Issue 01 - The Pilgrim - December 2011 - The newspaper of the Archdiocese of Southwark

Editorial The Pilgrim December 2011/January 2012
the
2012Pilgrim
50p
December 2011/ January The newspaper of the Catholic Archdiocese of Southwark, covering s
The Archdiocese of Southwark
Archbishop Peter Smith
020 7928-2495
archbishop@rcsouthwark.co.uk
Area bishops
Kent
Bishop John Hine
01732 845486
jhine@absouthwark.org
South-West London
Bishop Paul Hendricks
020 8643 - 8007
bishop.hendricks@gmail.com
South-East London
Bishop Patrick Lynch
020 8297 9219
bishoplynch7@btinternet.com
The Pilgrim,
Archbishop’s House
150 St George’s Road
London SE1 6HX
Editor: Greg Watts
020 7928-2495
pilgrim@rcsouthwark.co.uk
Advertising: Chris Morley
0161 488-1743
chris.morley@totalcatholic.net
Distribution: Andrea Black
0161 488-1716
andrea.black@totalcatholic.net
Print management, design and
distribution by The Universe Media
Group Ltd
When I was sitting in the TV
studio at Al Jazeera last year,
waiting to be interviewed
about the abuse crisis in the
Church, the presenter, a
Catholic, leaned across and
said, ‘Who is advising the
Church on how it handles the
media’
She was frustrated that so
often the only stories in the
media about the Church are
negative ones.
Yet she told me that, as a
reporter, she had witnessed
the fantastic work being done
by the Church around the
world.
I knew what she meant. As
Catholics, we have many good
stories to tell, but we have
not been very good at doing
this.
This is one of the reasons
The Pilgrim has been
launched. Although this first
edition is dated December
and January, the paper will
appear each month. It has
three aims:
to reflect Catholic life and
values through news and
features to provide a channel
of communication for the
diocese to be a vehicle for
catechesis and faith development.
To put it another way, The
Pilgrim will try to inform, educate,
entertain and inspire.
We’ll explore faith, family
life, liturgy, books, film,
music, art, history and much
more.
Of course, we now live in
the internet age, so an online
edition will be soon available.
The 188 parishes in south
London and Kent that make
up the diocese of Southwark
are incredibly varied.
They cover the inner city,
leafy suburbs, small towns
Telling good news
and villages and ports and
coastal resorts.
The masthead has been
designed to reflect this. Red
represents the urban areas,
green the rural areas and
blue the Thames and the sea.
A priest once quipped to
me, ‘Catholicism isn’t a shorthop
religion; it’s a long-haul
one.’ This is why the paper is
called The Pilgrim.
For faith is a journey, not a
destination.
And the idea of being a
pilgrim also reaches back into
the history of our diocese,
evoking Chaucer’s characters
making their way from
London to Canterbury.
Today, pilgrims from all
over the world have made
their home in London and
Kent. It’s not uncommon for
some churches on a Sunday
morning to have thirty or
forty nationalities in the
congregation.
Apart from its diversity, another
feature of Southwark is
its excellent schools. And as
Dr Anne Bamford says on page
4, we should do more to flag
up their achievements.
I am especially keen for
young Catholics to write for
The Pilgrim, or to provide
photos. If any young person
is interested in a career in
journalism, this is an excellent
way to gain experience.
It’s how I began my career in
the media.
That reporter at Al Jazeera
was spot on when she said
In October, around a thousand
Catholics took part in a walk of
witness from Westminster Cathedral
to St George's Cathedral
,there were fantastic things
happening in the Church.
So let’s tell some of those
stories. If you have any news,
want to contribute an article,
or have any comments, then I
would like to hear from you.
Greg Watts
Answering the call to priesthood
Fr Stephen Langridge,
Southwark Vocations Director
There are good things happening
in Southwark with regard to vocations
to the priesthood. In 2005
we only had a total of ten seminarians.
By the start of this academic
year the number had
increased to 23. Everything being
well, we can look forward to six
ordinations next summer.
One of the reasons for this remarkable
growth in the number
of priestly vocations has been a
subtle shift in our understanding
of vocations ministry. We might
characterise this as a move away
from a policy of recruitment towards
one of discernment.
Pope Benedict, speaking about
vocations in 2006, reminded us
that ‘we cannot simply recruit
people by using the right kind of
publicity or the correct type of
strategy’. In other words, vocations
work isn’t about designing
bigger and better posters or more
snazzy websites.
A vocation finds its origin not in
a poster but in the call of God.
So, the Holy Father went on to
say, ‘The call which comes from
the heart of God must always find
its way into the heart of man’.
This is what we mean by discernment:
the willingness of an
individual to step back from the
distractions of everyday life and
enter into his own heart. It is
here, in prayer, that the ‘still
small voice’ of God’s call can be
heard and it is also here that the
courage to respond joyfully will
be found.
Thus the Pope concluded, ‘precisely
so that it may reach into
hearts, our cooperation is
needed’. In other words, vocations
promotion needs to consist
primarily in giving young people
opportunities to develop their relationship
with God and to come
together in prayer.
In Southwark an important part
of our vocations work is the ‘Quo
Vadis’ group of young people from
16 – 24 years old who meet once
a month.
Inspired by World Youth Day,
the meetings, which are open to
men and women, consist of a
short catechesis, a meal and a
period of Eucharistic Adoration.
In August this year eighty-five
young people joined the Quo
Vadis pilgrimage to Madrid for
World Youth Day.
Apart from catechesis and a
time for prayer the group also offers
young people considering
their vocation the chance to
get to know each other.
This fellowship is important
because one of the themes of our
vocations work in the diocese is
friendship.
Recently I was talking to a
young man who applied to his
diocese after taking part in
our activities while an undergraduate.
‘My parents and all my friends
at university thought I was mad”,
he said. ‘I just want you to know
that without your work I wouldn’t
have had the courage to persevere.’
The Quo Vadis group is an important
support to both men and
women as they consider God’s
call.
Of course it is not true that the
shift in perspective from recruitment
to discernment means we
have given up on promotion
activities.
This year we trained a number
of young people to speak in
parishes for Good Shepherd Sunday.
We called the project ‘Vocation
Voices’ and we look forward
to developing it further next year.
We have also piloted the
‘School Vocation Project’,
encouraging Year 6 pupils to interview
a priest and a religious
sister and then to take part in an
essay competition with prizes for
the best entries.
And we have also just launched
The Calling, a 20-minute DVD following
a young man as he begins
to discern his vocation.
We are hoping that this will be
used in schools and parishes
across the diocese and to this end
we have included some lesson
plans for teachers and catechists.
Prayer is the foundation of
everything that we do and we are
particularly grateful to the many
parishes in Southwark who offer
holy hours for our work.
We are also grateful to those
who subsidise our work with their
generous donations to the Southwark
Vocations Office.
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