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St. Stephen’s and St. Nicholas parish – Manor Park, or St. Stephen’s in short, is the Catholic parish Church of Manor Park, Newham, Greater London. The parish is the eastern most Catholic parish in the Newham deanery bordering Ilford, and our Brentwood diocesan charity number is 234092.

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Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II - Our Queen and Monarch has passed

    Dear Parishioners

    As I am sure you all are aware Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II died today. As a community we would like to join the Royal Family and the country in honouring her faithful service to the nation and the Commonwealth . St. Stephen's Catholic community expresses our heartfelt condolences to the Royal family In honour of our Queen, who was a faithful Christian throughout her life.
    If you would like to offer prayers and to light candles the church will be kept open from 7.30 a.m. till 9 p.m Friday to Sunday (9th -11th September 2022). Everybody is welcome to come and pray during this time. God Bless us all.

    Fr. John Victor - Parish Priest


Synodal Pathway Process : 2021 - 2023


What is Synod? Synod is a council of the church, usually Bishops that meet periodically to think and pray together on issues of the Church including doctrine or administration. There are three types of Synods in the Catholic Church: Ordinary, Extraordinary and Special. The Synod on Synodality scheduled for 2023 is ordinary, and it is the first time an ordinary Synod is being organised this way in that it engages all levels of the Church. This process is from October 2021 to October 2023. .

The theme for this Synod is: Communion – Participation – Mission

Communion = fellowship, love, and unity as expressed in the Trinity. Participation = including all, excluding none, listening and dialoguing with an open mind, for all stages and ages. Mission = that spreads to the entire universe, as a single-family, as the identity of the Church. The tagline for the synodal process gives a clearer projective view for the journey ahead: Listening without prejudice; speaking out with courage and parrhesia; dialoguing with the church, with society, and with other Christian denominations. It is a process of discernment in which we ask the Holy Spirit to guide us.

What is the purpose of the Synod?

The synod purpose is an opportunity for the entire people of God to discern together how to move forward on the path towards being a Synodal Church in the long term. Below are the advantages of the purpose of having the Synod on Synodality. • To be witnesses of God’s love • To live as a participatory and an inclusive process in the Church, especially listening and hearing those in the periphery • To recognise the wealth and variety of gifts in the Church • To explore participatory ways of living the mission. • To examine the responsibility and power of the Church. • To help the church as a credible partner towards dialogue (faith & other Christians), fraternities, inclusion, participation and fraternity for a better world. • To value Minority Reports not just as a principle of convergence or majority in the consultation process. • To experience the new way of being church, walking together, the synod way.

What is a more Synodal church?

A Synodal Church is a Church that walks together and is rooted and united in Christ Jesus. The synodal process is no longer only an assembly of Bishops, but a journey for all the faithful in which every local church has an integral part to play. The process of the synod is as equally important as the product of the synod. In our church in Manor Park, we can count ourselves lucky to have been from different parts of the world, where every aspect and reality of being Christian is different, but unity in Christ Jesus is what brought us together. In this synodal process, we will once again put to greater use what we have learnt from the stewardship of the Gospel programme. Only that in this process we are asked to go further and look for the missing sheep, invite them back into the fold and with them have a spiritual introspection of what has happened. We are invited to rest everything with Holy Ghost while we communicate. Communication is not an easy business, but with the Holy Ghost, it is as easy as drinking water, as it is no more us but Him speaking through us. All this cannot happen without prayerfulness. Prayer has been how we communicated with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and that remains the medium available to us. This is why Bishop Alan ask us to pray and discern together and ask for the intervention of Mary, our blessed mother who shall never lead us away from her son Jesus Christ.

Synodality is the form, lifestyle and structure of the church. Pope Francis put it as the pathway of the entire people of God. This includes everybody and excludes none. Those who pray together stay together the saying goes, and prayer is the spiritual glue of unity.

When does the Synodal process start?

This Synod on Synodality began on 9th – 10th October at St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican by Pope Francis, followed a week later by Bishops around the world inaugurating the first phase of the listening process in every church. It is at the diocesan level where the listening takes place. We are all invited to take this to our homes, and also invite friends to ponder with us about our church in the 21st century The basic question prompt that guides us is: How does this “journeying together” which takes place today on different levels (from the local level to the universal one), allow the church to proclaim the Gospel as per the mission entrusted to her, and what steps does the spirit invite us to take to grow as a synodal church. Addressing this question together requires listening to each other with the help of the Holy Spirit, listening gracefully, with our hearts open to others and neighbours. The will to open one's heart and mind to the environment surrounding us is the will to listen to the Holy Spirit who, like the wind “blows where it wills (Jn 3:8)

When will the synod conclude?

The synod will conclude where it all started, at The Vatican in 2023 with the assembly of Bishops around the world in a Synod on Synodality. Bu how does our Diocese of Brentwood carry out its share of the synod process? In line with Vatican guidance, Bishop Alan has appointed two Diocesan Contacts in Fr Andrew Headon and Teresa Carvalho, who will be assisted by a small Synod Team to guide the ‘synodal journey’. Michelle Moran, Anna McCormick, Fr Paschal Uche, Fr Jeff Woolnough and Steve Webb will be members of the Synod Team. It will be tasked with trying to involve as many people as possible across the diocese, especially the young, the marginalised and those without a voice. The duration of the listening process, in which we are all encouraged to participate, will stretch over three months. To begin the listening process the Diocesan Synod Team is keen to recruit liaison contacts in parish partnerships. Subsequent Zoom briefings will enable those individuals or groups of people to then reach out to as many people as possible, especially those on the margins. In addition, Teresa says, one of the key things is to encourage people to connect locally and via social media. Along with an email address ([email protected]), she has set up several platforms to enable people to do this: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Diocese-of-Brentwood-Synod-Journeying-Together-102017775605903 Twitter: https://twitter.com/BrentwoodSynod or @BrentwoodSynod Instagram: @brentwood_synod
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You can support us in our quest to seek God through other; our interaction with other faith groups through The East London Community Organisation (TELCO); our food bank program and other campaigns for the good of society.

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St. Stephen's Presbytery,
146 Little Ilford Lane,
London, E12 5PJ