Centenary Year Opens
SATURDAY June 21 was the perfect day for a summer celebration. Warm and sunny, but with a gentle breeze to prevent us from becoming over-heated. More than five hundred invited guests came to Douai Abbey to celebrate with the monks the centenary of their settling at Woolhampton. Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, archbishop of Westminster, presided, Abbot Primate Notker Wolfe preached the sermon*,
Bishop Crispian Hollis of our diocese of Portsmouth assisted, as did most of the abbots of England, almost all of the Douai community, many of our oblates as well as members of the Douai Society, representatives of all the parishes in England and Wales that Douai monks had served during the century, and members of the Association Guillaume Allen with representatives of the civil and ecclesiastical authorities of Douai, France.The music at the Mass was led by Dr John Rowntree and the Douai Singers with Terry Charlston at the organ. After the Mass all processed out onto the lawn where Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor, assisted by Bishop Crispian Hollis and Fr Abbot, blessed the commemorative stone, which also will serve as the foundation stone of the new monastic library, refectories and guest accommodation that we are hoping to build in the not too distant future. The stone, the gift of the Douai Society, was carved by Philip Whitehead, who had been a pupil of the former Douai School.
 | Left, Bishop Crispiam Hollis and Abbot Geoffrey Scott at the blessing of the stone. Right, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor gives the blessing at the end of the celebration. |
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The next day, Sunday, the Abbot Primate addressed the oblates before Mass, and the monastic community before the lunch given by the Douai Society, at which he was the guest of honour.
* The text of the Primate’s sermon is available on our web site and will be printed in the next issue of The Douai Magazine. ‡
Fr James Donovan OSB 1917 - 2003
THE death of Fr James Donovan OSB on Thursday May 15, although not unexpected, came as a shock. The day before, he had been chatting to the oblates on retreat at morning coffee, that very morning he had been conducted to his room in the monastery infirmary after Matins and given a cup of tea. When someone went to see about his breakfast a little later, he was found to have died peacefully in his arm chair. For the past few years he had been ailing, becoming increasingly forgetful and depending more and more on the assistance of his brethren, assistance which was always gratefully and humbly received. Had he lived another three weeks he would have celebrated the diamond jubilee of his ordination on June 3, preparations for which were already in hand.
The abbot in his panegyric said, "He was a generous, friendly person, kind and gregarious, an observant monk, energetic parish priest, and a welcoming host. James had a strong sense of duty which pervaded his life on the parish and within the monastery. Abbots in the past knew that they could always rely on him to take on any job willingly and do it to the best of his ability. He had an impatient energy which exhausted some of his curates who were continually told to get on with the job, but those huge hands always made one feel safe. He was a wonderful model for any of us who aspire to live out that harmonious English Benedictine vocation, for he so loved equally both the monastery and the mission that there was a rare sense of balance throughout his life."
Daniel Donovan had been born on June 2, 1917 in Dan-y-Craig, South Wales, at that time a parish served by Douai monks. For his secondary education he was sent to Douai School 1929-36, following which he passed directly into the novitiate and was ordained priest in 1943. Offices he held in the monastery were MC and assistant bursar, until he was sent as curate to St Robert’s in Morpeth, Northumberland, in 1950. While there he founded a chapel-of-ease at Pegswell, a redundant Methodist chapel being bought for the purpose. From 1961 until 1984 he was parish priest at St Gregory’s Cheltenham, where the congregation was growing. He developed Mass centres at Bishops Cleeve, Pennine Road and Hatherley. He built St Gregory’s Secondary School in 1962 and enlarged it in 1979.
Fr James built up strong ecumencial relationships in Cheltenham, where he became one of the first Catholic chairmen of a Council of Churches in Britain. He also became involved with the Samaritans, and was chaplain to the race course. He ensured St Gregory’s played its part in the annual Cheltenham Festival by holding choral Masses there. At the end of his tenure in Cheltenham a block of twenty seven flats for the elderly was named James Donovan Court; at the opening ceremony of which the Councillor present said, "This is Cheltenham’s way of saying ‘thank you’ for all you have done for the town."
Shortly after his arrival in Cheltenham, Fr James had been elected by the community to the abbot’s council, and was re-elected for many years, a sign of the community’s high regard for him. On several occasions he came close to being elected abbot.
