This year's Christmas stamps

The Royal Mail has just released pictures of this year's "Christmas" stamps. They say:
"These stamps will make your Christmas post sparkle with festive spirit, putting a smile on your friend's and family's faces."
Here is a picture of some members of my family overcome with sparkling glee after receiving a Christmas card from me with a snowman stamp on the envelope.

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1962 Missal pdf online

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Erasure releases "Gaudete"

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A brother priest has alerted me to the digital release today by Erasure of the track "Gaudete" which is apparently the first single from a new album "Snow Globe" which is to be released as a CD and download bundle in a couple of weeks. I confess that my knowledge of popular music nowadays is as close to zero as makes no difference so I had to look up the above details from the Wikipedia article on Erasure . This also informs us that one of the duo is a gay icon, which made me hesitate about posting this at all. However, on balance I agree with my correspondent that the problem is outweighed by the possibility of making Christ known to a secular audience at Christmas. It is a good idea to know what singers are singing. This would apply to Lady Gaga's recent celebrated performance: I guess some of those cheering it might be less enthusiastic if they knew what she was actually singing about. So here are the lyrics to Gaudete and a translation to help along ...
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Hippolytus and Eucharistic Prayer II

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