2015 is both the Year of Consecrated Life and Douai’s quadricentennial of foundation in Paris by exiled English monks. A number of events are planned for our 400th, and details will be posted here as soon as they become available. In the meantime to mark both occasions the community’s 2015 Committee has organized a series of talks under the title of Living Joyfully. People living various forms of consecrated life, some traditional and some not, will be speaking at 10.30am on one Saturday most months till February, giving an insight into their group’s particular charism and its efforts for renewal. Each session will finish at 12.30pm and all are invited to come for the talks and the discussions afterwards. The following talks are confirmed thus far, with gaps soon to be filled:
- 18 April: Fr John Dickson SDB, a Salesian currently chaplain at Royal Holloway College, University of London.
- 9 May: Members of the Chemin Neuf movement.
- 26 September: Sr Gemma Simmonds CJ, Director of the Religious Life Institute at Heythrop College, University of London.
- 31 October: Brs Richard Steenvorde OP & Sam Burke OP, both students at Blackfriars, Oxford, the former from the Dutch province and the latter a lawyer who worked in Parliament.
- 23 January (2016): Dame Josephine Parkinson OSB, Prioress and Novice Mistress of Stanbrook Abbey, Yorkshire.
