Forgiving those who have hurt us

In the Gospel today, we have heard all about forgiveness, determination, finding and losing.  It’s also about the joy of finding.  I know what that is because I’m always losing things, but this was much more than that.  It was about finding peace and joy through forgiveness; it was about repentant sinners coming back to God.  I loved it.

Let me tell you about one repentant sinner who came back to God. This took place many years ago when I was a child, and it actually happened through someone in our parish.

I wasn’t allowed at that time to read lurid headlines in the press, so this is secondhand knowledge. My mother believed that our minds should not be clogged up by bad things when we were too young to understand them.  St. Paul would have loved my mother. Remember, he told the Phillippians to fill their minds with everything that was good?  Well, that was my mother too. So when this terrible thing happened to one of our neighbours, and a friend of ours, I wasn’t aware of it  at first, even though I went to the shop for the Sunday paper and it was all on the front page!!

It gradually became a topic of conversation with the women around the district, and of course I picked it up!  It was terrible.  The eldest daughter of the family was murdered violently in London, and the police were seeking the murderer.  She was the housekeeper for an exiled European king, and moved in exalted circles. 

But there was political unrest and a man apparently broke into their quarters in Knightsbridge or somewhere like that, and shot this young woman dead in the general melee. Why,  I don’t know, and it doesn’t matter. We didn’t know her as she was much older and had left home many years before. But she was local, and we all knew the family.  They were lovely, and it was a terrible sorrow for them. The whole area was agog with the horror of it.

Eventually someone was charged with her murder, tried and condemned to death.  In those days they still had the death penalty for murder.  Everyone breathed a sigh of relief that at least something had been done to find justice for Mary’s death. All that is, except one person – her mother.

 She was in her sixties,  I think. You aren’t good at ages when you’re young are you, but she must have been, because they had a large family; quite a few of them grown-up and independent of the family.  This woman who came from a small village in the North of Ireland, and had probably not moved out much from the big family house she had in Liverpool, decided she was going to visit her daughter’s murderer who was awaiting his execution in Pentonville prison. And that is what she did.

She had to fight her way through all the red tape to get there.  Eventually permission was granted, but of course she would have been closely guarded there in case she had come for her own version of justice!  But what she told this condemned man was that she and the family forgave him unreservedly for Mary’s death, that they did not hold it against him even though it was absolutely devastating for them, and that they would pray for him.. He wept and reputedly, so did she. 

 Before his death  I think he came back to God.  It took an elderly lady with no knowledge of London or the prison system of the time to bring that about.

She never got recognition for it, as far as I know, but she didn’t ask for it, or need it. 

She had God’s approval, and that is all that mattered.  When I saw those moving pictures of the late Pope with his would-be-murderer, I thought of that lady too. Aren’t we blessed with wonderful role models, in spite of all the bad things we hear.  Have a good week!

 

Follow Me!

Yesterday we were asked to put a special emphasis on what it means to be called by Christ to live fully.  That doesn’t mean what many people think it does, for example, what we sometimes call ‘living it up’ – having a good time while the money lasts, having as much fun as we can.  At least what we call fun until the headache kicks in! 

What Jesus meant was to live a meaningful Christian life, allowing the Holy Spirit to guide our choices in life, being in touch with ourselves through prayer and the sacraments, reaching out to the poor and the disenfranchised, taking each day as a gift rather than a burden to be endured.  That was how he himself lived.

Remember the Gospel passages when the first disciples met Jesus?  They are so simple, and yet so inspiring.  Let’s look at John Chapter 1 v. 29 - -34

The next day, seeing Jesus coming towards him, John said: ”Look, there is the lamb of God.”  Hearing this, the two disciples followed Jesus.  Jesus turned round, saw them following, and said “What do you want?”  They answered “Rabbi” – which means teacher – “ where do you live?” “Come and see”! he replied.  So they went and saw where he lived, and stayed with him the rest of that day.

So begins the story of the calling of the first two apostles. What did they do?  They spent time with Jesus, got to know him a little, loved it and immediately told their friends about it.  One of them was called Andrew and we know that he rushed out and told his brother Simon Peter, not in words we might have expected him to use like “We stayed with that preacher called Jesus – you remember him – he comes from Nazareth – and it was great. He really has something!”  but simply “we have found the Messiah”.  Then he took his big brother to meet Jesus.  The rest of the story is history....

