Portsmouth Roman Catholic

It is very hard to keep your head as a battle in the Church rages over you.   You try not to get involved, but abuse of children is such a terrible thing that you just cannot help yourself.  You want to know just what bishop abused and covered for other priests, and surely as a good Catholic you should stay loyal and say nothing? But such an attitude leads to a hatred of the Catholic Church and re-assuring victims that it is just a small minority of priests is not helpful.   Australia has had more than its fair share of abuse.   There was some idea that Cardinal Pell ran the Australian Church and so all the abuse was down to him - let us get the top man.   But Cardinal Pell had no more power over the other dioceses than i have and he was one of the goodies.      Rome decides the appointment of bishops and it was heartening to hear the Australian Prime Minister  a couple of weeks ago asking Rome for the removal of a bishop  The chances ...

I felt just a little sorry for Pope Francis on his visit to Ireland.    The poor man really poured out his heart during the Mass at Phoenix Park, praying for abuse victims, and for forgiveness for bishops and priests who had carried out or hidden the abuses.   He was having a hard time from the media who sat back and adopted the usual "Not Enough" headlines.    I believe the media carries a greater responsibility than Pope Francis. The first scandal that rocked the Church in 2002 was put down to many things including celibacy and although it was pointed out that even then 4 out of 5 victims were homosexual predators the media were not having that.   Gay groups stood up and called this hate for homosexuals, homophobic.   We were condemning all homosexuals and so on.    But this time it was a Pennsylvania Court which had investigated 8 Diocese and found that 300 priests had been involved in abusing pubescent adults and young seminarians, a se...

         During my watch today Fr Florian Racine in his book The Watchful Hour spoke about the Precious Blood of Jesus.     He quoted Ecxodus 24:8  where Moses took the blood of the sacrificed animal and poured it over that part of the altar where the Sacrifice took place and then threw it over the people.   The blood on the altar was for God and the blood on the people was to unite them to God through the Sacrifice.   I began to think of the chalice we drink from every week   I had perceived it as just an extra to the host and therefore obeying Christ at the Last Supper.   As I thought about it I began to realise that there was so much more.   Moses had used blood to unite the people to God in the Sacrifice so was the Blood of the New and Eternal Testament something that was a unifying power.    To me receiving the Body of Christ is a very personal thing for I feel so much love and there is no way I could catc...

Last Year we had Rosary on the Coast in which faithful Catholics turned up from many parts of the country to pray for Peace.   This year on October 7th it is hoped to join Catholics in America  and other countries who are having their Coast To Coast Rosary crusades.   But what did we learn from our fist faltering steps.   Yes, those who prayed the Rosary were at the forefront but the vast majority who were not familiar with the Rosary, indeed did not see the point of it, just remained at home.    NOW MARY IS NOT AN OPTIONAL EXTRA IN THE CATHOLIC FAITH, and the Rosary is such a powerful prayer that it should be part of every curriculum in a Catholic School.   It is through devotion we learn to love someone whether a sweetheart or a wife or husband.   If we spend no time with them and seldom speak to them, how can we grow in love for them.    The Rosary is not a prayer to Mary,   Mary does not stand there glorying in our praise,...

The scandal of 300 priests being involved in the abuse of OVER 1000 young boys and young seminarians in America does not seem to be rocking the BbC here.   In 2002 they could not broadcast enough about it and the press were just as eager. Perhaps the reason for this lies with the Catholic laity.   We were shocked by it all in 2002  and were ashamed to even talk about the subject.    We all defended the Church gallantly and tried to carry on as though nothing had happened.   But something had happened.    We began to look more closely at things.   America has broken first and I suspect Ireland will follow. and in a smaller scale the UK, as the revelations at Ampleforth and Downside have shown.    Yet even in the small bit of news like the Americans we are asking "Who knew what?"   The appalling efforts to cover up by leading bishops in America , the moving of priests from one parish to another and the sickening revelation th...

Nest week we will see people from al over the world meeting to defend the family as intended by nature and by God.   There are some who will be there however to attack the family as intended by nature and by God.    A Fr James Martin who believes that gays have a right to their conscience and can therefore ignore the teachings of Jesus, wants a dialogue between those who follow Jesus and those who 'follow their conscience'.    It is just about 'building bridges between one group of people in the Church and another   Having thrown the Blessed Sacrament from the Altar into a corner or another room, the people are the Body of Christ and they can make their own decisions.    It is almost a laughable proposal this idea that those who follow Jesus and love his Commandments, should somehow make room for the who do not.   But Fr James Martin is serious.   He wants Gay Marriages to be recognised by the Church. Now are Gay Marriages just another...