In 1984 he returned to Douai as bursar, being appointed to the office of Cathedral Prior of Winchester in 1985; in 1987 he was sent as superior to the short lived experiment of an urban monastery in Coventry, and in 1990 went as parish priest to Scarisbrick, Lancs. He returned to Douai again in 1992 when he was appointed subprior and assisted in the local parish, looking after the churches at Pangbourne and Theale, until ill health forced him to relinquish parochial work in 1994.
During these years Fr James took part in the annual Catholic Association Pilgrimage to Lourdes. He was a member of Hospitalité du Lourdes. Mary Vidgen wrote "Whilst on the pilgrimages Fr James was very solicitous of the sick, especially those who were housed in the hospital. He would visit the Grotto frequently each day and this would be quickly followed by a visit to the sick in the hospital. ... By nature he was a gregarious person and always included everyone in whatever he was undertaking, both spiritually or from a more temporal nature, and the feeling was reciprocated. Fr James was always ready for the next pilgrimage service whether it be a Mass or an associated event. Sadly towards the end of his life he became very forgetful, but never of his prayers especially the rosary. When he could no longer visit Lourdes he became a praying member of L’ Hospitalité du Lourdes and prayed for all of us."
Fr Abbot said, "It will be for his companionship at Douai during the last few years that he will be remembered best by most of us. Of course, creeping ill-health slowed him down, but the essential James never changed. There was the same urgency; he often convinced himself that he needed to pack to go to Cheltenham or old Douai. He continued to love company, and he kept his interest in music. It is touching that the leaflet accompanying Terry Charlston’s CD Sounds of Bach recorded recently on the abbey church organs concludes: ‘I would like to thank Father James Donovan for his company during the recording sessions’. Few could have failed to be impressed by that special quality of his life in these last few years, which somehow survived and transcended the loss of his mind and memory and the surrender to physical incapacity. These were the hours of quietly saying the rosary in the cloister and the church, the intense commitment to his lectio and a continuing love for each member of the community".
Fr James has provided the community with a role model of how to accept cheerfully the diminishment old age brings and how to let go. He was surely ready to hear the Lord call: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’
Centenary Year Opens
At Douai during Easter week there will be meetings of the monastic Theology and Liturgy Commissions, the History Symposium and the Monastic Interfaith Dialogue, as well as public lectures by Fr Edmund Power OSB, Mr John Trigg on Woolhampton in 1903 and Dr Nicholas Atkin onChurch and State in France in 1903. From April 30 to May 3 there will be a Flower Festival in the Abbey Church.
A commemorative volume Douai 1903 - Woolhampton 2003 - A Centenary History, a CD Music from Douai Abbey featuring the monks’ schola and the Douai Singers directed by Dr John Rowntree, with Terence Charlston playing the organ, and a commorative postcard showing F.A.Walters’ water-colour of the school entrance in 1903 have been published.These are available from the Abbey Bookshop. Also available is a CD Sounds of Bach recently recorded by Terence Charleston on the two organs in the Abbey Church.‡
Monastery News
Fr Edmund celebrates 25th
JUNE 24 was the silver jubilee of Fr Edmund Power’s ordination. As he had to return to Rome on the twenty-third he celebrated by presiding at Mass on Sunday June 22, which was also the centenary Mass of the Douai Society with many members attending. The Abbot Primate who was present played the flute during communion. Fr Edmund is currently Prior of Sant’ Anselmo College in Rome; next year he will take up an appointment as superior of the monastery of St Pauls-without-the-Walls in Rome.
Spirituality in the Workplace
PRIOR Dermot Tredget OSB continues with his workshop-retreats on this topic as part of the Pastoral Programme. In addition he is in great demand to lecture on Business Ethics to businesses, colleges and universities in England and Europe. Recently he has given a course at the Catholic University of Piacenza in Italy, addressed the management of BMW in Dresden, Germany; given the annual Plater Lecture at Plater College, Oxford, and a series of talks to business people at the church of St Mary Moorfield in the City of London.
University of Reading
OUR association with the local university continues; three Saturday Dayschools have taken place in our Conference Centre, one in February on Christian Poetry at which Fr Oliver Holt OSB was one of the speakers, another on Rayonnant architecture in 13th century France, and in May a third entitled By the labour of their hands: medieval and Victorian images of work.
