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News
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News from Ireland
THE SPIRIT COMES TO ATHLONE Following the very successful TINE evangelisation conference which was held at Athlone in January, the National Catholic Charismatic Conference for Catholic Charismatic Renewal, organised by the Irish NSC is also being held in Athlone this year 17th-19th June 2005. There is a great sense of expectation from the conference, because for many years there has been a prophecy circulating the country that a fire will begin in Athlone that will sweep Ireland and renew the Church. Will this be the year it begins? People are wondering. The speakers at this year's conference, which has as its theme "Come Holy Spirit" are Fr Rufus Pereira from India, famous for his healing and deliverance ministry and Fr Pat Collins CM, the popular retreat giver and author from All Hallows. Marie Beirne, the Irish NSC chairwoman will also speak. For further details contact the NSC office, PO Box 2434, Dublin 4. Tel (00 353 1) 667 0570 fax 668 9340. 700 PEOPLE ATTEND LIFE IN SPIRIT SEMINARS Seven hundred people attended the Life in the Spirit seminars organised by the Mohill prayer group and held at Carrick on Shannon in County Leitrim. The seminars, were held in the context of the 8pm evening Masses in the local parish, with praise and worship starting 15 minutes before the Mass began, and the talk given in place of the homily. Short personal testimonies were then given after Communion. The seminars were led by Marie Beirne, the chairwoman of the Irish National Service committee. She commented, "They were amazing. There was a real feeling of the Spirit moving in the church and the building was packed every night of the week." Seven hundred people, she estimates did the whole course, and a thousand came for the fifth night when Eddie Stones came to pray with people for the baptism of the Spirit. "I had the feeling that God had everything in the palm of his hand. With so many people, the praying over session could have been very difficult, but prayer group leaders from round about were called in to help and after Holy Communion people were invited to come forward and be prayed with. Marie remembers, "Eddie and two priests prayed with people. They were just touching them but we were dragging bodies out of the way all night, as people fell to the ground, having been slain in the spirit. This was the second time Marie had arranged seminars in the context of an evening Eucharist. The first one went well, but the Carrick on Shannon one was exceptional, she said. She wasn't surprised at the numbers because the group had had a prophecy before hand about them. "One lady had an image of people streaming into a church, which was why we decided to hold it in the church rather than the church hall, which is more common." The anointing on the seminars, she said was palpable, and was not something that can be arranged, however, well planned things are. Amazingly this was the not the biggest seminars to have taken place in Ireland. The honour for this belongs to some seminars, which were held in Longford Cathedral, six or seven years ago, when the speaker was Joe Dalton, and 1000 people packed the Cathedral every night. This time to ensure that people didn't come just to the talks of their favourite speakers, but did the whole seminars, the organisers didn't announce who would be speaking each night. Speakers over the seven weeks included Fr Joe Brilly, Joe Dalton, Martin Kelly, Marie Beirne herself, Eddie Stones, Frank McGuiness and Fr Michael Campbell. After several talks there was adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and ministry.The three local priests, Fr Pat Murphy, Fr Brian Brennan and Fr Thurlough Bacter were there every night. "They were gob-smacked by the whole thing," said Marie, "To see such crowds and the enthusiasm and the way people just hung around afterwards and didn't rush away the way they normally do." After the seminars, the participants were given contact numbers of local prayer groups and bible studies where they would get follow up.
The Mohill prayer group have also been behind the decision
to create monthly cluster prayer group meetings, to encourage smaller
groups that often don't have strong music ministries and are perhaps
not using the spiritual gifts as much as they once did. These are going
from strength to strength, and drawing about 80 people. Initially they
were going to different locations, and had the different prayer groups
hosting it, but now they have found a central location at Kenagh, which
is convenient for everyone.
