Jesuit Retreat House Celebrates Silver Jubilee

By a Staff Reporter " Catholic laymen are called upon to-day to lead heroic lives in a world of scepticism, cynicism, and listless apathy," declared Fr. Peter Blake, S.J., presiding at a lively retreat promoters' conference, representative of four dioceses, in Loyola Hall, Rainhill, last week-end.
The occasion marked the Silver Jubilee year of the Northern Retreat House, and Fr. Blake's first promoters' conference since being appointed Superior of the Hall.
" complacent " and " hardboiled " type of Catholic.
Fr. Blake, who was something of a statistician in the R.A.F. (he rated Glasgow lads and lassies the best Catholics in the Service), explained that according to a rough calculation he had made. only one man in a hundred from the dioceses of Liverpool, Salford, Lancaster, and Shrewsbury made a retreat last year.
" How many men in your street do anything about God," asked Fr. Blake. "For many, Sunday observance is the News of the World, a packet of Woodbines, and a cup of tea in bed. What enthusiasm for the cause of Christ " Of the Catholics who scramble into eleven o'clock Mass, Fr. Blake said the majority had "not a glimmer " of understanding about the Mass. More Catholic lay leaders must be trained. The lay man had a positive obligation from Christ to work for the salvation of the soul of his neighbour, as well as his own.
Week-end retreats at Loyola Hall, in 1947, numbered 42, with a total attendance of 2,012 men.