A CHURCH TIMELINE for 2012AD

12AD – Jesus is probably aged between 16 and 18.   If the former, then by modern reckoning he would have cost Mary and Joseph £178921;  if the latter, and assuming he was embarking on tertiary education, £200117.

112AD – The Roman governor of Bithynia (now N.W.Turkey), Pliny the Younger, writes to the Emperor Trajan asking what he is to do about the growing “contagion of the Christian superstition”.  He is told not to search them out, but to treat them harshly if they are brought before him.

212AD – In N.Africa, Tertullian (†220) the ‘father of Western theology’, examining the four Gospels, says that Matthew and John are the work of those apostles, that Mark is a Gospel written by Peter, and Luke a Gospel written by Paul [modern commentators would agree with those last two influences].

312AD – At the Battle of the Milvian Bridge in Rome, Constantine defeats his rival Maxentius, having had a vision of the Cross in the sky:  “In this sign conquer”.   To this is attributed Constantine’s conversion to Christianity.

412AD – The British monk Pelagius, appalled by the immorality in Rome, finalises his belief that grace is not necessary for salvation, and that we can achieve this through our own good works.    The Pelagian heresy remains universally popular today ….

512AD –  The Irish monk Saint Brendan is believed to have undertaken the first of the famous sea voyages which earned him the title of “Brendan the Navigator”.

612AD –  Another Irish monk, Saint Gall, a follower of St. Columbanus, begins the life of a hermit in Switzerland, the origin of the highly celebrated monastery which bears his name [Sankt Gallen, N.E. Switzerland]

712AD –  Moslems from N. Africa (the ‘Moors’) cross the Straits of Gibraltar and enter Spain.   They would advance as far as Poitiers in France before being repulsed (732AD) but remained a presence in southern Spain until 1492.

812AD – The first recorded pilgrim undertakes the walk to the shrine of St. James at Compostela in N.W. Spain.

912AD –  Death in Constantinople of the Eastern Emperor Leo the Philosopher, often invoked in cases of divorce and remarriage.  Leo was in his fourth marriage;  the Orthodox Church prohibited a second marriage for clergy, tolerated a third as ‘legal concubinage’, and regarded a fourth as a “sin and a scandal”.

1012AD – St. Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury and previously Bishop of Winchester, is martyred by the Danish invaders at Greenwich.

1112AD – Formal establishment of the Cistercian Order, a reform of the Benedictines, named after their mother house of Cîteaux, near Dijon.

1212AD – The so-called ‘Children’s Crusade’, in which bands of children were to set off – allegedly – for the Holy Land to convert Moslems.   Historians have strong reservations about the truth of this story.

1312AD – The Pope suppresses the famous, rich and powerful Christian military Order, the Knights Templar, closely associated with the Holy Land.

1412AD – Birth of (Saint) Joan of Arc, ‘The Maid’, the village girl from Lorraine who defeated the English at Orléans, had the Dauphin crowned King at Reims, was betrayed by the Burgundians and burnt as a heretic by the English in Rouen (1431).

1512AD – Michelangelo finishes painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome, leaving only the “Last Judgment” to follow in 1535-41.

1612AD – The radical Edward Wightman, who claimed to be the Saviour of the World, is the last person in England to be burnt at the stake for heresy (in Lichfield).

1712AD – Birth of Frederick the Great, Frederick II King of Prussia, famous as an “enlightened absolute monarch” with a policy of universal religious toleration (in fact not consistently applied to the Jews).

1812AD – What is seen as the first modern Constitution, that of the Spanish parliament in Cadiz following the defeat of Napoleon, regulates the position of the Church vis-à-vis the State.   In fact it was stillborn in the face of a revived repressive monarchy.

1912AD – The Methodist Church adopts an official Social Creed (proposed in 1908), the first Church to do so.

2012AD – The pages remain to be written.  Your contribution may be crucial.

This is the heart of the ‘mystery’.   The early Church guarded it carefully, for initiates only.   To this day in the Byzantine liturgy the deacon chants:  “The doors!  The doors!” meaning that the doors must be watched to prevent the entry of any unbaptised – not that anyone does.

Properly speaking, the Eucharistic (Thanksgiving) Prayer begins with the dialogue preceding the Preface & Sanctus, but conventionally we speak of it as beginning after the Sanctus (“Holy, holy”).

The Prayer is prayed aloud by the priest on behalf of the people (hence the imminent translation changes do not greatly affect the people at this point) but it is still the prayer of the people to which they give their assent in the final, ‘great’, Amen.