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News from Scotland
CALL TO BE "PEOPLE ON THE MOVE" Steve Lavery reports on recent leaders' gathering in Scotland "We the Church need to be on the move. We are a pilgrim people and we have to be prepared to be people on the move," said Michelle Moran from the Sion Community as she called Renewal in Scotland to be dynamic. About 50 leaders and core group members gathered in the
premises of the Community of the Risen Christ to listen to her speak
on Ecclesia Europa. Arriving with expectant hearts the people were not
disappointed. Importantly time was given to listen to the Lord speak
through his Word, the prophetic word and pictures. No matter how long
one is in Renewal it is awesome to witness the hand of the Lord. The
discerned message of the day was: We are called to the above - we have been chosen - and we have to trust in the Lord. Michelle then spoke with her usual relaxed, entertaining and yet powerful way. Below are some of the highlights that I remembered: What is the Lord asking of us in terms of evangelisation? The day left the leaders of Renewal with a spirit of hope and enthusiasm. This was taken into Mass celebrated by Fr. Laurence OSA commemorating the anniversary of the Abbot Mark Dilworth who was one of the first people to bring charismatic renewal to Scotland. David McGill gave a wonderful testimony to the Spirit at work in Abbot Dilworth's life.
Kevin Lynch writes about the LIVING WATER MINISTRY
The first month is dedicated to training. This includes developing skills in public speaking, leading small and large group discussion, drama, games, music ministry, retreat planning, prayer ministry, and teaching in the basics of our Catholic faith. Formation for the team is ongoing between retreats throughout the year and includes a programme of personal and community prayer, study, monthly days of retreat/reflection and spiritual direction. We study Church teaching on material such as the Love of God, God as Father, the Sacraments, Sexuality, Forgiveness, prayer and the catechism of the Catholic church. Spiritual direction is of great benefit as each member of the team develops their own personal prayer life, in addition to growing in prayer as a community. Team members are responsible for their travel costs to
and from Scotland. During the year all living needs are provided by
Living Water (food, lodging etc) as well as a small monthly stipend
for personal needs. The Living Water Ministry team will be moving to
larger quarters in August 2005. We have been offered St Brendan's parish
house in Saltcoats. In addition to our Scotland wide ministry to schools
and parishes, we will also have the opportunity to support the youth
programmes in the area. Our new address will be Living Water Ministry,
St Brendan's Corrie Crescent, Saltcoats, KA21 6JN. "Eddie McDonald steps down from leadership of GLASGOW CCR" Eddie McDonald, who has been chairman of the Glasgow Catholic Charismatic Renewal for seven years is stepping down this June. He feels called to the diaconate and will start his training soon and feels it will not be possible to do both things. He comments, "I was finding things were starting to clash and I knew I had to choose." Interestingly he says, a third of those on his course, are from a Charismatic Renewal background, and a sign of how Charismatic Renewal brings alive people's faith and a desire to serve the Church in ever deepening ways. He has done an excellent job in Glasgow and has been an inspirational and enthusiastic leader, ably assisted by Nan McLoughlin, who helped him put his ideas into practice. Please pray for the discernment process for the new chairman. The next two Glasgow weekends are 13th-15th May
with Michelle Moran, and 2nd-4th September with Ros Powell from Birmingham
(see Coming Events)
News from Wales
The Wrexham DST has recently increased its membership from seven to twelve. The members now are Rev Canon Bernard Morgan, Fr Jim Durkin, Brother Loarne, Rev Ian Cameron, Steve Halsall, Pam Cox, Geraldine Seery, Brunhild Tynam, Pauline and Brian Stewart, Betty Morris and Ruth Massey. Several of these members will be attending the Newman Consultation in Birmingham on behalf of Wales. They met in February for a time of prayer and sharing. It was felt that the time was not yet right to make definite plans for an event in the diocese, and that the Lord will show them when and how to proceed. It was also felt that the new team needed time and space to get to know each other more deeply and to recognise each other's gifts.
