Inside the Carmelite Monastery

Paddy, the Carmelites dog

This weeks theme for lectures was Community Life so after an early start and a lecture in the morning, the SPES community headed for the Carmelite Monastery in Notting Hill. We were quite apprehensive as to what to expect, considering the most that some of us knew about Carmelites was from a short film about St. Therese! We were greeted by a nun and a lovely big dog who immediately befriended Ambrose who we, of course, had brought along with us.




The grill from our side of the parlour, before it was opened

Entering the parlour room, we were faced with a closed window that led into another room. We heard what sounded like a stampede of elephants entering the room on the other side of the wall however, when the grill was finally opened we were met by 17 radiant Carmelite nuns all eager to see us and introduce themselves! The age varied among them as did the accents; from Scottish to Malaysian to South African! After such a warm welcome from the nuns, only two were able to stay to give us a talk on community life. One of the nuns was from Yorkshire which seemed to excite one of our community members and they spoke in a strange language for a couple of minutes that the rest of us could not understand... These nuns had both been in that Carmelite monastery for almost 30 years, compared to our just over 3 weeks in SPES, so they had a lot of experience on the topic we were to discuss.

 

 

The sisters kindly gave us a run through of what their typical day is like. They wake up at 5.20am which is slightly similar to us although we have breakfast together at 6.30am. They pray the hours of the day and have a very structured timetable, similar to ours, squeezing as much as possible into the little time available. They have work time which includes making of the hosts for the surrounding parishes and is where they get their main income from, gardening, making the habits that they wear and doing the washing, cooking and cleaning. They are in total silence apart from recreation time which is twice a day and during this time they sit around in a circle and talk to each other while doing something for fun like knitting for example. They spoke about the importance of sharing as a community because otherwise you don't fully know the people that you are living with, so they thoroughly enjoy and appreciate these recreation times they get to spend together.

 

 

We were curious as to what their rooms were like and were told that they in fact were called 'cells' and were very simple rooms with a bed, a desk and some drawers but that this was sufficient and one of the sisters even called them fashionable because most of the decor in the room is wooden!

 

 

 

 

The joy that radiated from these nuns was infectious and gave us hope, because if these ladies can live together for almost 30 years and still be so joyful, then we will definitely be able to survive these next 9 months!!

 

(Photo of Paddy and Sister's cell from Carmelites website http://carmelitesnottinghill.org.uk/ )

Our First NightFever together

On Saturday, 19^th October, we had our first Nightfever London together as SPES. Before the evening started, we had a short introduction with Laura, who was the evangelisation leader that evening. We met our evangelisation partners, guys from Father Steven Language´s vocation centre.  We got to know them and went together to Mass. After that we went downstairs for a short briefing with a copious number of other volunteers.

The main part of the evening began with the exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. The nice music started and we prayed together for our fist street evangelisation. Outside we invited people who crossed Soho Square to light a candle in the church and enjoy the nice atmosphere of prayer and music. Many meetings and conversations later we went inside to stay very close to the Blessed Sacrament for a personal time of adoration. Later some of us did welcome ministry: we stood at the door and welcomed the people entering the church; others went outside again for another time of street mission. At half ten all volunteers met inside for conclusion prayer and the amazing evening ended with the Benediction and a wonderful Salve Regina. After tidying up, some of the volunteers shared the experiences they had that evening. For each of us it was a splendid evening with many great experiences. Tired but full of joy we caught the bus and went home.

Our Day with the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal!

We recently spent a day in Canning Town with the Grey Friars.  When we arrived we immediately began by helping with the preparations for the soup kitchen which they run for the poor and homeless.  This involved opening plenty of cans, chopping potatoes, getting stuff ready for tea and coffee and then serving the soup and toast to the people that came along to the Friary.  We had the opportunity to have a chat with many of the people that came along; both the helpers and the homeless and we were really able to see how God is working with and through this mission.


After getting some soup for ourselves we were given a lecture from Fr. Emmanuel on Community Living.  He made no secret that the next few months are going to come with many challenges and hardships, but, he also let us know that from these 9 months will come great graces and so much joy; this, everyone found very beneficial and we look forward to putting much of what he said into practice.  After a bit of free time, along with some basketball, we settled down for Evening Prayer and an hour of Eucharistic Adoration.





The whole day was rounded up with a lovely chicken dinner prepared by Fr. Emmanuel and some good social time with Br John Bosco, Br Angelo and Fr. Emmanuel.  We are all looking forward to any other opportunity that may come to meet up with the Franciscans again!