Last Sunday we had the extraordinary opportunity to celebrate the Year of Consecrated Life with a powerful Mass in the RTE Studios in Dublin. We had a viewship of around 60,000 people not just in Ireland, but around the world.
You can view the programme by clicking here.
We had people from a variety of religious congregations and a number of lay groups
Welcoming all the youth from St. Albans to Flame 2
For Cardinal Tagle it was all about mercy. For the youth it was an opportunity to gather to celebrate faith. For the MSC Vocations team it was all about the Smarites!
Flame 2 was the largest Catholic Youth Event in UK in 2015. It brought together amazing speakers like Cardinal Tagle from the Philippines, Baroness Shelia Hollins, and Fr. Timothy Radcliffe OP. Worship was led by the double Grammy Award winning Matt Redman and his band. All in all it was an incredible day, but it was a lot of hard work!
Henry and Pat O’Brien running the Guinness Book of Records Smartie Challenge
Seeing as the MSCs were one of the main sponsors of Flame this year Henry and I were at Wembley SSE Stadium bright and early with our Starbucks in hand. Once we got our high vis. vests and event passes it was off to set up the vocations stand before the onslaught of thousands and thousands of teenagers. They came from all over England and Wales and created an atmosphere that could normally only be found at World Youth Day. It’s hard to describe, but it’s one of joy and hope and once you feel it you can’t forget it. (more…)
Vocations ministry in Ireland is busy at the best of times, but it looks like 2015 is going to be exceptional! Pope Francis has continued to revolutionise and encourage the Church by designating November 30th 2014 until February 2nd 2016 the Year of Consecrated Life. He believes that, “Religious life ought to promote growth in the church by way of attraction. The church must be attractive. Wake up the world! Be witnesses of a different way of doing things, of acting, of living! . . . It is this witness that I expect of you. Religious should be men and women who are able to wake the world up.”
A Year for Getting Up and Going!
This year in Ireland we are going to continue and expand our vocations ministry. We will have opportunities to walk the road less traveled along pilgrim pathways to Lourdes, Medjugorge and Santiago de Compostella. We’re going to take part in festivals at home and abroad where you can celebrate what it really means to be a Catholic with thousands of others. We’ll have Samuel groups, discernment weekends and Road Trips for those of you who are perhaps looking to really listen to where God is calling you, whether it’s marriage, the single life, priesthood or a religious vocation. We’ll also have our third year of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart Volunteering Project for people wanting to work in solidarity with the margnialised in South Africa. If the challenge is to wake up the world, then the question must be, ‘Why are you still lying around?!”
Over the coming week we are going to be advertising all of our programmes for 2015. Like our Facebook page or subscribe to our blog to make sure you get all the up to date information for the Year of Consecrated Life.
Spirit in the City Festival in London
It has been a summer of celebration for the MSC vocations team, filled with festivals, pilgrimages and volunteering. Most exciting of all we opened our new student community in Dublin on September 8th with two candidates, Kevin and Henry. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. In fact we’ll start at the very beginning of summer. It is, as the song goes, a very good place to start.
Arriving after 111Km on the Camino
June opened with a young adult pilgrimage along the Camino de Santiago. For those of you who haven’t heard of The Way it’s an 800km walk across the north of Spain to the resting place of the Apostle James. It has been part of Catholic tradition for well over a millennium. Each year it inspires hundreds of thousands of pilgrims to leave hurry and noise of life behind, to walk or cycle or ride on horseback to Santiago in a spirit of reflection and prayer. Our group this year came from Scotland and Ireland and they were profoundly moved by the experience, in spite of the torrential rain once or twice. June was also a good time for festivals and we took part in Brightlights young adult weekend and the Spirit in the City evangelisation day in Leicester Square. They are at the forefront of engaging young adults and exploring what faith means today. (more…)
Kevin, Clare, Fr. Alan and Henry
It’s a real day of celebration for the Chevalier Family. Today we have three young adults entering formation in Dublin, two with the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart (MSC) and one with our sister congregation, the Daughters of our Lady of the Sacred Heart (OLSH). It is an exciting new departure, as they take that courageous next step exploring where God is calling them in life.
Meet the Students (more…)
Pilgrims from absolutely everywhere!
The first thing that strikes you when you arrive for the first time for the Medjugorje Youth Festival is the heat. It’s hot and I mean roasting. The second thing you notice is the sheer diversity of young people gathered from all around the world for a week of prayer, testimonies and fun. You have pilgrims from Paraguay, Vietnam, Congo DRC and even the UK and Ireland.
Prayers offered in every imaginable language
There are even pilgrims from Syria and the Ukraine, who share on how their faith has helped them to deal with the challenges of life in their countries. This what the Medjugorje Youth Festival is about. The week is not about being some sort of holy huddle, separated off from the world. It’s about sharing stories and exploring faith. Above all it’s about celebrating what we feel and know to be true about God’s love for us and His invitation to share that message with the world. As part of the celebration pilgrims are adding their prayers to a hundred metre tapestry that will brought up during the final Mass on Tuesday. It represents the hopes and petitions of over 40,000 pilgrims, written in every language imaginable. During each of the youth Masses this week we have had over 500 priest concelebrating. Honestly we look likes clowns coming out of a mini there’s so many of us – if that’s not too irreverent!
Cenacolo Community’s production of Credo
Later tonight I’m going to see Credo, a musical and theatrical presentation by the Cenacolo Community. Cenacolo is an integral part of the Medjugorje experience. It is not simply a residential centre for people struggling with addiction. Rather it is a place of hope. Working without psychiatrists, doctors and social workers it bases itself on a Catholic ethos of prayer and compassion. The results speak for themselves and the community has spread and there are now 60 houses world wide. I’ll let you know how it went.