Evangelisation is the 'in world' in the Catholic Church.   We just have to set up a few Committees for this and that and we are evangelising.   We 'evangelise ' in our schools where 95% of pupils leave the Church even before they leave the School.    We evangelise at RCIA meetings where four out of five who come along looking for something leave because they find nothing.   We evangelise among ourselves after Mass on Sunday, well some do, showing we are very nice people and you should come more often to meet very nice people, for if you are a nice person you are a Christian.   too bad on all those nice people who are not. So what does 'evangelisation' mean to Jesus Christ.   After all are we not following him.? You will find the answer in Matthew 28,   "All authority is given to me in Heaven and on earth, go therefore  to all nations baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and TEACHING THEM TO OBSERVE...

jesus went into a village and a woman called Martha received him into her house.   And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching.    But Martha was distracted with with much serving and she went to him and said "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve on my own.   Tell her then to help me"   But the Lord answered her "Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things  one thing is needful.   Mary has chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her." {Luke 10: 38-42} At first glance the complaint from Martha seems reasonable enough.   Here she was with guests in her house, meals to be made, drinks to be given out, ensuring all the guests were comfortable.    She was on her own doing all these things and she did not have the time like Mary to pay attention to one guest.    So feeling right was on her side she came and complained, ...

Now where did this teaching that we should not adore Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament come from?   Certainly in the 70's and 80's when the Bishops of England were paying for 'scholars' and 'experts' to be rid of this devotion, the claim was that in the 11th Century the Church had made too much of the presence of Jesus in the the Sacrament.    It had got out of hand.   Many of us were obliged to sit and listen to them for they were 'experts' after all.    Yet, there was no document in the Church nor in the History of the Church that supported their 'expertise'. But this was Anti-Christ, the attack on Jesus.  We were stopped from kneeling to receive Holy Communion, Children preparing for First Communion were taught nothing about the Sacrament but nonsense about their gifts and charisms, and unhappy parents were told that to explain the presence of Jesus was only confusing children, since they could not understand.   It was useless to ask the qu...

I am fortunate to be in a parish where the community was spared the insulting behaviour of those who decided that the presence of Jesus in the Tabernacle on the main altar was 'not liturgically correct'.   As I said this was a unilateral decision of local bishops and priests and no authoritative document or official teaching of the Catholic Church supports the action.   Be that as it may there is something extra special in my parish Church,    The statue of Mary is placed at the back, so her face is fixed on the tabernacle.   There are no chairs turned towards her so a Rosary group has to say the Rosary with its back to her but looking at the Tabernacle just like her. Since I began my watches I have started saying the Rosary during my visits and have come to a wonderful understanding.   Mary is behind me but we both face the Tabernacle and this truth more than any other has come to mind - Mary is not someone who stands idly by while we pray TO HER, no, Ma...

In my last post I was pointing out how Jesus had appreciated the love of the woman who had poured expensive oil on his head and how those around him had rebuked her for wasting the oil that could have been sold and the money given to the poor..  Let us quote exactly what Jesus said. "Let her alone.  Why do you trouble her?"   She has done a beautiful thing to me.   For  you always have the poor with you and whenever you will you can do good to them., but you will not always have me.    She had done what she could, she has annointed my body beforehand for burial.   AND TRULY I SAY TO YOU wherever the Gospel is preached in the whole world what she has done will be told in memory of her". Interpretation is everything so let us look at the possibilities.  Was he saying.  "Look you are all moaning and groaning about the poor, but I like being anointed with oil, and I am reminding you that I will soon be dead so maybe you should give som...

Today the 3rd August is the Feast of St Peter Julian Eynard who was given the title of the Apostle of the Blessed Sacrament.   When his mother was expecting him she went to pray to Jesus in the Tabernacle and asked him to take her baby into his Service.   His Mother often visited Jesus in the Tabernacle and when Peter was young she would take him along with her.   In later life he constantly talked to Jesus in the Tabernacle and joined the Marist Fathers.     But his love for Jesus, true God and True Man, filled his every being.    He spent so much time talking to his Saviour that the Marists rationed his time and told him he could not spend more that a certain time with Jesus.    He would often passed the Tabernacle and wept for it was not time for his return.    Eventually he founded his own Religious Order the Congregation of the Most Holy Sacrament whee he started Perpetual Adoration.   I have found in my watch that ...

In the early Church there was no doubting that belief in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist was part of the Church.  The bread was reserved after the faithful had celebrated to be given to the sick when needed.  Then the early hermits began to keep the Sacred Species with them in their caves or on their person, and who could doubt that they did this was great reverence.   Then monastic  communities started and monks would reserve the Sacred Species in their monasteries or carry it with them when working in the fields or travelling to some place. "Toward the end of the eleventh century we enter on a new era in the history of Eucharistic adoration. Until then the Real Presence was taken for granted in Catholic belief and its reservation was the common practice in Catholic churches, including the chapels and oratories of religious communities. Suddenly a revolution hit the Church when Berengarius (999-1088), archdeacon of Angers in France, publicly denied th...