A message from Fr John

And with the rain comes the cold - ah well.

The news doesn’t get any better; large numbers of people in this country and worldwide are still contracting the virus, and sadly many people are dying. Thankfully people are still working courageously on the front-line and many others are helping as volunteers in lots of different ways - helping relatives, neighbours and the local community. Thank you to everyone.

Nor can we ignore the campaign ‘Black Lives Matter’. I won’t try to comment too much except to say that Pope Francis has said time and time again that Christians of any persuasion must strive to build bridges and not walls. 

Two further illustrations:

The first highlighted by the Manchester Evening News

Manchester has a proud history of welcoming people from all over the world, refugees from varying conflicts and struggles - let us try to stay faithful to that legacy. We remember especially the cotton workers strike of 1862/3 when working people of Manchester, at great cost to themselves, stood in solidarity with the former African slaves of the Southern States of America during the civil war.

And, as a warning against bigotry, there is a brief poem by James Fenton:

This is no time for people who say: this, this, and only

this. We say this, and this, and that too.