See yourself watching that scene – the early morning sun shining down on the sea of Galilee, the fishing nets drying on the shore nearby, the small fishing boats dotted around, John the Baptist pointing out Jesus as he passed and the two disciples following him to where he was living at the time...   See Jesus turn and smile at you, including you in that invitation, “Come and see!” You follow him, perhaps a little hesitatingly, and he encourages you, asking you to tell him about yourself.  He seems so interested as if you were the only one in the world, not just a number but a person whom he loves and who matters to him.  Feel your own eagerness to talk to him and to tell him what you have been doing with your life and what your hopes and dreams are, and see his smile of encouragement.  Receive his blessing before you part company, and then realise that he is with you on the way back home, he is with you always even though you can no longer see him.

Ask yourself: “What does Jesus really want me to do with my life?”  After all you only have one life, so it is a serious matter how you spend it. Perhaps he wants you to marry and bring up a family – perhaps he wants you to find him in your work, by staying unmarried so that you can witness through your single status to what St. Paul  calls “ an undivided attention to the Lord’s affairs.”

Perhaps Jesus is calling you to be a priest or a Sister – that could be as he always calls us  in different ways to serve the Church and to build it up in love.  Pray earnestly that you find out your particular path and then, when you have an idea of what it might be, follow it up by asking the right people about it, by “coming and seeing” as Jesus put it.  It may turn out to be what he wants of you, or it may not.  You’ll never know if you ignore it, or try to follow what you want and not what he wants for you.  They are two different things!!

Let’s resolve to pray not only for ourselves but for others that the Church may be “one whole Christ loving the Father.”   That was Jesus’ dream.  It comes at a cost. 

Meditate on this wonderful hymn and see if you can answer the questions he asks.

Here are the words of The Summons (Will You Come and Follow Me) :

WILL YOU COME AND FOLLOW ME

Will you come and follow me if I but call your name?
Will you go where you don’t know and never be the same?
Will you let my love be shown, will you let my name be known
Will you let my life be grown in you, and you in me?

Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name?
Will you care for cruel and kind and never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare should your life attract or scare?
Will you let me answer prayer in you, and you in me?

 Will you let the blinded see if I but call your name?

Will you set the prisoners free and never be the same?

Will you kiss the leper clean, and do such as this unseen

and admit to what I mean in you, and you in me?

Will you love the “you” you hide if I but call your name?
Will you quell the fear inside, and never be the same?
Will you use the faith you’ve found to re-shape the world around
through my sight and touch and sound in you, and you in me?

Lord, your summons echoes true when you but call my name.
Let me turn and follow you and never be the same.
In your company I’ll go where your love and footsteps show.
Thus I’ll move and live and grow in you, and you in me!
John Bell and Graham Maule.

God bless each of you. We will remember you in our prayers.

The Call of Christ - Vocations Sunday

"Thank God for the blessings of your callling, and let it become more and more precious to you each day."

Mother Magdalen

We are all called by Christ to follow him.  Let us ponder on the way that Christ is leading us even though we each have a unique path they all have the same destination - to Christ.

God will lead us. Pray that we will respond to God's call in our own lives.  Lord, wherever you go I am willing to follow. 

"God is calling all of us to follow him, and to do our best in his service.  The kingdom of God is so close, it is within us. Let us give him a heart wholly his."

Mother Magdalen

For today Pope Benedict XVI has written a letter on vocations:
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/messages/vocations/documents/hf_ben-xvi_mes_20111018_xlix-vocations_en.html

"Every specific vocation is in fact born of the initiative of God; it is a gift of the Love of God! He is the One who takes the “first step”, and not because he has found something good in us, but because of the presence of his own love “poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit” (Rom 5:5)."

PP Benedict XVI

Take a leap of faith. Dive in! Let us allow ourselves to be swept away by the grace of God.

Listen to Steven Curtis Chapman song "Dive" on letting go and jumping in with a leap of faith.

Let us conclude with a prayer:

God created me to do Him some definite service.

He has committed some work to me,

which He has not committed to another.

I have a mission.

I am a link in a chain,

a bond of connection between persons.

Therefore I will trust Him.

Whatever I am, I can never be thrown away.

If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him;

if I am perplexed, my perplexity may serve Him;

if I am in joy, my joy may serve Him;

if I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve him.

He does nothing in vain. He knows what He is about.

Amen.

 (Prayer of Blessed John Henry Newman on Life's Vocations)

Lord Jesus, we entrust to you the young women and men of the world, with all their hopes and aspirations.  Fill them with a love and desire to follow you with a generosity and readiness to respond to the call.