In the autumn term we shall be teaching a course on Monks and Monasticism as part of the Continuing Education programme, as well as hosting a Dayschool on that topic next year. In the Lent term Fr Gervase Holdaway OSB will give a course on Wisdom Literature.
Retreats
IN addition to retreats organised as part of our Pastoral Programme, we have led or hosted retreats or days of recollection for many different groups including the Benedictine Sisters of Grace and Compassion, seminarians from Allen Hall, London, and from Oscott College, Birmingham, the pre-seminarians from Campion House, Osterley, the staff of the Marist Prep School at Ascot, Jesuit Scholastics from Eastern Europe, as well as groups from various Catholic and Anglican parishes, Methodist and Baptist churches and the Thames Valley Progressive Jewish Community.
Conference Centre
AMONG the many groups who meet in our Conference Centre and Guest House are Spirituality-in-the-Workplace Network, the Oxford Christian Institute for Counselling, the Berkshire Girl Guide Commissioners, the Waverley Group, Probus, Euphony, Chief Army Chaplains, SpiritWorks, the Historic Churches Committee, Cursillo Formation, Diocese of Oxford Schools Advisory Committee, the Anglican Retired Clergy Association, Diocese of Oxford Industrial Mission Team, Diocese of Northampton Vocation Week.
Guests
ON May 15 the North West American chapter of the Knights and Dames of the Holy Sepulchre who were on a British tour as guests of the English & Welsh chapter visited Douai. They celebrated Mass and had lunch with the monks before being given a tour.
During July several school groups held services in the Abbey Church. Elstree School, our near neighbours had their end of year service on July 4. The following week Thatcham Baptist Church organised an activities day ending with a service for the primary school leavers of all the schools in our neighbourhood: over 300 children attended. On St Benedict’s Day the Catholic primary school leavers who will be going to Bl Hugh Faringdon School in Reading in the autumn had a Mass, followed by a picnic.
Concerts
CONCERTS continue to be held regularly in the Abbey Church. This year, apart from the annual concert given by the pupils of West & Central Berks Music Schools, we have had Canticum, Thames Voyces, Newbury & Leamington Spa Choral Societies who combined to perform Rachmaninov’s Vespers , the Choir of Clare College, Cambridge, the Trondheim Soloists with trumpeter Ole Edvard Antonsen, the Phoenix Choir, the Reading Bach Choir, London Baroque and Les Folies Françoises.
Confrater
ON St Benedict’s Day, during Conventual Mass, Professor Henry Mayr-Harting, who is the first Catholic Regius Professor of History in the University of Oxford, and the first lay Catholic Canon of Christchurch, a former pupil at Douai School and good friend and supporter of the community, was enrolled as a confrater.
Bell
THE bell that had been brought from Douai, France, in 1903 and which was known by the school at Woolhampton as ‘the outside bell’, because it used to call pupils in from the sports field, has been hung in the north tower of the Abbey Church. It is electrically programmed to ring the Angelus and to signal the beginning of each office. The bell is inscribed DROUOT FONDEUR A DOUAI NORD but is undated. It has been refurbished by Nicholson Engineering at their Church Bell Works in Bridport, Dorset. Mr Nicholson reported that “the bell is of no great age. It is highly decorated and superby modelled, making use of the lost wax or cire method”. Its note is slightly sharp of C international pitch.
‘Step into the Picture’
AGAIN this year an exhition was held in the Abbey Church as part of the ‘Open Studio Project’ during the Newbury Spring Festival. It was of illustrations for a children’s book about the life of Jesus, which are a contemporary essay in the tradition of the illustrated manuscript. In his address at the opening of the exhibition, Bishop Richard Harries spoke of the importance of art in passing on the Christian message.‡
Douai Abbey Newsletter No 17 Summer 2003
Douai Abbey Newsletter is published at Douai Abbey, Upper Woolhampton, Reading, Berks, RG7 5TQ. Phone: 0118 971 5300 Fax: 0118 971 5303 E-maildouaiabby@aol.com
17.07.03. Registered charity no 236962
Go to the recently published Douai Magazine 2002Go to index of previous issues.