As I'm too lazy to catch up on my notes from this morning I just want to bring up this topic Fr Sebastian raised. He talked about how little silence there is today & how that often spills over into making noise in Church. I must say when I was on retreat in Holywell I almost envied the nuns their time for prayer & silence. As the mother of ten very lively children there is noise morning, noon & night. When the first half were small they went to bed quite early & Andrew & I got a couple of hours peace before bed when they would wake up for night feeds all night long. I haven't slept through a complete night in 21 years! Mine all woke 3/4 times in the night, got up at 5 a.m & started sleeping through at about 5 years old by which time we'd had the other half & the cycle was repeated! By the way there was nothing 'wrong' with the children..Nowadays with five teenagers who stay up late we don't get the evenings to ourselves either. I tackle this need for silent meditation & quiet at home by getting up at around 5 a.m. I love the peace & quiet then..it's almost deafening! I read a few spiritual passages, pray a bit, blog & e-mail a bit! Coming clean there coz you all see the time I send you things! Anyway back to Church. I had also taken to going down early to Church when devotions were on around 7 p.m. & for nearly half an hour no-one was around..just me & Our Lord. However, because I know quite a lot of people I've got into the habit of Saving Money to them & disturbing them at prayer. I know how it feels because if I want to do a particular meditation & someone comes up to me I would feel mean not talking. Perhaps it's an elderly, sick or lonely person..what should we do?

I think I know the answer..tell them we can talk 'outside' after Mass. To be honest I probably wouldn't allow my children to chat as much as I do in Church!

So I think it was good that Fr Sebastian brought this up. I am certainly guilty & will try & change..keeping the reverence before Our Blessed Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Thankyou for that Fr...will get back to St Paul eventually!