This Sunday is All Saints' Day, and what a fitting occasion on which to celebrate a baptism. Please pray for Elwyn Mollart as we prepare for him to be received into that same household of faith to which the saints belong.
All Souls' Day is on Monday 2nd November, and Somerville College Choir will join us for Duruflé's Requiem, 7.30pm. If there's anyone you'd like us to remember at the requiem mass, please let us know here: stmarymagdalenoxford.org.uk/requiem. The midday mass will be in Ukrainian, and we shall remember especially those lost to war.
Student Group this week, Weds, 4th Nov, 7pm (15 Beaumont St) will be on Is the world created?, and we shall be looking at a Jain text, Jinasena's Adipurana (or Mahapurana) alongside a bit of Thomas Aquinas. We were treated last night to Visvapriya Desai's session on the Kena Upanishad (and Augustine's Soliloquies)—I promise you that this week's session will be much less erudite...but Visva returns 11th Nov to help us read the Bhagavad Gītā on incarnational theology. [God, I love my job.]
Speaking of Wednesdays, we have begun to prepare for the Wednesday midday masses with a period of silent contemplation and adoration before the Blessed Sacrament exposed. Do come and join us from 11am. If I get my act together, this week we will begin to supply rosaries for those who would like to pray with a rosary... The confessional will then be open from 1140am for anyone who would like to avail themselves of the sacrament of reconciliation. [Back in the COVID days, I wrote this little piece for the School of Theology on "spiritual communion": https://www.theschooloftheology.org/posts/essay/on-receiving-communion-in-desire]
On Saturday, 7th Nov, Russell Jefford will be leading a study day on St Irenaeus: The Summing Up of All Things in Christ. These study days usually run at Pusey House, and you can find out more about them (including this one) here: https://ordinarytheology.com/events/
Next Sunday is Remembrance Sunday, and with some luck there will be poppies available in church for donations to the Royal British Legion. That evening, 5.45pm. I shall also be preaching at Corpus Christi College—different sermon, which is most inefficient of me...