Dear Friends,
The month of September is always a high point in the Abbey year. This is largely due to the fact that we
celebrate, at the end of that month, our patronal feast.
Why St Michael should have been chosen as patron of our monastery we do not know. Was it that the Empresss
was already in contact with the canons of St Michel de Frigolet when she chose our patron? Could it be that
the hilltop site reminded her of other churches dedicated to the Archangel? Or is the best clue to the
riddle is to be found in the apse of the Abbey Church. In the evening summer light the beams which surround
the corona above the High Altar reveal the text, ‘St Michael, our glorious patron, intercede before God for
France and for England.’ The text in the beams is, of course, in French.
Our celebration of the Feast of St Michael was quite modest in comparison to previous years. After the
Solemn Mass we welcomed a small number of guests to luncheon. The Benedictine nuns of the Holy Trinity
Monastery, East Hendred were the principal victims of our hospitality.
Already we have reported to you the arrival of two new vocations among us this year. Well, at the end of
the month we welcomed two more. After a number of visits to us, Thomas Chambers, a native of Wigan, has
left his solicitor’s office to try his vocation with us. We ask you prayers for him as he begins to seek
the Lord’s will in his life.
We welcomed at the same time into the novitiate Fr Aldo Tapparo, a priest of the Birmingham diocese. Fr
Aldo is an old friend of the community and has been visiting us for some twenty years. For the last years
he has been parish priest of Royal Leamington Spa and, as a canon lawyer, has held various posts on the
diocesan tribunal. History is, in Fr Aldo, repeating itself, since even in its earliest days the
Farnborough community received a number of secular priests who wished to pursue a monastic vocation.
At a time when the Church in our part of the world is suffering a dearth of vocations, it is a great
blessing that our community should currently count four postulants and two junior professed. The road ahead
for them is a long one and will have its ups and downs, but the Lord does not make demands of us without
supplying the graces necessary to answer His call. Please add your prayers to ours, that the Lord who has
begun this good work in them will bring it to completion.
Sincerely in the Lord,
rchived 
ews