Jesus is beckoning... will you go?  Will you leave "the nets" and follow him?

Lord, give us the courage to say Yes to follow you

and to renew that Yes every day!

Just for Love - In Thanksgiving

This is belated, for which I apologise – but, like wine, thanksgiving keeps, warms and enriches! 

I want to say a fervent ‘thank you’ for your support, interest and prayers for our 140^th year, and particularly for its culmination in the Mass celebrated in Soho on the 11^th February 2012.  Let me tell you a little about it.

St. Patrick’s Church, as you know, is a very special place. It is situated beautifully in Soho Square, and seems to nestle comfortably into the corner of a bustling, lively London Piazza, if there is such a thing – but it has an Italian air about it – a little imposing, but also very welcoming, warm and well-used as most Italian churches seem to be.  Of course its congregation is wide-reaching and international; that gives it a gracious, open feeling, and a sense of the universality of the Church. 

We felt very privileged to celebrate our special anniversary there, particularly as our Foundress and the early Sisters in the Congregation worshipped there.  They walked the wide squares and narrow streets of the area way back in the late nineteenth century, visiting the tenements and crumbling houses which were the places where the poor lived then. Perhaps ‘existed’ might be a better word, for the great facades of the time hid the dirty, fetid, unhealthy rooms where they huddled around a few sticks in a grate – if they were lucky – to warm themselves.

Soho was then a violent, corrupt place, where pimps operated ruthlessly to extort money from the poor women who plied their trade as prostitutes to provide bread and other necessities for their children.  It was to these that Frances Taylor – Mother Magdalen – reached out.  She understood their sense of hopelessness and their fears.  Because she believed passionately in the dignity of each human being, she fought to give back to these young women the self-worth and confidence they had lost.  She gave them a listening ear, a smile, a respect they very much appreciated.  She taught her sisters to do the same, and never to judge them as many others did.

So for us, Soho is a special place.  One of the Convents they lived in is now occupied by the Fox Film Company.  It is right opposite the Church.  I went in there the day after the Mass, and the people who worked there were very interested in our history and in what the early Sisters had done in that building and in the surrounding districts.

St. Patrick’s Church has now been restored and is very beautiful. As we went in, we were greeted by a sense of love, unity and shared celebration which was lovely.  Every pew of course was packed with people of all ages who had come to share in our special day.  We began by taking up the flags of the countries in which we work throughout the world which set the scene for a very colourful and meaningful day.

L to R: Cardinal Murphy O'Connor,
Bishop Kieran Conry,and Fr. Alex Sherbrooke,
 Parish Priest of St. Patrick's Soho

The chief celebrant at the Mass was Bishop Kieran Conry of Arundel and Brighton.  He has known us all his life, as his Aunt was an SMG for over sixty years.  We were privileged to have the Cardinal Emeritus of Westminster, Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor with us, and also many priests who work with SMG’s in different parishes throughout the country.  It was a striking picture of the Church in miniature, which our Foundress would have loved. 

Sr. Mary Whelan, SMG
and Kenneth Campbell

It was moving and enriching to see the symbols of our past and present SMG life placed on the altar at the beginning of Mass and we felt that those who had started the SMG tradition here approved.  The liturgy was a mixture of past and present as we held hands with those who had gone before us in spirit, and embraced all that is happening to us today. 

Painting of the Sacred Heart pleading
by Gagliardi

Sr. M. Whelan, our Superior General, gave us her usual warm, loving and eloquent welcome, and she also put words on the symbols as they were brought up. Chief of these of course was the painting by Gagliardi of the Sacred Heart pleading which Mother Magdalen commissioned. It was the centre of our celebration as it showed so clearly what she wanted of us – to be friends of the poor.  “True devotion to the Sacred Heart”, she always said “means a real, practical love of Our Lord, and an actual realisation of his love for us.”  By that she wanted us to understand that devotion to the Sacred Heart was not about pious practices, but is an acceptance of his wonderful, all-embracing love for us, which invites a response of love in return.  The response she wanted was to show that love through reaching out to the poor, the lonely, the bewildered, and the lost.  That is why this special picture was at the heart of our celebration. Everything that followed reflected this, and the place we were in reminded us of the love of those first sisters, who, to quote St. Therese of Lisieux, “put love at the heart of the Church” -  and the world of their time: thus challenging us to do the same today.

