I have had a very quiet week or two so far, apart from a few calls to visit people in the next door parish because their answerphone tells everyone the parish is closed until September. It is a good time, I have a Neapolitan priest staying with me, who loves cooking, so we have had some looooong Italian lunches.
I have also had a few priests visiting, even an Orthodox bishop and theologian, it is important for priests to minister to one another and deepen friendships. I hate priests in meetings but sitting around a table together is another matter entirely.
Being hospitable was a very important requirement for being a bishop in the early Church. I think feasting is as important as fasting in the spiritual life.
We have had quite a few priests who have turned up wanting to say Mass, including Fr Tim Finigan and Fr Charles Briggs. We also had a French priest dressed as a friar, with a group of a dozen scouts, who came to Brighton for the day, the lads were so reverent, I should have taken photographs. Of the last seven or eight priests, six, including the friar, wanted to celebrate Mass in the Extraordinary Form.
We have had quite a few priests who have turned up wanting to say Mass, including Fr Tim Finigan and Fr Charles Briggs. We also had a French priest dressed as a friar, with a group of a dozen scouts, who came to Brighton for the day, the lads were so reverent, I should have taken photographs. Of the last seven or eight priests, six, including the friar, wanted to celebrate Mass in the Extraordinary Form.
4 comments:
I was wondering if the Orthodox Bishop might be His Eminence, Metropolitan Kallistos. He is such a joy to be with.
No, it is not him, it is most probaby not useful to give his name on-line.
Why is it you don't like priests at meetings? Do you all try and hold the floor? :-D
There's nothing like a lonnnng Italian lunch. What's your favorite Italian dish?
And I was very interested to see the eye candy of your side altar in these pictures. There seems to be a figure perched atop the abacus on top of your fluted column. It looks like a man with a mustache and long robes holding something, who is "looking" out towards the congregation. (It almost looks like he has wings too.) In renaissance art I've often seen where the artist will paint in kneeling figures of the painting's commissioner and his wife. This is a guess but could that be a figure of whomever donated money for the side altar?
Karen
[Inquiring minds want to know!]
Many thanks for your hospitality, Ray. It was great to see you and to say Mass at your fine Sacred Heart Altar.
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