Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Visit from Rome

 
St Angela tinvites us:-
 
"Please go often, as you have time and opportunity, especially on feast days,
and visit your dear daughters and sisters." 
 
 
During these past two weeks we have had the joy, in the English Province, of a visit from our Mother General Cecilia Wang and one of our General Councillors, Sr Brigitte Brunet. It was interesting to hear about the lives and activities of Ursuline sisters round the world and to share with our visitors something of our mission in this country.
 

Sr Brigitte and Mother Cecilia in the garden at Wimbledon

Sunday, May 26, 2013

Golden Jubilee Celebration at Wimbledon

 
In her writings Angela encourages us to "rejoice together" and we did just that yesterday  afternoon when the Wimbledon Community hosted a  celebration for the two Golden Jubilarians, Sisters Frances Oakley and Zela Procter.All the Province were invited.
 
The afternoon started with a buffet lunch and concluded with Evening Prayer I for the feast of the Holy Trinity. Angela's spirituality is very Trinitarian, she begins and ends her writings with invoking the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The mutual love within the Trinity was to be the model of the love lived by the members of the Company of St Ursula.
 
This love we experienced in our celebration together and as we sang with joy as our opening hymn some of her words:-
 
"I am here in your midst with Jesus,
my love and yours,
lending aid to your prayers.
 
I am more alive than when I was on earth;
I can help you more and hold you dearer.
 
Act, bestir yourselves,
make efforts, cry to him;
you will certainly see wonders.
 
Raise your hearts on high;
don't rest in things of earth.
Jesus is your only treasure.
 
Live in harmony,
be bound by bonds of love;
Sign of Jesus'favour; lead a new life.
 
 
Sr Zela and Sr Frances
 
 



 
 

Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Angela and the Church

 
For Angela, Christ and his Church were two loves which became one; two implications which were superimposed on each other.Idntification with the person of Christ her "one and only treasure" meant  active participation in the mission of the Church by evangelisation.
 
Prolonged prayer gave Angela the light and the courage to carry her intuition through to fulfilment.In founding the Company of St Ursula she provided for others a way for doing likewise. 

Sunday, May 19, 2013

Novena for Vocations

 
Today, the Feast of Pentecaost,
is the start of a nine week novena for
 Vocations in the Diocese of Lancaster 
 
 
 
Perhaps you would like to join in this important prayer. Each week I will post the intention for the week.The intention for this first week is:-
 
for the grace to live out our baptismal call
 
Novena Prayer

 
God our Father,
You created us and in baptism You called us to be Your people.
Grant courage to those You are calling to the priesthood, diaconate, religious and consecrated life.
Guid those who are discerning their vocation.
Bless the love of husband and wife
and help all parents to be open to Your will for their children.
Make us generous in responding to You
and help us to see that true happiness is found in Your will alone.
Through Christ our Lord. Amen 
 

Thursday, May 16, 2013

Hymn to the Holy Spirit

 
Spirit of God, on the waste and the darkness
hov'ring in power as creation began,
drawing forth beauty from clay and from chaos,
breathing God's life in the nostrils of man,
 
Come and sow life in the waste of our being,
pray in us, form us as sons in the Son,
Open our hearts to yourself, mighty Spirit,
bear us to life in the Three who are One. 
 
I think Angela would like this hymn to the Holy Spirit from Stanbrook Abbey with its focus on the creation of life out of chaos and darkness. Angela lived in a time which she described as "perilous and pestilential" and yet from that chaos she brought forth new life by being open to the action of the Holy Spirit in her heart.
 

Sunday, May 12, 2013

Links between St Angela and St Paul

 
Paul's letter to the Ephesians, the second reading for today's feast of the Ascension ,reminds me of aspects of Angela and her teaching. Paul prays may God
 
" give you a spirit of wisdom and perception of what is revealed..".
 
God certainly gave Angela this gift. Her contemporaries speak of the many people of all walks of life who came to consult her on every kind of problem including the interpretation of Scripture.
 
Paul continues:
 " May he enlighten the eyes of your mind so that you can see what hope his call holds for you, what rich glories he has promised the saints will inherit.."
 
Angela writes in a similar vein.Shortly before her death she instructs the local leaders:-
 
"Tell them that they should long to see me not on earth, but in heaven, where our love is. Let them set their hopes on high and not on earth.Let them have Jesus Christ for their only treasure, for there also will be love,which is to be sought not in this world, but above, in the high heaven at the right hand of the Father. "

Friday, May 10, 2013

St Angela and the Holy Spirit

 
Today we start the novena to the Holy Spirit in preparation for the feast of Pentecost. This feast  celebrates the coming of the Holy Spirit and the birth of the Church. It has also been said of the Company of St Ursula that it was born from the pierced side of Christ.So, as on the cross the Church became the bride of Christ ,the vocation of an Ursuline is to live this mystery of the Church as bride of Christ. Angela speaks of Jesus as our spouse and urges us to live as befits a spouse of Christ.
 
At the same time Angela instructs us:-
 
"Above all: obey the counsels and inspirations which the Holy Spirit unceasingly sends into our hearts."
 
Rule Ch 8

Friday, May 3, 2013

Stick at It

 
" Only one feat is possible - not to have run away."
Dag Hammarskjold
 St Angela also calls us to stick at it. She writes in the Prologue of her Rule:-
 
" seek and desire all the ways and means necessary to persevere and make progress to the very end."

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

May: Prayer of the Heart

 
 
This month's Prayer of the Heart, in preparation for our General Chapter due to start in September this year, is taken from the opening phrase of the sample prayer given to us by St Angela in Chapter V of her Rule. It is:-
 
"Lord, light up the darkness of my heart."
 
Angela's writings reveal a fascination with light. In our Constitutions of 1969 we read:-
 
"The clear sunlit beauty and deep silence of the countryside found an echo in her soul and awoke in her a need for light and for the infinite; a need for God.When she speaks of obedience, truth, knowledge of God or the happiness of heaven, all alike are expressed in  terms of light."