Dear Friends,
This Summer was one of particular blessings for our little community. In June we celebrated the first
profession of Dom Aidan, and the renewal of vows on the following day of our Dom Magnus, who was
celebrating fifty years of monastic profession. In the same month we welcomed Kevin White as a postulant
for our community. We were also blessed with visits from a number of other young men who are considering
the religious life.
In July we welcomed a second postulant, Matthew Jackson, for an initial month. Matthew is nineteen and
spent two month with us last year before embarking on his ‘gap year’, as they call it nowadays, for France,
in preparation for reading Law and French at Queen Mary’s College, London. Matthew has decided that his
response to the Lord’s call is more pressing than that of following a career in law, and so in August he
asked to join the community. We ask your prayers for him, that the Lord who has started this good work in
him will bring it to completion.
In August we were pleased to welcome among us again Bishop Geoffrey Jarrett of the Diocese of Lismore,
Australia. He spent a week with us to rest after leading a group of young people from his diocese to the
World Youth Day in Cologne. Bishop Jarrett has a great knowledge of Church history and architecture which
he put to good use on some day trips to Oxfordshire.
The organ recital at the start of August was the main event in our series to celebrate the centenary of the
arrival of the Cavaillé-Coll in Farnborough. Naji Hakim, the organist of La Trinité, Paris, performed on
the first Sunday afternoon of the month. A pupil of Jean Langlais, he was the organist of the Basilique du
Sacré-Coeur, Paris from 1985 until 1993, when he succeeded Olivier Messiaen at la Trinité. He improvised on
a number of chant pieces, sung by a small group of monks, and then on the haunting melody of a Christmas
hymn from his native Maronite tradition.
The Maronite Church is one of those ancient Eastern Churches which enjoys full communion with Rome whilst
enjoying a high degree of autonomy and its own liturgical rite. We welcomed another Maronite in the course
of the Summer, Brother Elias Chakhtoura. Brother Elias is a sub-deacon who will be ordained deacon next
year. He is presently concluding his studies in Rome. He is something of an expert on the Syriac language
and has done much work in the preparation of liturgical texts into Syriac for the Maronite Church.
Our cattle herd remains reduced in number because the cows and their new-born are still with the bull. We
have rejoiced in an exceptional honey harvest from our bees this year. An elderly bee enthusiast in
Farnborough has decided to retire from the heavy work of bee-keeping, and has kindly given all of his bees
and hives to us. This gives us the hope of an increase in colonies and harvest next year. Plans are afoot
to restore our orchard in 2006, planting the first lines of apple trees of varieties traditional on the
Hampshire/Surrey border. The estate is looking well generally. The tractor has lightened the work of moving
chicken sheds and fences.
Sincerely in the Lord,
rchived 
ews
