NINETEEN DAYS TO GO! We fly out from Gatwick with Astraeus Airlines at 11.10 a.m. on Friday February 9th and arrive in Freetown, Sierra Leone at 17.40 p.m. Returning we depart Freetown on Monday 19th at 22.30 p.m. arriving in Gatwick at 05.15 a.m. Tuesday. And a reminder of who's going: Myself, Ruth Halkon and Georgia O'Connor (both 6th Formers at St. Mary's College), Jacqui Woodmansey (chair of the Parish Council), Kirsty O'Reilly (who went the first time around with Fr. Tony, Sheila Priest and Rachel Ulyatt), Teresa Ulyatt, Chris Clarke and Gwen and Peter O'Reilly. Thank you for all your support in the planning of this 'expedition' and for all your generosity to the various appeals for things to take with us.

SVP – Our Twins in India: Our parish St. Vincent de Paul Conference is part of an international family and the SVP in wealthier countries provides support for our brothers and sisters in poorer countries through a system called Twinnage. We in Holy Cross have just been blessed with a new twinned conference in Kerala, South India (where many of our parishioners come from), in the parish of Blessed Mother Teresa in Vimalanagar in the diocese of Manathavady. This is our fourth twinned conference. After the Tsunami disaster last year we twinned with St. Anthony's in Utar Pradesh. Our other twins are St. Luisa's, Surada (Sheila Priest called them her 'goldilocks' parish.... I don't know why) and St. Mary's, Seethathode. In twinning with a parish, we agree to support them with £120 per year; not a large sum, but it goes a lot further in India than here and we can be sure that our brothers in the SVP in India will ensure that every penny is appropriately spent. We also support larger projects that they undertake. Three years ago, we sent about £700 to provide goats for poor families in St. Mary's and this year we are supporting an employment scheme in St. Luisa's to enable families to set up small businesses. Our purpose in the SVP is to seek out and help those in need. It is good to know that funds that are not used locally are helping the poorest and most needy of God's children. Many thanks for your regular donations in envelopes to help our SVP work. (Jim Norton)

Next Sunday's Readings:
First: Jeremiah 1: 4 – 5 and 17 – 19
Psalm: 70
Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 12: 31 – 13:13
Gospel: Luke 4: 21 – 30

Amnesty Concert: Tuesday January 30th at The Ferens Art Gallery. Tickets, including refreshments cost £15 and you can get them from Marian on 843948.

Counters this weekend are: Anne and Geoff Land.
Next week: Betty and Dennis Gilson.

Hull Lourdes Sick Fund: Bishop John is coming to celebrate the Annual Mass at the Marist Church on Sunday February 11th. This is followed by a Rally in the Parish Hall for which we are looking for Raffle, Tombola and Wheel of Fortune Prizes. There is a box in the porch for any unwanted Christmas gifts etc! If you know of any sick or disabled person who might like to go to Lourdes with the Diocesan Pilgrimage at the end of May and who might need some financial help, please contact parishioner Gerry Baker on 875614.

Week of Prayer for Christian Unity: And to mark this there will be a United Prayer Service at the Methodist Church, today, Sunday at 6.30 p.m.

Radio Humberside: I will be reviewing the national papers this Monday sometime after 7.30 a.m. Always good fun and the opportunity to mention our visit to Sierra Leone. They have already asked me to stand by to be on the Sunday programme the weekend we come back.

Parish Internet Computer Course: This latest course begins this coming Thursday in The Garden Room from 10.00 to noon. Our thanks to John McNicholas for being the course co-ordinator once again. All the places are filled, sorry!

Return to Sender: Churches will be urged later this month to modernise their funeral services by using motorcycles as hearses or fireworks to shoot ashes into the sky! The Christian Resources Exhibition, whose directors include the Anglican Bishop of Bristol, the Rt Rev Mike Hill, is to feature a range of less traditional ways of saying farewell to the dead at a three-day event in Exeter. Among the exhibitors in the 'Return to Sender' section is the Rev Paul Sinclair, the founder of Motorcycle Funerals, which runs sidecar hearses in place of traditional vehicles. "No one submits a Catholic to a Muslim service or places a Liverpool fan in an Arsenal strip when they die – so why should people who love bikes be last seen in an automobile?" Another less conventional method of dispatching the deceased that will be on display is the use of fireworks to send ashes into the night sky. Thirty-six such funerals, costing between £900 and £1,800, have taken place in Britain so far, none with the blessing of a Christian minister. The firm offering this service is called 'Heavens Above Fireworks'. Also at the exhibition will be 'Vidstone', an American firm that makes videos showing pictures of the dead person set to music and placed in a solar-powered screen on a headstone. The Rev Ian Morris, the author of 'The Motorcycle Hearse and Other Undertakings' said the Church must embrace alternative attitudes to death. 'People need permission to laugh and weep at funerals. I think it's fantastic.' He said the Church had a lot to learn from the new ways of conducting funerals as 'their default position is to be serious and sombre.' 'If there's anything we can do in the Church to take away people's fear of death, then let's do it. A firework display or a motorcycle hearse might be exactly the right thing.' (Roll on Bonfire Night!)

Hull Homeless and Rootless Project: Annual Report: "We provide housing and support services 365 days a year. We offer access to medical services, welfare benefit advice, housing and resettlement support, laundry and washing facilities and three cooked meals a day. Each year we prepare 23,000 meals. The HHARP food budget is about £2,500 per year for the purchase of items such as sugar, milk, margarine, vegetable oil etc. If you consider for a moment that this means, through local food donations (as we do at Holy Cross), purchased food and a small overhead, HHARP can serve a nutritious meal for about 33 pence per person. The Day Centre is opened from 9 – 8.30 p.m. each day. In 2006 we received 14,033 visits. HHARP Wish List includes: good used or new games, jig saw puzzles, cards, word games, draughts etc. new socks, razors, deodorant, DVD's (non violent), computer games, art supplies." Thank you for all your support over the years to this local charity, and may it continue. God bless you.

