One year on

What a lot of anniversaries there have been during this month of August!  Today, the 15th August, Feast of Our Lady's Assumption into heaven, we celebrate our first anniversary as a canonically recognised Congregation within the Catholic Church.  The official decree can be seen below.

One year on we thank Bishop Hugh Gilbert, O.S.B. for his gracious act of receiving us into the church as an officialy recognised Religious Institute.  Thank you also to all those who have been a support to us over the last year, and indeed throughout the last 25 years.  May God bless you all!

Sweet Mother of Perseverance, obtain that we may all one day be with you in heaven!

35th Anniversary of Ordination of Very Rev. Fr Michael Mary, F.SS.R.

Today Very Rev. Fr Michael Mary, F.SS.R. celebrates 35 years as a priest of God. We thank him for those many years of service to the Church, to souls and especially to us, the Congregation of the Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer.

Father celebrated Holy Mass this morning in the chapel in Papa Stronsay.

 35 years ago today this young Deacon knelt before his bishop to receive the the Holy priesthood from his hands, in an unbroken line back to St. Peter himself!  Thank you Father for this courageous sacrifice of yourself to and for the Church.

 May God bless you Father and grant you many more years for the exercise of your sacred ministry.  Thank you on behalf of all those whose souls you have helped towards their eternal salvation!

40 Days and 40 Years

The Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple
is 40 days after Christmas
(which was according to the Law of Moses).

The number 40 has an important significance
in the workings of God’s plan of salvation.
At the Flood the rain fell for 40 days and 40 nights.
The children of Israel ate Manna for 40 years in the desert.
Moses spent 40 days and 40 nights in the mountain with God
before he received the ten conmmandments.
David slew Goliath on the 40th day.
David reigned for 40 years.
Solomon reigned for 40 years.
Elias in the strength of the food given him by the angel
walked 40 days and 40 nights
unto the mount of God, Horeb.
And most importantly Our Lord fasted for
40 days and 40 nights in the desert
and tarried 40 days amongst us before His Ascension.

This year,
on 2 February,
Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple
Fr Michael Mary celebrates the
40th anniversary
of his entry into Religion and the service of God.

Father Anthony Mary
and all the Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer
join with all his family and friends
to wish Father a
Happy Anniversary,
a long life and a crown above.
We wish him many blessings
and assure him of our filial devotion and prayers.

20 years!

What a great achievement to reach 20 years of holy priesthood! Today, 27th June, the feast of Our Mother of Perpetual Succour, Fr. Anthony Mary, F.SS.R. has done just that. Congratulations Father!


Fr. Anthony gives his first blessing to his mother on the day of his ordination 20 years ago today, 27th June 1991.

Solemn first Vespers of Mother of Perpetual Succour were celebrated yesterday.


dicit matri suae mulier ecce filius tuus
deinde dicit discipulo ecce mater tua...

... He saith to his mother: Woman, behold thy son.
After that, he saith to the disciple: Behold thy mother...
(Jn. 19:26)


Followed by benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament.

*************************


This morning Father celebrated sung Mass for the community.


And gave a short but very edifying sermon.


The same image of Our Mother of Perpetual Succour before which Father celebrated Mass today was placed in the sanctuary at Ecône for his ordination day.


Dirigatur, Domine, oratio mea sicut incensum in conspectu
tuo: elevatio manuum mearum sacrificium vespertinum.

Let my prayer, O Lord, come like incense before You; the
lifting up of my hands, like the evening sacrifice.


Accendat in nobis Dominus ignem sui amoris,
et flammam aeterne caritatis.Amen.

May the Lord enkindle in us the fire of His love
and the flame of everlasting charity. Amen.


And the Word was made flesh!


And dwelt amongst us!


Father becomes alter Christus, another Christ, pronouncing the words of consecration:

Hic est enim calix sanguinis mei,
novi et aeterni testamenti: mysterium fidei:
qui pro vobis et pro multis
effundetur in remissionem peccatorum.

For this is the Chalice of My Blood,
of the new and eternal Testament: the mystery of faith:
which shall be shed for you and for many
unto the remission of sins.




Behold the Lamb of God!


Congratulations Father Anthony on completing the celebration of approximately your 7300th Holy Mass! May God grant you many more years in this life, and a crown of glory in the next!

Our Mother of Perpetual Succour

We would like to wish everyone a very happy and holy feast of Our Mother of Perpetual Succour! We had the great privilege to visit the original icon and to pray before it while we were in Rome. What a lovely feast to be welcomed home to!




