Southern Faith Priests

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The other day I was at the Southern Faith Priests Day at the Bridgettine Guest House in Iver Heath. It is a great place to stay and I recommend it if you want a day off or a few days peace and quiet, or even if you just want a nice place to stay before going to Heathrow Airport. I did not know where Iver Heath was until researching my travel arrangements. It is near the much-maligned Slough and other more happily named places such as Gerrards Cross, Stoke Poges and Shredding Green, tucked in between the M4, the M40, and the M25.

On Thursday evening, Fr Mark Vickers spoke to us about his work as chaplain to the University of Hertfordshire. He began celebrating an extra Mass on Sunday evening for the students which started with just a few but has grown in numbers. Other areas of apostolate have grown up so that the Catholic chaplaincy is now thriving and there have been several vocations. I have been before to speak to the students and will be going again this autumn. Nowadays, Catholic university students who go to events organised by a Catholic chaplain are not looking to attack the Church's teaching but to learn about it.

On Friday morning it was my turn to speak and the topic was the new ICEL translation. I based my talk on the article that has just appeared in Faith Magazine and will be on the Faith website soon. I'll post a link when it is there.

The Bridgettine Guest House is used by ordinary travellers, especially as a reasonable guest house in reach of Heathrow Airport. They have a Lourdes shrine in front of the house which might help some travellers think about things eternal:

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Inside, there is more than one painting of Blessed Richard Reynolds, a Bridgettine priest who was martyred by King Henry VIII along with the Carthusians:

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