In the early Church this Prayer was probably ‘ad-libbed’, though incorporating the Last Supper words of Jesus.   In time, the Prayers were written down and fixed.   The  Byzantine Church uses three, the Ethiopians so many nobody is quite sure, and our Roman Rite was left with just one – the so-called ‘Roman Canon’ or our present Prayer No. 1.

This ancient prayer is unusual in that it is based on the model of the Church in Alexandria in Egypt, whereas our other prayers follow the model of the Church in Antioch, in Syria (more on this anon).   The Egyptian model has two blocks of intercessions, separated by the consecration, and seems more diffuse and ‘scattered’ as a result.

At the Second Vatican Council (1962-5) there were some who wished to abandon the Roman Canon entirely as no longer meeting modern needs.   It was saved through the intervention of Pope Paul VI.   Some countries had taken this unrest as the cue to start composing their own prayers with chaotic results reminiscent of the early Church -  Holland provided 11 prayers, Indonesia 10, France – allegedly – 100!

Official order was restored when just three other prayers were added (2, 3, 4) and subsequently these have been joined by three prayers for use at children’s Masses, two for reconciliation Masses, one for Masses for the deaf where the prayer is signed, and one, coming from Switzerland (1974), called for “Various Needs and Occasions”, which has four variants – I usually call this Prayer 5, but that is not an official title.

Of the first three new prayers, the short No. 2 – beloved of the ‘quick Mass brigade’ – was based on an ancient liturgy proposed by St. Hippolytus (†235) in Rome.   Nos. 3 and 4 were the work of an Italian Benedictine scholar, Dom Cipriano Vagaggini (†1999), based on ancient models.   No. 4, which is particular expansive, has something in common with the Eastern ‘Liturgy of St. Basil’ which describes at length the work of Christ’s salvation.

One may add in passing that the words of Jesus – deliberately kept the same in all the prayers – do not exactly correspond to any of the four accounts of the Last Supper in the New Testament.    They are a composite formula of the early Church.

All of these prayers, of varying lengths, follow a common pattern.   This pattern we will analyse next week, before proceeding to particular translation points in the new prayers, and the people’s responses in the so-called ‘Eucharistic Acclamations’

111AD – The Roman governor of Bithynia (now N.W.Turkey), Pliny the Younger, writes to the Emperor Trajan that Christians do not seem to be guilty of the many vices attributed to them – but he still persecutes them.

211AD – In N.Africa, Tertullian (†220) the ‘father of Western theology’ makes the first reference to the ‘Power of the Keys’ as applying specifically to the Popes.

311AD – The ‘Edict of Toleration’ in the names of Constantine, Galerius and Licinius, ends the Roman persecution of the faith.

411AD – The Donatist sect (after their leader Donatus) maintain that churches which tolerate unworthy members can no longer be called churches.

511AD – Death of Clovis, the first Catholic king of France (born 466, and baptised by St. Rémy at Rheims).

611AD – Conversion of Mohammed, merchant of Mecca, into a Prophet of Allah, in the month of Ramadan.

711AD – Building of the Islamic mosque, the Dome of the Rock, on the Jewish Temple mount in Jerusalem.

811AD – The Christian faith reaches Hamburg, whence it will be spread by St. Ansgar (Oscar), the ‘Apostle of the North’.

911AD – The Emperor Leo VI in Constantinople confirms the autonomy of the Holy Mountain of Athos in Greece.

1011AD – St. Augustine’s old cathedral in Canterbury is wrecked by raiding Danes under Sweyn Forkbeard, father of King Cnut (Canute).   The archbishop St. Alphege is taken hostage and martyred.

1111AD – In Ireland, the Synod of Rathbresail (Westmeath) declares that the Irish church will move from the Celtic to the Roman customs, including the establishment of dioceses which survive to this day.

1211AD – In Assisi, St. Francis is granted the use of the ‘Portiuncula’ as the first spiritual home for his followers.

1311AD – The Council of Ravenna decrees that Baptism may be by sprinkling or by immersion, without preference.

1411AD – The Bohemian reformer Jan Hus (burnt at the stake in 1415 while under safe conduct) begins to preach against the abuse of indulgences and is excommunicated.

1511AD – Christianity arrives in Malaysia, through the Portuguese explorer Afonso de Albuquerque.

1611AD – Publication of the King James Bible (in preparation since 1605), the most printed book in the history of the world, [though actually now extant in a revision of 1769, as is not generally realised].

1711AD – A sermon given by Joseph Boyse at Christ Church, Dublin on the theme of religious toleration is officially burnt in public by the common hangman.

