Dear friends,
(Fr Richard remains on annual leave until Tuesday, 17 September: there will be no public Morning Prayer today or on Saturday (and no morning Mass on Saturday) – but all other regular services will proceed as usual, with grateful thanks to Fr Mike.)
Many months in the year have also a Marian focus: October is the month of the Holy Rosary; May the pre-eminent of Our Lady’s months – and this current month of September is littered with celebrations in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary: were this Sunday coming not a Sunday, it would instead be the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows – the day after Holy Cross Day – in commemoration of the one who stood so faithfully by her son in his last hour, at the foot of the Cross. Today is the memorial of the Most Holy Name of Mary, upon whom wecan call to aid us also in our times of need. Last Sunday we celebrated the Birthday of the Blessed Virgin Mary – and the Sunday after next, 22 September, will be our Patronal Festival, in honour of Our Lady of Walsingham – when we shall both enjoy the rite of Sprinkling, for healing and renewal, with Walsingham water (of which a limited number of individual bottles will also be available), and – after Mass – sit down together to enjoy one another’s fellowship, over another wonderful parish lunch. Please let Pat know this week what you can bring to share at this meal: the PCC is keen to avoid duplication, waste or omission, and – as such – Pat can advise you as to what would be most helpful to bring: please in any case bring only what you have pledged, and – if your plans change – kindly inform her. Sunday, 22 September will also therefore be my second anniversary of Induction as your parish priest.
One devotional website marks a Marian devotion for each day of September, listing some of the many titles under which she is honoured in so many places around the world! But in this meditation I wanted to reflect briefly on the Seven Sorrows of Mary, the devotional focus for September 15: this memorial acknowledges the many ways in which Our Lady modelled com-passion (literally, to suffer with): from Simeon’s prophecy of the sword which would pierce her heart, through the anxiety of the flight into Egypt to avoid being caught up in the massacre of the Innocents, to the loss of her child for three days on the return from Jerusalem – Mary then shared in her Son’s Passion first when she met him on the road to Calvary, then as she stood beneath his Cross: as the Pietà she tenderly caressed his lifeless body, and also shed silent tears as he was laid into the tomb. As the well-known hymn puts it, ‘Sing we, too, of Mary’s sorrows, / Of the sword that pierced her through, / When, beneath the Cross of Jesus, / She his weight of suffering knew.’ However, as much as Mary is indeed a most com-passionate Mother, to us as much as to her Son, yet she is also her of whom we ‘[s]ing again the joys of Mary, / When she saw the risen Lord, / And in prayer with Christ’s apostles, / Waited on his promised word‘: she is a fellow disciple, rich in faith, a model too of holy rejoicing – let us, in this month – as at all times – look to Mary to typify our faith, and to encourage and accompany us as she draws us to her Son.
Our young people can now sign up in church to come to the Youth Group trampolining party on Saturday, 26 October at Harrow Leisure Centre: the subsidised cost of £10/child includes 60 minutes’ trampolining, and refreshments afterwards – however, places are strictly limited. There are similarly sign-up sheets in church for Bishop Jonathan’s Walsingham Festival in Holborn on Wednesday, 25 September, and the outing to Westminster Abbey for Choral Evensong on Sunday, 29 September.
Thank you for your generous donations in August, in support of Caritas Bakhita House: this appeal generated £524.48 (+ Gift Aid). This month, we are receiving cash donations for the Harrow Food Bank: on 29 September we will celebrate our Harvest Festival, for which we also invite donations of food and household essentials for families in need.
This Sunday’s incense will be scented with amber: register your favourite scent here, between now and 4 November!
Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy help or sought thine intercession was left unaided,
Fr Richard