Duvets for the Orphanage at Bo: The Garden Room looked like a 'sweat shop' on Thursday morning with loads of people cutting, sewing, ironing etc. as we try to finish as many of the 38 Quilts we hope to take with us to Sierra Leone. Our next session will be this Wednesday from 1 – 4 p.m. in The Garden Room. No previous skills necessary, just enthusiasm! Other items we can take with us include toiletries, soap, shampoo, hairbrushes, beads to make jewellery, writing materials such as pens, pencils paper and books.

Wilberforce Lectures 2007: Archbishop Michael Fitzgerald was the speaker on Wednesday evening at the Guildhall and his topic was "Combating Modern Slavery". There was a full house and an excellent turn-out from Holy Cross! The next two lectures are: Sunday 25th March at Holy Trinity Church when Owen Arthur, Prime Minister of Barbados will talk on "The Impact of Slavery Today". Tuesday 24th April at 7.00 p.m. in The City Hall, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams will give a Wilberforce lecture "Wilberforce and His Legacy". Later on in the year the Archbishop of York, Dr. Tucker Mugabi Sentamu will deliver his lecture on the subject of "Freedom and Slavery". This will be in The City Hall on Tuesday Oct. 30th at 7.00 p.m. As part of this special year, we are encouraged to follow in the footsteps of Hull's most famous son, William Wilberforce, and to sign an anti-slavery declaration, copies of which are available in the porch. Leave the signed form in the box and we'll deliver them to The Guildhall.

Carers Support Scheme: Clare Smith from St. Vincent's parish has asked me to draw your attention to the above scheme which is a Macmillan Cancer Care funded charity. We are looking for volunteers to work with carers of people with a life limiting illness. There are information leaflets in the porch.

Sunday Evening Mass at St. Charles: This is at 6.30 p.m. and is preceded by Rosary and Benediction at 6.00 p.m.

John (Nostradamus) Gorman's Predictions for 2007:
1. Manchester Utd. to do the treble (and beat Hull City in the FA Cup Final!? (Wrong already after last Tuesday, John)
2. Hull City to avoid the drop (??)
3. Father Pat to stay at Holy Cross.
One out of three wrong already! Keep up the prayers for the rest!

Congratulations to Clare O'Loughlin on the birth of her first child, Mary, four days after Christmas. And to Catherine Randerson (nee Bellamy) on the birth of her first child Isabel Grace on Sunday January 7th. And we still have a few more expecting, so keep the prayers up for them!

Fraud Charge Priest Had Secret Wife: A Roman Catholic priest accused of embezzling more than $600,000 from two churches in Virginia, USA, had been living a secret double life as a family man in a neighbouring county. For at least eight years, Fr. Rodney Rodis had shared a home in Fredericksburg with his 'wife' Joyce and three children. He explained his frequent absences to neighbours (when he was off running his parish) by saying he worked in the import-export business (births and deaths?). In fact the 50 –year-old priest had spent the past 14 years as pastor of the parishes of St. Jude and Immaculate Conception in Louisa County. He retired last May due to health problems (I'm not surprised) but was investigated six months later after church officials discovered that a donation to the parishes had not been recorded. He faces up to 20 years in prison. (Was she worth it?).

Mass Intentions for the coming week:
Saturday – 6.30 – Reg Burgan (RIP)
Sunday – 10.00 – Dr. Bill Boyes (RIP)
Monday – 9.00 – Stewart Buchan (RIP)
Tuesday – 7.00 – Patrick and Margaret Downey
Wednesday – 9.00 – Ethel and Donald Land
Thursday – 9.00 – Peter Price
Friday – 9.00 – Terri Barker (A)
Saturday – 9.00 – The Parish
Saturday – 6.30 – Angela Jones (RIP – Harry Williams' sister)
Sunday – 10.00 – Johannes Schlosser (20th Anniv)

Anniversaries this week:
Saturday – Ronald Cuss, Albert King and Laura Mary Nolan (Pat Brennan's mother).
Sunday – Francis Bingham (Joan Horbury's grandfather), James Eagan (Betty's father) and Harry Hanson (Norah's husband).
Tuesday – Herbert Butler
Wednesday – Fr. Michael Hussey (Judith Harrington's uncle), and Michael Spaven.
Thursday – Monica Wood (Brian's sister), Erik Andersson (Terri Atkinson's father) and Mary Brown (Joan Horbury's mother).
Friday – Charles Pidd (Mary's husband) and Pauline Hazelgrove.
Saturday – Alfred Haughey (Mike's father) and Agnes Spaven.
Sunday – Elizabeth Mooney (Nick's mother) and Phyllis Wackett.

Journey in Faith Group: Around a dozen people meet in the house every Friday from 6 – 7 p.m. looking at different aspects of the Catholic faith and hoping to join the Church next Easter. Please keep them in your prayers. You'll recognise most of them as they have been attending Mass here for a long time and now they feel they want to take that extra step. We are having a Retreat Day with Bishop John on Saturday Feb. 10th at St. Aelred's in York from 10.30 – 2.30 p.m. at which they will be presented with The Lord's Prayer and when they sign the Book of the Elect. And on the first Sunday of Lent, 25th Feb. there will be the Rite of Election at the Cathedral in Middlesbrough when all those seeking admission into the Church will be presented to Bishop John. This is always a most moving occasion and friends and parishioners are warmly welcomed to attend.