Joanna Bogle visits

The well-known Catholic columnist and author, Joanna Bogle, joined us for Mass on Sunday 23rd December 2007 and spoke to the parents of our First Communion candidates about celebrating Catholic traditions in the home. This was very appropriate with the feast of Christmas just days away. Joanna painted a lovely picture of the Church's liturgical year, illustrating some customs that are very English but not much observed today since the Reformation, and others that are prevalent in other cultures, such as putting the initials CMB above door lintels at Epiphany, the initials signifying the supposed names of the Three Wise Men, Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar, who were guided to Bethlehem by a star.

A not particularly good photo of Joanna in full flight.

All parents said how much they enjoyed Joanna's entertaining talk.

Here Joanna poses with the Ebenebe and Horgan families

Joannal also promoted here book A Yearbook of Seasons and Celebrations, Gracewing (2007), ISBN 978 0 85244 129 9. The book goes through the Church's seasons of Advent, Christmas, Lent, Easter, as well as saints days and seasons such as Midsummer and Autumn.

You can find it at Amazon. If you order it via my other blog, the parish can benefit from a referal fee.

Joanna has her own blog too. Why not visit it?

Evelyn Leonard's Funeral Mass

Evelyn - the Angel of the North! (atop a hill in Northumberland)

Further to my previous post, the funeral Mass was today celebrated with a packed church - there were probably approaching two hundred people present. The majority would have been Anglicans (Evelyn was only received into the Catholic two years ago). Two were anglican ministers (there would have been a third but he had been misinformed as to the time.)

The choir did a grand job with the music. Hymns were "Praise my soul," "The angel Gabriel," "O come all ye faithful," "May the choirs of angels." In addition they sang the Kyrie, Sanctus, Agnus Dei and Lux aeterna from the Missa pro defunctis and a setting of Psalm 22(23) "The Lord is my shepherd" from The Complete Responsorial Psalm Psalter. The coffin was, as usual, removed accompanied with the singing of the In paradisum.

My homily can be read here. A tribute from the family (which was not read out but made available for people to take as they left the church) can be read here.