Dear friends,
We have now embarked upon our annual pilgrimage to the Cross, as we make our way through this holy season of Lent. We must keep always in mind the three Lenten pillars of prayer, fasting and almsgiving – making sure to come to Mass Sunday by Sunday (at the very least!); resolutely to discipline ourselves through the making of modest personal sacrifices, and similarly to commit ourselves anew in love to the neighbour whom we see to be in need. This Sunday’s Gospel reading tells the story of Christ’s Temptations in the Wilderness – the origin of our own forty days of fasting and prayer. These, then, are the means by which Christ would draw us closer to himself: our keeping of Lent is an intensely spiritual undertaking – for those who, in the words of our responsorial psalm, ‘[cling] to [the Lord] in love‘ will find freedom, protection and the deeper knowledge of God.
To aid us on this journey, we are all warmly invited to participate in this year’s Lent Course (organised jointly with our friends at All Saints, Kenton), which begins in church tomorrow (Friday, 7 March) at 7pm – starting with the Stations of the Cross.
Stations of the Cross will also precede the 9.30am Mass on Wednesdays during Lent.
Looking ahead to Passiontide, a number of you were kind enough earlier this week to take home those veilswhich require ironing: please use a low heat and/or iron underneath a tea-towel the silk-mix fabrics, otherwise they will scorch! And please return these as soon as possible: thank you again.
A reminder also to all members of the congregation to complete and return an Electoral Roll application form before 25 April (spare copies in church), and to take home both a stewardship campaign letter, and a Lent Appeal donations box for the Additional Curates Society.
Please find attached a flier for the Bishop of Fulham’s Chrism Mass, on Tuesday in Holy Week, 15 April at 11am, at St Andrew, Holborn. This is an important occasion on which the whole Fulham family comes together, not least for the clergy to renew their ordination vows, and for the blessing of the oils of catechumens, chrism and the sick.
Forthcoming Kenton Safer Neighbourhoods Team events include Women’s Safety Walks on Saturday, 8 March at 11am (Priestmead Recreation Ground); Saturday, 15 March at 2pm (Kenton Road Post Office); Saturday, 22 March at 4pm (Kenton Road Post Office), and Friday, 28 March at 11am (Priestmead Recreation Ground) – as well as a drop-in surgery at Kenton Library on Wednesday, 19 March between 1-2pm.
We begin again another exciting series of guest incenses each Sunday in Lent, made by the St Edward Brotherhood – a small Orthodox monastery in Brookwood, Surrey: this week’s incense is Alexandria Rose.
May Christ give you grace to grow in holiness, to deny yourselves, take up your cross, and follow him,
Fr Richard