Book Now For Walsingham Pilgrimage
Bishop Terry invites you to join him for the annual Diocesan Pilgrimage to Walsingham, from Saturday October 27 to Sunday October 28.
The cost is £85 per person, including return transport, evening meal, B&B and Sunday lunch.
Some ensuite rooms are availbale for £14 per person extra.
To book, click on the link to download the application form and once completed send it to reception@dioceseofmiddlesbrough.co.uk or call Jenny Dowson on 01642 850505.
Remembering Seafarers On Sea Sunday
July 8 is Sea Sunday, when the Church asks us to pray for seafarers and support the work of AoS, whose chaplains and ship visitors provide practical and pastoral help in ports around the coast of Britain…
Visiting a supermarket is a task we all take for granted. But if you’re away at sea for months at a time, walking along the aisles with your basket is a special occasion.
When Apostleship of the Sea (AoS) port chaplain Peter Barrigan went on board the Lan Hua Hai in Teesport, the Chinese crew were subdued because they assumed they would not be allowed shore leave in the UK after being at sea for months.
Peter made some phone calls and discovered there had been a misunderstanding and the crew would indeed be allowed to go ashore.
Billy and Jun Li Barnett, two volunteer ship visitors, agreed to look after the crew during their stay. Jun is Chinese and her husband Billy has spent time in China.
What the crew wanted most was to go shopping, so Billy and Jun took them to Tesco. Local shoppers were initially put out as Jun translated at the checkout for 16 seafarers!
However, when she explained where the men were from and how long they had been at sea, the locals were happy to wait their turn.
Most of the crew’s purchases were treats and gifts to celebrate the recent Chinese New Year.
As the ship was about to leave Teesport to sail to Murmansk in Russia, Peter gave the captain a Bible in Chinese.
A few days after they left he received the following message, which Jun was able to translate:
We had not been ashore for two months. It was very stressful. We really appreciated the chaplain contacting the agents for us to make sure we could get ashore.
We’ve been sailing more than half year. It’s so good to see another Chinese in another country, especially during Lunar New Year.
If there was no Billy and Jun, we wouldn’t have been able to go anywhere and would not have been able to shop and sort our things out.
We will keep the Bible to learn about other faiths and cultures better while we sail to different countries.
Taking the Chinese crew of a ship to a local supermarket might seem insignificant, but it’s these kinds of small gestures AoS port chaplains and ship visitors make that have a big impact on the lives of seafarers, who go months without seeing their families.
Without seafarers, we would not have many of the things we rely on in our daily lives, including cars, computers, fridges and much of the food we buy. Part of the role of AoS is to show seafarers they are not forgotten. For more information visit apostleshipofthesea.org.uk.
Photo: SeaSunday
Sun Shines On Postgate Pilgrims
Hundreds of pilgrims came from all over the diocese to the annual Postgate Rally in honour of the English and Welsh Martyrs and Blessed Nicholas Postgate.
The rally takes place in Egton Bridge and Ugthorpe in alternate years and this time was held in Ugthorpe, which was bathed in beautiful sunshine.
Bishop Terry was the preacher and principal celebrant at the Mass and was assisted by a number of priests.
Two coaches brought some of the 259 people who attended. Pilgrims came from Beverley, Scarborough and Middlesbrough as well as surrounding villages and members of the Madonna House community at Robin Hood’s Bay.
Around 25 people took part in the Walk for Vocations from St Hedda’s Church, Egton Bridge, to St Anne’s Church, Ugthorpe, ahead of the rally, praying for vocations to the priesthood for our diocese along the way.
Photos courtesy of Johan Bergström-Allen
Calling All Parish Musicians!
Middlesbrough Cathedral is delighted to welcome renowned composer, organist and choral director Malcolm Archer to lead a singing workshop on Sunday July 8.
Malcolm is one of the world’s leading church musicians and has enjoyed a distinguished career as director of music at St Paul’s Cathedral, from where his many broadcasts and recordings have received critical acclaim.
