Father had a great love for the poor and marginalised and called them his Anawim. His vision was to provide a spiritual support network that would assist the spiritually oppressed and those heavily burdened from the effects of abusive life experiences. Through the anointing of the Holy Spirit he came to a deeper awareness of God’s love for his poor and the spiritual gifts waiting to be fanned into life to help them.
As a Parish Priest in the Lismore Diocese he spent six years as a missionary in Papua New Guinea and then returned home to experience the love and healing power of the Holy Spirit.
He became actively involved in the prayer ministry of Inner Healing and intercession with Valerie. With Chris Housego he Co – founded the Beginnings Experience Movement for the separated, divorced and widowed in the Lismore Diocese. He was also appointed as a Chaplain to the Charismatic Renewal, Kairos Prison Ministry, Marriage Encounter, Cursillo and Natural Family Planning.
His greatest delight was to see Mary of the Angelus Association canonically approved and his writings and teachings became the foundational base for the Angelus way of prayer.
Father Vince died from a fall and the legacy he left to us was Love.
To Love God – to love yourself – to love others with the power and love of God’s Holy Spirit.
Chris had a special interest for the accommodation needs of the marginalised and those suffering the effects of abuse. Married to Valerie they opened their home in Coffs Harbour in 1979 to provide a haven for those seeking healing in body soul and spirit. In 1982 they relocated to a farm at Kungula near Grafton and opened the first Angelus Anawim House.
Moriah Christian Community was formed with people coming to stay for a period of months staying in the two farm houses and eight caravans. He fully supported Father Doyle’s Anawim vision to provide a safe and spiritual support network for God’s poor.
With Father Doyle he also co-foundered the Beginnings Experience (A healing program for the widows, divorced and separated) in the Diocese of Lismore.
In the early days of Mary of the Angelus Association before we were inaugurated in 1996 Valerie , her previous husband Chris Housego and Father Vincent Doyle opened the first Angelus/Anawim House. Nineteen people lived in Moriah Community on a rural property near Grafton.
Father Beccs would visit and stay in this community for his annual holidays. He developed a rapport with many of the residents and many came back to practising their faith through his prayers and outreach.
Father Paul was a retired Jesuit priest in North Sydney. He was originally appointed by Rome in 1966 to be the Australian Chaplain for over 100,000 migrants who came to build the Snowy Mountains Hydro Electricity Scheme. Being of Latvian descent and fluent in many languages he was able to communicate with the thirty nationalities that emigrated.
He met Valerie and Father Doyle at a Teaching Seminar in Sydney and asked to visit Moriah Community. He was delighted to witness prayer in action and became an important part of our team.
Skype didn’t exist in those day but each week he participated in our Angelus Intercessory prayer group via the telephone. The focus being for the concerns and policies of this nation towards immigration.
The one desire of his heart was to return to his native country but that was not safe nor possible in the early 80’s. At the age of sixteen years of age he was smuggled out of Lativia to join the Jesuits in Rome. He was never to see his family again. The only prayers he asked us to pray for was for a typewriter so he could write a newsletter about migration issues. We advertised in our newsletter and someone responded to this request.
He also asked Valerie to take him in spirit to his village in Latvia and visit the church where he was baptised and to ask the Priest to offer a Mass of thanksgiving for his vocation. Valerie did do this in 2000 but was unable to organise this as the Church was closed.
Valerie was able to visit the concentration camp outside of Riga where his mother, father brothers and sisters died and are buried there. Hundreds of thousands of inmates were buried in long trenches covered with stones from the local quarry. Only a niece survived the horror of imprisonment as she was sent to Siberia instead.
When Father Beccs died, he had left instructions for the Jesuits to contact Valerie and she was given the honour to lead the Rosary at his prayer vigil in North Sydney.
He was a great man of prayer and his heart embraced Gods poor in the refuges, the migrants and those who had nowhere they could call home.
He was a former Pathway Pilot in the Second World War flying missions over Germany to bomb military targets. As a foundational member of the Murwillumbah Prayer Group he embraced the Angelus vision for the prayer ministry of intercession in the 1980’s.
