LIVESIMPLY AWARD CELEBRATION JUNE 2024
In June we celebrated (simply!) not only achieving the CAFOD LiveSimply Award, but also the amazing spirit of cooperation between our parishes and between many groups within the parishes, that made this achievement possible. Thank you everyone!
Each parish received a wooden plaque, hand finished by artisans in Cambodia. The wood is sustainably sourced acacia and making the plaques enables the people with disabilities who make them to earn their own income. Once they are fully mounted both plaques will be proudly displayed in our two churches.
We began our Celebration in the grounds of Bishop Eton. Fr Jim Casey CssR, our patron, blessed the plaques and led us in an opening reflection. We soaked up the sunshine and delighted in the peace of the garden.
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As a small thank you to Fr Jim for all his support and enthusiasm during our LiveSimply journey Pauline presented him with a sunflower which had been grown from seeds shared at our Plant Giveaway in the autumn.
We prepare to leave Bishop Eton and head to St Mary’s to continue our Celebration.
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Our numbers grew as we joined those who were meeting us at St Mary’s.
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A simple but beautiful display provided a focus for our prayers and reflections. We felt the breeze and passed the plaque from hand to hand as we listened to the ‘Lectio with the Wind’:
God’s Soul is the wind rustling plants and leaves
the dew dancing on the grass,
the rainy breezes making everything to grow.
Just like this, the kindness of a person flows, touching
those dragging burdens of longing.
We should be a breeze helping the homeless,
dew comforting those who are depressed,
the cool, misty air refreshing the exhausted,
and with God’s teaching we have got to feed the hungry:
This is how we share God’s soul.
(Carmen Acevedo Butcher, Incandescence: 365 Readings with Women Mystics (Brewster, MA: Paraclete Press, 2005), 173. Butcher’s verse is based on Hildegard of Bingen, Liber Vitae Meritorum (The Book of the Rewards of Life), 2:43)
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Big smiles as we all enjoyed celebrating together…..
……… not least our delicious shared picnic in St Mary’s Parish Centre.
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Achieving and celebrating the CAFOD Award is definitely not the end of our journey. We pledged to continue to encourage ourselves and our parishes to live simply, sustainably and in solidarity with the poor, especially through our community spirit, our liturgies, and our care for the world.
Big thanks to Alex for all the photos.