The workshop begins at 2pm and is open to all parish musicians. Advance booking is essential.
To reserve your place, email the assistant director of music at craig.cartwright@outlook.com.
Sharing The Journey Around The Diocese
Many of our parishes have been organising Share the Journey walks to support the global Share the Journey campaign led by Pope Francis and Caritas Internationalis and stand up for the rights of refugees and migrants.
Scarborough Catholic Parishes’ confirmation group and Canon Eddie Gubbins walked the 3.6 miles from St Peter’s Church to the North Shore and around to the South Shore and back again. Well done to the young people leading the way and to Canon Eddie too!
The annual Humber Bridge Cross saw staff, supporters and volunteers from Christian Aid and CAFOD walked the two-mile span from Hessle to Barton and back again, as they have for many years. They were joined by Father Anthony Chundellikat James, from St Anthony and Our Lady of Mercy, Hull.
It was, as always, a very pleasant event with a jovial air and a shared mutual concern for people in need both at home and overseas. The almost 200 people taking part ranged from babies in pushchairs to octogenarians.
This year CAFOD Middlesbrough volunteers and supporters met their counterparts and schoolchildren from CAFOD Nottingham, who were participating for the first time, near the middle of the bridge.
Thanks to all who helped to organise the event and those who made long journeys to get involved, including three generations of the Wilson family from Market Weighton and our new communications volunteer, Obinna, and his friends, William and Ty, from Middlesbrough, pictured at the top with parish volunteer Mary Rose, from Our Lady of Perpetual Help, Market Weighton, and Carol Cross at the end of the walk.
CAFOD parish volunteer Don Lillistone reports that 42 parishioners from St Mary’s Cathedral walked to Mass, producing a combined total of 147 miles.
The Walk to Church Sunday is also an element of the parish’s Livesimply action plan, under the heading “Actions to live sustainably with creation”, which is linked to the talk Deacon David Cross gave last November on Laudato Si’ and to the recent launch of the new diocesan environmental policy. Pictured are two parishioners having just signed up their walking miles with Teresa Lyth.
SS Leonard and Mary’s Parish, Malton, held a summer service and Share the Journey walk. Other walks are being planned by Our Lady and St Edward, Driffield on June 24 and Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, Ingleby Barwick, who are walking to Preston Park followed by a family picnic after 11am Mass on Sunday July 1. Why not organise a walk over the summer in your parish? Resources are available to order from cafod.org.uk/Campaign/Share-the-Journey
If you would like to volunteer for CAFOD, please email middlesbrough@cafod.org.uk or call 01642 822301.
- After 13 years working with CAFOD in our diocese, I will be taking a break for renewal from mid-July until September, with a grateful heart for receiving so many blessings. Thank you for all the friendship, support and generosity I have benefitted from over the years.
Carol Cross, community participation coordinator, CAFOD Middlesbrough
Inspirational Bishop Speaks At Eucharistic Congress
Catholics from our diocese are invited to attend the National Eucharistic Congress and hear an inspirational speaker who has been described as “one of the Church’s best messengers”.
Bishop Robert Barron is the keynote speaker at the all-day event at the Liverpool Echo Arena on Saturday September 8 as part of Adoremus.
The founder of the “Word on Fire” Catholic evangelical outreach ministry, Bishop Barron is a world-renowned theologian and writer and is based in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.
His weekly half-hour TV show is broadcast across the United States every Sunday evening.
Father William Massie, chaplain at Hull University, has been using Bishop Barron’s ground-breaking ten-part Catholicism DVD series with students throughout Lent and Eastertide.
He explains: “They really like Robert Barron – for the clarity and beauty of the teaching – he never speaks down to his audience – and for the simple, down-to-earth manner and stories he employs. Six of them have signed up to attend the congress!”
