Spring News
Sunday 25 Apr 2021 · 1:30
» On 21 April Fr Gervase reached his 85th birthday, an occasion marked by the community with a celebratory ferculum in his honour. Given the celebration of his diamond jubilee of ordination earlier in the month, Fr Gervase is having an uplifting Spring.
» The same day Fr Abbot and Br Aidan went to Colwich to inspect some of their more ancient books now destined for Stanbrook Abbey. Taking advanatge of the occasion Fr Abbot was able to show Br Aidan old Stanbrook Abbey near Worcester, and to take a socially-distanced afternoon tea in the garden at Kemerton with Fr Francis. Fr Francis has taken on some of the hens from Douai and they have settled in well to Kemerton, and have begun laying already.
» On 24 April Fr Abbot was able to attend the AGM of The Fifteen, the Northumbrian Jacobite society of which he ios patron. He was consulted by the artist working on a sculpture of Blessed Hugh Faringdon, the martyred last abbot of Reading, which is to be placed outside the abbey gateway which has survived the ravages of the Dissolution better than the rest of the great abbey which lies in ruins in the heart of the town.
» Spring having sprung, Fr Oliver has snapped some of the fritillaries, primulas and cowslips to be seen in the monastery gardens. Fr Abbot has remarked that Eight Acre Gully is awash with bluebells. Some cheer in the midst of seemingly endless Covidtide. Fr Oliver's photos from the gardens, and one from Fr Abbot Eight Acre Gully can be seen in the slideshow below.