Our Parish is organising a pilgrimage to Medjugorje in Croatia. The dates of the pilgrimage are Tuesday 11th to Tuesday 18th July 2023. The cost is £650 per person for a shared ensuite room and includes return flights, half board accommodation and a tour guide. There are 20 spaces available. Places will be allocated on a first come, first served basis.
During Lent 2023 each Wednesday until 29th March we will be holding Lenten Spiritual Journey sessions entitled ‘Journeying with the suffering Servant’. These sessions will be from 6.30pm to 7.00pm followed by the Stations of the Cross at 7pm. All are welcome to join any of the sessions.
All Parishioners are invited to come for a Fairtrade breakfast and refreshments after both morning masses on Sunday 12th March in the Parish Centre. If you can make some cakes or biscuits using Fairtrade ingredients for the morning that would be wonderful. During Fairtrade Fortnight do look for products in your supermarket with the Fairtrade logo. Making the small switch to Fairtraide supports producers in protecting the future of some of our most-loved food and the planet.
Save the date: on Saturday 18th March 2023 will be our St Patrick’s Day party in the hall with Irish dancing and music. There will be a buffet and the bar will be open. We will start at 7pm. It is £5 per adult, and children are free.
For more information please contact the Parish Office.
An invitation from the Bishops of England and Wales
This is the bread come down from heaven (John 6:58)
A beautiful hallmark of the Catholic faith is the profound desire to participate in the Holy Mass and share in the Eucharist. We do so with deep gratitude and joy. The Eucharist gives the Church her identity – “The Eucharist makes the Church, and the Church makes the Eucharist.” It enables us to worship Almighty God, to support each other on our journey of faith, and to be a visible sign of faith in the world. This hallmark is supported and strengthened by the precept that our fundamental Christian duty is to worship God by participating in the celebration of Mass. Attending Mass on Sundays and Holy Days is the greatest of all privileges, sometimes referred to as “the Sunday Obligation.”
Since the beginning of the Covid pandemic, until the present time, we have shared with you our judgment that the situation of the last two years has meant that the Sunday Obligation has been impeded and has needed to be fulfilled in other ways. We thank God that this situation has now changed. The pressing challenges of the pandemic have lessened significantly. Most people have resumed the wide range of normal activities, no longer restricted by the previous Covid measures. We therefore believe that the reasons which have prevented Catholics from attending Mass on Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation no longer apply.
We understand there will still be some members of our congregations who, for reasons of health, do not feel safe enough to return to Mass. It has always been the understanding of the Church that when the freedom of any Catholic to attend Mass in person is impeded for a serious reason, because of situations such as ill health, care for the sick or legitimate fear, this is not a breach of the Sunday Obligation.
Our Catholic people and parishes have benefitted during these difficult times from the online streaming of Mass and other services. “Virtual viewing” of Mass online does not fulfil the Sunday Obligation. It may, however, be a source of continual spiritual comfort to those who cannot attend Mass in person, for example those who are elderly and sick, for whom the obligation does not apply. In this context, we recognise gratefully the ministry of those who administer Holy Communion to the elderly, sick and housebound.
We are grateful to our clergy, religious and lay faithful who have served our parishes, schools and communities with dedication and distinction throughout this pandemic. Now we look forward with renewed faith and confidence.
In the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Lord’s Supper, the Lord Jesus entrusted to us the precious gift of Himself. With humility, we glory in being a Eucharistic people for whom attendance at Mass is essential. Looking forward to the forthcoming feast of Pentecost, we now invite all Catholics who have not yet done so to return to attending Mass in person.
As the Church needs the witness of the presence of each person, so too each believer needs to journey in faith and worship with their fellow disciples. Nourished by our encounter with the Risen Lord Jesus, fed with His Word and His Body and Blood in Holy Communion, and supported by the presence of each other, we receive strength week by week, to serve the Lord and glorify Him with our lives.
Approved by the Plenary Assembly of the Bishops’ Conference
Friday 6th May 2022
We are looking forward to our next family Bingo night, which is taking place in the hall at 7pm on Saturday 9th April.
Please come along and join us in a fun family night out. Bring your own nibbles. The bar will be open.
Hope to see you all there.
Are you thinking about hosting or intending to host Ukrainians through the Homes for Ukraine sponsorship scheme? Are you unable to host but willing to volunteer your time to support Ukrainian refugees in Barnet in other ways? Barnet Citizens and the Barnet Refugee Welcome Board are ready to support you to join a borough-wide community response to welcome Ukrainians to Barnet.
OUR RECORD
We are an alliance of Civil Society institutions representing thousands of people who live, work and pray in Barnet. We build relationships across boundaries of faith, race and class and campaign on issues that matter to our members to make Barnet a better place. We campaigned to convince Barnet Council to resettle 50 Syrian refugees in Barnet and we supported the 15 families who arrived in a variety of ways including: holding a welcome party; providing ongoing ESL support; sourcing bikes for the children; arranging for Middlesex University to offer English language access courses and tuition waivers enabling 5 refugees to complete their degrees; holding a weekly coffee morning and toddler drop-in; finding employment. We have experience of providing direct support to newly arrived refugee families in Barnet.
HOW WE CAN HELP
We are ready to support you whether you are intending to host, thinking about hosting, or able to support Ukrainian refugees arriving in Barnet in other ways. Barnet Citizens has partnered with Citizens UK to identify hosts for 50 Ukrainian refugees in Barnet. Citizens has already received pledges for 500 places and expects to have 1,000 the end of the week. We think that Barnet can go a lot further than 50 – we think we can find room for at least 100 Ukrainians in Barnet. Citizens UK is working to ensure that the Homes for Ukraine sponsorship program is delivered in a way that is safe, sustainable, supported and at scale. We will support prospective hosts to think through the considerations and practicalities of hosting. We will help with the process of matching, application and planning for arrival. We will work with Citizens UK to provide safeguarding processes, training, resources, support structures, planning for what happens after the first six months and large-scale matching through partner organisations in Ukraine, Poland and Moldova. We will also co-ordinate a wider community response to engage the support and expertise of volunteers who are unable to host but have much to contribute in other ways. We will be building a local support network that will support hosts however they are matching with people to sponsor.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
If you would like to be part of a borough wide mutual aid group of hosts and volunteers building an active community of welcome in Barnet for Ukrainian refugees, please join us by completing the form below.
We are collecting this information now, but this scheme is only a week old and we don’t yet know exactly how matching will work so you may need to give some of this information again or we may need to ask for further information at a later stage.
This information will be collected and held by Finchley Progressive Synagogue and processed in accordance with our obligations under the Data Protection Act 2018. It will only be used for the purpose of supporting Ukrainians arriving in Barnet through the Homes for Ukraine program.
https://forms.gle/XQbpztxAYW3UgJVr5
We will be holding initial information sessions for prospective hosts and will contact you about them shortly.
Thank you!
Tamara Joseph,
Chair, Finchley Progressive Synagogue
Co-Chair, Barnet Citizens.
We have received the following letter from Archbishop Vincent Nicholls:
