Welcome to the website of St Joseph and the English Martyrs. Our church is situated in the Hertfordshire Market town of Bishop's Stortford and is part of the Diocese of Westminster.


Priest : Canon Edward Matthews

Parish Office:
Open 10.00am - 3.00pm Weekdays



Email Address: bishopsstortford@rcdow.org.uk

Parking arrangements (pdf)

Canon Eddie's Letter - Our weekly contributions(pdf).
Pledge Form(pdf).
Download Notes from meeting to set up fundraising committee for the new parish centre (pdf).
Results of Parish Liturgy Audit 2008
Information about the Parish Pastoral Council
Download the Parish Pastoral Council Constitution (pdf).
Saint of the Day
Today's Readings
Daily Prayer
Vocations information page

FAMILY HOG ROAST: Sunday, 12th July, 12.30-4.30pm.Please try and buy your tickets this weekend (£8.00/Children under 12 £4.OO - available after all masses) so that numbers can be finalised for the catering. Any donations of salad/desserts welcome on the day. Do please support this event in aid of the new Parish Centre Fund. THE SUN WILL SHINE!!

Diary Date –‘JCSS’ Concert in aid of the new Parish Centre on Saturday 25 July after the evening Mass –tickets available from next weekend.

PARISH YOUNG ADULTS PLEASE NOTE - Bright Lights The KSC (contact 653713) will sponsor up to 4 people that wish to attend the Diocesan Young Adults Festival for 16/30 year olds, which takes place at St Joseph's Pastoral Centre, Hendon, Fri 10/12 July. See Postcards in the information area for more details, or brightlights.org.uk

The Passage. Please support the excellent work The Passage does for homeless people in Central London, by attending the annual Garden Party in the beautiful and historic College Garden, Westminster Abbey, Wednesday 22 July, 5.30-8.30 pm. Tickets £25 each, available. Tel: 0207 592 1856. Email:tickets@passage.org.uk Full detailswww.passage.org.uk

Bishops Stortford Money Advice Service – BSMAS, run by a group of Churches in B/S, offers help and advice to people with money management or debt problems. Details in porch, cards in information area.

4. Gathering with Christ - and the priest

Last time (and it seems so long ago - I apologise) we reminded ourselves that when the parish community comes together to worship, Christ is really present in the community and that this presence is as real as in the consecrated bread and wine. That's not all. He is also present in the presiding priest, for this is what the Church teaches in the Second Vatican Council (Constitution on the Liturgy, 7): 'To accomplish so great a work Christ is always present in his Church, especially in her liturgical celebrations. He is present in the Sacrifice of the Mass not only in the person of the minister, "the same now offering, through the ministry of priests, who formerly offered himself on the cross" [Council of Trent], but especially in the Eucharistic species. By his power he is present in the sacraments so that when anybody baptises it is really Christ himself who baptises'.

Just as well that is so, because if the sacraments depended for their effectiveness on the presiding minister, priest or deacon (a deacon can baptise and preside at marriages), they wouldn't be sacraments as we understand them. They must be the action of Christ, otherwise they would not work.

For me, that is a great consolation because I sometimes say to myself, ‘Who am I that all these people should depend on me for leading their worship?' The answer is it's not me, it's Jesus Christ. Baptising a baby, absolving a penitent from his or her sins, or consecrating bread and wine, is me doing the actions and saying the words but Christ working his power through me. I am all too aware of my distractedness, my lack of effort, and all my other faults and foibles which get in the way of the community's worship; yet it is Christ who for some reason uses me as his minister.

Before each celebration of the Mass I pray a little prayer which goes something like this, "Dear Lord, help me to help these people worship you". I like to think that, ideally, people will go away from Sunday Mass, not thinking about the priest's 'performance', but about how they experienced a true encounter with their Saviour, Jesus Christ.

I use the word 'priest' of the one who presides at Mass, but that is not strictly correct because it appears to assume that there is only one priest - the ordained minister. The full truth is that all baptised people share in the priesthood of Jesus Christ; indeed, that is how the entire People of God is empowered to offer full and proper worship to the Father. The ordained priest's job is to enable or activate the baptismal priesthood of everybody else, to lead them in the exercise of their priesthood. His ministry is truly one of service.

In some parts of the world the title 'presbyter' (= elder) is increasingly used of the ordained minister. It has good scriptural pedigree as well as being more accurate.

The Church in this country, like so many others in Europe, is facing a down-turn in the number of ordained priests. Not so far from Bishop’s Stortford, East Anglia has had to amalgamate many parishes under a single priest. Our diocese of Westminster does not yet have as great a problem, but with a high average age of currently active priests real shortages are not far away in the future. All of us, laity and clergy, families and schools, must do our utmost to promote in young men the consideration of a life in the ministerial priesthood. After all, the sufficient supply of priests guarantees the future of our liturgy.