livesimply prayer (also remember the victims and bereaved of the Belgian schoolchildren accident)

livesimply workshop, 10^th March

Held as part of the J&P training day at Amigo Hall (St George’s cathedral)

14 parishes represented including St John Vianney in Tottenham.

Maria Elena Arana of CAFOD led the workshop

Summary version of the presentation I used

3,000 packs have been distributed, 5,000 fliers.

She passed round one of the awards which are made from recycled church pews!

8 parishes have registered so far with 12 others looking at registering soon

She assured us that CAFOD viewed this as a long and everlasting project so the marketing and branding would continue.

Major push this year to influence Cameron to take the water campaign to the G8 because UK is president in 2013.

Then we had a wonderful talk/discussion led by Mariantha of St John Vianney, assisted by John Mooney who had done most of the organising.  She noted that every group meeting started with the livesimply prayer.

They launched last October and 200 people signed up (1,300 attend Mass there) to support the scheme.  Many of their activities relate to the liturgy and what happens at Mass.

They have laid out a calendar for the whole year and other material.  I had a chat with John over lunch and he agreed to send me their registration, year calendar, Lenten calendar, and other bits and pieces.  His wife had prepared a guide to simple living in the home.

One event they ran was a rich man, poor man dinner.  This gave me the idea that we ought to try and think of an activity that each group might organise and have it ready to suggest at the interviews.  It also struck me that when we talk to the groups an important aspect to emphasise is that even if a group feels it can’t organise that they would encourage their members to support and participate.

Interview structure – comments?

Provide an idea for each group?

I’ve attempted this – there are loads of resources on CAFOD website (e.g. how to organise a loaves and fishes lunch)

Added 2 more groups (Rosary and Finance)

Miscellaneous points

2 positive reactions to the preamble (Doreen Hairs and Zosia Bajorek)

Shall I put LiveSimply on website main menu now?

Has everyone looked at the pages and can I have suggestions for improvement?

Next meeting – depends on interviews