One of the important features of the faith is the conviction that we are not alone: the Church is one body and contained within it are all those who have departed this life. I know how important it is for many people in the parish that they remember and honour family members who have died; one only has to look at the newsletter to see the many Masses said for the departed.

November is quickly approaching - the month in particular when we commemorate the Holy Souls - and if anyone would like to add their loved ones to the calendar please contact me including the name and dates of the person to be included.

Everyone's welcomeThere are a number of features of the website that our talented designer, Marco Pozzi, has introduced to make the site easier to use, particularly for those with disabilities. If the text size is too small, then click the 'Resize Font' feature on the left-hand side of the page to make the letters bigger. If you are using a small monitor, then scroll down and on the right-hand side of the page you'll find the 'Template Chooser': select 'Narrow'. And finally, the website also conforms to priority levels 1 and 2 for accessibility.

We hope these features mean that everyone will be able to use the website, now and in the future.

The original planFr Joseph Sunn founded the parish of Our Lady of Lourdes 85 years ago and served as its priest for 30 years, only retiring in 1953.  But the church he originally envisaged was a little different from the one we worship in today.

The grave - beforeFr Joseph Sunn, the founder of the parish of Our Lady of Lourdes, is buried in Waterfall Road cemetery. He died in 1953 and was buried in the same site as his mother, Mary Sunn. However, as you can see from the photograph, the gravestone had deteriorated over the years. So the Parish Council decided to see what we could do to renovate it.

Now, it so happens that my friendly Australian brother-in-law is a stone mason and he agreed to take a look and see what he could do. A couple of hours and some very vigorous scrubbing, scraping, chiselling and general cleaning later, produced something of a transformation.