Cardinal Pell presides at ordination

BROTHER BRIAN KELLY, a Benedictine monk of the Abbey of Our Lady of Quarr, was ordained to the priesthood by Cardinal George Pell, Archbishop of Sydney, on January 25, the Feast of the Conversion of St Paul, writes Peter Jennings.
Fr Brian, aged 49, from Limerick in Ireland, joined the community at Quarr Abbey in September 2000. In his homily during the ceremony in the Abbey Church the Australian cardinal said: "Britain is not as post-Christian as our opponents would like to claim as they strive to bar us from participating in public discussion.
"But," Cardinal Pell continued, "the decisions to follow the rule of St Bene
dict as a monk and accept priestly ordination are now counter-cultural, a provocation to many of today's opinion-makers.
"And a ceremony like today's ordination gives all of us reason to praise and thank God for the gift of our faith, for the monastic life, and the ministerial priesthood.
Cardinal Pell added: "St Paul and St Benedict make up an interesting pair of saints, demonstrating again that the word Catholic means universal. Paul's epistles and Benedict's rule reveal two very different personalities, who both dedicated their diverse talents to the service of the one true God and Christ His only Son."
Cardinal Pell concluded: "I am grateful for the invitation of Abbot Cuthbert. because it enables me, as Archbishop of Sydney, to acknowledge the debt of the Catholic Church in Australia to the English Benedictines who provided the first archbishops of Sydney. They came to us not from Quarr but from Downside, with a largely Irish flock and the harsh penal conditions in that distant colony." .
Fr Brian's brother Paul and sister Angela, who lives in New Zealand, together with other family members and priest friends, were in the Abbey church.
He said: "I am very happy to be a contemplative monk and priest at Quarr Abbey."
Cardinal Pell flew to Canada before returning home to Australia.