In the early formation days for intercessory prayer groups he was inspired by the Holy Spirit to draw a diagram correlating the Angelus Prayer Mission for Intercession as a military operation for spiritual warfare.
Members were being blessed by the Holy Spirit’s prayer gifts to sabotage and overcome the devil’s strongholds. God was raising up an Army of effective prayer soldiers for Mary to bring the Good News to the Poor and to set free the spiritually oppressed.
Bob was a gentle man with an incredible willingness to help those in need. He fully devoted his life to God and to minister to those within the Murwillumbah Parish.
Greg was a former resident of Moriah Angelus Community at Kungula near Grafton in the 1980’s. This was before the Angelus Community was formally inaugurated into the Lismore Diocese. Greg returned to live at Angelus House Lismore in 1998 when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer. A quiet man and former engineer he became disoriented and homeless after the breakdown of his marriage. At Angelus House he became very active and involved within the community and loved to partake in the prayer groups.
He mentioned how the members at Moriah Community in 1980’s would pray the Rosary and each night offer a decade of the Rosary for those who were homeless and dying with no one to care for them. This had a great impact on him that people would pray for the living and the deceased. After a few months he moved on to live in North Queensland and became a resident and helper for the Uniting Church House for the Homeless in Proserpine Queensland.
Ten years later he was faced with his own mortality with a terminal diagnosis of sun cancer. He chose to not undergo chemotherapy and hitchhiked all the way to Lismore to ask if we could look after him. He simply asked that he wanted his life to have a purpose and a meaning and to pray for all those homeless in similar circumstances as himself. Could he stay with us as he desired to be cared and surrounded by those who believe in God’s love, forgiveness and mercy.
This man gave witness to us all through his patience acceptance and gratitude of God’s love in the final year of his life. We prayed each day together and other Angelus members would take him out for a drive or a cup of coffee. Watching him die made me realise that it’s not the great things we do in life that define us but how we embrace dying and the acceptance of God’s love. He asked Father Doyle in the last week of his life to be baptised and to be buried as a Catholic. He is buried in the Maclean Cemetery in N.S.W.
Bill and his wife Cheryl became consecrated members at Bryon Bay. They were actively involved in Angelus Teaching Days, Prayer Groups and the School of Evangelisation. Bill was full of enthusiasm to bring the love of Jesus to everyone. He had a lawn mowing business which gave him a tremendous opportunity to witness about Jesus to everyone he met.
Bill’s smile and enthusiasm of life for Jesus, kindness and generosity reflected the virtues of St. Joseph.
A former priest of the Lismore Diocese, he became an Angelus Member while in Retirement in Port Macquarie. Through his contact with Father Doyle he became an enthusiastic Prayer Supporter for the aims and the objectives of the Angelus Association.
He offered his Daily Masses at the Retirement Villa for Father Doyle’s Vision to initiate a spiritual support network for the marginalised and Anawim.
He recognised how the spiritually burdened are unable to change their life’s circumstances without seeking God’s help.
Small in stature but with an enormous heart Sister Margaret embraced all the poor and marginalised of Lismore. As a former Nurse and Social Worker she became our role model on how to love and care of God’s Anawim. A tireless support worker at the Lismore Soup Kitchen. Each day she began early in the morning greeting those who slept rough on the riverbank with a cup of tea and biscuits. She would invite Valerie and sometimes Father Doyle to go with her on these early morning rounds.
The desire of her heart was to provide shelter for the homeless and she never gave up praying for this to happen. Each Wednesday at the Angelus Intercessory Prayer group she would attend and ask the group to pray specifically for her Anawim.
Her sudden death from an aggressive cancer gave birth to her belief and hope in the promises of Christ. Ridley and Mieke Bell, private benefactors of the Lismore Soup Kitchen felt moved by the Spirit to purchase a house for the homeless and named it The Margaret Mazzer House.
