CALENDAR OF SERVICES FOR AUGUST 2019
Sunday readings from Revised Common Lectionary, Year C (Year of Luke)
Weekday readings from Lectionary for Ordinary Time (Year One)
Liturgical colour (LC) green
Saturday, 17th August: Annual Pilgrimage arranged by Father Ignatius Memorial Trust:
11.30am Sung Mass in St. David’s, Llanthony
Lunch
1.30pm Assembly for walk or motorcade
3.30pm Evensong in Little St. Mary’s Capel-y-ffin
Procession to Monastery
Tea and cakes on Monastery lawn
Sunday, 18th August: Solemn Feast: Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven (transferred):
LC white: Patronal Festival of Hay: Capel-y-ffin, Feast of Title:
9.30am Parish Mass in Llanigon
11.00am Parish Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
6.00pm Evensong in Little St. Mary’s, Capel-y-ffin
Monday, 19th August: Week Twenty in Ordinary Time
Wednesday, 21st August:
10.00am Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
Thursday, 22nd August: Our Lady, Queen: Octave of the Assumption:
10.00am Mass in St. John’s Chapel
Saturday, 24th August: Feast of St. Bartholomew the Apostle
Sunday, 25th August: Twenty First Sunday and Week of the Year: Trinity X:
9.30am Parish Mass in Llanigon
11.00am Parish Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
Monday, 26th August: Feast of St. David Lewis (1616-79) Jesuit, Priest, Martyr, Tad y Tlodion (Father of the Poor), who was executed and buried at Usk.
Wednesday, 28th August: St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430) is honoured among the Four Latin Doctors of the Church. He wrote the Rule of St. Augustine, later adopted by several religious orders. His literary output was prodigious, including: Confessions (story of his conversion); Sermons on the Gospel and Epistles of St. John; Commentaries on the Psalms; De Trinitate; On the City of God (Christian interpretation of history in view of the sacking of Rome in 410 by Alaric the Visigoth); and innumerable letters. His conversion was assisted by the ministry of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, and the prayers of his mother, Monica. Augustine was baptised at Milan in 387 during the Easter Vigil. He returned to North Africa and served as Bishop of Hippo for 34 years, living in community with his clergy. (It is just as well that daily devouring of full English breakfast in close company with Senior Staff does not happen in our Dynamic Diocese today.) On conversion Augustine chose to become celibate. This meant sending away his mistress after 15 years of partnership. Adeodatus, their son, died young. As teacher Augustine conducted several controversies. Against Manichaeans he proclaimed the goodness of material creation. Against African Donatists he taught that the church was one and holy (Una Sancta) by virtue of its divine vocation. But, in this present age, the ‘net’ contained bad fish as well as good fish. Against Pelagian emphasis on our free choice in accepting salvation, Augustine taught that humanity was ‘massa peccati’ (heap of wickedness), which could only be saved by the irresistible grace of the Sovereign God. Alas, Augustine’s writings on ‘predestination’ would come to be used by Calvinists and Jansenists. The ministry of St. Augustine was set against the background of the Western Empire collapsing through barbarian invasions. He died during the siege of Hippo by the Vandals.
10.00am Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
Thursday, 29 August: Beheading of St. John Baptist:
10.00am Mass in Capel Ifan: Chapel of St. John Baptist
Friday, 30 August: Feast of Our Lady of Capel-y-ffin
EVENSONG IS SAID OR SUNG IN ST. MARY’S, HAY, EVERYDAY AT SIX O’CLOCK
CALENDAR OF SERVICES FOR SEPTEMBER 2019
Sunday readings from Revised Common Lectionary. Year C (Year of Luke)
Weekday readings from Lectionary for Ordinary Time (Year One)
Liturgical colour (LC) green
Sunday, 1st September: Twenty Second Sunday and Week of the Year: Trinity XI:
9.30am Parish Mass in Llanigon
11.00am Parish Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
6.00pm District Mass in Little St. Mary’s, Capel-y-ffin
Tuesday, 3rd September: Feast of St. Gregory the Great, Apostle of England
Wednesday, 4th September: St. Cuthbert (634-87) was a monk for 36 years, and the Bishop of Lindisfarne during his last couple of years. Cuthbert first belonged to the monastery of Melrose, which followed Irish tradition, brought to Northumbria from the island of Iona. From Melrose Cuthbert moved to Lindisfarne, where, following the Synod of Whitby, he accepted Roman customs, gradually persuading his community to do the same. For many years he lived as a hermit on the Farne Islands. In 685 connection was made between two of our September saints. Theodore of Canterbury, in his organisation of the English Church, chose Cuthbert as one of his new bishops. Cuthbert perfectly fulfilled his apostolic vocation, for he had already been combining the roles of monk and missionary.
Two centuries after Cuthbert’s death the Danes ravaged Lindisfarne, causing his relics to be taken by the monks on an extended tour, until they came to rest in Durham. In 1104 the relics were translated to a new shrine in the splendid Norman Cathedral. On that occasion there was discovery of the incorrupt state of Cuthbert’s body. Slowdown in the natural process of decay persisted even until the Reformation. What a gruesome business! The Reformers did indeed destroy and loot the shrine but (unlike in other places) they were afraid to throw away revered relics. So, Durham Cathedral remains the burial place of St. Cuthbert, great monk, missionary and bishop.