Marriage in Cana, Giotto c. 1304

We were reminded in the Word of God of the heart-warming phrase “How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring Good News!"  How beautiful indeed, and the Good News on that day was the Cana event, which brought the light of hope not only to the wedding pair, but also to all those who were guests – in fact to the whole village, and later, from them to everyone they met!  So it is with us, we are, as our Foundress put it, meant to be Christ bearers who bring hope and light to all those around us.  That is what she did.

Fr. Alexander Sherbrooke, the parish priest spoke movingly of the work of the Sisters and how it is carried on today in the parish – the Holy Hours before the Blessed Sacrament, the outreaching to the poor, and much more.  It was very uplifting to hear him.  At the end of a wonderful celebration, Sr. Frances Ennis also spoke in her inimitable way of the life, times and continuing inspiration of Mother Magdalen in a world of darkness and division.

I do not have space to say much more, but the kaleidoscopes keep returning – the meeting for refreshment after the Mass, the delight at seeing old friends and colleagues – the noise, laughter and joy...  the enjoyment of the huge birthday cake, and so much more. 

Sr. Mary Whelan, SMG
with Kenneth Campbell
and Sr. Joseph, SMG

Kenneth Campbell and niece Julia

We were so privileged to have Kenneth Campbell, his sister Julia and his daughter Jacqueline with us. Kenneth and Julia are the great grandchildren of Charlotte Dean, Mother Magdalen’s sister, so they are very close relatives of Mother herself.  Charlotte became a Catholic two years after leaving the Crimea.  She was very close always in thought and in affection to her youngest sister, and having experienced the horrors of the Crimea together, the bond was strengthened.  To talk to Kenneth, Julia and Jacqueline brought the whole story of the SMG’s to life – this was part of the family from which the first SMG came.  It was awesome! 

We’ll end where we began – with a fervent thanksgiving.  Thank you to all who organised the service and did the refreshments, to all those who so lovingly participated, and to all of you who faithfully prayed for us. 

Let’s remember to say together: “My soul glorifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour!” 

Thank you.

The end of our 140th year is a celebration of thanksgiving!



This is the official end of the year-long celebrations to mark the 140^th year of our foundation.  On Saturday we are celebrating a special Mass to gather together the riches of the year. 

Frances Taylor
(Mother Magdalen)

Mother Magdalen made her Vows for life on February 12^th, 1872, and so we became a recognised Religious Congregation in the Church.  Soho was one of the places that we started in.  The Sisters used to visit the poor there, especially the women, many of whom were prostitutes.  It was then a violent place, where few ventured out alone, especially after dark.  Even the police went in threes, and the doctor, frequently called out to the dens and crumbling tenements of the area, also made sure that he never went alone.  Only the Sisters were allowed the freedom of going about without escort, as they were respected for the work they did among the poor, and were generally received with friendliness. 

Every Saturday night, Mother Magdalen assembled as many of her Sisters from around London as she could to pray for the people in Soho, especially for those who were violent and abusive.  Outside, as these young women prayed, they could hear the shouts, the ribald comments, the screams and fights that were commonplace especially on Saturday nights, the effects of drunkenness and obscenity. This is what they offered to the Lord for his forgiveness and blessing.  It became a custom to have a Holy Hour there amid such scenes of hopelessness and depravity, and it is in some way,  still carried on today. 

On Saturday, we will have a special Mass in which we shall remember everyone.  As there is limited room, we cannot have an open invitation, and places are already booked. But please pray with us and for us from 2 o’clock onwards on Saturday, 11^th February.  We will tell you all about it in our next blog, so watch this space!  Thank you for taking the time to read this. Let's say a short prayer together:

Father, we thank you for the wonderful blessings you have given to us since our foundation in 1872.  Today, we ask that our prayer may reach out to all those who are lonely, unhealed, frightened, abused.  May they find friends who will help them in the same way as those who sought healing and wholeness in this place so long ago, found support, friendship and love.  May your peace come down on this celebration, to bind all of us, those present, and those who are part of our large family of friends, supporters and  co-workers, in a circle of love which no one can break.  We ask Mary, our Mother and our best friend to protect us, console us, heal us and make us better people.  We ask this through Jesus Christ, our Lord.  Amen.

Bless you all, and again, thank you for the great strength of your prayers and friendship.  We appreciate it more than you can imagine.

I leave you with some inspirational words from Mother Magdalen. Click on the picture for more animations every 12 seconds.

A Fish Out Of Water

This is not a lesson on the vagaries of the English language. That would take more than a blog.  It is, however, a look at what we mean when we use well-known expressions.  They tell us something about ourselves!! 

