Novena to Saint Jude

The following novena recently published in Carmelite News and from the National Shrine of Saint Jude is for nine days.

Our novena to Saint Jude is below and can be prayed over the next nine days until 15 April 2016. You can pray the novena in private, with your friends or family, or in a group:

Jesus, I praise you and bless you

And give you thanks for

all the graces and privileges

you have bestowed upon

your chosen apostle Saint Jude...

 (Make your special request now)

Loving God,

who revealed to Saint Jude

your desire to come to us,

and share your life with us,

open our hearts

so that your Spirit may teach us your truth,

and that keeping your commandments

we may know your abiding presence. 

Our new statue of Saint Jude was recently handed to Pope Francis in Rome, see here for more details.

Thoughts from the Chaplain - Easter 2016

Last Friday, we celebrated the Good Friday Liturgy; hearing the Passion Narrative, praying for our world in the Solemn Intercessions.  We venerated the Cross and received Holy Communion.  In Faversham we marked Good Friday with a walk of witness through the town to the market place for prayer and reflection.  Good Friday is a part of the Sacred Triduum which we can easily relate to, it is the day of the Crucifixion of Jesus.  On the other hand, today, Holy Saturday is more difficult; it has no structure, it is a day of waiting, of quiet reflection; all things that many people have difficulty with.   It is the day that Christ is in the tomb and a day that we too must spend in a spiritual tomb awaiting the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus, marked for us by the celebration of the Easter Vigil during this “night of grace” as the Exzultet says.

The night service or Easter Vigil as it is known although the highpoint of the Sacred Triduum is not separate from the rest of the three day celebration. Together the Sacred Triduum relates the Passion, Crucifixion, Death and Resurrection of Our Lord. It begins with the lighting of a fire which is blessed and from which the Paschal Candle is lit with a prayer explaining the significance of the lettering, numbers and five incense grains that are inscribed into the wax. This Candle will burn in the church during the whole of Eastertide being lit for each service.  It is the light of Christ and is also lit for Baptisms and Funerals.  The readings for this night service tell of the history of salvation according to the Old and New Testaments. It has long been a tradition that adults who are to be baptised or received into full communion with the church are received during this Mass being blessed with the oil of Catechumens, Holy Water and Chrism.  The final part of the service is the celebration of the Eucharist.

The overall significance of the Easter Vigil underlines our relationship with Christ climaxing in the taking part in the mystery of the Body and Blood of our Lord.  It also emphasizes our bonds as community, brothers and sisters in Christ and united by our common ties of Baptism and all the sacraments.  As we sing out the Alleluia this night let us remind ourselves of these bonds and pledge to live accordingly.

May I wish you all a very happy Easter!

Fr Michael Manning, O.Carm

Thoughts from the Chaplain - the Lord's Supper

On Thursday, we celebrated the Mass of the Lord’s Supper and with this celebration Lent ends and we enter into the Sacred Triduum, the climax of the time we have spent since Ash Wednesday preparing ourselves through prayer, fasting and charity or almsgiving.  Last Sunday we joined Jesus as he entered into Jerusalem, the city of David amid the cries of Hosanna, welcome is he who comes in the name of the Lord and processing over a carpet of clothes and palms strew in his path.  By the end of the evening of the Last Supper the cries of joy and adulation will have changed to those of derision.  Judas will have left his fellow disciples and returned to the high priest to earn his thirty pieces of silver; he will show a band of temple guards where Jesus is to be found and he will point out the Son of God by a kiss.  So quickly, can public opinion change.

The Sacred Triduum or three days is often thought of as three separate events: the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, Good Friday and the crucifixion and the Mass of the Resurrection in the Easter vigil.  But to separate them like this is to miss a major point.  All three days are the Sacred Triduum and belong together.  They are a story which takes it’s beginning from Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem or to go even further they begin with the reception of the cross of ashes on our foreheads six weeks previously.  But, let’s stay with the Sacred Triduum;   these three days are of course sequential but they are more than that.  They are three events which follow on one from the other and are also so intimately related that they are dependent upon each other.  The Last Supper is the setting for the institution of the Eucharist and is also the point in time when He reveals that one of His disciples is to be the person who will betray Him and hand Him over to the temple authorities; the one to whom I give the piece of bread that I shall dip in this bowl – he dips the bread and gives it to Judas Iscariot; Judas leaves and night falls.  The night is the time of his arrest and ends with interrogation by the temple authorities as Simon Peter, having denied Jesus three times, leaves the temple courtyard into the new morning of the day of Jesus’ crucifixion.

Novena to Saint Joseph

The Catholic Church keeps the 19 March as the Solemnity of St. Joseph, the Husband of Mary and Foster Father of Jesus Christ each year. The scriptures refers to St Joseph being upright and honourable. Certainly his sensitivity towards Mary and his care for both Mary and Jesus shows him as a person of action and care.

