Strange things happen at midsummer. The two bay-trees that have long guarded the entrance to the parish centre, and gave every appearance of being dead, have suddenly thrown out new pale green leaves in various places. We shall watch them eagerly. A sign of things to come.
And the statue of St Aloysius in the relic chapel has now acquired a "splendid shield" by Tom Meek. The original statue was wood, from Ammergau, and was mysteriously sold away just before the Oratory came to Oxford. The one we have now was given to us by the nuns of Oulton Abbey, and recently restored by Richard Pelter's team from IFACS. With the ihs and sa monogrammes on the background, it is a little reminder of four hundred years of Jesuit ministry in Oxford, from Fr Edmund Campion to Fr Richard Manners SJ.
