The Work of St Philip in London

The Oratory Outreach Programme aims to bring to London the work of St Philip Neri, the sixteenth-century founder of the Roman Oratory. When St Philip arrived in Rome in 1534 he soon saw that one way to draw others to follow Christ more closely was by sending them out to assist the needy in Rome. He himself often went out on missions of mercy to help those whom, by Divine guidance, he knew needed aid. By these means and by his preaching, St Philip became known as the Second Apostle of Rome.

 Helping us to help others

By volunteering through the Brompton Oratory you commit to a dual role: giving your time to those in genuine need and doing so as an ‘ambassador’ for your Faith and for the Oratory. This will be a chance to witness to the truth of our Faith by concrete deeds of love. Following St Philip’s lead and after assessing the situation we have established some main areas to concentrate on.

ASSISTANCE FOR THE HOMELESS AND VULNERABLE

The Oratory encourages our parishioners to support many of the charities in our area who run important projects to support people in need, homeless and in vulnerable situation:

If you contact any of the above charities, please mention that you come via the Oratory.

Visiting the elderly at home, in nursing homes & in hospitals

We are working with the RVS to provide this service. If you are interested in this, please email John Aylward, making sure to mention that you come via the Oratory, his email address is: jeaylward@yahoo.co.uk. If you know someone who needs visiting, please email the Oratory’s main email address generalenquiries@bromptonoratory.co.uk with “Elderly Visit Request” in the subject line. Volunteers are also needed to help co-ordinate/arrange possible hospital and nursing home visits. If you would like to investigate this, please also email John Aylward.

Mentoring those in need

The Oratory will work with the XLP (XLP stands for ‘The eXceL Project’) Charity. If you are interested in helping create positive futures for young people growing up on inner-city estates in London, struggling daily with issues such as family breakdown, unemployment, and educational failure. You can more details on how to volunteer at www.xlp.org.uk/volunteer.html. If you email, please make sure to mention that you come via the Oratory.

Visiting prisoners and potential post-release mentoring

We are looking for volunteers to help at Wandsworth Prison, supporting the Catholic chaplaincy. It would involve a pretty regular commitment helping to supervise the weekly Mass and working directly with prisoners. Volunteers would need a certain robustness of character in unfamiliar environments. If interested, please contact Dominic Sullivan at dsullivan@los.ac. There may also be the possibility to set up post-prison mentoring.

General and occasional assistance for those in need

A small team assist the Fathers in this work, dealing with the homeless and other who coming seeking support. If you are interested in helping with this, please email generalenquiries@bromptonoratory.co.uk with the subject “Outreach Assisstance”.

Occasional help

If you would like to volunteer to help for our Christmas Lunch on Christmas Day for elderly and lonely (emails monitored September to December), please email svpxmaslunch@gmail.com.

Summer Fête (Saturday nearest to 24th June – emails monitored only April to June): please email: oratorysummerparty@gmail.com if you would like to help or donate.

Wilfrid’s House

This Charity was set up in 2015 with the support of the Oratory fathers but separate from the Oratory.  Wilfrid's House is a BACP-accredited, registered charity committed to helping people cope with life’s challenges. On offer is a low cost 1:1 psychotherapy and life coaching for adults. Work is also done in schools, universities and other organisations (https://wilfridshouse.org/).

Helping the Needy in Our Area

The Oratory supported the Companions of the Order of Malta throughout the pandemic. In partnership with Westminster City Council, the Companions, using St Joseph’s Hall as their base of operations, distributed 50,000 items of clothing, toiletries and light entertainment (books, etc.) to the rehoused homeless. Through this process, we have learnt a lot about how we can best contribute to helping the homeless. While it may appear easiest to give money directly to needy individuals, the advice of our charity partners is that it is better to support organisations dedicated to assisting them. Sadly, money given directly is often misspent and can do more harm than good. We appreciate your great generosity and your desire to support those in need, which was exemplified in the life of our founder, St Philip Neri. But we invite you to consider making your kind contributions - whether of time or money - through the following routes, by which they can be most effectively deployed.

Some ways you can help:

Crosslight Advice (Debt)

In these difficult days, being in debt can become a serious problem with few job prospects around and businesses failing. If you need help, the Oratory Outreach Group is happy to promote Crosslight. But Crosslight also needs help and is actively recruiting volunteers. As this is a charitable endeavour, meetings can still happen but precautions are taken to protect both volunteer and client against the coronavirus.

What will they require if you volunteer? Here is what their website says:

We would love to talk to you whatever level of commitment you are able to give, but most of our roles start with a minimum commitment of 3 hours a fortnight, rising to half a day a week for a Case Manager.

Above all, our volunteers need a real heart for the poor and vulnerable among other qualities. We also ask all volunteers to sign an agreement with us and provide two personal references.

The first thing is to get in touch. We will invite you to meet our team to discuss your involvement and you can even sit in on an appointment if you would like to help please look here on the website https://www.crosslightadvice.org/volunteer


The Oratory, Brompton Road, London, SW7 2RP – Registered Charity: 240702
The nearest Tube Stations are South Kensington and Knightsbridge

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Love Your Neighbour

The Oratory is working together with this HTB campaign. Volunteers are needed to deliver prescriptions from chemists for those who are in isolation. Occasional volunteers are also required (especially those who are young and fit) to help with the making-up of parcels from a local foodbank and for delivering them to those in need. If you can help, please contact the Charity (telling them that you come via the Oratory) through www.htb.org/loveyourneighbour.

Christmas Hampers

Christmas Hampers

On Wednesday 16th December 16 volunteers from the Oratory gathered to pack hampers for the elderly guests who normally come to St Joseph’s Hall for Christmas lunch. Because of current government restrictions, we were unable to host our usual event on Christmas Day. Instead the volunteers packed up 75 hampers, which were then hand-delivered to our usual guests and to several other parishioners. The hampers included gifts to ensure our guests had a little cheer on Christmas Day, comprising a photograph frame, a candle from the Oratory, soap, hot chocolate with marshmallows, mince pies, homemade face masks, mugs and handwritten Christmas cards.


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The Oratory, Brompton Road, London, SW7 2RP – Registered Charity: 240702
The nearest Tube Stations are South Kensington and Knightsbridge

Privacy and Cookies