The Carmelite Order has had a particular devotion to St. Joseph for many centuries, venerating him with the title "Principal Protector of the Carmelite Order". Since Joseph cared for Mary and Christ in a particular way, we believe that he also cares for the Carmelite Order which is devoted to Mary and Christ. St Teresa of Avila had great devotion to St Joseph and saw him as a protector of her new foundations. 

Our novena to Saint Joseph is below and can be prayed over the next nine days from 11 March 2016. You can pray the novena in private, with your friends or family, or in a group:

God our Father,
creator and ruler of the universe,
in every age you call humanity
to develop and use our gifts
for the good of others.

With Saint Joseph as our example and guide,
help us to do the work you have asked
and come to the life you have promised.

We ask this through
our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you
and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.

Our Fathers' Mass takes place at the Shrine on Friday 18 March 2016 at 11.30am. All welcome. See our special page for more information.

Thoughts from the Chaplain - the Prodigal Son

Last Saturday, the second week of Lent we heard as our Gospel reading the parable from Luke which is popularly known as the Prodigal Son. This parable is in my opinion one of the Lenten readings par excellence.  It is about some major topics which are part of our Lenten journey: prayer, repentance, forgiveness and charity (or lack of it) as reflected in the characters of the parable; a father and his two sons.

Firstly there is the younger son, obviously at an age where the spirit of rebellion against parental constraints is coming to the surface; he asks for and is given his share of the inheritance and goes off to enjoy life.  This he does until two things coincide; firstly there is a famine in the land where he has been living and secondly his money runs out; what is they say about a fool and his money being easily separated.  Meanwhile the father and the elder son are living life as always with the son working away, doing as he is told and taken an active part in the business which will one day be his.  Unfortunately things are not going so well for his brother; he is hungry, has no money and no social network to turn to.  In despair he accepts work looking after a herd of pigs. Imagine it:  a good Jewish boy looking after pigs one of the animals forbidden by Jewish dietary laws - they are unclean; and he has to tend to them. After reflecting on this he realises that he has made a big mistake and he repents of his actions:  “I have sinned against my father and against heaven”.  The young man makes a decision to return to his father and to beg for his forgiveness even if he has to work as a hired labourer.

Meanwhile the elder son is working in the fields and the father is pining for the return of his youngest boy.  The parable tells how he is looking constantly for the first sign of his son returning home.  At last he sees a little cloud of dust in the distance and then there he is; his son. He hurries to meet him and orders that he is to be given what he needs:  he embraces the boy a sign forgiveness and of his returning to the family, to the community; he is given sandals for his feet the symbol of his not being a slave; he is given a robe as befits a man of rank and a ring is placed upon his finger, the emblem of his being a son who is an equal of his father and his brother.  And lastly the father celebrates, he throws a party for everyone using the calf they have been saving. 

As they start their celebration the elder son comes in from the fields and demands to know what is going on and when a servant tells him of the return of his younger brother, and how forgiving the father has been, he storms off and refuses to take part in the festivities.  Missing his elder son the father comes out and tries to persuade him.  Angry the son accuses his father of favouring the younger boy and ignoring all the work that he has been doing while his brother is off squandering his inheritance; you have never given me a lamb or anything to celebrate with my friends.  He then explains to him that this older son is as dear to him as the younger and that everything that is the father’s is his. He doesn’t rebuke the man but is kind to him and as forgiving as he was to his younger son.

And so we have this wonderful Lenten parable our Lenten journey:

Prayer as the young son reflects on his actions and includes heaven as he says he has offended both father and heaven.

Repentance as he makes his way back to the father to ask his forgiveness whatever the consequences.

Forgiveness as the father embraces him and welcomes him back into the bosom of the family and re-instating him in his earlier position.

Charity as the father talks to his older son and explains the important place he has in the father’s heart.

And what happens to the older son? I like to think that he did follow his father back into the house and that slowly he realised the bonds of love which joined both him and his father together but also the bonds to his younger brother.

I am celebrating a very special Fathers' Mass next month. Take a look at the details and maybe add your father? 

Fr Michael Manning, O.Carm

Chaplain, National Shrine of Saint Jude

Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus!

Happy Feast Day of Saint David to all our Welsh friends.

Photo of the Month - Mount Carmel

Thank you to Guild members, Hugh and Margaret Parry who sent us this beautiful photo of Mount Carmel.

The National Shrine of Saint Jude is served by the Order of Carmelites.

The Carmelite Family is one of the ancient religious communities of the Roman Catholic Church. Known officially as the Brothers of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel, the Carmelite Order developed from a group of hermits in thirteenth-century Palestine; priests and lay people living a contemplative community life of prayer and service modelled on the prophet Elijah and the Virgin Mary.

Read more about the Carmelites on the British Province website.

Details on the Guild of Saint Jude can be found here.