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Living
Water operates a team of young people who join us for ten months to
spread the Gospel in schools, parishes and other groups in Scotland
through retreat ministry. The team comes from all over the world (past
members from Australia, Ghana, Canada, Scotland) to begin training in
early September and are with us until mid-June. Team members are between
18-28 years old.|
News from England
CELEBRATE 2005 The theme for this year's Catholic Celebrate Conference, during Easter week (27th March to 1st April 2005), was "Love One Another" There were more people than ever and by having an overflow room in the gym 1500 people were able to attend. The number of young people and children was very striking and the organisers estimate that 44% of the participants were 22 and under. This year the main talks, a morning bible study on Acts, was given for the first time by a Baptist minister, Rev Jim Graham. There was a huge array of nearly 80 different seminars and workshops to chose from every afternoon. The evening sessions and liturgies were remarkable for their imagination and artistic sense. Most of the speakers, apart from Jim Murphy from the USA, were Celebrate regulars and included Lord David Alton, David Wells, Charles Whitehead, and Jenny Baker. Ever generous, the participants contributed £36,000 to be spent on various charitable activities, spiritual and social. Young people from one of the youth streams, also raised £1000 for the Make Poverty History Campaign, by using their initiative to raise funds. Contact: Celebrate, Open House, Bullstrode Way, Gerrards Cross, Bucks SL9 7QU WORSHIP IN SPIRIT AND TRUTH The Worship Forum, which brings together Catholics involved in music, liturgy and worship round the country, had their first retreat this February 5th- 6th at SENT, the Sion Community's HQ in Brentwood. About 40 people attended. The main input was given by House Church leader, David Matthews, who said that at the heart of worship was the desire to bring everything to God like the sinful woman who poured precious ointment on Jesus' feet. Maz Miller, one of the leaders of the Forum commented, "his words really challenged me. I thought 'let us not be frustrated with our parishoners who don't want to sing or read or be involved with the liturgy, let us not grow tired that the responsorial psalm that we spent hours preparing doesn't seem to evoke a response. But let us pray that through our music, our efforts and love, we may be drawn into a deeper response of worship, so that we may lead others to do the same."
Worship Forum is open to all ages, experienced and those with lots to learn but who are involved in the music and worship of the Church in some way. The Forum has an address list of 90 musicians, singers and those who lead music on their books. Its aim is to develop a lifestyle of worship among musicians, create a network of encouragement and support and training. It also exists to be a resource in the Church circulating new songs, producing Catholic CDs and providing lists of musicians and worship leaders who can minister in various settings. The next event on Saturday 4th June 05, will explore the difference between music for private prayer and for liturgy. It will be at Highfield House, Chertsey.
The CES team have been working for over a year on this youth video series, which is the most ambitious and expensive they have done to date. Apart from Fr Stan, each session will feature exciting personal testimonies from vibrant Christians, who talk about their Catholic faith. These include ex-London gangster, John Pridmore and South Norwood rap group UGC. Filmed in an MTV style the six part video series will also have biblical dramatisations, music, visuals and three priests being "grilled" about various faith issues. It is hoped that the series will be ready in June. The videos/DVD material will be accompanied by a comprehensive guide on how to run the sessions with suggested activities, discussion questions and prayer response times. Contact: Catholic Evangelisation Services, PO Box
333, St Albans, Herts AL2 1EL Tel: 01727 823803 fax: 01727 822837visit
their web site www.faithcafe.org
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The
rest of time was spent in practical workshops on preparing and leading
worship, and generally catching up on what people are doing. This included
new songs and CDs that people were working on. During the weekend a
basic CD was recorded of participants own compositions. The aim is to
make this available so these new songs and Mass settings can be circulated
among musicians. If you would like a copy of this, together with accompanied
words/chords to each song, see contact below. The long range plan to
is to see which songs work well, and those that do, to collate into
an album of songs to be recorded professionally.