In addition to this house they also purchased the Winsome Hotel to accommodate nineteen homeless men. The Soup Kitchen facilities are now housed in the Hotel and provides meals for approximately seventy people a day. The hotel is staffed by volunteers. Paul Murphy (Valerie’s husband) has now retired as the Centre Manager.
A former classmate of Father Doyle’s in the Seminary and a retired priest from Griffith. He was fondly known by the Management Committee as Father Computer. He provided the first computers for the Association to publish a Newsletter and the compiling of Teaching Resources for Angelus groups.
Father John had a great devotion to the Blessed Sacrament and was instrumental in bringing out The Adoration Sisters from Kerala India to his Parish. When they returned to India they stayed at Angelus House in Lismore and offered continued prayer support by their Mother House for the Angelus vision.
With Father Doyle, Peter Breen and Valerie they launched the first Angelus Web Site. Father John managed this site, donated the computers and compiled the first Angelus teaching resource books. He died suddenly from a heart attack but didn’t forget us. Within a week he was busy in heaven organising the angels to prompt Anthony Whitten to join the Angelus Web Team who is still our present Technical Advisor
A former Opes Dei Priest from Maryland U.S.A who made contact with Valerie through Skype. He visited Australia twice to grow in understanding and knowledge about the Angelus way of prayer.
One of his trips included a six week prayer safari with Father Doyle, Valerie and Paul visiting Angelus groups in regional areas in Australia. Masses were celebrated at many Aboriginal massacre sites for the healing and reconciliation of this nation.
This image captures Father Steve invoking God’s blessings for the Angelus Association overlooking the Garden of Eden in the Olgas. He embraced this sacred place of the Aborigines as the spiritual heart and soul of Australia.
He was appointed to Louisiana on his return to America and invited Angelus members to present a Retreat in his Parish. Members also visited and prayed at many sites where slavery conditions of extreme cruelty and brutality occurred.
Father Steve enthusiastically embraced the Angelus way of prayer and wanted to initiate intercessory prayer groups throughout America. He applied and was appointed to the Lismore Cathedral Parish so he could receive further mentoring from Father Doyle. Unfortunately he was killed after eighteen months into this appointment with another priest in a car accident. They were returning to Lismore from an Easter Chrism Mass held at Coffs Harbour in Australia.
Alan has a long history with the Angelus being a visitor to Moriah Community in the 1980’s. He promoted the Angelus way of prayer tirelessly after a conversion through Father Doyle’s prayer ministry. He was a husband, father of two boys and a Nurse. A man of great zeal that loved sharing his faith about a Jesus who loves you as you are.
As an Administrator of a Nursing Home he implemented many programs to enrich the lives of the residents. He also had a social vision for the poor and marginalised by sponsoring local aboriginal youth in Surfing Schools and other sporting activities.
With other Angelus members they applied for government grants to build a sports Stadium at the Yamba Aboriginal Mission.
Alan was a great intercessor and stoically faced his death with a strong and unwavering faith. He embraced each stage of his brain tumour believing Jesus was blessing many others through his illness. He desired Jesus’ mercy rays to flow out to all those who self-abuse or abuse others.
I regularly pray for Alan’s intercession for those who self-harm or are abusive to others.
Christine initiated the first Angelus Outreach Group. In 1996 she began to promote the Angelus way of prayer in Bathurst and regional towns throughout western New South Wales.
As a wife and mother of six children she actively engaged in the wider community as a nurse and then as a nurse and compassionate friend in the prison ministry. Her love for those rejected by society remains a living testimony to us and the Angelus prayer mission. Her stories would hold you spellbound about the healing power of God’s love for his poor.
Christine’s three Angelus Prayer groups supported her in intercessory prayer via the telephone for her prison ministry. She also accompanied Valerie on some trips in regional Australia and to the U.S.A. Generous of heart and spirit she left us a legacy of commitment and zeal to pray for the unlovable and to set the downtrodden free.
So young and so beautiful of heart, this extraordinary mother of six children and grandmother died in her sleep in her early fifties.
With no warning the angels of heaven visited her house one night and she was found by one of her daughters the following morning.
An active member of the Angelus Casino group
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