Tickets are now available for anyone from our diocese who would like to attend. They cost £40 and can be booked by emailing sharrondriver@dioceseofmiddlesbrough.co.uk.
The absolute deadline to book through the diocese is Thursday May 31.
A limited number of tickets are also available for Day One of the congress, on Friday September 7. This will include a theological symposium, with workshops for parish catechists, RE teachers and extraordinary ministers. These tickets are also £40.
Eucharistic Congresses are gatherings of clergy, religious and laity that promote an awareness of the central place of the Eucharist in the life and mission of the Church.
The last International Eucharistic Congress in England was held in 1908 when permission for a public procession of the Blessed Sacrament was refused.
This time a one-kilometre street procession will take place, on Day Three of the congress, Sunday September 9. This is open to all but access to the final Masses, at 9.30am and 11.30am on the Sunday morning, will be restricted by the capacity of Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral.
A limited number of hotel rooms are available in the city over the weekend of the congress but these are relatively expensive because of high demand.
Catholic author Katie Prejean is the keynote speaker at a Youth Congress aimed at those aged 13-20, which takes place in Liverpool on Saturday September. Tickets for this event are £10.
New Badges Promote Father Postgate’s Cause
Parishioners in Redcar have come up with a small way of promoting the Cause for the Canonisation of Blessed Nicholas Postgate by having badges made and offered for sale.
In recent years the previous four parishes that served Redcar, namely Sacred Heart, St Augustine’s, St William’s in Dormanstown and St Alban’s have been drawn together into a single parish now served by two of the churches, the Sacred Heart and St Augustine.
The process of joining the parishes together included Bishop Terry giving the new parish an overriding dedication and he chose one of our own martyrs, Father Postgate. Redcar parish is now known as the Parish of Blessed Nicholas Postgate incorporating the churches of Sacred Heart and St Augustine.
Parishioners are currently working hard to raise funds to add a hall and meeting rooms to the Sacred Heart Church to assist in developing the community life of the parish and provide much-needed facilities for RCIA, SVP, Legion of Mary and Children’s Liturgy of the Word, together with social activities.
In the last 12 months the parish fundraising committee has raised £15,000 towards its £500,000 target. The idea of selling badges to promote Blessed Nicholas Postgate will contribute to the fundraising while promoting the common identity of the newly established parish and the Cause of Blessed Nicholas Postgate.
With support from the Postgate Society, a parishioner has worked with a manufacturer to produce large numbers of the badges, which have already proved very popular. The badge features a small section of the Postgate Window by Thomas Denny in St Hedda’s Church, Egton Bridge.
The badges are distributed together with a copy of the prayer card that is made freely available by the Postgate Society and with the society’s encouragement will be offered for sale during this year’s Postgate Rally.
If you would like to buy a badge together with a copy of the prayer card, please contact Mick and Val Grainger either by calling 01642 477581 or emailing mickvalgrainger52@ntlworld.com. Badges cost £2 each, to include the free prayer card. If nine or fewer are ordered there is a post and package charge of £3. Orders of 10 or more badges will be post and package free.
For more information about Father Postgate, visit postgatesociety.org.uk.
Environment Policy Launches In York
Inspired by Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si’, the Diocese of Middlesbrough Justice and Peace Commission has launched its environment policy at All Saints’ School in York.
The event contributed to activities around the globe for Earth Day on April 22 and the speakers were Ellen Teague of the Columbans and York Central MP Rachael Maskell, a former Shadow Minister For The Environment.
Chair Barbara Hungin, pictured above, said the policy in its colourful, illustrated format would be distributed to schools and parishes throughout the diocese and is intended as a catalyst for action.
It contains suggestions for action on an individual, parish and group basis. Stalls at the launch included alternatives to plastic, green energy, protection of bees, Fair Trade, Eat less Meat, CAFOD and Live Simply.