Fr
Stan Fortuna CFR, the rapping Franciscan friar from the Bronx, flew
in at very short notice to contribute to the filming of Catholic Evangelisation
Service's youth video series in early March. In a flurry of activity
200 pupils from nearby Catholic schools were bussed in for the day's
filming to provide an audience for Fr Stan's teaching. Although most
of the young people had never heard Fr Stan speak before, they were
mesmerised by his passionate and articulate presentations, as he spoke
about the basics of the faith. He performed many of his songs and greatly
impressed them with his ability to make up spontaneous raps. One of
these, where he called on them to plug into Jesus, the Church, and the
Holy Spirit inspired the title "plugged-in" to be adopted
for the series. |
INTERNATIONAL NEWS COME BACK TO THE CENACLE! Kristina Cooper reports on a powerful move of the Holy Spirit which is gradually gaining strength in Europe, and which is calling Christians to come back to the Upper Room for renewal and strengthening and to intercede for the needs of our society.
o presenting the
meeting/person Part of this too was the promotion of the practice of having Pentecost novenas again, drawing on the insights of Sr Elena Guerra. It was this 19th century nun who had inspired Pope Leo XIII to call the entire Church to a perpetual novena to the Holy Spirit every Ascension to Pentecost for the unity of Christianity, the renewal of the Church and the renewal of society (social and evangelisation). Since then the idea has been gradually spreading round Europe with great fruit. Particularly striking has been that of the Charismatic Youth Council in Germany (JCE), who organise a youth outreach called "Jump" every summer for young people 13-18 years old. Last year, inspired by Kim Kollins' vision, they took on board the importance of intercession and organised Burning Bush prayer vigils during their leadership gatherings and in the run up to the conference, as well as fasting. During the outreach itself they had a team praying 24 hours a day and every aspect of the programme began with 20-30 minutes prayer. The results were extraordinary. There were more conversions, more healings in soul and body (especially during the sacrament of reconciliation) and a stronger sense of God's presence than in all the meetings over the past ten years. This had such an effect on the organising team that it inspired them to launch a similar call to prayer and fasting and intercession for this year's world youth day. Elsewhere in Europe other groups are experiencing fruits. A parish in Paris, called St Leu, took up the idea and have been holding Pentecost novenas since 2001. They have been amazed at how God has used the idea to bring the whole parish together in prayer. In the beginning the novena was animated solely by Charismatic Renewal groups, drawing on non-parish members to keep it going. As its benefits were appreciated by the parish as a whole, however, different parish groups have taken on the task of leading it, using different forms of prayer. This the organisers saw as the ultimate goal anyway, that the renewal would not be something apart but spur the rest of the parish and bring forth fruits of communion. The European sub committee of ICCRS is now suggesting that other Charismatic groups round Europe might be encouraged to develop their own initiatives so that the whole of Charismatic Renewal in Europe can be united in prayer this Pentecost. For those interested in knowing more about the Burning Bush there is a web site in 7 languages www.burningbush.beatitudes.org CHARISMATIC WORLD YOUTH DAY EVENT IN BONN The German Catholic Charismatic
Renewal are organising an afternoon of praise and worship and ministry
as part of the official World Youth Day events programme. This will
take place in Bonn (close to Cologne) on 17th August 2005 from 2.30-5pm.
Fifteen thousand people are expected with input and support from charismatic
communities. Look out for it!
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The
Burning Bush initiative, as it has become known, is the inspiration
of Kim Kollins, a leader involved in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal
and based in Germany. It was in 1997 while she was praying in front
of the Blessed Sacrament in Rome, that she felt a prompting by God
to simply remain there and pray. This she did, cancelling her active
engagements for nine months, while she prayed and meditated on what
this call might be. The needs of the Church and our society at this
time were such that she felt the Lord was calling the Charismatic
Renewal to come back to the Cenacle again to pray for a fresh outpouring
and empowering of the Holy Spirit. Key to this was a renewed call
to fervent intercession in front of the Blessed Sacrament drawing
on the Charismatic gifts of praise and tongues. This was taken up
and promoted by RnS, part of the Italian Charismatic Renewal and became
known as "the Burning Bush initiative". The intercession
model she developed was:|
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