am recognizing a reality that exists outside myself, and that these properties are true whether I wish it or not. What I call their wishful thinking posits that no reality exists outside themselves, and their reality would wink out like a snuffed candle if they were run over by a streetcar. But if the word “reality” does not mean that which wishful thinking cannot change, then the word has no meaning.

To cleave to God is an act of faith, or, if you prefer, a gift of divine grace. It is like the sun, at which we cannot stare lest our eyes be dazzled: an inexplicable mystery. However, this mystery casts a light that shows all other things in sharp relief, so that all lesser mysteries are resolved. We know whence we come and where we are going. We know the meaning of life and why things are as they are and not some other way.

It may be a hard thing to accept. Let us not mince words: to believe God became Man and suffered and died for our sins and rose again drawing all men to Him is ridiculous, scandalous, and foolishness. And yet, if we accept this foolishness, everything else in life becomes not foolish at all, not absurd, not meaningless. Life makes sense, suffering can be endured, the grave not move us to terror, the poor and weak not move us to contempt. We will have something to say to Agent Smith, or to the Accuser who accused Job, if he demands of us to account for ourselves and our life: and what we say will be clear and piercing as a trumpet blast, as quiet and significant as a whispered promise from a lover, not some mere garble of postmodern nonsense, the caw of a proud and ugly crow. We will speak the truth because it is true, not because mere wishing makes it so.

[link]

I'm sure I don't have to remind you of the terrible decline in vocations to the Bishophood. Back in the olden days most Catholic diocese had a single Bishop while now this figure has plummeted, in our diocese we now have to get by with only one.

The scale of this calamity can be seen in the measures that have been imposed, such as the new way of grouping parishes for the purposes of confirmation. When I was confirmed it didn't happen every year but the Bishop was able to confirm candidates in their own parish. Now of course, with the number of Bishops having fallen so dramatically, confirmations are grouped so that the candidates from parishes across the city are confirmed in a single location.

Which is just rubbish.

Everybody knows it's rubbish, all the priests I have spoken to would prefer to have confirmations every few years in the home parish, all the parents and extended families I spoke to at last years bulk confirmation lamented it and said it was a shame.

Update:

It has been pointed out to me that this blog entry may be a bit on the harsh side and that Bishop Drainey might have good reason for devoting less time to doing confirmations, e.g. in order to do more thorough parish visitations. Fair enough.

It was also suggested that as Bishop Drainey is the Bishop then if I don't like his decisions I should keep quiet about it. How is that working for them over in Ireland?

This even is just a stones throw away from us...

As part of the effort to "Pray for Peace in the Holy Land", Sister Catherine invites you to join her to build a Cairn for Peace in the grounds of the Endsleigh Centre at 3 pm on Friday, June 5th. Come along and Bring a stone!

[link]

I like how "Pray for Peace in the Holy Land" is in quotes.

I hope you will all pile in because this event will rock. This is slated to be the event of the year and will be a marbleous occasion. If it goes wrong they will just have to chalk it up to experience. If it goes well maybe they will get in the igneous book of records.

My granite was who said she liked a good cairn.

As always, I am waiting with eager anticipation for your puns. A special challenge us to see if you can use puns on the words Sedimentary, Igneous, and Metamorphic all in one sentence.