Today we also celebrate Fr. Anthony Mary's 18th anniversary of priestly ordination. He celebrated Holy Mass for the community this morning.




Happy anniversary Father; may Our Mother or Perpetual Succour Watch over you!

Our Mother of Perpetual Succour
Pray for us!

50th Anniversary: Blessed Nicholas, Missionary-Monk

The Apostolic Visitator

He was consecrated Bishop

beneath the image of Our Mother of Perpetual Succour

in the Church of St Alphonsus, Rome.

Blessed Nicholas

The Missionary-Monk and Bishop

laboured to bring the Separated Orthodox

into 'Holy Unia' with the Catholic Church.

He was a successful, powerful and exemplary Missionary Bishop.
Soon he would be arrested and for 11 years he would suffer a martyrdom of prisons and hard labour in the GULAG system of the Soviet Union.Fearing his death in the GULAG he was released from prison camps less than 3 years before his death. He lived his last years in the room of a house belonging to a Catholic married priest and his family. In the photograph above he stands with the two children who had accepted him as their 'grandfather'. In this house he secretly ordained many priests.

2 April 1959
Blessed Nicholas sleeps in death awaiting his Resurrection.

Blessed Nicholas,
heavenly Patron of the Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer,
Pray for us!

Rev. Fr. Michael Mary's, 30th Anniversary of Priesthood

Ordination to the Priesthood

by Most Reverend Brian Patrick Ashby, D.D., R.I.P.

Bishop of Christchurch

12 August 1978

Mother of Perpetual Succour Monastery

268 Bower Avenue

Christchurch

New Zealand

On this day the sublime and ineffable grace of the Catholic Priesthood was confered on the young Deacon. His soul received the indelible priestly character and his life was never again the same.

"Tu es sacerdos in aeternum secundum ordinem Melchisedech"

"Thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech."
— Ps. 109

...Thirty years later, 12th August 2008
Golgotha Monastery Island
Papa Stronsay

Solemn High Mass...

20th Anniversary of our Foundation, Feast of St Alphonsus, 2008

Feast of St. Alphonsus, 2 August 1988

Monastery of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary

Isle of Sheppey, Kent, England

"In the Congregation each subject must live solely for eternity. Oh, how happy shall we be if we spend these few short days wholly for God! And he is specially called to do this who, perhaps has already given a good part of his life to the world. Let us keep eternity before our eyes, and we shall suffer every thing in peace and gladness. Let us thank God for giving us so much light, and so many means of loving Him perfectly, and for having chosen us, from the midst of so many others, to belong entirely to Himself in this Congregation by giving us the gift of his holy love. And let us make haste to advance in virtue, in order to please Him, with the thought that, perhaps as St. Teresa said to her daughters, we have already got over the chief difficulty in the way of becoming saints when we turned our back upon the world and all its good: that which is less difficult remains for us to accomplish and then we shall be saints. I am certain that Jesus has prepared a beautiful place in Paradise for those who die in the Congregation. In this world we shall be poor, despised, and looked upon as fools and imprudent persons; but in the next our lot will be far different.

Let us continually recommend ourselves to our most loving Redeemer, hidden in the most Blessed Sacrament, and to the Blessed Virgin; for the members of the Congregation are obliged to have a most special love for Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, and for the Immaculate Mary. Let us have great confidence. Jesus Christ has chosen us to be the great ones of His court: a certain proof of this is the protection which He gives to the Congregation, and to every member of it: Dominus illumination mea et salus mea: quem timebo? (Ps. xxvi. 1)."

From The True Redemptorist

by Our Holy Father St. Alphonsus,

Bishop and Doctor of the Church

Old Community Photos From 20 Years Ago

Outside the Monastery Chapel, Sheppey,

After the first Clothing Ceremony on 22 August 1988

Formal Photo after the Clothing

Fr. Michael Mary and Fr. Anthony Mary, the first novice

"At the Refectory Fire", Br. John the Baptist, our second novice, clothed October 16 1988, now, Rev. Fr. Dom Christopher Andrews, O.S.B. "At the Clothes Line" Novice Reverend Father Anthony Mary, F.SS.R.

"In Our First Kitchen"

Br. Gerard Maria our third novice, clothed 16 October, 1988, cooks the dinner

"... Perfect Thy work, O Lord and for Thy glory make us all Thine own; so that all the members of this Congregation, even to the day of judgement, may continue to please Thee perfectly, and to gain for Thee a countless number of souls. Amen, amen."

(Ibid.)