Dear friends,
Many congratulations are in order! Last weekend’s Macmillan Coffee Morning raised a record-breaking and deeply impressive £716.10 for the vital work of Macmillan Cancer Care: thank you to all who contributed, especially to Bernadette and her team of those who baked for, and then hosted the event. Thank you very much likewise for donations last month in support of Harrow Food Bank totalling £550 (+Gift Aid). Next week, we will take your Harvest Festival donations of groceries and other household goods to the Food Bank: if you have any outstanding items to bring to church, please do so this weekend.
All are welcome after Mass on Sunday to the burial of the ashes of the late Peter Coe, in the memorial garden.
Our external giving in October will be for the work of the charity Freedom from Torture: there are information magazines, and Gift Aid envelopes, in church – please give generously. Freedom from Torture works internationally to support and provide therapy to survivors of torture, as well as to fight for change.
October is also the occasion for the Church’s annual statistical count of those attending Mass: please make sure to be in church each Sunday (or otherwise at the Saturday evening Vigil Mass), so as to give the best impression of the health and growth with which God has blessed us at St Mary’s.
All Souls’ Day (the commemoration of the Faithful Departed) falls this year on Saturday, 2 November – when there will be Masses at 9.30am and 2pm. Please add (clearly!) to the list in church the names of those whom you would like remembered, and indicate at which Mass you will be present to pray for them.
Had we not celebrated our Harvest Festival last Sunday, we might instead have kept the Solemnity of St Michael and All Angels (“Michaelmas”): our hymnody this week will include a nod to Michaelmas, as well as to today’s memorial of the Holy Guardian Angels. The name angel derives from the same root as to evangelise – and means, literally, one who bears a message. In this sense, we are all called to be angels, called to carry the Good News from God to men! Colloquially, we sometimes speak of those who show us special kindness as angels: what greater kindness is there to another than to share with them the message of salvation? This Sunday’s second reading describes both how Christ was ‘for a short while made lower than the angels‘, and also how his purpose is ‘to bring a great many of [God’s children] into glory‘: accordingly, ours is in fact an even nobler vocation than that of the angels, for we are by ever closer conformity to Christ throughout our earthly lives called ultimately to reign with him eternally in heaven.
Sadly, our original guest preacher for St Leonard’s Day on Sunday, 3 November can no longer be with us: however, I am delighted to confirm that Fr Julian Browning, honorary assistant priest at All Saints, Margaret Street, has agreed to preach instead – and an updated publicity poster is attached. A reminder that on Sunday, 3 November there will be no 10.30am Mass: Mass will instead be at 5pm, to allow our friends from other parishes to join us. Please therefore spread the word; please speak to Pat if you can bring a dish to share at the party afterwards, and please see me if you might be able to help fund the purchase of fireworks for the evening (c.£250 in total).
There are just a few spaces remaining on our next Youth Group outing, to go trampolining at Harrow Leisure Centre on Saturday, 26 October: the cost is £10pp, to include refreshments. Please sign up in church, and collect and return a registration form.
A public consultation has started regarding the future of the Travellers’ Rest Beefeater pub opposite Kenton Station: click here to have your say on proposals to redevelop the site as a residential complex. There will also be a public exhibition onsite on Saturday, 12 October 10am-2pm.
This Sunday’s incense will be scented with copal: register your favourite scent here, between now and 4 November!
May the holy angels of God watch over you and guard you,
Fr Richard