Bishop Meeking's Diamond Jubilee

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This morning one of the seminarians drove me to the Church of St Aloysius in Caulfield where Bishop Meeking celebrated Pontifical High Mass, arranged by the parish in anticipation of the diamond jubilee of his priestly ordination on the 19th of July 1953.

Fr Tattersall, the parish priest, was Assistant Priest, Fr Marshall was Deacon, I was Subdeacon and seminarians were (very competent) first and second MCs. In my case, they needed to be competent since I'm not very familiar with the ceremonies and have to be guided quite a bit.

Fr Tattersall preached a fine sermon on the priesthood with particular reference to St Maximilian Kolbe who went to begin his slow martyrdom at Auschwitz with the words "I am a Catholic priest."

There will be some photographs of the Mass posted in due course on the website of the Catholic Community of Blessed John Henry Newman. In the meantime, here is a photo of the cake:

Meeking-cake


The interior of the Church:

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The shrine of Blessed John Henry Newman:

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And Bishop Meeking's splendid shoes which were made by a specialist here in Australia:

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