Our Lady's Catechists

Our Lady's Catechists is a special Committee whose members are qualified to teach the Faith to adults and children through postal courses.

Our Lady’s Catechists Annual Conference 11th to 13th July 2008

Our Annual Conference was held at St. Mary’s College Oscott, an excellent venue with many facilities. The ancient buildings and the beautiful Pugin chapel of the College are set in magnificent surroundings. There was an atmosphere of holiness in this peaceful place. We arrived on Friday evening and met with joyful faces eagerly waiting for the happenings of the weekend. It was lovely to meet old friends and welcome the new ones. A few delegates arrived on Saturday morning.

The high point of the evening was holy Mass concelebrated by Rt. Rev. Mgr. John Armitage of Brentwood diocese and Rev. Fr. Harry Curtis, Spiritual Director of Our Lady’s Catechists. Father Harry in his homily spoke about the roll of the catechist. He said that we should listen and proclaim the Word of God. After supper our Chairman Mrs Marie Francis welcomed everyone. Then Margaret Jones gave a brief presentation on the booklet, “On the way to life” by Rev. Fr. James Hanvey SJ. This book contains a critical analysis of our ever-changing contemporary culture and the bearing it has on catechesis. A small altar with an icon of Jesus holding the holy Bible was the focus for night prayer. After the reflection the candles were placed near the altar as a reminder of our gift of life to God for all the love and care he gives us. On Saturday we had three talks given by Rt. Rev. Mgr. John Armitage. He began his first talk with one of St. Benedict’s quotations “Monastery is a school of Lord’s service” The second quotation was from St. Gregory, “As they walked along the road their eyes were not open. It is in carrying out God’s will they saw the light.” The disciples had their own problems and they were depending on Jesus. To be heralds of the gospels we have to know our times. We are catechists teaching the generation of today.

The young people come from a variety of domestic situations and cultures. We have to remember that we are trying to instil the faith to such a generation. Most of us learnt the faith and love of prayer at home. Now it is different. Society should know how to teach values to young people. “Teaching values to children is a national responsibility” says the school curriculum. Mgr. Armitage illustrated other examples to explain the theme of his talk. “Children sitting in front of the TV, playing games on the computer, ears plugged with earphones lose awareness of what is happening in the world” (The Times) and “Quality of life for children in U.K. is completely ruined” (Evening Standard newspaper). He continued to say that values and virtues that were engendered into us, are no longer important for most young people of today. We are trying to catechise in a very difficult period. It is not enough to base our teaching on the Scripture and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. In order to deal with some of the young people with all their problems and lack of love at home, we have to first understand what is going on in their lives. When we offer life-giving knowledge from the Holy Bible and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, we have to bear in mind the person’s culture, family life and family history. Children need values and virtues to understand their story.

The absolute fundamental of teaching is giving the person virtues. He finished his first talk by saying that children need values to grow in society. As they grow they can make choices with proper values and virtues. In the second talk he spoke about negative and positive psychology of a person. The negative psychology is the analysis of the issue. It is focussed on emotional shock. The person concerned blames oneself as the victim. There will be an explanation always for the bad action. Positive psychology is a major shift from the real state. It is our character virtues that help us and give us strength. The character virtues are wisdom and knowledge, courage (emotional strength), humanity (love and kindness), justice and transcendentalism. The character sacraments are Baptism, Confirmation and Holy Orders. These sacraments build the character and help us to live a well-balanced life.

When a person takes drugs, that person gets isolated from society. The pain of isolation may drive the person to take more drugs and thus gets addicted. Even if one has all the information, without formation, one cannot lead a balanced life. Sometimes the most intelligent person is unable to make a decision. Sense of vocation is the missing link. We need to lead them to faithfulness to God. Then we will be successful. He concluded the second talk by saying that the way, the truth and life, are what gives us to build up that which is life giving. He began the third talk with a quotation from Thomas Zanzig “Make Knowledge secondary” Vocation is the fundamental relationship with God and trying to do his will. Each one is unique. Our spiritual DNA is our vocation.

God called us into existence and then into his family. Then he invites us to a relationship with him. Each person can do something that no other person can do. First we have to find the meaning in our lives, in order to understand our story. As part of our catechetical process, we say, ‘who am I in that relationship for you?’ Vocation is our attitude of living our lives. Thinking of the above statement we will be able to understand the youth in a better way. The young people brought up in a profoundly selfish society, find it difficult to sort their lives. They need a firm foundation. We want those we catechise to desire for a great heart. In order to achieve that they need to know their uniqueness, their generosity and that they are loved. Finally Mgr. Armitage concluded saying that the young people see Lord in the cross roads as did the apostles in the Emmaus story. Our job is to stand with them until they have this vision.

The revamped Diploma Course and the new Children’s Gospel Course were launched later on in the afternoon. At our AGM on Sunday morning we were privileged to have the presence of the Rt. Rev. Bishop Peter Doyle the ecclesiastical advisor for the Catholic Women’s League. The chairman of Our Lady’s Catechists, Mrs. Marie Francis mentioned the presentation of our work at the Catholic Women’s League Officers’ Consultative Meeting in Swanwick. She thanked the officers and the committee for their hard work. The registrars gave their interesting reports. During the elections Charmaine Jayasuriya was appointed as the new treasurer of Our Lady’s Catechists.

The Chairman and the Secretary remained the same. Carol Taylor was appointed as the vice chairman. Kathleen Lucas was proposed as a co-opted member of the Executive. Gill Moodie was appointed as the Director of Studies to work with Fr. Harry Curtis, the other director. Bishop Peter Doyle thanked us for passing on the faith. Fr. Harry Curtis said that we are faced with real challenges. He wanted us to be courageous. Eve Smith was presented with a certificate of excellence for being successful in the scriptural part of the Diploma Course. Our conference finished with the glorious celebration of the holy Mass concelebrated by Bishop Peter Doyle and Fr. Harry Curtis. At the end of the conference we were spiritually nourished and better equipped to carry on our work in the future. My sincere thanks go to all those who made our Annual Conference a great success. Charmaine Jayasuriya.

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