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The Potta Priests' Tour Michael Mulroy from Darlington in the North of England, reflects on the three week nation wide preaching tour of England this summer by a team of priests from Potta in India
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Would people come to a virtually unknown team from India? When I was first asked to be involved I was a little sceptical about the numbers of people the organisers were anticipating would attend these meetings. After all, a national tour by a virtually unknown team from India… in the summer holidays… attended by thousands of people? And yet at every planning meeting I left knowing that the Holy Spirit was at work. My faith began to grow. The organising team led by Dr Chandy were experienced and very well organised. They were the same team that organised the Millennium celebration at the Stadium of Light in Sunderland, a few years ago, which was attended by 35,000 people, so they knew what they were doing. I found out to my amazement that the meetings were planned to last between 4 and 7 hours. My prayer meeting is 2 hours maximum, and I wasn't sure how I would cope with such a huge stretch. But do you know what? I WAS RIVETTED! What preaching, power, conviction. Such a clear exposition of the gospel and the kerygma. There wasn't much music and no extended time of worship. Just a song, an hour's preaching, followed by another song and another hour's preaching. At one point me, the great worship leader, and the music team were covering a loo break! And yet… as I looked around, most people were totally caught up in all for 2, 3, 4 hours. Good News on hard pews! People Are Thirsty To Hear The Gospel Preached And Will Respond When It Is Preached With Power! Leading the music at Newcastle (1500 people over 3 nights) and Liverpool (3000 people) I quickly realised that the vast majority there were most definitely not involved in the Charismatic Renewal movement. We didn't sing in tongues much. But if you could have heard "How Great Thou Art", especially with Vikki Waters superb violin playing at Newcastle and Liverpool. What praise! The roof lifted and people were healed. If most of the people were unfamiliar with charismatic renewal when they arrived, they looked fully involved by the end! Arms in the air, shouting out loudly Allelulia, Alleluia, Alleluia, ALLELUIA! All those alleluias… it wasn't everybody's cup of tea though. It put one young man (my guitarist) off so much at Newcastle that he refused to come to Liverpool. But you can't win them all. How lovely it was to be joined by so many from the Indian community. Their warmth, friendship and hospitality was really wonderful. And listening to their alleluias - they really showed me how to do it! God is sending faith filled Catholics from the 3rd world to help us What is the Spirit saying through it all? If I had to share one conviction as a result of the tour it was why do we have to get people to come all the way from India to preach the gospel? The truth is, I think, that the Church has become too lukewarm here in the West, too comfortable and too middle class. In India 20,000 people go to Potta EVERY WEEK. Why? Because they are desperate to hear the gospel. They will stand all day in the rain to hear it. What about us? The truth is we are not desperate enough. We don't realise how much we need Him. And if we don't produce more preachers than we have there is never going to be the great religious revival that we all want. God is sending us these faith-filled Catholics from India and the so called 3rd world to help us - to set England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales on fire. We need them to inspire us, to shake us out of our apathy, to seek God more fervently and to wake up. I think we can expect more such evangelists in the future, and we should welcome them, learn from them and then do it ourselves! As far as the downside of the tour was concerned, Indian culture is not Western culture and speaking as a Brit, I do feel in the future that slightly shorter meetings could be just as effective, with perhaps a bit more worship and far less words. And a break somewhere to stretch your legs and have a cup of tea! It wasn't perfect, but then nothing ever can be this side of heaven, can it? The experience certainly gave me a lot to think about and meditate on.
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During
August this year a team from the Potta Retreat Centre in Kerala (India)
led by Fr Matthew Naickomparambil undertook a preaching and healing
tour of 7 venues around England: Bristol, London, Aylesford, Newcastle,
Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham. Three of these venues including
the one in Newcastle were held in the metropolitan cathedrals. The
organising committee was based in Sunderland and led by Dr Joseph
Chandy, who put an enormous amount of energy and time into making
it happen. Bishop Ambrose Griffiths was actively involved in promoting
the tour. So now it's all over what was the fruit? Below I offer a
few observations, reflections and comments received by some of those
who attended. 
