Is it Autumn?

There has been, we are told, snow in the Eastern United States; yet here on the South Coast of England we still wait for our first frost. The picture above is of a rose in our garden - the Yellow Banksian Rose - which usually flowers in May. Then this afternoon we went to the Coast (Barton on Sea is just six miles from home) and saw these escapees from cliff-top gardens; I believe they known as Cape Fig, usually blooming in Summer - yet here are one or two precocious yellow blossoms.



For all that, the sun is very low in the sky, and there is not much warmth left. We reached not much more than 12 degress C today, though without a breeze it felt quite balmly.



Still, winter approaches. In the Bournemouth Ordinariate Group (some of them seen below after Mass this morning) we are making plans for Advent and Christmas. We shall be joining the Parish for Midnight Mass and on Christmas Morning. Our Servers are very pleased to have been asked to assist at Midnight. We were a bit unsettled a couple of weeks back, with the announcement that our Pastor, Fr Graham Smith, felt he must move on. Msgr Keith reluctantly agreed, and has asked me to look after the Group as a temporary measure until such time as we have another former Anglican priest ordained. We have resolved to have fewer Masses (just Wednesday at 10.30 and the Sung Mass on Sunday at 9.30) but most of the Group seem to think this is a good arrangement, giving them the chance to worship in their local churches on other days.



Click on the pictures for a larger view

Good news....

Since no news is good news, here is some no news. A wonderful sunny day in Lymington, and a free Sunday! Our daughter brought 10yr old grandson yesterday to stay for half-term (looking pensive on the right). She has now gone back to Wales but after attending an 8 o'clock said Communion at St Thomas' - very BCP for Trinity xxi - it was good to stroll along the cliffs and on the beach just a few miles Southwest of home. Very restorative. There was even one hardy family with a toddler paddling!

If I weren't an anglo-catholic, I think I'd be a blue-domer. Notwithstanding the claims that science has 'disproved' God, the sea and the sky always set me wondering. The tide has been going in and out from whenever it was that water and land were separated; and when I consider the heavens, the works of His fingers, the moon and the stars that He has ordained; well "what is man that thou art mindful of him; and the son of man, that thou visitest him?"

Even empty beachhuts can look lovely in such weather. Next weekend will be less restful; three sermons in two days, and a trip to East Kent into the bargain. But that will be All Saints, which is a great time.