Catholic charismatic renewal in England

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Catholic Charismatic Renewal is generally considered to have started in February 1967 at a retreat for Duquesne University students at The Ark and The Dove Retreat Center north of Pittsburgh, USA. From there it rapidly spread to other countries including England. Unlike most other religious movements, the Catholic Charismatic Renewal (CCR) claims to have no founders and no central directing organisation: those involved with it look to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. In England there appears to have been no single starting event or person but a number of people, prayer groups, meetings and conferences were influential in the early days, as detailed below.

Origins

An American, Bob Balkam was one of the early influencers of Catholic Charismatic Renewal in England. Having experienced Baptism with the Holy Spirit in 1968 in Washington DC, he and his wife Laurin moved to England in 1969 with the intention of setting up an ecumenical centre with two other pioneers of renewal in England, Lady Bronwen Astor and Mary Tanner. The centre never materialised but he met with Anglican priest Michael Harper, a key figure in the English Charismatic movement from the 1960s to the 1980s. Harper had founded the Fountain Trust in 1964 to encourage charismatic renewal across different Christian denominations and Balkam met at least 20 Catholics involved with renewal prayer groups at the 1971 Fountain Trust conference in Guildford.

The first Charismatic Conferences specifically for Catholics were the Day of Renewal at Heythrop College in Kensington on 19th September 1971; the International Ecumenical conference at Digby Stuart College Roehampton in 1972; and the Hopwood Hall conference in August 1974. The National Service Committee for Catholic Charismatic Renewal (the NSC) was also formed in 1974, chaired initially by Fr Mike Targett. Other Days of Renewal were set up in various parts of the country in the 1970s including in Yorkshire, at Worth Abbey in Sussex, La Retraite in South London, and Alton Day of Renewal in Hampshire in 1975.

Many prayer groups started to run "Life in the Spirit" seminars, a course of teachings leading to Baptism in the Holy Spirit.

Development

In the early days of the Catholic renewal movement, there were objections that it was too much like Pentecostal Protestantism in character. However, many other priests experienced renewal of their vocations through the movement and enthusiastically endorsed it. Priests involved in the early years included Fr Ian Petit at Ampleforth; Fr Peter Dolan in Preston; Fr Jim McManus at Hawkstone Hall; Fr Mike Gwinnell in South London; and Fr Brian Coogan in Basingstoke. Bishop Langton Fox was nominated by Cardinal Hume as ecclesiastical assistant at the Newman College Conference in January 1976 and later joined the National Service Committee. At Easter 1978 there was the first charismatic retreat for priests at Hopwood, attended by over 500 priests and Cardinal Hume.

Communities

Many of the early charismatic prayer groups developed into Communities, including the following. The Prince of Peace Community, led by Myles Dempsey, which runs the annual New Dawn Conference in Walsingham; the Emmaus Prayer Community in Lancashire; the House of the Open Door Community in Worcestershire; the Upper Room in St. Albans; the Maltfriscans in Yorkshire; Cor et Lumen Christi in Surrey; the Antioch Community in London. The Sion Community in Brentwood. The Nottingham Pilgrims. The Maranatha Community in Manchester. The Chemin Neuf Community in Devon; the Catholic Bible School in Sussex.

Days of Renewal and Conferences

The Day of Renewal in London, which started at Heythrop in 1971, became a regular monthly event: first in rooms belonging to Westminster Religious Education Cenre; later in the Centre next door to Westminster Cathedral; then at Friends Medting House Euston; and currently at St Aloysius Church Euston.

Another of the monthly Days of Renewal which started in the mid 1970s, Alton Day of Renewal, grew to around 300-400 attendees until a large group from Southampton and Portsmouth set up the Southampton Conference at La Sainte Union College. On the leadership team were a married couple who were another notable influence on the development of renewal in England, Charles and Sue Whitehead. Having been baptised in the Holy Spirit in 1976, they were involved with the Southampton Conference until 1994, when they started the Celebrate Family Conference at Ilfracombe, which attracted around 1,200 people annually. Then from 2008 Celebrate weekends have been held around the country. Charles later became Chairman of the English National Service Committee for Charismatic Renewal. Then from 1990-2000 he was President of the International Catholic Charismatic Renewal Service, spending much time in Rome working closely with Pope John Paul II, who made him a Knight of St Gregory(KSG) in 2002.

Evangelisation

In 1996 the NSC discerned that they should put resources into encouraging evangelisation in the Catholic church. In 1997 David Payne set up the Catholic Alpha Office, to liaise between the Catholic hierarchy and Holy Trinity Brompton, the Anglican church which had developed the highly successful Alpha course, and to promote the course in the Catholic community. To provide a follow-up to Alpha and other training materials for parishes, Catholic Evangelisation Services was formed and produced many video and DVD courses, now known as "CaFE" (Catholic Faith Exploration) courses. One such DVD course was "The Gift", a version of the "Life in the Spirit" course which has introduced millions of people around the world to charismatic renewal. The Gift course was given an apostolic blessing by Pope Francis.

Integration

Although many of those involved with renewal in the 1970s and 1980s were in charismatic prayer groups, these subsequently diminished; instead, by the 1990s, renewed Catholics were more integrated into their parishes, running or helping with ministries such as: faith formation programmes; sacramental preparation; marriage groups; mission teams; evangelisation programmes; the Alpha Course; healing ministries etc. Others went into full-time service with the Church as Deacons, Education Officers, Youth Officers, or with traditional religious communities.

Today

Despite the decline in the number of active charismatic prayer groups, and continued scepticism from some traditional Catholics, in recent years there has been a growing sense of optimism among English charismatics that, following the encouragement of Pope Francis, Charismatic Renewal should no longer be considered a "fringe activity" for a minority, but an important and fruitful means of renewing the mission of the whole Catholic church. The CHARIS National Service of Communion (CNSC) is encouraging charismatics to pray with expectant faith that God will act in amazing ways to bring people to faith and transform their lives through the power of the Holy Spirit.

The CNSC is the principal co-ordinating organisation of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal (CCR) in England. They seek to be open to the guidance of the Holy Spirit and keep in close contact with the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales, primarily through their Episcopal Advisor. They avoid imposing strong central authority but instead aim to encourage and support ministries, groups and individuals. They also provide directories of CCR activity; organise meetings, conferences and leadership training events within CCR; support a youth network; promote Catholic Evangelisation Services; publish the Good News Magazine and the CCR website.

References

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