Week of 29th January 2006

TILLIE CALLAGHAN RIP

“God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” (Jn 4:!6)
It is with great sadness that we pass on the tragic news of the sudden death of Tillie Callaghan last Wednesday, from what seems to have been something akin to a brain haemorrhage. She was 25.
Tillie had been working in the parish over the last year helping especially to develop the youth work side of the parish, along with Martin Plunkett.
Together, 18 months ago, they had begun a small community of young Catholics inspired by the 1980’s apparitions of “Our Lady, Queen of Love” in Schio, Northern Italy. They felt called to find means of bringing young people to know the love of God through Our Lady in the Church.
The main practical means they felt called to use, with the help of the friendship they experienced in their community, was drama and art. In this context, through their attempt at selfless loving, they prayed that the love of God would flow.
At Schio the Lady had said:
"I am the Queen of Love. If you love one another you will be close to the Father. Love and charity. Unending prayer. Go out into the highways and byways of the world, proclaiming the Kingdom of the Father untiringly. He who saves his brother will also save himself. Love and you will be loved. I shall not abandon you. I bless you".
May Tillie know the fruition of this promise. May her past apostolate amongst our community, and her continued love and prayers for us, bear fruit in the living and the loving of our own young people. May they come to know the true love of God through us. Please pray also for her family and friends.
The date of her funeral has not been set yet. It will take place in her home family’s parish in South East, London.
On the day Tillie died, the Feast of St Paul, Pope Benedict issued his first Encyclical “Deus Caritas est”; (God is love), in which he tries to plot a way through modern confusion to show the harmony between true love of God and love of neighbour. We will print extracts next week.

Week of 22nd January

PRO-LIFE ACTIVITY

The White Flower Appeal- the retiring collection last weekend for the Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child (SPUC) raised £610.00. Many thanks for your generous contributions.

Helping new mothers in need through the Good Counsel Network
Can you offer a live-in job to a mother with a child aged 0-14 months or can you offer a room free or low rent to a mother and baby? Please call Aracely 020 7723 1740 or 07756 895321.

Easing the pain of the dying: House of Commons Bill - URGENT
Jim Dobbin MP is introducing a Ten-Minute Rule Bill requiring palliative care for the terminally ill. Despite tremendous developments in the hospice movement far too many people are still dying in great discomfort. This is totally unnecessary and plays into the hands of the euthanasia movement. Please write to our MP Sarah Teather at the House of Commons, London, SW1A OAA. Or telephone 020 7219 3000 and ask to speak the MP or his/her secretary. The Bill, is to be debated on Wednesday, 25th January. It is essential for MPs to make clear to their party leaders that they support Jim Dobbin’s move and that they let him know. The short title of the Bill is “Palliative Care for the Terminally Ill”. Urge the MP to attend the debate if possible to support Jim in case there is a vote. Further information telephone Right to Life: 020 8992 7657

Saving the sick: House of Lords Bill
For the third time in the last three years, Lord Joffe is introducing a Bill to legalise ‘assisted dying’ by allowing doctors to provide drugs so that patients can be killed or can kill themselves. It is obvious that Lord Joffe is working on the principle of wearing down any opposition to euthanasia. It is very important that we write to as many peers as possible urging them to vote against the Bill. N.B.: every disability rights organisation in the United Kingdom is stresses that the legalisation of euthanasia in any form would completely undermine the rights of people with disabilities. Peers should be written to at the House of Lords, London, SWIA OPW. Lists of peers are on the back side wall noticeboard, or tel. 020 8992 7657

Dispelling ignorance about Fertility
· Central London Fertility Care Centre has a new website www.fertilitycarecentre.co.uk with an amazing amount of easily accessible information.
· The orange mission leaflet, “The Practicality of Conversion: Following the Church’s teaching on the Marital Act” is still available from pamphlet rack or as you leave Church

Week of 15th January 2006

IN TRUTH, PEACE
Today is the World Day of Peace, a theme close to all human hearts. Below are extracts from Pope Benedict’s powerful Message for the Day – available from www.vatican.va

3. … Forty years ago … the 2nd Vatican Council stated that mankind will not succeed in ''building a truly more human world for everyone, everywhere on earth, unless all people are renewed in spirit and converted to the truth of peace''. …we must realize that peace cannot be reduced to the simple absence of armed conflict, but needs to be understood as ''the fruit of an order which has been planted in human society by its divine Founder'' ….
5. …Sacred Scripture, in its very first book, Genesis, points to the lie told at the very beginning of history by the animal with a forked tongue, whom the Evangelist John calls ''the father of lies'' (Jn 8:44). …. the final chapter of the last book of the Bible, Revelation, which bars liars from the heavenly Jerusalem, (says) ''outside are... all who love falsehood'' (22:15). Lying …has had and continues to have, devastating effects on the lives of individ-uals & nations. We need but think of the events of the past century, when aberrant ideolo-gical and political systems wilfully twisted the truth and brought about the exploitation & murder of an appalling number … wiping out entire families and communities. After ex-periences like these, how can we fail to be seriously concerned about lies in our own time, lies which are the framework for menacing scenarios of death in many parts of the world. Any authentic search for peace must begin with the realization that the problem of truth and untruth is the concern of everyone; it is decisive for the peaceful future of our planet.
6…everyone should strive …to prevent any form of untruth from poisoning relationships.
9. …..Pope John Paul II (said): ''Those who kill by acts of terrorism actually despair of humanity, of life, of the future. In their view, everything is to be hated and destroyed''. ….. From the beginning, John Paul II was aware of the explosive danger represented by fanatical fundamentalism, and he condemned it unsparingly, while warning against attempts to impose (rather than to propose for others freely to accept) one's own convictions about the truth …
11. In view of the risks which humanity is facing in our time, all Catholics in every part of the world have a duty … to show that acknowledgment of the full truth of God is the first, indispensable condition for consolidating the truth of peace.
15….. the Church, in fidelity to the mission she has received from her Founder, … reminds everyone that, if peace is to be authentic and lasting, it must be built on the bedrock of the truth about God and the truth about man. ….
16. . When we hear the Gospel, dear brothers and sisters, we learn to build peace on the truth of a daily life inspired by the commandment of love…. At the same time I ask for an increase of prayers, since peace is above all a gift of God, a gift to be implored incessantly
BENEDICTUS PP. XVI