New priests


The ordination season is now well underway. Four of the students who suffered my lectures a couple of years ago have been ordained this year: Fr Gerard Hatton was ordained for Arundel and Brighton a few months ago: Fr John Chandler for Portsmouth, Fr David King for Arundel and Brighton, and Fr Jonathon Routh for Southwark were all ordained in recent weeks. The fifth, Rev Daniel Kelly, will be ordained a priest for the Diocese of Brentwood in September.

Ordinations tend to happen on Saturdays: this makes it difficult for me to get to most of them, so I was glad to be able to get down to Our Lady, Help of Christians the other week for Fr Routh's ordination. The Archbishop announced that he had been appointed to the parish of St Joseph's, New Malden, where the parish priest is Fr Peter Edwards, one of the founding members of the British Province of the Confraternity of Catholic Clergy.

An ordination is always an occasion for brother priests to rejoice, especially if the candidate is for their own diocese. Playing even a small part in the formation of priests gives an extra dimension to the occasion: I was glad to be able to receive Fr Chandler's blessing as well, since he came to concelebrate at the ordination of his classmate.

The photo above shows an important part of the ordination rite, the "tradition of the instruments." There are more photos at the RCSouthwark flickr set and at Mulier Fortis.

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