Let's take this one.  “A fish out of water.”  Have you ever seen a stranded fish?  It struggles, flips its tail about, looks desperately for help, which, sadly, is usually not forthcoming.  This is because of course a fish out of its element will soon die.  It cannot breathe, ingest or move about. It is imprisoned, afraid and eventually just one of a crowd in the net;  unnoticed, non-functioning, paralysed;  just another fish preparing to have its life and vitality choked out of it in order to be displayed on a marble slab for the greedy, the curious and the indifferent. 

In English-speaking countries, we use these expressions which we call idioms, to say something about the way we feel.  It is usually a picturesque way of describing our situation.  We find ourselves, for instance in a country which is unfamiliar to us;  the people speak a language we do not understand, the food is different, the customs are strange, the weather is either too hot, too wet, or too cold, depending on what we are used to.  We feel different, alien, out of our element.  That is a bit exaggerated of course - we may love new experiences, we may be able to slough off our old skins as easily as we divest ourselves of extra clothing in the warmer weather, but nonetheless, we have all experienced at times the feeling of being out of our depth, not at home with ourselves, as the saying is.  It isn't the most comfortable place to be.  I remember, some years ago now, being with a group of people who were what we then called the computer literate. They used a language that was, to say the least, unintelligible, at least to people like me, who found it difficult to manage the keyboard let alone the intricacies of the mighty chip! They talked endlessly of cyberspace and bytes and blogs until I began to think that I was born much too early on to master it. I felt like a fish out of water!!!

 That was a while ago, but I have always thought how awful it is to feel like a has-been, an anachronism, the ghost of Christmas past when in a situation like that. I felt some sympathy for the lovely, gleaming, darting fish that was caught, and held in an element completely foreign to it.  Part of life, of course, and necessary for the food chain to function efficiently, but, all the same a pity, at least for the fish! A fish out of water – what is that element like for the fish?  Flowing, life-giving, supporting, creative, thirst-slaking, cool, clean, regenerating, healing, safe.  Well at times...

Water and fish come into the Gospels a lot, don't they? Jesus knew the Sea of Galilee well as his first disciples were most of them fishermen.  Their old, much - mended nets were always around, drying in the morning sun after a hard night's fishing.  Their boats, equally old and in need of constant patching up, were used by him to preach his first homilies, to gather the people around the lapping water as they sat on the sandy beach around him.  He walked on that water one dark night towards the incoming fishing fleet, to the consternation of Peter and co.  That is, until the young teenager John shouted out: "It is the Lord!" Then there was fun! Peter sinking and being rescued by Jesus when he tried to imitate his Master, the lovely smell of cooking fish on the brazier by the shore which Jesus was using, the talk and laughter and fun, the falling asleep on the sand after a wonderful breakfast in the open air.  Then there was what we call the miraculous draught of fish! Hundreds of them which they had only caught by taking Jesus' advice and putting down their nets on the 'wrong' side of the boat.... 

And what about the time Jesus fell fast asleep in the boat in the middle of a storm?  What a lot of bustling about then!  "We're drowning and he's fast asleep!" they yelled to each other over the noise of the thunder and howling wind.  "Wake him up, Peter!" But of course he didn't.  He knew he would get a telling-off which he did anyway.  "Where is your faith?" Jesus asked him sternly. "Didn't you know you'd be safe?" Of course he didn't - these men knew the treachery of those waters. But Jesus wanted something more from them, just as he does from us today.  "Where is your faith?"  "Don't you know I am always with you, especially when you feel just like one of those gasping fish in the net?"  And he reaches out to us as he did to those long-ago fishermen to reassure us that no matter how bad our situation seems to be, we are never alone.  Never!

He offers us too the living water of the Spirit to allay our thirst. "Come to me, all you who are thirsty and drink!" he urges us.  Just as he assured the Samaritan woman at the well that the water he would give her would be life-giving and eternal, so that she would not thirst again, he tells us gently to come close to him, to ask for the living waters of the Spirit to refresh us, particularly when we are tired, dispirited, lonely or feeling like that lovely silver fish pulled out of its natural element and looking about desperately for a rescuer.  He is our rescuer, our friend.  And he too knows what it is like to be a fish out of water.  After all, he left the glories of Heaven to come to our cold, dark, inhospitable, alien world. Just for love.  To rescue other fishes darting about in dangerous waters or having their life half-choked out of them because they couldn't find a way to change things.  He can!  And he does! 

Have a good mid-January!  And when you think you are out of the water, jump in again! Even if, like me, you can't swim.  Take care.



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