1811AD – Birth in Bohemia (now Czech Republic) of St. John Neumann who after emigrating to the US in 1836 founded the Catholic school system there.

1911AD – G.K. Chesterton publishes the first of his stories involving the fictitious RC priest-detective Father Brown, based on a real-life priest in Bradford.

2011AD – Maybe this is your year??

ARRONDEAU George L/9576 Private Middlesex Regt. Buried Huddersfield ( Edgerton Cemetery) 6/11/14 age 28.

BURROUGHS Bernard Prendergast 2^nd Lieut 1^st Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers. Died of wounds 16/3/1917. Buried St Sever Cemetery, Rouen.
Son of Lt Col Charles and Mrs Margaret Burroughs( nee Prendergast) of Pelham Lodge, 356 Shirley Road. Born Salford Barracks, Manchester.

COLLET Charles Herbert, Flight Commodore DSO, RN Air Service and Captain Royal Marine Artillery.

Son of James and Teresa (nee Pilley) born Calcutta lived at Lansdowne House Regents Park Road( where Lansdowne Road is now) and later Woodleigh West End. Successfully carried out the first long distance air raid into enemy country of the war when he bombed Zeppelin Sheds at Dusseldorf on 22 Sept 1914. Killed in Gallipoli area in an accident 19 August 1915 age 27 . Buried  Lancashire Landing cemetery, Gallipoli.

CLOSE H.B Lieut Royal Dublin Fusiliers
Husband of Josephine Close of Plas Newydd, Killiney, Co Dublin. Died 1 Nov 1918 age 30. Buried Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin

EDMUNDS John Simons 25054 Private 9^th Battalion Lancashire Fusiliers

of 1 Nightingale Freemantle. Formerly Private 3326 Dragoon Guards. Born June 1889 Southampton. Enlisted 1915. At the Dardanelles, Landing at Suvla Bay and Gallipoli. Presumed killed at the Somme 26 Sept 1916. No known grave. Name inscribed on the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France.

KENNY Bernard William Sub Lieut  Nelson Battalion ,Royal Navy Volunteers.
Born 8 April 1892 Freemantle House 47, Millbrook Road, Freemantle. Father William Charles Kenny was a block ice Merchant from Bayswater his mother Lucy from Pimlico. One of his brothers ,Edmund Couche Kenny, also RNVR, Howe 1^st Royal Marines Battalion survived Accidentally Killed at Gallipoli 19 November 1915 by British artillery shell falling short. Death described in diary of Sub Lieut J C Hilton 4^th Platoon, Hood Battalion. Name inscribed on Helles Memorial, Turkey. No known grave. His will proved in London 28/Jan/1916 made William Sheppard , bank official executor and his estate was £528 12shillings and 11pence.

O’HARA Thomas
Son of James O’Hara of Brig O’Earn, Charlton Road, Shirley.

STANLEY Thomas James Private Middlesex Regt
Killed 1 July 1916 in offensive on a line north of Gommecourt to Maricourt. Name inscribed on Thiepval Monument, Somme, France. No known grave.

STANLEY S. Gunner, Royal Field Artillery
21 Sidney Rd Shirley. Son of Samuel and Elizabeth Stanley of Woodford, Co Galway. Enlisted 1917. Fought on Western Front. Killed near Poperinghe, Ypres 1 May 1915 aged 20. Interred Nine Elms British Cemetery, Poperinge, West Vlaanderen, Belgium.

WELLMAN Gilbert James, Private 6525, Dorset regt
Born 1883 West Dulwich, London .Served 6 years in India. Husband of Mary ( nee Ward) of “ Shamrock, Wimpson Lane, Millbrook. whom he married March 1912 Southampton. Son of James and Susan Wellman of 61, Clarendon Road, Shirley.Killed 3 July 1916 aged 34 in offensive on a line north of Gommecourt to Maricourt. Name inscribed on Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France. No known grave.

WOODMAN Herbert Edmund Langdon 5492 1^st E Lancashire Regt Lance Sergeant
Served in S African campaign ( Boer War) Husband of Louisa Woodman( nee Cawte) married Dec 1910 Hartley Wintney. of 75 Wolseley Rd Shirley She died Southampton 1966 aged 81. Son of Samuel and Martha Woodman of Gosport.  Killed at Ypres 26 March 1915 aged 35. Interred Lancashire Cottage Cemetery, Comines- Warneton, Hainaut, Belgium.

