Help! Parish Priests to the Rescue

The Church is in danger of serious decline and I believe the disaster can only be arrested  by Parish Priests. After the Second World War in the late nineteen forties and nineteen fifties, Parish Priests tried and succeeded in reigniting our Catholic faith by using Parish Retreats, Missions and Novenas to set their parishioners on fire with the faith of Our Fathers. I remember them well for they were deeply successful. Churches were crammed, confession boxes were full, and even collection boxes were overflowing, so much so that our Parish Priest built a new Lady Chapel.

We Need Parish Retreats

It seems to me that we need such Parish Retreats and Missions once more to reinvigorate the faithful with the faith of Our Fathers. That there is a genuine ground-level desire to return to our true Catholic Tradition is undeniable. The only problem is,  “Where do we return to find that tradition in all its glory?”. Many feel that it means returning to the spirituality that prevailed immediately after the Second World War and before the Second  Vatican Council. Others feel that it is not so much to the Pontificate of Pope Pius XII that we must return, but to the Pontificate of Pius X, or even to that of Leo XIII. I, with an increasing number of others, feel that we must go much further back to the Pontificate of Pope St Peter I.  And who will take us back?

In the Footsteps of St John Henry Newman

We must follow in the footsteps of St John Henry Newman and go back, not just to the Fathers of the Church in general, but to the Apostolic Fathers. We must go back and begin again with the Apostles and with Our Lady, who received the Holy Spirit together on that first Pentecost. There in all its simplicity, the essence of the Catholic Sacrificial Spirituality was introduced into the early Church, as it was first preached and practised by Jesus Christ himself.

The problem is,  “Where do we go to find religious priests who can do this?”. For instance, when I joined the Franciscan Order in the late nineteen fifties there were over three hundred members of the English Province with perhaps ten who were practiced and capable missionaries.  Now there are hardly ten friars left with an average age in the late seventies. It is a similar story wherever you look. Where then do Parish Priests look for preachers to run their Parish Retreats.

The answer is that they look to themselves, and to the example given to them by St John Henry Newman.

A Busy Pastor’s Guide

In the present circumstances, we no longer need the type of histrionic preachers who we once enjoyed after the Second World War. A far more sober and measured delivery is called for today that I believe can be delivered by Parish Priests themselves, with a little help that I now want to suggest.  Because of my experience of listening to Parish Missions in the nineteen fifties and giving them myself in the nineteen sixties and seventies, Essentialist Press has engaged me to collaborate with them in producing what they have called, “A Busy Pastor’s Guide to Running his own Parish Retreats”. My further experience of spending over sixty years following in the footsteps of St John Henry Newman to recover the spirituality of the early Church was also of crucial importance.

Restoring Catholic Spirituality

“A Busy Pastors Guide to Running his own Parish Retreats”, involves 15  free lectures on restoring Catholic Spirituality based on the Self-Sacrificing, and Contemplative spirituality, that Jesus Christ himself practised with Our Lady and the Apostles before it was introduced into the early Church. These lectures are complemented by other relevant, ancillary, and complementary material, that will enable the Parish Priest to produce his own talks with a minimum of the time for study that his already pressing pastoral work would make all but impossible. Samples of “A Busy Pastor’s Guide to Running his own Parish Retreats” are currently available to be shared with any interested Parish Priest. He need only send an email to Ryan Moreau, the Editor in Chief, at Essentialist Press: [email protected].

This would give any Parish Priest plenty of time to peruse the material before deciding whether or not to introduce a Parish retreat into his own Parish this Autumn. Although the Work Book for Parish Priests is private and only available to Parish Priests, any lay reader can access the lectures on Prayer. They can be found on the Essentialist Press website and please see number 14 “Ut Unum Sint.”

Ut Unum Sint – That they May be One

Shortly before He left the Upper Room Jesus Prayed for us – “Ut Unum Sint”, – “That they may be One”. If these retreats take off all over the world then this prayer may well be answered sooner than we might think, because the profound spirituality of the early Church to which St John Henry Newman leads us will indeed make us one once more, as we were so clearly one in the early Church, thanks to the Holy Spirit, whom our prayer invites back into our spiritual lives.

May I ask all lay readers of this article to send it to their Parish Priests without delay. Samples of “A Busy Pastor’s Guide to Running His Own Parish Retreats” are currently available to be shared with any interested Parish Priest. He need only send an email to Ryan Moreau, the Editor in Chief, at Essentialist Press: [email protected].

There is no time to be lost, make this Autumn the time to renew your Parish, if not before, with the sort of retreat that only you can give, because only you know how to edit, adapt, and reframe the material, so  that it will be given by you to suit the needs of your parishioners.

St John Henry Newman Pray for us.

David Torkington