Goodnews march/april 1997

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A Time of Change
Charles Whitehead
always been central to our work - the support of prayer groups, days of renewal and conferences, theinformation and teaching through GOODNEWS, the Life in the Spirit Seminars, our leadership training week-ends, the support of the weÜ-established charismatic communities etc. We feit that all these were still very important, and must continue to have our support and service. The Lord is using them to reach many, many people.
The second group consisted of rather different things, most of which were rela-tively new. These included the ALPHA Course, the Youth Network, our links with Christian radio and television, the diocesan youth mission teams, the new communities, and "CELEBRATE" - the new family conference. Group one were clearly identified under the label "Charismatic Renewal", whereas group two were not - even though they are fruits of the Charismatic Renewal and totally committed to the Baptism in the Holy Spirit and the charisms. Asweprayed, listened, and shared, webecame increasingly convinced that the Lord was asking us to commit our resources to both groups, but to work from two different locations. Since then we have held two further NSC meetings and are now putting into place the following new structures:
1. A new administrative centre is being established under Dave Payne at London Colney, which will be the location for The Catholic Alpha Office and the base for the Youth Network, to which the diocesan youth mission teams and new communities also relate.
2. The GOODNEWS office will remain under Kristina Cooper at Allen Hall, and will serve as the international contact and information centre. For the momént it will also continue as a general information centre.
3. A new network of regional contacts is being set up to deal at local level with information aboutprayer meetings, days of renewal etc., and to provide all sorts of general information and help in the form of names and contacts in the Charismatic Renewal. Names, addresses, and téléphoné numbers of the regional contact people will appear regularly in GOODNEWS.
4. NSC members will each continue to act as liaison with 2 dioceses, and will de-velop closer relationships with Diocesan Service Teams.
5. The retirement of Vi v Sewell, who has been a tireless and highly effective manager of our book and tape service, means that Phil Rogers will be taking over this whole area and operating it from London Colney under
a licence as "GOODNEWS BOOKS AND TAPES", serving groups 1 and 2 and the whole Charismatic Renewal.
One important factor behind some of these changes is our conviction of the vital part ALPHA will play in Catholic parishes over the next few years, and so we see our woric with ALPHA as a service the Charismatic Renewal can offerto the whole Church. With the support of Holy Trinity Brompton, the Catholic ALPHA Office is running 3 training conferences this year, and producing 2 talks in video under the title "Post ALPHA Catholic Teaching", which will lead into the RCIA or other similar parish programmes.
So these are the changes planned so far. They will be fidly implemented after Easter, and there will certainly be further develop-ments and refinements over the coming months. Please pray for the NSC and for all those affected by the changes. Things like this are never easy to accept, but we believe we're hearing the voice of God, we have a new vision, and we're committed to a clear course of action - always trusting in his promise "I am with you always" (Matt 28: 20)
© Charles Whitehead
Ns crs
nsc training day
As part of the decentralisation process cur-rently being undertaken by the NSC, an information and training day was organised by Anne Nolan from the NSC office, for the new regional contact people. At the day which was held at Maryvale in Birmingham, the new contact people were given the up-dated prayer group directory and other usef ul information to help them'in their new task. Their names and addresses will be in the next issue of Goodnews and the overall co-ordinators will be Pat Kennedy for the north of England and Sr. Maria Natella for the South.
nsc leaders
week-end
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