WOSIKOWSKI Joseph Henry private PO/14253 Royal Marine Light Infantry, SS Kermouth
Son of Francis and Sarah Wosikowski of 197 Foundry Lane, Shirley. Parents were tin church caretakers. Died 27 January 1918 age 30. Interred New Orleans ( Greenwood) Cemetery, Louisiana, USA.

These names were inscribed on a chalice given to St Boniface Church after the war by the families of the deceased .

The only change in our Pastoral Area is that Fr. Louis McDermott OMI is leaving Millbrook/Lordswood and returning to his Order, to their Inchicore parish in Dublin.    He leaves us in early September taking, alas, his own inimitable style with him.   His successor will be Fr. Des Connolly who is one of the Montfort Fathers based at Ashurst, though he himself has latterly been Parish Priest of Ringwood/Fordingbridge.   He is the inspiration behind the ‘Poitiers Project’ which we support with food donations, etc., and will be known to many as not so long ago he was Chaplain at St. George’s College.

On the East side of the city, Fr. Bill Wilson is moving from Woolston/Netley to Westbourne (Bournemouth) and Fr. Claro Conde is coming instead from Sandown/Shanklin/Ventnor on the Isle of Wight.   Fr. Anthony Gatt of Portswood will be their new Coordinating Pastor.

And that’s it.  You’ll just have to petition the Bishop again next year …

Our parish children are at present being prepared for their First Reconciliation, which takes place in the church on St. Patrick’s Day – not in the Confessional, though we do show them that, so they understand how it ‘works’. And we teach them the word ‘Reconciliation’, so introducing them to the language of six-syllable words.

Having said all that, the Latin title of the sacrament is not Sacramentum reconciliationis. It is Sacramentum penitentiae, literally ‘Sacrament of Penance’ or of ‘Penitence’. Penitence is our sorrow for sin, penance is the atoning for that sin in some way, as when the priest ‘gives one a penance’. A different emphasis again, to be honest not as complete a notion as ‘reconciliation’

There are other emphases, too. One is the communal nature of sin. It is quite wrong to think: ‘My sin is a private matter between me and God’. All sin, however ‘privately’ committed, impacts on the world at large; it weakens the threads of love and trust. If you came to the talk on “Celebrating Lent the Orthodox Way” on March 2, you heard how the Orthodox, on the day before Lent, hold the “Service of Forgiveness”, where everybody present asks forgiveness of everybody else, albeit without listing details.

That is the main point of our celebrating a Parish Service of Reconciliation in Lent (March 23, 8pm). By coming together we recognise the weakening of the social bond which sin causes, and the strengthening brought about by forgiveness.

In our primary school, given the large numbers, the children write their sins on cards, which they even decorate and illustrate. The priests read the cards and give Absolution, and the cards are fed into a shredder before the children’s eyes, to show them that the sin is ‘gone’.

In France there is now a ‘confess by mobile phone service’ – of which the French church does not approve – by which at 0.34 euros per minute one can speak of one’s sin to God. Mon Dieu! So God has a mobile phone after all – no wonder he is always ringing during Mass.

Next we will have text-message Confession: i bad sind comm. 1 3 6 9 and presumably Penance & Absolution: 2 OF, 2HM, 2GB, u OK. Have nice day. Gd.

Choosing the Common Good argues that the construction of a just and civil society can be achieved as the desire for love and truth is innate in all women and men. While there has been a fracturing in trust in institutions and in each other, the Bishops argue that it is up to all in civil society to lead the re-building of this essential trust. Central to that task is the understanding that we are not self-contained individuals but inter-dependent, where human flourishing lies in the quality of our relationships and the practice of virtue.

Archbishop Vincent Nichols, president of the Bishops’ Conference, said: “We encourage everyone to read this document and participate in the wide-ranging and necessary debate about the values and vision by which we seek to construct a just and civil society. Ultimately Choosing the Common Good is about human flourishing. It does not offer a direction on how to vote, but forms a back-cloth to the more particular issues which may well dominate the election itself and offers an invitation to the political parties on how best to respond in all of our joint efforts to build a better society.”

It is also promoted as a reflection on essential strands of Catholic social and moral teaching ahead of the visit of Pope Benedict XVI which takes place in September.