Pictured above with Barbara Hungin and Ellen Teague are four refugee children from the Democratic Republic of Congo, now living in Middlesbrough, who brought to our attention the crisis in their homeland where the tourbiéres, huge areas of peatland containing the equivalent of 20 years of US emissions, are threatened with exploitation and deforestation by Chinese companies.
Ellen Teague took us on a journey around the world, highlighting the fragility and vulnerability of the planet and evidence of the effects of climate change on the very poorest communities. She emphasised the need to make the connections between poverty and the environment. We must, “hear both the Cry of the Earth and the Cry of the Poor” (Laudato Si’ 49)
Our popes have long been leading on this issue of overarching importance. From Pope St John Paul II, who called us to “an ecological conversion”, to Pope Benedict, who installed 3,600 solar panels at the Vatican, and now with Pope Francis, who has made it the theme of his papacy.
On the day of his inauguration he made this plea: “I would like to ask all those who have positions of responsibility in economic, political and social life, and all men and women of goodwill: let us be “protectors’ of creation, protectors of God’s plan inscribed in nature, protectors of one another and of the environment”.
Ellen countered any inclination to despair with many examples of individuals, schools and parishes where the challenge to take action rooted in faith is bearing fruit, including Live Simply status, recycling, solar panels on church properties, community gardens and tree growing.
She said our liturgies should alert us to the care of God’s creation and that our clergy should be trained in creation-centred theology.
September 1 has been designated by Pope Francis as World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, initiating “Creation Time”, running until the feast of St Francis on October 4. All parishes are urged to participate.
Rachael Maskell spoke of our “precious and fragile planet in trouble” and praised the accessibility and wisdom contained in the environment policy. The silence among politicians on the subject is of concern and the churches have a role in provoking them to urgent action.
“Our greed has broken our planet and our need will persuade us to restore it,” she said.
A change in our unsustainable consumer lifestyle is urgently needed to ensure this happens.
Margaret Blatchford
Political Theologian Is Storey Lecture Speaker
The Diocesan Justice and Peace Commission is delighted to welcome Dr Anna Rowlands as this year’s Anthony Storey Memorial Lecture speaker.
Anna is a political theologian and an expert on Catholic Social Teaching and is St Hilda Associate Professor of Catholic Social Thought and Practice and Founding Chair of the Centre for Catholic Social Thought and Practice at the University of Durham.
She and has worked on theology and migration for more than a decade and is committed to forming partnerships with Catholic faith-based organisations that are influencing the next generation of social practice.
The title of the talk is “On the promise and the limits of politics: Catholic Social Teaching and Immigration”.
Anna is passionate about Catholic Social Teaching and sees it as a gift to all people of goodwill. Her work is rooted in the practice of faith, not just its study, and is concerned with how communities are working this out in their lives.
The lecture takes place at 11am on Saturday May 12 in the Canham Turner Building, University of Hull. Tea and Coffee is available from 10.30am.
New Website For Postgate Society
The Postgate Society, which aims to spread knowledge of and devotion to Martyr of the Moors Blessed Nicholas Postgate, has launched a new website.
As well as giving a detailed account of the life of Blessed Nicholas Postgate, it contains information about the society’s activities, including meetings, newsletters and other publications.
There are photographs from past Postgate Rallies.
Father Postgate ministered to Catholics across the North York Moors before being arrested while baptising a child near Sleights in 1678.
He was taken to York and imprisoned before being put to death on what is now the site of York Racecourse.
His last words on the scaffold were recorded in a contemporary newspaper.
“Mr Sheriff, you know that I die not for the plot but for my religion,” he said. “I pray God bless the king and the royal family.
“Mr Sheriff, I pray you tell the king that I never offended him in any way. I pray God give him his grace, and the light of truth. I forgive all that have wronged me and brought me to this death, and I desire forgiveness of all people.”
The Postgate Society also encourages devotion to other martyrs and those who kept the faith alive during penal times and the study of our area’s rich Catholic history.
Visit the website at postgatesociety.org.uk.