10.00am Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
Thursday 5th September: St. Teresa of Calcutta (1910-97): Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu was born in Yugoslavia of Albanian parents. In 1928 she went to India as a Christian missionary, joining an Irish order, Sisters of Loretto. After the war she left her convent and started to work on her own in the slums of Calcutta. After medical training in Paris she opened a school for destitute children. She also cared for lepers and the dying. Mother Teresa formed a new institute: Missionaries of Charity. This order extended to 200 branch houses, some of them situated in terrible slums on the edge of affluent western cities.
10.00am Mass in Chapel of St. John Baptist, Lion Street – NB: As long as repairs to the Chapel continue services will be moved from St. John’s to St. Mary’s
Sunday, 8th September: Solemn Feast: Birthday of the Blessed Virgin Mary: LC white:
9.30am Parish Mass in Llanigon
11.00am Parish Mass in St. Mary’s Hay
Monday, 9th September: Twenty Third Week of the Year
Wednesday, 11th September: St. Deiniol (Daniel of the Bangors): Timothy Rees (Bishop of Llandaff when I was born) sang about ancient Celtic saints, ‘Dewi, Dyfrig, Deiniol, Teilo’. Regarding Gwynedd in North Wales, he could have added, ‘Cadfan, Cybi, Seiriol, Beuno’. Deiniot founded the monastery of Bangor Fawr on the Menai Strait, nucleus of the medieval diocese of Bangor. He also founded Bangor Iscoed on the River Dee in Clwyd. Deiniol’s burial place was on Bardsey, island of the saints (Ynys Enlli).
10.00 Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
Thursday, 12th September
10.00am Hay Market Day Mass in St. John’s Chapel
Saturday, 14th September: Holy Cross Day: Credo Cymru, society for traditional believers of the Church in Wales: Festival of Faith:
12.00 noon Mass in All Saints, Shrewsbury (near railway station)
Picnic Lunch
Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament
Sunday, 15th September: Solemn Feast of the Holy Cross (continued): LC red:
9.30am Parish Mass in Llanigon
11.00am Parish Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
6.00pm Evensong in Little St. Mary’s, Capel-y-ffin
Wednesday, Friday and Saturday are autumn Ember Days. Originally supplications at Embertide followed the progress of the agricultural year. Now they have more connection with our prayer for ordained ministers.
Wednesday, 18th September: Twenty Fourth Week of the Year:
10.00am Mass in St. Mary’s Hay
Thursday, 19th September: St. Theodore of Tarsus (602-690) served as Archbishop of Canterbury for twenty years. At the time of appointment, Theodore seemed very unsuitable. He had already passed retirement age. As a Greek from Asia Minor, he could not speak English. As a monk and scholar (educated in Athens) he did not yet belong to even the lowest rank of clergy. Nevertheless, the Venerable Bede praised his achievement, ‘The English churches prospered more during the pontificate of Theodore than they ever did before’. After visitation of all the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms Theodore proceeded, through a series of synods, to provide an adequate diocesan and parochial framework for the whole land. He reconciled diverse Celtic, Roman and Gallican elements in the English Church. As investment in the future, Theodore set up a school in Canterbury with a wide range of studies. By uniting the Anglo-Saxon church across boundaries of independent kingdoms, Theodore prepared the way for the formation of one English nation. Theodore’s synods were indeed fruitful. But ‘synods’ have got a bad name in the modern Church in Wales. For they seem designed to operate on ‘exciting strategy’ of getting rid of parish-based mission and replacing it with a pyramid of bureaucracy.
10.00am Mass in St. John’s Chapel
Sunday, 22nd September: Solemn Feast of St. Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist (transferred): LC red:
9.30am Parish Mass in Llanigon
11.00am Parish Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
Tuesday, 24th September: Feast of Our Lady of Walsingham: Twenty Fifth Week of the Year
Wednesday, 25th September: St. Sergius of Radonezh (1315-92), Patron Saint of Russia: My memory is a broken thing but I know that, in college days, we visited Trinity-Sergius Monastery at Sergievo Posad (called Zagorsk in Soviet days) near Moscow. Between the wars the Monastery was closed but restoration happened in 1945 to gain patriotic support for Stalin. Here indeed is the spiritual heart of Holy Russia. Abbot Sergius founded his community in the forest – wilderness at a time of national peril. Tartar invasion had torn to shreds the existing Civic and monastic fabric of Russia. In 1380 Sergius sent Prince Dmitri Donskoy into battle against the Tartar Khan, Mamai. Victory at Kulikovo Polye became a turning point. It was ‘Stalingrad’ of the fourteenth century. Liberated Russia received renewal from Trinity – Sergius Monastery. Soon 35 daughter houses were planted, from which bishops were recruited to gather the flock, so recently wounded and scattered. The beauty of holiness, as reflected in the lives of Sergius and his community, finds expression also in a famous painting, the Trinity Icon, written for this Abbey by the monk Andrei Rublev.
10.00am Mass in St. Mary’s, Hay
Thursday, 26th September: St. Cosmas and St. Damian suffered martyrdom at Cyrrhus near Antioch during persecution under Imperial Rome. On the ground of this simple fact, there arose a skyscraper of legend. Cosmos and Damian were twins from Arabia, who practised medicine in Syria. Long before Aneurin Bevan they invented the NHS. For they are called ‘anargyroi’, moneyless ones, their service being free at the point of delivery. Cosmas and Damian are commemorated in the Canon of the Roman Mass.
10.00am Mass in St. John’s Chapel
Sunday, 29th September: Solemnity of St. Michael and All Angels: LC white:
9.30am Parish Mass in Llanigon
11.00am Parish Mass in St. Mary’s Hay
EVENSONG IS SAID OR SUNG IN ST. MARY’S, HAY, EVERYDAY AT SIX O’CLOCK.