Read it on the website of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, at the link below:-

www.catholicchurch.org.uk/catholic_church/media_centre/press_releases/press_releases_2010/choosing_the_common_good

His place will be taken by Monsignor Vincent Harvey, who is one of the Vicars General of the Diocese – that is, one of the Bishop’s deputies for the administration of the Diocese – and has been Parish Priest of the Holy Ghost parish in Basingstoke, where one of his recent prominent concerns has been overseeing the building of the large new parish complex of St. Bede (church, centre, presbytery) to replace a number of scattered Mass centres. He has been on a Scripture study sabbatical in the Holy Land during the autumn (read and see more at his sabbatical blog), hence this slightly unusual time of year for a clergy move.

Moving is always a traumatic experience and we wish them both well as they move to new surroundings. The Pastoral Area thanks Canon John for his years of service to parish and city, and offers its welcome to Monsignor Vincent.

Canon John O'Shea

Mgr Vincent Harvey

They have recently completed 41 baby quilts and 21 cushions for the children of women using the Southampton Domestic Abuse Service.

These women and children often flee their homes in just the clothes they are wearing.

Donations of bedding and towels, toiletries and kitchen equipment are always welcome and may be made via Portswood Police Station.

I said then that you – the laity – know what richness you need to find in the ministry of your priests and deacons. You expect to be able to find in us a familiarity and intimacy with God so that, in all humility and confidence, we might be able to lead you to God. When all is said and done, the only richness you hope to find in us is the richness of God.

This is a “high” understanding of the priestly vocation and one which you rightly hold. Today, I want to put before all of you, who are celebrating significant anniversaries in your married lives, a similar “high” understanding of marriage, that sacrament which defines your lives. It is important that we do so at this time when so much in our public and political life is intent on undermining this great sacrament which underpins the whole of our Christian life.

Let’s start with that reading from Colossians – and let me remind you of what Paul wrote: “As the chosen of God…you are to be clothed in heartfelt compassion, in generosity and humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with one another; forgive each other…The Lord has forgiven you; now you must do the same. Over all these clothes, put on love, the perfect bond.” It’s in these qualities, generously lived out by you over many years, that we find the sanctity of marriage, its richness for human growth and its importance, both for our immediate families and for the family of the nation.

Inevitably, you will cast your minds back to the beginnings of the partnership that you enjoy today. You will remember the quickening of the heart and those first stirrings of love. You will remember the joy of sharing and that sense of contentment that comes from being together. You will remember and rejoice in that coming together in oneness and the ideals and hopes that you have had and which you have done your best to sustain over the years. Be thankful for the great gift of love with which the Lord has blessed you.

But you will also remember the realities of your shared lives and the challenges that they have made on your generosity and love, on your need for that patience and understanding of which Paul writes. You won’t have always got it right – none of us do – so you will remember too those moments when there has been need for forgiveness and mercy and understanding.

This all goes to prove that in any Christian vocation, which is a way of life, there has to be what is described as the “gradualness of the Law.” Vocation, be it to marriage or priesthood, is about a process of building and sharing lives and enthusiasms; it takes time and involves change. You did not achieve perfection on the day of your marriage. Cardinal Newman writes that “to be perfect means to have changed many times” and all of you will have learned the truth of that.

Today is an opportunity for a solemn recommitment of your lives to one another, a recommitment to that love which “costs not less than everything”. This is yourfidelity to the particularity of loving to which the Lord has called you – and it costs. “Remain in that love…and love one another as I have loved you.” St John goes on to write, though we haven’t heard those words today, that “no one can have greater love than to lay down their life for a friend.” That is precisely what you undertook when you first exchanged your marriage vows, however many years ago. At that moment, “the peace of Christ reigned in your hearts and it was for this that you were called into one body”. And, of course, “the peace of Christ” is another way of saying “the presence of Christ” is in your hearts and families.

This vision of your vocation may seem hopelessly idealistic but, striving to make this vision the reality of your married lives is to bear witness to the world of what St Paul describes as “the unfathomable riches of Christ.” In the Church, you are not simply married for yourselves; you are married for all of us and for all who live around us. You give us the opportunity to see and experience – made flesh in yourselves – the love that the Lord has for each of us and for all his people, You show us what it means to lay down life for friends. You are witnesses to the Gospel, so that when I want to talk about Christ’s love for us, then I can point to you and say “there you are; look at that.”

You are in the front line of the mission of the Church – proclaimers and witnesses of the Gospel of love. Hear again and take heart from other words of John Paul II – “What the world needs are heralds of the Gospel, who are experts in humanity, familiar with their own emotions, able to share them with others, and who are, at the same time, contemplatives who have fallen in love with God.”

If ever there was a “high” teaching on marriage this is it; it is your vocation – we rejoice in it – and our prayer today is to help you celebrate it in prayer and gratitude to the Lord who alone gives the gift.